In The City Of Angels (Goodfellas FELL07)
Hollywood Palladium, Hollywood, CA – November 28, 1981: Intro / Gloria, Another Time Another Place, I Threw A Brick Through A Window, A Day Without Me, Rejoice, Cry / The Electric Co, Stories For Boys, I Will Follow, I Fall Down, Twilight, Out Of Control. Agora Ballroom, Cleveland, OH – December 8, 1981: An Cat Dubh, Into The Heart, With A Shout, October, Fire. Brendan Byrne Arena, East Rutherford, NJ – April 15, 1985: Bad
In The City Of Angels is a one disc release primarily documenting the November 28th, 1981 Los Angeles radio broadcast from U2’s Boy tour. The sound quality is very good to excellent, but doesn’t contain the whole show. LA is missing “An Cat Dubh,” “Into The Heart,” and “With A Shout” from the main set. Goodfellas compensate by including those three songs from a soundboard from Cleveland a week later. Also missing are the encores “Fire,” “11 O’Clock Tick Tock,” and “The Ocean.” LA does contain “Return Of A Day Without Me,” which had not been played since the concert in New Haven on May 27, 1981. The song is pleasantly followed by “I Threw a Brick Though A Window,” which is quite rare. The eventually will be segued together in preformance.
The tape begins with the DJ saying, “Coming up, Berlin. But first, join us for an evening with Ireland’s U2.” The audience is enthusiastic, although the 4400 capacity venue fell two hundred short of a sell out. Bono introduced “Rejoice” by saying, “In Dublin they’re pulling the houses down in the city centre and they’re putting people out of the city and throwing them away in districts outside of the city if they were like something not human .. .. But I say: Rejoice!”
Goodfellas include as a bonus the longest version of “Bad.” This dates from April 1985 in New Jersey, and as the band start the song Bono speaks about how Bruce Springsteen taught them to treat the big arena as a small venue. The song lasts for more than eighteen spectacular minutes. This title is packaged in a black and white glossy gatefold digipack which is very attractive. Since these tapes have rarely been pressed on silver before, the label did a good job in the mastering and presenation of the material. For U2 fans this is an excellent release that is worth having.
2 Comments
Where was I? After listening to this I realized I missed the train early on with U2. Fasten your seatbelt this is a intense high energy show from the start. Great sound, nice packaging and the 18 minute Bad is a must hear. No regrets on this one.
16 years before the Disco Lemon. Before the sky turned Blood Red. U2 played the Hollywood Palladium. Goodfellas has released a pristine Soundboard of U2 in their primal years as a band. This is U2 – Raw and in your face. Even in the early years Bono wore his political feelings on his sleeve for all the world to see. For such a young band the musicianship and interplay between the members is fantastic. The songs are tight and well played and Bono’s Banshee-like scream is in fine form. All of the tracks on this release are of pristine soundboard quality making for a great listening experience.
Goodfellas packaged this release in a tri-fold cardboard case with numerous black and white pictures of the band from their early years. The materials used for the packaging are not cheap by any means. Overall everything is well thought out and executed by Goodfellas. This could easily fit in at your local music retailer’s “U2” section. This release should appeal to any U2 fan due to the quality of the sound and packaging. I highly recommend this release and I’m sure that it will be in heavy rotation in my CD player for a long time to come. HarleyDog (March 2008)