Live in Leipzig (30 years ago)

Started by Ulrich, August 04, 2020, 10:22:23

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Ulrich

30 years ago, The Cure played an open air show at the "Festwiese", Leipzig, Germany (their first show in the east of Germany, I believe, seeing the 2 German states had just been "re-united").
There was a tv broadcast on Swiss television, I myself didn't have a video recorder back then, but my mate's parents had, so I bought a VHS video cassette and asked him to tape it for me. Later on, in 1991 I bought a VHS video recorder together with my sister, so I was able to watch this again (and I watched it many times):


P.S.: This is not the exact thing as I saw it back then, i.e. not completely the same songs.
The holy city breathed like a dying man...

Rietan

Great memories. I recorded that one too. Robert is in a very good mood and I always remember the crowd cheearing "ROOOBERT, ROOOOBERT" ! And it reminds me on my first the cure concert in the summer in Innsbruck in the heavy rain...ufff  time is passing

SueC

@Ulrich, what was going on with Simon Gallup?  He wasn't moving much at all!  Do you think his hairstyle at the time just created too much drag for efficient movement?  Or is roaming all over the stage doing 50 kilometres per show just something he's taken up in middle age, as a fruitful strategy for increasing his incidental exercise?

Also, is this just a 90s thing, or why is the filming of this show so incredibly unrepresentative?  Did camerapeople / film editors / audiences think only singers really counted in a band?  I've not been much of a watcher of stuff like this in my lifetime, but do remember that in the 80s too, live clips seemed to focus mostly on singers.  The Cure live box set from 2018 compares so favourably in terms of representation - shows how a band is an interaction of equally important parts working together - rather than some dude and his karaoke backing...
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Ulrich

Quote from: SueC on August 08, 2020, 10:02:26The Cure live box set from 2018 compares so favourably in terms of representation - shows how a band is an interaction ...

Back then I didn't have much to compare it to. (I did get the "Live in Orange" video though when I had that player.)
Of course this was just a tv broadcast thing, which I'm certain the band agreed on, but didn't have much "input" themselves.
Anyway, back then it made we want to see the band live asap! (Which happened in 1992.)

As for Simon, I'm not sure when/why he started "running" more on stage. Anyone got an idea?
The holy city breathed like a dying man...

Rietan

hmmm, maybe as soon as he went wireless?! allthough I like your middle age theory more, Sue !

SueC

Quote from: Rietan on August 08, 2020, 11:01:21hmmm, maybe as soon as he went wireless?! allthough I like your middle age theory more, Sue !

That wireless idea makes complete logical sense, thank you! :)

Although yes, the middle-age-must-increase-incidental-exercise theory is highly emotionally appealing, especially if you're over 40 yourself.  :lol:

On a side note, watching recent gigs, Reeves Gabrels always reminds me of this telephone we had when I was in primary school - does anyone else remember the curly cable that used to go between a home phone and its enormous handset?  Mr Gabrels has enough of that for dozens of phones.

I'm sure if I were connected to someplace by cable, I'd be forever tripping up on it.  I already have excessive amounts of collisions with furniture as it is.  Wireless sounds excellent. :cool

SueC is time travelling

SueC

Quote from: Rietan on August 07, 2020, 21:14:08Great memories. I recorded that one too. Robert is in a very good mood and I always remember the crowd cheearing "ROOOBERT, ROOOOBERT" !

You know, that would completely freak me out - people calling my name like that - I'd be so tempted to squirt water from a water pistol to get them to cease.  But then again, with my audiences (education, high schoolers and undergrads), I tended not to run into hysteria, and if they ever got too excited (I did a lot of cool demos involving explosions) I could always calm them down again with offers of homework etc.  And if I was publicly propositioned in any way, I had some standard responses, e.g. I had a "What are you doing this Friday night, Miss?" from a 15-year-old when his class first walked in at the start of the school year once, and he got, "Nothing that could possibly be of any interest to an embryo such as yourself!"

As an audience member, I've never been particularly comfortable with the crowd carry-on at many contemporary music concerts; I feel totally at home in the classical audience though - just smiling and polite clapping.  I can unbend enough for a sing-along, or with Capercaillie (Scottish band) I was happy, at an open-air gig in our town, to join in with the Scottish dancing, but all that screaming and hysteria and throwing underwear is just anathema to me...

Having said that, when Brett and I first saw Trilogy I thought that was a really nice audience, compared to "standard" for modern popular music or whatever you want to call it...
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Ulrich

And another thing which happened about 30 years ago, might be worth reminiscing:

http://www.slicingupeyeballs.com/2010/08/31/cure-fm-pirate-radio-mixed-up-robert-smith/

Quote...Robert Smith and the rest of The Cure — aided by a pair of American DJs and shadowed by MTV and the music press — set up a pirate radio station at Fiction Records' offices with plans to illicitly premiere their soon-to-released remix album Mixed Up over the London airwaves.

Things didn't go quite as planned; despite distributing 20,000 fliers inviting fans to tune in "at Friday Aug. 31 starting at midnight," a technical snafu kept Cure FM — as the band had dubbed the pirate-radio broadcast — off the air for more than two hours.

With DJs Mike Halloran, of San Diego's 91X, and Lewis Largent, of Los Angeles' KROQ, on hand to interview Smith and Co. on air, the band proceeded to play all of Mixed Up for the first time publicly, as well as The Doors' "Hello, I Love You" and their own newly recorded cover of it (for the Elektra Records compilation Rubaiyat).

Also on the playlist, according to this Vox write-up of the broadcast: Dinosaur Jr's cover of "Just Like Heaven," The Human League's "Human," Digital Underground's "The Humpty Dance," De La Soul's "Eye Know," "a number of Jimi Hendrix songs" plus tracks from Jane's Addiction's then-new Ritual de lo Habitual.
The holy city breathed like a dying man...

SueC

Haha, sounds a bit like The Goodies doing pirate radio...

Not YT but here's the episode:  https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3kgp61
SueC is time travelling