I'll Sleep When I'm Dead | 1977-02-05 | Warren Zevon

33:35
Taper:
Transferrer:
JEMS
SHNID:
warren_zevon1977-02-05.ecm22p.tandberg.sg.jems.burke.flac16
Source:
Sony ECM-22P Microphone > Tandberg Model 11 Portable Reel to Reel
Taper Notes:
View NotesWarren Zevon
Paramount Theater 
Seattle, WA 
February 5, 1977
Pacific Alliance "We Don't Need Nuclear Power" Benefit Concert
JEMS Full-Track Tandberg Mono Master 

Recording Gear: Sony ECM-22P Microphone > Tandberg Model 11 Portable Reel to Reel 

JEMS 2016 Transfer: Master reel > Tandberg Model 11 > Sound Devices USBPre 2 capture (24/96) > iZotope RX and Ozone > MBIT+ convert to 16/44.1 > Peak Pro XT (volume smoothing / edit / index) > xACT 2.35 > FLAC 

01 Introduction
02 Frank And Jesse James
03 Hasten Down The Wind
04 Backs Turned Looking Down The Path
05 Carmelita
06 Mohammed's Radio
07 Excitable Boy
08 I'll Sleep When I'm Dead

Known Faults: 
None 

Tale of the Tapes and the Tandberg
With Jared’s passing in October 2016, the complete JEMS Archive was moved south from his home up north. That move, sad impetus aside, presented an opportunity, however daunting, to go through and organize the collection. With the help of some amazing friends and experts (among them Slowburn, SS, RD and slipkid68), JEMS tapes are now accessible in ways they have never been before. SG was also on hand to help and fill in our taping history as he always does. 

When the task was done and loaded into the truck, one box in particular captured my attention: master reels recorded by SG on his Tandberg portable reel to reel. We’ve posted some 20 or more of these on DIME over the years, but this box contained master reels that had never been digitized before and, in some instances, had never been traded or circulated. 

If you don’t know about the Tandberg, it was a remarkable piece of gear in its day, not only capable of recording at 3-¾ and 7-½ IPS, but in full-track mono. I won’t do the math, but compared to a cassette, the surface area of tape capturing the music is orders of magnitude higher, which is why so many of SG’s Tandberg masters from the likes of David Bowie, Elton John, Led Zeppelin and Bruce Springsteen are considered by some as audience-recording classics. The Tandberg required 10(!) D-cel batteries to operate, is roughly the size of a compact typewriter and weighs more than ten pounds. Imagine sneaking that into a show and your respect for what SG accomplished only grows. 

This is the fourth in a series of Tandberg master reels digitized for the first time. Happily, the original Tandberg deck is still fully functioning, so these transfers offer full-track mono playback on the original tape recorder to maximize quality. 

Warren Zevon
We follow up Boston (http://www.dimeadozen.org/torrents-details.php?id=581370,  Lou Reed (http://www.dimeadozen.org/torrents-details.php?id=582027) and ELO (http://www.dimeadozen.org/torrents-details.php?id=582643) with Warren Zevon, in a short but striking set opening for Jackson Browne at this benefit concert opposing nuclear power development. The Browne performance will follow in the near future.

Zevon opens the show with a few powerful solo songs on piano and guitar before being joined by Browne's band and special guest David Lindley. I'm not a huge Zevon fan, but these 34 minutes went a long way to convincing me otherwise, including the rousing closer "I'll Sleep When I'm Dead."

Back on home turf at the Paramount, SG was surely in his favorite taping position, Row JJ, where he could hang the microphone in the folds of a giant velvet curtain away from close-up audience interruptions. It's another fine recording for the period. Samples provided. If the file size seems small, remember it is short opening set AND a mono file, half the size of stereo version of the same duration. 

Our hat goes off again to SG for his remarkable work in the ‘70s, ‘80s and beyond for capturing these shows in the first place, and to Jared, may his legacy live on as he rests in peace. Thanks as well to mjk5510, for his consistent support of JEMS’ efforts and indispensable post production work. 

BK for JEMS

Uploaded to www.dimeadozen.org on January 28, 2017 by mjk5510.

Uploaded to the Live Music Archive on March 31, 2017 by Tim Burke ([email protected]).