I think our expectations of how good a '75 or '77 soundboard can sound need to be revised upwards now that they can easily be remixed into stereo. Here's a sample of No Quarter from the 3/21/75 show. Having the guitar panned into both the left and right channels is a choice that I went with because I liked how it sounds, but it could as easily been placed in just the right channel like a traditional live album, similar to what I did for the 3/14/69 remaster below. The cool thing is that once you have the instruments separated from each other, there are lots of creative things that can be done with them. I'm not sure this kind of thing will ever be good enough for Jimmy to consider releasing, but I'm guessing other bands will be looking at their back catalog of soundboards and seeing an opportunity. And before anyone asks, I'm still working on the 3/21/75 show so I don't have links for it yet.

Thanks. Check your messages.

I'm guessing it was pretty toasty in the Dallas area on 8/31/69. I couldn't find the exact temperature, but before "You Shook Me" Robert says: I checked the Plantations database (http://www.ledzeppelin-database.com/geekbaseweb/speechpage.aspx) and that was the only quote I found from him regarding temperature. Obviously that database only covers shows for which there are recordings, but we have recordings from other festivals that summer and he didn't talk about the heat during them.

Thanks for the heads up. That looks like it will be great. Can't wait to see it.

The "faux" stereo sound was likely done by offsetting one track from the other by a small amount, which can give a mono recording a sense of spaciousness that it wouldn't otherwise have. That's easy to do and has been around a long time. The ability to break a mono song into the individual instruments and remix it like you would a true multi-track recording is much more recent technology. It's already advanced enough for commercial use, and should only get better. I'm hoping the band uses it to revisit the BBC sessions and some of their other early mono recordings and releases them in stereo. It really brings the music to life.

Thanks. This one came out as good as I could have hoped for. I'm working on stereo remixes of a few other shows. I don't know if they will sound as good as this one, but hearing them in stereo really adds something to them.

I'm not sure about his health, but they played multiple shows on the 14th and 15th and single shows on the 16th, 17th, and 19th. At some point all of that singing in such a short period of time may have caught up with him.

Very cool. Thanks for doing that. My suggestion for a future episode is ticket stubs.

The "soundboards" from the Earls Court shows are actually video soundtracks, so they were recorded on a different machine than the soundboards from the '75 US tour. I haven't listened to the Earl's Court recordings recently, but being soundtracks they may also include effects (reverb, etc.) that don't appear on soundboards. Also, more generally, we don't know the path each recording took before it was released. One could have been copied from tape to tape multiple times before we got to hear it, and another could be much closer to the master. That's my guess as to why the '77 soundboards all sound so different, even for shows that were played on consecutive nights.

Thanks. I'd be very happy if everything I remaster sounds this good, but because each source is different, the results always vary. This one just worked out well.

This is the radio broadcast, which I remixed to stereo and remastered. Send me a PM if you want a copy.

Thanks for posting it. It seems strange how being off for two years was considered a long time away back then when bands these days go much longer between albums, much less tours. Although given how frequently Zep was on the road through most of their career, it was a long layoff. And for a bit of perspective on how productive they were, all of the music we know and love from their time with Bonzo was created in about the same amount of time as the period between the 2007 show and today.

For me, the version of Moby Dick from the Yale show is my favorite one, and unfortunately it's only available on an audience recording.

What show?

Evolution Is Timing volume three is out. 12 DVDs covering: 1975.5.241975.5.251977.7.171979.8.41979.8.111973.MSG Also, volume one was re-released at a much lower price than the original was going for recently.

Robert talking about the first record he ever owned, as well as meeting Elvis and a lot of other topics. Part 1: Part 2: Part 3:

I second going directly to Dave. If that's not an option, I checked Magzter last night and it turns out they no longer accept subscriptions to TBL, but they do have the last six issues available for purchase at US$5.99 each.

It sounds like a tracking force issue, but because you have a turntable that automatically returns the arm, it may simply have reached whatever cutoff point it has set internally. This would only happen where the sides of an LP are longer than is typical. To test it, try manually putting the needle past the point where it is automatically returning. If it auto-returns as soon as you set the needle down, then it seems like the machine will only let the arm go so far before returning it back to base, regardless of whether or not it has reached the runout grooves. Info on tracking force: https://blog.fluance.com/tracking-force-important-turntables/

Welcome. You can get current issues of the magazine electronically through an application called Magzter. A year long subscription (which I think covers three issues) is US$7.99. If the app won't work in the UK, you can order the current issue and back issues directly from the TBL web site. The back issues are pretty inexpensive, and shipping should be low given that you are not far from Dave. http://www.tightbutloose.co.uk/magazine-orders/

Back when bootlegs only came on LPs, not only did you get pressings of bad audience recordings, but the ticks and pops from the terrible vinyl the bootleg companies used were often easier to hear than the music. Good times.

My nephew just graduated from Xavier (nobody calls it St. Xavier, even if that's its official name.) As the article mentioned, the school is still very straight laced (boys only, ties required, a dean of discipline who takes his job seriously, etc.) Based on what my nephew said about his time at the school, I can't imagine a similar band playing there today, even though the shock of people with long hair playing loud guitars has long since worn off. It must have been quite the jolt back then to have a band like the Yardbirds do a show there, with Vietnam going on and the length of your hair being as much of a social statement as fashion statement.

I mistakenly deleted it from the site I had it stored on. I'll upload it again this weekend and will send you the links once that's done.

I haven't compared the two. Despite how much time I spend remastering Zep shows, I actually don't care too much about sound quality so I don't try to collect every version of a show to find the one I think sounds best. I'm typically fine with whatever version I'm listening to at the moment. For Blueberry Hill, Winston's version was the first time I heard the stereo source and it's remained my go to since then. I picked up the Nite Owl release and listened to a few songs and they sounded good, but it didn't make such an immediate impression that it made me forget about Winston's.

The only North Bridge soundboards I've released that I still have available for download are the ones you have listed there. There were a couple others (5/25/75 and 5/25/77) that were terrible and should never have been released. Also, Winston has done a bunch more than what's on your list. There's a thread on this site about his remasters, and it includes a list of what he's done. One of his that I really like is his version of Blueberry Hill. It's called "The Great Love Affair".

Some desert blues. Not sure why this is labeled as an acoustic performance because Bombino is playing an electric guitar during it.