STING 3CD – July 27, 1988 Los Angeles Wiltern Theatre – Soundboard recording

For the avid bootleg collectors, a new gem has popped up: STING – July 27, 1988 Los Angeles “Wiltern Theatre” – Soundboard recording. This show was part of the second US-leg of the 1987/ 1988 Nothing Like The Sun tour. Most of the shows were performed in large arenas or at special summer festivals. He did however play in the intimate Wiltern Theatre on July 27. Only about 2,300 people were able to attend this very special and long show. Sting and the band performed all the songs they did during the other dates of the tour, but many extra songs were added. The show also included several interesting covers (including songs by George Gershwin and Frank Zappa). This resulted in the longest Sting show ever. A whopping 172 minutes, or almost 3 hours. Some members of the band had the chance to perform some songs of their own: Dolette McDonald, Delmar Brown, Kenny Kirkland and Branford Marsalis provided some very high quality moments. During the tour Sting liked to perform songs in the language of the particular country. That night in California he sang all those songs in French, German, Italian and Spanish.
Now, the funny part is that In 1988/ 1989 there were serious plans to release a live album of (parts of) this show. The artist Robert Gligorov already made artwork for the album. Somehow the whole project was withdrawn by the record company and the official album was never released.
Until 1992 when the first recording appeared on the 3CD-bootleg “The Art of the Heart” (Phantom Red label; RPBX 009/010/011) in October 1992. This recording came from an analog source and had quite a lot of hiss.
In 2004 another source appeared on the Japanese 3CD-bootleg “LOS ANGELES 1988” (label: Watchtower). This source doesn’t have any hiss and sounds much cleaner compared to “The Art of the Heart” recordings. However, this bootleg is missing the last 90 seconds of “King of Pain”. The splits of the show over the three discs is also different compared to “The Art of the Heart”.
This “new” source is a major upgrade to all previous sources and contains the full concert, without glitches or missing parts.
Setlist:
disc 1 (54 min):
01-01 Someone To Watch Over Me
01-02 Sister Moon
01-03 The Lazarus Heart >
01-04 Too Much Information
01-05 Englishman In New York
01-06 Rock Steady
01-07 Straight To My Heart
01-08 Tempted
01-09 One World
01-10 If You Love Somebody Set Them Free

disc 2 (58 min):
02-01 Bring On The Night >
02-02 When The World Is Running Down
02-03 Lonely House
02-04 The Idiot Bastard Son
02-05 I Don’t Wanna Be (performed by Dolette McDonald)
02-06 The Promise (performed by Delmar Brown)
**
02-07 Blasphemy (performed by Kenny Kirkland & Branford Marsalis)
02-08 They Dance Alone
02-09 Consider Me Gone
02-10 King Of Pain

disc 3 (60 min):
03-01 Be Still My Beating Heart
03-02 Walking In Your Footsteps
03-03 Fragil >
03-04 Little Wing > From Me To You
**
03-05 The Secret Marriage
03-06 Don’t Stand So Close To Me
**
03-07 Mackie Messer/ Mack The Knife
03-08 Caro Mio Ben
03-09 Ne Me Quitte Pas
03-10 Home On The Range
03-11 Every Breath You Take

Happy hunting!

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