Closing Night February 1970

Post by **blackdiamond** » Sat Jul 14, 2007 10:51 pm

This is the 17th release of the Madison label and what a great one this is! With this CD the Madison label has released the closing show of Elvis' performance at the International Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada.
The show is very good and the soundquality is excellent. Some hiss is noticeable during Elvis' monologues but we can't complain can we? As always with Madison releases, this CD comes with a beautiful full colour booklet with very nice photographs.

There are great performances of Kentucky Rain, Don't Cry Daddy, I Can't Stop Loving You and Let It Be Me. It almost looks like an awards show because Elvis praises his crew members and he wants to introduce his mangager colonel Parker: "He's not only my manager, but I really love him, I'd like to say hello to colonel Parker...What? No Colonel? He's not there, he's in the casino trying to get even". Years later it will be come common knowledge that Elvis is only performing in Vegas because of the fact that Parker had to pay his gambling debts.

According to the back cover tracks 13-14, 19-21 are previously unreleased. It doesn't matter if the other tracks aren't previously unreleased, because this CD is definately a must have for every Elvis fan. The sound is incredible and the setlist is much better than the official RCA release "On Stage".
We can hear the complete press conference from Houston, February 27, 1970 prior to the Houston Astrodome shows. The video of this press conference is used in the video Elvis Memories with George Klein.

We can read this technical note at the last page of the booklet: "This classic closing show resents all tracks in best-ever quality, as it comes directly from the original two reels, carefully transferred to DAT. The first reel stops after C.C. Rider, the second begins with Sweet Caroline. These 37-year old recordings are somewhat rough, with noticable hiss here and there. Every effort was made to alleviate this problem without affecting the original sound. We hope you enjoy the results.

Some of the contents of this CD was previously released on In Dreams Of Yesterday, live at the Interna-tional vol. 2, released by Tupelo records (including Rubberneckin' and Guitar Man sessions). My suggestion is this: stick with the Madison release, it has much better sound.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~twiceshy/cd/import/live/cdpages/closingnight/closingnight.html

Post by **drjohncarpenter** » Mon Jul 16, 2007 3:14 am

Nice review! Thank you for posting it.

Post by **YDKM** » Tue Jul 17, 2007 2:04 pm

Yes i picked this CD up on Saturday and fully agree..... THIS is the release to treasure enjoy and listen too...it ROCKS all the way through!

Post by **Joe Car** » Tue Jul 17, 2007 6:18 pm

I think I'm going to order this, EP at peak form! Thanks for the review.

Post by **Rich_TCB** » Thu Jul 19, 2007 2:36 am

You should definately get it, Joe.

It's a great CD.

Rich