Captain Beefheart & THe Magic Band
Golden Beach
Huntington Beach
California
February 18, 1978

An excellent Beefheart gig culled from mint vinyl played for the first time.

Lineage: Audience>'Easy Teeth' vinyl LP>WAV (Wavelab)>FLAC (level 8, Trader's Little Helper)

Setlist:
a1. Hair Pie: Bake III (2:27) mistitled Flavor Bud Living
a2. Suction Prints (5.12)
a3. Electricity (4:54)
a4. Click Clack (8:21)
a5. A Carrot Is As Close As A Rabbit Gets To A Diamond (2:07)
a6. Floppy Boot Stomp (4:23)
b1. Bat Chain Puller (6:16)
b2. Nowadays A Woman's Gotta Hit A Man (4:52)
b3. Crazy Little Thing (3:12)
b4. When I See Mommy I Feel Like A Mummy (5:22)
b5. Owed T'Alex (4:53)
c1. I Love You, You Big Dummy (0:16) poem
c2. Low Yo Yo Stuff (4:06)
c3. Pachuco Cadaver (5:02)
c4. Abba Zaba (4:57)
c5. Grow Fins (7:43)
c6. Dali's Car (1:35)
d1. China Pig (8:34)
d2. Sure 'nuff 'n Yes I Do (3:22)
d3. Sun Zoom Spark (2:30)
d4. When You Smile (0:46)
d5. Big Eyed Beans From Venus (6:11)
d6. Golden Birdies (2:37)

Total length: 1:39:38


Quality: 8,5/10

Line-Up:
Captain Beefheart/Don Van Vliet: vocals, tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone, bass clarinet
Eric Drew 'Black Jew/Kitabo' Feldman: bass guitar, keyboards, synthesizer
Robert 'Wait For Me' Williams: drums, percussion
Jeff 'Tapir/White Jew' Moris Tepper: guitar, slide-guitar
Feeler's Reedo/Walla Walla/Denny Walley: guitar, slide guitar
Harry Duncan: harmonica
Paul 'Eazy Teeth' Young: vocals (on: When You Smile)

Comments:
Whitney Quinn: One time (late '70's?) I got a chance to meet him backstage at the Golden Bear in Huntington Beach, California, and Don and I spent about two hours in a wonderful one-on-one conversation, where we talked about everything BUT music. Being a professional musician myself, I'm not usually an awe-struck fan, but, punk kid that I was, I asked Don if he might autograph an LP for me. He said sure, so I went back to my car, came back with an armful and said, "Which one?" His eyes lit up, and Don signed every one, inscribed, "To Whitney - love over gold. Love, Don" and the date.
The things I remember most about seeing him and his band were the consistently tight ensemble playing, the roaringly powerful performances by Don himself, his gentle and playful interaction with his audiences and his beautiful soprano sax improvisation. That such creative energy can be physically contained in one body is astonishing.
(Whitney Quinn: Love Over Gold, Radar Station)

Richard Snyder: Side note: 'Easy Teeth' was Don's nickname for our ready-and-able road manager, Paul Young -- a man with a perpetual smile and a great organizational sense.
(Justin C. Sherill: Interview With Rick Snyder)
http://easyweb.easynet.co.uk/~bgwaters/hatsizejustin.html

D. McComb: Among other things, I got to hear Don tell a heckler, in reference to Alex St. Clair-Snouffer, "I never fired a musician in my fucking life!"
(alt.fan.capt-beefheart)

Steve Froy: This is a 2 record US bootleg with a heavy card cover featuring a black and white photograph on the front of Don wearing sunglasses and looking uncomfortable on a sofa. The labels are black spirals on a yellow background.
A reasonable quality but a bit bass-y recording of an excellent show which includes a rare (but not very successful!) outing for 'Sure Nuff'.
The crowd sound pretty stoked and Don attempts to calm them down between songs by reciting various lyrics, including 'Big Dummy' and 'China Pig'. He tries to gain their sympathy with "they put these damned lights on me and give me no water!". He also tells the Roland Kirk and ribs story.
Before 'Owed T'Alex' he explains the song's about Alex St Claire and his tendency to always blame things on his motorbike and then after 'Electricity' he says "that song is 25 years old ... it's a square dance .. that's right ... it's a dance for squares".
At one point he realises Bruce Fowler is in the audience and, amid much whooping from the audience, tries to get him to join the band on stage, vaguely asking someone "do you have a trombone?".
(Bootleg discography, Radar Station)