Celestial Voices - Pink Floyd

I am not too overly-familiar with Pink Floyd bootleg catalogue. Can anyone recommend some of their greatest live performance alterations of some of their studio-produced work? 

infandous wrote: For a band like Pink Floyd, I think they and their record company missed out on a huge opportunity to make even more money (as if they haven't made enough with just the official releases!) by releasing a lot of these boots themselves.  The demand has always been there, and probably still is.  I suppose they didn't want to release anything of low quality, but I have heard a number of PF boots that have close to excellent sound quality. Instead, we just have two live albums from their 70's period that were actually released while they were a band.  Of course, we have Delicate Sound Of Thunder and Pulse as well, but that I don't really count those as they are basically run thorough's of the studio versions (there is little to no changes in any of that material from what is on the studio albums).  I think that is why their 70's boots are so popular, because each performance was different from the last (not drastically, of course, but enough to make it worth having multiple versions of the same songs).  I've heard boots from the 80's and 90's, and aside from Echoes on the first leg of the first Momentary Lapse tour, there really is no reason to have any of them over the official live release.  This isn't the case with the 70's material.

Actually, songs on Delicate Sound and Pulse (at least some of them) are different enough from the originals that I would prefer them over the studio ones... sure, not as different as the performances from the 70's, but they are good enough. I particularly like "Another Brick in the Wall 2" on Pulse, with longer and better guitar solo at the end; "Comfortably Numb" on Delicate Sound, with even longer and better solo at the end too; "Yet Another Movie" on Delicate Sound is very different, and much better than the original, as far as I'm concerned; and "High Hopes", specially because of the backing vocals at the end. There are some other songs that I do like better on this two live albums, but I guess the differences would be less significant.

^ good point.

I like what the celestial voices are singing at the start of Not Now John.

For a band like Pink Floyd, I think they and their record company missed out on a huge opportunity to make even more money (as if they haven't made enough with just the official releases!) by releasing a lot of these boots themselves.  The demand has always been there, and probably still is.  I suppose they didn't want to release anything of low quality, but I have heard a number of PF boots that have close to excellent sound quality.

Instead, we just have two live albums from their 70's period that were actually released while they were a band.  Of course, we have Delicate Sound Of Thunder and Pulse as well, but that I don't really count those as they are basically run thorough's of the studio versions (there is little to no changes in any of that material from what is on the studio albums).  I think that is why their 70's boots are so popular, because each performance was different from the last (not drastically, of course, but enough to make it worth having multiple versions of the same songs).  I've heard boots from the 80's and 90's, and aside from Echoes on the first leg of the first Momentary Lapse tour, there really is no reason to have any of them over the official live release.  This isn't the case with the 70's material.

^ I agree, these unofficial recordings capture a rare glimpse of many of our favourite bands creative and performing progress 'in flight'. They are priceless, and I love to discuss them in length, but this site is all above board, and we have to respect that, let alone the bands themselves.

Edited by Tom Ozric - March 29 2016 at 08:07

^ We all have to tread carefully when discussing 'unofficial' material here.
............wish we could have a 'secret' bootleg thread, but technically, though many of us have them, they have always done the artist a disservice.
I've always said that if I meet any band member featured on an unofficial recording, I'd hand them a tenner (whatevs the pitiful royalty they'd get from a proper album) coz the enjoyment I get from the better recorded boots is immense.

I was never much of a fan of the long jamming section on Interstellar Overdrive, even though the initial riffing (repeated at the end) is very cool, so I don't really enjoy the long Live in London version. Actually, my favourite version is a shortened one that appears on an anniversary edition of the album, with lot's of bonus alternate versions of the songs (apart from the early singles).

uduwudu wrote: There is always Childhood's End (1973 tour), extended with DG doing his guitar thing his way. You know what I mean. Lovely 10 minute type versions. If only there were a lovely soundboard somewhere. Official release is probably set for another 100 years away... As for Set The Controls may I recommend the unofficial version of Ummagumma whereupon Set The Controls is not faded early (why this has not been fixed for the CD version I have no idea. Unless it has, I've not heard all the PF remixes / remasters. You also get Interstellar Overdrive which could have reworked the CD version of Ummagumma very nicely thank you. But yes, as Dellinger mentioned - the BBC sessions; the recordings from 1970 and '71, the John Peel In Concert series plus the 1968 and 1969 studio sessions (Celestial Voices is also isolated in one version) makes for terrific extra curricular PF listening. As he mentioned, Embryo - this is where DG really gets the soloing going. As well as the space trip thing. Watch out for Corrosion and Moonhead as well. Gosh, we'll be dissecting A Man; A Journey next... (hint  - the 1996 rebroadcast of the Concertgebeouw Amsterdam show from 17 Sept '69 if I recall rightly).

I have never been much of a fan of Childhood's End, but perhaps if I heard that live version... Floyd had a way to make regular songs really special by playing them live with Gilmour's guitar thing (and Wright's keyboard thing shouldn't be overlooked either, specially on this early concerts).

About Ummagumma... perhaps that's the album I would like them to release on a special bonus added edition. I never notice the live version of Set the Controls was faded (my version lasts for 9:12 min), but if it is, I would certainly want it complete (still, I would rather be able to get a CD release of it from Live at Pompeii, which I prefer over this one). And I had heard about Intersellar Overdrive from this concert, which I would also love to be able to get (I did get a version of it with Gilmour recently, on the on the BBC '68/69 album, but it was rather dissapointing, with the guitar at the beginning much too tame).

Yeah, this is a fantastic piece. One of my favorites from Pink Floyd and one of the proggiest they ever produced.