Todd Rundgren's Utopia
Radio City Music Hall
New York, NY
1974-10-20

Todd Rundgren - guitar, vocal
Moogy Klingman - keyboards
Ralph Schuckett - keyboards
Roger Powell - keyboards, trumpet
John Siegler - bass
Kevin Ellman - drums

source/lineage-liberated boot "The Ikon City-Live in NYC 1974" from the Blue Cafe boot house> VG++ audience recording captured on unknown equipment> EAC> Audacity> TLH> TTD

01. The Internal Fire-A Treatise on Cosmic Fire (excerpt 1) (6:02)
02. Utopia Theme (14:10)
03. Don't You Ever Learn? (6:05)
04. Todd speaks-show length and More Guitar! (0:56)
05. Seven Rays (7:54)
06. A Dream Goes On Forever (2:20)
07. Real Man (5:05)
08. Freedom Fighters (4:32)
09. Alpheratz (5:56)
10. The Wheel (5:52)
11. Welcome to My House (7:38)
12. When the Shit Hits The Fan-Sunset Blvd. (3:47)
13. Le Feel Internacionale (1:55)
14. Todd jokes Mel-Low (0:49)
15. The Last Ride (5:08)
16. Bassball (9:02)
17. #1 Lowest Common Denominator (5:00)
18. Moogy Speaks (0:56)
19. Night In New Orleans (10:48)
20. Do Ya (4:23)
21. Todd explains Freak Parade (3:04)
22. Freak Parade (8:04)
23. Born To Synthesize (cuts in) (1:20)
24. Spark of Life (4:58)
25. The Goon (8:34)
26. A Treatise on Cosmic Fire (excerpt 2) (0:26)
27. The Ikon (32:14)
28. TR band introductions (0:43)
29. Sons of 1984 (3:28)
30. Slut (3:30)
31. Heavy Metal Kids (4:13)
32. Just One Victory (excerpt -- cuts off) (0:50)

First of all, I know what I was doing slightly over 50 years ago on October 20th, 1974. I was at this show! Still memorable to this day, and I even still have the souvenir pyramid "program" that you'll hear Todd refer to from the stage (more on that as you read on). Secondly, boy was I happy to find this boot back in my pre-torrenting days. 3 disc set that I got in a used cd store either on Long Island, or in NYC (Boo!, to those commercial boot merchants, but I was very happy to come across things like this at that time, as I was scoured the bins). Thirdly, as for 3 discs, this show is over 3 hours long, and that's with much of the first part of Born to Synthesize and all but the beginning of Just One Victory missing. It's a shame about that, but kudos to whoever it was that grabbed this on that night so long ago. Given tape length and battery life, as just 2 factors for clandestine recording back then, our recorder did an amazing job.
At that time, Utopia was largely a NYC band, as you'll also hear Todd say from the stage. This was the time of the "Todd" solo release, and the first "Todd Rundgren's Utopia" album. At this point, Todd's musical course for the next few years seemed set, and there were no live glances back to any material prior to A Wizard from 1973, except for Slut. There were also looks forward toward Todd's Initiation album in 1975 and the next Utopia album that same year, the live "Another Live". Finally, there are 5 pieces that never surfaced on any official releases that I know of which featured Todd's bandmates.
This night does show up as an inactive torrent having been shared here about 15 years ago, but it doesn't seem that share came from this same boot. Given the length of this show, doing work prior to the share was a bit more time consuming than usual. I didn't check pitch/speed issues too closely, because it sounded like it was basically okay. Audacity's tool sets were used to set the current tracking and to apply some light sonic touches to the song files. Beyond the idea of no longer presenting this to be burned to disc, start points for a few things like Bassball and Spark of Life are now more precise. The sonics had been clear to begin with, but there now is a general clarity and depth that should improve the listening experience. There are short sections of stage banter that didn't get separated to their own track, but the ones here that did stand out for particular reasons. I also remember one bit of stage banter that didn't make it here. That was a jokey Todd reference to Don't You Ever Learn having a serial melody (look that up for a musical explanation, if needed). He off-handedly said "I wrote it over my breakfast." Serial-cereal, get it?
I'm usually not one to go with visual components in my torrent shares, but I've scanned part of my show program and the cover from the boot, and they're included in a separate folder. The boot cover track listing includes an error or two, but my program clearly shows the names for each of the band solo parts. Those hadn't correctly been named on the cover, in the prior share here, or over at the TR Connection Todd rarities page. The sections of the program I've copied also show the symbols indicating new stuff that Todd refers to in a stage announcement. That program also reveals that material was played at the show which hadn't been indicated there (e.g. ...Shit Hits the Fan/Le Geel Internacionale). The program sections I didn't scan included photos of the band and some crew, along with short bios of each band member.
Hoping that those who jump in on this share will enjoy what's probably one of the most expansive single live shows you'll likely get to hear from Todd's camp.