...and remember: If you talk, I'll kill you!!!...
Introduction to one of the Sydney gigs in 1997, and I agree!!!

All phases:

I guess, some of the "recording engineers" can't read the clock! Every tape has a well known length! (that's what I thought, ha!) So the end of the tape is predictable by measuring the time between pushing that recording button and "now". The likely end of recording space on the tape (or disc) can be caltulated! Hey great news! So please "recording engineers", if you calculate a remaining length of - let's say - 8 mins or less, please change the tape/disc! OK - it's hardly to predict the set list! "Plague-Medleys", extended "Pioneers", "Flight", "Usher-Suites" and "Headlong Streches" often need half a tape to record them uncut! A cut version of "Ophelia" or those other "shorter" songs is avoidable! Dear reader, have a look at all these cut-comments in the set lists! Isn't it a pity!?

Can anybody tell me, why some people used "used" tapes to record a show??? Is it fun, listening to "Simon and Garfunkel" as a background music on the quieter parts of a PH show? No it isn't!!! What is the sense of a tape recording when they use a tape, which was stored a few years in a car parking in the sun of let's say - California?

'68-'79:

The recording qualities of that phase don't fit recent expectations. Well at least 'till the mid-70s, the then typical concert visitors tended to make experiments on how various substances have effect to their brains! This is why some recordings of that era feature some special effects ('...hey, maybe I should push this recording button again to stop it from growing and changing colors...', '... funny how the needle stops dancing when I turn recording volume to max...', '...oops, I took a drag from the mike, not from the joint, hahaha...')! Best example for this kind of effects is probably the Pescara 75 or the Poitiers 75 gig!

Those then 'Hippies' spent their money not for hifi portable recording equipment, but for drugs!

Magnetic stored music isn't too durable, even when the tapes are not stored in a damp cellar! ("...all tapes are masked in fungus...")

The typical "good" recording quality is like that on the "One More Heaven Gained" or the "Modern" bootleg. So "good" recordings of that era are like that (often a bit worse, seldom a bit better)!

"Listenable" recording qualities are like the Verona-gig on the "Generators" bootleg.

Beware of "BTN" recording qualities, except you are a real PHanatic.

In most cases mixtures like "listenable-good" or "BTN-listenable" were used to cover recordings, which are in the higher quality category except some parts of it or one strange effect thoughout the recording.

Stereo? At home, OK! Mobile stereo recording equipement? If you're lucky! Some of the recordings are in stereo but some are not!

'80-'89:

In this era, the invention of the walkman enhances the amount of recorded concerts and the recording quality! (Well, some "recording engineers" might have been stoned still, the equipement was still expensive, good microphones anyway!)

I guess - 80% of the recordings have better recording qualities than those from the 70s! But there remain those 20%!!!

Stereo recordings become "usual". But still not all recordings are in stereo! Peak distortions disappear because of those "automatic recording volume controls" - the dynamics in volume sometimes too!

'90-today:

Walkman with recording functions are well established, Minidisc / DAT equipment became available (and affordable) for everyone.

Reality sucks! On Karlsuhe '96 Murphy's laws stroke acceptable, on Groningen 2000 they stroke without mercy! The best equipment doesn't help, if other visitors keep running into you and hit the mike directly! (This happened to me during the first Nürnberg 2001 gig!)