Therapy? - 1995-12-28 - Dublin, Ireland (FM/FLAC)

(FM broadcast FLAC)

The Point

Source:

RTE 2FM (soundboard)

Transfer:

Tracks 1-18: BASF Type II cassette (master) > R-09HR (16/44 WAV) > CD Wave Editor (WAV) > Audacity (WAV) > TLH > FLAC level 6

Tracks 19-21: TDK Type I cassette (master) > BASF Type I cassette (1st gen) > Philips CDR602 > CDR > EAC > WAV > Audacity (WAV) > TLH > FLAC level 6

Andy Cairns (vocals, guitar)

Fyfe Ewing (vocals, drums)

Michael McKeegan (bass, backing vocals)

Martin McCarrick (cello, backing vocals)

01 epilepsy

02 bad mother

03 isolation

04 turn

05 loose

06 a moment of clarity (edit with 1st gen patch)

07 hellbelly

08 die laughing

09 lunacy booth

10 opal mantra

11 stories

12 stop it you're killing me

13 trigger inside

14 nowhere

15 diane

16 knives

17 nowhere

18 30 seconds

19 again (1st gen)

20 teethgrinder (1st gen)

21 potato junkie (1st gen)

Length: 76:53

In anticipation of their upcoming 2015 christmas shows performing Infernal Love, here's a great show from the original tour 20 years ago at Dublin's biggest indoor venue (such was their popularity at that time), known back then as 'The Point' (now called the 3 Arena). This was a 100% 'as it happened' live broadcast on Irelands' national broadcaster, featuring almost the entire set. Only the last song, 'Screamager', wasn't broadcast as the show had already gone over the alloted time so RTE cut for the news during 'Potato Junkie'.

Show notes:

Fyfe Ewing's penultimate show, he was to quit a few days later. He'd blatantly lost interest in the band in 1995 (not doing press, not communicating with the band etc), but his performances were as good as ever. 'Bad Mother', 'Turn' and 'Teethgrinder' here are my favourite live versions. Martin McCarrick was soon to become a full member, unsurprisingly considering his ever-increasing role throughout 1995. New song 'Again' became 'Stay Happy' from 1998's Semi-Detached album.

RECORDING NOTES:

This is a new transfer of a master tape I received in 2015 from "richboy" (Therapy? messageboard). I played the tape on a Technics RS-TR232, through a Yamaha RX-V365 amp, into a Roland Edirol R-09HR.

It's a big improvement on the existing circulating version (1st gen cassette transfer) which I sent around many years ago. I too recorded this show from radio but the tape quickly deteriorated so I made a copy before binning the master as it became unplayable. Seemingly, all circulating versions prior to this torrent come from my 1st gen copy. I made that transfer circa 2002.

Richboy's tape sounds a LOT better but unfortunately didn't include the 3 song encore and there's also an approx 15 second cut in "A Moment of Clarity", caused by the tape flip (the gig started halfway through side one). However, this cassette runs at the correct speed which makes a big difference.

After a crash-course in Audacity, I edited 'Clarity' with the missing 15 seconds patched from the old 1st gen version, at around the 3 minute mark. I increased the volume of the patch by 3db to match the rest of the song. I also slowed down that section by 3.5% due to the 1st generation cassette running too fast. The encores were also boosted by 3db and slowed by 3.5% (I used the FM broadcast of 'Again' & 'Teethgrinder' from Belfast 30/12/95 as my baseline for determining the correct speed). This complete show now runs almost 3 minutes longer than the previous 1st gen version simply due to having the correct speed.

A lot of work went into tracking down a master cassette, borrowing a decent tape deck, learning how to use Audacity in order to fix the issues etc. But is was fun too so I hope you like it. If you have the older version that's circulating, please throw it in the bin as you won't need it anymore!