Posts Tagged ‘ neumann km150 ’

Fiery Furnaces: November 13, 2021 Brooklyn Steel

October 3, 2022
By
Photo Courtesy of Edwina Hay

Our live experiences with the Fiery Furnaces date back to the earliest days of this website. It would be fair to say that this band was in part responsible for the growth of the site circa 2007-2008, as we recorded them all around the area, from multiple times at Maxwell’s, Mercury, Bowery, and Music Hall, to singular shows at Sound Fix Records on Bedford (RIP), Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens, LPR, Southpaw (RIP), East River Park Bandshell (RIP), and Hiro Ballroom (RIP). We recorded them so often that we ended up getting credited as an “engineer” for the Fiery Furnaces live album Remember, which used some of our recordings. The attraction was natural for we live music fans — the band never played any of their shows or songs the same way twice, they consistently invited superb musicians to join them on tours, and the music was always challenging and cerebral. We couldn’t get enough of them.

But in 2011, the band’s core siblings Eleanor and Matt Friedberger decided to take a hiatus. I expected a few years of time away, a solo album or two and then a return. I didn’t expect the break to take a decade, but in 2020 the reunion was finally announced and well, you know what happened then.

Last November at Brooklyn Steel, the wait was over. Fiery Furnaces were back for a “hometown” show at long last. To be honest, I didn’t really know what entirely to expect. The two stalwarts of the band from last decade (Jason Loewenstein and Bob D’Amico) were not joining in the reunion, and of the new band members, we only were familiar with the most excellent Emily Lee (Shearwater, and others). But what I did expect was a new take on classic material, and likely the new single from 2020 (“Down At The So And So And Somewhere”). And in that respect, this show was entirely what I had hoped to see. The setlist contained a healthy dose from all of the band’s releases, of course segued with unexpected twists and turns — but always anchored by Eleanor’s meticulously delivered tongue-twisters and turns of phrase. Matt’s keyboard rack was liberally employed throughout and jibed perfectly with Emily electric piano — check out the interplay in a tasty “Benton Harbor Blues”, and the rocking “Ex-Guru”. The entire ninety-minute set worked like that, with no lulls, plenty of highlights, and no dip in energy throughout. It was great to have Fiery Furnaces back, even if for just one night. We hope it isn’t another decade before they return.

I recorded this set with the Neumann hypers set up at the Soundboard and mixed with a board feed. We are extremely happy with the results, and are pleased to offer this high quality download. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream the Complete Show:

nyctaper · Fiery Furnaces – Live at Brooklyn Steel Nov 13 2021

Fiery Furnaces
2021-11-13
Brooklyn Steel
Brooklyn NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Neumann KM-150s > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:22:52]
01 Leaky Tunnel
02 Single Again
03 Two Fat Feet
04 I’m Going Away
05 Benton Harbor Blues
06 [checklist]
07 My Dog Was Lost but Now He’s Found
08 The Garfield El
09 Chief Inspector Blancheflower
10 I’m in No Mood
11 Don’t Dance Her Down
12 The Vietnamese Telephone Ministry
13 Down At The So And So And Somewhere
14 Duplexes of the Dead
15 Automatic Husband
16 Ex-Guru
17 Quay Cur
18 Tropical Ice-Land
19 [encore break]
20 Here Comes the Summer
21 My Egyptian Grammar
22 Chris Michaels

SUPPORT Fiery Furnaces: Bandcamp / Thrill Jockey page / Third Man Records page

Taper’s Choice: August 30, 2022 Central Park Summerstage

September 1, 2022
By
Photo by @phluffandy

The fit seems natural — a band called Taper’s Choice and our website devoted to recording and sharing live concerts. It also helps that these folks have long been friends of the site and featured many times on our pages in their other configurations. When we caught TC’s NYC debut in April at the Sultan Room, I was unable to attend and Eric expertly captured an extraordinarily full set of heat. On this night TC opened for another site long-time friend Animal Collective (recording coming soon), so we caught an abbreviated Choice set.

As the threat of a Summer storm rolled in, the band’s set time was also moved up, but all was still well in the world as TC took the stage in the gorgeous daylight air with a like-minded crowd ready for a special night. We’ve always loved Dave Harrington’s guitar playing and in this quartet he has the room to breathe and to shine and on this night he did just that. But this band is about four masterful musicians playing off each other and realizing the magic of improvisation. And in that regard, this brief but powerful set was a clear success.

I recorded this set with the Neumann hypers directly in front of the soundboard tent and the sound in the venue was fabulous, which translates perfectly to this recording. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show from Archive.org [HERE]

Stream the Complete Show:

Taper’s Choice
2022-08-30
Central Park Summerstage
New York NY

Digital Master Recording
Recorded at Front of Soundboard Tent

Neumann KM-150s > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 41:48]
01 Running From the Rain
02 Darkness on the Edge of Midtown
03 Lilac Palace
04 Doner Wrap

Taper’s Choice is:
Dave Harrington, Alex Bleeker, Chris Tomson, Zach Tenorio-Miller

Please Support Taper’s Choice and visit their Bandcamp Page

Tonstartssbandht: October 28, 2021 Market Hotel

December 12, 2021
By
Photo by Tod Seelie

In what is perhaps the most NYCTaper-friendly tour announcement ever, last week it was revealed that Ryley Walker and Tonstartssbandht will co-headline a six-date Northeast tour in March that will arrive in New York at Bowery Ballroom on St. Patrick’s Day. I’ve already purchased the Bowery tickets, but we’ve had some serious discussions about doing multiple dates on this tour, with the mostly likely being the Portland Maine and Providence Rhode Island dates on the weekend after the Thursday night in New York. We shall see, but suffice to say its an exciting tour that should not be missed by us, or by anyone serious about good music.

But the Bowery will not be the first post-pandemic show in New York for our old friends Andy and Edwin White. In late October, they toured for Petunia, the band’s first proper album in three years and played a sold-out show at our own Market Hotel. I can not properly express how thoroughly renewing it was for us to see one of our favorite bands and favorite people play live again. Nevermind that the crowd also included a bunch of old friends, this night was just magic from start to finish. The band’s set concentrated primarily on the new album material, and flowed as their sets always do, in remarkable continuity. The energy was peak throughout and hit a crescendo during the set-closing “Sorcerer“, ending a wonderful night in truly excellent fashion. We expect more of these peaks on the tour in March.

I recorded this set with the installed Neumann hypercards blended with an excellent board feed mixed by Osaro. We are very pleased with the sound quality of this capture. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream the Complete Show:

nyctaper · Tonstartssbandht – Live at Market Hotel Oct 28 2021

Tonstartssbandht
2021-10-28
Market Hotel
Brooklyn NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard [engineer Osaro] + Neumann KM-150s > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:01:57]
01 Falloff
02 Opening
03 What Has Happened
04 Hey Bad >
05 Breathe – Susie – Last Train Home
06 All of My Children
07 Magic Pig
08 Smilehenge
09 Sorcerer

SUPPORT Tonstartssbandht: Facebook / Bandcamp

Phish: August 14, 2021 Atlantic City

August 22, 2021
By

The bright sunlight of a crystal clear Saturday morning reflected off the Atlantic Ocean and offered some hope of redemption from the negative energy of Friday night’s gaseous debauchery. Overnight, the unfortunate souls tasked with cleaning the boardwalk had removed nearly all evidence of the previous evening’s wreckage and with the arrival of weekend vacationers, Atlantic City seemed to breath fresh again.

We had the pleasure of spending a little time in the Phan Art exhibition on Saturday afternoon and those gentle vibes reinvigorated me and gave us a sense that maybe the positive elements of the scene could rise above the darkness that still lurked in the shadows. The threats of rain having dissipated, we entered the beach with a sense that this night could be special.

Perhaps Phish got wind of the negative energy, as they closed the first set with the dark cautionary tale “Squirming Coil”, advising all to steer clear of “Satan on the beach”. The balance of the first set was an up and down affair, as the trainwreck opening of “Ya Mar” was offset by a near-perfect run through of the intricate “Reba” jam.

But it was the meat of the second set where this show really began to shine. Phish covered the entire Quadrophenia album for Halloween 1995, and fortunately the epic “Drowned” has remained in occasional rotation, making a couple of appearances a year. The jam out of Drowned went into the familiar Jersey territory, as Trey clearly teased Springsteen’s “Dancing In The Dark” before transitioning to a nice spooky “Ghost”. Further buoyed by the opportunity to stretch out and explore, Trey seemed to be heading into a reprise of Drowned, which somehow then weirdly morphed into the middle portion of Scents and Subtle Sounds, which sadly petered out after about five minutes. The band refocused and launched into a gnarly Chalkdust that went into deep space before emerging through a fog of noise towards the gentle keyboard opening of Zeppelin’s “No Quarter”. At this point, the weekend had achieved musically exactly what I had hoped to see — a band playing at the peak of their powers and delivering transcendent moments in a troubling time of confusion and despair. We live for these peaks, and when Phish reprised Friday night’s “Tweezer” as the second encore to bookend my own person weekend experience, it was quite emotional. No nefarious post-show Boardwalk shenanigans could bring me down on this night, as we floated home through the magical mist of a sweet Summer night.

I recorded this show in the exact same manner as the previous night, with the mic stand only a few feet away from the Friday location. The Neumann hypers again delivered their magic and cut through the elements to deliver a sharp and bright recording. We’re extremely pleased again with this recording and hope you are too. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream “Chalkdust Torture > No Quarter”:

nyctaper · Phish – Live in Atlantic City August 14 2021

Phish
2021-08-14
The Beach
Atlantic City NJ

Digital Master Recording
Tapers Section at Soundboard

Neumann KM-150 Hypers > Sound Devices 744t > 24bit 48kHz wav > Soundforge (post production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
Set 1 [Total Time 1:20:54]
01 Llama
02 Tube
03 Destiny Unbound
04 Ya Mar
05 46 Days
06 Reba
07 Soul Shakedown Party
08 Split Open and Melt
09 The Squirming Coil

Set 2 [Total Time 1:24:54]

10 I Never Needed You Like This Before
11 Drowned
12 Ghost
13 Scents and Subtle Sounds
14 Chalk Dust Torture
15 No Quarter
16 Slave to the Traffic Light
17 Suzy Greenberg
18 [encore break]
19 A Life Beyond The Dream
20 Tweezer Reprise

SUPPORT Phish: Website | Store

Phish: August 13, 2021 Atlantic City

August 17, 2021
By

Other than two stops for higher education, I’ve lived my whole life in New York State. This means that I have a complicated relationship with the State of New Jersey. Yes, I accept that there are beautiful sections of New Jersey — the lakes and mountains in the North of the State, the breathtaking scenes along the Delaware River in the West of the State, and of course the many wonderful beaches on the state-long Atlantic coast.

But with that beauty comes some ugliness. Each of the major towns along the coast have commercialized boardwalks, and while the music of artists like The Drifters, Bobby Rydell, and Bruce Springsteen have glorified life along the Shore, the boardwalks are mostly just depressingly seedy. What is particularly depressing about Atlantic City in particular is that a hundred feet north of the boardwalk across the entire expanse of the town is even worse. Sure, there are casinos — America’s most blatant and unabashed grift — but there are also countless empty stores, vacant lots, and lost souls.

The arrival of the traveling circus that is Phish tour took this carnie atmosphere to an entire other level. This was not just a culture clash, but a multi-layered appropriation of a socially and morally bankrupt city by an out of control bacchanalia that sucked the last vestige of pride from the town. When I left Friday night’s show and walked back to my sad motel, I traversed a balloon orgy — a never-ending row of nitrous tanks where the underbelly of local criminals fed an insatiable suburban youth with the hiss of an addictive but terribly fleeting high. These scenes played out before midnight, but I am told that the hiss of evil lasted at least until 3:30 am.

I don’t have any reason to know if Phish themselves know any of this. They very clearly should know because like it or not, their name and reputation are tied to these events. But the sad confluence of a decaying scene and a band at the top of their game is not lost among those of us who are there for the music. This is not the late-era 1990s Grateful Dead, whose decline as a band in many ways paralleled the disintegration of the “scene”. What is coming from the Phish stage are consistently excellent performances, and that is part of what makes so infuriating the dangerously cavalier behavior of those who are going to ruin this for all of us.

It was against this dark backdrop that Phish took the stage on Friday night and proceeded to reference New Jersey and the beach setting from note one and throughout. The show opening “Cars Trucks and Buses” is both a Phish song and the less traveled right three lanes of the split NJ Turnpike between exits 6 and 15. The set closing “Sand” was everywhere, including stuck to everyone by the end of the night. In between, the band played one of the most solid first sets of the tour, highlighted by a bouncy and driven “Blaze On”. The second set was equally strong, with a notable Trey solo in “Possum” and the always-welcome Hood. But the highlight of the evening for me was certainly the thirty-five minutes of “Tweezer > Bathtub Gin”. At 22 minutes, this Tweezer wasn’t a long as the version from earlier in the tour, but the jams were all precise and focused. This might be the best single song played this Summer by this band.

The oasis of chunky jams now over, the trek from the Missouri Avenue Exit One off the beach to quieter confines was both physically difficult and psychically draining. While it was impossible to avoid the utter anarchy of the overrun Boardwalk, there was always Saturday to hope for some measure of redemption.

I recorded this set with the Neumann hypercards from a very advantageous location at the soundboard cage, shielded from the ocean wind by the tent (along with some extra custom “windcutter” screens). The live mix was sublimely perfect and loud enough to rise above the crowd din. The resulting recording is superb and exceeds any expectations tempered by this difficult taping location. I’ll be playing this one loud for a long time to come, and I hope you do too. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream Tweezer > Bathtub Gin:

nyctaper · Phish – Live in Atlantic City August 13, 2021

Phish
2021-08-13
The Beach
Atlantic City NJ

Digital Master Recording
Tapers Section at Soundboard

Neumann KM-150 Hypers > Sound Devices 744t > 24bit 48kHz wav > Soundforge (post production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
Set 1 [Total Time 1:04:29]
01 Cars Trucks Buses
02 AC DC Bag
03 Blaze On
04 Wolfman’s Brother
05 I Didn’t Know
06 Funky Bitch
07 Rift
08 Sand

Set 2 [Total Time 1:30:40]
09 Tweezer
10 Bathtub Gin
11 Everything’s Right
12 Possum
13 Also Sprach Zarathustra
14 Rise Come Together
15 Harry Hood
16 More
17 [encore break]
18 Loving Cup

SUPPORT Phish: Website | Store

Pernice Brothers: October 20, 2019 Mercury Lounge

October 30, 2019
By
Photos by PSquared Photography

The calendar year 1999 was one of great upheaval and positive personal change in my life and of the few records that soundtracked that eventful year, The Pernice Brothers Overcome By Happiness was right at the top. The album was a breakthrough of sorts for Joe Pernice, whose previous project the alt-country Scud Mountain Boys had disbanded after one album on Sub Pop Records. Overcome was a master work of perfectly written pop gems that touched on elements of alt-folk and chamber pop, and was an album created among a fellowship of Joe’s best friends at the time, including his brother Bob. There’s a great piece in Magnet Classics that describes the making the album [here].

When it was announced earlier this year that the Pernice Brothers would be returning with a new album for the first time in nearly a decade, I revisited Overcome and twenty years on, the album definitely stands the test of time. So kudos to my 1999 self for recognizing its brilliance and for continuing to follow the band through five more excellent albums before the hiatus. We were also lucky to have caught them live several times last decade, including at Mercury Lounge in 2006, a show I recorded mere months before NYCTaper became a thing. That Merc show it ends up would be the last Pernice Brothers show in NYC for thirteen years until this month.

The new album Spread The Feeling is a remarkable return to form for Pernice Brothers. The wit, wisdom, and melancholy that pervades the band’s catalog is clearly present, but this time around Joe Pernice tackles a variety of new subjects, including the abusive priests, drug abuse, and fatherhood, in a batch of songs that seem to be flexing more musical muscle than the band’s previous outings — albeit with virtually the same set of contributors.

The handful of dates that were announced included a return to Mercury Lounge and we were so pleased to be there and be permitted to record. What transpired was literally exactly what we had hoped to see. The band was tight and in great spirits, and the setlist featured both a substantial number of tracks from the new album, a nice selection of classic tracks, a classic cover, and quite a bit of a hilarious banter. And the early set time allowed me to fully experience this event, pack up, and go a few blocks to also see the Luna show we posted earlier. Quite an unforgettable night.

Joe Pernice announced on his active twitter account that the band will return with dates in the new year, and we’re hoping that includes another NYC show.

I recorded this set with the Neumann hypers mounted next to the soundboard and mixed with an excellent feed by FOH Manny. The sound quality is superb. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream the Complete Show (minus banter):

Pernice Brothers
2019-10-20
Mercury Lounge
New York NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Neumann KM-150s > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Please support this legendary band:
https://pernicebrothers.bandcamp.com/
http://pernicebrothers.com/

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:04:56]
01 [intro]
02 Eric Saw Colors
03 [band introductions]
04 Lullabye
05 [banter – first show]
06 Monkey Suit
07 [banter – thermometer]
08 The Ballad of Bjorn Borg
09 Something for You
10 [banter – are you high]
11 There Goes the Sun
12 Skinny Jeanne
13 I Came Back
14 [banter – Cardinal Law]
15 Always in All Ways
16 [banter – whisper]
17 She Don’t Care About Time [Gene Clark cover]
18 Baby in Two
19 Throw Me to The Lions
20 Mint Condition
21 Working Girls
22 [banter – Elvis]
23 The Weakest Shade of Blue
24 [non-encore break]
25 Somerville

PLEASE SUPPORT Pernice Brothers: website | buy Spread the Feeling on Bandcamp

Luna: October 20, 2019 Bowery Ballroom

October 23, 2019
By

The Luna tour that just completed was a big one. The band played seventeen shows in twenty days, and played a complete album every night, alternating between Lunapark, Bewitched, and Penthouse. The added bonus was the appearance of original bassist Justin Harwood, who shared duties with Britta Phillips throughout the shows and also allowed Britta to provide some vocal harmonies when Justin performed.

Now five years into their reunion, we’ve already noted that Luna seems poised to stick around as a working band and their performances have been revelations of consistency and excellence. And the fans seem to agree — both Bowery shows were sold out and it was actually a bit of a chore to score a ticket (thanks generous friend!). We did get one at the last minute for Sunday night’s show, and were fortunate to have captured this show.

Sunday night at Bowery was a Penthouse night and the band’s first set was a meticulous performance of the album, with personal favorite “23 Minutes in Brussels” as my highlight. After a brief intermission, the band returned to play the bonus or hidden track of “Bonnie and Clyde”, followed by a neat set of favorites, oddities, and a couple of covers. The final encore was “IHOP”, the lead track from the Pup Tent album that is virtually never played live — it was a personal request from a band superfan who despite travelling all over the country and indeed internationally to see Luna had never experienced this song live. This tour was like that — tricks and treats for the superfans and just plain great music for the rest of us.

Luna returns to performance in February, with two West coast shows announced thus far. We’d expect some New York dates to be added.

I recorded this set from our usual spot with the Neumann hypers this time, and mixed with a feed mixed expertly by the band’s sound man Paul. The sound quality is superb. Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream the Complete show (minus banter):

Luna
2019-10-20
Bowery Ballroom
New York NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard + Neumann KM-150s > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:44:43]
First Set (Penthouse)
01 [intro]
02 Chinatown
03 Sideshow by the Seashore
04 Moon Palace
05 Double Feature
06 Twenty-Three Minutes in Brussels
07 Lost In Space
08 Rhythm King
09 Kalamazoo
10 [banter – Tolstoy]
11 Hedgehog
12 Freakin’ and Peakin’
Second Set
13 Bonnie and Clyde [Serge Gainsbourg]
14 California Blue [Roy Orbison]
15 Still at Home
16 Inside Your Heart [The Monochrome Set]
17 Eggnog
18 Slide
19 Superfreaky Memories
20 [encore break]
21 Pup Tent
22 Season of the Witch [Donovan]
23 IHOP

SUPPORT Luna:  Website | Bandcamp

Wilco: October 13, 2019 Brooklyn Steel

October 15, 2019
By
Photos by Ellen Qbertplaya

I first saw Wilco 23 years ago, and first taped them live 22 years ago. Wilco was one of the first bands to be featured on NYCTaper in 2007 and have been consistently featured on this site over the years. By my count, we’ve featured Wilco 26 times on this site, from many local venues but also as far away at Virginia, Massachusetts, Cooperstown, and Connecticut. The simple reason for this consistent and voluminous documentation is that Wilco is perhaps the greatest American band of the last 25 years and their live performances are unfailingly superb. We’ve never had a bad time at a Wilco show, and very clearly have had some of our best live experiences thanks to them.

The release of any new Wilco album is a cause for excitement, but by all accounts (including ours) the latest release Ode To Joy is their strongest and most accomplished album in more than a decade. In times when the world is reeling out of control on a nearly daily basis, Wilco’s newest album is a thoughtful and measured approach to contemporary life. Given that Jeff Tweedy recently completed his autobiography and released two solo albums, this kind of contemplative Wilco release seems to have been the next step in this artist’s evolution.

After a newly two-year hiatus from touring, the entire Wilco band seems very much to have absorbed the energy at the center of the recent artistic output of its leader. The Wilco we saw on Sunday night, and by all accounts on every night of this tour, is a relaxed and confident band comfortable with themselves and each other. The result is that these shows have been not only celebrations of the return of the band to touring, but also kinetic performances of the new material mixed in with virtuoso versions of the classics. Of note at Brooklyn Steel was the absolutely stunning guitar solo by Nels Cline in “Impossible Germany”. Just check out the audience response at the close of the song and the extended ovation. What a moment. We were also quite pleased to see another spacey “Laminated Cat” and first album stand-out “Box Full of Letters”. But on this night, the showcase was on Ode To Joy and the setlist wisely spaced the songs throughout the set where we heard nine of the album’s eleven songs nearly in order of the album.

The Wilco tour continues with dates throughout the country for most of the rest of the year (dates here), culminating in the Wilco Sky Blue Sky Festival in Mexico in January.

I recorded this set with the Neumann hyper cards raised high directly centered behind the soundboard. The Stan Doty mix in this already-excellent sounding room was simply perfect and as a result we’re offering what I currently believe to be the best sounding Wilco recording I’ve ever captured. Enjoy!

Download The Complete Show [MP3] / [FLAC]

Stream the Complete Show:

Wilco
2019-10-13
Brooklyn Steel
Brooklyn NY

Digital Master Audience Recording
Recorded at Soundboard Booth

Neumann KM-150 Hypercardioids > Sound Devices 744t > 24bit 48kHz wav file > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 2:14:58]
01 Bright Leaves
02 Before Us
03 Company in My Back
04 War on War
05 One and a Half Stars
06 Handshake Drugs
07 You and I
08 Hummingbird
09 [banter – Radio City]
10 Someone to Lose
11 White Wooden Cross
12 Via Chicago
13 Laminated Cat
14 Random Name Generator
15 On and On and On
16 We Were Lucky
17 Love Is Everywhere (Beware)
18 [banter – Schmilco]
19 Impossible Germany
20 Box Full of Letters
21 [banter – Paul]
22 Everyone Hides
23 I’m Always in Love
24 Heavy Metal Drummer
25 I’m the Man Who Loves You
26 [non-encore break]
27 Hold Me Anyway
28 Misunderstood
29 [encore break]
30 An Empty Corner
31 Red-Eyed and Blue
32 I Got You
33 Outtasite
34 I’m a Wheel

PLEASE SUPPORT Wilco, visit their website, and purchase their Ode To Joy and their other releases from their website [HERE]

Acid Mothers Temple: April 20, 2019 Market Hotel

April 24, 2019
By


[photo from Kawabata’s blog]

The return of the Acid Mothers Temple stateside has become a yearly tradition and as a result the band has built its reputation in the U.S. as one of the most intense psych rock bands on the planet.  This year the band agreed to play the show on the day that has become a kind of Christmas for heads — “4-20” at Market Hotel.  Whether responding to the unique surroundings or the “holiday” atmosphere, AMT drew their largest crowd of the tour and played their longest set of the year.  This show was 90 minutes of the most intense music we’ve ever seen from this band, which has evolved in personnel in recent years, but remains anchored by the ferocious lead guitar of  Kawabata Makoto.  New-ish guitarist and vocalist Jyonson Tsu was featured in Dark Star Blues and La Novia, and the band is blessed with Tsu’s intense vocals and intuitive interplay with Makoto.  All in all, this was exactly what we’d hoped for from this band on this date, and judging by the diary entry for this date on Kawabata’s blog, the band was pretty stoked about the show too.

I recorded this set by substituting the Neumann hypers into the installed rig in the venue and the change was exactly perfect for this show.  A small percentage of the board feed was used to fortify vocals and kick drum, and overall the sound is superb.  Enjoy!

Download the Complete Show from Archive.org [HERE]

Acid Mothers Temple
2019-04-20
Market Hotel
Brooklyn NY

Digital Master Recording
Soundboard + Audience Matrix

Soundboard [engineer Allesandra Urso] + Neumann KM-150s > Sound Devices 744t > 2 x 24bit 48kHz wav files > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:23:43]
01 Blue Velvet Blues
02 Dark Star Blues
03 Chinese Flying Saucer
04 Flying Teapot
05 Disco Pink Lady Lemonade
06 La Novia
07 Pink Lady Lemonade Coda
08 Cometary Orbital Drive

PLEASE SUPPORT Acid Mothers Temple: Website | Buy Albums

The War On Drugs: September 19, 2017 Terminal 5

September 21, 2017
By


[screen capture from this video]

This is what the “next level” looks like. On the heels of the release of their 2017 major-label debut, A Deeper Understanding, The War On Drugs showed up for a two-night stand in New York, first at a packed Terminal 5, to be followed by a sold-out Central Park Summerstage on this Friday night. If the band’s Radio City show in 2015, right after they signed with Atlantic Records, portended what was to come, here we were, in the thick of the actual next step. I won’t retell the story from that 2015 post, but it’s worth a read if this is your first time with a War On Drugs recording from this site.

Being on a major label, or selling out lots of bigger shows, doesn’t signify whether a band is “good” or not, or worthy or not, of course. In fact, this part of the process can be a nasty trap for many musicians — anyone who knows anything about Nirvana or a zillion other bands can tell you that. But in the case of this band, the product of years of hard work, with a wide-open, intricate sound that screams for a bigger stage, it’s the right result, and it’s one that validates Adam Granduciel’s songwriting efforts in particular. Granduciel is the perfect vehicle for big-tent lyrics, writing songs that are both personal and universal, and the sound he has developed is of a piece with that. Beginning with Lost In A Dream, and continuing in a major way with A Deeper Understanding, War On Drugs albums have a precise, densely arranged, melodic sound with an almost otherwordly sheen to it. Of course, what’s funny about that is that it’s so unusual today. If you grew up in the 1980s, or listen to much music from that era, having albums that sounded good was table stakes for even cult-favorite bands. Studio budgets, and album sales, were different then. Many fewer bands show up these days with fourteen instruments credited to a single track — nearly half of them, in many cases, played by Adam Granduciel.

To reference the 1980s, and stalwarts like Tom Petty and Springsteen in particular, is not to malign this band at all. If anything, this show at Terminal 5 underscored that The War On Drugs are rightful heirs to that personal-yet-massive rock style. Like the best of their forebears, The War On Drugs are also able to translate their studio sound to the stage. Perhaps in a nod to many of the newer fans in the audience (one of us got asked if we first heard of the band on NPR), this set focused exclusively on the last two albums, and the band was so dialed-in they could very well have been playing the album over the PA. Of course, that would have deprived us of the added guitar pyrotechnics, and the joy of realizing, for the umpteenth time, that even in 2017, a band comprised of talented musicians of limited gimmickry but exceptional live performing skills can still make it big, can still mean something to people who these days are more accustomed to “musical precision” coming from an Ableton Live setup.

In this broad-reaching survey of the band’s last two albums, the band’s other most remarkable quality — consistency — was evident, to the point that it’s almost impossible to focus on a highlight. But for me, The War On Drugs song that will always best-represent this evolution in the band’s journey is “Under the Pressure,” which so elementally captures both Granduciel’s mindset in the making of Lost In A Dream, but also in many ways the enormous weight of the band’s current success. It’s another of those songs with specific meaning to its author that is also able to capture an almost-universal anxiety among its listeners. To see a band that we personally have liked and supported for so long reach this point — not only making it to this proverbial “next level” but thriving against the pressure — is a special and rare thing. To hear, even in the relatively few snippets of stage banter on this night, how they remain the same people who played in tiny bars ten (or even six) years ago, is rarer still. I have to acknowledge, briefly, that I realize this band doesn’t “need” the support of a website like this, but their treatment of us as fans, both in the past and today, says a lot. We appreciate it.

We each recorded this set from our usual location directly at the soundboard, acidjack’s with Schoeps MK41V microphones and nyctaper’s with Neumann KM150s. The sound quality of each is excellent, and both versions are offered here. Enjoy!

Special thanks to The War On Drugs, their management, and the Terminal 5 staff for allowing us to record the show. 

Download the nyctaper Neumann version of this show at Archive.org [HERE] [MP3] / [FLAC]

Download acidjack’s Schoeps version: [MP3] | [FLAC]

Stream acidjack’s version here:

Stream nyctaper’s version here:

The War On Drugs
2017-09-19
Terminal 5
New York, NY USA

Hosted at nyctaper.com
Recorded and produced by acidjack

Schoeps MK41V (at SBD, DFC)>KCY>Z-PFA>Sound Devices MixPre6 (24/48)>WAV>Adobe Audition CC>Izotope Ozone 5 (EQ, effects, image)>Audacity 2.0.5 (track, amplify, balance, downsample, dither)>FLAC ( level 8 )

Tracks
01 In Chains
02 Pain
03 An Ocean Between the Waves
04 Strangest Thing
05 Holding On
06 Red Eyes
07 Knocked Down
08 Nothing To Find
09 Up All Night
10 You Don’t Have To Go
11 Burning
12 Eyes to the Wind
13 [encore break]
14 Under the Pressure
15 Clean Living
16 In Reverse

************************

The War On Drugs
2017-09-19
Terminal 5
New York NY

Digital Master Recording
Recorded at Soundboard Booth

Neumann KM-150s > Sound Devices 744t > 24bit 48kHz wav > Soundforge (post-production) > CDWave 1.95 (tracking) > TLH > flac (320 MP3 and tagging via Foobar)

Recorded and Produced by nyctaper

Setlist:
[Total Time 1:47:30]
01 In Chains
02 Pain
03 An Ocean Between the Waves
04 Strangest Thing
05 Holding On
06 Red Eyes
07 Knocked Down
08 Nothing To Find
09 Up All Night
10 You Don’t Have To Go
11 Burning
12 Eyes to the Wind
13 [encore break]
14 Under the Pressure
15 Clean Living
16 In Reverse

PLEASE SUPPORT THE WAR ON DRUGS: Buy A Deeper Understanding from their website

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