It couldn’t have been more than two hours after writing Woodstock revisited and stating it was unlikely I would be purchasing the latest re-release of the rock festival that I walked into Costco and found a copy of the 40th anniversary Ultimate Collector’s Edition at a price I wasn’t expecting. So low, that is. Of course, I picked it up and bought it.
My main interest was not in the Director’s Cut, which I had bought back in the early ’90s, but in the Extras disc, Woodstock: Untold Stories. It includes about three hours of material with nearly 150 minutes of previously unreleased performances, the rest consisting of documentary video segments.
The inclusion of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band was the main attraction for me, despite the band performing only one song, but the disc also includes The Who, Jefferson Airplane, Santana, Joe Cocker and first-time appearances on a Woodstock disc by Johnny Winter and Creedence Clearwater Rivival.
The viewer will have to sit through a somewhat painful first half of the disc though to get to the good bits. That may affect your decision on buying the set at all. You can skip over most of that of course, but it does reduce the portion of the footage that will draw you back for repeated viewings. Continue reading Woodstock Extras
For details about the project, including specific mastering techniques, as well as a wealth of other information on The Beatles, check out 
Sebastian’s charming and engaging style of entertaining creates an immediate connection with his audience as he mixes interesting anecdotes from his career with a type of humor that is so easy to relate to, especially for his contemporaries as he puts it.
If you pre-ordered the set, you also received another previously released concert on DVD/CD, Sugar Mountain Live At the Canterbury House 1968, which I wrote about back in December in 
Oregon Public Radio just posted an 
The only question left is whether Michael Lang, who produced the original festival, will stage anniversary events in August. There were reports earlier this year about free 
The sound is pristine, the performances near flawless and the songs are fully formed in almost every instance. It’s an easy and pleasant listen. What it lacks is a hint at how most of these tunes changed from the early demo stage to the finished product.
But Secret, Profane & Sugarcane is hardly just a bluegrass album. Costello imbues his songs with rock, country blues and jazz sensibilities as well as folk themes built around four songs from an unfinished Hans Christian Anderson opera.