Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Triumvirat - 1974-10-12 - Providence, RI


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3 comments:

Dr. Forrester said...

Triumvirat
Palace Theatre
Providence, RI
12 October 1974

Master audience recording taped by Dan Lampinski

01 Illusions on a Double Dimple

- Flashback
- Schooldays
- Triangle
- Illusions
- Dimplicity
- Last Dance

02 Mister Ten Percent (spliced)

- Maze
- Dawning
- Bad Deal
- Roundabout
- Lucky Girl
- Million Dollars

Personnel:
Jürgen Fritz: piano, synthesizers
Helmut Köllen: bass, acoustic guitars, vocals
Hans Bathelt: drums and percussion

A review of the album they were touring when they played this gig:

"Triumvirat is EL&P German Counterpart"

The Hartford (Connecticut) Courant

July 28, 1974

ILLUSIONS ON A DOUBLE DIMPLE

by Triumvirat (Harvest Records)

International comparisons are always tedious and generally wrong. Remember when Donovan was called "The British Bob Dylan"? And is Johnny Halliday really the "French Elvis Presley"?

In some cases, though, the comparisons are so obvious- and so exact- that they must be made. Such is the case with Triumvirat; they are the German Emerson Lake and Palmer.

Jürgen Fritz, Triumvirat's synthesizer player, is the master of several keyboard instruments, as is EL&P's Keith Emerson. Both have extensive classical music training, inevitably reflected in their groups' music. Hans Bathelt, Triumvirat's percussionist, is a strong, sure-footed drummer, as is ELP's Carl Palmer. And Helmut Köllen, Triumvirat's guitarist, provides a competent rhythm track and sings, as does ELP's Greg Lake.

"Illusions On A Double Dimple" Triumvirat's first U.S. release, bears a strong resemblance to ELP's second album, "Tarkus". Both consist of extended suites, highlighted by exciting synthesizer sequences and occasional vocal passages. Triumvirat's "Last Dance" on the LP is cast from the same mold as ELP's "Mass", with bits of their "Jeremy Bender" thrown in for good measure.

There is the same halting rhythm, the explosions of synthesizer lunacy matched beat-for beat by the drums and the fervent bass track. But beyond that, there is the same strange mixture of honky-tonk and jazz-rock. It's enough to suspect that Triumvirat is really ELP in disguise (hmmm...surely there's no trace of German accent in the vocal passages...could it be?)

Still, there are differences, chiefly Triumvirat's skillful use of the Cologne Opera House Orchestra as a backing band. And in any case, there's no cause for Triumvirat to avoid comparisons. Any groups that can so successfully reproduce a top-notch jazz-rock sound like ELP is in good company indeed.

Especially pleasing is "Million Dollars", the final movement of the groups' "Mister Ten Percent" suite (apparently dedicated to a recently fired manager) in which all Triumvirat's talents are released in one electronic deluge. An especially Tarkus-like opening dissolves into a huge orchestral and vocal rush as Triumvirat bids farewell to their agent; "Who's going to work for you for the rest of your life?"



Opening for Fleetwood Mac



unknown model dictation style Tape Recorder
External Mono Microphone
Scotch cassettes


Mastered and FLAC'ed by Carl Morstadt (dantalion8@yahoo.com)

Master Cassette ->
Nakamichi CR-3A cassette deck with azimuth correction ->
M-Audio Firewire Audiophile 2496 ->
CDWAV 24-bit/96-KHz wav files ->
Goldwave (normalizing and crossfades) ->
CDWAV (track breaks) ->
dBpowerAMP Audio Converter (24-bit/96-KHz wav files converted to
16-bit/44.1 KHz wav files) ->
FLAC Front End (FLAC 8 with sector boundary alignment)
FLAC files tagged with Foobar2000 Live Show Tagger

No EQ'ing.

September 27, 2011 at 4:11 PM
MisterManiac said...

Holy sh*t!!! Live T.Rat?!! This is awesome! I have the 74/75 boot, but not the entirety of Illusions in concert...truly rare and unbelievable! Too bad there isn't more of this band live. Definitely look forward to hearing this. A million thanks!

October 3, 2011 at 10:41 AM
Anonymous said...

You are most definitely my new music hero by posting Triumvirat !!!

December 21, 2011 at 9:43 PM

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