11. Empty Sky (Elton John - Live In San Diego: 9/29/1975)
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- Опубліковано 15 вер 2024
- After licking my wounds from being defeated during the 1985-1986 UK Tour TierMaker (which was rigged by the way), I am forced to upload a few shows that are not part of the 1986/1997 plan. I want to thank the team of “TheEltonBootlegs,” “Ethan Thompson - Murray,” and “TSS_Killer” for putting me through misery and forcing me to listen to shows that make me cry. For years, an incomplete copy of this show circulated that missed most of the show and wasn’t in the best quality. In April 2020, the nearly complete show was released online from the Mike Millard collection which made all previously known versions obsolete. The quality is absolutely amazing and with the exception of “Your Song” fading in during the first verse, this recording is complete. With the length of the set (which was split into two parts with an intermission) and the character count limit on UA-cam, I have decided for all of the uploads for the 1975 tour to split the description into two parts. The first part will start at “Your Song” and end at “Street Kids.” The second part will start at “Funeral For A Friend/Love Lies Bleeding” and conclude with “Pinball Wizard.”
With the limited quantity of shows, it is hard to document the overall tour - but what is available can give an idea on how it might have sounded. This first show from the tour contains songs that were dropped later on in the tour and the extremely high audio quality highlights just about everything that happens on the stage. While this is the same band that played on the Wembley 1975 concert that happened in June, there are many differences compared to that show, and to the shows on the “West Of The Rockies” Tour. While this new band played with focus and did justice to the material back in June, the approach has changed for the tour proper. The material (new and old) is played with more of a “fly by the seat of the pants” style and has a feeling of randomness throughout. A number of songs have also been extended to include jams that are meant to highlight the prowess of the rhythm section as well.
Apart from the chaotic nature of the music, another talking point of this tour is the state of Elton John’s voice. Despite being the first show of the tour, his voice is not in great shape and the song deliveries are fraught with intonation problems, sour phrasing, and bad tone throughout. While Elton’s voice was often not in the best shape during 1973-1974, he at least had a decent tone and had a better grasp with his phrasing, note choices, and could reasonably stay in key. For the shows on this tour, his tone has taken on a nasally, thin, and shrill characteristic that is often unpleasant on the ears. When that is combined with the off intonation and the lack of energy behind the singing, you get some of Elton’s worst live vocal performances outside of the infamous nodule era of late 1986. Now… time to get through all of these performances…
PART I:
“Your Song” has Elton bungling the piano in a few places and his voice has a rough sound that even breaks during one of the choruses. “I Need You To Turn To” highlights Elton’s thinner tone and his intonation is off in a handful of places. “Border Song” displays Elton’s and the backing vocalists’ ability to sing notes that don’t have clean intonation and Elton seems to nearly shout to be heard when the band kicks in. “Take Me To The Pilot” has Elton struggling in places and has trouble singing in the upper register. In contrast, the guitar work sounds really good with Davey Johnstone and Caleb Quaye playing great throughout. “Dan Dare (Pilot Of The Future)” has Elton sounding shaky in places and he also flubs lyrics early on. “Country Comfort” has Elton’s voice giving out in the choruses, stumbling on a line in the second verse, and clashing with the backing vocalists. “Levon” has random oversinging in places and Elton also phrases some of the lyrics with odd inflections. His intonation is also spotty throughout the performance. “Rocket Man” has a coarse vocal tone in places and some of the falsetto notes have unclean precision. “Hercules” has Elton forcing his voice in places and while there is some great instrumental work being done (especially from Davey and Caleb), things are borderline chaotic at times (which gets amplified as the tour progresses). “Have Mercy On The Criminal” has Davey and Caleb playing harmonics during the intro which overwhelm the sound and Elton sounds really rough in places. “Empty Sky” features less-than-stellar singing from Elton, but the track highlights what the new band brings to the table and there are some great moments during the jam session. Concluding the first part, “Street Kids” has great energy, but Elton’s vocals are a couple steps below the album version and the groove of the music doesn’t come through as well as the album version.
ENJOY!!!
I can imagine this song being a difficult one to sing on stage. He seems to find it hard on all the live versions I've heard
That first line sounds dreadful and the "I look High" sections are flat.
Hahaha! Pretty rough!
I've never heard the 'ultimate' version of this live; and I reckon it could really roast on the right day with everyone firing as it sounds so much more alive played live. But today that certainly wasn't happening and this is where I stop for today because one can only ingest so much of this kind of aural abuse, Elton's slurred vocal and Pope's hideous session-level drum patterns are giving me nightmare-level taunts and I havent even fallen asleep yet.
Sorry that you're having nightmares!
theres better live versions dw!
@@cringehubcentral3003 I have since come to believe that, just as there is no floor 13 in hotel complexes, the year 1975 never actually existed.
@@ncf1 😭