These Bootlegs Won't Be Walking

Billy Joel will be the headliner at the Greenwich Town Party later this month.

Once again, WGCH will be the official radio station of the event.

For the third year in a row, Sean will co-host with me.

Now, to be clear, Billy Joel's show will NOT -- repeat, NOT -- air on WGCH. We are not allowed to carry that. From what I've heard, we can air literally everyone else but Billy Joel.

We haven't finalized our broadcast plans yet but if it follows what we've done in the past, we'll probably be live by Noon and go until maybe 6 (or later this year).

But, as I talked about it on "Doubleheader" today, it got me thinking: why can't Billy Joel let us air it?

Oh, I know, I know. People could record the show and digitize it and sell bootleg copies.

Oh lordy! The horror!

Look, I love Billy Joel. I've been a fan of his music for over 40 years. And, I get it. Literally, every headlining act in the past wouldn't let us carry their show. From Lynyrd Skynyrd and Paul Simon to Eric Clapton and Steely Dan and, duh, the Eagles.

Yet...

Think this through for a moment. The ticket to this show is one of the hardest to get. Only a small amount of people (I've seen 6,000 but factor everything in and maybe it's 8,000) will get into Roger Sherman Baldwin Park (including the Adams Boys, who attend on media credentials).

There will be boats in Greenwich Harbor that will jockey for position to listen to the show.

There will be a lot of people that will gather on the sidewalks outside of the park on Arch Street. They, too, will be able to hear the show.

Many, however, will not. 

Billy Joel has always been one of the more "regular guys" in the rock and roll world. To me, that's always been part of his appeal to go along with the timeless tunes that I've been singing since I was probably eight or nine.

So, it would be really cool if he would be the one to say, "Let's throw a big party and air it on the radio so that everyone can hear it." It would look great for Billy, Greenwich, and of course WGCH (I'm not dumb).

As it is, he has so many live albums in existence. Probably countless more shows that have been turned into bootlegs over the years. Plus Billy always appreciated all kinds of bands, like the Grateful Dead, who let fans record their shows.

But I get it. What I'm saying makes zero sense.

To an extent, I still have a bit of a bitter taste in my mouth at the Eagles management shoved WGCH aside like we were, well, nothing. Which I guess we were.

But, ah, the good old bootleg. For every wise band that allowed such things (jam band Umphrey's McGee immediately springs to mind), there are countless others who would be horrified at such things.

Of course, it reminds me of the infamous episode of What's Happening!! in 1978 featuring the Doobie Brothers and a contraband cassette recorder in the hands of one Mr. Freddie "Rerun" Stubbs.

But it was really a staple of life. Now, while I never took an illegal tape recorder to a concert, you can bet I recorded a few shows off the radio. Concerts were a constant -- especially at night -- on outlets such as WNEW-FM and others who ran things like "The King Biscuit Flower Hour."

As I told the story on "Doubleheader" today, my most famous tape was when Huey Lewis and the News (of course) aired a concert on Showtime. That concert was then simulcast on WNEW. I went to my sister's apartment and watched the concert while recording the audio on a boom box. 

Postscript: the concert, filmed at the Kabuki Theater -- now a movie theater -- in San Francisco, was made available on VHS and won a Grammy.

I almost wore the cassette out, so much so that I made sure I had an extra copy available. That's the tape that I then played constantly, keeping the other one as the master tape. Eventually, that and other concerts became available digitally. The sound, needless to say, was light years better.

One night, a few years later, I caught an HLN show from their FORE! Tour on the radio. I rushed home and threw a cassette in my stereo to catch the rest of it. It was years before I got the whole show. That cassette featured the brilliant "Whole Lotta Lovin'" which then transitioned to "The Boys Are Back in Town." The poignancy of that was Huey was a good friend of Phil Lynott, the Thin Lizzy frontman who wrote and sang "The Boys Are Back in Town."

Huey, in fact, was producing a solo album for Lynott when the Irish performer died in 1986. Huey considered Lynott to be a mentor and he played harmonica on both a live Thin Lizzy album and a studio album.

Well, a post that was going to be more about bootleg albums turned into a deeper dive down a rabbit hole. Still, with digital media, there are plenty of ways to dig into the bootleg world. Gone is the tape hiss that those of us who grew up in that era knew all too well. Gone, also, is making sure you have just enough tape before it cuts off on a song. It was quite a dance.

So, dream all I want about Billy Joel's management giving us the "all clear" to air his concert later this month. 

It's not happening.

So the answer is to get a ticket or find a position where you can listen to the show.