Last Wednesday, High Places performed outside of their standard Brooklyn DIY and club scene. The Oval at Stuyvesant Town has had weekly Wednesday concerts for quite some time, but for years the bands have been local acts and cover bands. As the community has gone through some substantial upgrades, the Summer music series booked its first legitimate act.

The video embedded above appeared on youtube yesterday, and has created a bit of stir in the blogs. While the video seems to indicate that High Places only performed to a group of toddlers, the shot is quite misleading. This footage was taken during the day when High Places did their soundcheck to the afternoon crowd at the Oval — primarily children and older people. When the actual performance took place, the grass area in front of the stage was filled with people of all ages who included many fans of the band, local residents and curious onlookers — all very supportive of the interesting and excellent music on stage.

High Places is a taper friendly band, as our friend baltimore-taper recorded them last year. We recorded this set with a direct line from the soundboard. The signal is fairly clear, but there is a noticeable hum/buzz from the board that also was apparent in the PA stacks. During louder moments the well mixed board is outstanding, while during the quieter points the hum can be distracting. With that caveat enjoy this excellent band!

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE)

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

High Places
2008-07-02
Stuyvesant Town Oval
New York, NY USA

Digital Soundboard Master

Soundboard > Edirol UA-5 (Oade Digimod) > M-Audio Microtrack 24/96 > 24bit 48kHz wav file > Soundforge 8.0 (level adjustment, downsample, dither, EQ) > CD Wave (tracking) > Flac Frontend (level 7, align sector boundaries) > flac

Recorded and Produced
nyctaper
[email protected]
2008-07-07

Setlist:
[total time 39:18]
01 /Banana Slugs
02 Sandy Feat
03 The Storm
04 Golden
05 The Tree
06 Oceanus
07 Head Spins
08 Namer
09 Gold Coin
10 New Grace
11 Stardust
12 Vision’s The First…
13 Universe
14 Freaked Flight

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT High Places and visit their MySpace page, where you can follow the links to buy official releases. The High Places artist page on Thrill Jockey Records is (here). You can purchase High Places CD 03/07 – 09/07 at Emusic (here).

[photo by neil d] [higher resolution photos (HERE) and (HERE)]

Our Intrepid Correspondent Reports:

The weather report was for a high of 80 with a 50% chance of thunderstorms — so of course the day turned out to be hot and muggy with almost no rain to speak of. I arrived at 12:45 for 2 pm doors, expecting a huge crowd wanting to get there early for the Feelies. Instead, I was maybe the 50th person on line, and got a prime spot about 30 feet from the stage, right in front of the stage-right speakers.

The Feelies were just great – I’d never seen them live before except on video, but it didn’t seem like they’d missed a beat after their 16-year layoff. Watching Dave Weckerman play whatever bit of percussion he was responsible for at any moment (a tambourine, a maraca) as if it took every fiber of his being was especially great fun. Ira Kaplan was about ten feet directly in front of us, rocking out for the entire Feelies set.

Sonic Youth were excellent as well, with a set heavy on songs from Daydream Nation. (Hey Joni, Silver Rocket… several others, I forget which right now.) Kim Gordon looks amazing for a 55-year-old. Anyway, you can hear the SY set on WFMU’s site, if you haven’t already.

Afterwards, we sat on the Battery Park lawn finishing our picnic food and watching the eight billion fireflies, then headed over to the East River for the fireworks. The fireworks themselves were great, though, so hard to complain about any part of the day.

A regular nyctaper reader pointed us to his ebay auction for a Feelies rarity — the limited edition promotional Away EP autographed by all of the Feelies. All proceeds from this auction will be donated to the charity of choice of the winning bidder!

The Recording:
As our recorder noted to me, the stacks were very bass heavy, and as a result quite a bit of EQ was applied in post-production. This is a clear upfront recording which is subject only to the limitations of the sound system and the outdoor conditions. Enjoy!

Direct download of MP3 files (HERE)

Download the Complete show in FLAC [HERE].

The Feelies
2008-07-04
Battery Park
New York, NY USA

Digital Audience Master Recording
Recorded 30 Feet from Right PA Stacks

CoreSound Binaurals > MM-EBM-1 battery box > Sony MZ-NH900 > Audiophile 2496 > Sound Studio > 16bit 44kHz wav file > Soundforge 8.0 (set fades, level adjustments, EQ) > CD Wave (tracking) > Flac Frontend (level 7, align sector boundaries) > flac

Recorded by neil d
Produced by nyctaper
2008-07-06

Setlist
[total time 46:22]
01 [introduction]
02 On The Roof
03 The High Road
04 Nobody Knows
05 Let’s Go
06 Higher Ground
07 Away
08 Time is Right
09 Slipping (Into Something)
10 Doin’ It Again
11 Raised Eyebrows
12 Crazy Rhythms
13 [encore break]
14 Outdoor Miner (Wire)
15 Fa Ce-La

If you email nyctaper for access to this recording, we expect that you will PLEASE SUPPORT The Feelies and visit their official MySpace page, and purchase their official releases at various commercial outlets. They are working on new songs. Purchase their new CD when it is released!