More Danny & Live '76

[John A Swartz]

Theo>"Hey, dudes, read my whole post.  I said Danny was a monster bass
player, but I don't see him as an equal partner in the band.

While I disagreed on the live visual aspect as far as Danny being an
"equal partner" (Adrian raises some good points about letting Danny do
a little lead vocals - couldn't hurt).  As far as band decisions go, I
really don't know.  But, it hasn't ever been clear to me who makes the
decisions in that band these days - for awhile I had heard that Buck was
tired of the BOC bit and needed prodding from Eric to continue.  More
recently I've heard that it is now the other way around.  Some have jumped
to the conclusion that because he's doing most of the singing, that BOC
is now "Buck's Band" - I think that isn't quite correct, and that the only
reason for Buck singing more is due to Eric's voice - whether you want to
say that its in really bad shape, or whether he is resting it after too
much repeated strain is up to you - there may be elements of truth in all
of those.

>Again with the Live 76?  I remain unconvinced.  Is the Drumming any
better than Al's passionate pounding on Feet/Knees?  What live version
on this offering is better than anything on SEE, Feet Knees or even ETL?

I haven't paid strict attention to the drumming so I'd have to listen
again to render an opinion, but I do remember that some of Al's work
during "Astronomy" on *Live 1976* was exquisite - on the video during
one part in Buck's solo, there's a split-screen shot of Buck soloing with
Al accentuating stuff on the drums and cymbals and I remember distinctly
being impressed with that.  Of course, only on *Live 1976* do you get
to hear a drum solo, which has some cool parts (although it seemed more
like it was done at the time to showcase the lasers, rather than Al in
particular).  Now for an over-the-top Al Bouchard drum solo, go check
out the Brain Surgeons live doing "I Play the Drums"!!!

>To the FAQ editor, is Live 76 and official release?  I don't think it
is.  I dunno on this one guys.  Certainly I think if I do use one off
this offering I'll dub it from the video, sound quality may be a bit
better.  But which song would you recommend.

Dunno about all the business of releasing stuff in different countries, but
I believe Live 76 is a legitamite release (Castle Records, UK), and not
a bootleg (it's much more easily available than something like *The Thing*,
and Castle is a legitamite record company, yes?).  It is not a release
from Columbia/CBS/Sony as far as I know.

If you want to use a track from Live 1976, go for the "5 Guitars"!  Not
that is necessarily that great as a whole song (but, it IS cool to
listen to, and the band was pretty "on" in their jamming that night),
but it was a feature of BOC's live show from that time period.


As for your overall list, we could all come up with our own "must have"
list of BOC songs, and we'd all come up with some slightly different.
Your list is probably as good as any other - of course WOTT made some
serious sins of omission so I'd have to say yours might be better than
that -- of course, you left off Hot Rails to Hell as well, so you better
add it!! ;-)

John