So, who listens to the Grateful Dead around here?? I do!! In amongst all of the other listening projects and the side tracks into non-Dead.... boo hiss. Well everyone needs a break sometimes and there's so much great music.... Any ol' way I've been checking out 4 gigs from 1984. 1984-04-13 Hampton 1984-04-14 Hampton 1984-04-16 Rochester 1984-04-17 Niagara Falls That 04-16 show gets a 'Whole Show' rating for highlights in the Taping Compendium. Guess that's what got my attention here. The other thing that drew me into these shows is that they all have audience recordings by the same team that used the Sennheiser MKE2002 Binaural microphone set-up. The MKE was designed to be worn on the head of a person with the mics in-ear. Or to be used with a dummy head. Which is what these guys did. Over at the IA there's a note from the guy that claims to be part of the team. He says they had a girlfriend smuggle the head into the gig. They put a bandanna on it and painted it up and told security that it was a 'dead head'. Sailed right through no questions asked. So anyway at these gigs they had seats FOB right in the sweet spot. And they got what I think are really excellent recordings. You can hear the stereo spread from the stage and the front of hall speakers just exactly perfect. Billy on the left Mickey on the right. Keys on the right. Bob on the left, Jerry in the middle. Very nice. Hearing these recordings kind of justifies the extreme panning that one can hear on so many sound board recordings from so many years. Sometimes I think those soundboards sound better with the stereo image collapsed a bit. But here we hear the reason for doing that! These shows for content are really excellent. Well mostly. I need to listen again but I think Jerry is singing gibberish briefly in Day Job, opening song from the 13th. Forgot the words. That set is fine though. It's All Over Now, very cool with some kinda scat singing from Brent. And then set 2 starts out with a Scarlet-Fire that's first class. During Fire Mickey is playing a Talking Drums. Cool! The 14th. opens with a great Feel Like a Stranger. Set two has a Playing into Terrapin into Don't Need Love. Nice. The 16th. is great from start to finish. First set opens with Shakedown. Then the set ends with West L.A. into Might as Well. The 17th. is fun but does have some 'issues'. lol Jerry kind of screws up the Help into Slipknot! transition. He stops playing for a few bars like he's lost. Oops. Still better than any other band playing that night probably. I'm now discovering that there are other shows recorded by I guess the same team with that dummy head. Some from 1983. I'm sure I'll be checking those out. I'm also currently just getting into the 1984-04-21 show. The recording using the Neumann U87 microphones with the FOB 30 ft. split in the 17th. row. It's one that has been raved about for years as being a great audience capture. I'm getting the impression it is, although it's got some phase issues that those binaural mics don't have. So were into the Grateful Dead here right??
Just to fall in the point/counterpoint rebuttal camp, I was a budding rock musician who had played folk and was playing bass in my college jazz band at the time I first got into the band in early 1982 and the single factor that tipped the scales for me was their undeniably high level of musicianship. It wasn't the songs; it wasn't the lyrics or the vocals, per se; it was this unique blend of odd musicians who obviously knew their craft backwards and forwards in their sleep and chose to go the odd route. That was the kicker and good on them for it. If it took a throwaway ditty like Touch of Grey to lend respectability to their legacy then I have even less hope for the human race than I did this morning.
So, 6/11/76’s sequence of: Sugar Magnolia> Eyes of The World> Stella Blue> Sunshine Daydream ...really is all that and a bag of chips. Might delicious. The Stella Blue has that “hear a pin drop” majesty that it requires.
Finishing the weekend with some ‘92-‘95 Dead — I’ll be diving back into the 70’s next week . . . 2019 Rhino Records (2) – R1-596008, Dead.Net – 0603497851270 1993/2009 Grateful Dead Records – GRA2-6008
epic binge into the deadbolts by a nut. the appendix arcana also delightful. lucky enough to have attended one pairing of the OO>DS at ye olde Boston Garden
Just listened to 10/31/71 (Ohio Theater). A fantastic Dark Star, St. Stephen, Sugar Magnolia and NFA > GDTRFB > NFA sequence are the highlights (though depending on which format these might be the only songs available...). Great playing and energy. No minute is wasted.
I used to go nuts when there was (say) a Costello concert review in RS in the late 70s. (The Palomino in LA from '79 comes to mind. Had a boot, soon thereafter. Great times.)
The first set that night is one of my favorites of ‘86. I thought Revolutionary Hamstrung Blues had potential, and it’s too bad it didn’t get any more attempts after that.
IWT! I think that and Sandstone 6/25/91 were the only times I saw them play Cones a Time. Possibly my favorite GD song, but a HEAVY song and Jerry really needed to be feeling it, I suppose.
I have that version and can’t compare, as I don’t have other vinyl versions. It was the only in print version in the mid-80’s when I got into the Dead. It is ok, but I suspect there are better vinyl versions out there. Packaging wise, it certainly could be improved upon...
[QUOTE="Dahabenzapple, post: 23558888, member: and to think years ago I had forgotten what love is......[/QUOTE] Foreigner circa ‘84 were in the same boat. But in all seriousness, let Winterland ‘73 and other great music and family be a guide to whatever is and source of solace in these uniquely crazy time, and hopefully we can all be a light and source of love and solace to each other as well. Hope you and everyone here are weathering the storm well.
Great description about that Legion Of Mary track. I hear a quite unsettling darkness in pre-coma '80s Dead that I don't much hear in post-coma Dead, instead hearing a lightness and colour. There are obvious exceptions - that Miami '89 Dark Star for example - but there's something about the wild mix of a band still working hard, touring the country, without a hit album, dedicated fans and touring heads seeing them every night, primary musical alchemist killing himself with heroin, worthwhile new material (Touch, West LA, Throwing Stones and Hell In A Bucket come to mind), a wildcard in Brent capable of anything at any time...basically a bizarre mix of talent, drive, addiction and dysfunction. I shouldn't take pleasure from hearing that but I find it much more compelling than what came after. I find it hard to explain why I don't particularly enjoy about post-coma Dead and it may well be an in-built prejudice. I'm going to try to tackle that after this '83 listening with a bit of '93 listening (to go with my '73 listening recently...something about 3s...)
The connection between Jerry and Brent was undeniable, I loved when they shared moments like this on stage...2:54 on... this is how to jam together without stepping on each other!
‘84 is definitely like ‘82 for me...I don’t listen to it enough. The thing about the “dead head” is wild, lol. I’ve got a taper friend who I’m gonna ask. He was active in ‘83-84.
There are pictures of something like that from the 7-31-74 show in Hartford. Binaural Recording Head and Microphones. Grateful Dead Live at Dillon Stadium, Hartford, CT 31 July 1974 | James R Anderson Photography This is a link to the gallery: Grateful Dead 1974 07-31 | Dillon Stadium Hartford CT - Images | James R Anderson Photography There's a lot of cool pics there, including Bennie the binaural head.
I’m through the first two shows so far and this is easily the highlight for me. Great stretch! I’ve never heard these shows so I’m really interested in hearing what comes next.
I've heard that on some 1983 recordings too (I think Santa Fe is one example). Bill and Mickey are separated on an AUD tape just like a SBD.
I typically prefer 1970 and definitely 1972 over 1971. There was too much cowboy Dead (for me) in some of 71. That being said -- I think this is in the top 5 or higher single discs of the entire Dick's set, and probably also including Dave's. This is a front to back winner, and sadly overlooked. Which just goes to show, you don't ever know...
Your post got me to pull this show out and give it a listen. It went there for Dylan. Growing up most of what I listened to was antithetical to the Grateful Dead, however time and having got into jazz and improvisational music I began to appreciate what they did more. I also realized that the songwriting was very good. Anyway, even though I had changed my point of view towards the Dead this show proved that I still had a way to go before I could embrace drums and space.
Re: Cowboy Dead Circa ‘87, I heard my first true Dead bootleg, which was a Cincinnati’70 show, set 2, all acoustic where they introduced it as being Billy’s birthday, but it wasn’t. That might not be real, but that’s how I remember it. I do know it was some countrified Dead...and the birthday thing. Anyway...my response to the kid was “Who would spend their lives following a country band?!!?” Ha!
