Grateful Dead

NME-otherwise known as the New Musical Express has finally expired as a printed edition. This was the primary source of information on music when I was a teenager-well, throughout the 1970s, really. It was the first place I read about the Dead, in an article written by one of its best writers-Nick Kent. It was published sometime in 1974, and was entitled "Whatever Happened to the Cosmic Dream?" It wasn't a flattering portrait. Kent was into the New York scene-American bands who were morphing from punk to glam, like Iggy Pop and The New York Dolls. Speed/heroin as opposed to acid. But his article on the Dead, although damning, was great. It was one of the things that made me want to find out more about them and their music. A classic example of how opposing something can make it more interesting.

Capitol Theater...1970!!! March, June, November 1970 have amaaaaaazing shows at Port Chester. Oh for soundboards of those, or at least really clean audiences. 3/21 6/24 each November show

I dig '71. The shows all have a raw, rugged bar-band/saloon sound. Makes me think of the photo on "Working Man's Dead" whenever I listen to setenta y uno. In fact, I was just groovin' to Austin 11/15/71 at the gym this morning.

I hop in my truck to run an errand during lunch, turn on Satellite Radio and what's the noon concert? You guessed it.. 2/19/71, Capitol Theatre, Portchester NY. These freaks are stalking us.. and have been for 52 years! On a related note.. we haven't seen our favorite group mind conspiracy theorist, GFar in a while.. hope all is good and you are in good health and spirits. Have a great weekend folks.. play some GDead, and in the spirit of what's been going on here, some Good Old Grateful Dead preferably something from the Capitol Theatre.. your mind will thank you.

Seems like pretty much everybody in the tape trading circles I used to trade with had this run of shows. I would trade boxes of Maxells for boxes of Maxells with the mentors who where higher up on the tape generational food chain (usually with one or two generations, occasionally higher), and recieved decent quality copies of some of them. I've also seen most of this run of shows selling as unofficial releases back in the 90's on any number of "bootleg" labels. I've always been under the impression that these were popularly traded shows, so would believe there would be enough interest in them to see released, even as a box. I seem to recall that these were originally intended to be the material that was to be culled for the "Skull Fuck" album, but scrapped in favor of the April dates at some point. i don't know if that is accurate, but could explain why they multi-tracked this run. I could see a box of this material, or in addition to the other shows recorded for potential release from '71. Probably not as high a priority on my personal wish list, but could dig it. Still kind of hoping for a Greek box, or a Red Rocks box, Alpine box, Cal Expo box, Autzen stadium box, Laguna Seca box, New Years run boxes...and lesser explored regions of '82 - '88 and '91.

Really hoping for a box set release in the 1965-1995 range, they had some pretty good shows during those years!

So DaP26 arrives at our doors in the beginning of May. Anthem 50th anniversary is in July (first released 7/18/68)? If and when we get another box set when do you think it'll be released? I need to know so that I can choose which internal organ part to sell.

Driving along the PCH through Malibu after a few drinks with friends, caught up in the jam between The Wheel and Wharf Rat from 5/7/77, amazed by how music that's so familiar can suddenly sound like you're hearing it for the very first time...

My final bets are Summer '73 (wish list) or returned tapes '76 (not wish list). I've spoken the magic words, the lamp shuddered and a puff of smoke arose and, when the smoke cleared, there it was: a box set pre-order for 19__. Enough speculation for me (obviously). I await news.

Excellent article by doc on PC 71. I would agree that these shows mark a high point in terms of the bands re-interpretation of country and blues styles. As stated , this period in the bands music seemed to start mid 1969-but their attempts at shorter, rootsier based material didn't sound all that convincing in that year. Similarly in 1970. The band seemed far more at home during the long, powerful jams in both years. The shorter songs seemed a bit awkward in comparison. During 1971, they appeared to shelve the jams in favour of focussing on the short songs. Which they then started playing and singing really well. I half remember a quote from Jerry about how the album Skull and Roses represented the group as a bar band-and that's how they come across during these first few months of 1971. The spacier side is temporarily discarded, for the most part. And then....having mastered the art of playing concise traditional style material, they returned to the most sophisticated jamming of their career, during 1972-`1974. With the added bonus that they could now play convincing versions of what became first set numbers as well. I do like 1971, but for me, the best of both worlds wasn't realised until 1972, after Keith had joined.