Jazz

Jazz Tour (28.10.1978 - 18.08.1979)

Dreamer's Ball was added to the acoustic set. The 'Live Killers' tour is included here because it was in fact European leg of the Jazz tour (even the tour program had the Jazz logo). Only slight changes in drums and bass gear. For the first time Roger played electronic drums (during the interlude of Get Down Make Love).

Percussion

Ludwig drum kit (for almost all the songs): 26" x 18" Bass Drum, 14" x 10", 15" x 14", 16" x 15" Rack Toms, 18" x 16", 20" x 17" Floor Toms, 14" x 6" Snare Drum, 15" & 16" Roto Toms. Cymbals were 15" Paiste Hi-hats, 22" Zildjian Ride and China, 20" Wuhan China, and 18", 20" (x2) Paiste Crash. Electronic drum pads were of the brand Syndrum. The bass drum logo was the robot (American leg only) and later the Jazz logo. Roger played a Gretsch kit in Dreamer's Ball, it consisted of 14" x 5" Snare, 18" x 4" Bass, 12" x 8" Rack Tom and 14" x 14" Floor Tom. Roger also used this kit (and played a Ludwig tambourine) during '39 (the fourth photo). Freddie played a New Era tambourine in Keep Yourself Alive and always threw it into the audience (he sometimes even used two or three tambourines for this song and threw all of them in the audience). Freddie probably still had red maracas for the intro of '39. Roger did a Ludwig Timpani solo and at the end of BoRhap hit the Paiste 6 ft. Gong. Roger (1983): "I have an amazing Gretsch kit in our studio over in Switzerland. It's got three toms, a snare and bass drum. It's a great sounding kit. Some kits sound great, others don't."

Bass guitars

Before the American leg John got the 1955 Fender Masterbuilt Precision with maple neck (fourth photo); besides he'd still got both of his main Fenders (first and second photo) and the fretless type (third photo). The fretless Fender was used for '39 every night in both tours, while the other three were swapped probably according to John's mood: during the American leg he mainly used the 1955 and 1967 models and at the first night of the European leg in 1979 he was all the time with the 1955 one. For most of the European and Japanese gigs though, he seems to have changed to his usual 1968 model as the main instrument but in Paris he switched to the old 1955 Fender just for Dreamer's Ball'. Strange, isn't it?

Guitars
Red Special was the main electric guitar, having a Birch replica as back-up. For the acoustic set (now including three songs) Brian played the Ovation Pacemaker 12 string. He had another one as back-up (since now the acoustic set was longer and there was a bigger risk of breaking a string).

Piano
Freddie's Steinway D. During the Japanese leg Brian played piano for the first time live (in Teo Torriatte).

Vocals
6 Shure mics: one for John, one for Brian, two for Freddie (one at the piano), two for Roger (one for '39)