Jerry Garcia Hand Print Face Mask?

Anyone heard of any craftsy, enterprising Deadheads making Covid-era face masks with Garcia's hand print? If so, please let me know, as I am in the market for one.

Self-quarantine

I accidentally let a few notes of "Looks Like Rain" slip into my ears this morning. I immediately went to hit stop, but I was too late. I have disinfected everything and am self-quarantining for 14 days so as not to infect the rest of you.

Major New Piece of Instrument Research

Michael Clem has published a major piece of research into Garcia's instruments over at LIA's old stomping grounds. I don't know gear, and will surely make use of it whenever I have a question about it.

Popper on Ignorance

"The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, specific, and articulate will be our knowledge of what we do not know, our knowledge of our ignorance" (Popper 2002 [1963], 38).

"our knowledge can be only finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite"  (Popper 2002 [1963], 38).

"while differing widely in the various little bits we know, in our infinite ignorance we are all equal"  (Popper 2002 [1963], 38).

we must "admit that all knowledge is human; that it is mixed with our errors, our prejudices, our dreams, and our hopes; that all we can do is to grope for truth even though it be beyond our reach"  (Popper 2002 [1963], 39).

"truth is beyond human authority" (Popper 2002 [1963], 39).

! ref: Popper, Karl. 2002 [1963]. On the Sources of Knowledge and Ignorance. In Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge, 3-39. London: Routledge.

Paper Inspiration

In the man-cave in which JGMF happens, I mostly work while facing this wall. My aim is to build a poster collection (which might, naturally, spill over onto other walls) with posters for as many Garcia On The Side configurations as I can. I don't have a ton of money for this, so I often get stuff that's dinged, folded, torn, etc. I think that gives it character. The good news is that GOTS is less collected than GD, so there isn't that much demand for what I am looking for.

1. Is the Stanley Mouse's "Purple Pig" for the Carousel (late spring '68) Tuesday Night Jam sessions. This is the only one of this size I have ever seen. This is more or less the GOTS uhr-moment, since the handbills show Jerry's name, outside the GD, for the first time in the GD era.

2. Mickey and the Hartbeats, October 1968.

3. Probably the first color-printed mention of the New Riders of the Purple Sage. This is the back page of a complete copy of the Seattle Helix vol. 9 no. 3 (ca. August 19, 1969), billing GD and NRPS at the Greenlake Aquatheatre on August 20, 1969. Of course, this gig was canceled and we know from Corry that the fellas went and played some bar in Ballard instead.

4. Family Dog and the Common on the Great Highway offer "Magic at the Edge of the Western World", including NRPS on 11/18/69. Strictly speaking this and #5 are redundant, but, well, sue me. I like "the Common" a lot, and I like the catch-phrase, and I like the colors.

5. NRPS headlining the Fillmore West. I like this for the arc of the NRPS that it describes, shepherded by Midas Garcia from the local hofbrau to the top of the poster, eventually to strike out on its own on the foundation that Jerry laid, including big-time record contract with Clive Davis.

6. JGMS 11/8/72, one of the few posters I have seen that lists Tom Fogerty.

7. JGMS with Martin and Sarah Fulcher, Legal Aid at Winterland 10/2/73. This one is signed by artist Randy Tuten, but that's sort of like having a Bob Feller-autographed baseball card - they're rarer without the signature.

8 & 9. Two beauties from the Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin, lots of neat icons and such. These posters were hanging in the AWHQ lobby in advance of the shows, the story goes, and have the pinholes to prove it.

10. Reconstruction at Temple Beautiful, 8/10/79.

What's missing?

JGMS pre-Fogerty: there's a poster from the Matrix for the February 2-3, 1971 shows

Garcia-Wales: there is a beautifully colorful poster for 1/22/72 in Syracuse, but boy is it rare. I hadn't even heard of the show, let alone seen poster, until it came to be in my blogging capacity. I don't recall any other posters from the short east coast tour.

OAITW: very few to choose from. The most common one is from Bimbo's on 5/25/73, which had Bill Graham's involvement in support of a school support program called "Sumerland". I really, really, really want a copy of that poster, but it's expensive. The copy you see at the link, as beat up as it is, is retailing for $725 at Wolfgang's. Even handbills are several hundred. There is some advertising for 10/5/73 in Santa Cruz and 11/4/73 at Sonoma State, but I can't tell if these are posters rather than handbills or advertisements.

Great American String/Music Band: No posters that I can think of, though the 7/7/74 canceled gig is a near-miss, and I'd gladly put a clean copy on my wall for giggles.

JGMS 1974: I presume Tutt was drumming for the Austin shows, so it'd be great to have posters for the group with Kreutzmann (1/17/74 through 9/2/74) and Paul Humphrey (ca. 10/12/74 through November). There are random handbills here and there -- I'd love a copy of the Rheem Theater 2/9/74 paper, whatever its dimensions-- , but I can't think of posters for either of these configurations, and any that exist would be very, very rare (and correspondingly dear). I can live without representation at that level of granularity.

JGB #1 with Nicky: Looks like there is a poster for the De Anza College gig on 10/10 that has at one time been available through Wolfgang's Vault. It must be very rare. Any others? edit: I see one from St. Paul, 11/22/75.

JGB in the Keith and Donna era: several to choose from. I am eyeing the one from the Del Mar Theater on 8/16/76, which has some great icons. There are others from this three year period - I won't be picky about drummers.

JGB in the Ozzie/JohnnyD era: very few to choose from, one from Stony Brook, probably a few others. Very hard to find.

JGB pre-Kemper - not that many out there, I am not chomping at the bit to find one. Kemper era things are plentiful, and I already have several (not pictured). Post-Kemper, not sure there are any posters, per se - maybe for some of the SoCal shows. But I am not too worried about that.

In brief, though, if you have something you think I might need, please let me know! I am into smaller stuff, too, any Garcia ephemera, really, but it doesn't end up on the wall.

The Things You Learn ...

... while pawing through stuff at the GD Archives. Case in point: the original Mars Hotel artwork was run over by a UPS truck.

Now you know.

Ateliers to Empereur

Les Sports Illustrés (Brussels, Belgium) moved from 3, rue des Ateliers to 12, rue de l'Empereur sometime between 1924 and 1926. Business must have been good.

Added bonus, the one from Workshop Street, no. 188, has a story about some 1924 New York Giants barnstorming outside of Paris.

A relentless tinkerer said

"if it ain't broke, fix it until it is."

Wise words.

Fallow

Enjoying a nice fallow period, been listening to lots of stuff that's not Jerry.

What have you been listening to?

Public to Private

• Proposition 13: "Grr ah. Grr ah. Grrr rrrr rrrr ah," URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2015/06/grr-ah-grr-ah-grrr-rrrr-rrrr-ah.html
• Public libraries: "San Diego Public Library, and Public Libraries," URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/11/san-diego-public-library-and-public.html.
• Sesame Street: Winter, Jessica. 2015. Why Sesame Street’s Move to HBO Is Both Great and Extremely Depressing. Slate.com, August 13, URL http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2015/08/13/sesame_street_goes_to_hbo_practically_it_s_great_symbolically_not_so_much.html, accessed 8/15/2015.

San Francisco Sessions, 1969

update: changed title 20160319

San Francisco Sessions Series

• San Francisco Sessions, 1967-1968
• San Francisco Sessions, 1969
• San Francisco Sessions, 1970
• San Francisco Sessions, 1971
• San Francisco Sessions, 1972 

Moving through the Garciaverse, I pick up lots of pieces that are more degrees of separation out from Jerry than I can ever have real occasion to write-up, except purely on grounds of the shedding necessary to free up scarce cognitive resources. Thus was born my series San Francisco Sessions, which will run through 1972, I think.

/update

I just posted some random gatherings from SF (mostly studio) sessions, 1967-1968, mostly involving people who cross the Garciaverse in some way or who just interest me (e.g., QMS).

More of the same, 1969, with some half-baked effort to put in bold the names of folks with whom Garcia shared a stage.

A few fun ones, for me:

• I love that the Mule and the Bloomfielders did a radio commercial for Country Club Malt Liquor. I am sure that stuff went down smooth.
• A Howard Wales sighting! Ever the obscurity, even the union doesn't know his address.
• I notice Richard Greene and Kahn working a Brewer & Shipley session together on December 1st - I am not sure I knew that Greene had crossed into the Kahn-o-verse in this way.
• Question: is James Cooke of the Steve Miller sessions a.k.a. Curley Cooke, or is that someone different?

Anyway, please do leave name corrections, random thoughts, hoots and jeers in comments.

San Francisco Sessions, 1967-1968

updated title 20160319

San Francisco Sessions Series

• San Francisco Sessions, 1967-1968
• San Francisco Sessions, 1969
• San Francisco Sessions, 1970
• San Francisco Sessions, 1971
• San Francisco Sessions, 1972 

In the course of my research into Jerry Garcia’s musical life outside the Grateful Dead, I have gathered up, well, an awful lot of stuff. Sometimes I can’t resist, especially if I find myself in amongst papers that others might not get around to, but that might contain good information.

The following is just a rough list of some of the union contracts I came across. You’ll see that this is biased toward names that I know from the Side Trips Social Network – that has been my research purpose. But sometimes there’s stuff that’s very peripheral that just catches my eye.

 I am trying not to transcribe too much information, since it’s so peripheral to my interests. I am putting it out here for other researchers who might be interested. The documents of course contain all kinds of other information I am just listing date/venue, artist/project/names, employer, and a six-digit number that will help me find the document in question. If you are curious about a particular document, drop me a line.

update: I have now posted a similar list for 1969.

1967

May 4, 1967 Golden State Recorders, 655 Harrison Street (TV)

Steve Miller (SM, Jim Cooke, Tim Davis, Lonnie Turner)

(illegible)

110942

May 12, 1967 KQED Studios, SF (TV - Replay of May 10 program)

BBHC

110231

May 12-13, 1967 Fillmore Auditorium (live)

Jefferson Airplane

RCA Victor

110309

June 28, 1967 Fillmore Auditorium (live)

Steve Miller (SM, Jim Cooke, Tim Davis, Lonnie Turner, James Peterman)

Mercury Records

110919

June 29, 1967 Fillmore Auditorium (live)

Steve Miller (SM, Jim Cooke, Tim Davis, Lonnie Turner, James Peterman)

Mercury Records

110900

June 30, 1967 Fillmore Auditorium (live)

Steve Miller (SM, Jim Cooke, Tim Davis, Lonnie Turner, James Peterman)

Mercury Records

110813

July 7, 1967 KQED Studios, SF (TV)

Country Joe and the Fish

KQED

111717

July 26, 1967 The Cheetah, Santa Monica (live)

Steve Miller (SM, James Cooke, Tim Davis, Lonnie Turner, James Peterman)

Pacific Radio – KPFK

111407

July 31, 1967 Golden Gate Park (live)

Mimi Farina

Bay Area Educational Television Association (KQED)

111114

July 31, 1967 Golden Gate Park (live)

Steve Miller (SM, Jim Cooke, Tim Davis, Lonnie Turner, James Peterman)

Bay Area Educational Television Association (KQED)

111133

September 18, 1967 unknown location (but see QMS for this date) (live)

Dino Valente

Epic Records

111501

September 18, 1967 New Committee Theater, 836 Montgomery St., SF (live)

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan)

Columbia Record Company

111520

November 8, 1967 Commercial Recorders, 149 Natoma, SF

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore, Nick Gravenites, Harvey Brooks)

Capitol Records

113510

November 10, 1967 Commercial Recorders, 149 Natoma, SF

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore, Nick Gravenites, Harvey Brooks)

Capitol Records

113544

1968

March 18-19, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

James Cotton (JC, Edward Adams, James Patrick Cooke, Raphael Martin Fierro, Larry Wayne Talbert, Jose Emilio Rodriguez

Vanguard

113426

May 7, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Wayne Talbert [leader], Dough Sahm, Mack Rebbenack, Martin Fierro, Joe Rodriguez, Eddie Adams, Bill Atwood, Mel Martin, Lee Charlton)

Mercury Records

120715

May 8, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

“Joyce Dunn” (Dough Sahm [leader], Wayne Talbert, Martin Fierro, Frank Morin, Bill Atwood, Whitney Freeman, Mack Rebbenack)

Mercury Records

120654

May 9, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Wayne Talbert [leader], Martin Fierro, Joe Rodriguez, Eddie Adams, Bill Atwood, Mel Martin, Lee Charlton)

Mercury Records

120654

May 11, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Sir Douglas Quintet “Honky Blues” (Dough Sahm [leader], Hewlett Crist, Frank Morin, George Rains, Whitney Freeman, Martin Fierro, Wayne Talbert, Bill Atwood, Mel Martin)

Mercury Records

120645

May 18, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene, Norman Bellas)

MGM

113624

May 19, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene, Norman Bellas)

MGM

113643

May 21, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene)

MGM

113653

May 22, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene)

MGM

113702

May 23, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene, Harvey Brooks)

MGM

113715

May 28, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene)

MGM

113715

May 29, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene)

MGM

113735

June 4, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene)

MGM

113806

June 8, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene)

MGM

113756

June 10, 1968 Sierra Sound Laboratories, 1741 Alcatraz Ave., Berkeley

Blues Project (Andy Kulberg, Roy Blumenfeld, John Gregory, Richard Greene)

MGM

113747

June 11, 1968 Avalon Ballroom 1:30 pm

Harvey Mandel (HM [leader], Armando Peraza, Frank [Lalo] Varela, Edward F. Hoh, Arthur Stavro)

Mercury Records

120548

June 24, 1968 Commercial Recorders, 149 Natoma Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Wayne Talbert, Mack Rebbenack, Edward Adams, Jose Rodriguez, Martin Fierro)

Mercury Records

120737

June 25, 1968 Commercial Recorders, 149 Natoma Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Wayne Talbert, Mack Rebbenack, Edward Adams, Jose Rodriguez, Martin Fierro)

Mercury Records

120119, 120130

June 27, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Martin Fierro [leader], Bill Atwood, Mike Ropec, Melvyin Martin, Richard T. Washington

Mercury Records

120027, 120309

June 28, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

“Wayne Talbert” (Martin Fierro [leader], Mike Ropec, Mel Martin, Frank Morin, Richard Washington, Wilfred Sache, Lewis Davis, Bennie Harris)

Mercury Records

120042

June 29, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

“Wayne Talbert” (Martin Fierro [leader], Mike Ropec, Bill Atwood, Mel Martin, Frank Morin, Richard Washington)

Mercury Records

115239, 120257

July 1, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Martin Fierro [leader], Wilfred Sache, Melvyn Martin, Mike Ropec, Lewis Link Davis, Frank Morin)

Mercury Records

120620, 120631

July 3, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Martin Fierro [leader], Wilfred Sache, Melvyn Martin, Lewis Link Davis, Alfonso Molino Jr.)

Mercury Records

120017, 120319

July 9, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Wayne Talbert and the Melting Pot (Martin Fierro [leader, address is c/o Brian Rohan], Wilfred Sache, Melvyn Martin, Lewis Link Davis, Alfonso Molino Jr.)

Mercury Records

120058, 120610

July 12, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (Powell St. John [leader], Martin Fierro)

Mercury Records

120522

July 15, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (Powell St. John [leader], Martin Fierro, Bob Arthur, John Andrew, George Rains, Mark Naftalin)

Mercury Records

120511

July 16, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (Martin Fierro [leader], L. Link Davis, Bob Salisbury)

Mercury Records

120500

July 17, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Roy Head (Doug Sahm [leader], Martin Fierro)

Mercury Records

120340

July 19, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Roy Head (Frank Morin [leader], Martin Fierro)

Mercury Records

120359

July 31, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (John Andrews [leader], Link Davis Jr., Martin Fierro, Robert Salisbury, Spenser Perskin)

Mercury Records

114118

August 1 (?), 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Mother Earth (John Andrews, George Rains, Robert Arthur, Mark Naftalin, Link Davis Jr., Frank Morin, Ronald Tourmina, Tracy Nelson [leader], Martin Fierro, Robert Salisbury)

Mercury Records

114100

August 4, 1968 Frost Amphitheater, Palo Alto, CA (live)

Don Ellis (too many other people to list, no names familiar to me)

Columbia Records

114300

August 5, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Mother Earth (John Andrews [leader], George Rains, Robert Arthur, Mark Naftalin, Link Davis Jr., Frank Morin, Ronald Tourmina, Tracy Nelson, Martin Fierro)

Mercury Records

114050

August 8, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (Martin Fierro [leader], James Cooke, Frank Morin, Lewis Link Davis, Ronald Tourmina, Louis Gasca, Spenser Perskin)

Mercury Records

114031

August 9, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (Martin Fierro, Frank Morin [leader], Lewis Link Davis, Ronald Tourmina, Louis Gasca)

Mercury Records

114217

August 14, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Mother Earth (Powell St. John [leader], John Andrews, Terry Anderson, Robert Arthur, Mark Naftalin, Frank Morin, Ronald Tourmina, Martin Fierro, Luis Gasca, Cox [?] Rodriguez)

Mercury Records

114138

August 15, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (Powell St. John [leader], Martin Fierro, Luis Gasca)

Mercury Records

114207

August 16, 1968 Columbus Recorders, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mother Earth (John Andrews [leader], Martin Fierro, Luis Gasca)

Mercury Records

114157

August ??, 1968 Korty Films Inc., Stinson Beach, CA (film “Riverrun”)

Richard Greene (leader), Peter Berg

Korty Films, Inc.

114413

August 27, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

“Junior Parker” (Frank Morin [leader], George Rains, Link Davis, Ron Tourmina, Martin Fierro, Terry Hensley, Henry Angeli Jr., Whitney Freeman, Charles Pritchard, Doug Sahm, Hewlett Cris)

Mercury Records

120843

September 14, 1968 Coast Recorders, SF

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115733

September 16, 1968 Coast Recorders, SF

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115743

September 17, 1968 Coast Recorders, SF

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115752

September 23, 1968 Coast Recorders, SF

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115004

September 24, 1968 Coast Recorders, SF

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

114951

September 26-27-28, 1968 Fillmore West, SF (live)

Al Kooper [leader], Mike Bloomfield, Skip Prokop, John Kahn

Columbia Records

120756

October 5, 1968 Coast Recorders, 960 Bush Street, SF

Amigos de Musica Band (Doug Sahm [leader], Whitney Freeman, Terry Alan Hensley, Ron Taormina, Jose Rodriguez, George Rains, Martin Fierro, Frank Morin)

Mercury Records

120414

October 10-11-12, 1968 Winterland (remote session)

Dino Valente

Epic Records

115900

October 24-25-26, 1968 Fillmore West (live)

Jefferson Airplane

RCA

114750, 114800, 114810

November 4, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Shades of Joy (Martin Fierro [leader], Edward Adams, Jose Rodriguez, Jackie King)

Mercury Records

1145354

November 5, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Shades of Joy (Martin Fierro [leader], Edward Adams, Jose Rodriguez, Jackie King, Jymm Young)

Mercury Records

1145544

November 6, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Shades of Joy (Martin Fierro [leader], Edward Adams, Jose Rodriguez, Jackie King, Jymm Young)

Mercury Records

1145601

November 7, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Mitch Greenhill (Richard Greene [leader], Peter Kleinow)

Mercury Records

114641

November 7, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Shades of Joy (Martin Fierro [leader], Edward Adams, Jose Rodriguez, Jackie King, Jymm Young)

Mercury Records

1145552

November 7, 1968 Fillmore West (live)

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115818

November 8, 1968 Columbus Recording, 916 Kearny Street, SF

Shades of Joy (Martin Fierro [leader], Edward Adams, Jose Rodriguez, Jackie King, Jymm Young)

Mercury Records

1145612

November 8, 1968 Fillmore West (live)

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115843

November 9, 1968 Fillmore West (live)

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115828

November [between ca. 6 and 12], 1968 KQED-TV studios (TV: West Pole II)

It’s a Beautiful Day (David LaFlamme [leader], Mike Holman, Patricia Santos, Linda LaFlamme, Val Fuentes, Harold Wagenet)

Bay Area Educational TV Association

114515

November 10, 1968 Fillmore West (live)

QMS (John Cipollina, David Freiberg, Gary Duncan, Greg Elmore)

Capitol Records

115807

November 23, 1968 Pacific Recording Studios, San Mateo, CA

Wayne Ceballos (WC, Kenneth Newell, Larry Martin)

Sire Records

114905

light blogging

Odds are that blogging will continue to be light for awhile. I like to do more during the summer, but circumstances just don't permit right now.

Click some tags and sniff around here, or the allied blogs such as Lost Live Dead, Hooterollin Around, Grateful Dead Guide, Dead Sources, etc. Links are to the right.

In the meantime, some randomalia.

Thesis: Garcia on the side is about more music with proportionally less bullshit.
Antithesis: Garcia being JERRY GARCIA OF THE GRATEFUL DEAD, the bullshit found a way in.
Synthesis: Jerry Garcia's Middle Finger.

Also, re-reading one of my all-time faves, Voltaire's Candide, in French. Love it love it love it love it.

I wish the Dead's canceled October 1968 Europe tour would have happened, but on the other hand that might have deprived history of Mickey Hart and the Hartbeats. Not Heartbeeps, the preclusion of which might have left history better off, or so I gather.

Insomnia, anxiety, break-ups … musicians on the dark side of touring

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/jun/25/musicians-touring-psychological-dangers-willis-earl-beal-kate-nash

Tonsorial Undertakings

http://www.vox.com/2015/6/24/8834319/wikipedias-most-edited-pages

Wonder why WWE wrestler the Undertaker is on the list? He may not be as historically significant as Hitler, but his fans' devotion more than makes up for it (sample edit note: "This is notable in that it was the first time he was seen as the Deadman without his long hair").

Deadthinking

http://deadthinking.blogspot.com/

Check it out.

Underground Press Syndicate Meeting, Boulder, 1973

http://www.undergroundpressarchive.us/gallery/album-01/Index1.html

Free Caravaggio

There are a bunch of Caravaggios in Rome, but the stunning thing is that four of them can be seen for free. I am certainly no art critic, but I don't let that stop me, strolling from north to south.

On the Piazza del Popolo is Santa Maria del Popolo, which is just bursting at the seams with great stuff - I need to spend more time there. On the subject at hand, the Cerasi Chapel contains two Caravaggios. The Crucifixion of Saint Peter has unbelievable heft, as the linked wiki entry notes, and Peter is a full-on badass oldster -- this is a painting more about man than God.

  

Conversion on the Way to Damascus is another chiaroscuro knockout, on the right side of the little chapel. I couldn't quite figure out the horse, but Paul's open, heavenward reach, his stunned amazement at the revelation he's experiencing, the simultaneity of his swooshing movement and his knocked-the-wind-out-of-me frozenness, groundedness and transcendence ... it totally transfixed me.

(Bernini's sculpture The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa was also recommended to me as one not to miss on this ecstatic theme - I hope/plan to see it.)

Heading south, and quite close to the Piazza Navona, is the unassuming Sant' Agostino is Caravaggio's Madonna di Loreto. It probably impressed me least of the four I am including here, though there were two things that I really pondered over. The first is that the Madonna's toenails were dirty, or so it seemed to me. No biggie, I know, but I just don't recall this kind of utter humanization of the subject to quite this extent before. Second, while I am not impressed by the proportioning of the young God, still his head and face struck me as improbably photographic. Just looking at that, I would have been hard pressed to say this was a painting and not any, say, late 19th - early 20th c. snapshot bimbo. So I guess it's the realism of this one, in the details, that really spoke to me.

Finally, right around the corner in San Luigi dei Francesi/Saint Louis des Français, the whole of which I find quite striking, is the amazing The Calling of Saint Matthew in the Contarelli Chapel.

This is probably my favorite of the bunch. Customs houses get at the intersection of money and the state that always interests me, and the sacred graft --to say nothing of the breathtaking quality of the work, the sheer depth of each character, the shading and the lighting-- just knocks my socks off. As I might say here over a particularly hot Garcia solo - WOW. Two snaps up.

Of course, each of these churches holds countless other masterpieces of canvas, plaster, marble and all the rest. It always feels a little strange to me to crowd around the Caravaggio when there's a neglected Raphael a few apses down. But why overthink it, especially at a first go? The Eternal City, God willing, always be, and once you're there, a lot of its treasures are there for the mere walking-to and taking-in.

Google Arts & Culture offers even more Free Caravaggio!

Biblical Serendipity Alert

Let's start by recognizing that, insofar as the probability of a given event happening is the product of the individual probabilities of all of the events needed to produce it, we certainly shouldn't be here. Everything is impossible.

It's nonetheless funny when individually improbable streams cross, which is what's happening when we talk about serendipity. It's probably a mere coincidence -- lots of streams are running at any given time, and weird shit happens just by the law of large numbers. But check this out.

Step 1, In the Beginning

1) a fragment a canceled Dead show 9/27/70 becomes an occasion for me to talk about death in the Garciaverse, especially during that period.
2) this leads me to David Crosby; I use the phrase "homeward through the haze";
3) I am reminded that I don't know that song well-enough, nor the Crosby-Nash record Wind on the Water (ABC, 1975) well enough, so awhile ago I put it on and start listening to it. Note that this is maybe the second or third time I will have heard the record (I am not a big Graham Nash, generally), ever.

Step 2, parallel streams

4) in this same space, I am going back through some of Crosby's amazing autobiography (the first one) (Crosby and Gottlieb 1988), mostly scanning some of the Garcia-relevant pages for good research at a distance.
5) because I come across it, I start copying some of Crosby's digressions and thoughts on drugs, which come quite frequently, and with the analytic depth that you'd expect from such a true connoisseur.
6) In a flash, I am thinking about cocaine as a private drug, and I come up with the idea that Jesus gave loaves and fishes to the people, but by the looks of the Last Supper He and the Disciples kept the best stuff for themselves.

Step 3, the weird serendipity.

7) Having referenced loaves and fishes, being fully lapsed but inclining toward precision in referencing and such, I Google "bible verse loaves and fishes". Turns out all four of the gospels use the phrase, but never mind. I maybe look up Bible verses 2-3 times per year. As I am doing it here ...

8) up comes "Howard Through The Haze" over the speakers; and ...

9) it's got bible verses in it.

Weird, huh?

Prosopography

“the investigation of the common background characteristics of a group of actors in
history by means of a collective study of their lives” (Stone, 1971: 46).

Stone, L. (1971). “Prosopography,” Daedalus 100(1): 46–79.