Where Is Sharon? Orlando 5-25

[Macfan4life]

Originally Posted by jmn3

So I was too young to notice any of this stuff but in looking back, clearly the technology changed a ton during the mid-80’s. It seems that almost every act, especially the older ones who toured earlier and later, started to change to a more glossy sounding, truer to the recording approach sometime in the mid to late 80’s.

Fleetwood Mac 1982 vs 1987 is pretty night and day. And it’s not just Lindsey leaving and Rick and Billy replacing him. I suspect had Lindsey stayed, the “raw” 1982 version of the band would’ve been unrecognizable in 1987. The Rolling Stones 1982 vs. 1989 are the same way. It’s jarring how much more slick everything got and stayed that way - it’s only gotten worse.

The joy of listening to old live shows now is hearing how varied and unique each tour was - and in many cases, each SHOW! The evolution of a song throughout a tour is much more interesting to me than just hearing the same exact track night after night. I know that the shows are designed for the fan sitting in the arena that night as opposed to some guy listening to a recording on YouTube 40 years later, but it just seems to lose some of the rock and roll aspect when everything is so predetermined and “coded.”

I do understand that for bands like Fleetwood Mac or Eagles whose studio recordings are meticulously crafted, recreating the songs on stage isn’t easy and I’m not against some degree of augmentation to fill out the sound. But it just seems everyone is taking that way too far and creating boring predictable outcomes.

That's what makes the 1980 Live album so special. It showcases the band as a rock group where they would jam out and make uses of the only 5 members on stage with a little Ray Lindsey thrown in.