San Francisco Sessions, 1970

**updated 8/10/2015, especially under heading D**
**update2 8/11, more, especially, in section D**
**updated 8/12, re-ordered sections (now goes from more micro and Jerrycentric to more macro (and less so)), also reworked some of section D, though not really many new words.**

I have been processing information from contracts filed at the American Federation of Musicians (AFM) Local No. 6 in San Francisco.

• San Francisco Sessions, 1967-1968
• San Francisco Sessions, 1969
• This is the 1970 iteration, with bonus features. For this one, I include the Garcia events. They are formatted in blue. There is one GD entry, which is formatted orange.
• San Francisco Sessions, 1971
• San Francisco Sessions, 1972 

Let me speak to (A) Garcia sessions; (B) Dead-related stuff,(C) other Garciaverse echoes, and (D) an analysis of what these contracts tell us about San Francisco Rock on film in 1970.

A. Info on some of Jerry's prolific 1970 studio work:

1. Materials around the iconic Paul Kantner/Jefferson Starship Blows Against the Empire (RCA LSP 4448 [SF 8163], November 1970) tip the possibility of Garcia working on "Mau Mau" (July 17 and 22), not currently given at Deaddisc. This material may have ended up on the cutting room floor. They also us to date his credited contributions to "Starship" (July 15, August 10-11) (LIA corrected me on earlier error, saying this was previously uncredited.)
2. The song "Old Man" pops up July 15 and August 10. I am assuming this is Covington's execrable "Whatever The Old Man Does (Is Always Right)", unreleased from the Jeffersons' Bark (Grunt FTR 1001, September 1971) sessions.
3. Brewer & Shipley, Tarkio (Kama Sutra 2024, February 1971): Deaddisc shows Garcia only on "Oh Mommy". The session paperwork also lists "50 States Of Freedom", hard to know if Garcia played on that one and/or if any material was used. There is one contract for two sessions, so my hunch is that there was one session for each song, and Jerry probably only attended one of the two. Who knows. The sessions were Friday, August 21, 1970 at 5pm and 9pm. Work on the record picks up again in October, but Garcia, still/again at Heider's, makes no further appearances.
4. Lamb, Cross Between (Warner Brothers WS 1920, 1971): Deaddisc says "Jerry Garcia plays on Flying (banjo), Flotation (pedal steel) and Reach High (pedal steel)" and notes "Garcia's contribution to this LP is not documented on the LP cover. There is simply a note on the back cover that says 'special thanks to Jerry Garcia', which has been interpreted as meaning Garcia played on the album. It has subsequently been confirmed by Walter Rapaport, the co-producer of the album, that Garcia played on Flying, Flotation and Reach High. The contribution to Flotation is only 4 notes." For what it's worth, the contract gives us time: Monday, October 5, 1970, in the afternoon.
5. Thanks to commenter runonguinness, I see that RCA buys some "Soul Fever" on Tuesday, October 6, 1970, eventually to appear on Papa John Creach's self-named Grunt record (FTR 1003, December 1971). ROG notes "it is credited to Papa John, Garcia, Rolie, Brown and Covington and it does sound like just one guitar". Deaddisc does show a Garcia credit, listing Papa John Creach - electric violin, Dave Brown - bass, Joey Covington - drums, Jerry Garcia - guitar, Gregg Rolie - organ). So I guess the really tantalizing question is whether Carlos Santana showed up, and he and Jerry played together. It's interesting to me that there are just about no instance of that particular shared studio, and the Shared Stage only came about post-Garcia's 1986 coma. A few months later, in a near-miss (as far as we know), Carlos was billed playing with Merl Saunders at the Matrix). In the alternative, some Carlos licks hit the cutting room floor.

B. The Grateful Dead Node

1. I found no 1970 GD contracts in the union records, which is a tragic shame. Might such materials exist in the Grateful Dead Archive?
2. The Planet Eart Rock and Roll Orchestra (PERRO) sessions at Wally Heider's included some Dead guys, though Phil Lesh is curiously absent from any of the paperwork I have seen. Bill Kreutzmann has an appealing looking session on July 29th with Paul Kantner and David Crosby), Mickey Hart makes a less-appealing-to-me Joey Covington-led one on September 2, 1970. That session, BTW, also seems more reliably to put Spencer Dryden in the New Riders' drum chair at the Matrix this night, but for some weird reason I have listed Hart. I assume this is my error?
3. Bob Weir makes the James and the Good Brothers sessions in December, also with Mickey.
4. Note the new studio "Alembic, Inc.", address 320 Judah Street in SF, late in the year. These are the earliest references I have found to that particular dba configuration.
5. There's a Grateful Dead film contract dated 10/2, with no performance date listed. The location is given as “remote locations at Family Dog, PHR". It was contracted by KQED (Bay Area Educational Television Association), under the moniker "San Francisco Rock". Under heading D below you'll find that end up concluding that this session transmogrified into the live broadcast from Winterland on October 4, 1970. I have more to say about this in section D, below.

C. A few quickies more on the margins of the Garciaverse:

1. PERRO at Heider's. QED.
2. Paul Kantner spent a lot of time in the studio, and the amount of studio time at Heider's paid out of RCA monies speaks to just how lucrative the Jeffersons' contracts really were. Doug Sahm (Mercury) and Joe McDonald (Vanguard) get a lot of time in, as well.
3. An awful lot of the PERRO contracts are AWOL, based on the comparison of the union files with, e.g., the metadata attached to circulating recordings.
4. John Kahn at Heider's: January 15 with Steve Miller; April 16 (approx) with Butterfield; August 17-18-19 with Brewer and Shipley (also Bill Vitt), as well as October 5-6-7 and 14, 1970 with Brewer & Shipley but w/o Vitt.
5. Other Garciazens making appearances in the contracts include Ron Stallings and David Crosby, though not with Jerry in these materials.
6. Martin Fierro kept pretty busy, mostly with Sir Douglas and QMS.

D. "San Francisco Rock", 1970 film contracts

In this section, I use the 1970 Bay Area Educational Television Association (i.e., KQED) "San Francisco Rock" film sessions to shed some light on San Francisco Rock, 1970 - what was played, when, etc.
1. The Concept

Ralph J. Gleason (b. - d.) was brilliant enough to see the leading edge of a wave of musical, cultural, social effervescence gathering around San Francisco from 1965 forward, turbo-boosting his own transition from newspaper jazz man to hip capitalist (Kramer 2013's formulation). He had a hand in the creation of untold countless precious artifacts including newspaper columns, radio broadcasts, interviews, records and tapes, and of course films. In 1970 KQED apparently paid him to do a five-year introspective, arranging to have the three biggest Haight-Ashbury bands filmed in "San Francisco Rock", the Airplane the first week of August, Quicksilver the first week of September, and the Dead the first week of October.

1. ca. August 3, 1970 (contract date) Family Dog on the Great Highway (film S.F. Rock): Jefferson Airplane (Balin, Dryden, Casady, Kantner, Kaukonen, Slick)
2. ca. August 31, 1970 (contract date) Sonoma State College (film – S.F. Rock, Part I): QMS (John Cipollina, Gary Duncan, David Freiberg, Greg Elmore)
3. ca. October 2, 1970 (contract date) “remote locations at Family Dog, PHR", (film – S.F. Rock): GD (Lesh [leader], Garcia, Hart, McKernan, Weir, Kreutzmann)

"San Francisco Rock" was a Ralph Gleason joint at T+5, nearly to the day. What a great idea! But, as it happens, maybe it all didn't quite work out as planned. Whatever does? So Gleason looks typically prescient in seeing the promise of marketing something at the 5 year totem, but the end results skew a little, as artifacts must.

2. The State of the Bands in/and the Broader Time Period

a. The Bands

The Jeffersons are still huge, but the peak has been passed in terms of the Airplane's live act, which I date rather precisely to 4/15/70. May brings the low swamp of Grace's "shrimp rap", the tape that turned me against live recordings of the Airplane from later in that year - I just can't get the taste of that local low off my aural palate - and by 10/4/70, or maybe it was 10/5, Marty expresses his need for a new band not just to the assembled mourners, but over howevermany watts on KPFA.

The Quick has a lot of energy in this period, but more of the kind that the the fractious Jeffersons always wallowed in, and less of the relatively --relatively!!-- interpersonally harmonious Grateful Dead scene. (I just came across a quote of Garcia saying in 1970 how well the Dead guys got along on the road - that must have been chez LIA somewhere?) There's a reason David Freiberg could jump from the Quick to the Jeffersons, besides his bad-ass bass playing, his vocal strength, song chops, and all the rest of it - he seems not to have suffered much from the burn of working with difficult, brilliant people.

The band peaked hard November 7-11, 1968 at the Fillmore West, spun the electric circle Happy Trails, and then crashed to Dino Valente's unambiguous re-entry into the band, his subsequent departure with Duncan in tow, the east coast motorcycle trip, aresulting relatively fallow first half of 1969, toodling around a little bit with Nick the Greek and then welcoming Nicky Hopkins into the fold. There is much more hot music to be played throughout the spring, but by summer 1970 Quicksilver, as it happens, is in the process of breaking apart. Nicky leaves the live act in August, Cip sort of quits after --again? 10/4/70?-- the horns come in 10/4/70 and 10/5/70 and the radio broadcast is painful to listen to. Nothing can survive the onslaught of Dino Valente --his "Long Haired Lady", which includes the line "uni-corns pran-cing, in my mind" should have earned him a lifetime ban from the commissioner-- and by 1971 they have Whodat playing the bass and would never make meaningful music again.

That said, Gleason didn't entirely miss with Quicksilver - the performance that ended up happening, being filmed, and the film eventually released is a fine one, indeed, in many respects. I say more below.

The Dead's cards showed loss, recovery and some mighty fine music, and unlike the other two bands the arrow is pointing up after 1970 - a strong buy, and go ahead and go long. The spring and fall records Workingman's Dead and American Beauty were, respectively, strong on the charts and just-released, the first a weary tune and the latter a wreath of the titular bloom. Darkness swirled around them, who took refuge in each other, sharing lives with all of their music. The last quarter of 1970 is its weakest one, by far, anchored not least by the shambolic performance that I think we have contracted here, Winterland 10/4/70.

 b. San Francisco Rock, ca. 10/4/70

Indeed, Winterland 10/4/70, the night that Janis died, the manic, brain-blasting qualities of the various broadcasts (which really were never gotten together, technically -- all of the tapes pretty much suck), the Airplane and Quicksilver falling apart at the seams, and the less well-known to me show the next night in many ways stand as an epitaph to the whole idea of getting up close and personal with "San Francisco Rock" five years along. All three "S.F. Rock" bands performed, revealing that five years will take a toll on people and the groups they comprise, living under the spotlight and fueled by all kinds of drives will bring out some really good and some, well, less so. I think it's no coincidence that the three bands contracted for "San Francisco Rock" would be playing together.
(see also LIA | cryptdev | Corry on the broadcast angle )

c. Art and Commerce

In short, I think Gleason succeeded in capturing some clear truths about "San Francisco Rock" in 1970, and I find the footage that we have to be artistically successful on a lot of levels. I don't think they worked out all that well commercially, but then again this is public television we're talking about here. The fact that Gleason gets to release this material under his own name (see just below) is interesting ...

3. The "Ralph J. Gleason Presents" DVD releases in Light of the Contracts

When I first saw the contracts, I assumed that they gave rise to film already released under the banner of "Ralph J. Gleason Presents" DVDs:

A Night at the Family Dog (EV 30122-9, 2007, IMDB)
Go Ride the Music & West Pole (Eagle Vision EV30181-9, February 2008).

I have been able to parse things a little more closely, to fine tune against the baseline of my starting assumptions. After you read this section, I want you to believe that a) the metadata around these releases contain errors, b) I can correct some of these errors using these contracts, b) none of these contracts refers to material appearing on Night at the Family Dog or West Pole; c) the Airplane and QMS contracts refer to material found on Go Ride the Music, and thus recorded in August and September 1970, respectively; and d) the 10/4/70 gig at Winterland probably constituted the Dead's  "S.F. Rock" contribution, but none of this material has never appeared in the Gleason films.

The release metadata are a little all over the place. The contracts bring clarity. Let me move from simplest to most complicated by going in the order West Pole, A Night at the Family Dog, and Go Ride the Music.

a West Pole

West Pole is the easiest to deal with. Toby Gleason says the film was made in 1968, the back cover says it aired in 1969, and the front cover says it was previously unreleased. The overall WP&GRTM release has copyrights of 1969 and 2008.

It is wonderful to see. The Airplane and Dead material on West Pole is not from discrete sessions, but colles some pastiches some rather amazing sound and image from various times and places, different kinds of sources (live and studio), and different people into primal music videos. There's great tape of legendary venues and groups such as the Ace of Cups, some street scenes from a dingy Haight, and lots of other cool stuff.

The whole thing's a hoot to watch, but it has nothing to do with  the 1970 "San Francisco Rock" sessions.

b. A Night at the Family Dog 

Filmed on 2/4/70 (update: maybe also 2/3/70) and first released in 1970, Corry has a great writeup. The metadata are very solid, two small flies in the ointment.

First, I have always supposed a "4/2/70" Airplane session  (Abbott 2007) to be spurious, probably stems from a European orthography somewhere in the script. Tape attributed this way has crossed six or seven media, and every copy I ever heard was, IIRC, the same material known to be from 2/4/70. But I note below that it is not impossible...

Second, ihor's irreplaceable The Complete Grateful Dead Discography (TCGDD) entry lists a June 28, 2005 release of the Night DVD, with otherwise identical catalog information (Eagle Rock 2030122-9), but calling it San Francisco Rock: A Night At The Family Dog. That's the sort of coincidence some of us are paid not to believe in. On my 2007 imprint of that release, that formulation ("San Francisco Rock, A Night at the Family Dog") appears as the title of Toby Gleason's brief missive. But I'd give a full title of Ralph J. Gleason Rock Classic: A Night at the Family Dog, if forced to.

I am confident out a number of decimal places that none of the material contracted during 1970 under the heading "San Francisco Rock" has anything to do with the Night at the Dog. We should be keeping these two things separate, IMO, except insofar as Toby Gleason titled an essay that way.

Overall, here, I conclude with memory rule: 2/4/70 is the Night at the Family Dog, and A Night at the Family Dog derives from only 2/4/70. (Update: except for maybe some or all of it being from 2/3/70? Heh heh.) None of this material appears to have been contracted through the papers described below.

c. Go Ride The Music

The back cover of the release says "Go Ride the Music was recorded in 1969" gives 1969 and 2008 copyrights. But 1969 is flat out incorrect. The JA and QMS tracks derive from 1970, from material contracted by KQED under the film title "San Francisco Rock".

i. Airplane

The cover reads that "the seven Airplane clips [on Ride the Music] were shot at Pacific High Recording and feature their new drummer, Joey Covington". 

The venue is a contraindication, since the contract said Family Dog. But note the wording on the Dead contract: "remote locations at Family Dog, PHR". So PHR was certainly on the script for "San Francisco Rock", and what's more --and tremendously ironically, given the story that I plan to narrate in "Jerry and the Jeffersons", parts I and II-- the Dog was busy giving birth to The Common in early August 1969, though it sure could have used the paycheck. For whatever reason, it seems very plausible to me that they contracted the Dog and ended up at PHR.

In terms of personnel, erstwhile drummer Spencer Dryden flew out of the Jeffersons' orbit by April 1970. Depending on how literally we take the word "new", this could give oxygen to the notion that there was an Airplane ssession at Family Dog on 4/2/70, despite the strikes agsinst that idea (noted above). That said, August 1970 still consists in Joey being "new" to the Airplane, I'd say, with five years (or thereabouts) already under their belts (8/13/65 is as good a starting point as any), the guy who had been in that particular seat for only three months --though around for longer-- was still "new" to a first approximation. Either way, Covington's presence as the Airplane's drummer, rather than a guy hanging out with Jack and Jorma, speaks unequivocally in favor of 1970. 

Sealing the case for 1970 for me is Jeff Swenson's liner notes. which put Garcia in the Jeffersons' studio striking Blows Against The Empire. The contracts are all over that stuff, of course, and things could not be clearer: this is summer 1970.

All in all, I am about 95% sure that work contracted for "San Francisco Rock" begat the Airplane material featured on Go Ride the Music, which therefore dates to sometime in the first third of August 1970. 

ii. Quicksilver

This QMS material completely knocks me out, Dino doing his Full Narcissist, the band tearing the shit out of things, the material very uneven. Remember this rule of thumb: "Subway" good, "Long-Haired Lady" bad. Further, any song that includes the phrase "uni-corns pran-cing in my mind" must not be. It must not be. Nicky's fingers appear a time or two, and he is clearly audible Freiburg looks like he's rocking, but he's buried in the mix, I guess that's Greg Elmore hitting the skins. It went downhill fast from here, but in September 1970 (which I'll conclude this is) these guys were at a local peak not seen since late 1968 and Happy Trails. The scenery is incredible, what looks to me like a fall day in Sonoma County, not too many people dancing out in ticklish sunshine, on a little bit of a breeze.

The "San Francisco Rock" contract fits the bill most precisely with the location  (Sonoma State College) and the season (fall). 

Personnelwise, Nicky is not on the contract, but one senses that his contractual status might have been a little bit fluid (hence the disembodied fingers on the film?). Alsoa  strike against is that, as I recalled, he had stopped gigging with the Quick in August. This certainly doesn't rule out a September 1970 QMS gig for film, which remains extremely likely given the balance of all of the evidence, but it does raise small question..

The fact that Dino Valente and Gary Duncan are in town strikes me as strongly confirmatory of 1970, since as I recall they spent all of 1969 out east riding and running around, not returning until about New Year's Eve. I'd like to consult Shelley Duncan's book again to feel more confident about that, but that's my strong sense.

All told, the balance of the evidence favors the QMS material from Go Ride the Music having been contracted as "San Francisco Rock" and performed in early September 1970.

iii. implication

Go Ride the Music comprises an early August 1970 Jefferson Airplane set from Pacific High Recorders and an early September 1970 Quicksilver Messenger set from Sonoma State College, both contracted under the planned Bay Area Educational Televation Association's planned KQED film "San Francisco Rock".

d. The Dead: All Contract, No Release

Based on all of the above, here's what I think happened with the GD session. If the Jeffersons played a different room than contracted, the Dead could have, too. And having taken that step, why not get some really live material for the film, with the people who do it best, and knock out a simulcast on KQED? In short, I now believe that the 10/2/70 contract was fulfilled by the Dead through the 10/4/70 television and radio broadcast from Winterland. Why didn't the Gleason folks use some of this footage in Go Ride the Music? My best guess is that it would have been a rights and money thing. Earlier I had entertained a few other possibilities. Maybe there really was a separate Dead session filmed during this timeframe, per the terms of the contract, which has remained hidden. This seems unlikely, to say the least. Or maybe it was never consummated (i.e., the 10/4/70 had nothing to do with the "Rock in S.F." project. Maybe the Dead bailed out after 10/4/70, Janis dead and darkness, darkness all around. But I think all of that is less likely than my preferred alternative.

Note: as far as I can tell, no video of the Dead's 10/4/70 set has been seen. Is that correct?

4. "San Francisco Rock", 1970 and San Francisco Rock, 1970

[with more time, here I would close the loop on the idea that what we get on the film is pretty much what we get in the real world. I sketched this out preliminarily above.]

Barebones session listing follows. Note that, in a pure breach of common sense, I have added a fifth line to some of the most interesting entries, to identify the songs. If I ever try to parse these into real data I'll have to remember that.

August 9th

This August 9th finds me thinking more about 70 years since Nagasaki than 20 years since Jerry Garcia, though that, too, is on my mind.

Might as well go straight for the cream: cue this one up from about 5:40 to hear Garcia wail. In the alternative check out the whole smokin' hot, first-night-of-tour set I closer, Wednesday night, February 4, 1981 at the Warner in Washington, DC:

"Tangled Up In Blue"

Thanks to taper Dave Redman, who also seems to have shepherded the tape to the DAT kingdom and from there, through the agency of unidentifed but much-appreciated agents, to the lossless realm (shnid-30859).

Turn it up!

p.s. Jim Vita also taped this hottie of a show (shnid-83742), and it's worth hunting down.

p.p.s. my notes for the Redman fileset below the fold.

Jerry Garcia Band
Warner Theater
513 13th Street NW
Washington, DC
February 4, 1981 (Wednesday)
Redman MAC flac1644 shnid-30859

--set I (7 tracks, 62:36)--
s1t01. ambience [0:04]
s1t02. I'll Take a Melody [13:16]
s1t03. //That's What //Love Will Make You Do [#6:#32]
s1t04. Mississippi Moon [11:06]
s1t05. Sitting In //Limbo [13:#04] [0:14]
s1t06. How Sweet It Is [8:54] ->
s1t07. Tangled Up In Blue// [9:23#]

--set II (8 tracks, 74:06)--
s2t01. ambience [0:09]
s2t02. Harder They Come [14:13] [0:03]
s2t03. /Mission In The Rain [10:46]
s2t04. //They Love Each Other [#8:10] [0:02]
s2t05. //Russian Lullaby/ [#12:36]
s2t06. Dear Prudence [12:25] (1) ->
s2t07. Deal [7:39] ->
s2t08. Midnight Moonlight [8:00]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #12b
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-b;
! lineup: Jimmy Warren - el-piano;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - organ;
! lineup: Daoud Shaw - drums.

JGMF

! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; ... = fade in/out; # = truncated timing; [m:ss] = 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 [m:ss] right after a song title is an attempt to say how long the song really was, as represented on this recording.

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19810204-01

! JGC: http://jerrygarcia.com/show/1981-02-04-warner-theater-washington-dc/

! db: http://etreedb.org/shn/30859 (this fileset); http://etreedb.org/shn/83742 (Vita MAC all-1)

! map: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Washington,+DC+20004/@38.8961209,-77.0296101,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m2!3m1!1s0x89b7b7976efcc7c5:0xb764664d930ed128

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/07/warner-theatre-513-13th-e-streets-nw.html

! review: [mixed] Lindsay, Dave. 1981. Garcia’s Solo Jamming. Eagle (American University), February 13, 1981, p. 7.

! R: field recordist: Dave Redman

! R: field recording gear: xx Nakamichi 300 > Sony TC-D5M

! R: lineage: cassette master > DAT > CD > EAC > FLAC.

! R: seeder: misSHN, 9/2005

! R: seeder notes: "Where it's good, it's quite a good recording. It may run a touch fast, but I am not really capable of judging that. There are also numerous patches of oversaturation, a good number of  cuts (and in general very tight editing), and a very chatty crowd. Beyond those presumed attributes of the master, there are a great many warts on this particular copy which would make a new transfer most welcomed.  I will try to list some of those warts below, but I am sure that I have not noted all of them.  Caveat auditor."

! P: seeder notes: "The show itself is extremely hot, IMO a contender for hottest show of the great month of 2/81.  Of note: a sweet version of Sitting in Limbo, a second solo in TUIB (around 8:40) that is absolutely filthy (watch your speakers!), and a pretty nicely executed transition from Deal into Midnight Moonlight.  A really fun show"

Visions of Johanna

Powerful viewing of a gut-wrenchingly beautiful performance, a dying man grasping at life, stumbling a time or two, laying bare the depth and beauty of the human condition. Thank you, videographer, thank you Bob Dylan, thank you Jerry.

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.

Eskimo Blue Day

Just found Garcia at Heider's (SF) on May 27, 1969 with the Airplane (Grace, Paul, Spencer, Jorma - very vew times I have found all of the Jeffersons listed on the same sessions!). What's interesting is that, as far as I know, Garcia is only known to have contributed (pedal steel) to "The Farm" on Volunteers. This session shows them working on "Eskimo Blue Day". Now, that doesn't mean he didn't work up some steel for "The Farm" on this date. And it could be that they didn't end up using whatever he might have recorded for "Eskimo Blue Day". It doesn't mean shit to a tree, of course, but I find it interesting.

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

That fiddle!

https://archive.org/details/gd1969-08-03.sbd.miller.30652.sbeok.flac16

I can't believe how great the guest fiddler is on this show, 46 years ago today. There's also a sax and maybe a few other mystery players.

Goddamn, I wish I could have seen a show at the Family Dog.

Seasons Of My Heart

One Kind Favor

I presume this is 9/6/73.

Deep River Blues on the Festival Express

--> Early-on, riding the Festival Express: "A few people started to drift into the forward lounge. Leslie West and Felix Pappalardi pulled out guitars. West, toying with his tiny, ancient Les Paul Gibson as if it were a stalk of grass lazily picked out Delta bottleneck blues, and Mountain's drummer, Corky Laing, sang along: Let it rain, let it pour / And let it rain some more / Got those deep river blues. Jerry Garcia, Delaney [Bramlett] and Kenny Gradney, Delaney's bass player, joined in" (Dalton and Cott 1970, 31).

Because I like to build out the sociomusical nodes in the Side Trips Social Network, I thought I'd mention this. I don't know the precise date.

BTW, and related to the post I just made regarding GD setlists, Dalton and Cott report that there were free gigs at Coronation Park on both the first and second days in Toronto, i.e., both Saturday June 27 and Sunday June 28. They identify GD, NRPS, Ian and Sylvia, James and the Good Brothers and the People's Revolutionary Concert Band as playing those gigs, to 4,000 the first day and only 500 the second (p. 32).

Dalton, David, and Jonathan Cott. 1970. The Million Dollar Bash. Rolling Stone, September 3, pp. 30-34.

Deadlists, Deadbase, GD19691003

I understand that the Deadbase guys are making a 50th anniversary print edition. I doubt I'll get it, because I already have Deadbase I, II, III and IX, and though they promise updates based on the wave of information that has emerged in the digital era (starting with Deadlists, and moving through LLD, LIA's work, some of my tidbits, etc. etc.). I hope they give credit where it is due in respect of all those and countless other sites from which, if they have done a good job, they will have gleaned their updated info.

In the spirit of updating The List, I note that Lenny Kaye (1969) drops a few little setlist nuggets about the Dead's Boston Tea Party gig on Friday, October 3, 1969, with respect to which It (i.e., Deadlists) currently shows nothing, mentioning a long jam around/into some Anthem of the Sun material and a resurrection of that Old Chestnut, "In The Midnight Hour", apparently with Garcia on pedal steel (!).

That info should go to Deadlists, if it were ever to be updated. And the fact that Deadbase 50 is already printed and can't take this info onboard speaks to the limits of the print medium for this kind of thing (without denying its considerable other charms). Anyway, there you have it.

--> Kaye, Lenny. 1969. The Grateful Dead: The Year of the Dead. Fusion, November 14, pp. unk, via rocksbackpages.

Cats in the Studio: September 1977

-->

I can’t write up everything I have gathered around the recording of Garcia’s 1978 masterpiece Cats Under the Stars, not now, and, alas, perhaps not ever in any true sense of the word “everything”. Once I write the book I plan on just throwing open all of my materials and letting others have at it insofar as they might care to.

The Dead organization’s calendar for the month of September 1977 listed Garcia in the new Front Street studio (built for the recording of Cats) from September 6-22 for overdubs, mixing, and mastering. Let me just briefly drop a few notes from a one week, Friday September 16, 1977 through Thursday the 22^nd, based on the union paperwork. All of these sessions were paid by Arista Records and the named artist is Jerry Garcia Band. The union scale looks to be $110 for a three-hour session.

Friday, 9/16/77, 6 pm

Session leader: Merl Saunders, 1353 17^th Avenue, San Francisco (double scale)

Also: Jerry Garcia (address a PO box in Corte Madera), John Kahn (a different PO box in Corte Madera), Keith Godchaux (PO box 1073, San Rafael, i.e., the Dead’s business address) and Ron Tutt (a PO box in Topanga).

Song: “Rubin”

Monday, 9/19/77, two sessions, 5-8 pm and 8-midnight

Session leader: Kahn (double scale)

Also: Garcia (1^st session only), Tutt, Saunders (double scale)

Song: “Rain”

Tuesday, 9/20/77, 3-6 pm

Session leader: Keith (double scale)

Also: Kahn, Tutt, Saunders (double scale)

Song: “Rhapsody In Red”

Tuesday, 9/20/77, 7-10 pm

Session leader: Merl (double scale)

Also: Garcia, Kahn, Godchaux, Tutt

Song: “Rhapsody In Red”

Wednesday, 9/21/77, 2-5pm

Session leader: Kahn (double scale)

Also: Godchaux, Tutt, Bob Hogins (Petaluma, CA), Robert F. Ogdin (Nashville, TN) (4x scale), Saunders (double scale)

Song: “Gomorrah”

Wednesday, 9/21/77, 6-9pm

Session leader: Merl (double scale)

Also: Kahn, Garcia, Godchaux, Tutt, Ogdin (4x scale)

Song: “Gomorrah”

Thursday, 9/22/77 6-9pm

Session leader: Tutt (double scale)

Also: Garcia, Kahn, Godchaux, Saunders (double scale)

Song: “Love In The Afternoon”

My comments are pretty obvious, if you follow along with my MO.

First, Merl! Though there is a listing for Garcia sitting in with Merl in late 1976, I believe it’s probably spurious. After playing together steadily for almost five years, Jerry and Merl suddently stopped doing so in July 1975, for reasons that remain obscure. They picked up again in late 1978, Jerry sitting in with Merl at Shady Grove and then “reconstructing” the old gang, with some fresh tunes and arrangements, for most of 1979. Merl is credited on Cats, so this is not new information, but seeing him here all week, and getting double-scale, just makes raises all kinds of questions about the nature of these men’s relationship. I don’t get it.

Second, Bob Hogins. Discogs shows him to have been in the a Buddy Miles/Santana kind of orbit, did some work with the Rowans and Barry Melton. Keyboards, a little horns, some arranging. He is not credited in the deaddisc entry for Cats, which tells me he wasn’t credited on the record. Hm.

Third, Robert F. Ogdin of Nashville, who gets 4x scale. Discogs describes Bobby Ogdin as a “prominent american session pianist and keyboardist [who] is also Vice-president of the Nashville branch of the Recording Musicians Association.” He boasts well over 100 credits with all kinds of country stars. He crosses with Tutt in various places, and his own credits page shows Cats, despite that his name isn’t given at deaddisc (and, again, I assume, not on the record itself).

Fourth, why so many keyboard players? My hunch is that they are good with arranging, but that’s just a shot in the dark. Anyone?

Fifth, Merl gets double-scale all the time, but he is listed as leader three times, Kahn twice, and Tutt and Keith once. It seems like there was a rotation to share the double-scale leader’s pay among the guys who aren’t Jerry, consistent with what we have long understood about Jerry’s egalitarian approach to things.

Anything else jump out at you?

GD releases on Youtube

http://danb.altervista.org/gdstream.htm

What a great resource Dan Bryan has put together! In short, this is a way to access just about every official GD release via the official (sponsored) versions on Youtube. Thanks!

"M.G. is writing a book"

http://danb.altervista.org/Default.htm

07/06/15 - From p.84 of the July/August 2015 issue of Relix:

[Trixie Garcia is now] on the board of the Grateful Dead with the band's surviving members—Lesh, Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart. In many ways, she has become Garcia's avatar. . . She's excited that M.G. is writing a book. She's relieved that her mother finally gets to participate. Trixie's also had a hand in planning the Dead's 50th anniversary shows; some of the proceeds will go to restoring the Jerry Garcia Ampitheater.

Hell yeah. Can't wait to read what she has to say.

Reading Notes: Henke 1991

LIA posted a quote from this, I stumbled across it amidst my materials, and I decided now was as good a time as any to annotate it.

Henke, James. 1991. The Rolling Stone Interview: Jerry Garcia. Rolling Stone, October 31, 34-40, 103, 106, 108.

Two September 1991 afternoons, hotel room overlooking Central Park.

July 1991 was release of JG DG, August 1991 was release of double live JGB. Meantime, JG was trying to kick H again.

“solo jaunts are often more entertaining than his work with the Dead, and one gets the feeling that if he felt he could easily extricate himself from the Dead and his attendant responsibilities, he might just do it. Still, when pressed, Garcia claimed the Dead take precedence. … We’ve all put so much of our lives into it by now that it’s too late to do anything drastic” (Henke 1991, 37).

Two separate interview sessions September 1991 NYC. In a family way with Manasha and Keelin.

“recent” meeting in which Garcia told the other band members that he wasn’t having fun anymore, that he wasn’t enjoying playing with the Dead. Garcia confirms this.

“The band is the board of directors, and we have regular meetings with our lawyers and our accountants. And we’ve got it done to where it only takes about three or four hours, about every three weeks. But anyway, the last couple of times, I’ve been there screaming ‘Hey, you guys!’ Because there are times when you go onstage and it’s just plain hard to do, and you start to wonder, ‘Well, why the fuck are we doing this if it’s so hard?’”

“We’ve been running on inertia for quite a long time. I mean, insofar as we have a huge overhead, and we have a lot of people that we’re responsible for, who work for us and so forth, we’re reluctant to do anything [38] to disturb that. We don’t want to take people’s livelihoods away. But it’s us out there, you know. And in order to keep doing it, it has to be fun” (Henke 1991, 37-38).

“we’re … going to have to construct new enthusiasm for ourselves, because we’re getting a little burned out. We’re a little crisp around the edges” (Henke 1991, 38).

They are trying to work up to taking a long break, a la 1974, “aiming for six months off the road” (Henke 1991, 38).

p. 38 Gar talks about how he dislikes trying to write songs. “It’s like pulling teeth.”

They saw Brent’s death coming. “About six or eight months earlier, he OD’d and had to go to the hospital, and they just saved his ass. … I think there was a situation coming up where he was going to have to go to jail. He was going to have to spend like three weeks in jail, for driving under the influence or one of those things, and it’s like he was willing to die just to avoid that. Brent was not a real happy person. And he wasn’t like a total drug person. He was the kind of guy that went out [39] occasionally and binged. And that’s probably what killed him” (Henke 1991, 38-39).

Getting older, people dying. Rick Griffin just died. “[F]or me at this point, I’m just happy if someone dies with a minimum of pain and horror” (Henke 1991, 39).

“I’m not a religious person” (Henke 1991, 39).

“The Grateful Dead is not where you’re going to find comfort. In fact, if anything, you’ll catch a lot of shit. And if you don’t get it from the band, you’ll get it from the roadies. They’re merciless. They’ll just gnaw you like a dog. They’ll tear your flesh off. They can be extremely painful” (Henke 1991, 39). Note that one word from Garcia could have put a stop to that, but he didn’t roll that way.

“Brent had a deeply self-destructive [40] streak.” (Henke 1991, 39-40). Talks about Brent lacking in culture.

“My life would be miserable if I didn’t have those little chunks of Dylan Thomas and T.S. Eliot” (Henke 1991, 40).

#drugs “I’ve been round and round with the drug thing. People are always wanting me to take a stand on drugs, and I can’t. To me, it’s so relativistic, and it’s also very personal. A person’s relationship to drugs is like their relationship to sex. … For me, in my life, all kinds of drugs have been useful to me, and they have also definitely been a hindrance to me. So, as far as I’m concerned, the results are not in. Psychedelics showed me a whole other universe, hundreds and millions of universes. So that was an incredibly positive experience” (Henke 1991, 40).

Still dabble with mushrooms: “It’s one of those things where every once in a while you want to blow out the pipes. For me, I just like to know they’re available, just because I don’t think there’s anything else in life apart from a near-death experience that shows you how extensive the mind is” (Henke 1991, 40).

“as far as the drugs that are dead-enders, like cocaine and heroin and so forth, if you could figure out how to do them without being strung out on them, or without having them completely dominate your personality … I mean, if drugs are making your decisions for you, they’re no fucking good. I can say that unequivocally. If you’re far enough into whatever your drug of choice is, then you are a slave to the drug, and the drug isn’t doing you any good” (Henke 1991, 40).

“I’m an addictive-personality kind of person. … with drugs, the danger is that they run you. Your soul isn’t your own. That’s the drug problem on a personal level” (Henke 1991, 40).

Says he was doing H on and off for 8 years.

Hard to quit H, but real problem now is smokes, that last thing left. “My friends won’t let me take drugs anymore, and I don’t want to scare people anymore. Plus, I definitely have no interest in being an addict” (Henke 1991, 40).

“I still have that desire to change my consciousness, and in the last four years I’ve gotten real seriously into scuba diving.” Also gives him some physical exertion (Henke 1991, 40).

With Keelin “I have a little more time to actually be a father. My other daughters have all been very good to me, insofar as they've never blamed me for my absentee parenting. And it was tough for them, really, because during the sixties and seventies, I was gone all the time. But they've all grown up to be pretty decent people, and they still like me. We still talk. But I never did get to spend a lot of time with them." (Henke 1991, 40).

Garcia got together with Heather (daughter of Jerry and Sara Katz) for first time 18 or 19 years ... (Henke 1991, 103).

At this point, JG and MG are in the process of getting divorced. “She’s real glad to get rid of me. We had a great time, a nice life together, but we went past it. … We haven’t really lived together since the 70s” (Henke 1991, 103).

Joe died when Gar was 5. Joe played clarinet and other woodwinds, in a big ol 40 piece jazz orchestra. “My father’s sister says he was in a movie, some early talkie.” (Henke 1991, 103).

“I remember him playing me to sleep at night. I just barely remember the sound of it” (Henke 1991, 103).

Jerry watched Joe go under and drown. “It was horrible. I was just a little kid, and I didn’t really understand what was going on, but then, of course, my life changed. “ (Henke 1991, 103).

Ruth was an RN, but after Joe died she took over his bar. “He had this little bar right next door to the Sailor’s Union of the Pacific, the merchant marine’s union, right at First and Harrison, in San Francisco. It was a daytime bar, a working guy’s bar, so I grew up with all these guys who were sailors. They went out and sailed to the Far East and the Persian Gulf, the Philippines and all that, and they would come and hang out in the bar all day long and talk to me when I was a kid. It was great fun for me. I mean, that’s my background. I grew up in a bar. And that was back in the days when the Orient was still the Orient, and it hadn’t been completely Americanized yet. They’d bring back all these weird things. Like one guy had the world’s largest collection of [106] photographs of square riggers” (Henke 1991, 103, 106).

His third grade teacher Miss Simon hipped him to the possibility of being a creative type. “’You mean you can spend all day painting pictures? Wow! What a great piece of news’.” (Henke 1991, 106).

Dwight Johnson was another teacher, “he’s the guy that turned me into a freak” (Henke 1991, 106). He was a motor cycle guy, 7th grade teacher.

Talks about liking Dylan songs: “they speak to me emotionally on some level. Sometimes, I don’t even know why. Like that song, Senor. There’s something creepy about that song, but it’s very satisfying in a weird sort of way” (Henke 1991, 106). “This is talking about a kind of desperation that everybody experiences” (Henke 1991, 108). Songs-S

More fun outside the Dead. “that’s always dangling in front of me, the thing of, well, shit, if I was on my own, God, I could … “ (Henke 1991, 108).

“Bruce, Branford, Rob Wasserman and I have talked about putting something together. I had this notion of putting together a band that had no material, that just got onstage and blew. And maybe one of these days we’ll make that happen” (Henke 1991, 108).

Garcia listens to Django, Art Tatum, Charlie Parker, Coltrane. “Michael Hedges is great. And my personal favorite lately is this guy Frank Gambale, who’s been playing with Chick Corea for the past couple of years” (Henke 1991, 108).

“Living Colour is a great band … Jane’s Addiction is another band I like” (Henke 1991, 108).

“I feel like I’m a hundred million years old” (Henke 1991, 108).

Why kids keep coming to see the Dead: “There must be a dearth of fun out there in America. Or adventure. Maybe that’s it, maybe we’re just one of the last adventures in America” (Henke 1991, 108).

Reconstruction in Tempe, AZ, July 29, 1979 (CANCELED)

**update: the show was canceled, per JGBP's correspondence with show promoter, in comments**

I gather up a lot of stuff, and "processing" it takes time. I appear to have gathered the above about 2/20/2015. It bears the watermark of noted photog Jay Blakesberg, and it's a ca. July 1979 schedule of Dead-related events put out by the GD offices.

Of course, I care about the "Reconstruction Band". July 14-15 in Colorado were canceled, Garcia putatively ill (but not so ill that the GD couldn't spend some time in the studio, per a few cuts on the Beyond Description release - harumph). July 20 and 22 shows happened, the July 28 show in San Diego is uncertain (no tape, no other hard evidence), and this is the first I have seen of a listing for the band at Dooley's in Tempe, AZ.

I have no idea if the show happened. If it did, it'd be notable as the band's only out-of-state gig outside the April shows at Barry Fey's Rainbow Music Hall in Denver. **update: as noted above, and elaborated in comments, the show was sold out but canceled for reasons not recalled.

JGMS Marx Meadows video

Wow. That is a four-minute black and white video, with sound, of JGMS playing "Sitting In Limbo" at Marx Meadows, Golden Gate Park, September 2, 1974. There's an equipment malfunction and the snippet ends on Big Steve coming out to fix some things.

Beyond the fact that this video exists, what amazes me most is that there are two horn players (h/t casable). Martin Fierro is the guy toward the right of the screen, and next to him is a guy with a beret or something and what I think is a baritone sax. update: this is Snooky Flowers! Right @ 0:39 and for a few seconds gives the clearest view of both of them. Snooky also plays a few lines later on, clearly him because Martin is shown and is not playing (see especially 2:53, and then the bari sax is audible until the sound cuts out @ 3:45).

Here's a screenie of the two of them from 0:51:

In a nice piece of convergence, on Facebook Merl Jr. captioned this pic of the show over at Facebook, noting that he himself is looking toward a cap lower down in the field, which is Snooky stooping over to roll a number. So it is definitely Snooky here. QED.

Thanks as always to Gordon the Drummer for keeping up with what hits the youtube airwaves.

BTW, love this about Garcia's apolitics: "Asked by the Barb if he sympathized the White Panther politics of the People's Ballroom, Garcia replied, 'I don't support them or not support them, but I'd just as soon play as not".

! ref: "Garcia Returns to Marx Meadows," Berkeley Barb, September 6-12, 1974, p. 2 (via Independent Voices).

"A Shitty Father"

The title of this post comes from Garcia daughter Annabelle's remarks at his funeral on 8/11/95, probably not said in anger, almost certainly considerably true.

I don't recall Jerry speaking so frankly about this issue as here, ca. July 1981: 

I have a family – I am talking about the woman I used to live with, and my kids—and I visit them. They certainly mean something to me, but they are not the focus of my life, and they know it. It’s been hard for me to come to grips with some of this, because these are people that I care about … Music is my life. There's nothing I love more than music. 

Van Matre, Lynn. 1981. Jerry Garcia Keeps the Spirit of the Grateful Dead Alive. Chicago Tribune, July 5, p. D11.

p.s. in looking up Annabelle's remarks, I have found three versions quoted:

• "he was a shitty father, but a great man" (McNally 2002, 614)
• "a great American but a shitty father" (Gans 2010, 331 )
• "he may have been a genius, but he was a shitty father" (Edmondson 2009, 100)

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.

Garcia, Cutler, Hunter, unidentified woman chatting, ca. 1970

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_g2GWeAgYQ

Not much very revelatory, but nice to hear Hunter rapping, and they talk together about Altamont. Around 20, we get some Hells Angels talk.

Garcia: "It's almost like having tigers on the streets."

Hunter, in a classic case of how these guys romanticized the Angels and other outlaws: "Hells Angels are Robin Hood.

Cutler is talking about one of their leaders, and even here he doesn't name names.

Garcia: "They've got a form that works. Like one of the old brotherhoods ..." Hunter: "They've been there from time immemorial. There have always been brotherhoods." Garcia: "... Samurai warriors ..."

update: LIA has transcribed this at Deadsources.

Garcia radio program this weekend

I am just passing along the info, sounds cool.

A two-hour public radio special on Jerry Garcia & music and fans of Grateful Dead is airing this July 4th weekend.

The name of the radio program is American Routes, which airs over 300 public radio stations nationwide, and this special episode features the host Nick Spitzer's interview with Jerry Garcia, from 1989, at Smithsonian Institution. You'll also hear brief conversations with fans and security guards at a Grateful Dead concert in Washington, DC, as well as the music by Grateful Dead, and those who influenced their music.

American Routes is based in New Orleans, LA and we've been on the air for 17 years.
To find a station near you, visit http://americanroutes.wwno.org/stations/
You can also hear our Jerry Garcia episode as an on-demand streaming at this link, http://americanroutes.wwno.org/archives/show/911/july-4th-weekend-2015-with-jerry-garcia-the-grateful-dead

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