Steve Miller Band at the Record Plant, July 1, 1973

KSAN aired Steve Miller from the Record Plant on July 1, 1973, with “The Joker” in the set three months before Capitol released it. The 15-song broadcast opens on a “Fly Like an Eagle” tease inside “My Dark Hour,” three years before that title reached a record.

The documentation is unusually specific. Back-cover notes from an All Access CD reissue list 62 minutes of music, with timings and composer credits for every track. They name Steve Miller on vocals and guitar, Gerald Johnson on bass and vocals, Dicky Thompson on piano and keyboards, and Jack King on drums.

The set opens with “Fly Like an Eagle / My Dark Hour Tease.” “Just Like a Woman,” “Mary Lou,” “The Sky Is Crying,” “Living in the USA,” “Gangster of Love,” “Space Cowboy,” and “The Joker” follow across the 15 tracks. The sequence matters more than a retrospective claim. It shows a band carrying old material, current material, and a fragment that would later acquire a different scale.

“The Joker” sits at track 11 of 15, deep in the set rather than staged as a coronation. “Fly Like an Eagle” comes first, still coupled to another idea. This is not a greatest-hits package. It is a live working order before later releases fixed those songs in public memory.

A separate Steve Miller broadcast from January 7, 1973 is also cataloged at the Record Plant. Keep the two dates apart. The July 1 source carries its own lineup, its own 15-track sequence, and its own record of what the band was playing that day.

The complete 62 minutes survive on the physical source copy in the archive. One performance is public so far. The liner notes hold the rest of the night in writing until the audio follows.