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    August 29 - September 04, 2016

    Welcome back to the Tapers’ Section, where this week we have Grateful Dead music from 1969, 1970 and then some late-era Dead from 1993.

    First up this week is music from 1/17/69 in Santa Barbara, where we have this classic sequence from the era, That’s It For The Other One>Cosmic Charlie. This was recorded just a week before the Avalon shows, some of which would become Live/Dead.

    From a year and a day later, we have this great batch of late-TC era Dead from 1/18/70 in Portland, OR, featuring Cumberland Blues, me and My Uncle, Good Lovin', China>Rider, Lovelight .

    Lastly this week, from 1/26/93 in Oakland, we have the start of the second set, featuring Man Smart (Woman Smarter) ; Eyes Of The World > Estimated Prophet > Terrapin Station. I’ve always found the December 1992-May 1993 time period to be the last, great sustained period of Grateful Dead music. Of course there were plenty of great moments after that, but this was a particularly strong six month period for the Dead.

    Be sure to join us here next week for more music from the vault.

    David Lemieux
    vault@dead.net

    408716

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    DoubleT
    8 years 2 months ago
    1993
    Could not agree more with the assessment. A great year period in my view. After 1990 by far the best year - 1991 was supposed to be "all that" but as the years go by it feels more and more lackluster to me. I love Bruce Hornsby as an artist but having him just hang out and play the piano didn't do anything. A waste. He should have been all in or nothing. I know he tried . . . it wasn't his fault.
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Submitted by ccasal on

Welcome back to the Tapers’ Section, where this week we have Grateful Dead music from 1969, 1970 and then some late-era Dead from 1993.

First up this week is music from 1/17/69 in Santa Barbara, where we have this classic sequence from the era, That’s It For The Other One>Cosmic Charlie. This was recorded just a week before the Avalon shows, some of which would become Live/Dead.

From a year and a day later, we have this great batch of late-TC era Dead from 1/18/70 in Portland, OR, featuring Cumberland Blues, me and My Uncle, Good Lovin', China>Rider, Lovelight .

Lastly this week, from 1/26/93 in Oakland, we have the start of the second set, featuring Man Smart (Woman Smarter) ; Eyes Of The World > Estimated Prophet > Terrapin Station. I’ve always found the December 1992-May 1993 time period to be the last, great sustained period of Grateful Dead music. Of course there were plenty of great moments after that, but this was a particularly strong six month period for the Dead.

Be sure to join us here next week for more music from the vault.

David Lemieux
vault@dead.net

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Welcome back to the Tapers’ Section, where this week we have Grateful Dead music from 1969, 1970 and then some late-era Dead from 1993.
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August 29 - September 04, 2016
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Submitted by DoubleT on Mon, 08/29/2016 - 08:07

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Could not agree more with the assessment. A great year period in my view. After 1990 by far the best year - 1991 was supposed to be "all that" but as the years go by it feels more and more lackluster to me. I love Bruce Hornsby as an artist but having him just hang out and play the piano didn't do anything. A waste. He should have been all in or nothing. I know he tried . . . it wasn't his fault.
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Submitted by wolff on Mon, 08/29/2016 - 10:40

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listen to 91 msg and tell me he was a waste
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Submitted by wolff on Mon, 08/29/2016 - 10:41

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listen to 91 msg tell me he was a waste
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Submitted by mark_mumper on Mon, 08/29/2016 - 20:57

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This January '69 Santa Barbara sample has the worst drumming I've ever heard in a Grateful Dead performance. Someone ( -it's Mickey) was way off. (Not helped by the close miking of his bass drum.) ...The others get raging ~six minutes in....
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Submitted by DoubleT on Tue, 08/30/2016 - 06:42

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Nine nights - how many of those stand out? And how many because of what Hornsby was doing? I think his peak with them was the Shoreline run 8-16 through 8-18. The Boston Garden and spring tour '92 had a lot of great Bruce moments. My point is he was just sitting there playing piano and accordian - not writing, singing lead. He should have been dominating like Brent did. A waste in that respect. Early on he tried to do some of his own tunes but since they didn't rehearse everbody lost interest. It was not his fault he became a sideman. But since he did I felt like it was kind of pointless since they didn't exploit the opportunity. I thought they were better off without him. It's like if Aaron Rodgers went to the Seahawks and they said, right, we're going to run it 60% of the time and try to win every game 13-7.
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Submitted by corrycorry2005 on Tue, 08/30/2016 - 16:31

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Does anyone have any idea or interesting speculation about the actual venue for the Jan 17 '69 Santa Barbara show? In the past, it has been listed as "Civic Auditorium," but there is no such place.
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Submitted by nirktwin2 on Tue, 08/30/2016 - 18:48

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Great batch of songs from January 1970. Cumberland Blues is truly excellent. I love Pigpen on Good Lovin' and Lovelight too. Great to hear more from this late T.C. era after enjoying Dave's Picks' 19. I thought post T.C. '70 was great but this is proving they were doing just fine in January 70 with him. David Lemieux, when are going to put out your own book delineating the differences in the Grateful Dead's sound which I think should be titled "Dead In Transition"?
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Submitted by PonchoBill on Wed, 08/31/2016 - 13:32

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Wowza!!!
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Submitted by Gr8fulTed on Thu, 09/01/2016 - 06:37

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Check out this possibility, corrycorry2005. There is a Civic Auditorium in Lompoc. I read a review from someone who claims he was at this show: he said it was his 1st Dead show, with Santana, and it was in the UCSB Robertson Gym (archive.org)
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Submitted by Mike Joyce on Thu, 09/01/2016 - 19:13

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Thanks for posting that 1.26.93 pre-drums. The circulating SBD has a fair bit of distortion, it's nice to listen to this cleaner version. That show would make a nice Pick from the '90's someday, though I guess the Santana guest spot might complicate things. Would love to hear the post-drums in a future Taper's Section!
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Submitted by corrycorry2005 on Sat, 09/03/2016 - 10:26

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The Lompoc idea is very intriguing. 1969 is actually when kids in Central Valley towns started wanting to see bands who were Fillmore-famous, and the Millard Agency liked to book places like that. The Dead may have flown into Santa Barbara airport and then driven to Lompoc, which would account for the tape box marking. I don't think the Jan 17 '69 show is Rob Gym. The Dead played there on May 29 '69, and Santana very likely opened the show, so the person who recalls it has an accurate memory. There is an almost zero chance, however, that the Dead played UCSB twice in one year, I did check, though, and Santana was definitely free on Jan 17, so maybe they did play Lompoc with the Dead...