Pink Floyd - The Darker Side Of Rising Sun - Music From The Dark Side – Tokyo First Night (1972-03-06) FLAC

GENRE: Art Rock, Prog Rock, Psychedelic Rock 
FORMAT: Lossless (Flac) 
SIZE: 863 mb (3% Recovery) 

CD1 & CD2 from 12×CD Box "The Darker Side Of Rising Sun (Japan 1972 Chronicles)".
Recorded at Taiikukan, Tokyo, Japan, March 6, 1972.
Label: The Godfather Box - G.R. BOX 24
Released: 19 Mar 2014

Pink Floyd’s inaugural visit to Japan in 1971 found the band playing two festival dates and one in a small concert hall and was certainly a very successful visit and the seeds were planted for a larger scale visit the following year. The resulting tour commenced in March 1972 and consisted of six dates, two each in Tokyo and Osaka, one in Kyoto and Sapporo. Thankfully the enterprising tapers in Japan were on hand and all six concerts were captured on tape, these tapes are the focus for the fourth Pink Floyd Box set from the folks at Godfathers. The best sources are used and alternate recordings are used to fill gaps or to be used as bonus material, one only has to look at the disc times to know that one is getting a value for one’s money.

The packaging is simple yet elegant, each concert is housed in an individual tri gatefold sleeve and the typical box is used to house them all. There are goodies as well, a ticket reproduction of the first gig in Tokyo, the mini tour program reproduction and tour poster with liner notes written on the flip side is also included. While the liner notes are not as expansive as one would like, they are informative and accurate. The box itself is a work of art, the white background is striking against the colorful graphics taken and expanded from the tour poster, the shiny foil effect used for the lettering in a very nice touch. There are detailed reviews for each of the six concerts on the Collectors Music Reviews web site, please follow the links for the in depth analysis of each concert, this review will primarily focus on the sound quality of each concert. 

TRACKLIST:

CD1
1-1 Speak To Me
1-2 Breathe (In The Air)
1-3 The Travel Section (AKA On The Run)
1-4 Time
1-5 Breathe (Reprise)
1-6 The Mortality Sequence (AKA The Great Gig In The Sky)
1-7 Money
1-8 Us And Them
1-9 Any Color You Like
1-10 Brain Damage
1-11 Eclipse
1-12 Stage Announcements
Bonus Tracks:
Japanese FM Pirate Radio Broadcast
1-13 Speak To Me
1-14 Breathe (In The Air)
1-15 The Travel Section (AKA On The Run)
1-16 Time
1-17 Breathe (Reprise)
1-18 The Mortality Sequence (AKA The Great Gig In The Sky)
1-19 Money
1-20 Us And Them
1-21 DJ Comments

CD2
2-1 One Of These Days
2-2 Tune Up
2-3 Careful With That Axe Eugene
2-4 Tune Up
2-5 Echoes
2-6 Stage Announcements / Intermission
2-7 A Saucerful Of Secrets

NOTES:

The first night of the Japanese tour and the first of two nights in Tokyo, there are two recordings that circulate, a partial FM source featuring a large portion of the Dark Side suite and a complete audience recording. There have been previous versions of the audience source such as Waters Gate (TNT-940147/148) and Live In Tokyo 1972 (Amsterdam AMS-9616-2-1/2), back in 2009 Sigma came out with the most complete version with upgraded sound and featured both tape sources in a three disc set called Acid Moon (Sigma 45). Three years later the same label would release the audience source in better sound and this time complete as Eclipse Of The Sun (Sigma 84), featuring all between song chatter and tune ups and stage announcements.

For the first set of this new box Godfathers utilizes both tape sources to provide collectors with the most complete version of the show. The first disc consists of the audience source for the Dark Side suite and with the stage announcements clocks in at 49:40. The sound is very good and when compared to Eclipse Of The Sun (Sigma 84) it does sound slightly lower in volume but has a warmer and natural sound and the bottom end is not as pronounced as the Sigma. The warmer sound makes for a much more enjoyable listening experience as it does not sound as harsh, since the source is already very good it becomes a choice of preference. The stage announcements from Goro Itio are after the Dark Side suite on this release as on Sigma 84 they are at the beginning of the second disc.

The rest of disc 1 is the FM source, the quality of the recording is excellent, much more dynamitic than the audience source, it has been released before as Dark Music (Sirene 118) and on disc three of Acid Moon (Sigma 45). The recording is not complete as it runs out 1:20 into Us And Them, Sirene chose to release the recording on its own on Dark Music while Sigma 45 completes the recording with the audience source, Godfather chooses to present the recording on its own. Again I used Acid Moon to compare sound, Sigma is a tad louder and Godfather has a warmer sound and its upper frequencies are not as harsh, the differences are minimal though.

As Gerard pointed out in his assessment of Eclipse Of The Sun that the second half of the show is much more dynamic of a performance. The sound quality when compared to Sigma 84 goes hand in hand with the previous disc, slightly lower volumes with warmer sound and a bit more clear to my ears. The crowd is more enthusiastic since they are familiar with most of this music, the tune ups do get tedious as they are a couple minutes long, the ever patient Japanese calmly wait for the musicians, their reward are great versions of Careful With that Axe Eugene and Echoes. All In All a decent first night in Japan. 

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