Passaic '75 vs New Haven '76
 

As this has just appeared for download on bt.easytree.org, now seems an appropriate time to ask:

Which is it? :) And what evidence do we have either way?

What is bt.easytree.org?

A place to download boots. :) It's too complicated for me to even attempt and I have dial-up, so... :laugh:

When I first got online in 1995 or so, I hung out in the Fleetwood newsgroup. We used to argue about the King Biscuit radio broadcast all the time. One of the intelligent regs (intelligent except for the fact that he was on Prodigy) had a ticket stub from a friend of his who attended an old Mac show on November 20, 1975, at Yale University (New Haven) Coliseum (the Veterans Memorial Coliseum the band played on the Tusk Tour). The girl remembers seeing the King Biscuit mobile recording unit (a white van) at the site, recording for radio. I buy this, incidentally.

Fleetwood played the Capitol Theatre in Portchester NY on May 30, 1975. They also allegedly played the Capitol Theatre in Passaic NJ on October 17, 1975. In fact, that might be the show that Don't Let Me Down Again off "Live" is taken from.

The November 20 date is also given as the date for a show at Wake Forest University in North Carolina, but so far, that's just fan hearsay, & fairly late in the game, at that. The tape of that show is the one with Go Your Own Way. That NC gig may not be November 20, but the time frame seems right. Steve heard the band play GYOW on Thanksgiving, & the Billboard review of the Winterland show a few days after Thanksgiving also refers to You Can Go Your Own Way being performed.

When asked about this in a Q&A, Ken Callait & Leo Rossi only added to the confusion by referring to a city in a neighboring county of Passaic & then by bringing up an entirely different show in Wallingford CT:

"My partner, Leo Rossi, who toured with them since 1975, just told me that the King Biscuit show was from Union City, N.J. in 1975. I know it was a long time ago but I seem to recall it being recorded in a small radio station? No? I have many fond memories of mixing that show, fond, because if I hadn't have done it I probably wouldn't have recorded Rumours, and that probably wouldn't have met Fleetwood Mac at all! Well that was funny, Mick Fleetwood just called from Bubba Burger's in Maui, he said to say hello and he can't remember a thing about the King Biscuit show. That doesn't surprise me!"

The Passiac show I have is dated May 1 1975 and has the following setlist:

Station Man
Spare Me A Little
Rhiannon
Landslide
I'm So Afraid
World Turning
Don't Let Me Down Again
Hypnotized

And that's it! Seems like it was trimmed down for the BN crowd. Is there a more complete version of this out there, and is this the wrong date?

Then I have one that is simply called "CT 1975" and, between the two, seems more likely to be a radio broadcast. Setlist:

Get like You Used to Be
Spare Me a Little
Station Man
Why
Rhiannon
Over My Head
Landslide
Oh Well
I'm So Afraid
Green Manalishi
World Turning
Blue Letter
Hypnotized

Again, is there a more complete version of this out there (they must have done more than 13 songs!), and should I date this Nov. 20, 1975?

I realize we may never get any definitive answers on some of these, but if we can all come to some sort of consensus :laugh: it might make things a little easier on all of us.

Thanks for any light anyone can shed... :wavey:

One if my greatest Mac-related wishes, is that the band would officially release a remastered version of the Trod Nossel Studios recording, from Wallingford, CT.

That is one of the most incredible Mac performances ever... it's not glossy and perfect, and yet it's flawless in its own way.

I still get goosebumps at various times throughout that show.

This has been bootlegged so many times under so many names (and so many cities credited), yet it is just the ONE recording...from all my research, recorded in New Haven, CT

It has been released as:

Albatross, But Not Around My Neck
Rockhoppers Live 1975
Live In Passaic, NJ 1975
King Biscuit Flower Hour 1975
and mixed in with other BN outtakes & demos; released as a 2-LP set, Almanac


This one has been released as Trod Nossel, Wallingford 1975, Who's The New Girl? & Smiling Ears...I assume that the Wallingford, CT credit is the correct one.

My "database" is as follows:

King Biscuit Flower Hour
Yale University (Veterans Memorial) Coliseum
New Haven CT
November 20, 1975
(Big outdoor audience. Eight songs: Station Man, Spare Me a Little, Rhiannon, Landslide, I'm So Afraid, World Turning, Don't Let Me Down Again, Hypnotized)

Trod Nossel Studios
Wallingford CT
September 23, 1975
(Small indoor audience, radio station/studio. Thirteen songs: Get Like You Used to Be, Station Man, Spare Me a Little, Rhiannon, Why, Landslide, Over My Head, I'm So Afraid, Oh Well, Green Manalishi, World Turning, Blue Letter, Hypnotized)

The former might be from the Capitol Theatre in Passaic NJ (326 Monroe Street), where the band played on October 17, 1975. But what little decent evidence there is suggests it's the outdoor show in New Haven. However, Don't Let Me Down Again from the 1980 "Live" LP might be from the Capitol since the sleeve says "Passaic."

The Wallingford recording definitely predates the King Biscuit recording -- you can hear it in the arrangements (Rhiannon, for example). Wallingford is a lot more similar to the Landover show on video, which is probably from October 5, 1975 (twelve days earlier). The South Orange NJ audience recording falls in that time frame as well: October 13 -- eight days after the Landover video & four days before Passaic. You can hear lots of similarities in arrangements among this small cluster of late-September/early-October shows, whereas the King Biscuit & the Wake Forest University shows sound more evolved in terms of arrangements.

Caveat emptor, Sugah!

I think it's OK. It's not my preferred era. The band -- especially Mick & Lindsey -- hadn't yet fully developed their idiosyncratic styles or their chthonian exploration of the dark nights of the soul, & I'm really full of ****.

I've always thought so! LOL :nod:

:lol: :lol:


Naw, anyone who likes "one Deadly summer" can't be!
AMber

For the record, the Coliseum is an indoor venue.....Maybe they played at the Yale Bowl (at Yale's Football Stadium) in 75?

ChiliD and David--Thank You!!!

I wonder how many other ledgies are out there scrambling to re-label their tapes, like I just did.

Good to know that these shows are complete. The setlist on The Penguin is much longer, but I'm guessing that it includes all songs that may have been done at any time on the tour.

Were all these shows this short? My Largo boot (date anyone?) also only has Get Like..., Station Man, Spare Me..., Rhiannon, Why, ISA, Oh Well, Green Manalishi, WT, Blue Letter, and Hypnotized.

The South Orange show has even less (dated Oct. 13, 1975: Get Like..., Station Man, Spare Me..., ISA, SYLM, Jumping at Shadows, Frozen Love, Rhiannon, Oh Well, WT, and Green Manalishi.

And the set sure seemed like an ongoing work in progress at this time. I initially thought it was because of the two new members and maybe they added their songs as they became more popular via the radio, but looking at these dates and setlists, that doesn't really seem to be the case. Maybe they actually just liked to change it up a bit more back then... :shrug:

Thanks again, guys, and I'm sure I'm not the only one benefitting from this!

This show is my favorite of this tour for sure. the quality is definitely the worst but it's good enough quality to know it's greatness. This rhiannon in particular is the best rhiannon I've heard.

I just did, too. Thanks ChiliD & David. :)

Before everybody runs off to relabel, it's really important that I emphasize "Let the buyer beware." Remember what happened with the Joe Louis Arena Mirage show tape. . . .
Possibly October 5. See my post above.

Well, all I can comment is that the arrangement of Rhiannon sounds very much like the one on Midnight Special in April of 76.

For some reason they were not yet doing the harmonies on any of the song, except when Christine sings 2 lines with Stevie.

I find it very unusual that they would record the song in the studio with harmonies, but not perform them live until the later years.

Which reminds, me--On that site, I also got the Japan 77 Bootleg, and I was quite suprised to hear them perform the alternate version of You Make Loving Fun, especially because it sounded from the bits of dialogue that Rumours was already in stores. I don't see why they would have performed the unused version. (If anyone doesn't know, the alternate had a different order or the verses, and there's different solo breaks and harmonies--this version is now on the remastered Rumours second CD)

I've always wondered when that performance was actually taped, assuming April '76 was the broadcast date.
Or later that year (1976), when they shot the promo footage for the Rosebud film.
That studio alternative was the live arrangement since they began playing the song. You can hear it that way on tapes of shows from 1976 (like Milwaukee & Cincinnati), 1977 (tour rehearsals & all shows) & later. They probably just wanted to elongate the song in concert, & that arrangement adds an extra minute or so.

The broadcast date IS April 9, 1976. The video rip I have is from a 'Best of Midnight Special' and that is the date that is in the video.

For whatever it's worth, I own an "official" copy of the King Biscuit Flour Hour CD of this show, and the announcer states that the following show was taped at the Capitol Theatre show in Passaic, NJ.

Station Man
Spare me a Little
Rhiannon
Landslide
I'm So Afraid
World Turning
Don't Let Me Down Again
Hypnotized

I have one of those, too. It was for broadcast at radio stations back in 1992. I bought it back then hoping that the sound quality would be superior to the other copies I had on vinyl & cassette (all from underground sources). Was I bummed when the sound on this one wasn't much better -- I think it was just a rather poorly recorded show by Leo Rossi. That may be why King Biscuit hasn't released the show on CD commercially (a lot of other KBFH CDs are on the market at music stores or through the KBFH Web site: www.kingbiscuit.com/). Incidentally, Rossi believes he recorded the show in Union City.

Yes, we all have that.

I think that show was filmed fairly late in the year in 1975 or in very early 1976. I think the indoor soundstage stuff on the Rosebud promo was filmed many months later, possibly even after the spring/summer 1976 touring (Stevie's haircut & hair coloring match photos of her taken in the fall of '76 at various parties & at awards shows with Fleetwood Mac). On the spring '76 tour shows we have taped, the harmonies on Rhiannon are there.

Well that wouldn't make sense then...

Just to go on record:

The outdoor live portions of the Rosebud video ("I'm So Afraid", & portions of "Over My Head" & "World Turning") were filmed at the University Of California, Santa Barbara football stadium show in May 1976.

Hey, I betcha that was the film footage that Warner Brothers played for Soviet officials when the plans were being made for Fleetwood Mac to perform in Moscow in 1978.

The Random Notes column in Rolling Stone reported the plans. Mickey Shapiro, the band's lawyer at the time, got clearance from the Russian Embassy & the U.S. State Department. The next step was for U.S. & Soviet politicos to meet the band (does Mick talk about the meeting in that book of his?) & see their Washington DC concert (? must have been in late March or early July 1977, but I don't have a date for it). Then one of the comrades from the politburo was shown a videotape of the band performing an "outdoor summer show in Santa Barbara" (says RS), which apparently clinched the deal -- except that the comrade was a little concerned about John's cutoffs.

Mac was going to play July 8, 9 & 10 (1978) at a three-thousand-seat concert hall in Moscow, with a live satellite broadcast & TV special. Now everybody talks about Stevie's putative knack for fortune-telling, but Mickey Shapiro is the prescient one: RS quoted him saying, "It wouldn't take much to disrupt all these plans." And sure enough, the whole damn thing fell through!