Hidden hoard of live rock to be released

[BERIGAN]

Hidden hoard of live rock to be released

John Harlow, Los Angeles

THE world’s largest independent rock and pop music archive, featuring stars from Jimi Hendrix to Elvis Costello and from Janis Joplin to Madonna, is to be opened for the first time.

Up to 100,000 songs recorded and filmed between 1966 and 1991 by Bill Graham, the American concert promoter, languished in an underground basement in San Francisco for more than 10 years after his death.

Then it was bought by Bill Sagan, a health company executive turned rock entrepreneur, who has now launched negotiations aimed at securing the stars’ permission to release their music. This weekend he was flying to London for talks with lawyers representing British rockers such as Led Zeppelin and the Who.

The archive contains unseen footage of a legendary performance by the Who in 1973, when drummer Keith Moon collapsed and a student was picked from the audience to finish the show, and the final concert in 1978 by the Sex Pistols.

There are unknown performances by Led Zeppelin such as a version of Howlin’ Wolf’s Killing Floor, which they later rewrote as the Lemon Song, and a tousle-headed Elton John singing his 1970 ballad Your Song.

There are also moments luminaries may prefer to forget, such as Joe Cocker vomiting on stage and Madonna hitting herself in the face with her chunky necklaces. All were pitilessly captured by Graham’s photographers or, in later years, four cameramen.

Graham, born Wolfgang Grajonca in Nazi Berlin, was described by Joplin as the first concert promoter to respect the artists and give them what they wanted, both on and off stage.

As a result, normally wary performers such as Frank Zappa and Bob Dylan signed contracts that allowed him to record their concerts at venues he managed in New York and California.

Graham hoarded everything, from ticket stubs and backstage passes to psychedelic Jefferson Airplane posters and surplus Duran Duran T-shirts.

When Graham died in a helicopter crash in 1991, he had packed an air-conditioned cellar with 30m artefacts. Three years ago his corporate heirs sold it for £2.9m to Sagan, a Led Zeppelin fan from Minnesota, who joked that he had only snapped it up for the garish Zeppelin tour ties. He beat Paul Allen, the Microsoft billionaire, to the deal.

Now, having spent months going through enough boxes to fill 25 40ft-long lorries when he moved the archive to a more secure warehouse, Sagan estimates his trove could be worth more than £50m.

Sagan, 56, has already started recouping his investment by selling off posters and tickets through an internet site called Wolfgang’s Vault. But he believes the 7,000-plus concerts captured on audio tape and film are his prize asset.

In February Sagan started gauging rock fans’ reactions by broadcasting live recordings by Bob Marley, Bruce Springsteen and Chuck Berry over his internet radio station. He was inundated with e-mails asking for more.

Some of the shows, such as Aretha Franklin at the Fillmore West in 1971, have been officially released, albeit in truncated form, and others are to be found on bootlegs. But most of the music has been heard only by those who were lucky enough to be there at the time.

Jimmy Page, of Led Zeppelin, who spent years begging for scraps from bootleggers so that he could compile a history of the band in 2003, is keen to dive into the archive.

“Bill recorded a San Francisco show that Jimmy remembers as momentous: which Zep fan would not want to hear that?” said an Atlantic Records source last week.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-2271915,00.html

Edited July 16, 2006 by BERIGAN

[Rooster_Ties]

The archive contains unseen footage of a legendary performance by the Who in 1973, when drummer Keith Moon collapsed and a student was picked from the audience to finish the show, and the final concert in 1978 by the Sex Pistols.

from youtube...

Keith Moon Passes Out During "Won't Get Fooled Again" 1973

[jazzbo]

This article is old news (remember seeing an indepth interview/feature on CBS many months ago) but good news!

[Claude]

The site was launched last december, I think

http://www.wolfgangsvault.com

[bluesbro]

One thing is owning the tapes and a very different one is owning the RIGHTS to rlease any of the material. I doubt any of it will be released anytime soon.

[jazzbo]

Right. . . but. . . if there's cash to be made. . . I bet some of these artists and labels will get interested.

Edited July 16, 2006 by jazzbo

[Chuck Nessa]

Beyond artists rights are the rights of "venue", labels, managers, promoters and (depending on the sales contracts) the folks/label/corp owning the artists' contracts at the time of recording. Did I mention the recording engineer(s)? Did Graham have a "contractual understanding" with him? Fun, fun, fun.

[jazzbo]

Well, one plus for the new owner will be that the venues were Graham's. And likely the recording was by one of his staff and "work for hire." He was fas much as I can tell also close and friendly with a lot of the managers (and artists) and that will help grease some agreements.

Sure won't be easy sailing, but I predict it won't be too long before some of these come out.

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

i heard the only thing in his archive is a video of him lecturing a hippie from the stage pointing at him sayin': "listen up shmuck, cause this invloves you"

[Chuck Nessa]

Well, one plus for the new owner will be that the venues were Graham's. And likely the recording was by one of his staff and "work for hire." He was fas much as I can tell also close and friendly with a lot of the managers (and artists) and that will help grease some agreements.

Sure won't be easy sailing, but I predict it won't be too long before some of these come out.

If you'd been involved it stuff like this before, you might have a different view. Any one of those (and other) folks can file a suit (for minimal bucks) and drag stuff out.

[jazzbo]

I realize that, but I think that it's not as likely as it might be had this been the holdings of another promoter.

That's all I'm saying.

I'm willing to wait and see. I still predict we don't wait too terribly long.

[Chuck Nessa]

I realize that, but I think that it's not as likely as it might be had this been the holdings of another promoter.

That's all I'm saying.

I'm willing to wait and see. I still predict we don't wait too terribly long.

I'm sure we will see something but there will be insurmountable roadblocks for many projects. Depends how deep the pockets are/

[JSngry]

Oh good! More 60s rock!

[jazzbo]

I confess that I'm looking forward to some of what might come out of this. . . as always, I expect that a lot of material needs to be released to get the gems I want. We'll see. I think that there's a market for this stuff that many concerned won't turn a blind eye to (now if these were all jazz shows, fugedaboudit.)

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

but at filmore cannonalball adderely opened for the who! who did miles open for again, the dead? i dont remember. in his book he said he was suppose dto 2 support steve miller but refused cause steve miller sucks. and the charles lloyd opened up for i dont know who

BUT MOST OF ALL AT FILLMORE EAST IN 1969 THEY WOULD HAVE JAZZ DAY AND 1 FLYER I SAW WAS LIKE A QUADRUPLE BILL OF:

-COLEMAN HAWKINS QUARTET

-LEE MORGAN QUINETET

-ART BLAKEY AND HIS JAZZ MESSENGERS

-THAD LEWIS/MEL JONES BIG BAND

[Rooster_Ties]

BUT MOST OF ALL AT FILLMORE EAST IN 1969 THEY WOULD HAVE JAZZ DAY AND 1 FLYER I SAW WAS LIKE A QUADRUPLE BILL OF:

-COLEMAN HAWKINS QUARTET

-LEE MORGAN QUINETET

-ART BLAKEY AND HIS JAZZ MESSENGERS

-THAD LEWIS/MEL JONES BIG BAND

FWIW, Blakey in '69 at the Fillmore East would have probably included Woody Shaw and Tyrone Washington!!! :rsmile: :rsmile: :rsmile:

source

April? 1969: Woody Shaw-tpt; Tyrone Washington-tsx; George Cables-p; Scotty Holt-b

Wollman Auditorium, Columbia University, NYC (February 24, 1969) [db 3/20/69 p.15]

Loeb Student Center, New York University, NYC (March 3, 1969) [db 3/20/69 p.15]

Fillmore East, NYC (March 9, 1969) [db 3/20/69 pp.14, 52]

Black Bottom, Montreal, Canada (April? 1969) [Coda 6/69 p.34]

Café La Boheme (early April-early May 1969) [Voice] [this is questionable considering the below activity]

Edited July 17, 2006 by Rooster_Ties

[Tony Pusey]

Anyone else remember Mike Wilhelms poetic exchange with Graham in the terrible film of the Fillmore Wests last stand `F..k you and thanks for the memories!`?

and I would love to have a stack of SF music Quicksilver, Mad River, C J Fish, Electric Flag, Country Weather and so on, aint never gonna happen, but it would be nice sometime before I die....

[Aggie87]

Oh good! More 60s rock!

Yeah, and no more archival jazz releases, either!!

[JSngry]

Actually, at this point, I could handle that.

[DatDere]

Just heard Zep's version of Killing Floor live at the Fillmore East on Wolfgang's Vault's online radio. Sounds okay, but the vocals and lead guitar are buried way too low in the mix. Unless it's possible to remix the tapes (did they record on 4 track?), I kind of doubt this will ever be released officially.

[Dan Gould]

Speaking of Fillmore recordings, a truly rare and sure to be spectacular recording has appeared on Dime:

Two sets of B.B. King, first generation CD off of soundboard, live at the Fillmore East in 1971. The seeder says "I just got the ok to put up" but I am guessing that OK came from his source, not B.B. or this guy who bought the tapes. Don't snooze and lose!

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

OH I TOTALLY FORGOT ON THAT POSTER ANOTHER JAZZ ACT ON THE BILL WAS, AND IM TOTALLY NOT SHITTIN YOU: THE DUKE PEARSON BIG BAND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[PHILLYQ]

My first concert, in 1970, was Santana at the Fillmore East. Opening act was Rahsaan Roland Kirk. Would love to hear that now- then, it was bewildering and strange. Now, I'd probably dig it a lot.

[Chuck Nessa]

Speaking of Fillmore recordings, a truly rare and sure to be spectacular recording has appeared on Dime:

Two sets of B.B. King, first generation CD off of soundboard, live at the Fillmore East in 1971. The seeder says "I just got the ok to put up" but I am guessing that OK came from his source, not B.B. or this guy who bought the tapes. Don't snooze and lose!

I wanna know what a " first generation CD off of soundboard" is. It could be the first cd copy of a 15th generation cassette "off of the soundboard".

It sounds interesting but I prefer my King earlier.

Folks have to understand some "soul jazz" and bunches of "blues artists" performed differently in front of different audiences. I'd pay $100 for a cd of BB live at Silvio's in 1965.

[Dan Gould]

Well Chuck hearing the recording, this is not a multi-generation source. Its clearly straight from the soundboard to reel to digital. One generation from the source.

I love all eras of B.B. but its very rare to find recordings much earlier than this. Listening to these tracks he's sounds as strong as the Blues is King album or Live at the Regal.