Grateful Dead

Hey Bob I put the pm to the test, check yours.

OK, past music easily 60's centric picks, but what about real (semi real?) past. First thought on earlier picks, Fats Domino, 50's/early sixties, might depend a lot on not so state of the art electronics. Seems a club small enough to see these guys in would to be there before they were them. (did that make sense) Maybe 1958 BB king at the Capitol downtown didn't sound so good up in the top tier. First 20-30 rows, may have been a-ok. But maybe 1951 BB was just that fat black guy, playing in the bar up the road. Amps might have sounded incredible in that environment. (BTW, I'm just pull bb dates out my ass for illustration) But most somebodies are nobodies first.

Anyhow,, I didn't see him mentioned, but could have seen a young Bruce Springsteen in Jersey bars back in 72. Southside Johnny would have been nice to see at his best.

Anyhow again, how about older stuff. Virtually all acoustic. The Glen Miller Orchestra at those California coast shows, were played over the radio. Smaller open venues for dancing, a solid 16-20 piece band. You know when those horns stood up and that blast hit, your head would explode.

It be easy to say Sinatra, but in a lot of ways I think I like older Frank. But you could see him in a Hoboken bar or with the Dorsey Orchestra or with Harry James.

Al Jolson be nice to see, maybe because I was brought up with Al in the house. They say his voice was very deep and you could feel it when he sang, but it never came through on the recordings.

Probably get boring real fast, but the impact in the day of John Philip Sousa. Image that small town park with this huge brassy sound hitting it. Must have been something.

ANYPLACE Louis Armstrong played.

So much past music!

Jimi, you've seen some real great ones over the years. I never saw Fats Dommino, but I love his song Walking to New Orleans. One time when I was seeing Ray Charles someone in the audience took a photo of him durring Georgia on My Mind and he said "shit, don't go takin no photos" I don't know how he could tell. Earl Scruggs, never saw him, was fortunate enough to see Bill Monroe & Ralph Stanley. Blues guys, seen a hell of a lot of them over the years, including Muddy Waters, B.B. King, & Buddy Guy. Along with The Dead, Blues is my favorite music. I agree with you 100% that we are fortunate to have seen all the cool music that we did see, and are so lucky that so much cool music was taped and is now being released.

to note that we think the issue of not being able to send messages (PMs) is now fixed. Bring 'em on. Thanks! Back to your regularly scheduled discussion...

Stoltzfus; that would be an amazing choice! Perhaps the ultimate Woodstock set?
Carlo/10/16/89; one of my top GD releases ever, the playing, the sound, the set list, this show for what ever reason seems to be so under appreciated? Hope you dig it! HEY DAVE, how bout some more fall 89......Spectrum shows anyone?
Talking Heads; critics and the public have always hailed Stop Making Sense movie as one of the top Concert films of all time, a must see if your not familiar.....another awesome band I should have but didn’t get to see. My cousin has seen them and DB solo several times and says he’s never seen a show that wasn’t amazing! Bet that solo broadway show was ridiculous....just talking about this makes me want to get up and dance!

Coulda Shoulda Woulda.. yes, we all have regrets.. the shows we didn't make because we (thought) we couldn't afford them or didn't have the time. Some of these decisions turn out to be responsible, some the result of an unwillingness to toss caution into the wind and take a little risk.

I don't focus too much on the acts that were before my time. There's not much I could have done to influence these decisions beyond getting the Way Back Machine up and running.. :D

There are a few I could have seen, but didn't for some reason or another.. mostly the dreaded responsibilities of life.

like...

- Doc Watson (but I did see Earl Scruggs for the first time just about on his 80th birthday) so there's a bit of balance there, both high on my list of acoustic intramentalists.
- Stones (no brainer)
- Who (no brainer)
- Buddy Guy/Muddy Waters/BB King/Blues greats of my time
- James Brown
- Collins/Clinton/Parliament/etc.

That's sort of 5.

More importantly perhaps are the bands and performers I feel fortunate to have seen..

GD and JGB (high on that list and from a surprisingly early age, saw a couple of ho hums, but a surprisingly large number of what turned out to be quite good shows)

Followed by Floyd / Gilmour, ABB, S. Dan, Lots of Bluegrass/folk/etc, Zappa, Crimson, Yes, Rush, NRPS. But just as important are those smaller, intimate acts in small clubs/bars/restaurants/theatres, etc. Performers like Jackie Greene, Dr. John, Ray Charles, Fats Domino, Galactic, even DSO, Melvin Seals & Co, JRad, etc.

In fact.. the older I get the more off the beaten path I seem to venture.. smaller places, lessor known performance and intimate not quite discovered bands.. had a great time at the 50th aniv. of Alice's Restaurant a year and a half ago in a tiny place.. stuff like that. Small, no fuss and more or less unplanned fun. My festival days are likely behind me.

A few regrets.. but not really. Feeling both very fortunate for what I have seen and grateful for the recordings that exist and the efforts put into making them sound as good as possible here at dead.net.

Love that band as well. Stop Making Sense was a staple during the college years.

Our softball team had a tradition. Any time someone made an error, the entire team would turn towards that person and do the "hand chop" down our forearm, mimicking the MTV video from Once in a Lifetime. Same as it ever was.

I'll throw in Roxy Music as another band from that era that I listen to every now and then.

I would like to add a few more performers to my original list: Rolling Stones 69/70, Jimi Hendrix Woodstock & Monteray Pop Festivals, Howlin Wolf, Elmore James, Freddie King , & Janis Joplin.

Archive hopping at the moment, found this excellent recording of Keller with SCI.

https://archive.org/details/sci2000-08-12dsbd/sci2000-08-12dsbdt09.shn

The Franklin's is very nice.

Saw the Talking Heads show last year, fantastic.

Funny that there is a lot of Talking Heads talk going on around these parts. Over the holidays, the wife and I took a trip to NYC to see Phish at MSG on the 28th and 29th. On Sunday the 29th, we also scored tickets to see a 3:00 matinee of David Byrne's American Utopia show on Broadway at the awesome Hudson Theater. It was Byrne and about 11-12 musicians and dancers, all with portable instruments on a completely bare stage. The whole thing was choreographed to a T, and watching them all move as an ensemble, along with some minimal but creative lighting, provided for some incredible visuals. The music was a perfect mix of Heads tunes and Byrne's solo stuff.... Great show! I think it runs through February, and is totally worth checking out if you are in or near the city.

Peace

I like his cover of Wishing Well. That's a very nice cover of Slippery People, very slow like Dead and Company were doing it. :-) I'll be looking for that album.