Description
On this day fifty years ago, the 18th of October 1975, Roxy Music played the second of two shows at Wembley Empire Pool.
The Viva! Album live version of this Roxy classic was recorded at that show. Here is is an upgrade of my 2018 edit of Roxy Music Siren tour footage, synched to that magnificent live cut!
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Roxy Music’s Siren tour commenced on October 2nd 1975, and continued through Europe and the US until late March 1976. Andy MacKay: “(In the States) we played mainly theatres which suited us. In the U.K. we were playing arenas, but the audience were great in both”. Roxy’s Siren album was not released until October 31st, 1975. So on many of the early dates of the tour, including all the UK dates, the audience had not heard the new material. Despite that, Roxy played most of the tracks from Siren, even starting the set with Sentimental Fool.
In a review in the Melody Maker of the October 3rd Liverpool show, Barbara Drillsma described Both Ends Burning as ”a real classic rocker”. Andy MacKay: 'Toward the end of recording (of Siren), we were compromised as we had been on Stranded and other albums by Bryan not having finished lyrics so that tracks got overworked as instrumentals while we were working as it were in the dark. ‘Both Ends Burning’ is a case in point. It has always been better live because we know where the singing comes in!”
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There’s been some doubt which show the Viva! recording is from. But comparing the soundboard from the second night at Wembley, October 18th, to the version on Viva!, it’s obviously the same recording. Some alterations have been made to the Viva! version – it’s about 30 seconds shorter, having had some of the repeated “Keep on Burning until the end” lines omitted. And there’s been considerable overdubbing of Andy MacKay’s saxophone, which although it is almost inaudible on the soundboard, is clearly different playing. Richard Adams writes about Viva! and the Wembley show on his blog:
“Phil Manzanera… assembled the songs and added some judicious instrumental overdubs - bits of Andy's sax playing here and there when mics hadn't picked everything up, some of his own guitar playing, tidying up wayward notes. Not much was needed as Roxy live was a well-honed machine”.
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“Ferry looking like an AWOL GI”, wrote John Inghan, in his Sounds review of the 18th October Glasgow show. On the Siren tour Ferry introduced a new aesthetic. He wore a khaki military style uniform, apparently inspired by Elvis Presley’s in the movie, “GI Blues”. Looking at shots of Presley in the movie, that seems likely. Even down to the detail of the military emblem on the left shoulder of Presley’s uniform. ‘Tho of course on Ferry’s shoulder the emblem says, “Roxy Music”. Also new on that tour was the addition of backing singers, the "Sirens", also uniformed – the John Ingham review again: “…Doreen Chanter and Maggie Sullivan showed real class with powder blue WRAF uniforms”. Again from Barbara Drillsma’s review of the Liverpool show: “Roxy were helped along by two attractive young ladies Lorraine and Doreen - dressed in tight-fitting airforce outfits”.
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The original version and upload of this video, saw me finally coming out of the long run of only Bowie videos, and I wrote this: It’s been a while now, that I’ve been wanting to untypecast myself from the strictly 70’s-Bowie-videos mantle. I’ve loved the first phase of Roxy Music since I was a kid, and of course there is so much common ground between Roxy and Bowie, so it seemed like a good place to start.
This video is assembled from pretty low quality sources, from three different shows, and it was no easy task to make something coherent and watchable. This time, I've managed to improve some of the previous issues that I wasn't happy with.
Thanks for watching, hope you dig it!
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Credits
Video sources:
17 & 18 October 1975 | Wembley Empire Pool | London, UK | Official Both Ends Burning promo video
Unconfirmed 1975 show | All You Need is Love | Episode 15 | US TV 1977
27 January 1976 | Konserthuset | Stockholm, Sweden
Audio Sources:
Roxy Music | Both Ends Burning live at Wembley Empire Pool | London, UK | 18 October 1975 | From the 1976 album Viva! Roxy Music, and live at Wembley soundboard
Musicians:
Vocals | Bryan Ferry
Drums | Paul Thompson
Guitars | Phil Manzanera
Saxophone | Andy Mackay
Keyboards | Edie Jobson
Bass | John Gustafson
Backing Vocals | Jacquie Sullivan | Doreen Chanter
Production | Chris Thomas
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Always more videos to follow, so please keep your electric eye on me babe!
I don't own the rights, and I'm not making any money out of this etc. Just a fan making videos for other fans.
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