Thursday, January 13, 2011

Jean-Luc Ponty - 1977-10-07 - Boston, Mass (early show)

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1 comment:

Dr. Forrester said...

Jean-Luc Ponty- violin
Allan Zevod- keyboards
Jamie Glaser- guitar
Daryl Steurmer- guitar
Ralph Armstrong- bass
Steve Smith- drums
Berklee Performance Center,
Boston, Mass. U.S.A.
October 7, 1977 (First show)
Performance quality: B+ to A-
Recording quality: B to B+ (depends on your standard.
I think this came out well and it is consistent sound.)
source: master audience tape
runtime: 70:27
lineage: Realistic stereo mike >
JVC KD-2 cassette deck (dolby off) >
TDK-SA cassette > soundforge 4.5 > FLAC > torrent.
setlist:
1: tarantula
2: mirage
3: overture and the trans love express
4: wandering on the milky way (Ponty solo)
5: the gardens of babylon
6: band introductions
7: the struggle of the turtle to the sea (spliced)
8: encore break (applause)
9: encore: new country
comments:
This is the whole 1st show (minus a few seconds for 1 tape flip)
of Jean-Luc Ponty's Enigmatic Ocean tour stop in Boston at the
acoustically delightful Berklee Performance Center. I wasn't real
close for this one, I'd guess it's about 30 rows back, the only time
I recall seeing Ponty with 2 guitar players. This was my second Ponty
master recording, but the 1st is on reel from master. This is direct
from the master cassette, it's been circulated a little on tape but
not alot, and I've given it a torrent-audie-file-equivalent of TLC
(IMHO)- ICPVR (individual clap peak volume reduction) and removed/reduced
some mike bumps between songs so it sounds better than ever now. At the time
I remember thinking Enigmatic Ocean was not quite as good an album, and
the band is not quite as good as on the 1st 3 albums by various Jean Luc
Ponty bands: Upon the Wings of Music, Aurora, and Imaginary Voyage, which
I think are much better music than most of what would follow. But there's
nothing shabby about this show either. I just happen to think the other
2 I saw and recorded were a little better shows, and the 1st Ponty show
I saw and later got in tape trade (Berklee 1976) was a five-star stellar
concert, one of my alltime 10 hottest shows seen. I've started listening
to this more now that it's remastered and on disc. When I say this is not
as good a band as previous JLP band, I don't mean they're not good. They
are quite good too. I like Norm Know No Fear Fearrington on the drums for
Ponty concerts best of all. He was almost Cobhamesque. Steve Smith took
over sometime on the Imaginary Voyage tour and this was my second time seeing
him. Ralph Armstrong always sounds strong when I've seen him, here too.
He does some good stuff in the struggle of the turtle. Daryl Steurmer is
the most regular mainstay of Ponty band, and seems comfortable with that.
As much as I like some of his playing in Genesis, I like him alot better
with Ponty's bands. I just wish with all the great songs he has in these
bands, why oh why every time, new country encore when we could have a Polyfolk
Dance or a fight for life? That's getting real old with me, but Tarantula and
Gardens, that's prime Ponty to me. Steve Smith is good drummer, but I suspect
he cannot or will not try to play any of that other stuff of 1st 2 records.
He did do well, I thought with both the Imag. Voyage in the summer and the
followup to that, which is this tour. An underrated Ponty tour, I think,
haven't seen much Ponty on DIME, so here it is. A you're almost there
production from your buddy, glasnostrd19.

January 13, 2011 at 2:47 PM

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