San Francisco

San Francisco

Tuesday, June 6 (2 shows) & Thursday, June 8 (2 shows)

For years, the quartet of performances at San Francisco’s legendary Winterland loomed as a perilous desert of sorts for song chroniclers, with only a partial tape from one show and some Greenfield dispatches to guide fans across the humbling void. Although the recent discovery of a complete (and altogether revelatory) audience tape from the final Winterland concert has finally secured one full set list for us, there are still more than two concerts of emptiness ahead. Are there more surprise numbers a la Thursday evening’s Loving Cup and Honky Tonk Women lurking in the San Francisco repertoire? And who is right about the ultra-rare Let It Rock encore in San Francisco? Greenfield places it at the second Tuesday show, but Karnbach claims it happened at an unspecified Thursday performance.

Answers to these and other questions emerge quite readily from the microfilm, for the daily and weekly press coverage of the Winterland shows was plentiful, detailed, and credible. The multiple reviews reach across time to nail down complete sets for both Tuesday shows, confirm Greenfield’s Rolling Stone account of Let It Rock, and even relate the Loving Cup and Honky Tonk Women renditions that so surprised us when they re-emerged from a long-lost cassette not too long ago. The only bit of potential uncertainty remaining is the set for the third show (Thursday afternoon), for which we have no direct press evidence yet. However, my reading of the Sundaze review suggests that the author probably attended that concert, saw no song variations from the Tuesday afternoon baseline show he was to chronicle in such perfect detail, and thus left the Thursday matinee untreated. In all likelihood, the third San Francisco concert was a reprise of the first, which had pioneered the 15-song template that would become standard fare on the tour.

The Sundaze review also contains a clue that helps establish the placement of the partial (10 songs) audience tape typically credited to June 6. Regarding the performance of Love In Vain, “Capt. Grunt” notes:

During the second show Tuesday a girl had fainted in the midst of the

audience. All of us being extremely greedy wanting to savour every moment

of the Stones did not move to get a doctor. Instead the crowd screamed doctor

while signaling with their hands. Jagger sensed he was loosing the audience.

A frightened Altamont look preceded a strained vocal arrangement. It was Bill

Wyman who first noticed what was causing the disturbance. He signaled to Mick,

“Mick, Mick” the house lights came on a little. The girl was rescued and sent

out into the lobby.

With telltale audience shouts of “doctor!” sandwiching its restarted opening, the version of Love In Vain on the putative June 6 tape appears to capture the commotion described above. From this evidence, we can place the recording more specifically to the evening show, the one that would close with Let It Rock.

From costume analysis, the live All Down The Line clip in CS Blues, showing Jagger in his red polka-dot shirt and decorated black tank top, can be matched to the first Winterland concert.

June 6, 1^st show
*SF Examiner*	*Good Times*	*SF Chronicle*	*Sundaze*	*Cream*	*Daily Californian*
Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar
Bitch		Bitch	Bitch	Bitch	Bitch
Rocks Off			Rocks Off
	Gimme Shelter	Gimme Shelter	Gimme Shelter
			Happy
Tumbling Dice		Tumbling Dice	Tumbling Dice		Tumbling Dice
Love In Vain	“a little blues and acoustic stuff”	Love In Vain	Love In Vain		Love In Vain
Sweet Virginia	“a little blues and acoustic stuff”		Sweet Virginia		Sweet Virginia
YCAGWYW		YCAGWYW	YCAGWYW	YCAGWYW	YCAGWYW
All Down The Line		All Down The Line	All Down The Line
Midnight Rambler		Midnight Ramber	Midnight Rambler		Midnight Rambler
	“Chuck Berry style side”		Bye Bye Johnny
	“Chuck Berry style side”		Rip This Joint
	JJF	JJF	JJF		JJF
SFM	SFM	SFM	SFM		SFM
Jagger: “a raspberry polka-dot shirt” and “flaired chartreuse pants” “there were fifteen tunes in all” SFM “the rousing, floor-stomping finale” Opening: Stevie Wonder, followed by mime Robert Shields	Jagger: “whipped off his silk red with white polka-dots jacket” to show “his black Marilyn Monroe sleeveless shirt, a picture of MM climbing a rope to an ellipse of sequined stars” after SFM “they were gone” with no encore Opening: Stevie Wonder	they also played “five others I didn’t know, mostly from the new Exile on Main Street double-album” “they did one acoustic number each set” Opening: Stevie Wonder and “mime Robert Shields, who worked deftly during intermission both sets”	Jagger: “wearing green tights, a red long-sleeve shirt with white polka-dots, and a black vest with gold and green sequins” Opening: Stevie Wonder		Jagger: “lavender pants, a multi-colored scarf, a red parka with big stars on it over a black shirt, and white loafers” “sixteen song show” Opening: Stevie Wonder
*Berkeley Barb: “So, the Stones play two sets, early and late. For the early set Jagger wears green; for the later set, he wears white.” Ramparts: “a black tank top with a portrait of Marilyn Monroe on his chest” LA Times: “a huge 20 x 30-foot mural featuring the group’s tongue emblem that was unfurled high above the stage when the Stones went on” Daily Californian: “During the earlier numbers, Jagger kept turning his back to the audience and complaining that ‘they just can’t get it on well enough.’ Later, Jagger tried climbing on a huge amplifier only to look over a Bill Graham and have the master nod his disapproval. Like a child who instinctively knows when to leave well enough alone, Jagger abandoned his plans for a human high rise and concentrated on dancing on a huge dragon colorfully drawn onstage...At the feet of Watts, Jagger and Richard were long lists with the order of songs to be played during the show.” STP: “The Stones leave the stage after Street Fighting Man*. The crowd kicks and howls and wails and stomps on the floor, demanding an encore, but the band is already out of the building, and in the mobile home on their way back to the hotel.”

June 6, 2^nd show
*Oakland Tribune*	*Alternative Features*	*Manchester Guardian*	*SF Chronicle*
Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar		Brown Sugar
Bitch		Bitch	Bitch
	Rocks Off
		Gimme Shelter	Gimme Shelter
	Happy
Tumbling Dice	Tumbling Dice		Tumbling Dice
Love In Vain			Love In Vain
Sweet Virginia	Sweet Virginia
YCAGWYW			YCAGWYW
		All Down The Line	All Down The Line
Midnight Rambler		Midnight Rambler	Midnight Rambler

Rip This Joint	Rip This Joint	Rip This Joint
JJF			JJF
SFM		SFM	SFM
“Chuck Berry encore”	Let It Rock	“encore”	“rare encore”
Jagger: “jean jacket, white-satin-spangled one piece suit, sash, green sequined eye shadow” Opening: Stevie Wonder	Opening: Stevie Wonder	Jagger: “dark-spotted silver satin trousers, a thick waist-band of red and blue, spangles on his neck and temples, a silver-laced vest” Opening: Stevie Wonder	“Unlike Wonder, the Stones did exactly the [same] show both afternoon and evening, save for a rare encore Tuesday night.” Opening: Stevie Wonder and mime Robert Shields
*SF Examiner: “At the evening performance he wore a blue chambray workshirt tied over a white rhinestone-studded panne velvet laced-front jumpsuit and a striped sash. His eye makeup (a leftover from Performance?) was blue eye shadow with silver sequins.” LA Times: “That evening, the Stones did their first encore of the tour. They hadn’t planned to do any encores but the enthusiasm was so great in the hall, it seemed the only thing to do.” Sundaze: “On the second show Tuesday, the Stones came back and did Johnny B. Goode.” Rolling Stone: “The second show that night was a bitch, a stone rocker. The Stones did their first encore of the tour, what Mick later called ‘a minute-40 of Let It Rock.’” Oakland Tribune*: “Above their heads hung a huge banner with the new Stones’ logo – a bright pair of Marilyn Monroe lips with a grotesque tongue sticking out.”

June 8, 1^st show

no reviews found yet

June 8, 2^nd show

SF Examiner: “Their final set on the San Francisco leg of their 31-city American tour built from an okay start last night to a triumphant encore, an hour and a half later, on Honky Tonk Woman. If there was any doubt about the Stones’ continuing hold on their San Francisco devotees, it was utterly swept away by the ecstatic whoop that greeted the band when they returned onstage to play that encore. That whoop was louder, more explosive than any of the music played at Winterland the whole evening. And that’s not only some tribute, it’s a victory for raw lung power over the most advanced electronic technology in the realm of amplified music.”

Sundaze: “On the second show Thursday, the encore was Honky Tonk Women. What a tribute to San Francisco the Stones paid us by doing an encore. Also on the last show, Loving Cup was added to the play list.”

Rolling Stone: “They threw roses at the Stones for the second show and they lay on the white floor under Mick’s feet as he danced. Keith, in purple jockey silks, slashed at his guitar with the full arm extended motion that Pete Townshend borrowed and made into the windmill. Nicky Hopkins tinkled roadhouse chords like a madman. They went off after a killer set and came back with Honkey-Tonk Women. The Stones had finally gotten to play for the San Francisco they’d only heard about before.”

Selected Press Clippings

Alternative Features1 * 2

Berkeley Barb1 * 2

Cream

Daily Californian

Good Times1 * 1a * 1b * 2 * 3

Los Angeles Times1 * 2 * 3 * 4

Manchester Guardian

Oakland Tribune

Ramparts2 * 4

San Francisco Chronicle1 * 3

San Francisco Examiner1 * 2a * 3 * 4b

Sundaze1 * 2

Time

San Francisco Composite Sets
June 6, 1^stshow	June 6, 2^nd show	June 8, 1^stshow	June 8, 2^nd show
Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar	Brown Sugar
Bitch	Bitch	Bitch	Bitch
Rocks Off	Rocks Off	Rocks Off	Rocks Off
Gimme Shelter	Gimme Shelter	Gimme Shelter	Gimme Shelter
Happy	Happy	Happy	Happy
Tumbling Dice	Tumbling Dice	Tumbling Dice	Tumbling Dice
Love In Vain	Love In Vain	Love In Vain	Love In Vain
Sweet Virginia	Sweet Virginia	Sweet Virginia	Sweet Virginia
YCAGWYW	YCAGWYW	YCAGWYW	Loving Cup
All Down The Line	All Down The Line	All Down The Line	YCAGWYW
Midnight Rambler	Midnight Rambler	Midnight Rambler	All Down The Line
Bye Bye Johnny	Bye Bye Johnny	Bye Bye Johnny	Midnight Rambler
Rip This Joint	Rip This Joint	Rip This Joint	Bye Bye Johnny
JJF	JJF	JJF	Rip This Joint
SFM	SFM	SFM	JJF
	Let It Rock		SFM
			Honky Tonk Women