So this week the Lefsetz Letter once again turned its googly eyes upon the Dead, using the Workingman’s Dead anniversary as a jumping-off point for an endless chuntering stream-of-consciousness survey of the 1970-to-early 1971 period encompassing WD, The Angel’s Share, NRPS, American Beauty, and the February ‘71 Port Chester shows. Bob once again earns instant cancellation from me if only for calling “Ripple” “execrable... a wimpy ballad that made my stomach turn.”
Cool to see the process, but this is a skip for me. I think this is one of the lesser sets from the Classic years featured in the Dick's Picks series (It's pretty good, but no DiP 16 for example), and with two shows from the Fillmore West '69 on vinyl released in the past few years it also feels a little redundant.
My Gemini self is of two minds reading his review of Ripple. My first response is to put him in a rocket ship and set the controls for the heart of the sun. Then my good twin kicks in and realizes that this is a quick and painful way to go. So instead I'd put him in a rocket aimed for the Oort Cloud, with Bowie's Space Oddity playing on a repeating loop for the duration of his journey.
I'm enjoying the cover of "Me and Bobby McGee" by the Dead, but I hate that they change the lyrics in the chorus: "Freedom's just another word for nothing left to do." Huh?? Kinda ruins the chorus, and a sing-along-able one, at that.
I saw a deer (maybe the same one) in that general spot the other day when I checked the live camera. Tried to get a screenshot on my phone but it walked out of view of the camera before I could. Live Cam - Red Rocks Amphitheatre
Just heard from LITA and One From The Vault is indeed being re-pressed. Slated for release at the end of the summer!
August 13, perhaps? Hot diggity. I would probably spring for a vinyl version of this if they choose to release one of those.
Agreed. I was really hoping for DP11 (Stanley Theater 72) or DP36 from Philly. Not sure if they're free to choose from any of the DPs or if some are off limits but I doubt I'll pick this up unless I can get a good deal.
1973-09-20 Very solid China>Rider; excellent Truckin’ with Nobody’s Fault Jam, par Eyes, another great Stella Blue (but they play it every night now!), and Sugar Mag is kind of groovy, with Fierro unleashed…
That was the last Brent show for me. I remember thinking he looked horrible, and we were joking that we didn’t want to go home with him during I Will Take You Home, but it was still shocking when we got the news less than a month later. A good show that I should revisit one of these days.
Yeah, a good show. Good Shakedown, hot Far From Me in the first set. The second set pre-drums is a perfect accompaniment to a hot, lazy summer afternoon. I found Brent had died when I got a phone call from this girl I had met once at a show in Oakland. I guess I had given her my work phone number because we had a 1-800 line, in any case, she called out of the blue the day Brent's death was announced, and she wound up getting connected to the guy who sat in the cube behind me. He let me use his phone for 15-20 minutes and she gave me the news and we chatted about it a little. Pretty shocking, to be sure, and I think that when the toxicology reports came out, that was my first indication that hard drugs were still being used by the Dead.
DiP 15 (9/3/77) with a remaster would be my dream, order the moment it becomes available pick. Certainly would love some more '72 on vinyl as well.
My finding out about Brent story is weird. I went to a Mets game at Shea. I went by myself, so while watching the game, I was picking up casual conversation from people around me. Someone said that someone from the Grateful Dead died......some guy named Brent. I flinched, but decided not to start a conversation with strangers about it. When I got home, my answering machine (remember those?) was filled with messages.
That show is a rough mix of a 16 track reel. It should be properly mixed and released, then I would buy it ASAP. Right now, as a multitrack origin source, it sounds like hot garbage.
Yeah but, is that just in hindsight, knowing they were about to drop the song? 1973 versions of any song in general were less focused than 1972. Jerry was always happy to play slow gentle ballads...maybe it was the arrangement he was getting tired of. (Here Comes Sunshine also had that little stop-and-restart bit in the middle, and I think when Bird Song got resurrected in the '80s it was streamlined to just one jam.) It wasn't the first time they'd dropped Bird Song either, they also dumped it back in '71. (And when it came back in '72 it was in a new key, right?) Maybe it was one of those songs Jerry wanted to re-work with the band but it was easier to just stop doing it than to practice a new arrangement.
Sorry for the self-quote, but sometimes I don't know where I left off. Okay - I listened to the first set of 10/19/73 on my run yesterday, but was forced to turn the volume pretty low due to the bear in area sign having a new date for the last sighting, just one day earlier. I know it's not an aggressive bear and I run with spray, but it is apparently a youngish grizzly and I'd rather pay attention to the music. ANYWAY, everything was the high standard I'd come to expect from a first set 73 show, and the Playing was (as usual) the most interesting part of the set. Today, I hiked, and listened to the 2nd set, and man oh man, what a set it is. As special as that PNW box trilogy is, I remembered why people (i.e. Dick) geek out over Fall 73. The China/Rider transition is a thing of beauty, the Uncle, Half-Step, and Big River are all hot, and then the Dark Star>Dew (with me hitting the peak of my hike for the Dew) are special - my mind did indeed leave my body. You can do worse than hiking through an alpine meadow singing "sunshine daydream" real loud. And then, Eyes ... I'm thinking, oh, no Saturday Night or Johnny - this must be filler from another show, but nope - Eyes>Stella encore! This Eyes is also icy hot (discordant adjectives intended), maybe the best of the ones I've heard from the officially released 73 shows thus far. Stella finally finds her place as sweet post-jam relief, and then the Johnny, and hey, when you actually think to yourself, self, this is one hot Johnny, well, you know the band was on. Winterland 73 up next.
Maybe. But the versions prior to 6-22 had plenty of focus, many of the best versions were in the first half of 1973. Something happened on 6-22 where it fell asleep. At first this was pleasing, that is surely one of the best versions. But it seemed to drift after that. I don't think it's hindsight, I don't find the last versions of HCS to have any sort of flaw. But I don't know that that is why they dropped it.
Here's a semi-random question for any interested- from the 30 trips under the sun big big box, what are people's thoughts about the '92 show (3/20/92 Hamilton, Ontario) I was thinking of giving it a spin, wondering if in that somewhat hit-and-miss year (?) it was considered one of the better shows of the era?
1972-09-21 Big RR opener is a par version; Here Comes Sunshine is solid, Black Peter very good; WRS absolutely amazing, horns and all; He’s Gone>Truckin’>Other One>Wharf Rat>Row Jimmy: no horns; Top notch He’s Gone, amazing Other One with crazy jamming; weird crazy Keith on Wharf Rat; top Row Jimmy
Copp’s ‘92 were good shows. 1992 is a weird year. I enjoyed what I saw that year, but remember it being very average good, instead of average great, which it’d been 89-91.
