Pink Floyd

Madison Square Garden, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA
3 July 1977
Recorder 3

01 Sheep
02 Pigs On The Wing (Pt. 1)
03 Dogs (cuts)
04 Dogs (continues)
05 Pigs On The Wing (Pt. 2)
06 Pigs (Three Different Ones)
07 Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts I-V)
08 Welcome To The Machine
09 Have A Cigar
10 Wish You Were Here
11 Money
12 Us and Them


Total running time 113m 09s

Scotch Highlander C-60 cassettes x 2 (low) > Technics RS-B965-M > Focusrite Saffire Pro 14 > Audacity 1.3 > Wav (24bit/96kHz) > CDWave 1.98 > FLAC (24bit/96kHz)

*** kbrubaker's notes ***

In October 1977 I received two cassettes with a recording of Pink Floyd’s third night at Madison Square Garden. I don’t know anything about the provenance of this recording, other than it was offered for sale in the back of a music magazine. It was also the first concert tape that I ever got, and I was very excited to have finally located an “underground recording”.

The recording has lots of echo, and sounds very live and booming. It is often hard to make out lyrics. Rick’s keyboards come through as droning sounds, but are listenable. It sounds like the recorder was up in the rafters or somewhere pretty far from any speakers. Overall, although it is not a particularly good recording there is something kind of appealing about it. As I said it has a very “live” feel that I liked. I listened to it dozens of times when I received it.

I don’t think that this recording sounds weaker than some others from the time because it is a high generation dub. I actually think that this is a low generation copy of a an average sounding master. Remember that I purchased this from an ad in a magazine and received it in October 1977. Since magazine ad space usually closes two months before publication, the seller would have had to place the ad almost immediately after the concert in order for it to run in a September issue. There simply wasn’t much time for the recording to change hands often before it was advertised.

I am very happy that Neonknight generously offered to work on the retrieval and restoration of this tape, and wish to thank him for his efforts. One look at his EMI Tape icon told me that he was the right person for the job.

*** neonknight's notes ***

Kbrukaer's Scotch cassettes had been stored in his basement and he had not listened to them for over 20 years. Disturbed from their slumber they safely completed their journey across the Atlantic and I got the ball rolling by forwarding them backwards and forwards a few times and was pleasantly surprised by how quiet they were.

I have recently started using a Technics RS-B965-M to transfer tapes. You'll not find one for sale. It's a heavily modified and impressive sounding deck created by expert tapehead A.N.T. For those who would like to learn more there is a detailed account at http://www.tapeheads.net/showthread.php?t=6018

Whilst completing the transfer I checked the heads on the Technics after each side and there was no tape residue whatsoever. The tapes are in good shape and gave no cause for concern.

The labels on the cassettes stated that the date of the recording was 1977-07-02 but after preliminary investigations it quickly became clear that the comments by Roger from 3 July could be heard. Listen out for frustrations boiling over as Roger says, "I’ll start that again because that’s the wrong verse. Having a word with that stupid mother***er sort of put me off," for example.

It's a shame the recorder missed Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts VI-X).

The recording has a minor phase shift and may benefit from some speed adjustment. I haven't tackled either for this release. I also avoided the temptation to make a cleaner join in Dogs, preferring to leave the cut and continuation clear for all to hear. There are a few pops on the tapes which I left in as well. In a brief experiment, adding 8-10db to the upper end worked very well. For some, I think, the real value to this recording could be as an addition to a quad/surround mix.

Summing up this is not a transfer I expect many of you will play repeatedly but as new recordings from this era are somewhat rare nowadays I am delighted to have helped bring it to the community.

Neon 05/11