It’s common knowledge in rock and metal that how good a band is is judged by its live performance. There are several cases, some of them well-known, some still hidden, where a live recording gets an official release after being heavily manipulated in the studio. In order to fix stuff, correct mistakes, etc there’s an extra hand in the mix, or even the re-recording of parts in the studio from scratch. That way the final product is not exactly the real thing, it’s something more or less artificial.
That’s something that’s impossible to happen on an illegal recording that usually come from the band’s fans carrying a tape recorder, microphones, cameras at a gig, or even from a sound engineer who gets the sound directly from the soundboard, either for professional or personal use. The truth is that these recording that back in the day were traded by enthusiasts hand to hand, or by mail worldwide, or after paying a small fortune to record stores and now are easily accessible online are the only faithful source from where you can listen to a band’s performance exactly as it went down. Obviously, the issue that arises is the sound quality, which might differ from one case to another. I can only imagine how much money were spent on crappy sounding bootlegs searching for the “holy grail”. But, inside the “pirate” circles there are always some recordings that are sought after being crystal clear with the band in top form.
Rainbow and Deep Purple are the most bootleg-recorded band in rock music and the reason is quite obvious… they were two of the best live bands of all times.
So, here’s a show in Wales from 1983, which was a actually broadcasted on the radio, and probably that’s how the “pirates” got a hold of it in the first place. This is not the first time it sees the life of day, as you can find it around with a couple different covers, but this is the first time it gets an official release, still without the band’s consent. We’re talking about Joe Lynn Turner era after releasing the third and final album featuring the American singer, “Bent Out Of Shape”, and almost one year before mk.II Deep Purple reunited.
Honestly, if someone could make some small adjustments to the sound, I think that this could have been an official release. It’s 83 minutes long featuring 25 songs in a single disc. You also get songs that you won’t find on the official live Rainbow albums, like Stranded”, “Fool For The Night”, “Drinking With The Devil”, “Death Alley Driver”.
The sound is a bit lousy in the beginning, but gradually gets better. It’s either this, or your ears adjust! There’s also some feedback, and boy I wouldn’t be in the sound engineers position with Blackmore giving them one of his scary stares, but even that goes away after the first 5-6 songs.
Needless to say that Blackmore is smoking, ecstatic and flies with his playing being awesome and “dirty” as it’s raw and untouched from any studio treatments. The maestro is in a great mood giving an amazing performance with his 6 strings. He changes the solo in the songs, he throws in some “shots” of Purple songs like “Lazy”, “Woman From Tokyo”, “Smoke On The Water”, as well as Hendrix’s “Hey Joe”.
Chuck Burgi and David Rosenthal on drums and keyboards respectively are awesome, and so is Joe, although he butchered “Stargazer”. The setlist and his way of singing proves why the master chose to rely on him as he was spinning his last dice pursuing the band’s commercial establishment. As a matter of fact, that was also the reason for the female backing vocals (Lin Robinson, Dee Baele) that gave Rainbow songs a new dimension.
The negative thing about this release is the absence of a booklet with some information about the band’s lineups, maybe some photos. You will only get a sort text about Rainbow in general.
So, is “Taffs and Toffs” worth buying? I’d say that a fan of the band and Blackmore as well should have bought this one yesterday! Of course, the sound doesn’t even reach the standards of any official release. Still, it manages to capture the tension, the passion, the energy and the undisputed talented of that lineup. Oh, and Blackmore kicks ass! Yiannis Dolas
