Kansas City Babe

Info File

Recording Gear: Sennheiser 421 > Sony D5

2013 Transfer: Maxell UD‐XLIIS 90 first‐generation cassettes >
Nakamichi CR‐7A (azimuth‐adjusted) > Sound Devices USBPre2 (24/96 Audacity 2.0 capture) > Peak 6.0 with
iZotope Ozone > iZotope MBIT+ convert to 16/44.1 > FLAC

While 1980 leg of the River tour is well‐documented, well‐recorded and oft‐revisited, the early 81 leg
through secondary markets and Canada is much less so. The reasons why are understandable: the East Coast
concerts in December were covered by established tapers, and because of their epic durations, often
pushing past three and a half hours, those sets have earned a certain legendary status.

When the tour
resumed in late January 1981, the show shortened a bit and the cities visited were more like Toronto,
Ottawa and Ames, not Boston, New York and Philadelphia. Also, the European dates that followed these in
early April took on a legendary status of their own. As such, the second leg of the River tour has a kind
of middle‐child syndrome, to stretch an analogy well beyond appropriateness.

Needless to say early 81 is
no slouch and it is filled with some excellent sets. It is a tighter show, eschewing the kind of second
set stretch of long sad songs we heard in December, though not walking away from it completely.

Kansas City
Baby is a fine representative of this leg, with the core of the first set relatively unchanged from 80
(though with two nice covers included, “Wholl Stop the Rain” and "I Fought the Law), and the second set
starting off with a bang before moving into a powerful three pack of “Because the Night,” "Wreck in the
Highway" and a terrific “Point Blank,” giving us a bit of the dark ride we heard in 80, but without that
extra long addition of a “Stolen Car” or “Drive All Night.” One thing Bruce tends to do in secondary
markets is what you might call the “localized cover song,” and tonight its a spirited take of Wilbert
Harrisons “Kansas City,” one of the shows highlights.

Our recording was done by a very capable taper
with excellent gear (something not often seen on recordings outside of Bruces home courts in this era)
and it is quite good: close, full and clear. The first generation cassettes used for this transfer were
copied by our friend DL off the master tapes again using good gear, but there is one big catch: While he
would of course do it differently if he had it to do all over again, back in 1981, blank tapes, especially
high‐quality Maxell UD‐XLIIS tapes, werent exactly cheap, especially if you didnt have a lot of money.
So in an effort to preserve the show on two blanks instead of having to buy three, DL faded out and back
up between some songs to cut out the audience. There are several such cuts across this tape, which can be
annoying, but more often than not the audio resumes at the start of the next song, perhaps clipping the
first note or two on occasion but often coming back right in time. For instance, "Once Upon a Time in the
West" is retained as the intro to “Badlands,” and compared to last weeks release 12/19/80, listen for
Dannys contribution to the passage which you dont hear in the other.

Unfortunately there is no other
known recording of the show, and all circulating copies of KC have these fadeouts. DL hopes that one day
he might track down the masters from his old friend, but thats a long shot. Until then, this is what
weve got. I will say that after you hear the fades the first time or two, it isnt too bad. The show is
still well preserved and well documented, and all the performances are pretty much intact. If youve had
a copy of this show before (such as Convicted & Sentenced: Life Without Parole), you should find Kansas
City Baby a material upgrade. Samples provided.

Thanks very much to DL for reaching out and loaning us his
first‐generation tapes and providing photos from the show that Ivan has used for his artwork.

Theres more
River to come and other tours, too. Maybe even some studio material;)

Wayne Darlington