My friend Pat Cooper and I were skateboarding in Towson Md, when the Towson State radio station announced they had two tickets to the first caller. With no cell phones in trhose days we hurried home, made the call and snagged the tickets. We rush to DC and made it to the show. We were hanging on the stage and at around 1:04 in Dixie Chicken we gave Lowell George a joint...thus the comment "better than a beer bottle". The last time I saw Coops in the keys before he died ( 2006 ) of cancer he reminded me of that moment. Its nice to find this recording and appreciate the memory of the music and my friend. I was lucky enough to spend the weekend in Jamaica with Little Feat a few years ago and they still rock.

favorite favorite favorite favorite

As is clear from the many fine shows posted to Internet Archive, Little Feat played and plays consistently well and this show is no exception. This set features an extended version of "Dixie Chicken" with excellent guitar interplay between Paul and Lowell, marred only slightly by a glitch with the sound mix about a minute before the end.



This performance comes 15 months before the classic shows at another Washington DC venue (the Lisner Auditorium at George Washington University) which make up the bulk of the excellent live CD "Waiting for Columbus" (buy it!).



This show was recorded off the radio. During the set, someone in the band comments the show is being broadcast and just after "On Your Way Down" an announcer says "ninety point three."



The mix is generally good with clear vocals and all the instruments present (plus a good dose of the crowd ambience), but the recording isn't great --there is a fair amount of tape hiss, the bass is a bit boomy, and the higher frequencies are attenuated. The start of "Tripe Face Boogie" (never my favorite song, though the band jams with feeling) is ruined by a too-high input level, with resulting tape distortion. The sound gets back to normal for the three-song encore. "Rock and Roll Doctor" features some fine slide guitar soloing and group vocals.



Generally a very acceptable recording worth a listen for the dedicated. No point in downloading the FLAC files -- the SHN MP3 is fine for this quality of recording.



If you are after the very best-sounding shows, look for the various other soundboard and radio recordings available on this site. In particular, the 2 "Ultra Sonic" recordings for radio station WLIR (1973, 1974), and the shows from the Boston Orpheum (1975), Atlanta's "Richards," and Denver's "Ebbetts Field" (both 1973) are all standouts.

- March 1, 2009Excellent Performance, Good Radio Recording