Question on Fireflies - Page 4

amber · #46 06-06-2006, 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chiliD

2 years of training in recording studio techniques, 30+ years of experience.

but how can we tell? For instance, I wouldn't think the Rhiannon wasn't live. And the painfully long and screech/whisper NGBA.

Is part of it because you heard a lot of their concerts at that time?

chiliD · #47 06-06-2006, 11:59 AM

That, and listen to a concert boot of the same track that the official version is supposedly taken from. Not only has the track been "studio sweetened", in most cases the vocal has been completely re-recorded (as well as some of the instrumentation)

What can be done in the studio is just amazing, even for a grizzled veteran like me. Even though my "Jaded" quotient is pretty high, there are still things that I still am in denial about. One is that "live" albums are really "live". I WANT to believe that they are, but from what I've learned in the past 30+ years, I know better.

amber · #48 06-06-2006, 12:11 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chiliD

That, and listen to a concert boot of the same track that the official version is supposedly taken from. Not only has the track been "studio sweetened", in most cases the vocal has been completely re-recorded (as well as some of the instrumentation)

What can be done in the studio is just amazing, even for a grizzled veteran like me. Even though my "Jaded" quotient is pretty high, there are still things that I still am in denial about. One is that "live" albums are really "live". I WANT to believe that they are, but from what I've learned in the past 30+ years, I know better.

Hmmm. Well, I have heard some boots from then, but I don't recall a massive difference. Especially, as I said, with Rhiannon and a few others (except in recording quality, obviously, but I just thought that was the diff. between professionally recorded and audience recorded). I should compare, I guess. I mean, you would know, it's hard to believe you are wrong with all that experience.
I don't think it diminishes my listening pleasure much, if they still sound like live versions (inflections, made up parts, crowd cheering, etc.).
It kind of sucks for when I go "That is amazing! I can't believe they could do that live!!!" in my head or to one of my friends.

becca · #49 06-06-2006, 12:32 PM

I can tell when Michelle is seen singing into a banana instead of the mic that it isn't 'live'. Ed Sullivan lied to us people! Oh, wrong group site. Sorry.

I hear a fairly small room acoustically on Fireflies, not the big spaces they were playing at live then.

David · #50 06-06-2006, 05:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by amber

Hmmm. Well, I have heard some boots from then, but I don't recall a massive difference. Especially, as I said, with Rhiannon and a few others (except in recording quality, obviously, but I just thought that was the diff.

The Rhiannon lead vocal on the Live album is definitely the real thing: London April 8-10 1977. Compare it with one of the London boots or with the soundboard boot from Paris four days later. It's virtually identical in every respect.

I think the only lead vocal that's a mystery redub is for "Sara." The opening stanza ("Wait a minute, baby") & the instrumental performance throughout are from November 6, 1979, as indicated, but the lead vocal after that opening stanza is a curious thing: very husky, very bronchial, it had to have been recorded much later (for some reason) & probably when Stevie was getting over a chest cold.

I think the Live album has several backup vocal overdubs, like some of the Buckingham & Nicks backups on "Over & Over" & "Go Your Own Way." And there's probably some instrumentation that's rerecorded throughout--especially guitar & percussion. But thanks to "raw" or earlier copies we have of things, it's easy to tell that many tracks are just about verbatim from the night of performance. You can hear the exact same "Monday Morning" on the Japanese TV concert, you can hear numerous "Say You Love Mes" from the Rumours tour, you can hear the exact same "Dreams" & "Don't Stop" on the old promo videos, you can hear "Oh Well" on the St. Louis '79 soundboard (as well as the '79 "Sara" for differences), you can hear dozens of "Rhiannons" from the Rumours tour, several "Don't Let Me Down Agains" from the 1975 tour, you can hear the exact same "Not That Funny" & just about the exact same "Go Your Own Way" on the Cleveland boot, you can hear several "Over & Overs" from August 1980 (including one soundboard), you can hear several "Never Going Back Agains" from the Tusk tour, etc.

You just have to spend many, many hours--weeks, months & even years--listening closely to all your bootleg recordings, as I have done for twenty-five or more years. I think I've listened to my concert boots more than just about anyone I have ever met in the fan world.

chiliD · #51 06-06-2006, 05:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by David

I think I've listened to my concert boots more than just about anyone I have ever met in the fan world.

{ahem!} Forgetting someone?

amber · #52 06-06-2006, 05:45 PM

Thanks David! It was hard to understand when first you said "I think Live has several backup overdubs" but then you said they are verbatim to the boots you hear from then.

David · #53 06-06-2006, 05:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chiliD

{ahem!} Forgetting someone?

I would never forget you, my friend.

But I never got the impression from you that you were as rabidly interested in collecting & listening to all the concert recordings from the Rumours years as I used to be. I mean I really took it to a near-psychotic degree, amassing hundreds of tapes & playing them nonstop. So while you might have been listening to some old Peter Green or some Allman Brothers, I was listening to Fleetwood Mac at the Omni, June 1, 1977, for literally the 900th time, analyzing every second of it, playing it day & night, day & night, month after month, until I had the entire thing memorized.

I used to amaze (or scare) people in the old chats that Marty & Lisa used to moderate with my knowledge of the dates & details of all the old shows. Or someone would come into the chat & ask, "Which concert was it where Stevie sang up a whole step instead of down on the last stanza of Sara, right before the guitarist played a riff from Sound of Music?" And I'd just pop right up & say, "Oh, that was at the Civic Arena in Roanoke Virginia Oct. 26, 1983." I was like the Old Concert Freak for many years while others were just starting to collect all these old tapes. But even the people I knew over the years who had the biggest collections--Roland Benoit, Kip Lupton, Debbie DeStefano, Aaron Muentz, Jeff Samuels, Lisa Aarons, Joe Admire--didn't listen to & study their tapes the way I did. They were often oblivious about what was on the tapes in their very own collection, & I just didn't understand that. I played my concert tapes so much that I wore them to the nub, & I literally memorized countless numbers of tapes of old shows. I just felt driven; I loved those shows so much that I wanted to swallow them up. So I just devoured them, & I really never met anyone else in the fan world who was as voracious of the old shows as I was...... with one exception. Debbie Peterson, who lives in Ohio--listened to her concert tapes (& still listens) of the Buckingham & Nicks years as much as I did. We used to discuss the minutest details of them for five hours at a time. We'd talk about the smallest detail in, say, the closing shout on "Not That Funny" on our tape of Fleetwood Mac at the Minneapolis Met Center, Sept. 23, 1982, or hundreds of other shows.

I don't think you ever got that psycho, Steve. Plus, you didn't really want to collect hundreds of concerts from the '75 to '86 years, primarily because you didn't care for the bad sound quality, & then in later years you just got tired of the rumours stuff.

tynan88 · #54 06-08-2006, 06:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by David

I would never forget you, my friend.

But I never got the impression from you that you were as rabidly interested in collecting & listening to all the concert recordings from the Rumours years as I used to be. I mean I really took it to a near-psychotic degree, amassing hundreds of tapes & playing them nonstop. So while you might have been listening to some old Peter Green or some Allman Brothers, I was listening to Fleetwood Mac at the Omni, June 1, 1977, for literally the 900th time, analyzing every second of it, playing it day & night, day & night, month after month, until I had the entire thing memorized.

I used to amaze (or scare) people in the old chats that Marty & Lisa used to moderate with my knowledge of the dates & details of all the old shows. Or someone would come into the chat & ask, "Which concert was it where Stevie sang up a whole step instead of down on the last stanza of Sara, right before the guitarist played a riff from Sound of Music?" And I'd just pop right up & say, "Oh, that was at the Civic Arena in Roanoke Virginia Oct. 26, 1983." I was like the Old Concert Freak for many years while others were just starting to collect all these old tapes. But even the people I knew over the years who had the biggest collections--Roland Benoit, Kip Lupton, Debbie DeStefano, Aaron Muentz, Jeff Samuels, Lisa Aarons, Joe Admire--didn't listen to & study their tapes the way I did. They were often oblivious about what was on the tapes in their very own collection, & I just didn't understand that. I played my concert tapes so much that I wore them to the nub, & I literally memorized countless numbers of tapes of old shows. I just felt driven; I loved those shows so much that I wanted to swallow them up. So I just devoured them, & I really never met anyone else in the fan world who was as voracious of the old shows as I was...... with one exception. Debbie Peterson, who lives in Ohio--listened to her concert tapes (& still listens) of the Buckingham & Nicks years as much as I did. We used to discuss the minutest details of them for five hours at a time. We'd talk about the smallest detail in, say, the closing shout on "Not That Funny" on our tape of Fleetwood Mac at the Minneapolis Met Center, Sept. 23, 1982, or hundreds of other shows.

I don't think you ever got that psycho, Steve. Plus, you didn't really want to collect hundreds of concerts from the '75 to '86 years, primarily because you didn't care for the bad sound quality, & then in later years you just got tired of the rumours stuff.

I own Live in Boston