The next Southern Comfort / Audionics "team-up" is entitled April Fool's Dinner and contains the April 1st, 1975 dinner show. This show was originally released as Rockin' with Elvis April Fool's Day on vinyl in 1980 and re-issued straight from vinyl on CD in 1992, complete with pops and clicks.
We were lucky enough to hear a few A-B test samples and must say that the sound on this re-issue has really been improved compared to the original Rockin' With Elvis... release.
From the press release:
The upcoming CD-release by the Southern Comfort / Audionics "team-up" is entitled "April Fool's Dinner ", and it contains the excellent April 1st, 1975 dinner show. Import collectors first heard this recording via the 1980 vinyl release "Rockin' with Elvis April Fool's Day." This was later dubbed directly from vinyl for its 1992 CD debut, complete with pops and clicks. This new release marks the first time since the original LP that the original audience master tape has been used - and naturally it has received a significant upgrade using topnotch industry equipment. This stellar show is also now complete: "Can't Help Falling In Love" and "Closing Vamp" from this show were actually on the original tape. These were restored to the best of our abilities, and are now included, warts and all. On the original LP and CD, these songs were borrowed from RCA's 1974 "Recorded Live On Stage In Memphis" album. The April Fool’s Day performance shows Elvis at his best – a far cry from the problematic October ’74 shows – he’s in excellent voice, and he performs a solid mix of classic songs and recent additions. Elvis is both entertaining and witty, and actually sounds like a seasoned Vegas pro. April 1st also marked the final day for bassplayer Duke Bardwell, who in all did 181 shows with Elvis, despite the fact that their relationship often was a bit strained. Duke had experienced some great highs and some terrible lows with Elvis, but at this stage he was fed up with it all and relieved that it would soon be over.
The first two Midnight Show bonus tracks are from a booth tape and the other 4 tracks (first heard on "Rocking With the King April's Fool Day" Vol. 2.) are from a decent quality audience tape. The prior release of the closing show was de-noised in a rather destructive way, and has been restored to optimal quality for the Elvis connoisseur.
All accompanying photographs were taken in March - May 1975 at the Las Vegas Hilton hotel and on the subsequent concert tour. The CD will be presented in a beautiful 3-panel digipack and is scheduled for late February '09.
Tracks:
01. Opening Vamp / C. C. Rider - 02. I Got A Woman / Amen - 03. Love Me - 04. If You Love Me (Let Me Know) - 05. And I Love You So - 06. Big Boss Man - 07. The Wonder Of You - 08. Burning Love - 09. Band Introductions - 10. What'd I Say - 11. Drum Solo (Ronnie Tutt) - 12. Bass Solo (Duke Bardwell) - 13. Piano Solo (Glen D. Hardin) - 14. Electric Piano Solo (David Briggs) - 15. School Day - 16. Celebrity Introductions: Roy Clark, Conrad Hilton / The Great Pretender (excerpt) - 17. My Boy - 18. I'll Remember You - 19. Let Me Be There - 20. Celebrity Introduction: actor Hugh O'Brian - 21. How Great Thou Art - 22. Hound Dog - 23. Fairytale - 24. Can't Help Falling In Love - 25. Closing Vamp.
Bonus Tracks (highlights from Las Vegas, April 1st, 1975, Midnight show - Closing night):
26. Big Boss Man* - 27. It's Midnight * - 28. You Don't Have To Say You Love Me - 29. An American Trilogy - 30. Help Me Make It Through The Night / Mickey Mouse March - 31. Steamroller Blues
* taken from booth tape.
I assume die hard Elvis fans spend little money on 'new' releases these days. I'll have to think hard: what was the last NEW soundboard release for us? America from FTD I think. I'll have the double bootleg Rockin' with the king april's fool day volume 1 and 2 released in 2002. So we can skip another re-release! Let's hope the TTWII box follows real, real soon!
It's a very welcomed reissue,especially if the sound quality will be better. I love this Vegas season,he was in top form. The original cover was terrible,this one is 100 times better.
I heard the samples, too and was impressed.....well done...not for newbies only....and for the first time we have the real ending and not the fake from 20.3.74 tagged after Fairytale....
GREAT !!! This is a fantastic show !
This is Excellent 'news' I always felt the flaws with the original Vinyl release needed to be address-such as running bit slow and tagged on ending. Correct photos from the time period(instead of from Asheville 22/7/75)This corrected and sound improved WITH bonus better sounding highlights from the Midnight show will certainly be THE definitive release of this show and i can file away my 722722 productions release i bought in the early 80's. Certainly one of the more worthwhile re-releases to buy.
Ronald V: I've heard the samples-- it kicks the prior releases to the curb...! As for the main show of the old 1992 CD, who wants to keep a CD mastered from vinyl and not the original tape? They've cleaned that sucker up. You can't go wrong with "Southern Comfort." This has to be one of the best audience-recordings out there and it's good to hear the king putting on a fully charged show. Nice cover, too.
Ftd,this is artwork,got it? Not to mention better communication!
This is a great show from a great label,so you can't go wrong with this one. I've also heard the sound samples (those were posted on another site) and there's a big improvement. The sound quality is much better. Not surprising,though,as they were working from the original master tape,unlike the producers of the previous releases.
Elvis gave only 4 shows on april 1st during his whole career. One in 1955,another one in 1957 and two in 1975. Another april 1st show was planned in 1977,but that was cancelled. From the 4 shows he gave on this day,only 2 are available for us. These shows are very interesting,he's in different mood and sang several rare (for the period) songs,for these alone and for historical reasons it's really worthwile to purchase this new Southern Comfort release. The improved sound quality,the more complete concert and the beautiful artwork are big plus,though.
as english isn't my native language: what does the term "booth tape" in connection with the Vegas showroom mean? thanks.
Why don't you include the "A-B test samples" in the article so we all can hear them and make up our minds?
Espen,tha sound samples are available here: elvis-collectors site/Messageboard/All Elvis section/New Southern Comfort CD - April Fool's Dinner topic/page 2. It was posted by Ciscoking. Listen to the samples and please share your opinion with us.
sitdown68 : as the press-release of this CD mentions " a booth tape " : Surf to Google, enter " soundbooth", then click on "pictures", look at second row of pictures, second picture from left = a " booth" ( soundbooth") Hope this was helpfull to you. Always El.
This looks to be an exciting release, the original bootleg album recording had a lot of charm. It was pretty good quality for the time, so any improvements will be very welcome.
benny scott: thank you very much! very helpful. as recorded from this equipment, one could look forward to a FTD relase one day, in case the tape is in their vaults...?
Want to know when available ? Isn´t this the show in which Elvis sang right after CCRider, the closing song (April Fool´s day joke) Can´t help falling in love ??
No. The true charm of this show is how little he jokes around, by and large, and is singing with such power, along with a bunch of then-new songs.
Good title. So let's see what the highlight is. Perhaps The Mickey Mouse March or is it the introduction of Hugh O'Brien?
The highlight is the whole show.
the highlight could be: FTD publishing the midnight show as there is a soundbooth tape (thanks again to benny scott who helped me to get aqcuainted with this term) or don't they have it in their vaults?
From Ernst Jorgensen himself i KNOW that they don't have that booth tape.
Whats the difference vetween these "booth tapes" and a soundboard tape? Isn't that the same thing - both recordings directly off the mixer ("soundboard")?
Espen,a booth recording is a type of audience recording. It's still an off-line amateur recording (and not a semi-professional soundboard!) but it's better than a normal audience recording,because the tape recorder was near to the stage. These booth recordings were made by the "inner circle" and not by casual fans. This is all that i know,somebody else may know much more.
They have taken the cover of my book, with the photo taken by me, and used as their cover. I am just wondering which of my photos they have stolen to use inside.
Dear Sandi,first of all,congratulations to your great photos! You was so lucky to attend so many Elvis concerts,including the great march-april 1975 Vegas shows. I understand that you are disappointed for using your photos on various bootleg releases,but these are illegal releases,after all. They don't pay for the photos and don't pay royalty. That's life. These releases were made by fans to fans. I've heard these were pressed only in about 500-700 copies,sometimes even less,so they wouldn't be able to pay for the photos and other things. It's just a small business and it's not all about money. FTD is a different thing,those CD's were pressed in 5000-10.000 copies by Sony/BMG so they pay royalty. But most FTD's are in ugly digipacks,without booklet and they screw up everything (mastering errors,wrongly dated concerts,wrong take numbers etc.) so i'm really grateful to the better bootleg labels for these fantastic releases. They do it from their heart,and not only for the money.
That's really well said, Erika. These are truly "by fans for fans" releases and are truly super-limited items. Royalties don't go to the TCB band ..nor photographers. That's why their called bootlegs. And also one of the reasons they're so damned good, quite frankly, from a strictly consumer perspective.
And just to be a contrarian, having dabbled in photography (all aspects) myself, I've never totally understood the degree of ownership bestowed upon the one taking the photo when in reality the person in the photo is the true star. To boil it down, it's about pointing and clicking. All praise go to the subject , not the photographer. That's simplistic and even insulting to the craft of photography but it's not my intent. It's Elvis (now dead for 30+ years) who is the star, as a fixed figure in human history.
At one point the public domain aspect of photography does (or should) kick in about a historical picture. I'm sure this or that photographer took some great shots of the crash of the Hindenberg disaster of 1937 (or Septermber 11, 2001) but at one point history owns the shot in a practical sense. And to the import world, it's all about documenting in the best way possible the concerts of arguably the world's greatest performer, especially when the main label is slow or resistant to such historical material.
I'm sure when I see this release, it's going to be a delight to hard-core Elvis fans, a very small group indeed. (The sound samples are a revelation..to a classic old release..) I'd hope the photographer is ultimatelly charmed by the cover. That's the way I look at it. I've not seen the book (it rings a bell) but likewise relatively few will see this CD. May the new golden age of imports continue!
I'm sorry, but it's better to be honest about this...hard core Elvis fans are not a very small group
and a real delight to those fans is an UNRELEASED show!
These reissues are mainly for newbies,who still don't have these concerts in their collection. If you already have it,then don't buy this upgrade. Stick to the old,bad sounding,incomplete version.
...or just buy it on a cdr, I've supported those greedy producers enough with those previously released stuff... I'll save my hard earned money for the TTWII boxset!
Janos,i don't want to go into details,but be sure that FTD don't have the closing show on soundboard, they don't have the booth recording,either. A sound engineer has the complete booth recording and he sold a small part of it (2 songs only) to bootleggers and these 2 booth tracks (Big Boss Man & It's Midnight) will be on this new release. That's all. This is all that i know. I don't have infos about the upcoming FTD releases.
Ronaldv wrote: "or just buy it on a cdr". What a stupid comment! Let's kill the few good bootleg labels (Madison,Audionics,Southern Comfort,Straight Arrow,Fort Baxter)! And after that what will remain? The FTD digipacks,mastered by Lene Reidel...
HL, maybe it's time to wake up. The river is running dry. Every fan knows what great times we had in the past with this import labels. Releases like Goodbye Memphis, Guaranteed to blow your mind, Here I go again, A hot winter night in Dallas etc. Nowadays we mainly have this re-releases. I'm not waiting to spend another 22 euro for better sound bla bla releases and many fans agree about this. FTD and Madison, let's kick some *ss and release previously unreleased material, starting with opening night 1969! Thank you.
