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    Road Trips Volume 3 Number 1

    Oakland, 12/28/79

    The latest installment in our Road Trips series, now entering its third big year (and ninth release overall) is bound to become a favorite. Road Trips Vol. 3, No. 1 is the complete show from December 28, 1979, part of the sparkling run that has already given us the excellent Dick’s Picks: Vol. 5 (from 12/26/79). You’ll recall that these year-end concerts, held at the Oakland Auditorium because Winterland had closed down for good the previous New Year’s Eve, were the first holiday shows featuring new keyboardist Brent Mydland, who joined the band in April 1979.

    The new lineup had been gaining momentum with each passing tour since that spring, and by December was truly hitting its stride. It helped, too, that the band was in the midst of recording their Go To Heaven album, so they were really playing together a lot during this period. This 12/28/79 concert is a blast: a super high-energy rock and roll show that also has its share of spacey jams and exploratory passages. The first set includes standout versions of “Sugaree,” “High Time” (rare enough that it always felt like a treat!) and “The Music Never Stopped,” while the second set opens with the always potent pair of “Alabama Getaway” > “Greatest Story Ever Told,” turns deep and introspective with “Playing in the Band” and “Terrapin,” and then later turns into a non-stop party with “Uncle John’s Band,” “I Need A Miracle,” “Bertha” and Good Lovin’.” If you’re not wiped out after that, the double-encore will waste you—“Casey Jones” and “Saturday Night”!

    The sound on both discs is spectacular (it’s hard to beat great reels as source tapes), and as always the CDs have been mastered to the exacting HDCD spec, because you would accept nothing less. The colorful accompanying booklet contains a number of excellent Jay Blakesberg photos from those Oakland Aud. shows, as well as a typically inspiring essay by the always poetic Dead scribe Steve Silberman.

    So it’s a win-win. A slam-dunk. A no-brainer. For more info on all the goodness packed onto these discs, click here. And when you finally come to your senses and decide that you can longer live another day without Road Trips Vol. 3, No. 1, you can order it here.

    —Blair Jackson

    Track List

    CD 1: Oakland Auditorium Arena, December 28, 1979

    1. SUGAREE
    2. MAMA TRIED>
    3. MEXICALI BLUES
    4. ROW JIMMY
    5. IT’S ALL OVER NOW
    6. HIGH TIME
    7. THE MUSIC NEVER STOPPED
    SET 2:
    8. ALABAMA GETAWAY>
    9. GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD

    CD 2: Oakland Auditorium Arena, December 28, 1979

    1. TERRAPIN STATION>
    2. PLAYING IN THE BAND>
    3. RHYTHM DEVILS>
    4. SPACE>
    5. UNCLE JOHN’S BAND>
    6. I NEED A MIRACLE>
    7. BERTHA>
    8. GOOD LOVIN’
    9. CASEY JONES
    10. ONE MORE SATURDAY NIGHT



    15687

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  • simonrob
    15 years ago
    The bonus disc.
    The bonus disc is a perplexing thing. The material on it seems two fall into one or other of two categories. The first is category is that it is more of the same as is on the basic two-disc set, in which case it should be released as a contiguous three-disc set. The second category is that it is something almost totally unrelated to to the basic two-disc set, except that it generally comes from a time reasonably close to that of the basic set. In this case it should be released as a separate item. In either case, it should be just as available as the set it comes with. There would seem to be two reasons for releasing it as a bonus disc in a separate sleeve: 1) The cheap 'n' nasty recycled toilet-paper-roll sleeves of the Road Trips series can only be made to accomodate two discs, and 2) It is a shoddy marketing gimmick to get people to part with their money a.s.a.p. in a desparate attempt to claw back the costs of the release as quickly as possible. Additionally, the more Road Trips that you purchase with the bonus disc, the more scared you become of missing out on one - we are all human, after all (aren't we?). In any event, it amounts to releasing 1/3 of the material as limited editions (albeit seemingly free of charge). I can see the reason for limited editions in some situations, i.e. those nice Mobile Fidelity Gold discs, but for bulk-standard CD's such as these I really cannot see any justifiable reason. We are all aware of how many people are utterly pissed off that the Fillmore 10CD box was so limited and in that case it seems obvious that they could have made a lot more money on that one by releasing it in unlimited quantities. Possibly it was all down to not knowing what the demand for it would be, and being terrified of having shelves full of unsold, expensive boxes.But don't worry folks - I am sure the people in charge here will reply and expain everything so that we are not left wondering what & why. Oh, sorry, I forgot - the people in charge here do not deem it necessary to explain anything, ever. Shame, really.
  • Default Avatar
    Andrew Right
    15 years ago
    What's with the bonus disc?
    Although I love the touch ups to the sound quality of the Road Trips shows, why not just make the bonus disc apart of the set? If you dont get the bonus disc now you will end up paying up to $100 for the set on eBay and the music from the bonus is take off the free streaming sites online! This music is lost forever to most folks! While I love the '79 Winter tour, there is a lot of other music from the late 60's and early 70's that needs to get out there as well. How about a '72 or '76 Road Trips? I wish they would slow down on the releases, this habit is getting too expensive for me. I wonder what Jerry would think about all this....
  • simonrob
    15 years ago
    Inferior music formats
    The concern show here by some posters about so-called inferior music formats is, to some extent justified. I know of a couple of (live) albums in the last year or so that are only available as MP3 downloads from iTunes. Whilst MP3's are not my format of choice, they are undoubtedly popular due to their portability. On this site, downloads are available in a variety of formats including lossless FLAC. If you choose for a FLAC download, then you can burn it to a CD as WAV files and you can also decode it to MP3 for listening on the move - you do not have to buy both versions. To digress slightly, there are also portable music players available which will play FLAC files directly, just as an iPod or the like will play MP3's. In my opinion, sales of a product offered only as a download will be reduced by only offering it in MP3 format and to me it doesn't make much sense - the show or whatever was surely not recorded to MP3, but to a higher quality format. That being the case, why not offer that as well? I can see the demise of physical CDs in the not too distant future - and I for one will miss them, but as long as a lossless format such as FLAC is available, the loss will not be too great. If only MP3's will be available in the future then it will be a serious loss and a retrograde step as technology improves. The only possible motive for such a move is, of course, the bottom line - savings can be made in the capacity of servers as regards storage (disc) space and also bandwidth. As usual, the consumer will be the one to lose out. Regarding higher resolution formats than FLAC / WAV, such as DVD-A and SACD, I personally saw no justifiable reason to buy yet more hardware and (re)purchase all my favourite music - again. I re-purchased most of my LPs once already, as CDs, and was not prepared to do so yet again. Time will tell how we are able to purchase music in the future, but from here the future does not look very bright.
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Submitted by frogstorm on

Oakland, 12/28/79

The latest installment in our Road Trips series, now entering its third big year (and ninth release overall) is bound to become a favorite. Road Trips Vol. 3, No. 1 is the complete show from December 28, 1979, part of the sparkling run that has already given us the excellent Dick’s Picks: Vol. 5 (from 12/26/79). You’ll recall that these year-end concerts, held at the Oakland Auditorium because Winterland had closed down for good the previous New Year’s Eve, were the first holiday shows featuring new keyboardist Brent Mydland, who joined the band in April 1979.

The new lineup had been gaining momentum with each passing tour since that spring, and by December was truly hitting its stride. It helped, too, that the band was in the midst of recording their Go To Heaven album, so they were really playing together a lot during this period. This 12/28/79 concert is a blast: a super high-energy rock and roll show that also has its share of spacey jams and exploratory passages. The first set includes standout versions of “Sugaree,” “High Time” (rare enough that it always felt like a treat!) and “The Music Never Stopped,” while the second set opens with the always potent pair of “Alabama Getaway” > “Greatest Story Ever Told,” turns deep and introspective with “Playing in the Band” and “Terrapin,” and then later turns into a non-stop party with “Uncle John’s Band,” “I Need A Miracle,” “Bertha” and Good Lovin’.” If you’re not wiped out after that, the double-encore will waste you—“Casey Jones” and “Saturday Night”!

The sound on both discs is spectacular (it’s hard to beat great reels as source tapes), and as always the CDs have been mastered to the exacting HDCD spec, because you would accept nothing less. The colorful accompanying booklet contains a number of excellent Jay Blakesberg photos from those Oakland Aud. shows, as well as a typically inspiring essay by the always poetic Dead scribe Steve Silberman.

So it’s a win-win. A slam-dunk. A no-brainer. For more info on all the goodness packed onto these discs, click here. And when you finally come to your senses and decide that you can longer live another day without Road Trips Vol. 3, No. 1, you can order it here.

—Blair Jackson

Track List

CD 1: Oakland Auditorium Arena, December 28, 1979

1. SUGAREE
2. MAMA TRIED>
3. MEXICALI BLUES
4. ROW JIMMY
5. IT’S ALL OVER NOW
6. HIGH TIME
7. THE MUSIC NEVER STOPPED
SET 2:
8. ALABAMA GETAWAY>
9. GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD

CD 2: Oakland Auditorium Arena, December 28, 1979

1. TERRAPIN STATION>
2. PLAYING IN THE BAND>
3. RHYTHM DEVILS>
4. SPACE>
5. UNCLE JOHN’S BAND>
6. I NEED A MIRACLE>
7. BERTHA>
8. GOOD LOVIN’
9. CASEY JONES
10. ONE MORE SATURDAY NIGHT



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Submitted by vegafleet on Tue, 01/12/2010 - 04:18

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I too never got Road Trips 3.1, despite preordering in October and having my credit card charged in November. Multiple emails to MARYE and customer service were for nothing. When you do get thru to India on the phone, they promise to investigate and get back to me (they have never gotten back to me) and refuse to credit my credit card. I also am never buying from Dead.net again. I am trying now to get the 3 cd set from ebay. I'll pay more but at least I'll have an assurance that I'll get it. I have been defrauded and ripped off by GDP. I have been emailing and calling about this for 2 months now but I give up, life is too short. GDP should not use the bonus cd hook to sell cd's they can't ship. It only frustrates and penalizes the fans, it is a ripoff and only enriches the sellers in ebay (how did they get theirs in large quantities?) And GDP gets to keep my money! Never again.
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Submitted by vegafleet on Tue, 01/12/2010 - 04:27

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One more thing: They offer free shipping when you order sets in combo (i.e. RT3.1 and Let it Rock), and then go ahead and charge you for the shipping anyway. It seems the whole scheme of this website is now to ripoff customers. It didn't use to be like that.
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Submitted by stuman on Tue, 01/12/2010 - 05:19

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The Old Renaissance Faire Grounds from August 27, 1972. ??Nobody would be able to buy it , at least not from Dead.net !! However it would be nice to be able to vine out copy`s that already do circulate as bootlegs..
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Submitted by Captain Stormfield on Tue, 01/12/2010 - 13:09

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Time to start the wondering 'bout the next release. I see some are already doing so. I've been wrong about nearly every guess I've made since the series has started, so I guess I'll just keep my guessing to myself. Nevertheless, I AM eager for a new release... For Pure Jerry? That awesome JGB Halloween '93 show from Brendan Byrne would be sweet. One of the finest versions of Shining Star in existence. Just wishful thinking.