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Matt Gardner's Collection

Jefferson Starship   04/04/2002

Sweetwater Saloon, Mill Valley, CA
Source (AKG C61's xy center lip + Vocal Direct Splits)>Mackie 1202 Mixer>Sony TCD-5 cassette>CDR
Media CDR   2 discs
Notes AUD. This is the corrected "analog cassette to digital transfer." Same tracks as other version, but substantially better sound with much less hiss. See technical notes.
Tech Notes Date: Sun, 18 Aug 2002 17:09:35 -0700
Reply-To: Robert Daniels <rdanie2@US.IBM.COM>
Sender: Jefferson Family List <2400FULTON@LISTS.NETSPACE.ORG>
From: Robert Daniels <rdanie2@US.IBM.COM>
Subject: JS Sweetwater 4-4-02 Recording Details
Content-type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Back from the Summer Tours and catching up on everything...

1st - There is no 'soundboard tape' from the JS 4-4-02 performance.
Sweetwater is a very small room, so only the vocals and the keyboard were
going through the soundboard. Paul and Slicks' amps were more than
sufficient to carry the room all by themselves. There were a couple
'audience' tapes spun from various points in the room + a video that Doug
Moon shot from near the stage.

The recording in question (and it's sad story):
We set out to make the killer tape of this show. Paul and Darby's vocal
mics were split to send one side to the FOH SBD and the other side to a
Mackie 1202 mixer. A pair of vintage AKG C61's xy at lip of stage between
Paul and Darby's monitors (at this placement, one was aimed directly at
Paul's amp and one directly at Slick's). Plus, they picked the keyboards
directly from the stage monitors. Four channels going into the Mackie. We
were able to create a very good stereo image and it sounded primo. Main
outs from the Mackie going to a Tascam DAP-1 DAT with a S/PDIF second copy
spinning on a Sony PCM-M1. John Murray wanted a cassette 'car copy' to
listen to on the way home. We hooked up his Sony TCD-5(?) to the tape outs
on the mixer and started rolling.

What happened? Just minutes into the early show - we started
intermittently getting a bad crackling sound. Because of the panning, it
it was getting on both output channels. It progressed to the point where
it was killing both channels. We figured out which cable was doing it -
the first song already trashed - and got a new cable ready to swap between
songs - swapped it - and that fixed the problem. Monitoring off the mixer -
it sounded great from that point on. Missed a flip on John's cassette by
about 30 seconds as we were out in the room taking photos or something -
not to worry - it was a car copy and he had said just let it fill the first
side then turn it over.

The next morning - we listened to the DATs - and they were TRASH -
extreemly attenuated signal. The output switch on the back of the Mackie
had gotten bumped after soundcheck giving us the wrong output. Had we have
listened through the headphone jacks on the DAT deck during the show, we
would have known immediately and fixed it. But the DAT decks tend to have
cheesey headphone amps, so we plugged into the mixer headphone outs, which
sounded great - we were monitoring pre-problem.

Listening to the DAT that morning - I now know what it feels like to have
an stomach ulcer.
Frantic phone calls - the cassette copy came off a different output - it
shouldn't have been affected by the output switch setting. It wasn't.
John's cassettes are now the master tapes of the show - 1st song lost due
to the bad cable + about 20-30 seconds missing for a flip. John Murray and
friend spun the cassette to CDR's and sent that to me - which I passed on
'as-is'. There are a couple audible flaws on that copy. At some point -
when John and I can safely transport the only existing master cassettes up
to the secret High Sierra laboratory - we will attempt to do a better
analog cassette to digital transfer. Until then, it's not that bad of a
copy. The 'master' cassettes remain locked in a safe Bay Area location.

Peace, Bob D.



J-Card Comment Jefferson Starship
April 4, 2002
Sweetwater Saloon
Mill Valley, CA

FIRST SET:

Missing ?Wooden Ships?
1. Good Shepherd
2. Lawman
3. All Fly Away
4. Shadowlands
5. Love Has No Pride
6. When the Earth Moves Again
Missing ?Women Who Fly?
7. Hyperdrive
8. Baby Tree
9. Let's Go Together
10. Sunrise >Intro to Hijack>
11. Hijack
12. The Mountain Song


SECOND SET:

1. The Light
2. The Mountain Song
3. Lawman
4. Triad
5. Sketches of China
6. Good Shepherd
7. Love Has No Pride
Missing ?Hyperdrive?
8. The Baby Tree
9. Let's Go Together
10. Sunrise>Hijack>Have You Seen the Stars Tonite>Hijack
11. Volunteers
Trades Allowed Yes   Traded from: David Tanzi
Ratings Show: A    Sound: A-
Owned by Matt Gardner · Last Updated May 23, 2023