Dave Edmunds - Slippin' Away
OK, it's time for the second of three sets of back-to-backs I have set up for this month.
It's kind of hilarious that I couldn't do the Nick Lowe 75 post I wanted to last month, yet here we are 30 days later and I've got his most consistent collaborator all queued up for his 80th today.
I absolutely swear I'm gonna get to Nick Lowe eventually -- someone out there needs to do a lossless transfer of the LPs of his 1984 BBC appearance immediately! -- but for today Dave Edmunds is just gonna have to do.
Ah yes, Dave Edmunds... he hears you knocking, but you can't come in. He must be busy or something.
He's from Wales in the UK, but as I was saying about Nick Lowe, he identifies musically as American.
I wonder if that cancels out. Like, if you took all the American bands and artists that sound, for all intents and purposes, British, and all the English ones that wish they were Buddy Holly, if it would be directly proportional.
Look at that fret reach! That's big for a roots rock guy. Who does he think he is with that Tele, Steve Howe?
Really for me the central feature of Dave Edmunds always-catchy tunes is the prominent, piss-taking humor. Or the humour, as he is one of them Brits we spoke of earlier.
He also wrote a bunch of hits with which other artists scored, like Queen Of Hearts was for Juice Newton way back when.
Whether he's Crawling from the Wreckage or he Knew the Bride when she used to rock-n-roll, he's always had a wry album title or double entendre cooking.
All of these qualities are on full and prominent display in this crackling 1983 set from Roseland in NYC, in which DE -- then touring his tremendous Information LP -- conquers some initial technical catastrophes to deliver with his usual potency.
Dave Edmunds
Roseland Ballroom
New York City, NY USA
5.18.1983
01 WNEW-FM introduction by Meg Griffin
02 From Small Things (Big Things One Day Come)
03 Dear Dad
04 Sweet Little Lisa
05 Loud Music In Cars
06 Girls Talk
07 Don't Call Me Tonight
08 Queen of Hearts
09 I Don't Want to Be In Love
10 I Hear You Knockin'
11 Trouble Boys
12 Paralyzed
13 Slippin' Away
14 Information
15 Crawling from the Wreckage
16 Sweet Little Rock 'N' Roller
17 C'mon Everybody
18 Jeanie, Jeanie, Jeanie
19 Ju Ju Man
20 I Knew the Bride (When She Used to Rock and Roll)
Total time: 1:06:17
Dave Edmunds - vocals & guitar
John David - bass & vocals
Dave Charles - drums
Billy Bremmer - guitar & vocals
Gerriant Watkins - piano, keyboards & vocals
Chris Spedding - guitar (Tracks 16-18)
Brian Setzer - guitar & vocals (Tracks 17-18)
320k/48 webstream from Wolfgang's Vault
spectral analysis goes to 20k, so essentially equivalent to a preFM source
captured, converted to 16/44 CD Audio, edited, retracked & remastered by EN, April 2024
478 MB FLAC/direct link
This circulates as a partial off-air FM cassette, but the stream from Wolfgang's Vault goes to 20k and was essentially the complete thing.
Look out for wild guests shots from Brian Setzer -- then scaling the charts and the MTV mountaintops with his Stray Cats -- and guitar monster Chris Spedding (who needs his own day on this page), who show up to rip the roof off Roseland for a few tunes.
I will be back shortly with a completely sick mixtape I just finished for our next honored centennialist.
That's in 24 from now; this moment is about driving the pickaxe of your eardrums through the rockpile of this smashing Dave Edmunds show, that he might hear loud music in cars on his big day here. C'mon, everybody!--J.