Very cool Archtop, and thanks so much! Hmmm - five Europe '72 versions, Veneta, and two outliers (date-wise) - I'll need to double back on my collection and see what I have. I remember the Grateful Dead Movie version being a favorite Playin' of mine as well (10/16/74), though I have not listened to it in a long time. On a somewhat related topic, do you have lists of your top 5 to 10 Dark Stars and Other Ones? I'd love to see them if you do...
You didn't ask me, but here's my current 'top 5' Dark Stars: 8-3-69 - Family Dog at the Great Highway 11-08-70- Capitol Theatre (AUD) 5-23-72 - Strand Lyceum 12-18-73 - Curtis Hixon Tampa Fl 9-10-74 - Alexandra Palace, London. I am fairly confident none of those is in Archtop's top 5. As for 'the Other One,' that's kind of like Pepsi to Dark Star's Coke, but 4-26-72 is where I go first with that one. 4-28-71 is another favorite. I tend to gravitate away from it, as I usually go for Dark Star, and i listen to a lot of 1969-70, where the 'Cryptical reprise' is the meat of the jam. So for those, 2-13-70, 5-2-70, maybe 3-1-69 to round out the ranking. Of course, like most proper fans of the GoGD, my ranking stands for this moment and is subject to revision or replacement at any time.
Stupendous version. Just remember, @Archtop prefers the bite of the Alligator to the howl of the Wolf, and that will push his recommendations in a specific direction.
Considering how pricey the RT sets are on eBay even without the bonus discs (and the packaging), it's still worth it...however, the decision not to reissue the bonus discs is baffling (considering that the newest bonus disc is 6, going on 7 years old - more than enough time has passed for anyone to complain) and I'm sure they could have made much greater money off the deal if they had. I sometimes wonder if TPTB actually want an inflated secondary market for their product. The problem then would be having the time to listen to all 36 volumes once you get it!
Agreed. 6-15-76 Stephen->NFA->Stella is crispy quality and has been my go to jam from the month since my tape trading days. Tape has a great mix and the improv out of Stephen and through out NFA is ace. Including a Phil inspired Dark Star tease in NFA. Then IMO the finest Stella of the 70's coaleses. A complete band performance. Top shelf. As has been stated previously 6-14/15-76 is full of stellar and unique playing in addition to wonderful sound.
The electric sets are not in mono. They're almost mono, but they're not mono. I think it's an important distinction - it suggests to me that the mixing is not an error, as has been suggested at times (i.e. that Bob Matthews or whoever it was accidentally sent a mono signal to the tape), but a deliverate mixing choice.
right. cause any normal person would listen to dp 1, 2 and 3 and realize they needed to do that again. and again.
And when they finally get to Dick's #4 (13 & 14 Feb 1970) they get sucked into that Black Hole (aka Dark Star) and never be seen again. This morning: 7 May 1978- RPI. Scarlet Begonias > Fire on the Mountain. An exceptional version that gets little mention in these parts.
I asked a similar question about a month ago regarding Dark Star in my first post and received many suggestions from everyone. Since then I've been on a bit of a GD bender. Here are the suggestions made by @Archtop The Grateful Thread Here is the post where I asked for suggestions. If you start looking through the posts following it, you'll find lots of suggestions from everyone: The Grateful Thread I still go back to that post from time to time in order to pick out a new suggestion to check out.
I first got Dick's 4 (it was my first live GD exposure, along with Dick's 2, well first in that they were the first live sets that I personally possessed) sometime in college back around '98-'00. I think I got both of those because they had versions of tunes from Aoxomoxoa, American Beauty, and Workingmans that I was already familiar with. But what I did not know at the time was that exactly what you described regarding the black hole (and "That's it..." > Lovelight) would end up happening to me. I don't think I even really listened much to the rest of the set once I discovered that sequence; and, until about a month ago when I started posting here, it satisfied all of my live GD needs. I've been jonesin' for a Fire lately because none of the sets I have picked up recently have it. I'm going to order the '78 box tomorrow, but yesterday I got curious and hopeful that it would have a Fire in that set, so I checked the set lists and were elated to find that there are two Scarlet>Fire combos in the set!!!
Just now getting around to checking out your suggestion, but I accidentally started 5/24/70 instead of 6/24/70 due to faulty mental month mathematics on my part. However, I'm glad I did because this 5/24/70 version is pretty sweet so far.
I cannot believe you left 19 September 1970 off the list! This Dark Star I am listening to right now from 24 June 1973 in Portland, OR, is worthy of your attention.
Random show today: Pittsburgh 8/5/74. Matrix. Should help out today while I continually check the Dave's Picks thread to see if there's any new updates.
Yeah, I remember the Portlant Dark Star although I haven't listened to it in about 7 years...I will revisit it. I love some of the 69 and 70 Dark Stars but they fall just outside my top 5...not that the ranking is rigid or anything.
I was gonna post much the same last night, but my computer was having a wobble! You're right - if you were to stick both channels of DP8's electric set into a Digital Audio Workstation and phase-reverse one of the channels, if it were mono you’d hear nothing at all (the two identical but opposite waves would cancel each other out); in practice, that doesn't happen and you're left with a remnant of signal, which represents the sum of the unique audio information present in each channel. I must admit: as much as I love DP8 as it came out, I'm only listening to Charlie Miller's recent seed of this, with CR&S on, and in quite a bit crisper sound to DP8. Fabulous stuff.
Nobody asked, but I can't help myself.... Favorite 5 Dark Stars....today 12-18-73 4-8-72 12-15-72 7-25-74 4-13-69
Today's Listening: 1973-11-17, Dave's Picks, Vol. 5: Pauley Pavilion, UCLA, Los Angeles, CA. Today is going to be a good day. Nothing like a 12 minute Here Comes Sunshine in the second spot.
Agreed - which is why I wouldn't suggest doing them in order! I started with 4 and 8 and branched out from there. I think there's a handful of them that are great entry points (1, 3, 4, 8, 12, 14, 18, 29, 33, 36 would be my top 10 for that purpose) and should be absorbed before moving in deeper.
Or. . .for the same money, they could subscribe to Tidal for 8.75 years for lossless (or Spotify for 17 years) and listen to them that way.
