Music Banter - View Single Post - An Infinite Number Of Things That Pisses Me Off About Music

Urban Hat€monger ? · 09-12-2008, 01:35 PM

41 : Bands From The 70s With Rubbish Set Lists

I have already touched upon this subject in a couple of past posts so it's about time I went into it in detail.

As you know I am an avid collector of bootlegs and live performances and one thing that really annoys me is the attitude some rock bands have towards choosing their set list to play at gigs.

The best way to illustrate this is to give you an example of one. Here is the ENTIRE set played by Deep Purple at the California Jam in 1974..

Burn
Might Just Take Your Life
Mistreated
Smoke on the Water
You Fool No One / The Mule
Space Truckin'

Now on the surface this looks like a tight little set played by your typical mid bill festival band maybe lasting 30-45 mins. However for this gig Deep Purple were the headliners and this 6/7 song set lasted JUST UNDER AN HOUR AND A HALF!!!!!!!!
Space Truckin itself is 28 minutes long. I mean come on , Deep Purple had 8 albums out when they played this gig are you telling me you can only manage to come up with 6 songs to play. It's not just them it's most big name rock bands from the 70s. I already mentioned The Who filling their set with the Tommy album in it's entirety and endless covers , and I could easily find examples of other bands doing the same.

One book I have enjoyed reading over the past year or so is a book on the subject to Hawkwind. In the book one of the band members (I think it was Nik Turner) says that during the 70s rock bands were embarrassed to play any of their hit singles. Playing a song you had doing well in the charts at a gig was a big no-no back then. And it's true , Everybody associates Hawkwind with Silver Machine as it's easily their most well known song yet in the 70s it hardly ever featured in their live set. So it's ok to play loads of blues covers , rock n roll covers , have long guitar / drum / keyboard / whatever solos , make extended versions of your songs so that they last over 20 minutes ... all that's fine. But play a song people have come to see you play? ...THE OUTRAGE !!!!

Lemmy was once asked by an interviewer why he played Ace Of Spades at every gig. Lem replied "If I went to see Chuck Berry and he didn't play Johnny B Goode i'd get up on stage and punch his teeth in"

I happen to agree with that. And if I ever go and see Motorhead they BETTER play Ace Of Spades.

09-12-2008, 01:35 PM	#749 (permalink)
Urban Hat€monger ? The Sexual Intellectual Join Date: Dec 2004 Location: Somewhere cooler than you Posts: 18,605	41 : Bands From The 70s With Rubbish Set Lists I have already touched upon this subject in a couple of past posts so it's about time I went into it in detail. As you know I am an avid collector of bootlegs and live performances and one thing that really annoys me is the attitude some rock bands have towards choosing their set list to play at gigs. The best way to illustrate this is to give you an example of one. Here is the ENTIRE set played by Deep Purple at the California Jam in 1974.. Burn Might Just Take Your Life Mistreated Smoke on the Water You Fool No One / The Mule Space Truckin' Now on the surface this looks like a tight little set played by your typical mid bill festival band maybe lasting 30-45 mins. However for this gig Deep Purple were the headliners and this 6/7 song set lasted JUST UNDER AN HOUR AND A HALF!!!!!!!! Space Truckin itself is 28 minutes long. I mean come on , Deep Purple had 8 albums out when they played this gig are you telling me you can only manage to come up with 6 songs to play. It's not just them it's most big name rock bands from the 70s. I already mentioned The Who filling their set with the Tommy album in it's entirety and endless covers , and I could easily find examples of other bands doing the same. One book I have enjoyed reading over the past year or so is a book on the subject to Hawkwind. In the book one of the band members (I think it was Nik Turner) says that during the 70s rock bands were embarrassed to play any of their hit singles. Playing a song you had doing well in the charts at a gig was a big no-no back then. And it's true , Everybody associates Hawkwind with Silver Machine as it's easily their most well known song yet in the 70s it hardly ever featured in their live set. So it's ok to play loads of blues covers , rock n roll covers , have long guitar / drum / keyboard / whatever solos , make extended versions of your songs so that they last over 20 minutes ... all that's fine. But play a song people have come to see you play? ...THE OUTRAGE !!!! Lemmy was once asked by an interviewer why he played Ace Of Spades at every gig. Lem replied "If I went to see Chuck Berry and he didn't play Johnny B Goode i'd get up on stage and punch his teeth in" I happen to agree with that. And if I ever go and see Motorhead they BETTER play Ace Of Spades. __________________ Urb's RYM Stuff Most people sell their soul to the devil, but the devil sells his soul to Nick Cave.