Gettin' Churchy: JGB at the Stone, Sunday, November 30, 1986

LN jg1986-11-30.jgb.all.aud-corley.21301.shn2flac

Spun on its 34th anniversary yesterday, this show supplied me with a delightful hour and a half of easy-feeling post-coma Jerry Band. "Stop That Train" opens the show for the second and final time ever (also 1/29/77), and returns to the lineup after nine years away (11/26/77a). "My Sisters And Brothers" also returns after a long hiatus (7/30/77, when it showed up as the encore). Twitter commentator @Fireonshakedwn1 pointed out that these songs formed staples of the post-coma Jerry Church vibe, and I agree. Fitting for them to come back on a Sunday night.

As ever, it's hard not to read back from what I know of this historical period into what I am hearing, but Jerry certainly sounds sprightly out of the gate. A crowd member shouts a "welcome back, Jerry!" and the big fella thanks him. Even something as mundane as "you got the do re | I got the mi" gets a little juice. The seeder of this fileset (the only one in circ), Chris Ladner, refers to the "Van Moondance themed comaback", referencing the advent of both "And It Stoned Me" and "Crazy Love" in the JGB repertoire, and coining a term about late '86. Again, these tunes are just pleasant. The filth and grunge of the pre-coma are washed off -- "Oh, the water | let it run all over me" -- and Jer's just playin some old favorites in the city he loved for the fans who showed him so much love and support while he was sick. It's really sweet stuff.

Some of the arrangements aren't quite where they'd end up, and that's fun, too. I'd like to trace the evolution of the start of "Stoned Me", for example. David Kemper does some super-interesting hard syncopations during "Forever Young" which I don't recall hearing much of. It's like he's trying to put some more bounce into it, while Jerry wants to keep it slow and soft, a classic Garcia Band scenario that Kemper (I think - probably in the Barry Smolin interview) described as having his foot on the gas and the brakes at the same time. I do like this version of "Forever Young" a lot - it presents a little burn later on that works.

As ever, the amazing John Corley pulled a killer tape. If you know John Corley, please ask him if he'd be willing to have his masters redone - they are very much worthy of more optimal, high res treatment than they got 20 years ago. (I am NOT complaining.) Since I was there, I'd also like to pin down some tape archaeology, as I recall it. Corley apparently broke down his Nak 700s for stealth and put them in a silly hat. He hit the Stone a lot, and his tapes are pretty uniformly killer. I am fuzzy on the details, but when Bob Menke and Jim Powell were still friendly, one of them either transferred DATs (that would have been Bob) or acquired them from a third party and got them onto CD. Ladner and jjoops had formed the "misSHN in the Rain" offshoot of "The Music Never Stopped Project (TMNSP)", which was mostly working from CDs, ripping them, shn'ing them, and getting them to the tol.etree.org FTP server as a single integral collection. This collection ultimately provided the main foundation for what when to archive.org. The GD stuff went live, the Jerry stuff never could (not through the front door, anyway). But I digress. The misSHN guys were trading with Powell, and that's how most of the Corley tapes went from CD to the Lossless realm.

Listening notes below the fold, nothing major in there that I don't report above. But I do recommend this show if you are looking to chill.

Catholics listing the Legion

The very Catholic USF Foghorn mentioning the LOM gig 3/14/75: "yes, that's the Legion of Mary".

http://digitalcollections.usfca.edu/cdm/ref/collection/p15129coll8/id/7748

! mention: San Francisco Foghorn (University of San Francisco), March 14, 1975, p. 8.

! seealso: "By the Grace of the Lord: Legion of Mary at the Masonic Temple, Scranton, April 12, 1975"

h/t Yellow Shark

Sound Storm Echoes

The Grateful Dead played a legendary gig at the Sound Storm festival on Mrs. Irene York's farm near Poynette, Wisconsin on April 26, 1970. As ever, Corry is on the case, as is LIA over at Deadsources.

I have a couple of obscure followups.

First, three years after the fact, a program called "Studio None" on cable channel 4 in Madison apparently broadcast footage of the Dead and Baby Huey from the gig. The listing refers to "the 1969 Poynette Rock Festival", but I think this must be 4/26/70. Mmmm ... wonder where that tape might be? (! listing: Wisconsin State Journal, November 26, 1973, sec. 3, p. 3.)

Second, the Little Brothers of the Poor, a lay group from Milwaukee, asked the Columbia County Board for permission to host a "Festival of Christ" on the York Farm August 6-8, 1971, expressing hope that Joe Cocker and the Dead might perform. Seems unusual entertainment for a religious festival planned to include prayer and meditation, with prospective participation by evangelist Billy Graham and Catholic Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, but Jesus Freaks will Jesus Freak, I guess. (! ref: "Charity May Hold Poynette Rock Fest," Capital Times, April 24, 1971, p. 13.)

Third, Sound Storm '72 happened in August of that year. The promoter accused advertised headliners the Grateful Dead of backing out of agreement to play the Festival, which the Dead denied, with Gail Hellund telling local radio stations and newspapers that they had never accepted Don Bobo's offer to play the gig. (! ref: Cosgrove, Howard. 1972a. Rock Fair Set to Swing. Capital Times, August 3, 29; ! ref: Cosgrove, Howard. 1972b. Poynette 'Rock Fair' Falls Apart. Capital Times, August 10, 27.)

Bob Coburn Interviews Jerry Garcia, November 8, 1982

Garcia, Jerry, 1942-1995, “Bob Coburn with Jerry Garcia. "Rockline" radio show, hosted by Bob Coburn, broadcast on November 8, 1982. Includes an interview and phone calls from listeners [radio broadcast],” Grateful Dead Archive Online, accessed August 2, 2015, http://www.gdao.org/items/show/378595.

Garcia had two pretty good reasons to do a live national "Rockline" radio interview on Monday, November 8, 1982 with Bob Coburn.

The first was presumably to sell some tickets for the ongoing Fall 1982 Jerry Garcia Band tour (starting October 27 in SoCal, ending November 15th). From November 8th, the band still had shows in Worcester, Piscataway, New York City, Hartford, a college gig outside of Boston at Brandeis University, and a grand finale at Kean College in Union, NJ. The East Coast Deadhead paid a huge chunk of the Dead and Garcia's bills, better rally the troops.

The second is that Run for the Roses (Arista AL 9603, November 1982) had dropped, and for once Garcia was "touring behind an album" that people could buy from off the shelves of their local disc-O-mat on the way home from the show. For his last studio record, the 1978 masterpiece Cats Under the Stars (1978), work took so long that it remained undone during a putative promotional tour in March, probably not hitting shelves until a week or two after the tour ended. The Mystery Cats toured "in front of their" record, not your industry standard approach. Shocking that one sank like a stone despite representing some of Garcia's finest work, including in his songwriting collaboration with Hunter. Here, they're touring behind the record, but unfortunately, as one of Mike Myers's Scotsmen would say, "it's crap".

November 11^th would find the band playing for John Scher at The Felt Forum, part of an expansion push into the City itself, courtesy (or not) of Ron Delsener. Scher was going big in 1982,[1] and one of his early successes was Garcia and Kahn, in their first ever acoustic duet gig, at the Beacon Theatre, culminating with the good Dr. John sitting in with Jerry and John for some "Goodnight Irene", on April 21^st. That gig did so well (two 2,413 capacity sellouts, with gross $51,523)[2] that they made the same match in November. John Scher being John Scher --a multitalented guy who, from 1976, had basically taken over the GD's operations east of the Mississippi, and did lots more besides—he was fully locked into Garcianomics, on the recto and the verso.

John Scher Presents in New York City: Jerry Garcia Band at the Felt Foum, November 11, 1982.
John Scher Presents Program no. 270.

I don't know how many records they sold, but November 11^th grossed $107,661 on two sellouts @ 4,332 capacity.[3] Not bad – not bad at all. Biggest night of the tour.

Why do I get into the reasons for this interview? Because we find here yet another instance of Garcia being utterly incapable of marketing. In January 1976, he either forgot to announce a set of his band's gigs upcoming, chose not to, or else was reminded to book them when asked live, on the radio. I think there are a few other examples I can pin down of Garcia not really even swinging and missing on the tee'd up "new record" question, but kind of dodging it. And how's this for the soft sell, answer question of who's in the band:

I’ve had a band off and on for some time now, I guess about five years now … when you have musicians that you’re playing with on a regular basis, it’s easier to communicate with them, and they’re in the neighborhood, and things like that. Actually, the tracks on the record are recorded by parts of my band, as well as my current band, over the last, um, some of the tracks on the record were recorded as long as 4 years ago, 5 years ago.[4]

It’s a long slow process. See, when I make a solo record I have to make it in between the spaces, between Grateful Dead activity. So I have to do it as I can. Sometimes they accumulate, like a snowball rolling downhill.

Now, for someone like me, this is fascinating. First, "when you have musicians that you’re playing with on a regular basis, it’s easier to communicate with them, and they’re in the neighborhood, and things like that" could have come out of his mouth in January 1976 about Keith and Donna.[5] "I just picked whoever was around" isn't going to get me off the fence about these $11 tickets. Second, hearing that some of these tracks were recorded in 1977-1978 might signal to the discerning record buyer that they found at least some of this stuff sweeping up the cutting room floor. If they didn't buy Cats when it was released, why would they buy the lesser tracks now? Third, by interstitializing Garcia to the Grateful Dead, sublimating himself into the Borg, he gives further impression that the record might be rather second class.

Maybe he's just too honest, and can't shill the record that he may or may not feel good about. I guess I gotta respect that, even if it does thwart Global Corporation's master plan. Or maybe he just didn't get it. As McNally has recently said, "the celebrity interview, an opportunity for an artist to talk about himself and to pitch a current endeavor in as brief and efficient a manner as possible, was completely lost on Jerry".[i]

---

[i] McNally 2015, 9.

Other things I pull from this:

• Influences? Freddie King. Django, and he mentions Django's physical handicap – can there be any doubt but that Garcia felt a special kinship with Reinhardt?
• solo vs. GD: " When I compose a tune, I have a sense of what I want it to sound like. When I do ‘em for my own band, they sort of stay at that developmental level. But in the Grateful Dead, they have a tendency to keep moving. That’s true, I think, with Bob’s tunes, too."
• dodges a religion question
• Bashes Hank Harrison and his books; "wait for McNally's".
• a few other tidbits, depending on what interests you

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?

LN19760119 JG interview by Father Miles Riley, KPIX-TV Studios, San Francisco, CA

Update: looks like a 26 minute recording is available through the GDAO: http://www.gdao.org/items/show/379043

Update2: GD Archive material gives taping date as 1/19/76

Update3: see also "Jerry's January 1976".

Update4: 26 minute video has finally come into the light!

I have now put some slightly more verbatim "viewing notes" below the fold. Not a full transcription, but close enough for my own purposes.

Interview of Jerry Garcia by Father Miles Riley
KPIX-TV Studios
San Francisco, CA
Interview date: January 19, 1976 (Monday), 9 p.m.
Air date: January 31, 1976 (Saturday), 1 p.m.

(16 tracks, 13:34)
t01. Jerry's mother [1:04]
t02. Jerry's image, fame [1:52]
t03. aura, music vs. words, responsibility, leadership, JG experiential thing [3:00]
t04. interaction, film [0:16]
t05. TV [0:37]
t06. feedback, interaction with fans [0:37]
t07. mailing list, record samplers and fan mail [0:18]
t08. musical eclecticism, evolution, energy [0:46]
t09. where JG functions best [0:25]
t10. "it's working" [0:28]
t11. the best things happen when everyone agrees [0:40]
t12. improvised architecture [0:32]
t13. feeling good about it [1:06]
t14. something to work on, with observable progress [1:00]
t15. sign off [0:03]
t16. Hank Harrison voice note [0:40]

JGMF:

! Original note: "More from Hank Harrison's cassette interviews." Came with two further tracks. Track two was said to be interview to Robert Petersen, track three with Pigpen and Petersen. I note that Pigpen is on both, probably Petersen, too.

! Lineage given as "MC > CD > EAC > FLAC". I note that there's gotta be more than that. Harrison's voice notes are superimposed over tape, for one thing. And there was some kind of high-pitched tone at the start of some pieces ... would that be a reel? Or would a little dictation machine have done something like that, too?

! Lineage: JGMF: I took the flac, decoded, tracked it with CDWave, wrote up these notes, and flac'd with TLH.

! Recording: this runs to about 14 minutes. I assume the show was 30 minutes, but can't know that and that is correct, as determined by the video. There is definitely some conversation missing here [from the sound file - true]. We cut in at t01, and at a point are two there are references to things Jerry just said that don't appear on the tape. Just a wild guess that it was 30 minutes and we have about half of it. ["You are correct, sir!" -- ed]

! Material: Very, very interesting. I wonder how Father Miles Riley got Garcia to come into a TV studio to appear on his hipster priest show. Note that there is one interview, I can't remember the context, in which Garcia talks about being fascinated with these TV preacher types. But in that seetting he was talking about the hellfire and brimstone types, sweating hard and asking for money. Like that white-haired coke fiend who used to be on Bay Area TV in the 70s. Anyway, Father Miles Riley sounds much more in the gentle, closeted, trying-to-be-hip, leftwing catholic priest tradition.

! According to Harrison's notes and based on the vibe of the conversation, it does feel face to face, in studio. [update: yes] HH's notes only say the air date, not the recording date.

! The good Father has a reasonably light touch in trying to steer JG toward things spiritual and whatnot, but JG really isn't biting. He knows where Riley wants to take it, but he's pretty good-humoredly steering clear of it. It's a very interesting discussion. Indeed, t13 is sort of premised where the Priest tries to raise "faith", and Garcia basically says that his own guiding light is whatever feels good. If it feels good, he does it. If it doesn't, he doesn't. Hardly a faith-based, less still even remotely ascetic, philosophy.

! t01. This has to be the only tape I have ever heard of Jerry talking at all about his mother. There have been a few other interviews in which he discusses her, but hearing January 1976 JG talk about this is enlightening indeed. "I never was able to say to her, 'I thought you did OK'." I never was able to finish that idea. I don't feel as though our relationship is gone forever. She always respected what I did, and liked the fact that I was a musician and liked what I  was doing and so forth. And she never judged me. Even through things with involvement with drugs and things like that. It's a shock as things like that always are. (re death of his mother). Once your parents are gone ... y'know ... y'know [heavily connotative pause, more in the sense of "it's weird" in a way.] . They're gone. On some levels it's liberating and on other levels it's very sad."

! t02. "The kind of fame that I'm involved in, such as it is, is low enough of a profile so that I'm not constantly being reminded of it" [people aren't running up for autographs] "It's much cooler than that." So glad he could still say this as of early 1976, at least!

! t07 note that the mention of the mailing list, record samplers etc. provides data consistent with the identified time frame of the interview.

! t14. We might say something about Garcia's workaholism based on t14. He basically says fulfillment in life results from having something to work on, on which one can make observable progress, at the very center of life. Homo Faber, of a sort.

! t09. "I am not an artist in the solo ... or in the independent artist in the garrett mold. ... I'm part of dynamic situations and that's where I like it, and that's where I feel I function best. And The GD as a collection of people are all people who've come to that idea."

! t11. GD: "If somebody doesn't like it, we don't do it. We've learned to trust each other." "No idea really makes it if you can't include everybody."

! t16. Hank Harrison: "That was Father Miles Riley, Catholic Priest television host of a show called 'I Believe', recorded at KPIX Studios in San Francisco, aired at 1 o'clock in the afternoon in the entire Bay Area, 1/31/76, interview with Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead."