Big Ray: Live in Bordeaux, 1999
January 17th, 2008 by Ed
Clearing out the garden shed just before Christmas I unearthed a box with a load of mini discs and 7″ vinyl; bit of a treasure trove truth be told. In amongst some other gems (like the Business Machines track) were three live recordings from the 1999 Big Ray tour of France. I’ve not listened to all three gigs that closely, but I have trawled through one of them, from Club Jimmy in Bordeaux, and edited out the half-decent songs. I’ll get onto the other 2 gigs sometime soon.
Play the whole concert in your media player: Download
Buzzing: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download I Envy You: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Mefloquine Dreams: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download The Love You Gave Me: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download House At Wilson: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Iron Days: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Ticking Over: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Spaces Inbetween: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Dance Class: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Evergreen: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Driven: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download Shadowplay: Play Now | Play in Popup | DownloadThe line-up for the France tour was a one-off (i.e. not a seasoned outfit) so we had only just started to really get our shit together when the tour finished, but for all that there were some really decent moments onstage and it has to be said, it was by far the most fun tour I’ve ever been on. Great spirit all round, loads of laughs and our man, Didier Bouyer at the helm.
Points of interest from this particular gig:
- The Love You Gave Me is an unrelelased track that we were supposed to record for the Business Class album, but never did. Not sure why as it’s a decent song.
- This was the most poorly attended gig of the whole tour. Shame because it’s a nice club and everyone was very cool.
- Fluck was the support band.
- Recorded straight onto MiniDisc with a stereo microphone.
- We did a short set because there wasn’t much of a crowd; I dropped 4 songs for this post.
The Line-Up:
- Ed Wenn - Vocals and guitar
- Paul Duncan - Bass (2nd half of the set)
- Reado - Drums and vocals
- James Allen - Guitar
- Jason Green - Bass (1st half of the set)
- Sarah Parkin - Vocals
Posted in Big Ray |
January 17th, 2008 at 11:13 am
A treasure trove indeed Mr Wenn. Happy, happy memories.
Hope all is well in Wenn-world!
Reado xx
January 17th, 2008 at 12:59 pm
Very nice - that’s going straight onto the iPod tonight!
The version of House At Wilson is superb on there, and I’m pleased to hear you put my favourite Big Ray track (Iron Days) into the set!
When you come over to tour the US I seriously reckon you should add a third bass player to the line-up…
January 22nd, 2008 at 9:20 pm
Hey Ed,
Cheers for this. I assume you dropped some of the songs for a reason, so this could be a redundant question, but any chance of getting them up as well for the sake of completeness, curiosity, and the avoidance of annoying gaps between some of the songs? Thanks.
January 22nd, 2008 at 10:25 pm
Mark, while this website is all about catering for the completists out there, I need to keep some sort of control over my own legacy…and the truth of the matter is that while the French tour was amazing fun, the band was only together for 8 or so gigs and we probably needed another 20 to really get our shit together. As it was, we were gloriously ragged and there was definitely the odd moment where we sucked and I ain’t posting them here. Also the odd song fell victim to ‘technical’ problems as is often the case when you’re recording music in a room full of drunk people
It’s not all bad news though; stand by for more songs from this tour.