Return to Forever
L'Olympia
Paris, France
April 7, 1974

Stereo audience recording of unknown generation
From the collection of agalli
Speed corrected revision

Original lineage: CDR>EAC>WAV>FLAC
Editing lineage: FLAC > Audacity > MATLAB > FLAC > TLH (align SB) > FLAC (L8)


Setlist
01. Hymn of the Seventh Galaxy 3:03
02. After The Cosmic Rain 19:56
03. Captain Se�or Mouse 14:53
04. Chick Corea Rhodes Solo 5:43
05. Stanley Clarke Acoustic Solo 6:58
06. Lenny White Drum Solo 5:35
07. Theme To The Mothership 13:25
08. Space Circus 12:02
09. Improv Intro!>Spain 18:00

Running time: 99:36


Band
Chick Corea - Keyboards
Bill Conners - Guitar
Stanley Clarke - Electric & Acoustic Bass
Lenny White - Drums

mr_mags notes:
Here's another rare RTF Show from 74'. I am a completist when it comes to these guys & this show, despite its
sonic deficiencies, is one of the best I have ever heard. The energy, stretching out, tightness-it's all there
on this one-IMO. Give it a shot.

My measly 2 cents on the recording. it's not hissy or distorted like many recordings from this period. That
said, It's pretty bass heavy (Stanley Fans take note:) & and a little distant. I think if you dial in your EQ &
crank it up you will have a great time listening to what seems like just about the complete concert this night
in Paris. The version of the Spain here is sublime.


Ross (ledwhofloyd) revision notes:
The audio was running slow throughout. There are a significant number of cuts and the speed often changed at
the cuts. Fortunately, within the tape cut segments, the speed was constant enough. What really motivated me to
fix this is that Stanley Clarke's acoustic solo was running over a semitone flat.

Speed adjustments:
Tracks 1-3: +2.7%
Track 4: +2.0%
Track 5: +6.5%
Track 6-7: +1.7%
Track 8: +2.4%
Track 9: +1.5% (first 10:50, then cut), +0.5% (after cut)

This is definitely a stereo recording. Complicating matters is that there are moments where the channel levels
get significantly out of balance. The issue with balancing them is that the level of amplification required
to boost the weaker channel (typically right) can bring out more noticeable hiss when the one channel is very
weak. Still, I decided to balance the channels and accept the hiss.

The first 37 sec of track 1 was missing audio in the right channel so I monoized it by copying from the left.

For tracks 1 and 5 where the balance was significantly off, I did some level adjustments to the right channel
in Audacity first before running it through my automated MATLAB script to complete the balancing.

Some of the cuts in the audio could be cleaned up, but this is all I felt was necessary.

Original audio shared by mr_mags on September 11, 2010
Revisions by Ross (ledwhofloyd), October 2024