The Blogging Hobby

Blogging is a great hobby - if you have ever thought of just wanting to keep some intellectual interest of yours pinned down a little better than purely in your head, I highly recommend it.

Among Blogger's very limited features - You Get What You Pay For, Corry reminds us, and as a Braudelian he means it - is the statistics function. I check occasionally to see hit counts (pretty steady around 250, declines to 150 if I have a fallow month, increases to 350 and higher depending on idiosyncrasies of people dropping links), see what people are reading.

That latter is especially nice, just to see people skimming around, maybe get their chiaroscuro on. It's nice to be read, even when the prose is balky.

Seeing this, and thinking of my readers, inspires me to inspect a few freshly drilled rabbit holes. Thank you, reader!

Take today, for example.

1.

I see that someone's been into my post about a dreamed-of Garcia sit-in with David Bromberg at the Boarding House in mid-June 1972.

2.

I get to the thinking about Summer 1972 in The City (probably cold and foggy), great City room, not much on Garcia's mind since John's mostly not around to arrange gigs, play off some charts? (Who would have been in Bromberg's band?) Maybe a beautiful, marked-up copy of Night Times in the front seat, find some parking, see the show? Yes, please.

That picture probably never actually posed itself, but a fella can dream.

3.

I was reminded by my reader that I had posted what did happen, Jerry laying down his licks for the folkie's Demon in Disguise (Columbia KC 31753, 1972) at Heider's, Wednesday June 21 - Saturday June 24 at Heider's. I had forgotten I had posted that stuff.

The Bromberg post mentioned harmonica player Will Scarlett sitting in, which

4.

led to me to think about the Garcia Band show at the Keystone, March 3, 1978, The List telling us not only that Scarlett sat-in, but that the band played two blues singletons, Little Walter's "Juke" and, putatively, Booker T & The MG's "Green Onions". See notes 7-9 for more.

5.

I wondered where those setlist details might have come (tape?), so I emailed Corry.

6.

It also led me deaddisc, and I thought its proprietor might like to transcribe some of that into his DID page. Long story short, I thought he might like to go through some of my "San Francisco Sessions" posts, and in getting links I did a little light housekeeping with those.

7.

Listen to "Juke".

8.

Listen to "My Babe".

9.

Discover in my notes that the second singleton on 3/3/78 actually wasn't "Green Onions", but Sonny Boy Williamson's "Help Me".

10.

Lament that there's no Jerry Site to update.

11.

This was actually occurring throughout: "Thank you, Reader!"

Friday Night at the Boarding House

edit: well, this is a first - turns out I had already posted a version of this. Heh heh. Presumably, this one is better.

April 13-16, 1973 saw Garcia "Four Nights at the Boarding House", two with Merl Saunders and The Group (JGMS), two with Old And In The Way (OAITW). So much about these shows tantalizes me – the legendary San Francisco venue, the only-in-the-Garciaverse blend of black and white, old and new, my love for the repertoires and performances of both bands, and the fact that of the four nights, and presumably at least nine sets/shows,[1] only one set circulates, the first set of the OAITW late show on Monday the 16^th (see shnid-100404 for the best copy, and my listening notes). We know a little about the other three nights from Rob Eaton: Friday the 13^th and Saturday the 14^th were represented among the Third Batch Betty Boards that he transcribed in 1996, and somewhere along the way (possibly also the Third Batch) he transcribed one of the Sunday night (4/15) bluegrass sets.

In this post I want to say just a bit more about Friday the 13^th, mostly triggered by a show review I found in the Stanford Daily.[2] I'll start with what we already knew, and then turn to what the review adds.

Metadata

The Soto-McNally-Arnold JG List, Garciaverse successor to the Soto List, had a listing for this show, which may have come from union contracts and/or the newspaper and other research of any of the named authors. I show a Barb "Scenedrome" listing (April 13-19, 1973, p. 18) and one in the Hayward Daily Review (April 6, 1973, p. 53) with scheduled 8 pm start.

Setlist

Rob Eaton contributed setlist details for the end of the show, updated by TJS staff:

--end set II--

Money Honey

Positively 4th Street

untitled-19730307

Night They Drove Old Dixie Down

Tape Archaeology

These details came from a sound recording, and I'd like to dig into a bit of tape archaeology.

When Betty Cantor-Jackson and Rex Jackson got together in 1972, they mixed and mingled their lives and their tape collections. The legendary Betty Boards could be more accurately, if less fetchingly, understood as the Cantor-Jackson Collection, the tapes they merged and then made (together and apart) during Rex's foreshortened life (d. September 5, 1976) and beyond it, Betty flying where it's wing-meltingly-hot to make some of the finest sound recordings in the long history of live music.

This gorgeous personal collection of professionaly-curated tape got washed away along with everything else in her life over a number of years, by the early '82 floods and by a spate of equally natural human disasters, muck that doesn't come off with a Q-Tip. The tape went from a box in Betty's San Anselmo basement to the world of storage units (somewhere in the world exist documents that could help us pin down details, I just haven't managed to uncover them yet), lost from memory until it wound up auctioned-off with a thousand or more of its companion Betty Boards around May 1986.[3]

For over nine years, this tape hid in a goat barn until, in late 1995, its possessor called Rob Eaton to investigate and, eventually, preserve it. Armed with wood-stemmed cotton swabs and rubbing alcohol, an oven to bake flaky oxide to a vinyl backing, sweating over an Otari 50/50 reel to reel->Apogee 500 A/D converter-> Panasonic SV3700 DAT setup, Eaton spent 700 of his 1996 hours annotating, cleaning, repairing, spinning, and presumably soaking in and enjoying some of the sweetest sounds ever captured live – a Third Batch of Betty Boards, including the last 40 minutes of the Garcia-Saunders group at the Boarding House on Friday, April 13, 1973.[4]

Now I will get even more arcane about this particular artifact.

Eaton's "Kingbee" List gave the following:

04/13/73 The Boarding House, San Francisco Ca - xcerpt
4.8, 039min, Sbd, A0D1, Reel Master->Dat 1, 44k,
10inch Master Reel@7.5ips 1/2trk->3700 x 0->3800 x 1

Though he's almost never mistaken, I thought Kingbee had tripped up on this one. I thought this must be reel #3 of a show recorded on 7" tape. I was wrong, KB was right as usual. Not that anyone cares, but let me run through my reasoning.

It has generally been my sense that Betty usually taped Garcia on 7" reels running at 7.5 ips or 10" reels running at 15 ips (about 48 minutes). Sometimes tape diameter and recording speed would cross to the other diagonal, but not that much. What we have here is a 10" reel running at 7.5 ips (96 minutes), just such an off-diagonal tape. And, I have finally come around to the idea that this could indeed be the last 40 minutes of a contemporary JGMS gig, on these parameters – this looks a lot like the 49 minute end-of-show tape that lived with 4/13/73, March 7, 1973. I also note that Lion's Share 7/5/73 gives 10-7.5 parameters, though that one is a 180 minute monster. So maybe this is how she was doing it at this time.

Show Review

Happily, recent gatherings give me a bit more to report. The Stanford Daily has been beautifully preserved and presented at http://stanforddailyarchive.com/. Thanks to all involved in making that happen. Among many other delights, it yielded a review by Jay Harlow of this Friday the 13th at the Boarding House. 

Garcia and Saunders "returned for a two-night stay" (following a three night run in January[5]), "joined by guitarist George Pichner [sic: George Tickner], ... an important enough part of the group to deserve equal billing." They were late in starting: "At 9:30 we got word that the band was still waiting for the bass player. Five minutes later he was outside looking for a parking space, and eventually came walking in through the audience, being occasionally booed and heckled." The show eventually kicked off just before ten with "That's A Touch I Like". Garcia's guitar plays like a good, dry white wine (it was already Palo Alto, after all).

A friend named Sarah helped with the vocals on some numbers, and particularly shone on "Honey Chile". Her voice ... blends very nicely with Garcia's guitar. .. In the middle of the set there was a long, beautiful instrumental number in which everyone had some solo space. ... Pichner [sic], who had been playing mostly rhythm guitar so far, did some good leads, à la Eric Clapton at times. His somewhat harsher tone sets off Garcia and Saunders very well.

Harlow namechecks Bill Vitt for us, and has high praise for the Mule: "bassist John Kahn was certainly worth waiting for. Both in backup and solo playing, he is a real stylist. At times the flair in his left-hand fingerings reminded me of a classical guitarist." He gives us a few more setlist details ("That's All Right", "Lonely Avenue" and "I Second That Emotion"), and it sounds like a good time, "first rate musicians really working together".

Beautiful.

Unfortunately, Harlow doesn't say anything about the electric violin player reported present at JGC (via TJS). I wonder if George Tickner did any fiddling?

In Sum

Armed with this new information, let me sum up in the form of a draft TJS-successor entry.

Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders

Boarding House

960 Bush Street

San Francisco, CA 94109

April 13, 1973 (Friday) - 10 PM

--unknown set and order status--

That's A Touch I Like

That's All Right

Lonely Avenue

I Second That Emotion

Honey Chile

--end set II--

Money Honey

Positively 4th Street

untitled-19730307

Night They Drove Old Dixie Down

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders

! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;

! lineup: Merl Saunders - keyboards;

! lineup: John Kahn - el-bass;

! lineup: George Tickner - el-g;

! lineup: Bill Vitt - drums;

! lineup: Sarah Fulcher - vocals.

! ?guest?: ?? – electric violin.

JGMF:

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19730413-01

! JGC: http://jerrygarcia.com/show/1973-04-13-boarding-house-san-francisco-ca/, noting "An unknown electric violinist sit in on this performance".

! db: none in circulation as of 8/11/2015.

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2011/09/boarding-house-960-bush-st-san.html

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/4JEC3

! ad: San Francisco Sunday Examiner and Chronicle Datebook 19730401p12

! listing: Hayward Daily Review, April 6, 1973, p. 53

! listing: San Francisco Sunday Examiner and Chronicle Datebook 19730408p04

! ad: San Francisco Sunday Examiner and Chronicle Datebook 19730408p11

! listing: "Scenedrome," Berkeley Barb, April 13-19, 1973, p. 18

! listing: Hayward Daily Review, April 13, 1973, p. 53

! listing: San Francisco Examiner, April 13, 1973, p. 35

! listing: San Francisco Examiner, April 13, 1973, p. 44

! review: [positive] Harlow, Jay. 1973. Garcia, Saunders 'Together' At Boarding House Theater In SF. Stanford Daily, April 17, p. 7. Accessed via http://stanforddailyarchive.com/, 7/2/2015

! personnel: Harlow (1973) namechecks the whole band (though, as a few weeks earlier at the Inn of the Beginning, Sarah is just Sarah). The author identifies "George Pichner", but it's George Tickner on second guitar.

! setlist: The show was scheduled for 8, but started closer to 10 (John Kahn was late arriving). The set structure is uncertain beyond that That's A Touch opens the proceedings Dixie closes them down. I hypothesize that one of the sets was truncated due to the late start. For example, the songs from RE's reel transcription, Money Honey through Dixie Down, could be the entirety of set II. The rest of the songs derive from a review in the Stanford Daily (Harlow 1973), and I place them in set I, though that's not certain.

! song: " untitled 19730307" is the beautiful unnamed thing Jerry and Sarah did together on the March 7, 1973 tape.

---

[1] Normally, I'd say eight sets/shows, two sets per night for JGMS and two shows per night for OAITW. But the circulating tape of 4/16/73b suggests that that show contained two sets, bringing our presumed set total to at least nine, and possibly as many as sixteen sets (2 for each JGMS date and 4 for each OAITW date).

[2] Harlow 1973.

[3] Budnick 2014.

[4] See Eaton 2015 for more detail.

[5] See my write-ups for 1/24/73 (http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2012/07/ln-jg1973-01-24jgmsearly-latesbd.html) and 1/25/73 (http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2012/07/ln-jg1973-01-25jgmsearly.html). Betty taped and Eaton transcribed 1/23, but it has never seen the wider light of day.

NRPS June 21-23, 1971 Boarding House - CANCELED

San Francisco Chronicle, June 21, 1971, p. 47.

Here's an interesting one that I don't quite know what to do with - NRPS and Rowan Bothers playing the Boarding House June 21-23, 1971.

Of course, Garcia was in France on 6/21, and even gaining back 7 or 8 hours he probably couldn't have been back to the City to play on Tuesday (6/22), though it's not impossible. Wednesday 6/23, however, our hero certainly could have been back and playing.

I do wonder who was playing pedal steel these first two nights, if the NRPS ended up playing?

**update, 5 minutes later **

Sometimes the answers to our questions are closer than we think. From SFC 6/22/71, p. 37:

I guess that's all I  have to say about that.

Jerry Garcia and David Bromberg, June 1972

David Bromberg played the Boarding House, 960 Bush Street (San Francisco, CA,94109) June 13-17, 1972.

Robert Dunn wrote a nice review in Night Times. This drew my eye because I recalled that Jerry recorded tracks for Demon in Disguise around this time. Indeed, he did:

Table xxx. Jerry Garcia and David Bromberg: Demon in Disguise sessions, Wally Heider's, June 21-24, 1972.

So I looked at this review to see if maybe there was a hidden Garcia-Bromberg Shared Stage ... but it was not to be. The reviewer never tells us which night he saw, but he does mention that harmonica player Will Scarlett came out and blew some - there's a 1st degree of Shared Stage separation, since Jerry and Scarlett played together any number of times. But it ain't Garcia playing with Bromberg.

Anyway, sound like some good shows, and there are some nice ads on the page, for color.

The Group In and Around the Sarah Era: Boarding House, 1/24/73

LN jg1973-01-24.jgms.early-late.sbd-nfagdtrfb.100216.flac1644

update: this post has so  many old links to the evil db.etree - please never use that URL. Substitute etreedb wherever you see db.etree. Thank you.

(Man oh man does Blogger's formatting suck. One can't compose online, because stuff can get lost [viz my long beautiful post on Wales-Garcia 1/26/72]. One can't compose in Word, because Blogger can't swallow even pretty basic formatting [or Word doesn't make it clear to Blogger what it's doing]. Anyway, sheesh.)

Listing for Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders at Boarding House, 960 Bush Street, San Francisco, CA, 94109, Tuesday-Thursday, January 23-25, 1973. Source: San Francisco Chronicle-Examiner Datebook, January 21, 1973, p. 4.

The Sarah Era

I have been listening to tapes and contemplating materials from the Sarah Era –the period from ca. January 14, 1973 through ca. October 2, 1973 during which Sarah Fulcher sang with The Group, Garcia-Saunders-Kahn-Vitt, around the San Francisco Bay Area. I have touched on the following (from the jgmf etree list):

1. 01/15/73 JGMS Inn Of The Beginning Cotati CA 9573 Listening Notes
2. 01/23/73 JGMS Boarding House San Francisco CA noncirc handbill, ads, discussion
3. 01/24/73 JGMS Boarding House San Francisco CA handbill, ads, discussion
4. 01/25/73 JGMS Boarding House San Francisco CA handbill, ad, discussion (2011); listening notes for shnid 7670 (2012).
5.  03/07/73 JGMS Keystone Berkeley CA listening notes
6.  05/04/73 JGMS Homer's Warehouse Palo Alto CA Listening Notes
7. 05/29/73 JGMS Ash Grove Santa Monica CA dating (?No Sarah?)
8. 05/30/73 JGMS Ash Grove Santa Monica CA dating (?No Sarah?)
9. 07/05/73 JGMS Lion's Share San Anselmo CA Listening Notes (no Sarah)
10.  07/10/73 JGMS Keystone Berkeley CA material from 7/10/73 on the Live at the Keystone releases (No Sarah)
11. 07/11/73 JGMS Keystone Berkeley CA material from 7/11/73 on the Live at the Keystone releases (No Sarah)
12. 07/19/73 JGMS Great American Music Hall San Francisco CA San Francisco Phoenix review, brief discussion
13.  09/01/73 JGMS Keystone Berkeley CA Keystone handbill for 9/1/73 and 9/2/73
14.  09/02/73 JGMS Keystone Berkeley CA Keystone handbill for 9/1/73 and 9/2/73
15. 10/02/73 JGMS Winterland (listening notes)

She is not present on either 10/11/73 or 10/12/73. For now, then, 10/2/73 at Winterland stands as the end of the Sarah Era, as presently documented. Even within it, her presence on any given night was not assured.

Live at the Keystone

She was absent from what would like have been two of the most financially- and perhaps professionally-consequential gigs of her life, the Jerry Garcia - Merl Saunders (JGMS) July 10-11, 1973 Keystone Berkeley shows.

July 1973 Keystone Berkeley calendar, courtesy of Fred Herrera and Merl Saunders, Jr.

The Group manifested --Freud first made me write "menifested", on which more at some point-- as the Garcia-Saunders-Kahn-Vitt quartet and recorded enough material to establish a lifetime of steady, modest income. The two nights have been released, and re-released, and re-re-released, nearly in toto over the years. On vinyl came Live at the Keystone (Fantasy F-79002, 1973), Keystone Encores, Volume 1 (Fantasy MPF 4533, 1988) and Keystone Encores, Volume 2 (Fantasy MPF 4534, 1988). Per Scofield, at the advent of the CD era “the tracks from the original double LP and the two 1988 releases were reconfigured and released as Live At The Keystone, Volume 1 (Fantasy FCD 7701-2, 1988), Live At The Keystone, Volume 2 (Fantasy FCD 7702-2, 1988) and Keystone Encores (Fantasy FCD 7703-2, 1988).” And I won’t even begin with the various compilations and re-releases.

[update, 8/1/2012: Looks like the shows will actually be released in toto later this year. Affirms the point, needless to say.]

As Corry’s “Jerry Garcia Album Economics, 1973-74 (John Kahn XIII)” lays out so well, Garcia et al. were looking remarkably like grownups in 1972-1973. Relatively speaking, of course. Merl had two high schoolers, and Merl Jr. remembers that the live album bought the family its first house. Garcia had his place with Mountain Girl and two little girls, Mountain Girl's daughter by Ken Kesey, Sunshine, and three-year old Annabelle (Trixie would be born the next year). This was the most domestic phase of Garcia's life, Dad not just a good provider, as one might have said, but often actually physically present. I am under the impression that both John Kahn and Bill Vitt had young kids as well.

So, time for some grownup business decisions to go with grownup responsibilities. These seem to have included the various personnel variations that we observe over the course of 1973. The year started with Tom Fogerty still billed, but, far as I can tell, apparently never playing with The Group again. Sarah. George Tickner as another possible second guitarist. Maybe a mystery trumpeter  (12/28/72) or two (7/5/73), try on some horn colors. Figure out who’s good, who’s cool, who knows the stuff or has the background or chops necessary to pick it up. Oh yeah, grownups, one more thing: choose who gets paid and who doesn’t. Sarah Fulcher didn’t. “Nothin’ personal, darlin’, just business,” they might have told her.

Performance

All of that by way of background for a great night of music at the Boarding House, 960 Bush Street, San Francisco, CA, 94109: Garcia-Saunders-Kahn-Vitt and Fulcher, Wednesday, January 24, 1973. Early and late shows, unknown start times, but running over 90 minutes each. Great performance by the whole band, one of the shows that bears repeated listening. Vintage Garcia-Saunders. It’s considerably better than 1/15/73 and, to my ears, a little better than the next night (1/25/73). SteveSw sums up my feelings on the performance very nicely when he says “this show is a much better example of what this configuration is capable of than the ones we listened to before”, i.e., from earlier in January. I may even like it (and especially certain numbers, such as “I Was Made To Love Her”) even more than Steve does. In fact, I'll go ahead and call it my favorite January 1973 material. Every number creates its own pop, as appropriate, or settles you down deep in some American musical pocket. Seriously, there is not a clunker in the whole bunch. Event Dixie Down had me singing and, perhaps for the first time in multiple hundreds of hearings, feeling a little sympathy, if still no empathy, for ol’ Virgil Caine. I feel like I am dancing about architecture here, but the music simply shines.

SteveSw suggests that those pressed for time check out this version of “Georgia On My Mind” (Allan | Scofield), and who am I to argue? I’d only further that you check out the “Jam” track from the early show tape (a-t07, “collective improvisation”). It has some "After Midnight" feel at the start, but really only Jerry and only at the very beginning. Merl plays some very period-distinctive brassy synth while Jerry and John let it melt a little bit. The real treat comes about 8:15 here is what I am thinking of as The Group’s ghost story. Sarah opens the funhouse door with some spooky vocalizations at 8:15. Jerry strikes like a brown on a Colorado caddis hatch, flirting with and even briefly touching “The Tiger” in the nine minute mark while Sarah’s phantom wails creep everyone out. It’s not clear that “this place as clean”, as the little lady in Poltergeist might say. One could really scare the neighbors with this Halloween night ha'nted house soundtrack, which runs probably 4 minutes all told (into the 12-minute mark). Fantastic, distinctive stuff!

After the ghost story, there’s more good listening for you. Jerry scales around a little, fast strumming and a little GD-flavored picking at 13:21. With no Bobby Ace on the scene to blow the vibe with "Me And My Uncle" (the flavor there in Jerry’s playing), things stay pretty unmoored until Garcia things down, pregnantly, in the late 14-minute mark, wailing a little over more synth & Sarah. Everyone sounds lonely, all together, for a while. I almost hear gentle strains of “Imagine”  before Sarah brings out the first-ever Garcia version –and, for all we know, one of the first-ever live versions by anyone, anywhere—of “Like A Road Leading Home”, church-time in Memphis. Great stuff.

Setlist

While I think the performance is particularly good, it’s also particularly enjoyable because there is just a lot of great American music finding expression here. The Group’s repertoire is broad, deep, well-rounded and pretty well-conceived as show and, if one were inclined to think this way, as possible (vinyl) product.

I begin by noting that there are no obvious “jam vehicles”, numbers seemingly designed to open up improvisationally . The modal tune probably clocked in in the 3-minute range on the AM radio dial in its original form. Garcia and Saunders, of course, are perfectly willing to make room, so we get extended, funkified, street-struttin’ versions of Steve Wonder’s great “I Was Made To Love Her”, the Soul Survivors’ “Expressway (To Your Heart)” and Martha Reeves’s scorching rave-up “Honey Chile”, the players bobbing and weaving and Sarah, the Satin Doll, rocking the mic. They stretch out nicely on some blues, as well.

Related to the lack of specific improvisational vehicles, The Group plays no Merl Saunders compositions this night. The next night, they’d do no fewer than three.

There were not really any Garcia, Kahn or Vitt compositions to play, but there were a couple of mysterious tunes that I presume to have been written by, or at least for, Sarah Fulcher, both of which appeared in the late show. “Find A Rainbow” (Allan) is a pleasant midtempo that finds Jerry starting with his best Tom Fogerty/George Tickner impression, pretty straight chunka-chunka, gradually smoothing and fattening his tone. Sarah sounds absolutely lovely, trying to find a rainbow, despite looking out dirty windows … and Jerry … mellifluous. Some of Sarah’s improvisations fall flat in the 6-minute mark, but overall this is a lovely piece of music. As far as we know, it would never be played live again. “Go Climb A Mountain” (Allan), has some nice anthemic qualities that Garcia perceptively pushes, building himself up, John joining in, releasing the tension, working it back up. I could hear this song opening itself up to double-time jam of the sort we get on 5/5/73, but it doesn’t happen, an unrealized (and possibly wholly imagined!) possibility.

Songs

Here are some comments on specific songs.

a-t01 "Hi-Heel Sneakers" was a 1964 #1 R&B hit for Tommy Tucker, a.k.a. Robert Higginbotham, on Checker Records (Checker 1067) (Allan | Scofield | wiki). It's a fucking fantastic tune, such a wonderful feel, the steppin'-out-on-a-Sunday, bible-in-my-hand-but-razor-in-my-belt trope of Lackawanna Blues, an “uptempo 12-bar blues” (wiki). This version gets my toe-tapping, though I don’t think I have ever encountered one that didn’t. Go listen to Tommy Tucker do it, though absolutely everyone else did it, too, including the Dead on at least two occasions (11/19/66 and 8/3/69).

a-t03 "That's All Right" is commonly referred to among Garcia/GD-oriented listkeepers as "Who's Loving You Tonight?", but that is incorrect (Allan | Scofield [WLYT?, TAR]). This is a tune written by Jimmy Rogers. It is distinct from "That's Alright Mama", written by Arthur 'Big Boy' Crudup, though it is mistakenly credited to him on the Merl Saunders CD Keepers (Fantasy, FCD-7712, 1997). I had originally mistakenly listed the composer as Jimmy Rodgers, "the Singing Brakeman". The correct author, Jimmy Rogers, "was Muddy Waters' rhythm guitar player for much of the 50's. His given name was Lane but he took Rogers after his step-father." Thanks to commenter Paul for the correction and additional color!

There is a strong case for common usage (i.e., WLYT?) here, but I will resist it and stick with the correct title, as best I can determine. After this third known JGMS performance, they’d shelve it for a year, revive it briefly in early 1974 (1/17/74, 3/9/74), and retire it from the stage for the rest of Garcia’s career. One final Jerry would play this song as part of a wonderful medley of Jam -> That’s Alright Mama -> That’s All Right on about 10/2/75 at His Master’s Wheels studio in San Francisco (60 Brady Street) during the Reflections sessions. I need to revisit that great piece of music and see if I can glean anything from it.

a-t04 “Honey Chile” (Allan | Scofield). Motown female sensations Martha Reeves and the Vandellas had a 1967 hit (Gordy G 7067, released 10/14/67) with this in-your-face number about a woman who just loves him too much to leave the man who done her wrong (in addition to being shiftless, lazy, and no-good). Wiki: " the tune rose to number eleven on the Billboard pop singles chart and number five on the Billboard R&B singles chart." The Jackson 5 covered it in 1971, but Sarah Fulcher's rendition is quite certainly inspired by Martha Reeves. This is one of only 8 versions documented at Jerrybase, all of them presumed to be sung by Sarah Fulcher.

a-t06 "Are You Lonely For Me" goes by a few different titles in the (GD/Garcia) Lists, including "Last Train To Jacksonville". Allan and Scofield are not consistent (Scofield includes ", Baby?"). For now I will use the version without extraneous punctuation (the comma and question mark). It was “written and produced by Bert Berns (aka Bert Russell)” and “first recorded by Freddie Scott” (Shout Records, 1966), who had it #1 on the Billboard Hot Rhythm & Blues charts for four weeks in early 1967 (wiki; NB Scofield says charted in 1966). Commenter nick has suggested that Jerry and Merl probably got the song from Al Green's 1971 breakout Al Green Gets Next To You (wiki). Now, I know thatmMaking data parsing easier is not a good reason for my titling choice, but I don’t know how to judge, otherwise, from among the alternatives. So I choose the version without the comma and question mark.

Garcia-Saunders did this tune a documented 10 times between 1972 and 1974 (JB). The Grateful Dead, playing as Jerry Garcia and Friends and backing up none other than Bo Diddley, played the song at least once, on March 25, 1972 at the New York Academy of Music (Deadlists | dead.net). The earliest known Garcia On The Side version (though 3/25/72 might count!) comes from the legendary 6/30/72 (JGMF) show, is a real monster, stretching to a long and spacy jam. This is the second documented version. It was more frequent in 1974, including the very well-known Rheem Theater tape (2/9/74).

a-t08 "Like A Road Leading Home" is a beautiful piece of Don Nix / Dan Penn Stax poetry (Allan | Scofield | JB) understood to be making its Garcia debut here. Sarah put it on her record Sarah & Friends (TMI 30968, 1971) (Arnold | Scofield | Billboard), which Steve Cropper produced in Memphis. Corry first hypothesized that Sarah brought the tune to The Group, and I think this seems undeniable. She takes the vocals entirely on her own. Since I believe the band rehearsed at least a time or two with Sarah, trying to concatenate repertoires all while, y’know, learning to play together, I suspect Sarah had played her record for Jerry/John/Merl/whomever. But they might already have been familiar with the tune. Commenter nick notes that Like A Road appeared on Albert King's 1971 Lovejoy (wiki), and spending a little time with that record, it certainly seems like something Garcia would have had in his record collection.

Jerry clearly fell in love with the song, if not the songstress. Within a few months he was singing it on his own, as a kind of featured “sweet” Garcia vocal, and we are fortunate to have great tapes from ca. 5/29/73 (dit “5/23/73”), 7/5/73 and 7/11/73, the latter version appearing on the Live at the Keystone double LP (Fantasy F-79002, 1973). To my ear, he rarely struggled with the lyrics, which tended to be the case with songs that Jerry loved to sing, specifically. Why Sarah was not present to sing it, or anything else on those other early “Like A Road” nights, nor to share in the financial rewards of the Fantasy release, remains unclear. Jerry and Merl played it a few more times post-Sarah (into 1974). It would appear in Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) a little in 1981 setlists. From 1984 until the end of his life Jerry would play it regularly enough to be together, but rarely enough that it always felt special, a little church for the lost and weary soul.

b-t04 "Georgia On My Mind" is a super-rarity (JB). I need to complete this note, but NB it first appeared on 12/28/72. Sarah was in town in December. I wonder if she was there, or if they had already been working a few things up with her?

The Merle [sic] Saunders Experience: Boarding House, January 25, 1973

LN jg1973-01-25.jgms.early-late.sbd.7670.shn2flac1644

Introduction

Not long ago I posted a set of notes on JGMS 1/15/73 at the Inn of the Beginning, the second known date (and the earliest circulating tape) of the Garcia-Saunders-Kahn-Vitt group to include singer Sarah Fulcher. The Sarah Era, as I’ll call it, holds lots of appeal: she’s a mysterious figure about whom little is known; she is a totally distinctive vocalist; she was only around Garcia for nine months or so (1973); she came from Memphis (though she’s a Texan), providing a direct vein to a vast American musical tradition that surely interested Jerry Garcia, even if he hadn’t done much around it; and during her time with The Group they played lots of numbers that they had never played before and would never play again, among them a couple of presumed Fulcher originals (“Go Climb A Mountain” [Allan | TJS] and “Find A Rainbow” [Allan | TJS]).

1/15/73 had left me a little mixed. I enjoyed it, but it didn’t spark much for me. It’s always possible that this is determined to some (possibly large) degree by the particularities of any given listen. But it’s also possible that I was hearing a band that is trying to integrate a new player, trying to figure itself out. And that can be a little bit like work (for the band, if not the listener!). And that’s why one goes up to Cotati to start breaking in a new thing. Having now listened to a show that I confuse in my mind with that one, because of the numeric similarities –1/25/73, Boarding House—I feel more inclined to buy the latter scenario. What I hear on 1/25/73 suggests a unit that is getting itself together. There are many really nice moments, but it still feels like everyone is sort of feeling things out a little bit. One wonders the extent to which album economics are on Jerry’s, and everyone’s mind, as they try to get a vinyl-ready band and repertoire together.

Metadata

There seems little doubt but that the date/location attributions are correct. Merl Saunders, Jr. has shared a handbill image listing Garcia-Saunders-Fogerty at the Boarding House (960 Bush Street, San Francisco, 94109) for special, three-night, midweek engagement. Neither that source nor the other materials I have seen (Scenedrome listing in Berkeley Barb, January 19-25, 1973, p. 28; ad in San Francisco Examiner Datebook, January 21, 1973, p. 25; calendar listing in Hayward Daily Review, January 19, 1973, p. 23) list early-late shows. But two separately-ticketed shows seems perfectly plausible. What’s more, of course, they are supported by these tapes, which have Garcia giving two separate show-closing announcements ("see y'all later").

These tapes were part of the Betty Boards, which is how we came to hear them. I have seen the reels, which are clearly labeled.

While I am in this neck of the woods, let me say again that there is absolutely no evidence for a 1/26/73 listing of JGMS at Boarding House. Old, mislabeled copies of 1/24/73 shouldn't outweigh the absence of JGMS listings and the presence of listings (newspaper and poster) for Harry Chapin on these nights.

Performance

I’d say this is considerably better than 1/15/73, Jerry especially. He is doing a lot of very thoughtful, inventive playing here. There are a number of quite delicate passages and loud, dissonant, wildly-fanning moments. John Kahn plays quite forward, with a number of longish soli/interludes. He doesn’t have a ton of pure string force here, but he’s right on the melody and plays effectively. He  may be out a little more because I find Merl struggling a little bit, leaving some holes where, to my ears, he should have been dropping some heavy swirl. This seems especially true during the early show (@ 7:20 of Summertime, and during I Second That Emotion). I find Vitt to be right on the ball, though again there is a time or two where Jerry had soloed, John had taken a few runs around, and someone needed to step up. Sarah is pretty lowkey and effective this night.

Band and Personnel

Master reels identify the band as "Merle [sic] Saunders Experience", which is super interesting, for those who are into band names and that sort of thing. Tom Fogerty had jokingly suggested this as a possible band name in late 1972 (Selvin 19720927), and apparently The Group and/or or Rex Jackson (who labeled the tape boxes) took him up, with unknown level of seriousness.

Tom Fogerty appeared on the promotional materials, but did not play. In fact, he may never have played with The Group in 1973. We just don’t know.

Sarah Fulcher had been singing at these guys’ gigs for about two weeks at this point. We don’t actually know the precise date on which she first appeared live with The Group. I doubt it was the weekend (Friday-Saturday, January 12-13, 1973) shows in Berkeley. She *could* have sung a number or two, of course. But I find it much more plausible that her first gig would have been a nice, low-key Sunday evening in little Cotati (1/14), than a hot, sweaty run at a packed house of regulars.

On this Thursday night in the city (1/25), Sarah either hasn’t arrived or in any case sits out almost the whole early show, not making her entrance until midway through the last number, and then just singing a few bars. In the late show she first appears singing what I presume to be one of her originals, "Go Climb A Mountain". I’d want to go back and compare with other versions, but the song sounds compositionally fragmentary here, both musically and lyrically. Sounds like she’s workshopping it, you know? She doesn't back or alternate with JG on “That’s Alright Mama”, as she often did. She only comes into “Georgia On My Mind” about six minutes in. She throws a few lyrics into the show-closing “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)”. What’s striking is how subdued she sounds, and how sparingly she steps out. It’s not a bad vibe at all, I have to say.

Setlist

The main historical interest here (insofar as deviance is more interesting than conformity) lies in the setlist. I summarize it in Table 1, which gives the “official” JGMF title, the number of times played as documented at the Jerry Site as of this writing (N), the song timing on the tape under review, the song credits, and any notes I might have, especially about N.

This is a tremendous setlist from a rarity perspective. If we use a rough-and-ready indicator of song rarity as "fewer than ten known appearances", 6 of the 15 tunes here qualify (40%). Of course, we know very little about these early setlists. It could be that they played "Save Mother Earth" -> "Summertime" every night in 1970 and 1971. Who knows? Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" appears here for the second-to-last (known) time in the 1970s. "I Know It's A Sin" is a real rarity—Jerry just didn’t play that many blues as straight as this. “Biloxi” is only known to have been played three times, though I have a sneaking suspicion that they played it a lot in the early days.

I judge all of this in the context of January 1973. Whether or not they (or any subset of them) were thinking ahead to a group that could sell records (e.g., on Fantasy, à la Live at the Keystone [F-79002, 1973]), they pretty clearly seemed to be feeling each other out as players and as a potential Group. Tom Fogerty appears to have just left, and Sarah Fulcher appears to have just arrived. Recall that Merl didn’t sing in 1973. It seems plausible to think that Jerry was interested in someone who might shoulder some of the vocal chores, at least a number or two: Tom had done a little and that was clearly what Sarah was all about. A second guitar was another apparent desideratum, witness George Tickner, who would be around for a couple of weeks in April-May. Corry persuades me that this must have been a period strongly colored by album economics (see also my post on JGMS 5/4/73 Homers Warehouse, especially under heading III, “May 1973 and the Commercialization of Garcia On The Side”), i.e., that the choices being made were consequential, far from the structural spontaneity that is portrayed in canonical (and even PR-fueled contemporary) accounts.

We can think of each player as embodying a distinct musical bundle as well, in terms of taste, inclination, knowledge, background, experience, goals for the future, etc. Beyond personality and talent, then, stands a musical repertoire. For a band, or a Group, to work, repertoires need to be made to fit together. That’s practically the definition of society itself, the space in which people conjugate repertoires. So, while January 1973’s setlist variations look striking from the perspective of 25+ years of Garcia On The Side, I think once I listen to everything I can I’ll find that the Sarah Era hangs together, on its own musical terms, pretty well. And while it varies in the specifics of the individual titles, it is perfectly consistent in terms of the basic American musical wellspring from which everything is drawn.

So, what are these repertoires?

Let me start with a few words on the Merl Saunders compositions. Who are these writing partners of his? Does it seem likely that Fantasy had a “stable” and that these compositions were written, arranged, etc., at Fantasy (in the “House That Creedence Built”, at Tenth and Parker in Berkeley [wiki]), by Fantasy, and presumably (at least in Saul Zaentz and Ralph Gleason’s minds), for Fantasy’s benefit? The idea has been floated that, in JGMS (“The Group”), Fantasy might have thought it had a kind of supergroup. That’d be worth investing some songwriters’ time. Anyway, I find both “Save Mother Earth” and “The System” to be first-rate, right up there with Merl’s other compositions played as instrumentals by JGMS, including “Little Bit Of Righteousness”, “She’s Got Charisma” and “Merl’s Tune”. I am not a big fan of “Soul Roach”, generally speaking, so I exclude it from that laundry list. It lacks the dark underbelly that makes the others so deliciously ambivalent.

Lots of R&B hits appear in this setlist, as well. “That’s A Touch I Like” shares some of the steppin’ out vibe of “Hi-Heel Sneakers”, a little more earnest and without the bloodlust, while the other Jessie Winchester number, “Biloxi”, hides a quasi-psychedelic New Orleans voodoo vision (“The air is filled with vapors from the sea / The boy will dig a pool beside the ocean / He sees creatures from his dreams underwater”) inside a sultry tempo, with a real straight vocal delivery. “Summertime”, the Gershwins’ aria from Porgy and Bess, can also make you lose sense, perhaps even memory, of January in San Francisco. Steamy. “How Sweet It Is”, by contrast, is a confection. A couple rockabillies (“Mystery Train”, “That’s Alright Mama”), a couple Dylans, another standard (“Georgia On My Mind”), a straight blues (“I Know It’s A Sin”) and a presumed (by me) Sarah Fulcher original (a protean “Go Climb A Mountain”) mix things up nicely.

Is there a black American musical form unrepresented here? Funk, I suppose. And church music. But, blending various flavors of jazz, blues, soul, R&B and other forms, Garcia and his compatriots grazed over an awful lot of terrain, with Vitt’s Sacramento R&B and Sarah’s Memphis (if only via) contributing influences which would wane in future years.

Summary

Some really nice tape with which to spend a few hours!

Listening Notes

Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders

Boarding House

960 Bush Street

San Francisco, CA 94109

January 25, 1973 (Thursday)

161 min Betty Cantor-Jackson sbd of early and late shows

--Early Show (6 tracks, 67:44)--

a-t01. That's A Touch I Like [9:30] [0:28]

a-t02. Save Mother Earth [15:11] ->

a-t03. Summertime [13:50] [0:15]

a-t04. Mystery Train [6:59] [0:18]

a-t05. Biloxi [7:48] [0:03]

a-t06. I Second That Emotion [13:10] (1) [0:10]

--Late Show (9 tracks, 93:25)--

l-t01. It Takes A Lot To Laugh, It Takes A Train To Cry [5:45] [0:06] %

l-t02. //Soul Roach [#7:22] [0:19]

l-t03. Go Climb A Mountain [12:25] [0:21]

l-t04. That's Alright Mama [7:44] [0:15]

l-t05. The System [19:12] ->

l-t06. Georgia On My Mind [15:28] [0:03]

l-t07. When I Paint My Masterpiece [6:02] [1:01]

l-t08. I Know It's //A Sin [8:#49] [0:04]

l-t09. How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) [8:25] (2) [0:03]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;

! lineup: Merl Saunders - keyboards;

! lineup: John Kahn - el-bass;

! lineup: Bill Vitt - drums;

! lineup: Sarah Fulcher - vocals.

JGMF:

! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; ... = fade in/out; # = truncated timing; [ ] = recorded event time. The recorded event time immediately after the song or item name is an attempt at getting the "real" time of the event. So, a timing of [x:xx] right after a song title is an attempt to say how long the song really was, as represented on this recording.

! TJS: http://www.thejerrysite.com/shows/show/892 (early show), http://www.thejerrysite.com/shows/show/893 (late show).

! db: http://db.etree.org/shn/7670 (this fileset).

! R: Lineage per seeder: "S:R>C>D>CD. Slightly re-tracked using WaveMerge and CDWave,.shn encoding using mkwACT, and proper sector boundaries verified using shntool by jupillej@mediaone.net." Seeded approximately January 15, 2002. This fileset retracked by show, files tagged by jgmf, 7/4/2012. I believe that this came out of the Third Betty Batch, and maybe that these tapes specifically were caked in mud and filth when RE restored them. But it might also be Second Betty Batch, which would seem to me more consistent with the stated sequence of a reel straight to a cassette (for whatever the statement is worth). The back of my mind tells me that this may have come from Katy Miller way back when (ca. 2001).

! SteveSw writeup: http://gdvault.com/tracker/forum.php?action=viewtopic&topicid=2605

! date/location: Merl Saunders, Jr. has shared a handbill image listing Garcia-Saunders-Fogerty at the Boarding House (960 Bush Street, San Francisco, 94109) for special, three-night, midweek engagement. Neither that source nor the other materials I have seen (Scenedrome listing in Berkeley Barb, January 19-25, 1973, p. 28; ad in San Francisco Examiner Datebook, January 21, 1973, p. 25) list early-late shows. But two separately-ticketed shows seems perfectly plausible. Of course they are supported by these tapes, which have Garcia giving two separate show-closing announcements ("see y'all later"). While I am at it, there is absolutely no evidence for a 1/26/73 listing of JGMS at Boarding House. Old, mislabeled copies of 1/24/73 shouldn't outweigh the absence of JGMS listings and the presence of listings (newspaper and poster) for Harry Chapin on these nights.

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2011/09/boarding-house-960-bush-st-san.html

! personnel: Sarah Fulcher doesn't show up until 2 minutes into ISTE, i.e., at the very end of the early show. In the late show she first appears singing what I presume to be one of her originals, which we denote "Go Climb A Mountain". She doesn't back or alternate with JG on TAM, as she often did. She only comes into GOMM about six minutes in. She throws a few lyrics into the show-closing HSII, and it's all good.

! personnel: Tom Fogerty appears on the poster, but he is not present here.

! setlist: This is a tremendous setlist from a rarity perspective. If we use a rough-and-ready indicator of rarity as "fewer than ten known appearances", 6 of the 15 tunes here qualify (40%). Of course, we know very little about these early setlists. It could be that they played "Save Mother Earth" -> "Summertime" every night in 1970 and 1971. Who knows? Dylan's "When I Paint My Masterpiece" appears here for the second-to-last (known) time in the 1970s. "I Know It's A Sin" is a real rarity, as is “Biloxi”. All of that said, it certainly feels like, in January 1973, they are feeling out a repertoire well-suited to the talents and interests of those "in the band", including, apparently, Sarah Fulcher. So we should certainly think of this show in the context of the Sarah Era.

! R: CD splits typically between Biloxi/ISTE and between TAM and The System.

! R: Lots of warts on this, as a result presumably of the deteriorated state of the tapes. "A variety of mostly harmless light snaps, crackles, and pops".

! song: a-t01 That's A Touch I Like. This is commonly referred to in Garcia-world with the definite article ("The" instead of "A)", but I follow Allan and Scofield with this usage (see also TJS).

! R: a-t02 Save Mother Earth two ticks @ 0:01

! R: a-t02 SME lots of static and crackles through ca. 3:00

! P: a-t02 SME ten minutes in, Garcia drops it beautifully into some high register 1, 2-3, 4-5, 6-7, 8 stuff, and they slide very effectively into deep space. Tasty.

! P: a-t03 Summertime interesting that Sarah does not sing here. Summertime is unbelievable at the start. Jerry is playing as delicately, pluckily as you can possibly imagine at the start. Merl setting in deep, too. Two minutes in, Garcia is penning long paragraphs, mournful love letters. High soaring peak at three minutes in. He just surveyed that terrain and proceeded to tear it up. The solo he runs right over the 4-minute mark leaves me breathless. Maybe him, too, because Merl steps in real tasty and Jerry comps behind him. Jerry is running around, ready for bear, and things kind of fall apart in the 7:20 mark, no-one soloing, no-one going anywhere. Ouch! JK does some nice fluttering, symphonic bass in the late 7-minute mark. But there's no reason that giant hole should have opened up in the song. Now, late 8-min mark, Jerry is comping for John, soundfeels like he's nodding and strumming demonstratively and engaging John directly. As they take the descent again first half of 9-min mark, Jerry leads and Merl fills really nicely. JG comping for Merl again, who is doing lots of nice electric piano through 9 and into 10-minute mark. @ 10:34 JG, having seemingly mounted a set of stairs in silence, comes swooping down with some much more aggressive play, Vitt answers with a quick tempo dig, as in "I am on that horse." Every now and then, as in the 12-minute mark, the JGMS version of this song puts me in mind of Pink Floyd's "Shine On You Crazy Diamond" (which I don't think was written yet). Garcia wisely takes the lead in winding them down. It was an interesting take, for sure.

! song: a-t05 "Biloxi". This is commonly referred to in Garcia-world as "Down Around Biloxi", but I follow Allan and Scofield in using "Biloxi".Scofield: “One of three Jesse Winchester songs covered by Jerry Garcia. The others being That's A Touch I Like and Every Word You Say”). This is the last of three known Garcia versions of this song (9/24/71 and 6/30/72 being the other two known instances) (TJS).

! R: a-t05 Biloxi static buzz @ 1:00

! P: a-t06 I don't generally have a lot great to say about any iteration of "I Second That Emotion" other than Smokey Robinson's canonical version. This version is consistent with that general pattern. Merl just never cuts loose with it. Jerry comps behind him a lot, gives him lots of room, and he just doesn't take the bull by the horns. As SteveSw says, "I'm not sure whether the muse gets lost, or something is supposed to happen that doesn't, but it's strange, a bus with no driver." That said, Jerry's playing here is very expressive and measured. He's in complete control. I think Garcia sounds more "on" than Saunders, on this night.

! a-t06 (1) JG: "Thanks a lot. We'll see y'all later."

! P: l-t01 ITALTL, ITATTC is running at an absolutely somnambulant tempo.

! R: l-t02 Soul Roach cuts in, not much missing

! P: l-to3 GCAM early in the 11-minute mark, Jerry and John step forward for a little bit, Kahn doing some unusual percussive stuff.

! P: l-t05 The System starts off a little bit like "My Problems Got Problems". Deep, heavy funk. Merl bringing some synth in the 11-minute mark. Some nice spaceout weirdness in the 14-minute mark, where Jerry goes really clangy and dissonant, a little like what I remember as "Claire de Lune". Really wailing @ 15:23, an ascending run. Nice quiet space @ 15:50. They really let this get out there. It's an exceptionally wide-open space for this band, I'd say.

! R: l-t05 System some skipping/fuckoyage @ 1:36-1:41, 1:51.

! P: l-t06 GOMM John Kahn takes a nice bass lead in the 9-10 minute mark, though I confess the tone here sounds just a little fluttery, not unlike what he'd really do in the 1980s and beyond. He is still leading nicely into the 11-minute mark, and things pick up a little swing for a second, John still thunk-thunking, but with a real nice GOMM melody in the late 11-minute mark. Here's where he was so much better in the 1970s: unlike his soli in the 1980s during Simple Twist of Fate, etc., which often seemed to be orthogonal to the song, here he's not only technically faster and more precise, he's also able to work directly with the melody. 12-min mark Jerry steps in, but things are a little lost without the bass, as John appears to have stepped out, and Merl is not particularly audible. They hold it for a bit and Sarah comes back in for some singing in the second half of the 13-minute mark. She hits the windup to the song absolutely orgasmically, ends with a straightforward "thank ya". Nice!

! P: l-t07 WIPMM: It's great how simple Jerry's playing and singing is here. His guitar is so straightforward, nicely twangy, really stripped down. He doesn't try to guild the lily with his voice. Straight ahead. Nice.

! song: l-t07 WIPMM: NB that there is one more early appearance of this tune, on October 11, 1973 (presumably also with Sarah ... not sure the connection, but there it is). It would then disappear until 1980 before being shelved for good (by Garcia, even as it was appropriated as a Weir vocal into GD setlists) in 1987 (TJS).

! song: l-t08 "I Know It's A Sin": Usually referred to as "It's a Sin" in Garcia-related setlists, I follow Allan and Scofield. This tune appears to be an extreme rarity. As of this writing, only entries at TJS are 10/10/68 (Hartbeats), three shows in the window under examination (1/19/73, 1/23/73 [not in circ] and 1/25/73b), and a one-off reappearance on 3/14/74 (with E.W. Wainwright drumming, not in circulation). It would pop up in a Grateful Dead jam on 6/18/74 at Freedom Hall in Louisville. Anyway, I guess they wanted to try it on with this band, given the concentration in January 1973.

! R: l-t08 IKIAS It's a Sin cut/splice @ 3:03, 6:35.

! P: l-t08 IKIAS JG some pretty wild fanning in the late 4-minute mark, and some significant arcing, stretching, bending in the five minute mark. After a seemingly brief drop-splice @ 6:35, things come in swinging a little harder, Jerry digging in nicely and everyone bringing a little more juice, then back down into slow blues.

! l-t09 HSII does exactly what it's supposed to do, bring things to a tight close.

! l-t09 (2) JG: "See ya later."