The 4th of the 6 Orpheum shows. We are lucky to have a good AUD for the 1st set (the Orpheum had good acoustics), plus more than half is on
Dave's 18. The second set is a SBD. The show is a little better than the nights before and after.
First Set. Some idiot yells for "Walk in the Sunshine". Imagine how bad it would have been if they played something they had never tried before, that had no live arrangement, and that not all the players knew.
Cold Rain & Snow has a slow groove, mellowed down (get used to it – the whole show is way relaxed), but is sweet & well played; and one of the longest. The intricate
Cassidy is chocolate cake for breakfast.
Deal is fine, and
Mama Tried is rather mellow, yet strong. The slow relaxing removes all sparks from
Row Jimmy, but
Big River is given 220 volts by Jer as he extends the second solo. Even if not one of the year's best, Jer plays it differently on this night and it astonishes. By
Brown Eyed Women, now he's just roaring. A very beautiful BEW. Both Keith & Jer add the extras to a gustatory
Looks Like Rain. Peggy-O is a big, double-solo version. In this immediate era there are so many great versions of
Music Never Stopped; 6/12, 6/14, & 6/22 are all melodically superior, and 6/29 just might be the best ever. Still, this one stands among them. They go out of the set with a very good
Scarlet that has a bit of everything
: Donna, percussion, Bobby rhythm, Phil. The OFF mix is iffy, with Jer's guitar louder than the rest of the band combined. You can hear Bobby's guitar better on the AUD [and throughout the set], where Phil is also more prominent. A MTX would be nice for this set.
Second Set.
Playing has sections uniquely played by Jer, if not intentionally. The Playing jam winds down after 7mins and Phil tries a couple times to grab it. At 8½mins he hits a riff and Jer bites. Tapes used to mistakenly list the jam as "Stronger than Dirt", because they had it confused with King Solomon's Marbles. It's neither; it's a unique Playing jam. [StDoMtT is a Mickey/Billy drum riff, of which only 12secs was used on
Blues for Allah, before going back into KSM. They listed it on the LP so Mickey & Billy could receive writing credits, appending "Milkin' the Turkey" for copyright reasons. You can hear it
here, @1:49]. It keeps morphing, twisting in Samsara. They let it fall way down, before Jer suddenly starts a Cosmic Charlie, and they are all with him. There are better Playings this summer, but this a must-hear-once. The OFF has a poor mix, starting with mostly just Jer's guitar & Bobby vox, but the verse section was mixed poorly even FOH. Much of the show is laid back, but
Cosmic Charlie is a mellow idler to the point of bathetic. We get well past that with a
Samson that has a wild first half (the main section). Seems they were trying to resolve back to Playing, before bumping into
Spanish Jam. Either way, much of this section looks better on paper. The OFF cuts off Samson's first half, including only the jam. The latter gets so quiet that they essentially stop, and most of it is everyone waiting on each other rather than actual jamming. After nearly 4mins, Bobby hits on the Spanish theme – the only one in '76. The next is in '81! MHO [the OFF has an anomaly @6:24].
The Wheel is not the tightest or punchiest, but it goes into a unique Wheel jam on the way back to
Playing. Around is too slow/mellow. It's like a '74, but then the speed-up section gets good.
High Time is one of the longest versions and is above average. It's usually Bobby that does the Happy Birthday jokes, but here it's Phil teasing Graham. I kind of like Jer's tone and emphatic snarls on this
Sugar Mag, but he also almost trainwrecks the jam a few times. He then approaches
U.S. Blues differently, starting at the solo, then adding fills. It's great, though as mellow as the rest.
1st Set: A-
2nd Set: C+
Overall = 4 stars
Highlights:
Cold Rain & Snow – mellow, sweet
Cassidy – intricate
Mama Tried – mellow but strong
Big River – astonishes
Brown Eyed Women – roaring beauty (in a mellow way)
Looks Like Rain – listen for Keith/Jer
The Music Never Stopped – stands with other '76s
Scarlet Begonias – bit of everything
U.S. Blues – very mellow, different approach
SOURCES: The ashley-bertha_8666 is colored heavily with EQ, but casually sounds good. The 123477_ecm270_menke is the most accurate transfer of the 1st set. These sources are a tad slow through Row Jimmy and
need +1% pitch correction. The set1aud-set2sbd_miller_23569 is the best source for the second set, and it has been patched & repitched, except U.S. Blues
needs +1% pitch, as does the patch in Samson [4:36>6:08].
Dave's 18 has six from the first set, and eight from the second set [including the Playing jam and Cosmic Charlie faded into the Samson/Spanish jam].