Eric Clapton - Live Birthday Party 
Civic Center
St. Paul, MN. 
March 30, 1998
Mid Valley MVR 444-447


Disc1:
101 - My Father’s Eyes
102 - Pilgrim 
103- One Chance 
104 - River Of Tears 
105 - Going Down Slow 
106 - Born In Time 
107 - She’s Gone 
108 - Tears In Heaven 
109 - Circus Left Town 
110 - Layla 
111 - Needs His Woman 
112 - Change The World.

Disc2: 
201 - Old Love 
202 - Sick and Tired 
203 - Have You Ever Loved A Woman 
204 - I Shot The Sheriff 
205 - Wonderful Tonight 
206 - Tearing Us Apart 
207 - Sunshine Of Your Love 
208 - Crossroads.

Disc3: 
301 - My Father’s Eyes 
302 - River Of Tears 
303 - Pilgrim 
304 - Brokenhearted 
305 - One Chance 
306 - Circus 
307 - Going Down Slow 
308 - Fall Like Rain 
309 - Born In Time 
310 - Sick & Tired 
311 - Needs His Woman 
312 - She’s Gone 
313 - You Were There 
314 - All Things Considered.

Disc4:
401 - River of Tears 
402 - Pilgrim 
403 - Born in Time 
404 - Circus 
405 - Needs His Woman 
406 - Modern Girl 
407 - Main Pass 
408 - Lead Voc Up 
409 - BG Voc Up 
410 - LD&BG Voc Up 
411 - TV Version 
412 - Instrumental 
413 - Acapella 
414 - Lead Voc. Only 
415 - BG Voc. Only.


Review from : http://www.collectorsmusicreviews.com/clapton-eric/eric-clapton-live-birthday-party-mid-valley-mvr-444-47/ 
“Live Birthday Party” may just be Mid Valley’s weakest release in a long while. 
The sound quality of the audience tape used albeit good is still far from the excellent 
audience recordings MV usually treat us to. Maybe because of that MV opted to release 
a 4CD set with some soundboard stuff to make up for that below-par audience tape we get.

Discs1 & 2 feature the opening show for the first leg of the 1998 US Tour. 
Disc3 is studio stuff and features the so-called “Revised EQ Version #4? which is taken from 
a rare 1998 Reprise Security Service 14-track CD-R acetate which features “All Things Considered” 
later to be retitled “Inside Of Me” for the finished album. More studio stuff can be found on Disc4, 
which features six tracks from the “Pilgrim Master Mixes” (readily available on the bootleg on the 
EC IS HERE label (DJ COPY 56)) and nine tracks from the “Organized Noise Remixes”.

The live tape captures the first show of EC’s 1998 US Tour - first tour there since 1995. 
The sound is distant in places and you will hear people chat more than you’d wish but on the other hand, 
being the opening show you will be able to listen to songs to be dropped from the setlist for the rest of the tour. 
This is the case of “Born In Time” and “Needs His Woman” which would be dropped from the setlist after this gig.

“Pilgrim” sounded so strange when it came out. EC was definitely trying a new sound. 
He got that on the album and he wanted that on tour as well, that’s why so many new faces 
surfaced in the band: Alan Darby (guitar), Ricky Lawson (drums), Tim Carmon (keyboards), 
Kenneth Crouch (keyboards), Chyna (vocals) and Charlean Hines (vocals). 
Only Nathan East (bass), Andy Fairweather-Low (guitar) and Katie Kissoon (vocals) had 
toured with EC before. Also, EC was accompanied on this tour by a 20-piece orchestra with Nick Ingman as conductor.

The show sounds quite different to other shows of the tour not only due to the fact of being a new band 
still needing to get tighter but also to the fact of some songs not being completely developed by now.
”My Father’s Eyes” won’t feature an outro solo from EC as there would be later on the tour. 
Differences too exist on the intro to “She’s Gone” and at this time EC is still a whole world away from 
exploiting all the guitar possibilities offered by “River Of Tears”. “Born In Time” is one of my favourite tracks 
on the “Pilgrim” album and I like it on its live version though EC’s guitar solos are again conspicuous by their absence. 
The highlight on the 5-song acoustic set has got to be the rare performance of the tender “Needs His Woman”.

For the second part of the show we get more from “EC The Guitar Player” than from “EC The Singer” 
with great guitar works on “Old Love”, “Have You Ever Loved A Woman” and “Sick & Tired”, which 
angered some women’s groups at the time with the offending lyrics 
“I’m gonna get me a shotgun, baby / Keep it stashed behind the bedroom door / I may have to blow your brains out, baby / 
Then you won’t bother me no more”. I find the lyrics inappropriate these days but it is true that they represent the tradition 
of blues music too.

“Sheriff” never lets you down and the rendition of “Wonderful Tonight” is nice featuring the great vocals of 
Katie Kissoon along with the strings of the orchestra and subtle licks from EC. “Tearing Us Apart” 
features some rushing solos but it indeed is a weird closing for the show. EC returns on stage to play 
“Sunshine” for the encore saying “this is the best birthday I’ve ever had”. EC would return on stage once more 
for “Crossroads” as a second encore. It has a kind of abrupt ending with a slight false step from the drummer 
but it nonetheless is a great rendition.

Not the best audience recording ever. I could live without the studio discs too. Half of the show sees EC sing. 
Only the other half sees him attack the guitar. “Born In Time” has been played live just a couple of times so far. 
One is captured on this release and the second one - a far much better one, by the way - took place at the 
Crossroads Benefit Concert on June 30, 1999 when EC was joined by Dylan himself. 
“Needs His Woman” is unavailable elsewhere. I am glad to have this in my collection but I admit I will likely 
be not playing it too much…