It is extremely difficult to understate how much Philadelphia Concert Nostalgia is contained on this single cassette. It's an early-generation dub (very little noise, dropped out only twice on my deck despite not having been cleaned,) on a Sony T-160 with a hand-punched typewriter label that reads "ROLLING STONES - PHILLY '89." I don't know where I got it from, which means it came out of the trash at some point. It's a bootleg, shot on August 31, 1989, using a full-size VHS camcorder and an impossibly long lens from the second tier of Veterans' Stadium, tucked right up against the rail: not the legendary 700 level, but close, and all through a hole cut out in the side of a backpack!
Sound quality is surprisingly ripping, but the video is, truth be told, frustrating to watch throughout. This owes largely to the aforementioned hyper-extended zoom, which reduces much of the show in a blurry, energetic, orange and blue haze. If this sort of thing isn't your bag, you might responsibly assess this as a vaseline-blurry mess, Â as on my first viewing I did, but the few moments where everything actually comes into complete focus are surreal and gorgeous. It also bears mentioning that whoever shot this must have been very patient, the shot is rarely disturbed throughout the entire gig (tripod in the bag, maybe?)
Aside from a surprise club gig in Connecticut earlier that month, this Philly show was the band's first US date in eight years, and the first of their '89/'90 Steel Wheels/Urban Jungle tour, largely recognized as the period the Stones began their third-act existence as a massive arena act, and the last tour on which Bill Lyman was a member of the band. The eight-year road drought preceding this trip having many convinced this would be the final Stones tour, attendance & audience enthusiasm were both extremely high, and the band delivered.
(Setlist, other info at YT link.)
