FlaminÕ Groovies
August 14, 1978
The Bottom Line, NYC
2 sets
From The Moose Track Collection
Sony TC-RX410 Cassette Deck>Alesis 9500 Masterlink (no EQ)>AIFF
File conversion done with xACT setting of 6
This one is a tough one. First off, most of the quality isnÕt too great. (see sample 1 in the comments section).
There are some tracks that sound a little better. As though it was from a different source. (see sample 2 in the comments section)
Oh, and did I mention that the pieces seem out of order and some tracks seem to repeat?
Kind of a mystery..or a mess..depends on your view.
Anyway, IÕm not a huge fan of this band and donÕt want to deal with the puzzle factor so IÕve numbered the 55 tracks in the order that they appear on the tapes and the scans of the covers and cassettes (in the comments section) might also provide the clues to piece these two shows together in the proper order. Good luck!
The story of The Moose Track collection
In the late 80Õs a buddy of mine in Pennsylvania, Clark M., told me during my visit to the East coast about a tiny independent record store in Port Jervis, NY called Moose track Records. He thought I be interested in a box of live tapes he saw for sale in there. I went over almost immediately and sure enough there it was, a box of 72 cassettes. Some without labels. Some were generic white cassettes with a white cardboard insert. Most were TDK normal bias. Some were from the sixties, most from the seventies. Some were from BBC, most were audience recordings from the NY/east coast area. I bought them all at 50 cents a tape. Bands I knew: Devo, NY Dolls, Capt. Beefheart, Runaways,Tom Petty, Elvis Costello, Graham Parker, Rockpile, Damned. Bands I didnÕt know: Ducks Deluxe, Eddie and The Hotrods, Frankie Miller. Some cool oddballs: Johnny Rotten DJ-ing at the BBC, Monty Python in a radio appearance, a 10 minute radio clip devoted to the death of Paul McCarthy.
Jan 16, 2011 from nevinsrip
I am pretty sure I know where those tapes come from. The white cassettes are BASF bulk tapes that were sold in lots of 1,000 for commercial use. I bet those tape boxes are 2 part clear plastic. The tapes are probably all C-90's and C-60 but there were several C-45's too. The C-45 may have been black shells.
Back in the mid 70's there was a girl named Amy F from Queens NY who was a known bootlegger. She made her living by selling those tapes. She had trading partners all over the world and her and a big tall guy named Arnie (who looked like Bozo the Clown) did quite a bit of NY concert taping.
All of my collection of well over 1,000 shows is on those same white tapes. I used to go halves with her when she bought the tapes and the tape boxes. I know that at one time we got black cassettes but I cannot remember which were first the black or the white shells.
Anyway I lost touch with her in the '80's and heard that she moved upstate somewhere. If those are not her personal collection then they are someone's that she sold too. But she typed those lable just like the pictures you have.
Let me know if there are any identifying markers anywhere like her or Arnies initials or maybe a Forrest Hills or Kew Gardens address.
*(I sent nevinsrip an email with scans of tapes that had handwriting on the labels (that wasnÕt my own), a look at some of the cassettes, and even a Lou Reed Bottom Line show that had two tickets tucked into the jacket)* - hitwitstuff2
email from nevinsrip (Bill). January 17, 2011
Hey !Ê I'm gonna really think that those are Amy's original tapes. I was very familiar with her collection and I know those plastic tape containers always had typed labels on them. The handwriting looks like Arne's which would have been consistant with him giving Amy a copy of his stuff. He was always hot for her!! All she wanted from him was tapes LOL LOL.
Ê
Amy was big into Big Star, Chilton, Texas stuff and British things like Ducks DeLuxe and BBC concerts. Back in the tape days we had extensive networks
with Brits (BBC) Swedes and Germans (Rockpalast) who did a ton of live broadcasting.
Ê
Amy was a pretty good live taper but Arnie was the king around NYC. He was a tall guy who really looked like Bozo the Clown with tufts of hair on the sides of his head and nothing on top. If I recall he used to go to shows with crutches and have 2 mikes taped to the bottoms which he would then turn upside down once the show started and the lights went down.
Ê
Amy advertised in all the magazines of the day Record World, Creem, and those free supermarketÊrags. She also used to advertise over in Europe where she had really good connections.
I probably have a copy of her list around here somewhere in my tape boxes.
Ê
She graded everything X or VG+ no matter how crappy it was and was usually one step ahead of some angry buyers. But it was her only source of income
and she was good at finding the cheapest cassettes, cases, labels and anything else.
Ê
You have to remember this was before there was an Internet so it was all done by mail or phone. Great days and fun times!!! We were alwaysÊtrying to outdo each other. There was one other guy who was also big into it Frank Kornullson
or something close to that who also live inÊQueens (Middle Village, I think). He did a lot of Genesis, Richard ThompsonÊand the Clash.
Ê
In case you're wondering...Amy was a big girl. She was 5' 9 or 10" and probably 150-160. She has curly dark hair past her shoulder and beautiful, beautiful gray eyes. Not a show stopper, but pretty in a big girl kinda way.
Ê
Ok that's it. If you have more questions I'll try to help you as much as I can.
Jan 17, 2011 from rannyhill
Thanks for this! ÊAbout Arnie - a real wheeler-dealer. ÊHe prowled the record shows in the northeast for years and always had great stuff! ÊThanks again!
jan 18, 2011 from swimcat2
I will reinforce what you guys have to say about Arnie. ÊHere in Michigan I would get
blanks from him time to time, but I stopped after awhile, as the quality wasn't always
that good. ÊHad long phone conversations with him and the last time I took a road trip
to NYC we met up. ÊBozo the Clown, now that is a flash back, I have the same memory.
However, I have an addition to make to this thread. ÊIf my memory serves me correct,
Arnie, turned me on to a guy named Sam R down in Arizona. ÊI'm not sure of
the spelling or even if that is his real name, but the stuff he had was crazy. ÊHe got his blanks from these two as well. ÊSam was connected to somebody. ÊLast I heard of him he was arrested and everything in his house was taken. ÊAnybody have any knowledge of this guy or traded with him back in the 70's?
Jan 22, 2011 from noodles
"However, I have an addition to make to this thread. ÊIf my memory serves me correct,
Arnie, turned me on to a guy named Sam R down in Arizona. ÊI'm not sure of
the spelling or even if that is his real name, but the stuff he had was crazy. ÊHe got his blanks from these two as well. ÊSam was connected to somebody. ÊLast I heard of him he was arrested and everything in his house was taken. ÊAnybody have any knowledge of this guy or traded with him back in the 70's?"
yeh, Hitwit: ÊS. Romanghi, Glendale AZ USA. ÊMy pals and I used to buy tapes from him all the time (1979 - 84). Found his ad in CREEM? ÊReally great guy, always updating us with new boots from our faves (everything from ABBA to Zappa, but lots of =vH= + Cheap Trick as I recall).
As smalltown Midwestern teens, Jeff, Jr. and I spent our weekly allowances on whatever we could get our ears on. ÊANd, S. Romanghi's tapes arriving in the mailbox was KING stuff. We'd bring the tapes to school and blast them on the Band Room's killer system during lunch. Mr. Wilson, ultra-Christian choir director, LOVED that gahhdamn loud rock'n'roll + David Lee Roth's colorful stage banter. Êha.
I still have some of those old grey-cassettes with white labels + famous scrawled details. Great handwriting, he had. All useless now, as they've been upgraded in quality over the years with lower gens, etc.
I never kept in touch with ol' S. Romanghi much beyond early college daze... sad to hear of his troubles. I hope he's alive and well and still trading. LOVE to hear from him again...
Thanks for this and for all your treasures, hitwitstuff2.
-Noodles
January 22, 2011 from Nevinsrip in reference to my posting a Raspberries at the Cleveland Agora
ÒThat's an Amy tape..no doubt in my mind. She was a huge Raspberries fan and had a ton of their stuff..most of it was bad quality however.
But her most prized possession was the 13 th Floor Elevators.
She was a big Texas music fan and she always wore man tailored shirts, Wranglers and cowboy boots.
Pretty funny for a Jewish girl from Forest Hills, NY.
And Alex Chilton was the man of her dreams....LOL LOL......BillÓ
January 23, 2011 from abcdgoldfish 18:36:33 GMT
Wow, not so much the Alice, but the comments you posted.
I was just yesterday reading a letter I got from Sam Romahghi in Glendale Az. postmarked 1983.
I met Sam thru Creem like you guys did. Traded with him in the late 70's.
Still have allot of those tapes bare black with his scralling letters.
Well I moved to Tempe Arizona in 82 and Sam and I were still trading.
I had sent him a copy of my Pink Floyd "The Wall" Nassau Coliseum 2-80
and we were friends from then on. After moving to Tempe, Sam wrote me and
I had offered to record shows for him. He asked for my phone number and we were
to get together. But he was busted by the Feds a year or 2 later and that was the last I spoke with him. Still have all of his lists, His lists were enormous and were great material for checking tour dates.
Sam Romanghi was the man, he had everything. Miss dealing with Sam Romganghi. And Sam if you are out there. All the best to you. You were a pioneer and a great guy to trade with.
Sad what you gave up in the process. I think of you often Sam.
Well enough about me and the great music trader Sam Romanghi of Arizona. P.O. Box 1969.
Hitwit, thanks for confirming that Sam was real and you guys knew him also.
We trade freely now because of the sacrifices of others before us. Awesome
stuff, and nice tale you told us about your tape trading comrades. Pioneers, every one of them. BTW. I used to carry spare batteries in case Security took them from my deck. We learned the hard way. Keep the Music real.