— Leave a Comment

Elsah- Varsity Theatre, Baton Rouge La 7/1/05 CD Release Show Xfer f/Hi8 Master Enhanced alt.country

One from the collections here- this is from Neil Werries’ Hi8 master tapes that he sent a few years back. His band Elsah was pretty popular in New Orleans in the mid-2000’s. The Varsity Theatre holds 800, so playing that size room is no small feat. The tape was marked “CD Release”, but I don’t see any CD’s listed on discogs so I have no idea which one it is. There is a CD just called “EP” on Apple Music.

Here is a little info on the band:
here is some info about the band: “Elsah formed around singer-songwriter Neil Werries in St. Louis in 1997. Stories of growing up in rural and small town central Illinois along with a love of bands like Uncle Tupelo, the Meat Puppets and Blue Mountain inspire Elsah’s blend of punk, rock and old time country music. Werries relocated to Baton Rouge in 2001, continuing to write and perform with likeminded musicians. Elsah’s three-guitar front – Werries on acoustic, Sam “Boykin” Short and Glenn Harris on lead – is rounded out by Nick Butitta (bass) and Chad Townsend (drums). Elsah has remained as a standard bearer of Alt-country music throughout the Gulf South for over 20 years

Oh, and another PSA. If you can time align multiple analog video angles for edit, please hit me up! We have these shows from Neil that need alignment so we can edit:
old 97s barleypalooza 6/1/97
Gourds barleypalooza 6/1/97 (one angle is already up on the channel)
Old 97s- fitzgeralds 7/4/97 (2 angles)
Silos- lexington ky 7/26/97
Silos- Louisville Ky 7/25/97

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment Used: Sony DCR-TRV460 firewire into Dell workstation
Enhanced (degrain) in Adobe Premiere Elements/Neat Video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah- Varsity Theatre, Baton Rouge La 4/28/05 Xfer from Hi8 Master Enhanced alt.country

In case you missed it on the first Elsah post, here is some info about the band: “Elsah formed around singer-songwriter Neil Werries in St. Louis in 1997. Stories of growing up in rural and small town central Illinois along with a love of bands like Uncle Tupelo, the Meat Puppets and Blue Mountain inspire Elsah’s blend of punk, rock and old time country music. Werries relocated to Baton Rouge in 2001, continuing to write and perform with likeminded musicians. Elsah’s three-guitar front – Werries on acoustic, Sam “Boykin” Short and Glenn Harris on lead – is rounded out by Nick Butitta (bass) and Chad Townsend (drums). Elsah has remained as a standard bearer of Alt-country music throughout the Gulf South for over 20 years.”

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment Used: Cony DCR-TRV460 firewire into Dell workstation
Enhanced (degrain) in Adobe Premiere Elements/Neat Video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah- Thirsty Tiger Tavern, Baton Rouge La Acoustic Set Alt Country Americana xfer from Hi8 master

This one, from Neil Werries’ collection, was an absolute pain to deal with. It was super dark on stage, but when I tried to perform a full brightness/contrast enhancement, the screen would flash dark and light to the point of annoyance. This was the best I could do with it. At least it sounds good, so you can treat it as an audio post if you’d like. The acoustic set highlights the quality of the songs here.

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment used: Sony DCR-TRV340 firewire into Dell workstation
Enhanced in Adobe Premiere Elements/Neat Video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah- Magnolia, Baton Rouge La. mid 2000s? w Chuck Prophet? xfer from Hi8 Master tape

After a pretty insane schedule (Work, Kids, Sports, etc) over the past few months, things seem to be settling back down. Well, at least I had some time to organize my desk (it was embarrassing) and I found a bunch of videos I had not posted yet.
This tape is labeled “Elsah Magnolia w/Chuck Prophet”. I don’t recognize Chuck in this video, so maybe Neil Werries means that they opened for Chuck? Don’t know, but this one sounds nice.

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment Used: Cony DCR-TRV460 firewire into Dell workstation
Enhanced (degrain) in Adobe Premiere Elements/Neat Video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah/ Poor Harvey- Baton Rouge? LA xfer from 8mm master Alt Country Americana Mid 2000’s

Collections post time- this is one of the last if not THE last one from Neil Werries’ collection EXCEPT for the multicamera videos that I have been begging people to help me with, haha. Maybe one day.

This is his band Elsah doing a full band set at an unknown venue. The tape just said “Elsah/Poor Harvey LA” and I thought that Poor Harvey might be a venue. No, they were a Baton Rouge based band in the mid 2000’s, right when Elsah was active. If anyone has more info (like Neil maybe), please let me know.

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment used: Sony DCR-TRV340 firewire into Dell workstation
Enhance (lighting and denoise) in Adobe Premiere Elements/Neat Video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah- North Gate Tavern, Baton Rouge La 9/15/04 xfer from Hi8 Master tape enhanced alt country

Happy Sunday everyone! While we try to get Neil Werries’ multicamera angles of The Gourds to work together for edits (it has been a long painful process), let’s post a video of his band. I think this is the longest set that he had- almost 2 hours. There is a 5-10 minute part of the video where the camera gets bumped and is pointed at the ceiling, but that gets corrected2. Sounds pretty good.

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment used: Sony DCR-TRV340 firewire into Dell Workstation
Enhanced (degrain) in adobe premiere elements/neat video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah- Chealsea’s, Baton Rouge La. 8/14/04 xfer from hi8 Master Tape Enhanced Alt.Country

Here’s a surprise mid-week video instead of the typical audio. It’s a band that my friend Neil Werries is in called Elsah. Here’s a quick bio of the band:

“Elsah formed around singer-songwriter Neil Werries in St. Louis in 1997. Stories of growing up in rural and small town central Illinois along with a love of bands like Uncle Tupelo, the Meat Puppets and Blue Mountain inspire Elsah’s blend of punk, rock and old time country music. Werries relocated to Baton Rouge in 2001, continuing to write and perform with likeminded musicians. Elsah’s three-guitar front – Werries on acoustic, Sam “Boykin” Short and Glenn Harris on lead – is rounded out by Nick Butitta (bass) and Chad Townsend (drums). Elsah has remained as a standard bearer of Alt-country music throughout the Gulf South for over 20 years.”

They sound good- expect more posts about these guys in the future.

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment used: Sony DCR-TRV460 Firewire into Workstation
Enhanced(degrain) in Adobe Premiere Elements/Neat Video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah- Spanish Moon, Baton Rouge La 4/14/04 xfer from Hi8 Master Tape Enhanced Americana

Here’s another Neil Werries creation- a 2+ hour show from the Spanish Moon in Baton Rouge. They must have had a pretty good following to headline that size venue- touring acts such as Redd Kross w/ The Melvins have played there.
The date on the tape said 4/14. I am not sure if that meant April of 2014, or April 14 of an unidentified year.
The denoise cleaned this one up really well.

Ah, Neil provided some more info about this show:
2004 best I can figure. One of the first shows after relocating to Louisiana.
Paul Johnson – Guitar
Damen Williams – Bass
Brian Debate – Drums

Anna Byars Band plays from 1:18:17

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment Used: Cony DCR-TRV460 firewire into Dell workstation
Enhanced (degrain) in Adobe Premiere Elements/Neat Video

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Poor Harvey- Spanish Moon, Baton Rouge La early to mid-2000s xfer f/ hi8 master

This is the 2nd to last one from Neil Werries collection, unless I can get some help with time alignment on his multi camera sources- great bands like Old 97s, Jayhawks and more! Reach out if you can help- volunteering at the nonprofit gives you a tax donation receipt worth about $40/hr.

Alright, on to this one. Poor Harvey were peers of Neil’s band Elsah. It doesn’t look like they have anything listed on Discogs, but there is a soundcloud site that appears to be them. Poor Harvey is comprised of drummer Dan “Danimal” Thompson and brothers Patrick Johnson (bass and vocals) and Paul Johnson (guitar and vocals).

This show was super dark (as was the Elsah opening set, and then someone turned the lights on. So you will see this switch early in the set- I had to push the brightness and exposure early on, then pull back.

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment used: Sony DCR-TRV340 firewire into Dell workstation

Live Concert Video
— Leave a Comment

Elsah- Spanish Moon, Baton Rouge La 4/7/04 xfer from Hi8 master Alt Country enhanced

Another late one- this video collections post is from Neil Werries’ collection, and it is the LAST non-multicamera video I have of his. I received an email with an offer for video help. I need help with the time alignment of his other angles, so let’s hope that works out. I would love to get the rest of Neil videos done.

This one was really dark. I did my best to brighten it and clean it up, but it is DARK. At least it sounds decent. These “0474” was on Neil’s tape, but it definitely doesn’t mean April of 1974…

Recorded by: Neil Werries
Transfer by: Shayne Stacy
Equipment used: Sony DCR-TRV340 firewire into Dell workstation

Live Concert Video