Talking Heads - Stardust Room, Las Vegas (1979-09-29)

Talking Heads
Stardust Room, Las Vegas (1979-09-29)

Original source: SBD (?) - probably true

Original lineage lost:
SBD source (?) -> ? -> Encoded by FLAC v1.1.2a with FLAC Frontend v1.7.1

Sound quality is a pretty solid A for tracks 01 - 11, sometimes dipping to A- and rising to A+.

Tracks 12 & 13 I'd put at a B+, with 14 & 15 being slightly better, but not much.

David Byrne is entirely at his freaky best, adding in his usual assortment of vocal punctuation throughout. The band is tight and on-time throughout; a pretty smoking show that I will always regret not being at. This show is barely a month after the release of "Fear of Music."

As you may notice while listening, it seems reasonable that this really is a true soundboard. In fact, I'd call this one of the more "raw" soundboards I've heard. Typical soundboard artifacts are present, such as inconsistent recording levels in different channels from the stage, some electric humming (generally at low level and often not present at all). You can hear the equalization shifts at several points as the mix is being adjusted. Very low audience noise, some stage chatter, generally nice crisp sound with broad dynamic range.

Note, it is quite possible, even probable, that the cut in track 11 indicates a change to a different source, as you will notice a dramatic shift in the sound quality. A lot of dynamic range drops off after the cut, possibly indicating that the end of this torrent is sourced from an *.mp3 torrent (??) &/or audience recording (??). I'm only guessing, based upon the fact that I found several mentions of a 320 K *.mp3 torrent of this show while trying to identify the venue.

Talking Heads
Stardust Room, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA
09 September 1979

01 - Intro - 1:01
02 - Artists Only - 5:18 [ breakup in source @ 4:28-4:46; listen for the dishes clattering. ]
03 - Stay Hungry - 3:26
04 - Cities - 5:07 [ "There's a little bit too much pressure in the rear area." ]
05 - Paper - 2:40
06 - Mind - 4:59
07 - Heaven - 4:49
08 - Electric Guitar - 3:04
09 - Air - 4:05
10 - New Feelin' - 4:12
11 - Building on Fire - 0:46 [ cut off ]
12 - Found a Job - 4:23
13 - Psycho Killer - 6:39 [ ends 4:25; crowd noise to 6:39 ]
14 - Life During Wartime - 4:14
15 - Take Me to the River - 5:59

total time: 1:00:42

I picked this up anonymously leeching via mininova, and it was a P A I N F U L download! Took about three weeks with just one or two seeders & leechers dropping in and out every day or two with miserable connection speeds. I take that as an indication that this torrent is largely unavailable in general ... I therefore and so verily take it upon myself to re-up it and hope to get it to a new set of Talking Heads fans.

It was worth the pain.

- Talking Heads - Take Me to the River (SNL 1979).avi

It appears to be a rip of a TV broadcast, and a fairly high-quality one at that, given it's an *.avi. I'm including it as a relevent, context complementary bit of history on the band from this era of their career. Please consider it to be a "bonus track" of sorts. While not exactly up to the standards of a *.flac, the quality is quite good and, in fact, superior to a few other torrents I've grabbed here.

I didn't research up which night the Talking Heads appeared on Saturday Night Live, but this file claims it was in 1979, so I'm going to believe it unless further info crops up.

I gathered a bit of extra information while trying to find the venue. Included in the info file are some semi-random links and excerpts that fans should find interesting.

Here are a couple of shows that bracket this one, for reference:

- Berkelee Performance Center, Boston, MA (1979-08-08)
- Arlington Theatre (Santa Barbara, CA (1979-09-25)
- Stardust Room, Las Vegas, NV (1979-09-29)
- Boomer Theatre, Norman, OK (1979-10-14)