Category: songs-S

  • Risky Reconstruction

    **massively updated 11/24/2014 11 PM mountain time** I just tipped my hat to the idea of meso level musical risk in Garcia’s side trips. This is the pedantic-even-by-my-high-standards phrasing of the notion that that different bands, qua bands (combinations of players and repertoires), could and did musically challenge Garcia to different degrees. The challenge-comfort continuum…

  • Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders at the Keystone Korner, May 20, 1971 (LN jg1971-05-20.jgms.80mins.sbd-boswell-smith.126365.flac2496)

    Corry heard a lot of this keyboard work as Howard Wales. So did I. I also heard Jerry’s guitar tone as 1968, and the recording as the Matrix. I parsed the tape, which seems correctly identified, we talked it over, and I think we agree that this is some very interesting tape. Speaking for myself,…

  • Harpur College NRPS set

    “Enough about the Dead, how was the New Riders’ set?” – one guy, once Any Deadhead worth her salt knows the Harpur College gig from May 2, 1970. It’s a monster, one of the Dead’s best, and long-circulating from FM tapes; it has blown a lot of minds. I don’t remember hearing much about the…

  • We’re Having a Reasonably Good Time Here

    LN jg1989-01-28.jgb.all.sbd-goetz-retracked.28352.shn2flac Love this show. Two snaps up. A few bullets. First, I had a cryptic note-to-self in the 1/27/89 listening notes to elaborate on the “a year too late” thesis. In a nutshell, it’s my argument that when JGB recorded itself in 1990 at the Warfield for what would become the eponymous 1991 double-live…

  • A Pigless Monster at the Fillmore East: July 12, 1970

    LN jg1970-07-12.nrps-gd.aud-cooper.122707.flac1644 More old listening notes. The “Not Fade Away” and “Good Lovin’” from the electric Dead set feature absolutely top shelf rock and roll playing. Look at how I go off on this stuff wow wow wow wow wow and all that. If this tape sounded better, this’d be in the canon with 5/2/70.…

  • At Wolfgang’s Warfield: JGB, March 2, 1991 orchestra tape

    LN jg1991-03-02.jgb.all.aud-mk4-orchestra.123611.flac1648 Obviously I don’t get much into the 1990s, though I’ll need to do more to do the whole GOTS story justice. (seealso: JGB 3/1/91 listening notes) This is a totally professional gig, musically excellent. Old Jerry has his charms. He’s a sophisticated storyteller and themeweaver on the guitar. I have performance notes below,…

  • Big Daddy: “This is Old And In The Way, and I’ll let ’em stay all night if they want to.”

    LN jg1973-04-21.oaitw.early.fm-FlyingM.125747.flac1644 Old And In the Way Record Plant 2200 BridgewaySausalito, CA 94965 April 21, 1973 (Saturday) 57 minute Flying M FM shnid-125747 –(15 tracks, 57:29, basically complete)– t01. (1) … Going To The Races [0:15] [0:09] t02. (2) The Willow Garden [3:57] (3, 4) [0:18] t03. Katy Hill [2:19] (5) [0:16] t04. Till The…

  • RN Peter Simon 1975 New Age Journal

    Simon, Peter. 1975. Making Musical Miracles: An Interview with Jerry Garcia. New Age Journal .5 (May 1975): 52-59. This is a really neat piece, lots of great stuff.  Interview took place at the “film house”  (230 Eldridge Avenue, Mill Valley, CA, 94941), ca. the last week of March 1975. Love his notion of “tight-loose” forms…

  • Dealin’ on Johnny D’s Third Night: JGB, Keystone Palo Alto, October 14, 1979

    LN jg1979-10-14.jgb.s1s2p.aud-unk-moore-berger.122979.flac1644 Understood second third show for Ozzie Ahlers and John d’Fonseca. Update: I had this as the second show for this outfit, a week after its 10/7/79 debut, but it turns out they also played the Monday night, 10/8, in Berkeley. Excellent Sugaree and After Midnight, songs which this band made its own right…

  • JGB at Northwestern: Cahn Auditorium, March 12, 1976 (late show)

    LN jg1976-03-12.jgb.late.aud-unk.xxxxx.flac1644 My love of audience tapes is evident to anyone who reads here. The anthropological instinct (and practice) underpinning field recording enthralls me. To me, everybody who ever taped a gig is right there with Alan Lomax and all the rest. Now, sometimes you have to be willing to sacrifice your aesthetics a little…