Mahavishnu Orchestra, Antibes (1974)

1-Wings Of Karma (including Pastoral) 00:17
2-Sanctuary 17:19 *
3-Drum Solo 29:33
4-Smile Of The Beyond 38:59
5-Dawn 54:09
6-Sanctuary Opening with French DJ talkover 1:10:23 **
7-Sanctuary from end of talkover 1:12:33 **
8-Smile of the Beyond 1:23:00 ***

* contains wavering and flutter through much of the track
** seemingly dubbed from the video, and absent of any wavering or flutter, but including a French language voiceover that is now separated on to track 6
*** 2011 bonus added from French radio broadcast that may have originated in Paris on July, 15, 1974 (see notes below)

Mahavishnu Orchestra
Pinède Gould,
Antibes, France
1974-07-29

John McLaughlin-guitar
Jean Luc Ponty-violin
Ralphe Armstrong-bass
Narada Michael Walden-drums
Gayle Moran-keyboard, vocals
Steve Frankovitch-horns
Bob Knapp-trumpet, percussion
Steve Kindler-violin
Carol Shive-violin
Philip Hirschi-cello
Marsha Westbrook-viola

Original comments: "
Apocalypse was an incredibly ambitious album, and along with Inner Worlds (done by a pared down quartet-MO2C), it doesn't get nearly as much love as the rest of the material released during the 1970's under the Mahavishnu Orchestra banner. I do really like parts of Apocalypse-particularly 2 tracks not played here-Power of Love and Hymn to Him, and this is one of the best live recordings of this version of the band to be found. The material here finds them going back to the original MO's repertoire through performances of Dawn (from Inner Mounting Flame) and Sanctuary (from Birds of Fire), while also looking ahead a bit through including a section in Wings of Karma that became a separate track on Visions of the Emerald Beyond called Pastoral. Personnel info above should also credit background vocals to several members of the MO on each performance of Smile of the Beyond, but it isn't clear as to who exactly may be singing them.(...) There is also a commercially available video shot near to this date from Montreux on July 7th. That Montreux release has video of Wings of Karma and Hymn to Him, and audio only of Power of Love, Smile of the Beyond, Vision is a Naked Sword, and Sanctuary.
(...)
Before getting this share ready, I decided to present this torrent as the audio share of the show as it was when I got it, including the flutter-y Sanctuary, but I still searched for a better version of Sanctuary. That of course led me to michaelmee. He checked a few versions of this that he knew of and found the flutter in the majority of them. What I settled on here as tracks 6 and 7 is thanks to him. I then took this clean and non-fluttery version of Sanctuary and split it into these 2 tracks so that anyone wishing to avoid the 2 minute talkover by the French announcer could easily bypass that and go to the 10 minutes of the performance that followed the announcer. I've also been quite happy with the ability to preview some live effects in the latest versions of Audacity. That makes it much easier to audition settings and determine what might work as a potential fix or improvement to some older or flawed recordings. I've used them in some recent uploads, and while some shudder at the idea of EQ or Mastering tweaks being applied to older shares, others seem happy with them-as do I. I thought that in this case, some of what I've learned to do in Audacity would benefit audio that came off a French broadcast from 49 years ago. Samples will show before and after versions of how this once sounded, and how it sounds now.
The Kindle edition of the fine Mahavishnu Orchestra book, Bathed in Lightning by Colin Harper, included expanded materials including 7 bonus chapters and other appendices. Several new things dealt with the MO in 1974-75. One Appendix shows the known concert appearances made by all versions of the band during those years. That verifies the date for this Antibes show, but it also gives a clue as to where the second performance of Smile of the Beyond came from. There was a Paris show at the Olympia Theatre on July 15, 1974, so that might be the likely source of any additional French radio broadcast, and therefore this "bonus" performance.
Finally, my guess with this share is that some will elect to delete track 2 with its flutter issues after downloading, but it is being included as it was part of this original share in 2011. Totally anyone's call as to how they handle that, but for future shares it should be remembered that this did once include that flawed audio that doesn't include the French voiceover heard now in track 6, and that the remainder of that composition continues into track 7. Big thanks to magmasystems for offering this to us 12 years ago, and to michaelmee for doing the same then in video form, while being a present tense help to me in narrowing things down and dealing with the "flutter" issue on Sanctuary, track 2.

fm reel-to-reel "

Thanks to magmasystems, unclemeat, michaelmee & jswetch.

Footage and production by bigfootpegrande.