Dodgers Stadium 1992 (ARMS 45/46PR)
Dodgers Stadium, Los Angeles, CA – August 30th, 1992
Disc 1: White Room, Pretending, I Shot The Sheriff, Running On Faith, She’s Waiting, Tears In Heaven, Before You Accuse Me, Old Love
Disc 2: Badge, Wonderful Tonight, Layla, Crossroads, Sunshine Of Your Love
Dodgers Stadium 1992 is sourced from an excellent sounding almost complete stereo audience recording. The quality is crisp, clear and powerful and a joy to listen to with only two points preventing it from being perfect. Firstly the taper has a good mix of instruments and audience reactions but the tape tends to “breathe” as is common for tapes made in outdoor venues (Queen Space Boogie on Wardour is another recent example of this). The music does have some compression on it from the venue’s sound system, but this is as good as it possible. The other problem is the constant audience talking.
The music is able to drown them out, but during quieter numbers like “Tears In Heaven” they really become a distraction and makes me wish they would shut up and watch. The tape picked up the massive audience as well and it adds a lot of energy and a good “live” effect.
One can almost feel the presence of an ocean of fifty thousand fans reacting to what is occurring on stage. There are no cuts during the music or between song banter and runs out at the end of the percussion solo in the final encore “Sunshine Of Your Love”. Clapton also doesn’t speak much either.
He thanks everyone for buying “Tears In Heaven” and introduces the band later on in the show, but is otherwise pretty quiet and all business.
The Hawk label released this tape as Big Blue (Hawk 049/50) in similar quality and beautiful packaging but has otherwise not really circulated all that much.It’s a shame this hasn’t been released too much because it is a great concert.
It is in the final week of the Unplugged tour which would end on September 6th in Tacoma and he plays it VERY safe with the set list with material from the Journeyman LP, solo classics and Cream hits. “White Room” is a powerful beginning and “Running On Faith” has a great Clapton / Nathan rhythm interplay by the end.
“Tears In Heaven” is the first (and really only) relaxing part of the show. “Old Love” reaches twelve minutes in length and has some unique improvisational passages in the middle. “Wonderful Tonight” is played in the same dreamy arrangement used the previous year with George Harrison.
In “Sunshine Of Your Love” Clapton comes up with a really interesting riff before the percussion solo begins. Overall this is a great document and definitely worth having.
