Sleep: Live At Third Man Records

     A while back, the Sleep Live At Third Man Records box set showed up on my porch.  As much as I'm enjoying the seven sides of music, the manufactured rarity of the thing is a pain in the ass.  This thing should have been made available far and wide for everyone to enjoy.  Instead, it was only made available to people that signed up for the Third Man record club.  I signed up in order to get this thing but forgot to cancel my membership before they charged my card again for the next club release which had something to do with Jack White's band The Raconteurs.

     To an extent, I have great admiration for what Jack White has done for music but I really don't care for what he does musically.  Keeping the names of artists alive and keeping records in print with his label is a great service that he does but I have always found his music forced and predictable.  I can see why people are into what he does but it's just not for me.

     The downside of Third Man is the way the label turns music into a novelty and seems to forget that they put out music and not trinkets that are related to music.  Short pressing records to create a false scarcity and driving up the after market prices is not a way to get money out of my wallet.  I bought this box set to listen to it not flip it on eBay.  And they didn't even take into consideration making listenable records for this release.

     For some reason, Third Man felt compelled to put locked grooves at the end of sides B and G when they pressed the records.  For the folks that have lives, locked grooves are sometimes put at the end of a side of vinyl instead of the usual lead out groove that will draw the tone arm to the center label.  Locked grooves can best be described as an intentional skip at the end of the side.  Keeping the needle going over the same bit of information repeatedly and looping that sound until the tone arm is lifted.  This will shorten the lifespan of the needle and it will have to be replaced sooner.

     At least there weren't any skips or pops on the LPs so I was able to get a clean recording when I jammed them into my laptop to make my own digital copy.  Almost every other Third Man release that I own has some sort of defect on it that effects playback.  They tend to put more focus on quality control when it comes to their specialty releases than their records that are pressed on black vinyl for the masses.

     Outside of my frustrations with the circumstances that led to the records landing on my turntable, Sleep definitely played a set that was worth packing a lunch to go on the almost two hour journey with.  This was recorded in Nashville, TN four days after their stop in Pittsburgh back in December 2018 and was a very similar set list.

     Sleep was in fine form and this performance lacked the minor miscues from the Pittsburgh show due to the monitor issues at Stage AE.  The other difference between this set and the Pittsburgh show was the loudmouth yinzer that wouldn't shut up the entire night while I was trying to watch the band play was noticeably missing.  For that reason alone, it was worth it to me to pick this monster up.

     The new songs off of The Sciences and the 12-inch single “Leagues Beneath” sound incredible in a live setting and this recording captured that perfectly.  Matt Pike's guitar tone came blazing through the speakers with the correct amount of weight that sometimes gets lost on live recordings.  For all of my grumblings about the physical release of Live At Third Man Records, there was a lot of attention to detail paid to the nuts and bolts of the actual recording of the music.

     The performance was recorded straight to acetate and mastered on the spot.  That was no small fete for the engineers to pull off a recording of that high quality in that manner.

     Now that the hysteria around the box set has settled down, after market prices are around $80 or $90 online.  It's seven sides of music with an etching on side H so given the current retail prices on vinyl, that really isn't that bad compared to the $200 prices when the thing first came out.

     Hopefully, Third Man will see fit to release the music for everyone to enjoy at some point.  The work that the band and the engineers did that night deserves to be heard and recognized by everyone that wants to hear it and not just record club members.

And look at that.  Someone posted a vinyl rip of the entire set to the YouTubes.