So..  after music promoter Bill Graham passed away, a web entrepreneur bought his entire archive of concert tapes from all of his venues.  Over five thousand of them.

While he’s trying to figure out exactly how large of a gold mine he’s sitting on, what he’s doing with them right now is streaming them online, in rotating sets.  In the last hour, I’ve heard: 

• Elton John, “Burn Down The Mission”, 11/12/70 (opening for the Kinks; five days before the great live album in NYC)
• Cream, “NSU”, 3/10/68 (at least ten minutes long, and awesome)
• Chuck Berry, “Sweet Little Sixteen”, 12/29/67
• Led Zeppelin, “I Can’t Quit You Baby”, 1/10/69
• Muddy Waters & The Butterfield Blues Band, “I Got My Mojo Workin’”, 10/2/66
• The Chambers Brothers, “Can’t Turn You Loose”, 5/29/68
• Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, “Old Man”, 9/8/74 (80,000 people attended a one-day reunion concert at Roosevelt Raceway)
• Aretha Franklin, “Respect”, 3/5/71 (much faster than the radio version)
• Big Brother and the Holding Company, “Piece Of My Heart”, 4/18/68
• Bruce Springsteen, “Thundercrack”, 3/2/73 (pre-E Street Band and amazing; Berkeley Community Theater) 

You get the idea.

So..  the site is called http://www.wolfgangsvault.com (Bill Graham’s given name was Wolfgang William Graham) and the feature is called Vault Radio.  If you want to buy memorabilia from these shows, you can do that (the music seems to be the hook to get you to look at the tchotzkes), or you can just listen to the music. 

Enjoy!

            -wp