Bruce Springsteen
Sports Arena
Los Angeles, CA
November 1, 1980
Mike Millard first gen via JEMS
The Lost and Found Mike the MICrophone Tapes Vol. 6
Likely Recording Info: AKG-451E microphones > Uher CR-240 cassette recorder
JEMS 2014 Transfer: first-generation cassettes made by Mike Millard for SG > Nakamichi CR-7A azimuth-adjusted transfer > Sound Devices USBPre 2 > Audacity 2.0 (24/96) capture > iZotope RX MBIT+ resample 16/44.1 > Peak Pro XT (volume smoothing / edit / index) > xACT 2.21 > FLAC
101 Born to Run
102 Out In The Street
103 Tenth Avenue Freeze-out
104 Darkness on the Edge of Town
105 Independence Day
106 Factory
107 For You
108 Two Hearts
109 Jackson Cage
110 The Promised Land
111 Prove It All Night '78
112 The Price You Pay
113 The River
201 Badlands
202 Thunder Road
203 No Money Down > Cadillac Ranch
204 Hungry Heart
205 Fire
206 Candy's Room
207 Because The Night
208 Fade Away
209 Stolen Car
210 The Ties That Bind
211 Wreck On the Highway
212 Point Blank
213 Crush On You
214 Ramrod
301You Can Look
302 Drive All Night
303 Backstreets
304 Rosalita
305 Jungleland
306 Sweet Little Sixteen (with Jackson Browne)
307 Detroit Medley > I Hear a Train > Wabash Cannonball
JEMS is pleased to release the sixth in a series of recordings made by legendary taper Mike Millard, AKA Mike the MICrophone, best known for his masters of Led Zeppelin in and around LA circa 1975-77.
The 14 first-generation tapes (ten cassettes and four reels) were sent by Millard to SG, the beloved S in JEMS, in the mid-'80s after the pair had met in person in Orange County on two occasions. To the best of our knowledge, none of the eight shows (spanning the 14 tapes) has ever been attributed as a Millard recording. In fact, there are no extant references we are aware of to Millard ever recording Bob Dylan or Bruce Springsteen, the two artists captured on the tapes.
Several of the tapes are uncirculated; others are out there, but until now, not credited as Millard's work. Even those that turn out to be previously circulated are being released in this series from verified first-generation tapes made by Millard himself and marked/ notated in his signature manner. As such, we expect all of them to be upgrades at a minimum and new sources in many cases.
At this point you might be asking yourself, "So if JEMS received these Millard tapes in the mid-'80s, why haven't they circulated previously?" Fair question. And in condensed form, here is the answer, which also provides the "Lost" portion of our series title:
Twenty-six years ago, Millard sent SG a box of tapes. I remember having it my hands in 1986 at SG's house, right after it arrived in the mail. But that was the last time I ever saw the box. It disappeared. Nearly all of SG's tapes have since been consolidated into the JEMS North archive, but we never found the box of Millard tapes. Over the years, my memory faded of what was in the box. I thought there were Springsteen shows, but that fuzzy notion was all I could recall.
Now to the "Found": Several months ago, WG, a long-time collector friend of SG, contacted him and said, "I found a box of tapes of yours when I was moving furniture." Sure enough it was the Millard tapes and more. Turns out WG borrowed the tapes and some other SG masters after a Dylan show in 1986 and the box wound up misplaced and forgotten about by both parties, only to be rediscovered 28 years later.
Once the box was returned, SG sent it to me at JEMS South where we proceeded to make fresh transfers of its contents.
If there's any mildly disappointing element to this otherwise charming story, it is that none of the lost Millard tapes are of previously uncirculated shows; there are other recordings by other tapers of all of them. But the good news is the quality of most of them is indeed up to Millard's legendary standards.
The cache of lost Millard tapes included six Dylan and three Springsteen shows. Of the three Bruce recordings, one already circulates and another is of an '81 show well captured by the legendary (he won't like that word, but its true) Mark Persic.
That puts our attention on this welcome addition, an outstanding, epic-length River show filled with special moments. Brucebase lists two recording sources for the show, one an incomplete tape missing several songs and a second that's "complete, but not known to be in general circulation." We presume Millard's recording to be that uncirculated complete source, as he captures nearly every second of the performance.
A whopping 17 River tracks feature here, including the premiere of "Fade Away," with a lovely and lilting intro, the last song from the album to enter the setlist. It comes one night after the premiere of "The Price You Pay," but that was with the original album lyrics. Tonight, for the first time, Springsteen restores his original third verse ("some say forget the past…") from early in the River sessions and later replaced for the take on the album. The song is performed in a striking acoustic guitar and accordion arrangement.
As if that weren't enough, out of the blue Springsteen resurrects what we (and even he) now call "Prove It All Night '78." The long guitar and piano intro here is mesmerizing and for me this is a "Prove It" for the ages. After playing it this way again two days later on closing night of the LA stand, Springsteen wouldn't revisit "Prove It All Night '78" again until 2012.
Another short-lived element that shines this evening is Chuck Berry's "No Money Down" used as a long intro to "Cadillac Ranch" to start the second set. Bruce hams it up for a highly entertaining preamble that really gets "Caddy" started. In the encore, pal Jackson Browne takes the stage for the tour's only and Bruce's last known ESB performance of another Chuck Berry cover, "Sweet Little Sixteen." The "Detroit Medley" also includes a very brief attempt at "Wabash Cannonball," but even Bruce admits: "Hold on a minute, band, let's try that one more time, because I don't have it yet. Give me that E again. Not only do I not have, I think we're gonna forget it," and back into "I Hear a Train" they go.
Again, like our recent release, That Old '80 Sound, if you love The River, this is a show for yo;, but unlike Seattle, Springsteen ups the ante slipping in a few favorites not visited in the Emerald City: "For You," the always welcome "Candy's Room," and for me, an especially motivated "Backstreets."
As for the work of the esteemed Mike Millard, the recording doesn't match heady heights of his absolutely best work, like our recent Dylan posts on DIME and THOSE Led Zeppelin tapes from the Forum. He's not right on top of the PA as he so often is and the tape needed more work in mastering than a Millard tape typically requires (none of the Dylan titles in our recent series was materially mastered).
That being said, the more I worked on the tape the more I liked it. And the more I listened, the more I understood what a fantastic show I was polishing. Bruce is giving his all in this marathon and 34 years later, it absolutely holds up. Samples provided.
The recording equipment listed is an educated guess based verified gear he was using at other shows in the same period. While Mike marked many of his tapes with such details, on this one he didn't, though we did include photos of the cassettes on which Mike did his distinct labeling.
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