Saturday, February 13, 2010

Gil Scott-Heron - "Live at Glastonbury" (1986)




"Gun" (excerpt)



"Blue Collar" (excerpt)

With much buzz surrounding Gil Scott-Heron's new album, here's a half hour bootleg featuring four kicking tracks from a 1986 live show at the Glastonbury Festival, originally broadcast on the BBC. Here we capture GSH somewhere in the middle of his 12 year hiatus between "Moving Target" and "Spirits", but he's in fine voice and spirit.

Keyboardist Kim Jordan switches between synth and piano, and she contributes some particularly fine piano solos - she was a member of Gil's touring band for 12 years, also appearing on the live "Minister of Information" album and "Spirits", both in 1994.

Also appearing on those albums was the Turrentine-ish saxophonist Ron Holloway, who also played on "Moving Target" from which both "Blue Collar" and "Washington DC" appear live here. He went on to record some albums for Milestone in the 90s, including 1998's "Groove Update" which features GSH on new versions of "Three Miles Down" and "We Almost Lost Detroit". That album also featured drummer Rodney Youngs from here.

Joe Phillips' guitar adds a blues sensibility to the proceedings, occasionally rocking things out a little too much for me, but holding back (or held back) enough to not ruin things. Bassist Robbie Gordon played with GSH from 1978 until 1994. He released a solo album called "Still Growing" in 1996, which included an unusual straight-ahead acid jazz version of Gil's classic song "B-Movie".

In the comments for this post, Jamie said :

"I was at this gig as a young, wide-eyed first-time Glastonbury festival-goer. I was 16 years old, I'd just left school two days previously and had just had the best weekend of my life up to that point. What this tape omits is that 'Johannesburg' was aborted initially due to the lack of crowd response. Gil had asked the crowd to sing along with the chorus and he'd explained, patiently, that if we didn't sing up he wasn't going to do it. Cue the first 'What's the word?' bit and a fairly lacklustre response from the crowd. Gil cut the band and gently mocked our poor singing. I remember him saying something along the lines of 'OK, I know you were probably too busy pulling on a joint and missed it but this time you've gotta sing up'. The next chant of'JOHANNESBURG!' you can hear on the recording."

An anecdote about this gig from the blog Look on the Nice Side :

"I once had a pee on a fence next to him at Glastonbury festival, right after he’d just come off stage. And when I asked him if he didn’t have a hospitality area backstage and his own posh toilets, he shrugged and sad, “Yeah man, but I like to pee with the people”.

TRACKS

01 'Gun' (4.23)
02 'Washington DC' (5.05)
03 'Blue Collar' (12.30)
04 'Johannesburg' (8.44)

MUSICIANS

Gil Scott-Heron - vocals, keyboards
Kim Jordan - keyboards
Joe Phillips - guitar
Robbie Gordon - bass
Ron Holloway - saxaphone
Rodney Youngs - drums
Larry McDonald - percussion

CREDITS & BOOTLEG HISTORY

FM > cassette (1st gen) > CDR > WAV > trader's little helper > FLAC
Originally posted on DIME by Roofwalker.
I've converted to WAV and 320-mps from the FLACS.
Thanks to Roofwalker, and Scott for the alert!

Blogs linked to in this post are Pure Diggin', BeeQ, RockNRollaZ, Look On the Nice Side and Blaxploitation Jive. Please say hi to these folks and thank them if sample their wares, so that they keep posting.





37 comments:

Florian said...

Great thank you !
The sound reminds me the live "Tales of Gil", available on DVD.
We hope to see Gil Scott-Heron in Europe soon.

taro nombei said...

Many thanks Simon and much appreciated.
I've not heard this before.
TN

exilestreet said...

Simon - I hope you don't mind that I have linked to this...
Regards/

Simon666 said...

Thanks for the comments guys ... Mona, no problem :)

exilestreet said...

Simon/
Thanx!
Regards/

E-mile said...

hi Simon, the buzz surrounding the new 2010 I'm new here
(how humble!)
is totally justified...
I heard it the other day and there's a lot of beauty on it.
peace, E-mile

Unknown said...

Nice Stuff!!!
Greeting from Greece!

Jamie said...

Thanks ever so much for posting this, Simon.

I was at this gig as a young, wide-eyed first-time Glastonbury festival-goer. I was 16 years old, I'd just left school two days previously and had just had the best weekend of my life up to that point. What this tape omits is that 'Johannesburg' was aborted initially due to the lack of crowd response. Gil had asked the crowd to sing along with the chorus and he'd explained, patiently, that if we didn't sing up he wasn't going to do it. Cue the first 'What's the word?' bit and a fairly lacklustre response from the crowd. Gil cut the band and gently mocked our poor singing. I remember him saying something along the lines of 'OK, I know you were probably too busy pulling on a joint and missed it but this time you've gotta sing up'. The next chant of 'JOHANNESBURG!' you can hear on the recording.

I taped this off the radio when the BBC broadcast it and have been trying to track the recording down for a long time. I've often wondered if the BBC have the rest of the set as it was truly incredible. There probably wouldn't be too many sales of a live album but it'd be great if it found its way out onto the net some time.

Once again, thanks for posting this. Rapidshare's busy right now but I'm sure I'll grab it tomorrow.

Simon666 said...

Thanks for the story Jamie:)

makuma said...

Looking forward to hear this! Thank you Simon ;)

Anonymous said...

wow - this is a rare treat! First a new Gil CD this week and now this. THANK YOU!

ish said...

Thanks Simon. Have you heard the new album yet? I just ordered it from Dustygroove. Very eager to hear it--and this new live DL.

Simon666 said...

Hey Ish -

Been listening to the new album - I'm kinda mixed about it. On the downside, I find the music a bit too Massive-Attack-on-Krack for me.

But on the upside, these dark, sparse beats seem to have inspired GSH to come up with deeply personal poetry - the personal over the political this time - that goes beyond what I might have expected, given the faded tone that's permeated his rare guest appearances over the last decade of his troubles. He's got more to say and do.

So I'm looking forward to and hoping for the next one - maybe a reunion with Mr Jackson and others could take him back to the fields of jazz and soul where he's always played so beautifully.

cheeba said...

Yikes - just about missed this one!

Short but sweet and after Jamie's comment makes me wish I could hear the whole unedited set.

Your take on the new one has me even more curious now...ordered a copy from DG as well.

Thanks!

Reza said...

Apart from the fact I was a tad older than Jamie , I was at this concert as well, a nice bit of personal nostalgia, thanks Simon, now where did I put all my glastonbury programs .. if I remember Fela was on the year before

Simon666 said...

Hiya Cheeba!
Jamie, I've added your story to the post :)
Reza - give us an anecdote I can add. How much scrumpy did you drink ?

Simon666 said...

And another Gil bootleg! Gil Scott-Heron – “Live In Bremen” (1983) Come get it …

artlazarus said...

All of these GSH posts are priceless Simon. Thank you so much. There is still one that eludes me: GSH Live at the Tin Angel in Philadelphia - 1990 - a radio broadcast. Much appreciated if you or anyone else could track that one down.

Gavin said...

Thanks for all the GSH concerts, they're ear poppingly good fun.

Gavin said...

I suppose the new album is a bit short, and it ain't funky in a dancey way. But it still sounds like Gil whispering the truth in your ear somehow...

Anonymous said...

This is great Simon.

Thanks

Jazz Obsessive

Eksykator said...

Thanks for this.

One question i want to ask You Simon:

I was listening to the GSH's LIVE album Tour de Force founded on deezer.com. I was wondering where can i get more about that one? I mean tracklist, and more info... Maybe You know something about that? I was looking in Google but... zero founded.
Thanks in advance.

Simon666 said...

Hi Eksykator -
have you got a better link ?
Searched for Gil Scott-Heron there,but no luck ...

Eksykator said...

http://www.deezer.com/en/music/result/all/gil%20scott#music/result/all/gil scott

This is all they have. Great music.

Eksykator said...

I've founded that deezer.com search often replays 'no match' so i've pushed Tour de Force on 4shared server. http://www.4shared.com/file/232292091/af171e72/Gil_Scott-Heron_-_Tour_de_Forc.html mp3,

Simon666 said...

Thanks Eksykator :)

Rob said...

@Eksykator, I have lots of info on "Tour De Force" and the other live CDs here:

http://www.gilscottheron.com/forum/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Board=2&Number=870

Rob said...

@Simon, I emailed Larry and he confirmed that he was part of the band for the Glastonbury show, so you can update the musician list.

Simon666 said...

Thanks Rob!

I've updated the musicians list, and also the back cover image.

Simon

Ian G said...

WOW! I was there, but I can't remember anything about it, must've been good! Cheers 4 this

Simon666 said...

All files have been blocked - someone does not like me sharing this bootleg recording, so sorry, will have to leave this one behind.

Anonymous said...

Just popping in to say nice site.

Anonymous said...

Greetings,

I've recently been rounding out the live section of my music collection and with Gil's passing on Friday I've been focusing on him. Your blog is great!
I was wondering if you'd consider reposting the Glastonbury show.

Cheers,

Simon666 said...

Hi anonymous, as mentioned above, someone repeatedly gets files of this show taken down, so I will not repost it.

roofwalker said...

Hi there. It's lovely to see that this show I posted is circulating and it's nice to get a namecheck for it. Kinda restores some faith in humanity!

Biggles said...

Hi,
This was my first exposure to GSH, when the concert was broadcast on BBC radio in the UK.
The BBC transcription disc of this show omits Washington D.C. but is available for anyone with deep pockets at:
https://www.discogs.com/Gil-Scott-Heron-Robert-Cray-In-Concert-397/release/10941115
What an artist, what a band! Kim Jordan - simply amazing!
Many thanks!
Kind regards,
Joe

Unknown said...

Thank you! Glad it's available after all these years!