1972-April-21 The Mahavishnu Orchestra (emperor nobody remaster) Music Hall Cleveland, OH Disc 1 - 62.06 1 Introduction .13 2 Meeting Of The Spirits 12.36 3 You Know You Know 12.25 4 The Dance Of Maya 14.43 5 The Noonward Race 22.06 Billy Cobham Drums Jerry Goodman Violin Jan Hammer Keyboards Rick Laird Bass John McLaughlin Guitar Notes that came with the original recording: According to John McLaughlin, Columbia refused a live release of this show. John McLaughlin himself feels that this show in Cleveland is one of the best that The Mahavishnu Orchestra has ever done. As Irony would have it, Columbia asked their engineer and Gregg Bendian to assist with the release of this live CD. A mix was made and sent for approval to John McLaughlin. No word from Columbia since. Notes that came with the remaster: This isn't currently on the tracker and only circulates (as far as I know) from 2 sources, the silver CD bootleg "Wild Strings" (sourced from what sounds like a slightly generated cassette tape) and what sounds like a first-generation DAT from the soundboard master of the mix mentioned in the original notes above. This second, cleaner source unfortunately suffers from a horrifying digital clipping that comes in towards the end of "The Dance of Maya" and continues through to the end of the set, making the second half of this (absolutely face-frying) performance essentially unlistenable. I grabbed this version from another tracker and set about the arduous process of making the nasty and unfortunate clipping issues go away, and I was fairly successful if I do say so myself. It wasn't really all that hard, given that the bulk of the disastrous noise was in the kick-drum sound, making it easier to isolate and eliminate all the deleterious, nails-on-a-blackboard-in-Hell distorto-crunch. I should also mention that although this commonly circulates as being from the Emerson Gymnasium on the campus of Case Western University, it is indeed from the Music Hall as TMO didn't play Case Western until February of 1973 (and with a more "Birds of Fire"-oriented setlist). As for the performance, I don't know what to say other than Columbia are, once again, idiots. According to what I read the hang-up with the official release of this came in 2004, when the suits at the label offered the five band members 1972 scale wages (!!!) for their services... what amounted to $250 apiece. So I guess the band politely refused and the thing got shelved forever, another lost diamond left to languish in the greedy vaults of shame because some asshats, deaf to anything but the illusion of profit, can't even show a shred of respect for what a whole lot of people think is THE BEST CONCERT RECORDING ever made of what yet more feel is THE BEST BAND EVER. I took the time to fix this up and make it sound the best I could because we'll likely never get to hear this on the official release for which it begs, but on balance I think this version sounds pretty damn spiffy so have at it and see what you think... at least we'll get it circulating without mountains of hiss and ear-splitting clipping anyway. Once again the situation makes but two demands, and those are simply that you groove like you mean it and that you share like you'll die if you don't. e. nobody oakland, ca lineage: FLAC files from another tracker > WAV via Trader's Little Helper > SoundForge 9 > FLAC 8, sectors aligned, via TLH > Dime-a-dizzle > you The concert billing was: West, Bruce and Laing Procol Harum and The Mahavishnu Orchestra ************************************************************ The below is from the great web site Innerviews Anil Prasad (Interviewer): The long-lost Mahavishnu Trident sessions were finally authorized for release and are about to come out on Sony. Any thoughts on that? John McLaughlin: I didn’t authorize them! I don’t have any power whatsoever over these people, let’s get this clear right away. They do precisely what they want. They don’t care what I want or don’t want. They are essentially the owner of the tape and I am a secondary consideration. It’s as simple as that. That’s the way record companies are, but we need them. But I’m delighted because it’s a wonderful recording and they are idiots for losing the tapes and not releasing them a long time ago. Maybe it’s a blessing in disguise because it’s a great studio recording from 1972 - that’s a long time ago. It has a great analog sound. In fact, there was another recording made of the Mahavishnu Orchestra live in Cleveland, Ohio in 1971 by CBS who are Sony now. It’s great and I would love it if they would release it as a recording. It was a phenomenal night. I asked them "Why don’t you do it? It’s great!" But they say "Yeah, maybe, yes, no, but...". So, they do what they want - whatever they want. Reproduced from: Innerviews John McLaughlin Spheres Of influence by Anil Prasad Interview date: June 28, 1999 © Copyright 1999 by Anil Prasad. All rights reserved.