Grateful Dead

Anything Hendrix wins.
He was in other bands before he went solo.

Frampton Comes Alive seems to have worked pretty well for Peter.

I love Pink Floyd but Water’s solo albums are terrible. Gilmour’s first album is OK but the others are pretty weak.

The discussion on Page and Plant got me thinking...what are people's favorite solo albums by any of the great bands of the 60s? Zep, Who, Beatles, Stones, Floyd, etc.

I think mine is Pete Townshend's Empty Glass.

Dave - Is it Page on Hurdy Gurdy Man? I have read names such as Jeff Beck to (the late great) Allan Holdsworth, Jimmy Page, and a few others were the guitar player on this tune. I really don’t know.

MaryE - Thanks for all the help to myself and so many others!

Jimmy Page also cropped up on numerous sessions for all sorts of artists throughout the 60s-from Tom Jones to The Stones. "Baby Please Don't Go" by Them and "Sunshine Superman" and "Hurdy Gurdy Man" by Donovan are a few of the best. In fact, I once saw Donovan, and Page came on to play for a few numbers. "Happening Ten Years Time Ago" with The Yardbirds is also a classic-with Jeff Beck, too, of course.
I was wondering the other day if Covid marks the end of the 60's. Too early to say-maybe Live Dead 69 will be back next year, and it will all start up again.

Thanks for all the times you've listened to me and helped out, too. Always a pleasure.

50 years ago today………………

April 2, 1971
Memorial Gym Kent State University, Kent, Ohio

Was this a cancelled show?

Link: http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/11/april-2-1971-kent-state-univer…

Rock on!!!!

Doc
Then haste, kind Death, in pity to my age
And clap the Finis to my life's last page.
May Heaven's great Author my foul proof revise,
Cancel the page in which my error lies,
And raise my form above the etherial skies.

My 10th grade English teacher lent me the first two CDs back in '87, and I was hooked from there on (even read Hammer of the Gods), but I haven't listened to them much in the past 10 years. I had huge door posters of Zep IV and Houses of the Holy.

I got to see Page / Plant twice. They were some great shows....but the O2 Reunion exceeded my greatest expectations. I bought the CD when it came out and couldn't believe how ON they were. I didn't look at the track list when I bought it; I didn't even put it on for the car ride home. I took a day off work, packed a bowl and listened to it end-2-end. Set list had some nice surprises. For Your Life - really? Mother f@#%ing game on! After that song ended I seriously thought I might get Carouselambra too (love that song - would love to hear Jimmy's isolated guitar track - it's so cool, but buried in the mix).

What you're saying about Page makes sense, thanks for the insights. I didn't know about the slights against Plant. And Page IS always the guy doing the box sets and remixes for the Zep catalog. I guess I didn't realize how much sway he had in the Zep days. I knew they emerged from his New Yardbirds and that he was their Producer, so yeah, I guess that would cause some tension, especially once Plant carved out his own legendary rock persona.

I bought Mighty Rearranger, Raising Sand, and Band Of Joy several years ago, but didn't listen much. To your point though, Harm's Swift Way is a cover that he made his own (in fact, I didn't realize it wasn't his own until I heard him interview about it).

Well, thanks - that satisfies my curiosity. On the surface I thought, how does a riff master like Page not have at least as equal a solo career as the the other song writer in Zep.

P.S. - what's with Peter Grant as Executive Producer on all the records? I thought he was the manager and the muscle. What kind of musical input was he responsible for? Or was it a ceremonial title?

I tend to dive into subjects headlong, devouring multiple biographies, interviews, first hand anecdotes from those lucky enough to have met the subject, and of course, all the music. It's hardly possible with the Dead, but with Robert Plant for instance, my m.o. is to buy every official studio and live release and go from there. HendrixFreak talked of his methods with bootlegs, board tapes, etc. There's a ton out there if you're willing to find it with just about every established artist.

Robert Plant was able to reinvent himself commercially and stylistically with great success after the demise of Led Zeppelin. After the O2 show in 2007, I like many others (Jason Bonham included) was devastated that Plant would not resurrect the old warhorse for a proper tour.

He has his reasons, not the least of which, being his own man and sticking it to Jimmy for any one of a thousand slights. When Led Zep formed, it was Page's baby, he having financed and produced the first album and then basically leasing it to Atlantic for an exorbitant sum, retaining all musical and artistic control and receiving an unheard of royalty rate and worldwide distribution. Plant was unsophisticated and raw, a brilliant putty in Jimmy's hands in the beginning.

Peter Grant greatly aided and abetted in this scheme... Zeppelin were an incredibly decadent band of outlaws who pretty much owned the Seventies in every sense. It was not without it's mishaps and ugly scenes, hedonsim way out of control, but it was beautiful and magical and mighty as well as flawed, with an inherent dark side... and when it was over, all parties involved had to take a respite.

Page half-assed it with The Firm, Coverdale/Page and his Outrider record; he really only touched on past glories trotting about the globe with Robert for those few Plant/Page tours. He was and always has been a Zeppelin man through and through, the one true love of his musical life. Without Robert Plant, it just wasn't the same for him.

Plant on the other hand touched on numerous genres and succeeded brilliantly all across the board. His is a very fine voice, he's a very intelligent and gracious gentleman and he remains very hip. He has spoke of making "age appropriate" music, when one thinks of him during The Song Remains The Same at MSG, chest out and crotch thrust forward, wailing like a banshee, I suppose that was age appropriate at the time - but hardly so today. Along with emerging from Jimmy's shadow and that of Zeppelin, the man genuinely has a knack for inhabiting songs and making them his own with that inimitable voice and brilliant phrasing.

I could go on... Page never had the heart to put his all into anything Robert wasn't involved in, musically. Plant skillfully navigated his solo career and has always paid homage to Led Zeppelin without being constrained by it.

There are a number of Robert Plant solo albums that are absolutely brilliant that seemingly no one has heard of. Dreamland, Mighty ReArranger and Sixty Six to Timbuktu come to mind.

My two cents.

Jim & Oroborous that was some funny stuff. I'm still smiling. My wife surely thinks I'm back on the sauce. I haven't heard that song since the days when I had to get up to change the channel.

It's the Spectrum '73 for me at the moment. Had to throw a '73 Bird Song in the mix. Sounds close enough to Full Norman quality.

P.S. I think I mentioned Uncle Gary here a couple times. He sent me The Orpheum 7/18/76 show from the radio broadcast. First time hearing it last week and it's wow....that would have been a good run to release as a box set. Hopefully we'll see this show released. Pretty sure DL said 7/18 was recorded on multitrack when DaP 18 came out. Jerry's soloing is off the wall.

....she's the bees knees. Good addition to opening day in baseball land.