Steamhammer
1973-06-xx ::: (southwest?) GERMANY ::: unknown location ::: M?-AUD *2021 REMASTER*

~*~ Mk3 version, carefully remastered fixing various issues, without EQ or NR ~*~

"If you want to hear "Junior's Wailing", I suggest you go home. We got a new set for you"

01-[00:26]. ==intro/tuning==
02-[16:14]. Small Ball & Gibbon (with Cennamo opening freakout!)
03-[02:05]. ==bandmember introductions/song intro==
04-[09:38]. Heritage (part 1) -> Christine -> Heritage (part 2)

Total Time ::: 28:23

::: VG+. Check samples for nuts&bolts, dig or don'ts, passionate precursors.
::: Warts: Repaired dullspots & dropouts but surely missed a few. Gaps removed and/or merged in this version&speed is corrected.
::: COMPARISON CLAUSE: "Mk1" is original tape transfer/trade as received by propylaen (never uploaded to DIME.
::: COMPARISON CLAUSE: "Mk2" is propylaen DIMED 2016 "EQ'd" version (it's more than 2% slow).
::: CONTRAST CLAUSE: This is the Mk3 NO EQorNR remaster. The somewhat more defined Mk4 EQ+NR remaster is available elsewhere.
::: NOTE: This remastered from never-uploaded NO EQ original"Mk1"CD-R files (NOT from DIME"Mk2"upload).
::: *DATE Steamhammer played London Marquee 1973-06-15, so this set recorded early June (unless it was May...).
::: Remarkably, we have 3 tapes from this German tour (also 1973-06-09 Recklinghausen & 1973-06-xx Koenigshofen).
::: NOTE: SMALL file sizes due to only using better L channel of MONO recording after remastering.
::: LOCATION: 2016 hanwaker said: A German guy says "Macht oben die Fenster zu wegen der Lautstärke." [close the windows upstairs because of volume] & said accent "sounds very southwest German, between Mannheim,Stuttgart&Nürnberg"&noted Eloy is mentioned which confirms the June tour. Agreed it's probably June tour, but ELOY reference is to the fact Eloy also played "Junior's Wailing" in that era.
::: This latest 4-man incarnation of Steamhammer with Quittenton back on board (line-up #10 according to Steve Martin's "Steamhammer Family Tree", which came AFTER the 3-man Pugh/Cennamo/Lingwood "Steamhammer Mark XI") was on the verge of changing their name to AXIS. They played their first gig under the Axis name at London's Marquee Club on 15 June 1973, and recorded a new album for Brain (their German label), but it was shelved. It still remains unreleased up to this day. After six months under this new name, they finally disbanded." Soon after this, in 1974, Pugh & Cennamo formed the A&M band Armageddon with Keith Relf (ex-Yardbirds, ex-Renaissance) & Bobby Caldwell (ex-Captain Beyond, ex-Johnny Winter). Drummer John Lingwood has since played with many bands including Stomu Yamashta, Manfred Mann & Family.
::: It would be cool to hear the unissued Axis LP while I'm living, rather than waiting for the angels to sing it to me (or worse).
::: 4th/last LP"Speech"rec.early'71 (Pugh/Cennamo/Bradley&guest vox Garth Watt-Roy of Fuzzy Duck)&released late '72.
::: PLEASE #1: Steamhammer's BBC World Service "Rhythm&Blues" set brdcst 1969-09-27 (Junior's Wailing/All Your Friends Are Gone/Riding On The L&N) still isn't around & I'd love to hear it while my ears are still 'earin'.
::: PLEASE #2: I'd love to UPGRADE 1969-07-13 BBC Top Gear session I've up'd a couple of times. A better copy IS out there somewhere.

Recording Information ::: unknown mono tape recorder/microphone -> master mono tape (probably reel) -> unknown -> unknown (low) generation CD-R -> wavs.

Remastering 2021-06-xx ::: unknown (low) generation wavs -> Audacity [normalisation to remove DC offset (NOT to normalize volume_recording had weird varying DC offset, particularly between tracks), channel/phase alignment, fades, manual one-at-a-time glitch, bump, clap, pop, click, dropout & dullspot repairs, volume adjustments, +2.1% averaged pitch (speed) fix with single pass after frequency analysis & with CD pitch verification, NO equalisation or noise reduction] -> CD Wave (track splits) -> flacs (Trader's Little Helper) -> yr ears. Freed 2021-06-xx. (NOTE: Original Mk1/Mk2 had some gaps between tracks & "Small Ball&Gibbon" was split into 2 parts with a gap between them. Now these are fixed/merged. The Intro into "Heritage" is spliced back as on master (from the sound of it). End of Small Ball into talking was slightly overlapped to make for easy listening as (probably) a couple of seconds were missing with the real applause fadeout. MONO recording but L channel averaged about 500KHz higher, so after remastering, only the Lchannel was used for this version. Very probably ALC was used as the levels are too high in quiet parts (lowered a bit here) & too uniform - too bad so many tapers used the features but stealth recording was still in its infancy.

Line-up ::: Martin Pugh - electric guitar // Martin Quittenton electric guitar // Louis Cennamo - electric bass, bowed electric bass // John Lingwood - drums, percussion.

Nothing here ever commercially released to my knowledge. If I'm wrong, please advise & I'll take the offending trax offline.

DimeTravel 823 ::: Thanks to the original taper & traders! SERIOUS thanks due to propylaen for digging up so many Steamhammer goods, including his original acquisition of this set & for sending me the original pre-EQ CD-R files to work from. Sincere thanks to whomever uploads this for me. ::: Corrections welcome ::: I mostly re-did this one as I realised the speed was more than 2% off, which is significant. The original tape was in pretty good shape at point of transfer. There weren't many dropouts/dullspots but the channel offset was 4-5 cents off as well, there were some spots to fix & a lot of the fadeouts & between song cuts were repairable and/or could be merged & one channel was better. Since I had used the original transfer rather than EQ version DIMED by propylaen, in the end, I decided to try a version with differential EQ & used very light NR to removed a bit of the resultant hiss from high end increase, so you have that option as well. While incomplete, this is an important recording of the band as it features some of the new material in very listenable, non-distorted quality. Listen, enjoy, show appreciation, share, give, spread peace. Yrs truly, Knees

Original upload propylaen notes:"I received this many years ago in a trade simply labeled "Steamhammer - Germany 1973"...nothing else! Since it is very similar to the first 3 songs from the Recklinghausen show on June 9, 1973 I think that in all likelihood this recording is from the same tour. I have also adopted the song titles (more or less) from the Recklinghausen show. To my ears part 1 of Small Ball & Gibbon contains segments that strongly remind me of the first two parts of Penumbra from the Speech album. Small Ball & Gibbon is clearly announced in #4 (...that was called Small Ball & Gibbon). The announcement at the beginning of #5 says that it's called Heritage, and continues to say that it features a song in the middle that is called Christine. Unfortunately, there a fades between all tracks...that's how I got it. It is definitely not a full show, too short even for a support show.

Support the artists! Nothing to buy, but check Martin Pugh's at www.steamhammer.com (n longer working as of 2021-06-15) & John Lingwood is still gigging.

Do whatever you want with it except sell it, 'cause that ain't cool!