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Sleep Bootlegs - inaugural post

February 23, 2011, 8:52 pm
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So, I have decided to start this blog in hopes of finding more live Sleep content - whether its just fan shot stuff or heavily traded audio bootlegs, I'm happy to trade what I have on my list for what you have on yours.

A number of good bootlegs exist, but have taken me a while to get copies of through old message board posts and video trading lists from back in the days when VHS was the preferred medium.

I will update this blog as my collection expands and more shows come to my attention. At the very least, it should be a very good and hopefully comprehensive source of the catalog of live Sleep material.

As I get them, I will post synopsis of the bootlegs I have with quality ratings and some stills of the footage itself
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Sleep - Live in Carrboro, NC Cat's Cradle 1/23/1994 (video)

February 24, 2011, 6:51 am
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1 From Beyond
2 Dopesmoker (early version)
3 The Druid

This is a stellar show. I believe it came at the end of the 1994 Hawkwind tour and by this time, they were previewing Dopesmoker, albeit in a very different form. Some of the structure is there, and so are the lyrics, but the chord placement is almost all different.

The quality is a 10/10 - especially for the age of the original video. It feels like you are looking through the viewfinder. The audio is very good too and I plan on making an audio bootleg of this show.

It cracks me up that both Al and Matt are finishing joints at the start of the video, just chilling on stage, not a care in the world.
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Sleep - Live in Tallahassee, FL 1994 (video)

February 24, 2011, 7:08 am
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1 Dopesmoker (early version)
2 Holy Mountain
3 The Druid

This footage is available from Google or a couple sites. However - this footage I own is transfered correctly unlike the Google rip. It's not stellar filming and for some reason, Matt and Al are in the shadows for the entire show.

That being said, it is a great show with pretty good audio. It's also got the early version of Dopesmoker, which is pretty cool to hear.
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Sleep - Live at Outdoor Party 1992 CA (video)

February 24, 2011, 9:37 am
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1 Dragonaut
2 Evil Gypsy/Solomon's Theme
3 Aquarian
4 Hot Lava Man
5 Scourge
6 Unknown

This show is definitely a rarity as I never knew it existed until I found it on someone's list after years of searching for other footage I hadn't seen or had a copy of. It's shot from some one in the audience who actually moves around the stage quite a bit, making for some good angles. The song choices are awesome as its the only video I have even seen of Sleep performing Hot Lava Man.

Al is playing through an Orange 'Pics Only' head and cab and Matt is playing through a Laney AOR 100 and a Fender head, which I believe he just uses for clean tones. Definitely pre-Green era, but the love for 1970's tube amps is pretty apparent.

The video quality is about 8.5 out of 10, but the audio is excellent. The footage can get fuzzy at times due to the degredation of the original tape, but it's well worth seeing for any fan. Although, I guess that can be said fot most of the footage out there...

It's cool to see Sleep playing in front of such a small and casual audience. You definitely see them before their transition years, which seemed to be marked by the Hawkwind tour, where they really seemed to come into their own.
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Sleep - 09/11/2010 - Roseland Theater, Portland, OR

May 19, 2011, 7:41 pm
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01 [intro]
02 Dopesmoker
03 Holy Mountain
04 Dragonaut
05 Evil Gypsy/Solomon's Theme
06 Aquarian
07 Nain's Baptism
08 Inside The Sun
09 The Druid
10 From Beyond
11 Dopesmoker (solo)
12 Proceeds The Weedian
13 [encore break]
14 The Mob Rules
15 Antarcticus Thawed
16 Cultivator
17 Improved Morris

An excellent audio bootleg of a show from the 2010 tour, with a good Sabbath cover in The Mob Rules and the only live version I have found of Improved Morris, a new Sleep track. The full on Dopesmoker tone is here and the copy I have of this show is fantastic, a recent trade. It feels like you are there - assuming you have some good head phones.

The beginning of Dopesmoker is killer and the crowd noise is bordering on orgasmic. You can almost smell the herbs in the air. There is a crushing amount of Matt's guitar, but the bass is a bit low on the audio, but definitely there.

I thought about flying out for this show as I have a lot of love for the Pacific Northwest as I grew up in Seattle and wanted to spread out a stay over the weekend. Now I wish I would have made it happen! Stellar.
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Sleep - 2/21/1992 - Berkeley, CA

May 19, 2011, 8:08 pm
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1 Introduction
2 Stillborn
3 Inside The Sun
4 Hot Lava Man
5 Numb
6 The Suffering
7 Evil Gypsy/Solomon's Theme
8 Wall Of Yawn
9 Nain's Baptism Intro
10 Nain's Baptism
11 The Druid
12 Behind The Wall Of Sleep
13 Basically
14 N.I.B.

This is a stellar show and one that I have listened too quite a few times. Hot Lava Man is a crushing track and I've always wondered why it never made it onto an album! The cover of N.I.B. is truncated, about a minute and a half long and pretty cool.

The show consists of mostly older material, lots of Volume 1 tracks. I'm a fan of the earlier material and they definitely play it with a lot of bite here, a bit more punch than what made it onto record for the Volume 1 . It also ends with Al saying to remember to smoke fucking pot.

Which reminds me of the story that when Sleep was recording Dopesmoker, they were smoking two ounces of weed a day. 2. Ounces. A. Day. Holy crap. Talk about commitment. I know that in Such Hawks, Such Hounds, Matt admits to spending a ton of the cash from London Records of weed, and with that amount being smoked daily, I could believe they tore through that advance as quick as they did.
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Sleep - 5/09/2009 - ATP, Butlins Resort, Minehead, UK

May 19, 2011, 8:36 pm
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1 Intro
2 Holy Mountain
3 Dragonaut
4 Evil Gypsy/Solomon's Theme
5 Aquarian
6 Pike Solo/Some Grass
7 Interlude
8 Cultivator
9 The Druid
10 Nain's Baptism
11 Dopesmoker (Proceeds The Weedian)
12 From Beyond

This show is the first time Sleep played live since they broke up in the 1990's and people must have been out of their minds! The show itself is excellent and all their best stuff is here. Cultivator is actually the later part of Dopesmoker from the mellow solo on - which is pretty cool they busted it out here.

Pike's solo is done on an acoustic and there's footage of it on Youtube. The later Dopesmoker excerpt is excellent and the vocals are super clear - as they are for the rest of this audio bootleg. In fact, the sound is amazing on this boot - sounds like a sound board recording!

This show, along with the 5/10/2009 show would be the last with Chris Haikus - its too bad too because he's an absolutely stellar drummer. I really hope he returns with Sleep if and when they decide to tour in the future.
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Hawkwind/Sleep poster - 1994 Space Ritual Tour

May 26, 2011, 7:04 am
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I do have a small collection of Sleep memoribilia, but I am big into collecting old posters and flyers. I have a lot of old Skate Rock stuff from the Big Boys, JFA, etc, but never found any Sleep stuff, until just recently.

Won this on eBay a few days ago for a pretty cheap price. It's a pretty cool little piece of history and one that will hang proudly on my wall, next to my Green Matamp.

This is actually from a show that never happened due to a wicked snowstorm.
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Sleep - Dopesmoker - Live in Chicago 9/9/10 - Logan Square Auditorium

June 21, 2011, 9:17 am
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It's probably about time I put up footage from the only Sleep show I have ever attended. I was pretty torn when I saw them if I should film or watch and opted for the later for most of the show, but I did capture a few tracks, one oif which is here. It's Matt's solo and a chunk of 'Dopesmoker' and this was the song to start the encore. I was standing about three people behind Matt's set up and I'm suprised the camera didn't melt.
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Sleep - Live in Chicago 9/9/2010 - Logan Square Auditorium

July 10, 2011, 10:43 am
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1) Sciences/Dopesmoker/Holy Mountain
2) Dragonaut
3) Evil Gypsy/Solomon's Theme
4)Some Grass/Aquarian
5) Nain's Baptism/The Druid
6) From Beyond
7) -encore-
8) Weedian/Cultivator/Improved Morris

I'm definitely biased because I was there, but this is an excellent show - the audio is a bit distorted, but it was unbelieveably loud there, so thats probably as good as it would get without being directly from the soundboard.

During the intro of every song, the crowd goes nuts, like a modern day Beatles-on-Ed-Sullivan, but with howling guys instead of screaming girls.

I couln't hear well for two days after the show and was just euphoric during the opening notes to Dopesmoker. Matt looked completely hammered for the entire show and Al seemed to be super chill, head down, off to the left. There wasn't many there who weren't big time fans - massive, slow headbanging, shouted lyrics, lots of yeahs and hollers from the crowd. I bought everything from the merch both, including some patches, t-shirts and poster and I will probably never forget this show.
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Sleep - 09/21/1992 The Gilman St. Project - Berkley, CA

November 10, 2011, 10:48 am
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1) The Druid
2) Nain's Arrival (Nain's Bapitism)
3) Evil Gypsy/Solomon's Theme
4) Nain's Arrival (Interlude)
5) The Suffering
6) Inside The Sun
7) The Wall Of Yawn
8) Scourge
9) Nain's Arrival (Outro)

This is definitely an older cassette bootleg and not a bad one at all. It's pretty easy to find on the internet and one of the first I probably downloaded. There is a good mix of early tracks and stuff from Holy Mountain, including 'The Druid', which leads off the set. It's a high energy show, one that gives you a good idea what these years were like for Sleep. You can hear the infectous energy in tracks like 'Inside The Sun' along with that heavy stoner vibe that set them apart.

The audio quality is suprisingly good too, with the Matt, Al and Chris all being easy to hear and distinguish. It also sounds like Matt is playing through the Laney AOR 100 he used for Holy Mountain. He's getting some squeals out of the amp that are classic Laney tones.
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Sleep - 10/17/1992 The Gilman St. Project - Berkley, CA

November 10, 2011, 11:13 am
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1) From Beyond
2) Evil Gypsy
3) Dragonaut
4) The Druid
5) Sonic Titan
6) The Suffering
7) Nain's Baptism

This may be the most listened to bootleg I have of Sleep. This show was recorded right before the release of Holy Mountain and has a ton of those tracks. The sound is all there - the Roland Space Echo vocal effects, the heavy Orange/Green amp sound, Al's booming voice. Almost every track is a standout, including the only recording I can find of 'Sonic Titan', the only other song on the release of Dopesmoker that Tee Pee put out - and this is the show that was recorded at.

The audio quality is pretty good and powerful and the song selection is awesome. This one is easy to find on the net to download and I highly recommend it.

It's a great show to get a feel for what Sleep was all about - powerful, drivng riffs on 'Dragonaut', loud, pounding almost slow thrash on 'Sonic Titan' and the total stoner thing on Nain's Baptism. The volume and power of 'Sonic Titan' is too good to pass up.
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Sleep - 1/30/1994 Live at the Limelight NY, NY

March 16, 2012, 7:33 am
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1) From Beyond
2) Dopesmoker
3) The Druid

This is one of the shows from the 1994 Hawkwind tour and a pretty good bootleg from the time. The audio is very clear and you get a good idea of what they sounded like live. Tghe tone alone from Pike's Green's is thunderous!

'From Beyond' is slow and its like Al, Matt and Chris all just wanted to soak up that thick tone of the Matamps! It takes about 5 minutes from the start of the song to get into the lyrics, which is fine for me. If there were a perfect time to listen to this bootleg, it would be right after waking up. Starts slow and gets you nodding your head. After five minutes you chill hard and spend the next half hour drinking coffee and getting ready to chill equally hard for the rest of the day.

'Dopesmoker' is the early version heard on a few other bootlegs and its 22-minutes long and awesome here. It's still strange to me that the song went through such a transformation before they committed it to tape as this version sounds like its was almost done - if not totally there.

The show ends with a great version of 'The Druid', a version more reminicent of the Holy Mountain recording than the Vol. 2 one. It's a clear and powerful bootleg of Sleep on the fabled Hawkwind tour, a must-get for any fan of their live work.
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Sleep - Jerusalem (1998) CD Bootleg

May 8, 2012, 12:54 pm
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This is the last piece of the Sleep puzzle I needed as far as the Jerusalem/Dopesmoker releases are concerned. This is the bootleg version of the original Jerusalem mix the band released in 1998 with cover art by Arik Roper, who is credited as "Moonhawk" in the insert.

The release is identical as far as I can tell to the later Rise Above/Music Cartel Records release with "Jerusalem" broken up into 6 parts and the same truncated opening to the album on that later release.

This was bought from a small online shop and as far as I know, its pretty hard to find, but doesn't command stupid money - probably because the version is the same as the later Rise Above/Music Cartel one. It's worth it, if only for the awesome art. The Rise Above/Music Cartel version art is OK, even with the tolex of the Matamp/Green amp as the backing color/texture behind the pics.

For those of you wondering which version to get, there are four now - this, the Rise Above/Music Cartel one, the Tee Pee records remixed Dopesmoker release and now the Southern Lord version, which is sceduled to drop in about a months' time. The Tee Pee Records Dopsmoker release is really the one to get right now, but I have yet to hear the new version - which also has an extra track - a live version of "Holy Mountain".
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Sleep practicing 'Dopesmoker' before Roadburn 2012

August 2, 2012, 12:48 pm
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Very cool short video here and an undoubtedly tired and dragging Sleep. Al looks like he needs about ten Red Bulls just to get him off that chair. Still, one cool video and a neat insight into Sleep.

One of my co-workers got to go to Roadburn this year and said the Sleep show was amazing. Probably actually meant fucking unbelieveably amazing, but she's not given to hyperbole.

Doing a little sleuthing, I checked out the Sleep show schedule for this year and there was a full European Tour based around Roadburn and then four US shows - with 2 at Neumo's in Seattle, WA. Which begs the question - why two back-to-back shows in Seattle? (Even though Neumo's is a bitching club and its right next to my favorite fish and chip place, Pike Street Fish Fry) Jack Endino, producer extrodinare still records there and he's done a few HoF albums - so I am wondering - is Sleep is back in the studio?! Fucking hopefully.
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Sleep - Saarbrucken, Germany 1993 (video)

August 15, 2012, 9:34 pm
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This video is a short one, but awesome nonetheless. It was taken during Sleep's European tour opening for Cannibal Corpse (the banner is visible in parts in the background) and is only one song, Holy Mountain.

It's obvious that they are the opening act as the only one close to the stage is a dude smoking at the end of the stage and the audience seems pretty chill, even after they finish, though they do get a sturdy round of applause.

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Tons of energy from the band though and when the camera pans to Chris, he's going full out behind the kit - as are Al and Matt during the whole song. It's short but powerful and even though the audio is muddied by the approximity to the amps, its still got that 1993/1994 Sleep tone with the full-on Green Matamp thing, which is a seriously beautiful sound indeed.
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Sleep performing Dopesmoker at Hornstulls Strand Sweeden

January 14, 2013, 2:56 pm
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A bitchin' video I wanted to share - and I am still looking to add this show to my collection! Matt's playing through his Blackstar amps (he's an endorser through High On Fire) and still getting that awesome overdriven Green sound. Fantastic stuff. Great sound quality and lighting so its easy to see what's up.
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Sleep - Live at Kennel Club - 2-22-1994 - San Francisco, CA

January 20, 2013, 2:24 pm
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1) Intro
2) From Beyond
3) Dopesmoker
4) Aquarian

"We're Sleep, and we like NyQuil."

'From Beyond' is one of my favorite Sleep tracks and yeah, it sounds great when you are definitely high, but the best part of the track here is the second half, which starts in just before the 11-minute mark - powerful, hard riffage leading into a great solo. Here, Pike really nails it - one of the better solos I have heard from him. Both Al and Matt sound great and distinct and the Green Matamp thing is most definitely happening.

'Dopesmoker' is again the early version and its actually a great version on its own. Some of the riffs that ended up on the record are there in their infancy, and the song definitely feels unfinished and kind of dies at the end. 'Aquarian' is also killer, with Al in full voice and you can feel the power with which they are playing - slow and loud and backed up by some amazing tone.

The crowd is decently enthusiastic, but sounds sparse - what sounds like 20 people. You can almost hear individual people in between songs.

It's amazing to think of them at this time as Holy Mountain was out and doing well, but they were still mostly an underground phenomenon.
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Sleep producer Billy Anderson talks about the recording of Dopesmoker

January 20, 2013, 2:36 pm
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Billy was gracious enough to recount the recording of Dopesmoker for me - specifically what amps and mics were used to get that tone. He's an incredibly talented guy with a silly list of albums and bands he has worked with - including producing all of Sleep's recorded material. Check out his website for a comprehensive list - http://www.billyanderson.net

Hey man-
Thanks for the kind words...
That was a long time ago, but..its still really clear in my
mind what was used because that album was such a struggle and
achievement...Anyhow, for basic tracking (I'm pretty sure this
track was used throughout the mixing process as a center track,
except for the "scratch" solos..) we used a Green Matamp with a
Green 4x12 cab, mic'd with an Sm57 and a Beyer M88. For the
main guitars, we used two full stacks, one stack driven by a
Green Matamp and the other driven by a Green Matamp Combo amp
(I think it had 2x12" speakers) on the front end and a Slave
Unit power amp on the back end...Each stack was mic'd close
with SM7 and M88 with a room mic (probably a large diaphragm
Neumann U67) and all mics summed to one track on tape. This
setup was used to double the main guitar. So at that point we
had the original live track and two performances of the setup
with 2 stacks, equalling three tracks total.
THEN--on certain parts of the song, for texture and dimension,
we did an additional rhythm track using a fucking Pignose amp,
open halfway with an AKG 414 in figure 8 pattern inserted into
the open amp...Fucked up, right?
After that, solos were done with the 2-full stack setup or the
Pignose depending on which solo...Clean guitars were done with
the Matamp combo at low volume with a ribbon mic close up and a
room mic...
Does this help you? Thanks for the compliments. One day I/we will write a book
about that recording---it's an amazing story!!!
Be well, riff on..
BA
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Sleep - 1993 US Tour (Cathedral/Penance)

August 13, 2015, 9:49 am
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Now this is some great early Sleep footage of them playing a handful of songs on their 1993 US tour. The video is multiple cameras, but the quality is not too awesome - however, the sound is pretty great. It's all about the Greens (in more ways than one).
I have asked the uploader for the single file this may have been taken from, but for now, grab some couch and some youtube and enjoy.
I am always on the lookout for more 1993 tour footage from the US or Europe on the Cannibal Corpse tour, so if you have anything or know of some footage that is waiting to be set free, let me know!
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