I didn't become a fan until 1989 - at the age of 13. Even though I wasn't able to attend the Steel Wheels tour I followed it and was fascinated by it when it happened, at an age when its easy to feel wonderment. (I still listen to Flashpoint a lot.) It was my introduction to this music that I love so much.

When I go back and listen to the band in the mid 70's, I mostly think they sound completely awful - unrehearsed, shouting instead of singing, arrangements that no one put any thought into. In fact, I don't even think they arranged, it sounds like they just bs'd their way through it. Most of Love You Live is God-awful to my ears.

(I contrast, I love Get Your Ya Ya's Out and the '72 sound)

But people who were in their years of wonderment during that time seem to love the "Love You Live" sound.

So...the mid-70's sound - is it objectively bad? Subjectively good depending on your own memories?

I find LA Friday to be absolutely ridiculous for the reasons you've mentioned. There's some songs in the '75-'76 sets that I find unlistenable.

What Love You Live has though is the Toronto material which is fantastic. A very unevern period that was at it's worst in '75, then got progressively better until '77. By '78 they were AWESOME live again - for one last tour.

[thepowergoats.com]

It's an interesting take, and one that i imagine other fans share, particularly if the 1989 Stones are what you fell in love with first.

The 1976 Stones were very different in many ways. Loose and sloppy for sure.

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Send It To me
I didn't become a fan until 1989 - at the age of 13. Even though I wasn't able to attend the Steel Wheels tour I followed it and was fascinated by it when it happened, at an age when its easy to feel wonderment. (I still listen to Flashpoint a lot.) It was my introduction to this music that I love so much.

When I go back and listen to the band in the mid 70's, I mostly think they sound completely awful - unrehearsed, shouting instead of singing, arrangements that no one put any thought into. In fact, I don't even think they arranged, it sounds like they just bs'd their way through it. Most of Love You Live is God-awful to my ears.

(I contrast, I love Get Your Ya Ya's Out and the '72 sound)

But people who were in their years of wonderment during that time seem to love the "Love You Live" sound.

So...the mid-70's sound - is it objectively bad? Subjectively good depending on your own memories?

There are 25 songs in the setlist. Half of them are not the way you describe them, imo:

Fingerprint File
Angie
Wild Horses
All Down The Line
Gimmie Shelter
Honky Tonk Women
It´s Only Rock´n´Roll
Happy
Brown Sugar
Jumping Jack Flash
Tumblin´Dice
Sympathy For The Devil

All these songs are great, imo. Of course there are some stinkers + some songs where Jagger´s "arrogant" act is getting a bit too much, but let´s not forget that out of 25 songs, there are some really good ones here as well

EDIT:
Sorry, I didn´t see that you were talking about Love You Live.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2012-04-24 00:17 by DandelionPowderman.

There's something almost likeable about the awfulness of Tumbling Dice on that record. The way he lazily yelps out "BAY-bee" It's horribly fascinating.

Emotion, culture, and memory have lot to do with how we think and feel about music. I have a completely different relationship to the Steel Wheels record than someone who's a baby boomer; I can listen to Almost Hear You Sigh and think about having a crush on some girl in class - something that makes songs sound better and mean more.

I remember being so disappointed after hearing this release in '77. It was their first live album since Ya Yas and I expected a lot. I was especially pissed at shelling out extra bucks for this two disc lemon, that only had one good side, El Mocambo. There was little magic and a running out of steam vibe on the other tracks. I haven't listened to the non-Mocambo tracks since lifting the needle from side 4 in 1977. I might go back and listen to see if there was a gem or two in there that has gotten better with time.

Love You Live seems a symptom of what was happening in the band. They seemed kind of rudderless and Keith's smack addiction seems to have finally caught up with him. They reinvented themselves with a tighter, spunkier sound in '78, jettisoning Preston, and that rollicky, inappropriate sound on numbers like Get Off of My Cloud. (Which is also there on the recent '75 bootleg). It was the first Vegas/Cabaret era of the Stones, where the music was played note perfect, without any soul.

I just went and compared the 'medley' of If You Can't Rock Me/Get Off My Cloud from the '75 bootleg, and the '76 recording used on Love You Live. Get Off My Cloud is flacid in both instances, but If You Can't Rock Me is incredible on the '75 boot, and limp on Love You Live.

Whithout soul, 24FPS? Sometimes, especially late in a tour. But generally, I can still find a lot of feeling.

You're dead if you can't feel the joy and soul in a peformance like this:

The first time I saw the Stones was on that SW tour (Foxboro, '89), but I had all four live albums by then and had listened to them hundreds of times... I like the '75/'76 stuff because it is distinctly sloppy and raw. It is arrogant for them to play that sloppily and for Mick to sing like he has golf balls in his mouth, but that is part of who the Stones are/ were at the time. By '78 they were tighter again, and then on LSTNT we see Keith actually lying down on stage while playing, and Mick is hoarse from his mid-show endurance work-outs. Every tour has its characteristics! That's what I love about the Stones. You might get a similar setlist, but you get a new feel for all those tours from the mid 60's to '81. Then for our era, we get the Vegas act... but there was still a lot of fun to be had and some great arrangements of songs... Ruby Tuesday in '89 (and on Flashpoint) is fantastic, as is Factory Girl, and later in the 90's we got CYHMK, You Got The Silver, and other rarer gems. I'm really psyched to see what we get in the next 3 shows for download... Will we get a Brian era show? a 90's show? 1971? All three?? I assume we won't get a 90's or 00's show because of Four Flicks and Biggest Bang, but who knows? Whatever these shows are, we know for sure they will be fun, and different from all the others.

I got tuned in and became a fan in 93 when I was coming up to 16. I was never a fan of any of the post 73 live material to start with, although I did buy Love You Live and I've always liked the El Mocambo tracks. It was a few years after that I started listening to the 75/76 stuff and started to like it. Saying that I didn't get Exile at all the first time I heard it. I think it comes form having not grown up and gone through the various eras with the band. Trying to catch up when you're already 30 years behind and understand the history is quite difficult. The Stones are not like any other band in the fact their material spans so many eras in music, I mean most bands albums sound like a continuation of their last album. The Stones have always adapted and changed with the times. That's one of the things I love about them, the fact they can't be pigeon holed. As I grew up and listened to more and more of their material I realised every era has it's good points and bad points and you just have to take it for what it is. I now listen to all their stuff and there are shows I love and shows I'm not so keen on. But on the whole I think there's something great from every era. Of course I have my favourite Stones period like everyone (69-73) but I like the 75 period onwards but for different reasons to that of the 69-73 period.

"I've got nasty habits I take tea at three"

I love Love you live and everything about their mid 70s to late 70s era. All of the 70s actually.

It's nice having different generations of fans mixing on this board. I think there are different perspectives represented, which is a good thing...of course, it's only rock n' roll

I take it for what it is, and agree with the observations that what is great about the Stones is the uniqueness to their sound, with each tour.

Having said that, Love You Live, with the exception of side 3, mostly sucks.

Sorry, but "Love You Live" sucks...They play much better these days as "Shine a Light" and "Live Licks"are superior.

Love you Live is a very lazy effort that is close to the very bottom of the Stones entire catalog.

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James Kirk
Sorry, but "Love You Live" sucks...They play much better these days as "Shine a Light" and "Live Licks"are superior.

Love you Live is a very lazy effort that is close to the very bottom of the Stones entire catalog.

You don't have to apologize when you're right

Send It To Me: I didn't mean to imply that the Stones had no soul from '76 onward. I meant that they went through a stretch before '78 where they were kind of phoning it in. I've seen plenty of examples of them having heart and soul since, including their last tour.

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Send It To me
I didn't become a fan until 1989 - at the age of 13. Even though I wasn't able to attend the Steel Wheels tour I followed it and was fascinated by it when it happened, at an age when its easy to feel wonderment. (I still listen to Flashpoint a lot.) It was my introduction to this music that I love so much.

When I go back and listen to the band in the mid 70's, I mostly think they sound completely awful - unrehearsed, shouting instead of singing, arrangements that no one put any thought into. In fact, I don't even think they arranged, it sounds like they just bs'd their way through it. Most of Love You Live is God-awful to my ears.

(I contrast, I love Get Your Ya Ya's Out and the '72 sound)

But people who were in their years of wonderment during that time seem to love the "Love You Live" sound.

So...the mid-70's sound - is it objectively bad? Subjectively good depending on your own memories?

I completely agree with you. The worst ever period for the Stones live, in my view. The height (or depth) of the junkie era. Thank God they redeemed themselves with Some Girls. I will, however, defend the El Mocambo side, which is bursting with energy, playfulness, and crackling guitars. As for LA '75, I have not been able to get through the entire thing yet. I was at one of those LA shows, so I wish I liked it better. It has some nice moments, but Mick's "singing" is horrendous and that version of Wild Horses pisses all over the majesty of the fine studio track.

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Send It To me
of course, it's only rock n' roll

That's what it became imo, but it was more than that during their first 10 years or so.

I really liked Love you Live when I first heard it and this was some 25 years after it came out. I became Intrigued by the Mid 70's period. It was no Get Yer Ya's Ya's out, You could tell they had passed their peak , but they were doing some interesting things on there. . I dug it. I didn't know anything about bootlegs. Really not much point in listening to it now. But it served its purpose for me back then. Plus I remember the CD was yellow, and it had a very distinct platic-ish smell, unlike any other CD I have come across. So that was cool too.



Edited 6 time(s). Last edit at 2012-04-24 04:55 by ryanpow.

The comparisons between 1975 and 1976 show a deep lack of attention to these separate tours.

75 was far superior. ...and it's spelled Mocambo

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Send It To me
Whithout soul, 24FPS? Sometimes, especially late in a tour. But generally, I can still find a lot of feeling.

You're dead if you can't feel the joy and soul in a peformance like this:

I think you chose a really good example to make your point SITM; Vegas Stones contingent at their finest or nearly so. I always liked this clip very much.

But I don't feel the same way about much of the rest of that period though, which presumably we are still in, if it hasn't or won't suffer further decline. (And, no, I am not particularly a fan of Love You Live either).

And, in a disturbing way, while it's obvious to blame the decision to bring in and cultivate all the Vegas support players - or be disappointed with Darryl Jones over Wyman or even cringe when Ronnie isn't in best form, I've come to feel its all down to Mick and Keith losing some of the magic, bit by bit, incrementally, along the way.

The Vegas band is there to smooth it all out and mask what isn't there any more. To make the warhorses recognizable to very casual fans in a large venue and give the principals the opportunity to pace themselves.

I hate the expression "It is what it is" as it is generally used to either mask apathy or mute analysis, but in some cases it fits. The contemporary Stones is one such case.

We should enjoy what we have left though. There are moments. Here and there. VIVA Las Vegas Stones.

Love You Live has some gems on it but overall it is pretty bad. That tour was their most in demand - they didn't play like it.

There are other bad moments - Shine A Light is their next worst live album - but it reveals how they were. Listen to Honky Tonk Women, which is supreme, and then listen to Brown Sugar and Jumpin' Jack Flash - horrible.

You hear what you hear. Some people think Shine A Light is great. How they hear that I'll never understand. They certainly aren't un-biased.

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SweetThing

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Send It To me
Whithout soul, 24FPS? Sometimes, especially late in a tour. But generally, I can still find a lot of feeling.

You're dead if you can't feel the joy and soul in a peformance like this:

I think you chose a really good example to make your point SITM; Vegas Stones contingent at their finest or nearly so. I always liked this clip very much.

But I don't feel the same way about much of the rest of that period though, which presumably we are still in, if it hasn't or won't suffer further decline. (And, no, I am not particularly a fan of Love You Live either).

And, in a disturbing way, while it's obvious to blame the decision to bring in and cultivate all the Vegas support players - or be disappointed with Darryl Jones over Wyman or even cringe when Ronnie isn't in best form, I've come to feel its all down to Mick and Keith losing some of the magic, bit by bit, incrementally, along the way.

The Vegas band is there to smooth it all out and mask what isn't there any more. To make the warhorses recognizable to very casual fans in a large venue and give the principals the opportunity to pace themselves.

I hate the expression "It is what it is" as it is generally used to either mask apathy or mute analysis, but in some cases it fits. The contemporary Stones is one such case.

We should enjoy what we have left though. There are moments. Here and there. VIVA Las Vegas Stones.

Hey, Keith is singing AND playing guitar! At the same time! Seriously, when did he stop doing that?

I dislike the use of "Vegas era" as a label because it is completely pejorative and invokes a "has been" association. It's not as though they eschewed showmanship or spectacle at any point in their career. Other labels:

professional era
steel era
third era (first: abako years; second: up through first solo record)

I prefer the so called Vegas era over Love You Live anyday. Although You Gotta Move and the El Mocambo side three are very good. Mick's singing sucks on Love you Live. I know some like it as someone said above It's Only Rock N Roll.

I loved it when it came out (still do), but I always preferred the boots of some '75 shows. The audience recording of July 13th I always thought was a much better listening experience, for me. But at the time I didn't bitch about it. There's only a 9 month difference between the release of LYL and Some Girls.

ah - time for the bimonthly "love/hate LYL" already?? it's becoming a semi-monthly!
most of LYL shakes my tailfeather just fine, to the extent that i don't get why the Mick's "sloppy" enunciation bothers anyone.
listen to the guitars, and enjoy the Mick's voice as a rhythm instrument

LYL is a mixed bag. You got brilliant rendition of songs, like Hot Stuff, IORR (imo the best ever), Happy, You Gotta Move, YCAGWYW and Sympathy For The Devil. In addition we get the fantastic El Mocambo-side. There's material for a good live album right there.

However, the few songs that don't work as well are coloring the album, seemingly. Warhorses like BS and JJF sound tired and Mick is spitting his way through them.

I'd say we appreciate the good ones, because there are many.

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with sssoul
, and enjoy the Mick's voice as a rhythm instrument

that's a good way of looking at it. (or listening to it).

I don't understand how people judge LYL or the 75/76 tour only by Jagger's vocals, as there is so much more to enjoy. Sure, Jagger's vocals are a love/hate afair, but there's more to the Stones, right? I love the '75 tour, I think it simply is utterly fantastic. Best Charlie Watts tour, superb Richards/Wood tour, I love the percussion by Ollie, and I love that banks of hot Ampeg amps sound.

1976 is probably the least likeable tour of all Stones tours, but in my opinion that mainly is due to the lack of strong material. But even so, LYL has it's moments, from the superb openening of HTW and IYCRM, the fine version of Hot Stuff and Star Star, side 3 is good, IORR and Sympathy are fantastic.

Mathijs

Love you live....

The most self-satisfied piece of work of the band. That tour deserved a better official recording (even EL Mocambo part).