Sunday, December 11, 2011

FROM 1984 STRAIGHT TO 1990

With Christmas approaching, the time has come to get serious about preparing for the holiday.  The focus this weekend was getting the hand printed Christmas cards ready for mailing early next week: writing, trimming and creating custom envelopes.  I also began the process of designing the next block print which I hope to commence carving next weekend.  These tend to be bigger and often better than the Christmas print.


This Friday night I was in the mood for old favorites, wanting a couple from 1984 when these two bands were in their prime.  First up was Public Image Limited doing a live show at the Pier Hotel in Melbourne, Australia on December 20, 1984.  Johnny complains again about the spitting.  After yet another encore, the band returns to the stage to close the show with a fast and loud rendition of the Sex Pistol's "Anarchy in the UK."  A very good audience recording.

So filled with anger
Fearful of all the changes
Their lost white power

Uncompromising
The righteous firmly believe
Taking us all down


Download it here, a gift from Pilhead:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=YYYDEO7V


What followed next was Echo and The Bunnymen performing in New Orleans on the SS President Riverboat on August 28, 1984, a very good to excellent audience recording of this show in a most unusual location.






Download it here, a gift from Steve:
http://www.fileserve.com/file/mXf5WdC/EATB280884.zip


A couple weeks ago I heard a story on National Public Radio, an interview with Fugazi frontman Ian MacKaye. "Joey started to travel with us as a sound man," MacKaye says. "He just started to record the shows out of habit. We didn't really plan on recording all the shows, but after we had 50 or 75 or 100, it seemed like, 'Well, we might as well keep doing

"We were trying to figure out how to get all this music out there," MacKaye says. Now that technology has caught up with Fugazi, the band has done just that: Fifteen years of shows will be made available to buy off the Internet, warts and all.it.' And we ended up with 850."

"These tapes are not all good," MacKaye says. "I certainly cringe at some of the stuff I hear, especially sometimes when I'm talking to the crowd. I think sometimes my humor is extremely dry, and a lot of times I would say things that I thought were very funny but ... I have a reputation of — people think of me as a very fundamentalist, humorless fellow."

Fugazi is employing a pay-what-you-want strategy for this enormous library, so listeners can decide how much these hyper-authentic recordings are worth to them.

"They have to pay us at least a dollar — there's no free on this one," MacKaye says. But with their purchase, listeners get a true oral history of the band, riddled with moments that would have otherwise been lost.

Read it all here:
http://www.npr.org/2011/12/01/142998596/steady-diet-of-everything-the-fugazi-live-vault

Saturday night started off with a download from this expanding vault of recordings, for which I paid their asking price, all in an effort to support the band.  I chose their March 10, 1990 show at the Atlantic Beach Theater in Virginia Beach.  It was listed as being "very good" quality, but to my ears it was excellent.  The band stops on one occasion to scold the audience for getting carried away to the point where it looked like somone might be hurt.  It was a great performance, the first of their live shows I've listened to that may be the start of a trend downloading and listening to more shows., like in "kicked in the head."  Where was Ian MacKaye the night I got smacked in the head at the Social Distortion show?

"Fugazi, formed in Washington, D. C. in 1987, is Ian MacKaye (guitar and vocals, b. 16 April 1962), Joe Lally (bass, b. 3 December 1963), Brendan Canty (drums, b. 9 March 1966) and Guy Picciotto (guitar, b. 17 September 1965). They recorded several records on their own label, Dischord Records, and their straight-ahead, punk-inspired rock and dedication to touring earned them a national audience by the end of the 1980s. Fugazi is equally well-known for their anti-corporate politics, and for their steadfast refusal to charge big money for their performances."

"During their existence, the four-piece created some of the most intelligent, invigorating, and undeniably musical post-hardcore rock & roll. Along with their stridently underground ethics -- which were more out of pragmatism and modesty than anything else -- they gained an extremely loyal and numerous global following."




Download it here from the Fugazi Live website:
http://www.dischord.com/fugazi_live_series


Saturday night closed with a very good audience recording by Nirvana performing at the Cattle Club in Sacramento, CA on February 12, 1990.  Between Nirvana, Fugazi and other bands and all the touring they did in 1990, I wonder what it was that I was doing to miss out on such great sounds of the time!




Download it here:
http://www.mediafire.com/?7h182342tl9nthx

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