TIGDH: 9/6/80

This post first appeared on the Phish.net Forum on September 6, 2017.

OK, so here's a weird bit of Midcoaster perspective on what it meant / felt like to be a Deadhead in the 80s. This perspective has faded a bit in emotion and sense since this is something that is generally on the wane. Take it with a rock of molecule.

In the late-60s and early-70s, many hippies and freaks who had been devoted to Civil Rights and the Anti-War movement, said, "f*** it." They blended pages from Ken Kesey's and Helen and Scott Nearing's play books. At a massive Berkeley Free Speech rally from 1964, Kesey showed up with the Pranksters and the Hell's Angels. He stepped up to the mic in front of dreamy antiwar believers and said, "Do you want to know how to stop the war? Just turn your backs and say, 'f*** it.' " People were pissed and shocked, for that moment.

Much earlier, in the 1930s, Helen and Scott Nearing had dropped out of the Wall St. and Madison Avenue world to live "the Good Life" as they called it, subsistence farming in Maine. They were done with corporate greed and the shallow trappings of cultural materialism. To them, running a rustic farm on the shores of Penobscot Bay seemed a better option than harvesting riches for their own interests. They might face lean times, but it'd be better than demoralizing their own sense of conscience.

Once the idealists of the 60s faced the brutality that was 1968 and the shock of Nixon's 1970 invasion of Cambodia, many simply blended those two playbooks (Kesey and Nearing) and moved to rural New England. It was a hearty bunch who settled Maine where land was cheap. Hippies faced many challenges with locals, but New England's old fashioned brand of conservatism ("Do what you want on your land, just don't mess with my land") boded well for them. Those who could manage to split their own firewood, grow food, hunt, fish, work hard and do anything to survive soon found themselves a new thread of the fabric in their local communities. Still others hightailed it out.

Baron Wormser's memoir does a great job describing the 70s Maine homestead experience.

Mainers called these hippies "back-to-the-landers," and by the late-70s, the very life of rural Maine was transformed. The underground Head economy (see Jarnow's Heads) helped supplement wants and needs. The weed economy took root in earnest, bolstered by vast amounts of unorganized territories in Maine's north and Downeast woods. Coops and trading posts popped up, here and there. Gatherings like the Common Ground Fair were established to share agricultural dos and don'ts. Organic farming also became a real part of the economy.

This culture is now woven into the fabric of Midcoast Maine.

While the local music scene took off in the form of bluegrass and various forms of hippie country (hey, unamplified music only costs as much as the instruments and the sweat equity, right?), there wasn't much in the way of a national hippie act circuit in Maine. Sure, the Grateful Dead played in the Bangor Auditorium in 1971, but that was more a fluke of the times. It wouldn't be until 1979 when the "People's Band" returned to the Great State of Maine. When they returned, though, they returned en force.

In the spring of 1979, the Grateful Dead snuck back into Maine for the first time in May (5/13/79). This was a different move than the usual college circuits that the Dead repeatedly hit in the 1970s. Maine was a bit of a "hinterland," and the Heads liked it that way. It was a cheap place to live and get down to some dirty overall business. Was it Rick Turner of Alembic (a guy with deep Maine roots) who may have nudged the promoters this way? Was the call coming from Maine? Either way, the People's Band was hitting the scene, and reports were positive. This was an old high school girlfriend's first show, and she recalls walking up to the box office with her older brother a few hours prior to show time and buying a ticket.

The Dead returned to Maine the following September (9/2/79), pushing a little further up the road to Augusta. By all accounts, this was a super relaxed and super psychedelic environment. It was what people used to call a "family" night, or a show that was just for the Heads. If you don't know what that means, try to picture a venue full of "freaks only." On those nights, the electricity may be palpable, but it's so scrambled that it's a lazy lightning. Everyone has plenty of room to move. Dancing wildly, no one even so much as touches each other.

Lucky duck ©Jay Blakesberg documented 9/6/80 in all it's glory!

These travel routes or rituals seemed to become routine quickly. The Grateful Dead organization either realized they were tapping into a heady market, or the heady market was interested in re-tapping into their motherlode of energy. Either way, Maine became a regular stop at this point (almost as far as one can be from San Rafael and still be in the U.S.). There was a groovy scene already here, and it was sympatico. May 1980 saw the Dead make another stop in Portland (5/11/80), cementing the sense of routine. And, according to my sources, Maine shows simply had that reputation of being "for the faithful."

These early-80s vibes are difficult to explain. A show "for the faithful" back then often meant that alcohol was a sort of ancillary side show, mostly something to calm wiggy energies and help people cool off at the end of the day and sleep. Lysergic energy coursed through the scene, and as kids, we had a strong sense of history, that the "Heads" were present. By Heads, we meant people who were 60s dropouts, back-to-the-landers, Vietnam Vets, Carter-pardoned draft dodgers, old school outlaws and dope smugglers, bikers, as in real bikers, hardcore Heads who'd been to the Fillmore East, Winterland and Woodstock, traveling gypsies who'd been living alternative lives for what then seemed like a long, long time. They were older people who were serious about this lifestyle. It wasn't just a party to blow off steam in order to put in another 6 months at the bank. It felt like a way of life.

Note triangular stage canopy, signature Lewiston; ©Jay Blakesberg.

To set the record straight, I did not have the opportunity to see the Grateful Dead until 1982. However, these stories were alive and around me back then via siblings, cousins and older friends, which is why I feel it's important to set that little bit of a stage for 9/6/80. Read the reviews on archives. There are great stories in there. They convey some of the feeling. What has been handed down to me is something that has always seemed a bit of a dream, a bit of that "sunshining daydream" that seemed to wane all too quickly as my understanding dawned.

For many who have recounted the day to me, the decision to go to Lewiston was a whim. "Oh, sure, there's one more show on this tour. I can make it." For others, it was a chance to come out of the woods, fields and back 40s of Maine to celebrate another summer. The electricity flowed. Levon Helm played. At some point in the afternoon, there was a transition to the Dead. The music seeped in gradually. The dancing picked up in earnest. It was a flat fairgrounds on grass. There was no security. In short, in the middle of Lewiston, Maine, in 1980, the fortunate attendees were treated with a taste of something akin to a Veneta Field Trip.

©Jay Blakesberg

No, the music was not 1972. That's not the point. Rather, it is that vibe and energy thing which is so difficult to explain, that thing which is becoming increasingly difficult to explain year after year. It is summarized in Bill Graham's Fillmore East usher who once said, "The Grateful Dead aren't music; the Grateful Dead are an environment." It is the evocation of that environment which has always made 9/6/80 have this special place in my heart. (Imagine my surprise when I discovered Jay Blakesberg's photography! The images fit the stories I had been told.)

In that special "family night vibe," in the empty spaces between notes, one hears ankle bells, the squishing of dancing feet in grass, one's own breathing. Somewhere deep into the nearly two-hour first set, it would be easy to imagine a slight panic-feeling, Wait, is this the second set? Are they only doing a one set show? It is a hot, but not too hot, summer, but not summer, Labor Day feeling, and the world is melting again. The music which started so calmly is building to wild crescendos. The music is absolutely perfect. Everywhere there are familiar faces, knowing smiles, but names elude, and we seek the open spaces. Nowhere "inside" this venue is it crowded (except for those "bug-eyed" people down front).

It's a very difficult thing to convey, but those years always carried a sense of history. During the early-1980s, I was astonished that the culture still existed as it did, and boy did it exist! One could fully hop on the bus, and one felt that it was not child's play. Yes, you could join the circus and run away, but it was a serious circus, more like a bent carnival.

Crank it up, and maybe, just maybe, do it in a yard to feel the grass under your feet with a headfull, plenty of space to freak freely. Maybe, just maybe, a little bit of that magic will come through the airwaves.

For further reading, check out Jesse Jarnow's book Heads.

Also, please support Jay Blakesberg by purchasing his books wherever available. Well worth it!

TIGDH: 04/29/71 v. 04/29/72

This post first appeared on the Phish.net Forum on April 29, 2022.

When I think about a year these days, it's just a blur of school work and home chores and family activity punctuated by holidays and seasonal adventure. I'm on the middle age plateau where, if one is lucky, not much changes. It's difficult to remember the annual revolutions of youth where turbulent change was a skin-shedding rite. Still, though, when I think of my own, youthful incremental changes as compared to the evolutionary leaps made by the Grateful Dead early in their career, I feel positively stodgy. Each year in their early career finds sounds, songs, and structures on new footing.

Take their composition for one:

1965 Quintet -> Fall 1967 Sextet -> Fall 1968 Septet -> Winter 1970 Sextet -> Winter 1971 Quintet -> Fall 1971 Sextet -> Winter 1972 Septet.

That's a lot of changes. The core quintet is what held the organization together. The April 1971 tour, a classic, finds the band having recently shed both Tom Constanten and Mickey. They are lean and mean. Pig's rave ups are classic, especially in Princeton's Dillon Gymnasium: " 'Are you in the refrigerator business? Do you sell dope?' 'Nah, man, I got myseff a Cadillac.' " Or something like that, the infamous "Brooklyn Bridge" rap.



4/29/71 typified the warm sounds that the Grateful Dead could bring to the Fillmores. "Second That Emotion," electric versions of "Dark Hollow" and "Ripple" surround a crushing "Hard to Handle." Pig is still in fine form, muscular, not quite wasting away, and his organ adds a taste of the classic carnival. And the show contains "THAT" jam between "Alligator" and "GDTRFB." This is primal, old school Grateful Dead, and since Pig is barely involved, for a moment, they're a quartet. It's slightly out of tune, and they're exhausted by the encore.

Fast forward one year to 04/29/72, and they're a new outfit touring Europe. Billy is looser, more comfortable finding the pocket after one year's practice on his own again. Keith Godchaux fills a space no one knew needed filling, and it allows Jerry to hang back a bit. He can then spit Fender Strat fire at moments of his own choosing. Phil is, well, Phil. He is simply joyous in the new sound of '72, blasting all over the place at every opportunity. Bobby seems more professional and practiced, too, offering new tunes like "Jack Straw" and Ace's "Black-Throated Wind." At 25, he's in peak vocal form, too.



Pig is the only light that's fading here. It is his sunset tour. While he may have been with the band at the Hollywood Bowl on June 17, 1972, the Europe tour was his swan song. He gave it all he had, but one can hear him fraying at the edges. The bottom has dropped out. When he is on the mic, though, the band still manages to wind into the old rave up sounds, and there are echoes of yore. It isn't nostalgia, it's just that Pig coaxed it out of everyone else. A little bit raunchy, a little bit greasy, all American.

The space of the "Dark Star" contains a "Tiger" passage, an arrow pointing to 1973. The "Sugaree" echoes Jerry's best solo efforts, the Hunter/Garcia machine in full swing. This is a tight band that evolved an entire lifetime in one year, shed a skin layer to become more nimble, even incorporating a female vocalist. The chauvinism of 1971's tour with NRPS suggests acid saloons and gun fights, slightly out of tune. 1972 is a posh performance, the Bakersfield sound has downed the punch, and they're performing in a symphonic hall, velvet seated audience instead of dancehall throw down.

It's very difficult to describe. By the time they arrived in Veneta the following August, Pig Pen left back home, "Playin' " had opened even wider, and "Bird Song" found the band evolving again, seeking ever higher. As Jerry opines to someone in the audience after "Greatest Story," "You know how it is, we can't do the same stuff forever." Well, you can say that again, Jerry.

4/29/71 (complete recording)

4/29/72 (complete recording; Charlie Miller sbd)

4/29/72 (audience recording that captures the room)

Don't take my word for it, compare for yourselves.

TIGDH: 4/29/71 the final Fillmore East show (for the GD)

This post first appeared on the Phish.net forum on April 29, 2021.

Well, here we are folks, 50 years after the famed final performance of the Grateful Dead at the Fillmore East. It's really a testament to the Grateful Dead's live work that I am writing this (and that a handful of people are reading this) at all. This is a band who set out to have a good time and explore deep consciousness without a plan. The Acid Tests were a mere 5 and a half years prior to the night, here, immortalized on the 2000 release "Ladies and Gentlemen," and yet the world was already unrecognizable, transformed as it were.

For Deadheads, commercial release wasn't what immortalized this show. First of all, this was the final performance at the very venue that had solidified the Grateful Dead's foothold on the East Coast. To say that Bill Graham's venue was legendary would be an understatement. Patti Smith had her mind blown seeing the Doors there. Jimi Hendrix ushered in the 1970s with his Band of Gypsies there. The list is long. Talk to anyone who attended shows, any shows, at the Fillmore East, and you may not hear many clear details from this vantage point, but their eyes will light up.



My first introduction to 04/29/71 came when I started trading tapes in 1985. My dorm friend "Psycho" made a short list of "must have" shows, and this was at the top. Pre-Betty Board, I have no clue what the original source of my first Maxell XLII 90s were, but I can tell you they were of a fairly high generation evident in hiss. A lot of people had dubbed this prior to me, and I couldn't have cared less. For me, spinning the show in late night reverie, the experience was transformative. The semi-out-of-tune spare phrasing of Spring '71 acted like a time machine transporting me to an only-imagined world of the Grateful Dead.



Why an imagined world? In 1985, the only Grateful Dead pictures I had seen were record store posters and the vague memories I could conjure from a few live experiences. Hearing the band tune between songs, say after a short and sweet Dark Hollow, I was entering into a Coney Island of the Mind. Not surprisingly, each tape I collected from the venue conjured a different theater. The April 29, 1971 theater was a fuzzier and warmer place than, say, the hair-raising venue of 1970's Valentine's Day gig. The Persian carpets were there, as was the ever-present smoke, and Pig Pen was a dreamy impression of cowboy hat and ponytail.

Jerry, Bob, and Phil were bouncy geetars, only, twangier than during the '60s, still full of swagger but sounding tired. Billy was the metronome of single drummer swing, but I didn't fully understand that upon first listens. I was still trying to pick apart all those sounds happening at once, spare and unfiltered though they may be. Unlike 1970's final blast of shaking off the previous decade and 1972's brand new set of clothes, Spring 1971 always had struck me as sounding a bit tired, a bit laggy, a bit world-weary. And yet, it drew me in like no other year.



The 1971 tapes may have topped everyone's lists in 1985 due to the fact that there were solid board recordings of this final Fillmore East run. On the other hand, there may have been some cytoplasm of the final Fillmore run explosion that still lingered and stuck to tape traders 14 years later. There was an oral tradition that followed each trade, and each swapped reeked of the earlier Grateful Dead Free Underground Tape Exchange spirit. To dub was a Friday night event: hours of listening and copying in real time with all the usual enhancers.

Musically, a 21st century fan new to the Grateful Dead might not quite hear the magic inherent in this final night at the Fillmore. It is tired and a bit off-kilter. (Did Jerry even sleep on a four-night run like that?) However, for a fan like me, these tapes left a permanent stamp. Minglewood, here, is the original style Minglewood. That reinforces the extant element of the 60's magic evident in the transition from Alligator-> Drums-> Jam-> Going Down the Road. The guitars breathe sound rather than strum it. This is the five-headed-hydra becoming one. In fact, as Pig takes such a backseat, a jam like this is a rare quartet blast-off.

Fans these days might be in search of a longer jam or compare this to a full-on Europe '72 melt down. Fortunately, I hadn't heard much of that music yet when I sunk my teeth in, here. What I found were solid Rosetta Stones of classics such as Ripple, Cumberland, and Casey Jones. There was the Cornell Morning Dew, and then there was THIS Morning Dew. I would play and rewind and replay the Second That Emotion, shocked that this ragtag outfit could do justice to Smokey Robinson while making it their own. The same is true for Bobby McGee. Of course, I loved Dark Hollow, and for me, this performance erased my stored memory of the Reckoning version. Even Bill Graham and the band's banter prior to the encore conveyed something special.



In 1985, this seemed like a portal to a different time, a different world inhabited by giants of the underground. It didn't even resemble the same band that I'd seen just weeks before in Richmond, VA. At the same time, there was an undercurrent, a propulsion that knit it all together in a link to the present, though sometimes hard to grasp. Seeing the Grateful Dead play an electric Ripple in 1988 seemed a fulfillment of that connection, somehow: flawed and beautiful, acoustic played electric.

I could go on and on, I could ask for "more and more," but I'm content now to just "hang out" and know that the "musicians are here" in my heart. It has been nice to delve deeply into the Grateful Dead all these years, and now we have these spoils of NRPS opening sets, too. Don't mind the sonic warts and the clams, there is still magic to be found in them thar tapes.



If it's all new to you, don't distract yourself. Tune everything out, listen to the quin/quartet, and try to imagine a rotting ole theater filled with bug-eyed friends.

Ah, yes, this is the Good Ol' Grateful Dead, something timeless, something suspended, something with us, still.

TIGDH: Closing Night of the Warfield Run 10/14/80

(TIGDH = Today in Grateful Dead History)

This post first appeared on the Phish.net forum on October 14, 2019.

No matter how you slice and dice Grateful Dead history, 1980's Warfield > Saenger > Radio City run will always stand alone. The three set affairs, beginning acoustic, produced the releases Dead Set and Reckoning, platters that set a new generation of Deadheads' palates and expectations for the concert experience. I didn't realize just how much this was true until I started collecting. 1980 pointed toward the future of the band.

Well, the Warfield run set that bar high, and there are many highlights to be had in that 15-show-run! Everything climaxed, though, in the full show that is 10/14/80. Each set is full to brimming with great material. If the first set, especially the closing run of China Doll, Heaven Help, Bird Song, and Ripple, doesn't float your boat, try a different genre.

The second and third sets are both above average, well above average, and even great, with generous portioning. Much like the closing run of the acoustic, it's as though the band was playing with more intention drawing closer to the finish line of the first electric set. The Tennessee Jed > Let It Grow > Wheel > Music Never Stopped run is testimony to this.

The third set is a cup that runneth over. I count 7 heavy hitters in one set from an era that is easily overshadowed (still) by that core reactor meltdown of May 77. But this is fuller in some ways than that reedier era a few years before. The sound is spare and open in 1980, and yet there is a density to the bottom boosted by Brent's organ and Phil's recently revamped Alembic rig that tickles some of our fancies in just the right way. Scarlet> Fire, Estimated-> Terrapin> Playin> Drums> Space> Miracle> Uncle John's> Morning Dew> Playin? Sign me up!

Give it a spin, and if you're feeling really ambitious, toast the crowd, the band, and the late-great Bill Graham for achieving the impossible: Sneaking 2,300 glasses of champagne out into the audience so that they could toast the band after an electrifying run! (I'm fairly certain that wasn't the only liquid in those glasses.)

Full show:

https://archive.org/details/gd80-10-14.sbd-aud.gardner.3828.sbeok.shnf/

Charlie Miller's electric mix:

https://archive.org/details/gd1980-10-14.137560.sbd.miller.flac1648

Decent downloadable FOB of the entire show:

https://archive.org/details/gd1980-10-14.fob-nak700.ellner-marino.gmb.89632.sbeok.flac16

TIGDH: post-Jerry content–07/21/2001 Hartford

 (TDIGH = Today in Grateful Dead History)

TIGDH: "My Strange Heroes Lead Me On"–Disco Biscuits, Ratdog, Phil and Friends at Hartford Meadows on 7/21/2001

The "Q": Rob Barraco, Jimmy Herring, John Molo, Phil Lesh, Warren Haynes, c. 2001.

After the Furthur Festival in 1996 in Veneta, OR, I stopped seeing post-Jerry Dead-related shows (one exception: the Zen Tricksters). They were crushingly disappointing. In Veneta, all the gang was there: Kesey, Babbs, Jorma, even the Flying Karamazov Brothers. None of it, not even being sprayed by Kesey's mysterious fire extinguisher from atop the Furthur replica, "Further," could fill that giant hole in my heart and the music.

Fast forward to 2001. I had moved back to New England to strap in to the work-life imbalance we call adulting. It was a bumpy ride. A friend of mine from Oregon insisted I attend a run of "Phil and Friends" shows in the South during my school's April break. She plied me with recent recordings, and I was moved enough to ascent. So, as it happened, on 4/19 and 4/20/2001, I jumped back on the proverbial bus. Phil's quintet of friends blew my mind.

Naturally, the following summer, I just had to see as many "Q" shows as possible. Hartford Meadows fell right into the middle of that run. A hot summer day in Connecticut with friends and family, my old show crew mashing up against my new show crew, I was back into the dreamy swirl. Upon entering the venue, I spied Rob Barraco awaiting a radio interview, and we chatted about some of the weirder Zen Trickster shows I had seen. One, in particular, held in a downtown PDX office building, seemed to stir his memory and generate a wide smile.

Honestly, I don't remember much of the Disco Biscuits. We were grooving to them as we settled into our pavilion seats. What stands out most is that the shed seemed almost empty. We were awaiting Ratdog, who did not disappoint. This was not the stripped down Ratdog of 1996, and much to my surprise, they jammed! This was not the last Ratdog show I saw, as a result, logging many, many more in the years to come. My older sister and I both enjoyed this portion as Bobby was the hook which drew us into the Grateful Dead. (Jerry was the club to the head once we'd been pulled into the boat.)

While 4/20/2001's Phil show was some of the weirdest and deepest psychedelic shit I'd ever seen up to that point in life (and that includes the Warlocks, 3/29 & 9/20/90), this Hartford show represented new heights. Phil, Jimmy, Warren, Rob, and Molo demonstrated that they could blesh into a single organism. This entity fluidly accepted Bobby in for a couple of numbers during the first set, only to let him go and reform around the business at hand. And what a business! No one in our area of the shed stopped moving until the music stopped.

The "Q" absorbed Bobby and then let him go.

The bleshing phenomenon with this band can give one whiplash, be it from headbanging or just trying to determine what's happening. Warren's teases start with Devo's "Whip It" in the opening jam, continue with "Elanor Rigby" out of Beautifully Broken, and, of course, there are Allman's noodles galore. Most impressive to me, though, is that these guys are playing Grateful Dead material but making it sound very much their own. In that manner, this group transcended the trap of "cover band," and I never heard anyone disparage them in this manner. It is one sound; group mind; bleshed.

Listen for yourselves. While this may not be the most psychedelic Phil show (2/18/2001 and 04/20/2001 retain those crowns), this is by far the most fluid. The entire second set flows as a single thought WITHOUT PAUSE. While I chased the Q for the next couple of years, they never quite reached this height again. It is remarkable music they made on this hot July Saturday, and it deserves your listening attention. You will be rewarded.

Disco Biscuits opening set.

Ratdog's contribution.

Phil Lesh and Friends, aka the "Q."

TMIGDH: November Laryngitis Yields January 1979

 (TMIGDH = This Month in Grateful Dead History)

This post first appeared on the Phish.net forum on January 21, 2019.

When, in November of 1978, the Dead had to cancel five shows because of Jerry's "laryngitis," I'm pretty certain that other alarm bells were going off in various heads. The tour picked back up in mid-December, and the band rescheduled the missed gigs as part of a 20-show East Coast and Midwest run January and February of 1979. However, Garcia's voice would never be the same again, and these two legs would prove to be Keith and Donna's final shows.

I won't even consider what one must be smoking to induce TWO BOUTS of voice-stealing laryngitis in one year. January of 1978 was the Laryngitis/Bob tour, as Jerry's throat was suffering; and these late-November, early-December 1978 East Coast dates were cancelled for the same reason. However, dysfunction, at least during its most early onset, can reveal bold truths. One lesson from January of 78 was that the Grateful Dead was a vibrant machine that could bounce back from the lack of Jerry vocals. Would we miss the Jerr-bear ballad after Space? Would there be a deep well of empathy lacking after a Promised> Miracle> Good Lovin'? Sure. But dang-ola, this rock-n-roll stuff is fun, right? Some would even argue that Jerry's new "cracked" voice could induce more empathy.



So, here we are, in January 1979. The cancelled gigs had come somewhere between landing back home at SFO post-Pyramids (see "From Egypt with Love") and pre-Closing of Winterland. Whenever they were in the New York region, Belushi's Manhattan club house was open all night. Heady times. I just can't shake the idea that dope-sick Jerry hit it too hard after coming back from Egypt (I know, cringy). The Grateful Dead then slip back East (inconspicuously?) in a rare January tour. And it's a subdued affair. It's that post-holiday, deep winter exhaustion time for the rabid East Coast revelers, and your cancelled late-78 tickets gain you entry into several January shows. The venues are the usual suspects, even if the timing is off. (Philly on two consecutive Fridays with MSG and Nassau sandwiched in between. Weird.) Audiences (as evidenced on all the great audience recordings available) are near silent. Something else, though, something worse, is amiss.



What's worse than Jerry's (cough, cough) "throat condition"? Well, one dysfunction follows on the heels of another, right? Keith Godchaux is a literal non-entity this entire tour. Donna, too, comes and goes, taking lead vocals more consistently than caterwauling. Now, call me sick and twisted, call me cruel, but I think that all of this dysfunction had an electric effect on the remaining band members. Jerry, the cause of the late-Fall, early-Winter trouble, is now in a mood to make up for the earlier losses. There's a last-night-on-earth quality to some of the jams. The guitar volume is up, and every solo has a sense of searching. He even stays on stage to jam with the drummers for several Egyptian flavored passages throughout the tour, continuing that party. Godchaux, on the other hand, is asleep at the wheel, literally low in the mix, almost the entire mini-tour. He's fading out, literally.

At best, Keith could hit the down notes, rhythmically, acting as a somewhat melodic form of percussion, fermata-style. Jerry seems to notice, too, perking up where others lag. Dysfunction forces innovation, and Jerry, in Keith's absence, has room to open up and shine. The fewer the instruments, the more latitude his sound has to wander. A bit unsteadily, at first, the New Haven Peggy-O, for one example, exhales a spiraling Jerry passage that forms a dirt devil spin from an otherwise static landscape. During Minglewood, that night, in the space set aside for a keyboard break, Godchaux can't add much. Bob continues his slide experiments, and then Jerry steps up to lay waste with some searing, fuzzy blues peaks. The song is both disaster and sweet reward, and Jerry becomes master phoenix, always rising from the ashes.



While the Springfield gig had a miraculous Playin jam, worthy of listen (01/15/79), the New Haven gig (01/17/79) is a great example of how Jerry steps up, across the board, throughout this tour. The Shakedown opener is a monster. Steve Rolfe's FOB lays a clear foundation in Phil and the drummers, but Jerry leaps off the page and roams around the room. One can feel his extra mustard slinking out and about, even as his voice still suffers. Somewhere in the transition from Scarlet to Fire, Jerry, Bob and Phil nearly slip into Type II territory, and I can't help but think that the lack of keyboard support is what fuels this untethered exuberance.

Still, as many have pointed out over the years, this was an era of excessive repeats. The Miracle> Bertha> Good Lovin' triad appeared either as a tryptic or spread out over two nights. Miracle floated independently the most, and hearing the full three song combo on back to back nights was not unheard of. Take Estimated> Eyes, Terrapin> Playin, and Scarlet> Fire, spread them and some cowboy tunes around a bit, and you already have quite a chunk of the rotation. This is part of the reason why the return of Dark Star on the New Year was as miraculous as it was. Absent since 1974, Dark Star added a new spice much needed for the new Shakedown disco Dead.

Stagger Lee, Peggy-O, Jack-A-Roe, and From the Heart of Me had put a little pep into Jerry's ballad swagger late in 78, but Dark Star brings out a whole other element in Captain Trips. The first outing of the tour, from Nassau (01/10/79), is by far the more in-depth reading. Following a standard Miracle> Bertha> Good Lovin, the (north) East Coast return of Dark Star is the first since Boston 11/30/73. It's a nice two drummer jaunt, bouncy and upbeat, with quite a different flavor than the Wall of Sound era. As if that weren't sweet enough, the St. Stephen that follows is quite strong, and it's last time that Dark Star and St. Stephen would appear in the same show. Historic, though few could have imagined at the time.



The second Dark Star of the tour comes into being at Shea's Buffalo Theater (01/20/79). On the heels of an excellent, soaring Estimated-> Other One-> Drums-> Other One, this Dark Star is more a part of a whole than a number in and of itself. The jams into and out of Drums contain some very special space. Jerry is heavy on his Mutron filters, creating a delay effect I always came to associate with the best of nights of the early-80s when his fingering could be heard without interference. Jerry Moore's audience recording captures how intently this Saturday night Buffalo crowd came to listen.



The room is quiet, Shea's, and aside from the few appreciative hoots, claps or whistles, the overwhelming sound is that of a space full of ears. There's no synth wash, wobbling organ, midi honking, or Donna singing even (she was absent) to come between Jerry and the listening. The Dark Star is on the shorter side of the spectrum (about 9:22), but the clarity makes it a must listen. As with the masterful Playin' from 01/15/79 in Springfield, certain grooves in the Drums and Space jam preseage sounds of the early-80s while also pointing to a dreamier, more psychedelic era. I don't know, in some ways this defiant sounding hippie-Jerry captures the dissipation of Keith and Donna's departure. But it's more a whimper than a bang.



Donna drifts in and out of tour. Keith naps. The band returns to the Bay Area for one more Oakland gig, an environmental benefit, and a new chapter opens in April with Brent. By September, they sound like an entirely different band.

Fans of the late-70s sound shouldn't sleep on this sleeper of a tour. Though there is a certain amount of repetition, the set lists belie what is, at times, inspired playing.

Leg I: Northeast
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA (1/5/79)
Madison Square Garden, New York, NY (1/7/79)
Madison Square Garden, New York, NY (1/8/79)
Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY (1/10/79)
Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY (1/11/79)
The Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA (1/12/79)
Utica Memorial Coliseum, Utica, NY (1/14/79)
Springfield Civic Center, Springfield, MA (01/15/79)
Veterans' Memorial Coliseum, New Haven, CT (1/17/79)
Providence Civic Center, Providence, RI (1/18/79)
Shea's Theater, Buffalo, NY (1/20/79)
Masonic Temple, Detroit, MI (1/21/79)

Leg II: Midwest
Market Square Arena, Indianapolis, IN (2/3/79: set 1; set 2)
Dane County Coliseum, Madison, WI (2/4/79 set 1; set 2)
Tulsa Fairgrounds Pavilion, Tulsa, OK (2/6/79)*
*no known recording
Arena (U of Southern Illinois), Carbondale, IL (2/7/79)
Soldiers' and Sailors' Memorial Hall, Kansas City, KS (2/9/79)
Soldiers' and Sailors' Memorial Hall, Kansas City, KS (2/10/79)
Kiel Auditorium, St. Louis, MO (2/11/79)

Final Show: Bay Area
Oakland Coliseum, Oakland, CA (2/17/79)^

^ For more on this show, see @MJZ1974's awesome Workingman's Wednesday CCVIII.

TIGDH: 3-16-92 (Philly & Dew)

(TIGDH = Today in Grateful Dead History)

This post first appeared on the Phish.net forum on March 16, 2018.

Spring of 1992 was a bit rough for me. It wasn’t the job or the girlfriend trouble. It wasn’t the weather or the fact that I’d somehow ended up on the East Coast again. It wasn’t even the fact that we were entering another Presidential election year.

Spring of 1992 was tough for me because I was watching my beloved Grateful Dead fall to pieces. My first shows of the year were in Hampton. I had never stood stock still and felt “bored” during a Slipknot!, but I also couldn’t deny the truth. Something was missing. Yeah, there are some good tunes, I was excited for The Same Thing, and the Estimated-> He’s Gone, Space-> Wheel and So Many Roads touched me, but. . . . The second night didn’t really do much for me, either.

Hampton, aka "The Mothership"

My next stop was Landover. Ouch. The longest song of night one was Wave to the Wind. I was actually embarrassed (sorry, Phil, I still love ya!), and my girlfriend was like, “You’ve actually seen 100 of these shows?” Night two, while it had moments of transcendence, had moments of terror. Victim, Iko, Corinna and Jerry’s leaving the stage? WTF? That low energy I felt in Hampton portended some disastrous goings on with my beloved fat man. Of course, Jerry pulled out the Dark Star, but it wasn’t the same band as I had toured with in the late-80s and 1990.

The "Crap Center," which I used to call "Big Pringle"

We had a fun run up to Canada later in the tour, catching another Dark Star and two passable shows, but where was the ole magic? It was the beginning of a new era for the Dead (for me) in that shows merely had highlights, and the days of wall to wall slack jawed amazingness seemed to have gone the way of my favorite wingman, Brent Mydland. It was weird. It was so disappointing, that I didn’t even want to go whole hog on summer tour. (I ended up seeing Sonic Youth, Luna and Uncle Tupelo, combined, as many times as the Dead that year.)

I may never have returned to seeing Dead shows as regularly as I did had I not attended the Arizona shows in December. However, it remained a new era, one where a few songs (or shows) rose like a Phoenix from the stumbling ashes. All of which is to say, Philly. What the heck is it about the Spectrum? Why would everything come together there? Why was the Spectrum synonymous with Shakedown and Morning Dew? I think that the April 6, 1982 show had something to do with setting that precedent, but the Spectrum had a longer history than that (think 53 times from 1968-1995). Then, there was 3/24/86 of Persian Gulf USS New Jersey shelling fame.

The "Filthy Rectum" (Philly Spectrum) as Heads called it.

Well, as luck would have it, on this day in 1992, the Grateful Dead scraped their disintegrating selves together and pulled off a standard-good Dead show in a tour fraught with disappointment and fear (the end is near type fear). In 1992, the police were horrible, the lot scene was coming under major fire, the law was trying to smash our state. Jerry was dragging down their ship, but the one place of redemption was that dump of an arena in Philly! It boggles the imagination and pissed off West Coast heads! Philly? What in tarnation?

So, if you’re a history person, listen to Jerry pick up some bright light in the Corinna-> Scarlet-> Fire (in parts). Then, hear him anoint Philly (once again) with the best Dew of the tour. Sure, MSG may have gotten 9-16-87, but the Dead didn’t visit Manhattan on the Spring, Summer and Fall tour (they did the Spectrum) that year! There was something about the Dead in Philly, and if there’s one show to redeem the 1992 Spring Tour, this day in history’s show is it.

Enjoy it with a large grain of salt. If nothing else, listen to the Morning Dew.

https://archive.org/details/gd92-03-16.sbd.13571.sbefail.shnf/gd92-03-16d3t03.shn