Saturday, December 10, 2011

THE WALL - LIVE BERLIN 1990 OVERVIEW

The Wall – Live in Berlin




The Wall - Live in Berlin

Original 1990 cover
Live album by Roger Waters
Released10 September 1990
23 June 2003 (reissue)
Recorded21 July 1990
GenreProgressive rock
LabelMercury Records
ProducerNick Griffiths
Roger Waters chronology
Radio K.A.O.S.
(1987)		The Wall - Live in Berlin
(1990)		Amused to Death
(1992)
Alternative cover
Reissued 2003 cover
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
Allmusic3/5 stars[1]
The Wall – Live in Berlin was a live concert performance by Roger Waters and numerous guest artists, of the Pink Floyd studio album The Wall, itself largely written by Waters during his time with the band. The show was held in Berlin, Germany, on 21 July 1990, to commemorate the fall of the Berlin Wall eight months earlier. A live album of the concert was released in September 1990. A video of the concert was also commercially released.
The show is often mistakenly referred to as a Pink Floyd concert. This is wrong, since unlike previous performances of The Wall, the Berlin show took place after Waters had left the band, and involved no members of Pink Floyd's 1990 line-up.

Wall: Live in Berlin 1990

[edit]History

The concert at a strip of land between theBrandenburg Gate and Leipziger Platz.
The concert was staged on vacant terrain between Potsdamer Platz and the Brandenburg Gate, a location that was part of the former "no-man's land" of the Berlin Wall. The Wall was written by Roger Waters when he was a member of Pink Floyd in 1979 with a tour following in 1980 and 1981.
The show had a sell-out crowd of over 350,000 people, and right before the performance started the gates were opened which enabled atleast another 100,000 people to watch.[2] While this broke records for a paid-entry concert, 7 days earlier Jean Michel Jarre had set a new world record for concert attendance, with his free Paris la Defense show attracting a live audience of two million.
The event was produced and cast by British impresario and producer Tony Hollingsworth. It was staged partly at Waters' expense. While he subsequently earned the money back from the sale of the CD and video releases of the album, the original plan was to donate all profits past his initial investment to the Memorial Fund for Disaster Relief, a UK charity founded by Leonard Cheshire. However, audio and video sales came in significantly under projections, and the trading arm of the charity (Operation Dinghy) incurred heavy losses. A few years later, the charity was wound up, and the audio and video sales rights from the concert performance returned to Waters.
The production was designed by Mark Fisher and Jonathan Park.[3][4][5] The stage design featured a 550-foot-long (170 m) and 82-foot-high (25 m) wall. Most of the wall was built before the show and the rest is build progressively through the first part of the show. The wall is then knocked down at the end of the show.[6]
Waters had stated on the first airing of the making of The Wall on In the Studio with Redbeard in July 1989 that the only way he was to resurrect a live performance of The Wall was "if the Berlin Wall came down". Four months later the wall came down.
Initially, Waters tried to get guest musicians like Peter Gabriel, Bruce Springsteen and Eric Clapton but they were either unavailable or turned it down. Both Rod Stewart, who was to sing "Young Lust", and Joe Cocker were originally confirmed to appear but when the original planned concert date was put back both found themselves unavailable.[7]Also, on the same 1989 interview with Redbeard, Waters also stated that "I might even let Dave play guitar." On June 30, 1990 backstage at the Knebworth Pink Floyd performance at Knebworth '90, during a pre-show interview, David Gilmour responded to Roger's statement on an interview with Jim Ladd by saying that "he and the rest of Pink Floyd (Nick Mason and Rick Wright) had been given the legal go-ahead to perform with Roger but had not been contacted." Two days later, on July 2, 1990 Waters appeared on the American rock radio call-in show Rocklineand contradicted his Gilmour invite by saying, "I don't know where Dave got that idea".
In the end, Hollingswoth (with Waters assisting) brought in guest artists including Rick Danko, Levon Helm andGarth Hudson of The Band, The Hooters, Van Morrison, Sinéad O'Connor, Cyndi Lauper, Marianne Faithfull,Scorpions, Joni Mitchell, Paul Carrack, Thomas Dolby and Bryan Adams, along with actors Albert Finney, Jerry Hall, Tim Curry and Ute Lemper. Leonard Cheshire opened the concert by blowing a WWII whistle.
This performance had several differences from Pink Floyd's original production of The Wall show. Both "Mother" and "Another Brick in the Wall, Part II" (like in the 1980/81 concerts) were extended with solos by various instruments and the latter had a cold ending. "In The Flesh" (also like the 1980/81 concerts) has an extended intro, and "Comfortably Numb" featured dueling solos by the two guitarists as well as an additional chorus at the end of the song. "The Show Must Go On" is omitted completely, while both "The Last Few Bricks" and "What Shall We Do Now?" are included ("The Last Few Bricks" was shortened). Also, the performance of the song "The Trial" had live actors playing the parts, with Thomas Dolby playing the part of the teacher hanging from the wall, Tim Curry as the prosecutor, and Albert Finney as the Judge. Rather than the usual closing track, "Outside the Wall", the show ended with "The Tide Is Turning", a song from Waters' then-recent solo album Radio K.A.O.S.
The Wall - Live in Berlin was released as a live recording of the concert, although a couple of tracks were excised from the CD version, and the Laserdisc video inNTSC can still be found through second sourcing. A DVD was released in 2003 in the USA by Island/Mercury Records and internationally by Universal Music (Region-free).
Hollingsworth's company Tribute, a London-based "good causes" campaign company, sold worldwide television rights, with 52 countries showing the two-hour event. Twenty countries showed up to five repeats of the show and 65 countries broadcast a highlights show. There was also distribution of a double music CD and post-production VHS videotape by Polygram.

[edit]Set list

  1. "In the Flesh?" by Scorpions
  2. "The Thin Ice" by Ute Lemper & Roger Waters & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir
  3. "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 1)" by Roger Waters; sax solo by Garth Hudson
  4. "The Happiest Days of Our Lives" by Roger Waters
  5. "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 2)" by Cyndi Lauper; guitar solos by Rick DiFonzo & Snowy White, synth solo by Thomas Dolby
  6. "Mother" by Sinéad O'Connor & The Band; accordion by Garth Hudson, vocals by Rick Danko & Levon Helm; acoustic instruments by The Hooters.
  7. "Goodbye Blue Sky" by Joni Mitchell & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir ; flute by James Galway
  8. "Empty Spaces/What Shall We Do Now?" by Bryan Adams, Roger Waters & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir
  9. "Young Lust" by Bryan Adams, guitar solos by Rick DiFonzo & Snowy White
  10. "Oh My God - What a Fabulous Room" by Jerry Hall (intro to "One of My Turns")
  11. "One of My Turns" by Roger Waters
  12. "Don't Leave Me Now" by Roger Waters
  13. "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 3)" by Roger Waters & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir
  14. "The Last Few Bricks"
  15. "Goodbye Cruel World" by Roger Waters
  16. "Hey You" by Paul Carrack
  17. "Is There Anybody Out There?" by The Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir; classical guitars by Rick DiFonzo & Snowy White
  18. "Nobody Home" by Roger Waters & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir, guitar solos by Snowy White
  19. "Vera" by Roger Waters & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir
  20. "Bring the Boys Back Home" by The Rundfunk, Band of the Combined Soviet Forces in Germany & Red Army Chorus
  21. "Comfortably Numb" by Van Morrison, Roger Waters & The Band & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir, guitar solos by Rick DiFonzo & Snowy White
  22. "In the Flesh" by Roger Waters, Scorpions, the Rundfunk Orchestra and Choir
  23. "Run Like Hell" by Roger Waters and Scorpions
  24. "Waiting for the Worms" by Roger Waters, Scorpions and the Rundfunk Orchestra and Choir
  25. "Stop" by Roger Waters
  26. "The Trial" by The Rundfunk Orchestra and Choir, featuring:
  27. "The Tide is Turning (After Live Aid)" by the Company (lead vocals by Roger Waters, Joni Mitchell, Cyndi Lauper, Bryan Adams, Van Morrison and Paul Carrack.) & the Rundfunk Orchestra & Choir.

[edit]Personnel

The Company
The Bleeding Heart Band
Others

[edit]Performance notes

  • Before the beginning of the show, brief performances by The Hooters, The Band and The Chieftains (with guest James Galway) were held, but none of these songs were ever officially released.
  • In the actual concert on live television, the second song, "The Thin Ice" and part of the third song, "Another Brick in the Wall (Part 1)", were disrupted when a circuit breaker tripped. It was reset, but immediately tripped again so they had to rewire some equipment. Those two songs had to be re-recorded for the issue of the videotape. After 'The Thin Ice' was interrupted, the original, live American broadcast of the show said: "This is radio-aid live in Berlin. If you're wondering what's happening, is, a production involving some thousands of people, has stopped. And when that has to happen, Roger walked out in front of the crowd, sort of waved to them and said, 'Oh well, this happened a couple of times during rehearsal' - in fact, if you were lucky enough to have seen 'The Wall' in L.A., when it was performed, I think, the second night, there was a curtain that caught fire, some very similar situation has happening [sic] here. They have to back up tapes, they have to re-cue lighting, get everybody ready, and then they're gonna roll it. He's actually kind of jovial about the whole thing, he's walking across the stage and just kinda went 'Aw, shucks,' and the crowd is laughing, they know what happened, that somebody missed a cue and they're gonna rewind, uh, get everything going again, and take the film back...because this is what happens with The Wall...is so tall...they end up using it as a kind of like a drive-in movie projector - uh, screen, rather - they project images on it and everything, so there's a lot of things that have to be re-wound, re-cued...and then they're gonna re-start it and then they're gonna come back to it....You're listening to 'The Wall, Live from Berlin' on the Global Satellite Network. And the reason we're here is for the 'Memorial Fund for Disaster Relief.' And if you'd like to help out, they're trying to get together and - unless you can write a check for $800 million - they're trying to get together some money that will be in a permanent account, and this money will then go whenever there's a disaster, whenever it's needed, somewhere in the world. And you can send your check into for 'the Memorial Fund for Disaster Relief' P.O. Box 4383 Hollywood, California 90078 - and i think we're doing the show again! Let's go back live to the stage! 'The Wall, Live from Berlin'"
  • The live performance of "Mother" was also hounded by a power failure. Roger Waters tried to get Sinéad O'Connor to sing her parts anyway, or mime the song, while the error was being fixed. Offended by being asked to mime, she didn't return after the show to re-record the performance (which is how "The Thin Ice" was saved for the CD/Video release.) Instead, the release version of "Mother" comes from the dress rehearsal on the previous night before the concert. Consequently, the large projection of Gerald Scarfe's mother character that was projected on the screen during the concert cannot be seen on the video or DVD versions.
  • Film director Ian Emes was hired to shoot live footage originally intended to be included in the program. Emes devised a film around the character of Pink, performed by Rupert Everett, and of Pink's mother, played by Marianne Faithfull, and shot the sequences in East Berlin during the concert preparations. Only a small segment of the film was used in the performance.
  • Bryan Adams appeared to be miming his guitar-playing in Young Lust, and the Scorpions appear to be doing the same on all their instruments during the fascist rally sequence, as can be observed on the video.
  • The vocals that are heard through the megaphone in Waiting for the Worms are supposed to be coming through a rolled piece of cardboard (imitating a megaphone) that Roger Waters is singing to. However, in the beginning of the solo, the vocals that come through the megaphone are heard although Roger Waters was still picking up the paper megaphone from the floor, so it was obvious that the megaphone vocals are lipsynced.
  • The Wife's part of "The Trial" was reshot at London's Brixton Academy after the original sequence was deemed to be of insufficient quality due to camera shake. What is seen in the video issue is a close-up of Ute Lemper, shot against a dark background, lip-syncing to the original live sound.[7]
  • Shot on Potsdamer Platz, the no man's land between East and West Germany, the producers didn't know if the area would be filled with mines - no one did. Before setting up, they did a sweep of the area and found a cache of munitions and a previously unknown SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler bunker. TheLeibstandarte Adolf Hitler started as Hitler's elite personal bodyguard but were later diverted to Eastern and Western fronts. There is a misconception probably due to the SS division's name that the bunker found was the Führerbunker or the place were Adolf Hitler committed suicide which is false. The Führerbunkerwas in another location.[8]
  • At the request of the concert producers, part of the Berlin Wall was kept in place as a security fence behind the stage.
  • Paddy Moloney, bandleader for The Chieftains, is listed as a guest performer in the show. Although The Chieftains played a daytime set before the concert, his solo contribution to the main show remains a mystery.
  • During the final chanting of "Tear down the wall!" in the Trial sequence, the wall has a projection of a concrete and graffiti marked semblance of the Berlin Wall, just before it is torn down.
  • At the beginning of "Bring The Boys Back Home", a section of the Vietnam War Memorial was projected onto the wall, producing a chilling cross-image ofVietnam War lost American soldiers, Pink Floyd's album, and the Berlin Wall itself, sections of which were still standing near the concert site. These comments are from someone that attended the show.
  • The live Van Morrison version of "Comfortably Numb" is used in the Martin Scorsese film The Departed. It is later used in HBO's 'The Sopranos'. Morrison also performed this version on his 2008 concerts.
  • Rights in the event are held by Tribute Inspirations Limited.
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FEMME FATALE

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RAY CHARLES: LOOKING BACK

As his 80th birthday approaches, a look at the life and legacy of the late Ray Charles.


"I just do what I do." That's what Ray Charles told Billboard in June 2002 when asked to assess his role in music history. Of course, Charles' self-effacing response belies a groundbreaking career and a legacy that endures today, as fans look toward celebrating what would have been the legendary artist's 80th birthday Sept. 23. Looking back at Charles' storied career, what comes to mind is the phrase "musical genius." In Charles' case, that's no hype.


Rare & Unseen Ray Charles Photos | Charles on the Charts

80th Birthday Year Events | Charles Charity


In 1954, the artist's melding of gospel and blues yielded the pioneering hit "I've Got a Woman"-and forged an indelible imprint on R&B, rock and pop. His earthy, soulful voice graced a steady stream of classics after "Woman," including "Drown in My Own Tears," "What'd I Say," "Hit the Road Jack," "Unchain My Heart," "I Can't Stop Loving You" and "Georgia on My Mind."

Video below: Ray Charles performs "Hit The Road Jack" in São Paulo, Brazil on September 22, 1963.


Video below: Ray Charles performs "Then I'll Be Home" in Montreux, Switzerland on July 19, 1997.


Just as at home on the Hammond B-3 organ as he was on the piano, he also landed at the top of Billboard's R&B, pop, country and jazz charts-and even the dance chart, collaborating with childhood friend Quincy Jones and Chaka Khan on "I'll Be Good to You."

His final recording, 2004's "Genius Loves Company," made history when it won eight Grammy Awards, including album and record of the year for his pairing with Norah Jones on "Here We Go Again."

But what many may not know is that the inimitable Charles was also a genius when it came to the business side of music. In the early '60s he negotiated a rare feat after leaving Atlantic Records to sign with ABC-Paramount: ownership of his own master recordings. He also established his own labels. Tangerine (his favorite fruit) came first, which later evolved into CrossOver Records.

A songwriter who penned nearly 200 songs, Charles also operated his own publishing companies, Tangerine Music and Racer Music. For these entities, Charles and longtime manager Joe Adams designed and built the RPM International office and studios on Washington Boulevard in Los Angeles. The Ray Charles Memorial Library will open in the building this fall.

Charles also found time to manage the careers of other acts, including Billy Preston and '70s R&B group the Friends of Distinction. And way before it was de rigueur for artists to do, Charles set up what became a foundation to help needy children with hearing disabilities and later on support education.


He was an amazing human being," says Jones, 77, who became friends with Charles when both were scrappy teenagers in Seattle. "A true innovator who revolutionized music and the business of music," he adds. "Growing up, we only had the radio; no Michael Jackson, Diddy or Oprah. So it was hard to imagine today's entrepreneurial world. But that didn't stop us. We spent a lot of time talking and dreaming about things that brothers had never done before."

"He really was a genius," says singer Solomon Burke, a former Atlantic labelmate. "He did things the way he wanted."

Charles was born Ray Charles Robinson Sept. 23, 1930, in Albany, Ga. As many learned through actor Jamie Foxx's Academy Award-winning portrayal in the 2004 film "Ray," Charles became blind by age 7 and orphaned at 15 while growing up in northwest Florida.

In eight years at a state school for the blind, the young Charles learned how to read and write music. Leaving Florida in 1947, he headed for Seattle ("Choosing the farthest place he could find from Florida," Jones says), where he notched his first hit two years later as a member of the Maxin Trio, "Confession Blues."

Even then, Charles was an enterprising individual. "He had his own apartment, record player, two pairs of pimp shoes, and here I am still living at home," Jones recalls with a laugh. "His mother trained him not to be blind: no cane, no dogs, no cup. His scuffed-up shoes... that was his guide and driving force. He was the most independent dude I ever saw in my life. Ray would get blind only when pretty girls came around."

Signing with Atlantic Records in 1952, Charles as a West Coast jazz and blues man recorded such songs as "It Should've Been Me" and label co-founder Ahmet Ertegun's composition, "Mess Around."

Then he connected in 1954 with "I've Got a Woman," which set off a chain reaction of more hits capitalizing on his bold gospel/blues fusion. But Charles was just getting started. In 1958, he performed at the Newport Jazz Festival, accompanied by a band that featured such jazz cats as saxophonists David "Fathead" Newman and Hank Crawford. Further bucking convention, he recorded "The Genius of Ray Charles," a 1959 release offering standards on one side (including "Come Rain or Come Shine") and big band numbers on the other, featuring members of Count Basie's orchestra and several arrangements by Jones.


Video below: Charles' 1966 Coke commercial, "So Tired."


Leaving Atlantic for ABC-Paramount, a fearless Charles recorded the seminal "Genius + Soul = Jazz" album in 1961. A year later, his earlier dabbling in country music grew serious with the release of the million-selling "Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music."

Complemented by lush strings and a harmony-rich choir, he scored with covers of Don Gibson's "I Can't Stop Loving You" and Ted Daffan's "Born to Lose"-and spent 14 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard 200.




For a black man to do this in 1962 was unheard of," says Tony Gumina, president of the Ray Charles Marketing Group, which handles the late artist's licensing affairs. "He was trying to sell records to people who didn't want to drink from the same water fountain as him. But this was one of his greatest creative and business moves: to not be categorized musically and cross over. Though he never worried about it, he was resigned to the fact that he might lose some core fans. But he thought he'd gain far more in the process."

Gumina was operating his own promotion company working with state lotteries when he met Charles in 1999. The two teamed up on a series of commercials for various state lotteries and also introduced a line of Ray Charles slot machines also accessible to the blind.

"Everything he did had a business acumen to it," says Gumina, who cites Charles' liaison with manager Adams as a pivotal turning point. Originally hired to be Charles' stage announcer, former radio DJ Adams segued into overseeing production of the singer's shows, lighting and wardrobe.

Together the pair designed and built Charles' L.A. business base, RPM International (Recording, Publishing and Management) studio. When he began recording there in 1965, the label rented the studio from him, so he made money on his recordings before they were even released.

To save money on travel expenses, Charles purchased an airplane to ferry his band around to gigs. A smaller plane was also acquired so that Charles could wing in to, say, New York to record a couple of songs before flying back out in time for a show.

"He understood the entertainment business enough to know that you may not be popular forever," Gumina says, "and you need to maximize your product. At the same time, he had as much fun as any rock star but without the sad money stories. There was a time to work and a time to play, and he knew the difference. He didn't have a bunch of homes or a large entourage. That's why he was able to save $50 million before he died."

Calling Charles an "incredibly smart man," Concord president John Burk says he learned a lot from the ailing singer while he was recording his final studio album, "Genius Loves Company."

Video below: Ray Charles performs "It Ain't Easy Being Green" in Trentnton, NJ on Nov. 7, 2002.


Going through "some sticky deal points, he was amazing," Burk recalls. "He had the whole agreement in his head. Without referencing any material, he knew all the terms we proposed and had the deal done for the album in two discussions."

Creatively, Burk says Charles was an artist dedicated to delivering "a true performance from the heart. Part of his creative legacy was his approach to singing. He opened the door to vocal improvisations, changing how people perceived you could sing a song. Many singers today are influenced by him and they don't even know it."


Rare & Unseen Ray Charles Photos | Charles on the Charts

80th Birthday Year Events | Charles Charity

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