Velvet Underground
Second Fret, Philadelphia
May 1970
CONTRAST CLAUSE :
This is a slightly remixed version of this torrent, samples attached below for comparison -
Torrent #171845 Velvet Underground Philadelphia May 1970 audience recording drummerless
http://www.dimeadozen.org/torrents-details.php?id=171845
Velvet Underground Philadelphia May 1970 audience recording drummerless
"you may nave noticed we're drummerless tonight...."
01 Waiting For The Man
02 What Goes On
03 Cool It Down
04 Sweet Jane
05 Rock And Roll
06 Some Kinda Love
07 New Age
08 Candy Says
09 Head Held High
10 Train Round The Bend / Oh! Sweet Nuthin'
**BONUS TRACKS**
11 Ocean (cut) 0.54
12 Oh! Sweet Nuthin' (cut) 0.56
(Max's Kansas City, New York, August 1970 - samples from an uncirculated stereo recording by Joseph Freeman)
Lou Reed: guitar, vocals
Sterling Morrison: guitar, bass (?)
Doug Yule: bass, keyboards (?), vocals, drums (tracks 02, 03, 05, 09)
Billy Yule: drums (tracks 11, 12)
I hadn't been sure about working or listening to much VU live in 1970... my impressions were that by this time
Lou felt defeated and had lost his heart for performing with the band. Certainly what I heard of Live at Max's
seemed to reinforce that impression.
However reading about this one, a drummerless set in Philadelphia, noting the feel wasn't dissimilar to the
Velvet Underground (3rd) album, I was intrigued.
It's a good show...not classic, but definitely of interest to VU collectors. Many of you will, of course,
have this already, but i've worked on it, and it scrubs up pretty well. The mixing process I use (a long and painstaking one in Audacity that I arrived at through trial and error), has revealed a nice recording I feel.
I should point out that this process widens the sound...while it is a manual prcoess, if the vocal ends up a
little to the right (as it does here) or the left of other instrumentation, there is little I can do about that.
I have two choices ... labour away trying to correct that (and as I have found the more 'tweaks' you do, the more it can actually start undoing the good that's been done), or start again. The latter is an option, but doesn't always end up improving that much on what are old recordings done on not too sophisticated equipment
(with respect). Someone who has Magix, Cool Edit Pro or other complex software may well be able to do better, but for now this is my offering.
The bonuses sound fabulous! That is the version of Max's I would have rushed out to buy and played over and over again! :)
Sample attached below to show before and after mixing this [Train Comin' Round The Bound - after / before / after]...with hindsight I could have used a different sample as some of the tracks sound better, but it's still a nice example of the dynamics of the mixed version here vs the original.
If you don't approve of "remastering" / remixing, whichever label you attach , give this a miss. Otherwise, if you like the way this sounds, please give some feedback. (I don't like the term 'remaster',,,a 'bs' term
that basically means a minor remix...which is what I've attempted here).
Enjoy
Thanks to all those involved in the playing, recording and sharing of this concert!