New LP Releases – Rolling Stones 1965, Fleetwood Mac 1970

Available now from http://www.1960s.london

Let The Airwaves Flow 9: On Tour’65 Volume II

The Rolling Stones

Side One

1. The Last Time (Jagger, Richard)
2. Little Red Rooster (Dixon)
3. Everybody Needs Somebody To Love (Russell, Burke, Wexler)
4. Oh Baby (We Got A Good Thing Going) (Lynn)
5. (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction (Jagger, Richard)
6. Down The Road Apiece (Raye)
7. Time Is On My Side (Meade)
8. What A Shame (Jagger, Richard)

Side Two

1. Everybody Needs Somebody To Love (Russell, Burke, Wexler)
2. Pain In My Heart (Neville)
3. Around And Around (Berry)
4. The Last Time (Jagger, Richard)
5. Time Is On My Side (Meade)
6. It’s All Over Now (Womack, Womack)
7. (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction (Jagger, Richard)
8. Everybody Needs Somebody To Love (Russell, Burke, Wexler)

Recording Details

Side One

Tracks 1-3 Recorded and broadcast on the ‘Ed Sullivan Show’, New York 2.5.65

Tracks 4 & 5 Recorded for ‘Yeh Yeh’ with Tony Hall, BBC Light Programme, London on 20.8.65 and broadcast on 30.8.65

Tracks 6 – 8 recorded and broadcast on ‘Ready Steady Go’, Studio One, Wembley (ARTV) on 15.01.65

Side Two

Tracks 1 –  4 recorded live at Wembley Empire Pool, London on 11^th April 1965 and broadcast on April 18^th as “The Big Beat ’65” (ABC and ITV)

Tracks 5 & 6 Recorded live at the Olympia, Paris for RTL Radio, First Show April 18th 1965

Track 7  Recorded for ‘Shindig’, Los Angeles on 20.5.65 and broadcast on 26.5.65

Track 8 recorded and broadcast on ‘Ready Steady Go’, Studio One, Wembley (ARTV) on 26.02.65

Personnel

Mick Jagger – lead vocals, harmonica

Brian Jones – guitar

Keith Richard – guitar, backing vocals

Bill Wyman – bass

Charlie Watts – drums

Sleevenotes

1965 was the year that the Stones exported their domestic success to the rest of the world: the tracks here comprise radio and TV broadcasts from the UK, France and the USA.

London’s Ready Steady Go! was the Stones televisual home from home. Under the slogan “The Weekend Starts Here!” and fronted by uber-mod Cathy McGowan this is where the Stones learnt to play to the cameras. Mick Jagger: “RSG! wasn’t safe, it took risks and waded right into the wonderful chaos of the times. It was the best rock’n’roll show of all time”. January 1965 saw the Stones playing their own What A Shame as well as covers of Time Is On My Side and Don Raye’s Down The Road Apiece. By now female screams were continuous, overwhelming the quieter passages. During the February 1965 performance of Everybody Needs Somebody To Love Mick was dragged offstage by female members of the Stones fan club.

The success of RSG! spawned similar shows in America such as Shindig and Hullabaloo.  The Stones recorded (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction for Shindig in May 1965. Brian Jones sports an atypical acoustic guitar whilst Richard opts for a tougher looking Firebird. Equally influential was The Ed Sullivan Show. On their May 1965 appearance The Last Time seems to take Charlie by surprise as he is still setting up when the song starts. Brian sports his trademark white Vox Teardrop but it is Keith that solos. Brian’s slide provides the focus of Little Red Rooster, duetting with Jagger’s harmonica at the end of the song. Jagger vamps his way into Everybody Needs Somebody To Love, the audience screaming louder in response to his pointing at them during the “you, you, you” sequence. Remarkably the band still bow at the end of each number.

A short-lived BBC radio programme was “Yeh Yeh” was hosted by Tony Hall and featured the Stones in August 1965. Versions of Oh Baby (We Got A Good Thing Going) and(I Can’t Get No) Satisfactionare different to those on the official BBC On Air release. In April 1965 the Paris Olympia was the venue for an exhilarating gig, thankfully recorded in good quality by French radio and represented here by Time Is On My Side and It’s All Over Now. Despite a very lively crowd Jagger delivers Time Is On My Side with complete conviction, aided by strong backing vocals. The guitar solo in It’s All Over Now is lyrical and concise.

Amidst this international success the UK was not overlooked. Bill Wyman remembers “On 11^th April we played our first UK show in three weeks at the Empire Pool, Wembley. It was ‘The NME Poll Winners concert’ in front of a capacity audience of 10,000. Other acts included the Moody Blues, Georgie Fame, the Seekers, Donovan, Them, the Animals and the Beatles. We closed the first half and the Beatles closed the show.” Everybody Needs Somebody To Love is performed at a slower pace than usual and forms a medley with Pain In My Heart . Around And Around features a pair of densely interwoven guitars whilst the start of The Last Timeis greetedwith female screams and benefits from distinctive Keith Richards backing vocals. At the concert the Stones picked up awards for Best New Group, Best British R’n’B Group and Mick Jagger won Best New Disc Or TV Singer.

From February 1964 through to November 1965, the Stones were frequent performers on mainstream radio and television. It was like having them in your living room: they would never offer this easy access again.  From 1966 onwards the increasing fragility of Brian Jones would result in the Stones gradually cutting back on their live performances, both in person and on TV. Once 1967’s “Summer Of Love” was safely out of the way the Stones would resurface in the darkly menacing video for Jumping Jack Flash, all tribal make up and bug-eye shades.

The weekend would no longer start here, because the weekend would never stop.

Sleevenotes – Nell Cote

Live in Seattle 17.01.1970

Fleetwood Mac

Tracklisting

Side One

1. Let Me Love You (Ling & King)
2. Like It This Way (Kirwan)
3. Only You (Kirwan)
4. Madison Blues (James)
5. Baby Please Set A Date (James)

Side Two

1. Homework (Rush, Perkins & Clark)
2. Stranger Blues (Lewis, Levy & James)
3. The Sun Is Shining (James)
4. World In  Harmony (Kirwan & Green)
5. Great Balls Of Fire (Hammer & Blackwell)

Side Three

1. Rattlesnake Shake (Green)

Side Four

1. Jenny, Jenny (Johnson & Penniman)
2. Teenage Darling (Spencer)
3. Ready Teddy (Marascalco & Blackwell)

Personnel

Peter Green: vocals, guitar

Danny Kirwan: vocals, guitar

Jeremy Spencer: vocals, slide guitar, congas, percussion

Mick Fleetwood: drums, percussion

John McVie: bass

Recording details

All tracks recorded live at the Eagles Auditorium, Seattle on January 17^th 1970 and broadcast on KOL-FM “Great Nights At The Eagles”

Sleevenotes

In August 1967 Fleetwood Mac were a diffident group of Chicago-blues purists, playing their first gig at the seventh annual Windsor Jazz and Blues Festival. Much had changed by January 1970, when they toured the US in support of Then Play On, the 1969 LP that was their creative highspot. Mick Fleetwood’s memories of a night supporting the Grateful Dead gives a flavour of the tour.  “That Dead song with the line ‘busted down on Bourbon’, that was the night that Fleetwood Mac played with them at The Warehouse in New Orleans. Owsley had spiked the water fountains and after our set, John McVie was out of it, so he stood in the audience while the rest of us jammed with the Dead. The audience loved it – a massive freak-out. We were following their car back to the hotel, absolutely out of it on acid. I drove the car from the back seat with my feet while somebody else worked the pedals from the side – nobody was in the driver’s seat. We got lost, and by the time we arrived, they’d been busted . . .”

Thankfully Fleetwood Mac reached Seattle intact and unbusted, playing on both  January 16^th and 17^th. The latter gig was recorded on a reel-to-reel recorder using two microphones hung over the stage, the excellent quality results were broadcast on Radio KOL-FM. Because of this we can now enjoy the band at the height of their virtuosity as they balance their love of the blues with extended versions of their own songs, leavened by a smattering of 50’s rock’n’roll classics.

The set begins with a leisurely stroll through the slow blues Let Me Love You, originally recorded by BB King. Green revered King: King reciprocated, saying of Green: “He has the sweetest tone I have ever heard. He was the only one who gave me the cold sweats.” The focus switches to Danny Kirwan with a lively rendition of his Like It This Way. Although it never appeared on a Fleetwood­­ Mac studio LP it was included on the Blues Jam at Chess LP and was a frequent live number showcasing intertwined Kirwan and Green guitar parts. Only You is a more obscure Kirwan composition: it would not receive an official release until his solo album Hello There Big Boy (1979). Both these songs would have enriched Then Play On. Jeremy Spencer loved Elmore James, and two covers of his songs feature next, a raunchy Madison Blues is followed by Spencer’s plaintive plea of Baby Please Set A Date. Otis Rush’s Homework features a tough Peter Green vocal and an infectious workout from the whole band with McVie’s bass prominent. Although not featured on any studio LP Stranger Blues was frequently played live, as was The Sun Is Shining. This track was originally released as the B side of the Black Magic Woman single (1968): its slower tempo provides the opportunity for Spencer to excel on slide. The delicate passages of instrumental World In Harmony highlight the harmony guitars of Kirwan and Green whilst Jerry Lee Lewis’ Great Balls Of Fire gives Spencer a chance to indulge his Elvis fetish.

Thus far the set has been relatively disciplined, but Rattlesnake Shake gives the band a chance to stretch out. Often this involved a detour into the instrumental Underway but not tonight, as the band stick closely to the basic riff throughout with Mick Fleetwood keeping up a punishing pace through multiple guitar solos whih show this incarnation of the band at their improvisatory peak. The song builds to an impressive crescendo before fading at the 22 minute mark: in an alternative universe they are probably playing it still.

The set ends with a trio of rockers. Little Richard’s Jenny, Jenny is played long and heavy. Teenage Darling sounds like a 50’s original but it was written by Jeremy Spencer and was the B side of his 1970 solo single Linda. With a spoken introduction and some doo wop backing vocals the song simultaneously parodies and celebrates the genre. Finally another Little Richard song Ready Teddy has Spencer in full Presley rockout mode again. The audience clap along whilst the band take the song down and then roar back up again, making for a breathless set closer.

Peter Green would leave Fleetwood Mac in April 1970. The band spent years in the commercial wilderness before their unlikely re-invention in 1975, when  Buckingham Nicks’ catchy melodicism was grafted onto the sturdy Fleetwood Mac rhythm section.  The trademark eclecticism of Fleetwood Mac v1 would not survive the transition, so we are fortunate that their onstage exuberance was captured by recordings such as the one you are holding now.

Sleevenotes – Mrs. Brown