UNCLE TUPELO
Nachtwerk, Munich, Germany
December 2, 1992

plus

Melkweg, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
December 10, 1992

*Uncle Tupelo Upgrade Series, Vol. 15*

Sources:
Munich source 1 (songs, tracks 1 - 13): FM > DAT master > DAT clone(2)
Transfer from DAT (by mrpember, December 2020): Tascam DA-20 > M-Audio Audiophile USB > PC > Audacity

Munich source 2 (interview, track 20): FM > cassette master > DAT
taped and transferred to DAT by Andreas, transferred from DAT by bobfather

Amsterdam (tracks 14-19): soundboard (pre-FM) cassette, likely master or first generation, from the band's archive
Transfer to DAT (by Shayne Stacy, 1994): cassette (from Uncle Tupelo's archive) > consumer Aiwa belt drive deck > Sony DTC690 using monster audio cables > DAT (90M tape, 32 kHz)
Transfer from DAT (by mrpember, December 2020): Tascam DA-20 > M-Audio Audiophile USB > PC > Audacity

All sources combined and edited in Audacity > Izotope RX7 (De-clicking, normalizing) > CD Wave Editor (tracking) > TLC > Flac (8)


Munich, December 2, 1992

01- I Wanna Destroy You
02- Satan, Your Kingdom Must Come Down [traditional]
03- True to Life
04- Grindstone
05- Looking For A Way Out
06- Watch Me Fall
07- Punch Drunk
08- Still Be Around
09- Discarded
10- Graveyard Shift
11- Factory Belt
12- I Found That Essence Rare [Gang of Four cover]
13- Gun

Amsterdam, December 10, 1992 (partial set)

14- Whiskey Bottle
15- No Depression [traditional]
16- Watch Me Fall
17- Moonshiner [traditional]
18- Grindstone
19- Weary Blues from Waiting [Hank Williams cover]

20- interview (from Munich, December 2)

LINEUP

Jay Farrar: guitar, harmonica, vocals
Jeff Tweedy: bass, guitar, vocals
Bill Belzer: drums



The purpose of the Uncle Tupelo Upgrade Series is to circulate live recordings of Uncle Tupelo and related bands with known lineages, focusing on recordings taken directly from masters or from the cleanest, lowest generation copies available. Some are shows that have circulated online for years with unknown or incorrect lineages and others are shows that have not been widely circulated in the file-sharing era. I will share any information I have regarding the recordings, as well as any features of the shows themselves that make them special to me.

Vol. 15 is an attempt to document the brief (approximately two week) tour Uncle Tupelo did opening for Bob Mould's band Sugar in December of 1992 as part of UT's very first tour of Europe. I put both of these sets on a single CDR years ago and have always thought of them as companion recordings, so I decided to include them them together for this volume.

Note that the interview from Munich (track 20) was broadcast before the first song of that set, since the interview isn't all that interesting I moved it to the end of this release so you start first with the music. If you want to hear this in the order of the original broadcast it should be seamless if you change the track numbers.


NOTES ON THE RECORDING(S)

Munich, 1992-12-02

The radio broadcast of this show has circulated in excellent quality for years, the versions I've seen from file sharing sites were sourced from a cassette master by Andreas (as I understand it, if you are out there please correct me if I'm wrong) that was transferred to DAT. In preparing for this volume I dug into my archives and found a DAT that I received in trade in the mid-90s that was supposedly from a DAT master recording of the broadcast though it omitted the pre-show interview that was included in the other version. In listening now the recordings are very similar but there was slightly less hiss in the version from the DAT master, so that is what I used.


Amsterdam, 1992-12-10

In late 1994, Uncle Tupelo's management very generously allowed taper / collector / superfan Shayne Stacy access to their archive of live cassette tapes. That is if you consider a bunch of cassettes that they had thrown in a box in the closet, many with very little or no identifying information, to be their "archives." Most of those recordings as well as an embarrassment of other great shows are available for streaming on Shayne's website, https://sacramentomusicarchive.com/.

This is the last 2/3 of the set and is all acoustic. There is a strange echo in the mix of the first two songs, Jeff jokes that it is the first time their sound man (Gary Schepers on this tour) had ever smoked pot while he mixed. There is an audience recording of the complete set but this is all that I have seen circulating from the soundboard.


NOTES ON THE SHOW(S)

Back in 1992 there was a lot of overlap in the fan base of Uncle Tupelo and Bob Mould (yours truly included), so it was pretty big news when I heard Uncle Tupelo was going to tour in Europe for the first time (!) and that part of that tour would be opening for Sugar (!!). New drummer Bill Belzer was fully onboard by this time and as the two sets here show the band was more than capable of rocking out toe-to-toe with Sugar or of impressing the punks in the crowd with their acoustic guitars.

Longtime fan and Dime member bobfather followed this tour for awhile and was gracious enough to write up this description:

"1992: I was a huge fan of Bob Mould's work and when his band Sugar came on tour in December 1992, I decided to follow them on 6 dates in a row. First date for me was Cologne and I was there for the soundcheck `cause I wanted to talk to Bob before the show. When I arrived, there was a band on stage waiting to do their soundcheck. I asked who it was and the guy from the club said it was Uncle Tupelo. When they started the soundcheck I was speechless. Never heard of them before but I fell in love immediately. Usually I don�t like support bands and most of the times I�m glad when they finish, but not with these guys. For the next 6 days I was lucky to see the band, enjoying every minute of their shows and hanging out with Jeff and John (Stirratt of Wilco, guitar tech on that tour), we talked a lot and when I saw them 3 years later with Wilco we were still talking about that tour. Jay didn't talk at all except "hello� and "bye� but he did a great job on stage. The band was well received on each date. Even when you think that the audience was there for Sugar who were so loud (and I mean really loud), these acoustic guys won the hearts of so many people on this tour as they won mine. The only thing I regret is that I didn�t tape their shows. One of the biggest mistakes in my taper life."

Regarding the volume of Sugar's shows on that tour, Jeff Tweedy told a friend of mine that at the first show they did together Jeff was watching their soundcheck from in front of the stage, thinking "they sound really good; really loud, but really good." Turns out the main PA speakers weren't on yet, so all he was hearing was stage volume and monitors. When the PA was turned on he said it nearly knocked off his hat. I relayed that story to Bob Mould as we played pool at the Cat's Cradle 4-5 years later and he grinned and said "yeah...it was all-out war back in those days."

Enjoy,

mrpember, January 2021