Captain Beefheart 1972-03-24
Colsten Hall, Bristol, England
Set 1
Hair Pie: Bake III
Mascara Snake
When It Blows Its Stacks
Hobo Chang Ba (instrumental)
Band Intro
Click Clack
Grow Fins
I'm Gonna Booglarize You Baby
Old Black Snake
Peon
Abba Zaba
Woe-Is-Uh-Me-Bop
Steal Softly Thru Snow (instrumental)
Mascara Snake
When It Blows Its Stacks
Hobo Chang Ba (instrumental)
Band Intro
Click Clack
Grow Fins
I'm Gonna Booglarize You Baby
Old Black Snake
Peon
Abba Zaba
Woe-Is-Uh-Me-Bop
Steal Softly Thru Snow (instrumental)
Set 2
Set 3
Comment
Line-Up:
Captain Beefheart/Don Van Vliet: vocals, saxophone, harmonica
Rockette Morton/Mark Boston: bass guitar, guitar
Oréjon/Audi Hon/Roy Estrada: bass guitar
Zoot Horn Rollo/Bill Harkleroad: guitar, slide guitar
Winged Eel Fingerling/Elliot Ingber: guitar, slide guitar
Ed Marimba/Art Tripp: drums, percussion, marimba
Comments:
Paul Brown: The first date of the tour after flying in to London. The show reportedly suffering due to a bad sound system, was favorably reviewed in the majority of music journals.
(Paul Brown. Blimp Over Europe #1)
Steve Bradshaw: The Spotlight Kid is coming to booglarize you. Today, Saturday, Don Van Vliet - alias Captain Beefheart - opens his long-awaited British tour at Bristol's Colston Hall. Veteran of six albums and numerous Magic Bands, the Cap (vocals, reeds and harp) will be accompanied by Zoot Horn Rollo and Winged Eel Fingerling (guitars), Rockette Morton (guitar and bass), Oréjon (bass) and Ed Marimba (percussion).
(Steve Bradshaw: The Captain Invites You To Dance. Melody Maker. March 25, 1972)
Steve Peacock: If you live in London and are accustomed to going to hear music there, it really is a good idea to get out occasionally to hear bands. The difference between Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band's gigs at Bristol and at the Albert Hall last week was so marked -- and even though the Albert Hall was technically better, and the band played with more fire and confidence, the Bristol gig was infinitely preferable because there was so much more warmth and atmosphere about the whole thing.
It may have been something to do with the fact that Bristol was the first gig of the tour, and the first time I'd seen Beefheart live. But essentially what they did was more or less the same at both places: it truly is a Magic Band, but at Bristol there was a magic audience too. In London the fog was thicker.
But make no mistake about it both the gigs were rare and treasured experiences -- the Captain was there, on stage, playing his music with the Magic Band, and once you've experienced that you're unlikely ever to forget it, or be quite the same again. First we got a ballerina, then a belly dancer and then Rockette Morton -- big hat, printed suit, and bassus ophelius. Ed Marimba joined him on serrated fish and then the rest of the band came on -- Marimba to the drums, Zoot Horn Rollo and Winged Eel Fingerling on guitars, Roy Estrada (playing under another name that I didn't catch) on bass, and of course the Captain -- mouth harp, voice, soprano saxophone.
Just looking at them you knew it was going to be something special, and when they began to play ... it just wraps you up. They play with an innocence you can barely believe, shifting patterns and shapes into everchanging forms that bear as little relation to musical rules -- written or not -- as birdsong, or whalesong, or any other natural song. The titles are there, well-loved titles like When It Blows Its Stacks, Peon, Abba Zaba, I'm Gonna Booglarize You, Baby, and Woe-Is-Uh-Me-Bop but you realize that they're not playing the songs, they're playing themselves, or maybe just playing.
Inside the loose frame there are all kinds of things going on, each player relating to each other in a different way, interweaving threads, never contriving effects, never following a planned path. And the Captain outfront, a captivating presence, singing from growl to scream, blowing dat harp, boy, and making beautiful music with his horn. There were outstanding points -- like Rockette and Zoot Horn doing Peon, the Captain's solo song, and Winged Eel's playing on Alice In Blunderland -- but to view the thing in sections is to miss half the point, which is the total picture, or rather the total effect of a series of pictures.
The PA was duff, OK, and things could have been better at both gigs; but it didn't matter. To have the Magic Band there at all was such a relief, a release. "Men's music for women", says Beefheart, which it is. But it's also human's music for humans. There's few people who could claim to play that.
(Steve Peacock: The Captain Blows His Stacks. Sounds (UK). April 8, 1972)
Tony Rigby: Well, at Bristol Colston Hall one ballet dancer appeared, danced and left the stage, to be followed by the belly dancer. It struck me as being a pretty feeble pun at the time. This was not the supporting act. The supporting act was Foghat. The two dancers were the opening of the Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band set, and were followed by a bass solo from Mark Boston AIR. ... At any rate (Art Tripp) was certainly wearing a pair (of underwear) on his head in Bristol.
(Fireparty)
Mike Godwin: Beefheart didn't come back to the UK for several years (after the 1968 visit), but when he did, I caught the band at Bristol Colston Hall twice: once with Winged Eel Fingerling on guitar, and once with Alex Snouffer back in the band, wearing full evening dress. I guess that these shows were in 1972 or thereabouts. They played Big eyed beans at the second of these two performances, but the first one was mainly Spotlight Kid material. I had the misfortune to catch the tragic band at the Colston Hall in '74.
(Fireparty)
Tony Rigby: I saw the first and third of those shows. I was probably in Belfast when the second came around. The first was terrific; the third a disgrace.
(Fireparty)
Captain Beefheart/Don Van Vliet: vocals, saxophone, harmonica
Rockette Morton/Mark Boston: bass guitar, guitar
Oréjon/Audi Hon/Roy Estrada: bass guitar
Zoot Horn Rollo/Bill Harkleroad: guitar, slide guitar
Winged Eel Fingerling/Elliot Ingber: guitar, slide guitar
Ed Marimba/Art Tripp: drums, percussion, marimba
Comments:
Paul Brown: The first date of the tour after flying in to London. The show reportedly suffering due to a bad sound system, was favorably reviewed in the majority of music journals.
(Paul Brown. Blimp Over Europe #1)
Steve Bradshaw: The Spotlight Kid is coming to booglarize you. Today, Saturday, Don Van Vliet - alias Captain Beefheart - opens his long-awaited British tour at Bristol's Colston Hall. Veteran of six albums and numerous Magic Bands, the Cap (vocals, reeds and harp) will be accompanied by Zoot Horn Rollo and Winged Eel Fingerling (guitars), Rockette Morton (guitar and bass), Oréjon (bass) and Ed Marimba (percussion).
(Steve Bradshaw: The Captain Invites You To Dance. Melody Maker. March 25, 1972)
Steve Peacock: If you live in London and are accustomed to going to hear music there, it really is a good idea to get out occasionally to hear bands. The difference between Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band's gigs at Bristol and at the Albert Hall last week was so marked -- and even though the Albert Hall was technically better, and the band played with more fire and confidence, the Bristol gig was infinitely preferable because there was so much more warmth and atmosphere about the whole thing.
It may have been something to do with the fact that Bristol was the first gig of the tour, and the first time I'd seen Beefheart live. But essentially what they did was more or less the same at both places: it truly is a Magic Band, but at Bristol there was a magic audience too. In London the fog was thicker.
But make no mistake about it both the gigs were rare and treasured experiences -- the Captain was there, on stage, playing his music with the Magic Band, and once you've experienced that you're unlikely ever to forget it, or be quite the same again. First we got a ballerina, then a belly dancer and then Rockette Morton -- big hat, printed suit, and bassus ophelius. Ed Marimba joined him on serrated fish and then the rest of the band came on -- Marimba to the drums, Zoot Horn Rollo and Winged Eel Fingerling on guitars, Roy Estrada (playing under another name that I didn't catch) on bass, and of course the Captain -- mouth harp, voice, soprano saxophone.
Just looking at them you knew it was going to be something special, and when they began to play ... it just wraps you up. They play with an innocence you can barely believe, shifting patterns and shapes into everchanging forms that bear as little relation to musical rules -- written or not -- as birdsong, or whalesong, or any other natural song. The titles are there, well-loved titles like When It Blows Its Stacks, Peon, Abba Zaba, I'm Gonna Booglarize You, Baby, and Woe-Is-Uh-Me-Bop but you realize that they're not playing the songs, they're playing themselves, or maybe just playing.
Inside the loose frame there are all kinds of things going on, each player relating to each other in a different way, interweaving threads, never contriving effects, never following a planned path. And the Captain outfront, a captivating presence, singing from growl to scream, blowing dat harp, boy, and making beautiful music with his horn. There were outstanding points -- like Rockette and Zoot Horn doing Peon, the Captain's solo song, and Winged Eel's playing on Alice In Blunderland -- but to view the thing in sections is to miss half the point, which is the total picture, or rather the total effect of a series of pictures.
The PA was duff, OK, and things could have been better at both gigs; but it didn't matter. To have the Magic Band there at all was such a relief, a release. "Men's music for women", says Beefheart, which it is. But it's also human's music for humans. There's few people who could claim to play that.
(Steve Peacock: The Captain Blows His Stacks. Sounds (UK). April 8, 1972)
Tony Rigby: Well, at Bristol Colston Hall one ballet dancer appeared, danced and left the stage, to be followed by the belly dancer. It struck me as being a pretty feeble pun at the time. This was not the supporting act. The supporting act was Foghat. The two dancers were the opening of the Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band set, and were followed by a bass solo from Mark Boston AIR. ... At any rate (Art Tripp) was certainly wearing a pair (of underwear) on his head in Bristol.
(Fireparty)
Mike Godwin: Beefheart didn't come back to the UK for several years (after the 1968 visit), but when he did, I caught the band at Bristol Colston Hall twice: once with Winged Eel Fingerling on guitar, and once with Alex Snouffer back in the band, wearing full evening dress. I guess that these shows were in 1972 or thereabouts. They played Big eyed beans at the second of these two performances, but the first one was mainly Spotlight Kid material. I had the misfortune to catch the tragic band at the Colston Hall in '74.
(Fireparty)
Tony Rigby: I saw the first and third of those shows. I was probably in Belfast when the second came around. The first was terrific; the third a disgrace.
(Fireparty)
Sources
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Created At
Thu Mar 01 2007 00:27:42 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)
Updated At
Thu Mar 01 2007 00:24:31 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)
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