Just dowloaded the Toronto remaster from 1982..... And its good to hear a live version of Body Language.....was wondering what it would have looked like live on stage and how many times they played it live in 1982... did it ever appear in the 1984 set list. even just a snipet. Hot Space is my second favourite album love it because it was a album that most tracks until recently never appeared on other albums etc and love all the bootlegs of the 1982 tour...
I never realised they ever played it live? really? wow how the hell did they play it?
I would be very interested to know this despite totally hating the track...
Live it was actually a pretty decent song. Raw, more guitars, great vocals from Roger. But I wonder what Deaky's role was: did he play bass, since there is a synth bass as well...
Rick wrote: Live it was actually a pretty decent song. Raw, more guitars, great vocals from Roger. But I wonder what Deaky's role was: did he play bass, since there is a synth bass as well...
Sure he was drinking cocktails from behind is Amp-Bar !!
kevinhairsineevans wrote: Just dowloaded the Toronto remaster from 1982..... And its good to hear a live version of Body Language.....was wondering what it would have looked like live on stage
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Probably like the rest of the songs: 4 guys on stage, one with moustache and white or red leather jacket jumping around, well, erm, singing.....one with black, long curly hair playing a red guitar and the other two just looking cool :)
I wonder actually why all Hot Space songs (except Under Pressure) were removed from the setlist after this tour, probably because the album was weak in the charts and the songs weren't hits, or the songs were hard to play live, what's the reason?
To be fair, Body Language WAS a hit. A very big one, too: it sold just as many copies as Innuendo and I Want It All, almost twice as much as Tie Your Mother Down, over twice as much as Now I'm Here, five times more than Love of My Life, Hammer to Fall, Seven Seas of Rhye and Who Wants to Live Forever.
Now, it didn't translate quite well live, and it was probably harder to sing than some of their 70's rockers. That could've been a reason.
The Works tour wiped out a lot of the songs they used to do live: Save Me, Play the Game (both of which worked marvellously well), Flash's Theme (another very big hit for them - it even outsold Under Pressure, A Kind of Magic and You're My Best Friend), I'm in Love with My Car (which again worked great), and so on. Non-UP HS tracks were victims of the executive meddling just like only their two massive hits from The Game survived the massacre.
kevinhairsineevans wrote:
how many times they played it live in 1982... did it ever appear in the 1984 set list. even just a snipet.
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They just played it in 82. They tried it a couple times in Europe, but a more compact version was played every night in Canada, the US and Japan.
I've talked to many people who hated Hot Space and especially Body Language, and even they say the track sounded great on stage.
Check out this screenshot from the New Haven 82 TV report. Looks like Deacy's got a Strat..
I guess he isn't doing too much, because I can't hear any non-Brian guitar on even the best recordings from the year..
Er, no, Bob, that's the grey Fender Precision Special bass. Philipp Nothaft had indeed suggested, about a decade ago, that John could be playing it on that song, though I don't hear it anywhere on any of the available audio versions. Maybe he simply took a rest ... maybe the TV report actually filmed that bit during UP and the audio sync had BL? Too many maybe's ... I hope someday they release at least one version of it on video.
The video is definitely of Body Language. Check it out on youtube - link
The body looks just like a Strat ... or at least I thought so from the video I have. It's better quality than the youtube one, but pausing it gave it that interlaced look. But indeed you're right, it's a bass.
Either way, all I hear on the live versions is the vocal, drums, synth bass and Brian.
You're right. Now, after listening to both Vienna and Meadowlands, the bass sound is different. My educated guess: Vienna's only synth, Meadowlands is synth + bass (sometimes, when Mandel is playing pads, you hear only the bass).
On this: link You can clearly hear the bass (real bass) before the second verse.
John possibly picked up the grey Special bass because it sounded more artificial (as on UP) without being *too* electronic (as on AOBTD or Back Chat). I also suspect John used the Fender P-Special on the recordings of IWBF (compare it with the live version which is far warmer and more classic-Queeney).
Considering it was just one song, I don't see anything rare there.
Spike had a far more prominent role than John AND Roger on Is This the World We Created...