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    lilgoldie
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    What's Inside:
    • Five Complete Shows
    • 5/11/77 St. Paul Civic Center Arena, St. Paul, MN
    • 5/12/77 Auditorium Theatre, Chicago, IL
    • 5/13/77 Auditorium Theatre, Chicago, IL
    • 5/15/77 St. Louis Arena, St. Louis MO
    • 5/17/77 University Of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL
    •14 Discs, 111 tracks
    •Mastered in HDCD by Jeffrey Norman, Plangent Processes playback system for maximum sonic accuracy
    •Artwork by Grammy Award-winning graphic artist Masaki Koike
    •Period Photos by James R Anderson
    •Historical Essay by Steve Silberman
    •Individual show liner notes

    MAGICAL, MYTHICAL MAY 1977!

    If you're a Dead Head, chances are you've spent many an hour expounding upon the distinction of May 8, 1977, Cornell University, Barton Hall. Well, at the risk of preaching to the choir, we'd like to reintroduce you to a series of shows that matches said greatness from that same gloriously fertile season. While Barton Hall is well known, the astounding tour that surrounded it has occasionally flown under the radar due to the uneven quality of tapes in circulation. May 1977 is set to change all of that with a boxed set that zeroes in on this high-water mark in the Grateful Dead's long strange trip.

    For a band resurrecting itself after a 20-month hiatus, there was a great frenzy of expectancy that surrounded the Spring of 1977. We anticipate a grand reoccurrence of this fervor with the release of May 1977, a 14-disc boxed set featuring five complete shows from consecutive stops on that magical tour. Mastered in HDCD by Jeffrey Norman at Mockingbird Mastering, the "psychoacoustic phenomena" as Jerry once put it, of St. Paul Civic Center Arena, St. Paul, MN (5/11) Auditorium Theatre, Chicago, IL (5/12, 5/13), St. Louis Arena, St. Louis MO (5/15) and Coliseum at the University Of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL (5/17) can now finally be appreciated. Each of these shows finds the Dead delivering punchier, more focused sets, tightening up the framework; each night turning out first-ever renditions ("Passenger,""Iko Iko,""Jack-A-Roe"), unloading potent new pairings ("Scarlet Begonias">"Fire On The Mountain", "Estimated Prophet">"Eyes Of The World"), classic covers ("Dancing In The Street") and soon-to-be staples ("Estimated Prophet," "Samson and Delilah"), and ultimately rising up to paradise.

    And now for the nitty-gritty...

    Due June 11, May 1977 is limited to 15,000 individually numbered copies. Presented in a psychedelic box that boasts an intricate die-cut design created by Grammy®-winning graphic artist Masaki Koike, the set also includes a book filled with stories about each show, as well as an in-depth essay by Dead historian Steve Silberman, who delves deep into the history behind the tour and the band’s return from its extended hiatus.

    Once these 15,000 boxes are gone, May 1977 and its shows will never be available again on CD. However, the 111 tracks will be made available on release date as FLAC and Apple lossless full-set-only downloads for $99.98.

    Like its predecessors Europe '72: The Complete Recordings and Spring 1990, we expect May 1977 to sell out. Your best bet is to pre-order it now, then sit back, relax, and enjoy all the exclusive content we'll be rolling out over the next few weeks right here and on Facebook.com/GratefulDead and Youtube.com/gratefuldead.

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  • #571
    NorthwestGA_Matt
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    eBay
    I saw it too, they had up close photos of the front and the back of a still shrink wrapped set that isn't shown on the website. Selling it for a ridiculous price considering that this set is not even sold out here yet. Oh well. I can't wait to get this set and start the process of going through each individual show! It's a great day to be a deadhead!!!
  • #572
    Dead Ahead
    Joined:
    eBay sellers
    How do you know they have it now? Maybe they are just listing it now knowing that they will get it when the rest of us do.
  • #573
    jpreston
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    Joined:
    shipping
    this sucks why is it that the people that get theirs first is the people who sell on ebay?
  • #574
    jpreston
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    Joined:
    shipping
    this sucks why is it that the people that get theirs first is the people who sell on ebay?
  • #575
    rne
    Joined:
    SUNSHINE DAYDREAM FOR THE LAST TIME
    I was the one that started talking about something else than May 77, but, what the heck, I wanted to bring up the subject, that's all. The Dead on stage might have looked boring because they didn't jump around like The Who or because their concerts didn't feature special effects like the Floyd (two groups I love as much as the Dead), but I deeply enjoy just watching them play, inspecting the chord shapes Bob uses, the stunning leads Jerry plays, etc. etc. etc. Now, back to May 1977: I have a hard time passing on every release from the 1966-1978 period. I am not the greatest fan of 1977 and I don't picture myself listening to it as much as I do with the E72 set, or the Grateful Dead Movie Soundtrack, or Winterland 1973. Anyway, I got to have this box, 'cause I know otherwise I will regret it someday. After all, I like 1977 recordings (especially if they are done by Betty), "Terrapin Station" is one of my favorite compositions, "Estimated Prophet" is always a treat, I like "Sunrise". Hey! Now I know why I must have this set. C'mon, ship it at once!
  • #576
    Star Dark
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    Joined:
    Back to May '77
    I'm sensing a bit of overload - "market saturation" - at this point. Maybe too soon for another box, and testing limits with 15K at $140 each... especially given the presumably perpetual availability of downloads. The good news: flippers and gougers will be mightily disappointed. Looking forward to the next Pick o' Dave...
  • #577
    kevjones
    Joined:
    Sunshine Daydream
    This May 1977 has turned into a discussion about everything, but the kitchen sink, but I have to weigh in anyway. Think I'm gonna pass on the box set, I'd love to have it, but I have enough Dead to last me 2 lifetimes, plus I have really been into high quality audience tapes from the Archive lately. Forgot how much I love a good audience. 6/8/74 being a classic example of how much better Wall of Sound audience tapes sound than their SBD counterparts. Which leads me to my next topic. Face it, the Grateful Dead were not the most engaging performers to watch. Actually they are downright boring to watch. That is why I absolutely love the audience spliced in on the GD Movie and Sunshine Daydream. It gives the performance more relevance. Who doesn't love that surreal image of the strange man on the pole behind the Dead during Jack Straw in Sunshine Daydream? Finally, Europe 72. These mixes are absolutely amazing. I do believe that they used the multi-tracks because the recordings are so alive, and I love hearing Pigpen and Keith playing together. Would love to get into the vinyl stuff, but I do not have the space or the resources to do so.
  • #578
    rne
    Joined:
    SUNSHINE DAYDREAM
    "Great to see a youngish GD jamming out in the daylight. Not so great seeing a bunch of completely wacked out nude topless & bottomless hippies frolicking about..... " I agree, I would like to see more of the band playing, and less shots of the audience dancing, naked, or with clothes on. That's why I love the extra songs featured on "The Grateful Dead Movie": they focus on what happens on stage. Anyway, I understand that the aim of the movie was to portrait what a GD concert was as a whole: band, audience, roadies, etc. etc. The same surely applies to "Sunshine Daydream". The representation of a gathering, music included.
  • #579
    Star Dark
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    More Thoughts on Sound
    While we're on the topic, a few pet peeves regarding misuse/abuse of terms in concert and recording reviews: - "Out of tune" is not synonymous with "hitting bad notes" - "Off key" is not synonymous with "hitting bad notes" - "Pitchy" is not synonymous with "hitting bad notes" - There is little correlation between the quality of Wall of Sound *recordings* and what live audiences experienced. In most cases, WoS soundboards were poorly mixed with painfully compressed vocals. Understandable, given that the majority weren't intended for release. - "It's all good. Jerry on a bad day was better than most guitarists on a good day." NO! On an off day, Jerry was significantly sloppier (i.e., more "lost") than the average professional guitarist at his/her worst. Chalk it up to self-abuse and boredom. Whew! Glad to get those off my chest. (For what it's worth these observations have more to do with the Archive than anything posted here.)
  • #580
    estimated-eyes
    Joined:
    sound
    Do they have to go back to putting the "Caveat Emptor" on the releases? We can't have it both ways-- clamoring for more releases and then ripping on the sound engineers if the releases don't sound pitch perfect. I did not get the entire Europe box, but bought six individual shows and have the old Rocking the Rhein release. To my ears, mostly through a good amp and Sennheiser headphones, these releases sound very good-- I am able to pick out players and, in particular, Pigpen's organ sounds fantastic on the releases I have. There are a few rough patches that I attributed to the original tapes, but overall they sound great. Unlistenable? Some folks need to go back and listen to their old tapes and then they may appreciate these releases more. The most recent Dave's Pick, I think they sound good, but not great. For comparison, Dick's Picks 4 from the same era sounds better. I attribute this to the less than ideal storage conditions for the tapes over the past 40 years-- attics, garages, whatever. I think we are blessed as GD fans-- 4 releases per year of full live concerts and a major box set every year. My only wish is that there would be more DVD releases-- one per year from the 1980s in the View From the Vault series would do well.
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Submitted by lilgoldie on
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Dead Store Products

What's Inside:
• Five Complete Shows
• 5/11/77 St. Paul Civic Center Arena, St. Paul, MN
• 5/12/77 Auditorium Theatre, Chicago, IL
• 5/13/77 Auditorium Theatre, Chicago, IL
• 5/15/77 St. Louis Arena, St. Louis MO
• 5/17/77 University Of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL
•14 Discs, 111 tracks
•Mastered in HDCD by Jeffrey Norman, Plangent Processes playback system for maximum sonic accuracy
•Artwork by Grammy Award-winning graphic artist Masaki Koike
•Period Photos by James R Anderson
•Historical Essay by Steve Silberman
•Individual show liner notes

MAGICAL, MYTHICAL MAY 1977!

If you're a Dead Head, chances are you've spent many an hour expounding upon the distinction of May 8, 1977, Cornell University, Barton Hall. Well, at the risk of preaching to the choir, we'd like to reintroduce you to a series of shows that matches said greatness from that same gloriously fertile season. While Barton Hall is well known, the astounding tour that surrounded it has occasionally flown under the radar due to the uneven quality of tapes in circulation. May 1977 is set to change all of that with a boxed set that zeroes in on this high-water mark in the Grateful Dead's long strange trip.

For a band resurrecting itself after a 20-month hiatus, there was a great frenzy of expectancy that surrounded the Spring of 1977. We anticipate a grand reoccurrence of this fervor with the release of May 1977, a 14-disc boxed set featuring five complete shows from consecutive stops on that magical tour. Mastered in HDCD by Jeffrey Norman at Mockingbird Mastering, the "psychoacoustic phenomena" as Jerry once put it, of St. Paul Civic Center Arena, St. Paul, MN (5/11) Auditorium Theatre, Chicago, IL (5/12, 5/13), St. Louis Arena, St. Louis MO (5/15) and Coliseum at the University Of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL (5/17) can now finally be appreciated. Each of these shows finds the Dead delivering punchier, more focused sets, tightening up the framework; each night turning out first-ever renditions ("Passenger,""Iko Iko,""Jack-A-Roe"), unloading potent new pairings ("Scarlet Begonias">"Fire On The Mountain", "Estimated Prophet">"Eyes Of The World"), classic covers ("Dancing In The Street") and soon-to-be staples ("Estimated Prophet," "Samson and Delilah"), and ultimately rising up to paradise.

And now for the nitty-gritty...

Due June 11, May 1977 is limited to 15,000 individually numbered copies. Presented in a psychedelic box that boasts an intricate die-cut design created by Grammy®-winning graphic artist Masaki Koike, the set also includes a book filled with stories about each show, as well as an in-depth essay by Dead historian Steve Silberman, who delves deep into the history behind the tour and the band’s return from its extended hiatus.

Once these 15,000 boxes are gone, May 1977 and its shows will never be available again on CD. However, the 111 tracks will be made available on release date as FLAC and Apple lossless full-set-only downloads for $99.98.

Like its predecessors Europe '72: The Complete Recordings and Spring 1990, we expect May 1977 to sell out. Your best bet is to pre-order it now, then sit back, relax, and enjoy all the exclusive content we'll be rolling out over the next few weeks right here and on Facebook.com/GratefulDead and Youtube.com/gratefuldead.

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Submitted by icenine2 on Wed, 01/31/2018 - 14:07

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When will this be available as downloads again? I own the high-res digital download of Get Shown the Light and it is spectacular.
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Submitted by Sawwwn on Thu, 07/12/2018 - 07:03

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Oh man! Still waiting for these (May 77 and July 78) to be available for download! Please open this up or at least stop listing them as available. Killing me.
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Submitted by Sawwwn on Thu, 07/12/2018 - 07:04

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Oh man! Still waiting for these (May 77 and July 78) to be available for download! Please open this up or at least stop listing them as available. Killing me.
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Submitted by DanielSpace on Mon, 08/13/2018 - 13:02

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I think a fundraiser for the tapes is the dumbest idea Ive ever heard.
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