Rats Live 1982 on iPlayer

BTR · Tonight

Rats Live 1982 on iPlayer

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

Download Audacity http://audacity.sourceforge.net/

Get a 3.5mm Stereo Jack Male to 3.5mm Stereo Jack Male and connect output to input

BTR · Tonight

I have found a good and very easy to use PC program that allows you to save BBC Radio iplayer as MP3s:

http://www.nerdoftheherd.com/tools/radiodld/

1. Download and run the program.

2. Click on 'Find Programmes'.

3. Click on the BBC Radio icon.

4. Click on the 0-9 link.

5. Click on '6 Music Classic Concert' and there you will see Boomtown Rats available to download. The download is saved as an mp3.

Ian D · House on Fire

Excellent gig, think i have this on something called an LP!

One of Dave McHale's finest moments on Having My Picture Taken.

-- Edited by Ian D on Wednesday 30th of March 2011 05:59:05 PM

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

BTR wrote:
I have found a good and very easy to use PC program that allows you to save BBC Radio iplayer as MP3s:
http://www.nerdoftheherd.com/tools/radiodld/
1. Download and run the program.
2. Click on 'Find Programmes'.
3. Click on the BBC Radio icon.
4. Click on the 0-9 link.
5. Click on '6 Music Classic Concert' and there you will see Boomtown Rats available to download. The download is saved as an mp3.

This is a brilliant application. You can subscribe to radio shows and set quality as high as you like!

And the concert is brilliant as well!

BTR · Tonight

There's also a good interview with Bob to download:

To find it, click on 'T' and scroll down to The First Time with...

Arrgee, how do you set the quality?

ArrGee · Back To Boomtown

From any tab use Option button...

Provider Options -> BBC Radio Provider

You can then set bit rate up to 320 Kbit/s and force encoding by clicking check boxes. Also up Encoding quality to 1: High Quality, slow. It's not that slow.

The subscription is a great idea, as I can record every Jarvis Sunday Service and all the concerts (Kinks next week!). As good as having a V+ box.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Ian D wrote:
Excellent gig, think i have this on something called an LP!
One of Dave McHale's finest moments on Having My Picture Taken.

-- Edited by Ian D on Wednesday 30th of March 2011 05:59:05 PM

Haven't heard this concert before until now on the BBC Iplayer.

Generally I've got mixed views. I thought Charnmed Lives sounded excellent- more alive and playful with the brilliant playing of Dave Mchale and Andy Duncan. Also Up All Night was pretty good live and Never In A Million Years was good too.

Geldof has a habit of ruining the really good vocal melody's live- flattening them and turning them into nursery rhyme singalongs. This for me happens on Having My Picture Taken and Nothing Happened Today. He tends to steamroller over the melody turning what on record sounds excellent into something mediocre live. Doesn't happen on all tracks of course so it can be pot luck whether the live version is good or not- thats why I have my reservations. Also I'm not sure if playing trumpet or sax on a track like Having My Picture Taken is suitable.I'm not knocking Dave Mchale as a sax player- its just some songs sound better with or without certain instruments. Keep It Up again was a bit flabby and loose and lazy. Gerry Cott's chiming guitar was definitely missing.

Also live versions tend to be elongated when the songs are better suited to being three or four minuites long- generally short and to the point rather than semi jamming sessions.

The Rats tour of April 1982 was a 27 date tour of proper cities in the UK- London Manchester, liverpool ,Glasgow, Bristol ,Sheffield etc. Sometimes playing the same songs over and over on a long tour can lead to a bit of lazyness in the playing but I suppose its a good problem to have.

BTR · Tonight

ArrGee wrote:
From any tab use Option button...
Provider Options -> BBC Radio Provider
You can then set bit rate up to 320 Kbit/s and force encoding by clicking check boxes. Also up Encoding quality to 1: High Quality, slow. It's not that slow.
The subscription is a great idea, as I can record every Jarvis Sunday Service and all the concerts (Kinks next week!). As good as having a V+ box.

Thanks Arrgee, I've subscribed to the classic concerts too.

A217565 · She's So Modern

Has anyone managed to get a copy of this show that they could make available,? It seems to be off the listings so I cannot download. Shame, I went to this show.
Cheers,
Paul.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Hopefully somebody can help you with this matter. I just heard it for the first time on the IPLAYER when it was available and hence my earlier comments about the concert.

There can be a big differnce between live and recorded music. Some of the songs sound really good particularly Charmed Lives and Up All Night and my first hearing of a live version of Never In A Million Years. I would probably need to hear the concert again as I found some of the songs overblown and hardly recognisable from the recorded versions. A case of too many cooks spoil the broth, with all the extra musicians.

Do you have any particular memories of the concert or did you rate is as good or brilliant or whatever?

Ian D · House on Fire

I actually liked the brass backing to the band Noel, but i wonder if any of the band members were against it or who came up with the idea in the first place. I mean there wasn't a lot in the earlier albums to suggest the band going down this route in future gigs?

Bobi G · Banana Republic

A217565 wrote:
Has anyone managed to get a copy of this show that they could make available,? It seems to be off the listings so I cannot download. Shame, I went to this show.
Cheers,
Paul.

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=2YJKNJBG

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Ian D wrote:
I actually liked the brass backing to the band Noel, but i wonder if any of the band members were against it or who came up with the idea in the first place. I mean there wasn't a lot in the earlier albums to suggest the band going down this route in future gigs?

I'M not against the addition of brass backing per se- Charmed Lives from that gig sounds really good, as well as Up All Night. I've always liked A Storm Breaks from V Deep.

Not sure who"s idea it was to go with that sound? Maybe Tony Visconti perhaps? Pop music changes so quickly and that sort of sound was popular with the emerging New Romantics- Spandau Ballet et al. Bringing in the brassy sound worked in making House On Fire a hit or a minor hit anyway.At least the Rats were unpredictable, in a mainly good way.

My problem with a lot of the live gigs is what I call sloppy versions of the songs where Geldof just tramples over the melody structure in a lazy almost careless way. For somebody quite literate he sometimes seemed happy enough to la la la his way through songs. The version of Keep It Up from Hammersmith sounds lame compared to the recorded version. I've heard some so so versions of Diamond Smiles too.

On In The Long Grass it was back largely to their basic guitar, keyboard, drums sound so V Deep was just a short interlude in their career.

I'm more against sloppy, lazy versions of songs rather than the introduction of a brass or horn section- and I know also that the perception of how a song sounds is down to the individual listener. We all differ in how we experience the same songs, be they live or recorded.

I wonder did the Rats do a live version of Please Don't Go? I'd like to hear a live version of that. Also Straight Up from the Mondo Bongo live period- was it called Bongos Over Britain or is that something completely different!

Ian D · House on Fire

Not certain whether they did Please Don't Go live, but they definately did Straight Up. I have it on a Bongo Over Europe tour bootleg CD from Germany.

A217565 · She's So Modern

Thanks so much Bobi G. What stood out for me from this show was I think they opened with Close As You'll Ever be, one of my personal favorites, and that I was particularly impressed with the work Garry Roberts did filling in for 2 guitars. The encore was terrific, when they played Banana Republic there were a bunch of people dancing on stage. V Deep is my least liked of the albums, the first one beng my personal choice, especially now that it is on CD with the "live" demos. I still play it a lot. Although I saw them six times while living in the UK, I regret not seeing them with Gerry Cott, he was a fantastic guitarist, I thought easily one of the best from that era. Garry and Gerry worked brilliantly together as highlighted by the "Tonic" show on DVD. The Rats definitely lost something for me with one guitar. I love the way "The Rats" are playing the old stuff. I know we are missing four of the band but I think the songs are being put over in the spirit of the early Rats style, which I still love today.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Glad you got to hear the Hammersmith concert from 1982 and enjoyed it.

You got to see them six times, so they must have been doing something right!

I find it interesting that although V Deep was not too well received or perhaps "understood" by the critics the band still sold out a Uk tour of 27 major UK cities and towns, in April 1982. Enough people cared for them to achieve this-the paradox is that while sales of V Deep were low the fans still came out to see the band. Interesting.

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Ian D wrote:
Not certain whether they did Please Don't Go live, but they definately did Straight Up. I have it on a Bongo Over Europe tour bootleg CD from Germany.

I've always liked the recorded version of Please Don't Go and the surreal lyrics. This song for me has always had a vaguely psycadelic, trippy feel and I think a good live version would be interesting.

Real Rats gold would be a live version of Europe Looked Ugly to add to the wish list!

-- Edited by noelindublin on Tuesday 19th of April 2011 12:59:31 PM

Ian D · House on Fire

It always annoys me that Europe Looked Ugly was never put on the re-issued Cds. I can only assume that the recording was never found for some reason?

noelindublin · Loudmouth

Ian D wrote:
It always annoys me that Europe Looked Ugly was never put on the re-issued Cds. I can only assume that the recording was never found for some reason?

I have a version of Europe Looked Ugly as the B Side of House On Fire as a 12 inch single and its very good quality for something nearly thirty years old.

Not sure why it wasn't on the reissue of V Deep. Did they need an original master tape to transfer it from? Sometimes a good vinyl copy is just transferred to cd as in the case of the Only Ones album Remains, where you could "feel " the vinyl origin of the sound. Some say vinyl is better than cd so the confusion continues.

The disappointing thing is that a lot of maybe, non fanatical fans never got to hear that song. To my mind it is the Rats at their best- great tune and great lyrics. Nice if some left field dj were to play it on radio a few times just to show what the band was capable of. Always wonder what Geldof thinks of this song and why it was only a b side. Surely it was better than Charmed Lives and could have made a single with perhaps a certain change of some of the lyrics?

suss · In the Long Grass

Ian D wrote:
Excellent gig, think i have this on something called an LP!
One of Dave McHale's finest moments on Having My Picture Taken.

-- Edited by Ian D on Wednesday 30th of March 2011 05:59:05 PM

Haven't listened to this one yet but I've still got the Radio One gig from Newcastle June (5th) 82 on cassette. Will have to compare; and if I can make the Newcastle one available I will.