The Grateful Dead + "Hey Jude"

Going through the box my favorite little moment is the Caribbean-flavored jam that connects "Man Smart, Woman Smarter" and "Drumz" in Landover. It's unique (to me, anyway) and just a cool little nugget. They also went "MSWS" into "Drumz" in Albany, but that one essentially stops dead with no jam at all.

 

True.

I was at those Hamilton shows. The place went nuts when "Hey Jude" started, and it was great to see it in person.....even though the first 2 verses turned out bad.

 

The Dead also performed Fantasy/Hey Jude at a live show in '88 at the Garden that I was at. It was fun the crowd had a good time.

 

The outtake version of I Saw Her Standing There that was a bonus track with the All Good Things box is much better than the slower one that made the cut for the Run for the Roses album (which I agree is no great shakes).

 

I really enjoyed that jam when I listened to it last week as well.

 

That was the Hey Jude "coda" only, not full song. That was much more common - they did it in Red Rocks in '85 and then by '87 or certainly '88 it was a common occurrence. The Hamilton '90 show is the only time post-'69 that they played the entire song.

 

Here's the first occasion where Brent joined Bobby for an acoustic version. There were several more in 1988:

5/15/86 Berkeley Community Theatre, Berkeley, CA (Thu)
Festival, My Blue Tears*, This Time Forever>Victim>Throwing Stones, Hey Jude^
(* = w/ Kat McLean and l.t.p. was 4/29/76; ^ = w/ Brent Mydland and first time played)
(Wavy Gravy 50th Birthday Bash and "benefit for just about anything")

 

This also applies to their entire catalogue - they generally took chances and for that, they get major props. They are, at one turn, the best rock band ever and at another turn, the worst rock band ever. But their great stuff is so far above anything else in the rock idiom that they have to be in my top 2-3 rock bands of all time. I've long had trouble describing all of this, but I think I got it right this time.

 

Sluggish tempo really kills the Pigpen version.

 

I must say the 3/1/69 version is interesting with Pigpen goin "why don't you try walkin on the water". what's that about? Who cares?

That one from 3/22/90 though, OMG yikes

Seriously, yikes

 

the Pigpen version kinda sucked too, but the rest of the show was great...

 

i always liked the 2/11/69 version from the fillmore east show. but maybe that fantastic lovelight before it makes it just a little bit better

it's pretty sluggish though

 

i agree hey jude didn't work for them

 

I caught a couple odd ball ones in the eighties - Get Back and Blackbird - and they were both bad.