Killer Sugaree and final DDD: JGB at Country Club, Reseda, May 20, 1984

LN jg1984-05-20.jgb.all.aud-nak300s.79553.flac1644

This Sugaree is in the running for hottest ever, especially in the 6-10 minute range. It opened shows a lot in the 75-77 period, a little less frequently by this time, and it would leave the JGB fold in '86 to become GD only. But, for my money, the Jerry Band ones from this ca. '84 period were the very best. I am told that 8/13/84 is another smoker. I plan to revisit it soon.

I don't think Jim Rismiller still had the Country Club at this point, though I am not 100% sure. I am calling it The Country Club, though the tag still has Rissmiller's name to keep them together with other posts from earlier dates.

Last night out for DeeDee Dickerson. Thank you, DDD!

Jerry Garcia Band

Country Club

18415 Sherman Way

Reseda, CA 91335

May 20, 1984 (Sunday)

Nak 300s shnid-79553 retrack

--set I (6 tracks, 5 tunes, 53:59)--

s1t01. ambience [0:19] 

s1t02. Sugaree [15:32] [0:03] % [0:28]

s1t03. Love In The Afternoon [10:06] [0:02] % [0:02]

s1t04. Rhapsody In Red [11:42] % [0:03]

s1t05. Run For The Roses

s1t06. Deal [10:20] (1) [0:07]

--set II (5 tracks, 4 tunes, 40:31)--

s2t01. ambience [0:18] 

s2t02. Mission In The Rain [12:07] [0:03] % [0:02]

s2t03. [0:10] Harder They Come [14:21] % [0:03]

s2t04. /Gomorrah  [#5:48] ->

s2t05. Midnight Moonlight [7:30] (2) [0:07]

! ACT1: JERRY GARCIA BAND #21a

! lineup: Jerry Garcia - guitar, vocals;

! lineup: Melvin Seals - organ;

! lineup: John Kahn - bass;

! lineup: David Kemper - drums;

! lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - vocals;

! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals.

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/19840520-01

! JGC: http://jerrygarcia.com/show/1984-05-20

! db: https://etreedb.org/shn/79553 (this fileset)

! band: http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/jerry-garcia-band-personnel-1975-1995.html. DDD's last gig, and so last night out for JGB #21a. The classic 21b lineup with Gloria would debut ca. 7/10/84.

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/A6gX8hd4tfS2

! JGBP: https://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/06/rissmillers-country-club-reseda-theatre.html. 1,000 seat room which opened 3/28/80 with Merle Haggard (Jackson 1980).

! listing: Orange County Register, May 20, 1984, p. L7.

! seealso: JGMF, "The Auds Have It," URL https://jgmf.blogspot.com/2020/04/the-auds-have-it-jgb-at-irvine-meadows.html.

! seealso: JGMF, "There is World Class Guitar Playing Here," URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/02/ln-jg1984-05-19jgballaud-rossi.html.

! R: field recordist: unknown

! R: field recording gear: 2x Nakamichi CM-300 w/ CP-1 caps (no shotguns) > Sony D5

! R: lineage: MAC > ?? > DAT > HHB 830 CD Recorder (Stand Alone) > ?? > flac1644.

! R: Nice tape, brightness suggestive of improper Dolby decode.

! P: overall I like it less than the night before. Kemper sounds great on this tape. The Sugaree is pretty off the chain, otherwise not much that strikes me as special. The second set clocks in below the Minelli Line.

! historical: Garcia often undertook these compact SoCal tours in the early 80s. This one comprised four nights of earning: Beverly Theatre on Thursday 17th, Irvine Meadows (a very big space for the JGB of the time) on Friday the 18th, Arlington in Santa Barbara on Saturday the 19th, and this show to round things out. A logistics person might have wanted to run it north - south (SB, Reseda, Beverly Hills, Irvine) or the other way around, but I suspect Irvine had to be on the Friday or Saturday, so all bets were off. Robert Hunter opened the last three nights, as far as I am aware.

! P: s1t02 Sugaree in the 9 and 10 this thing is just going nuts. Returning some years or months later: yeah, yeah. Sugaree comes hot out of the gate, and never lets up. Some serious attack variation arises 6:19, goodness still a minute later. Each note has its own little existence, but he constructs half-phrases, half-paragraphs, up and down the fret board, fast-slow, loud and really loud, God damn, Jerry! Jeesus fucking christ, now Kemper 8:35 just CRUSHING to keep up with Jerry and Jerry is running circles like a fucking demon. Crowd is seems to be going crazy 9:10, but Jerry is playing so fucking loud and crazy that it's hard to know. Pure energy happening here. Mamma mia! Now starts some fanning 9:45, and it sounds like he has four hands, because he seems to be fanning chords and picking notes at the same time. Boy. Softens to set up a verse first half of ten, verse comes 10:30. After that verse 11:30 he comps for Melvin, and Kemper @ 12:20, I just love you, man. 

! P: s1t04 I hold my RIRs to very high standards, and this one is not above average.

! P: s1t06 Deal Kemper is a beast here.

! s1t06 (1) JG: "Thanks. We're gonna take a break for a few minutes. We'll be back in a little while."

! P: s2t03 HTC going a mile a minute. Right out of the gate, Kemper sounds awesome, John hits a huge note and a little slide!

! R: s2t04 Gommorah clips in

! P: s2t05 Mid Moon goes a mile a freaking minute, and tempo seems to pick up as the song plays. Kemper needs another leg and a couple of arms to keep up.

! s2t05 (2) JG: "Thanks a lot. See y'all later."

I Have A Confession To Make

I do not know who the JGB backing vocalists were between October 24, 1982 and November 15, 1982

Update: they are now known: Shirley Faulkner and Elisecia Wright.

I have posted many, many times about the early 80s backing vocalists (see Appendix below). Our understanding of who was who, and when, was greatly abetted by the fact that Corry Arnold took notes from the GD Ticket Service ("thank you, and stay in touch"), which also announced Jerry Band shows and tours and sometimes identified personnel. Here's how I currently understand things. This is all catalogued at Corry's "Jerry Garcia Band Personnel 1975-1995" post at LLD, or eventually will be to the extent that he agrees with me.

June 24, 1981 - August 23, 1981: Essra Mohawk and Liz Stires

The starting date of this configuration is not certain (see the discussion here), but overall this seems pretty solid.

September 7, 1981 - June 22, 1982: Liz Stires and Julie Stafford

Intrepid researcher slipnut found some reference to Liz Stires's sister singing on the first gig in this window, but I have shown the picture below to Julie Stafford, and she thinks that is her (left of the picture), and wasn't entirely sure but thought it could indeed have been her first night out.

JGB at Concord Pavilion, 9/7/81
photo credit: unknown

As far as the end of this window, Liz told me that she left the group just before the tour ended, after a gig in Richmond (6/22/82).

June 23, 1982 - June 24, 1982: Julie Stafford

We are fortunate that a review of the 6/23/82 show mentions "the female vocalist", confirming that Julie carried on as the lone backing vocalist, presumably for the last two nights of the tour.

October 24, 1982 - November 15, 1982: unknownShirley Faulkner and Elisecia Wright

At one point, I thought Jacklyn LaBranch and DeeDee Dickerson began here. But Jacklyn has said very clearly that she and DDD started together at the Keystone in January 1983. I had also wondered whether Julie continued through the end of 1982, but she has said she did not.

So, as of now, this is a three-week hole in my personnel knowledge that disconcerts me, on the one hand, but also delights me because we still have mysteries to unravel.

January 13, 1983 - May 20, 1984 (?): DeeDee Dickerson and Jacklyn LaBranch

With Jackie's clear statement that she and DDD began in January '83 at the Keystone, the start of this period seems clear. I used my unreliable ears to pin down the end of this window, noting the very different vocal sounds and stylings between May (DDD) and July/August (Gloria).

update: as of 2024, I still have questions about when DDD ended and Gloria started. There is evidence for both of them in May 1984 ...

July 10, 1984 (?) - April 23, 1995: Jacklyn LaBranch and Gloria Jones

The front end of this period is not entirely certain. I had originally thought Gloria started on 7/28/84, because there were no known electric shows between May (DDD) and then, while at the same time we know Gloria was with the band out east in August, so must have been in the fold for the local gigs in late July and on Jerry's bday. But then in 2018 I discovered previously undocumented Keystone Palo Alto gigs on July 10-11, and it seems extremely likely that these would have been Gloria's first with the band. It is not quite an iron law, but a clear regularity, that the Jerry Band liked to break in new members on off-nights, off the beaten path, or both. A Tuesday-Wednesday down in Palo Alto fits that bill pretty well.

Appendix: Mistakes along the way

10/24/82 with Julie? Apparently not

thought 7/20/83 was Gloria's debut, was wrong | thought 7/21/83 was her second, was wrong

late '83 tour: used to think this was Gloria, then discovered it was DDD

late '83 tour: further confirmation that it was DDD and not GJ

thought Gloria debuted 1/8/84, but I was wrong because 5/19/84: DDD still in the house per a review

thought Gloria debuted on 7/28/84, but 7/10/84 is more likely And May 1984 remains possible!

Gloria NON Advenit! JGB at Keystone Palo Alto, Saturday, July 10, 1984

update 1: Jeez ... I now think Gloria must have arrived 7/10/84-7/11/84, a Tuesday-Wednesday in Palo Alto. Working backward: she is mentioned in reviews of August 1984 east coast shows. It is an iron law that the band played local warmups before leaving on tour, which would be these birthday shows. And it is just about an iron law that new members broke in on off-nights, off-the-beaten path, or both. Tues-Weds in Palo Alto fits the pattern better than a Saturday (7/28) in Berkeley the weekend of Jerry's birthday.

Having spent some time with it, I am prepared to declare that I hold that the titular show, JGB at Keystone Palo Alto on Saturday, July 28, 1984 Tuesday, July 10, 1984 represents Gloria Jones's public debut with the outfit. It thus also marks the birth of JGB #21b, THE Jerry Garcia Band, which would play together through November 1993, making it Garcia's longest-running aggregation outside the Brent Mydland-era Grateful Dead.

I have been circling around this conclusion for almost a decade now. Let me reconstruct. Older reckonings had Gloria starting on 7/21/83, or 9/30/83. In late 2010, I found an ad for 11/27/83 naming DeeDee Dickerson and not Gloria alongside Jackie LaBranch, which got me to thinking those earlier understandings were wrong. Five years later, I went through band itineraries for the November-December 1983 tour, which included DeeDee's flight arrangements and so on. So far, this has DDD present through '83, consistent with Corry's current reckoning (as JGB #21a, b. 7/20/83, d. 12/13/83).

I did a bunch of stuff in 2014. First, I conjectured that 1/8/84 was Gloria's first gig, which probably led to Corry's current dating for JGB #21b. I am now pretty sure that was wrong because, second, I found a show review from Santa Barbara (5/19/84) which namechecks the band, including DDD. This is no guarantee, of course, since JGB member names were not always  correctly rendered by local journos, but it was suggestive. And, third, I found pictures from 8/11/84 which show Gloria onstage. So, the bookends have now moved forward quite a bit - DDD was in the house 5/19/84, and almost certainly the last night of the little mini SoCal jaunt it was a part of, 5/20/84 at Wolf & Rissmiller's in Reseda. The next show was 7/28/84, part of a four-night birthday run for Garcia, warming up for the East Coast tour.

So I did some listening around those bookends, the May shows now presumed to be with DeeDee, and the July-August shows now presumed to be with Gloria. Despite obviously strong priors (and probably other bias in favor of finding a difference), I hear differences in the backing vocals. I couldn't characterize them beyond saying they are different. Basic methodology was to find clean tapes (sbd preferred) that have clear backing vocals. I ended up focusing on the first chorus of "Cats Under The Stars" on 5/18/84 (an FM-SBD tape, shnid-32156) and on 7/28/84 (sbd, shnid-14428). Again, the backing vocalists sound different. There aren't a lot of board tapes in these frames, so then I compared the opening stanza of "Catfish John" on the same 5/18/84 and the next known version, 8/10/84. Again, I detect a difference.

update 2: the original version of this post had Gloria arriving July 28th. But I now think it must have been July 10th.

On this basis and on the basis of earlier sniffing around 10/82 and 7/83, I am prepared to "call" the following:

• DeeDee Dickerson's tenure with the Garcia Band ran from 10/24/82 1/13/83 (with JGB #15b) through 5/20/84 (with JGB #21a)
• Jacklyn LaBranch's tenure with the Garcia Band ran from 1/13/83 to the end (4/23/95).
• Gloria Jones's tenure with the Garcia Band ran from 7/10/84 (with JGB #21b) to the end.

My only concern is that I thought there was a new member on 1/8/84 based on audience chatter. That, combined with the fact that journos didn't always have the most up-to-date information about who was in the Garcia Band, gives me some pause. I hope the listening analysis I did holds up!

Now, how about 7/28/84, listening notes for which I post below?

The setlist novelty here is Allen Toussaint's "Get Out Of My Life, Woman", which came in strong and stuck around pretty much to the end of the Garcia Band. The JGB never varied its setlists that much (certainly not relative to the GD), and I don't really have the data I'd need to map song debuts, but this is just about the only new-to-the-repertoire tune I can think of between, say, 1981 and 1985. Are there any others, like, is there a single other cover tune that JGB added to the repertoire between, say, "Eleanor Rigby" in 1980 (sort of) and "It Stoned Me" in 1986? Anyway, great tune, done well, and at points "hot-hot-hot", per my notes.

The show, overall, offers plenty of sloppy pep. I hated when he couldn't figure out how to end "Cats Under The Stars", and this version suffers from that. There's plenty of mumblyverse, slop, and hot energy in tunes like "Tore Up Over You". Not bad, all told.

Listening notes below the fold.

Digitization Makes Me Happy

Via https://www.alexandria.ucsb.edu, the UCSB Daily Nexus (and before it, the El Gaucho) has been digitized. Having sniffed around Santa Barbara a fair bit (UCSB being my alma mater), I am happy to see this, and found a few good things.

First, I have found a preview and a review of OAITW 4/12/73 at the Granada, which gave me another piece of evidence in favor of the proposition that the undated set found in shnid-99222 is indeed from this date (the late show).

Second, in addition to a very positive review of the 5/25/74 GD gig, one Stephen Westfall notes to my amusement that the first band was billed as Great American Music Band but announced as Great American String Band --I should just acronymize as GA_B-- and to my surprise that the band featured none other than Cecil Taylor and Archie Shepp collaborator, the great Buell Neidlinger, apparently at this time teaching at Cal Arts in Valencia, on bass. I did not know that. If a tape would ever come into the light, I'd be mighty happy about that.

Third, I found a preview and a review of the 5/19/84 JGB show --a mighty good one-- which both mention DeeDee Dickerson rather than Gloria Jones, and seem to do so reasonably knowledgeably. This has led me to again revise my understanding of DDD's tenure. While we used to think it ended in mid-83, and I have recently extended it through that year, it now seems to have run at least into May of 1984. I would love to learn more about when Gloria Jones actually came in!

There were also various materials around 10/13/74 (JGMS), 6/26/75 (LOM), and 2/5/77 (JGB), now swept into my vortex. Good stuff.

JGB in Phishland: Flynn Theater, Burlington, VT, 12/6/83

Note that I have started changing all of my info to reflect the presence of DeeDee Dickerson on the bus with the JGB in November-December 1983.

12/6/83a

Nice Catfish John, otherwise this early show does not light me up.

Jerry Garcia Band
Flynn Theater
153 Main Street
Burlington, VT 05401
December 6, 1983 (Tuesday) - 7 PM (early) show
Senn 441 flac2496 shnid-135010

--(7 tracks, 69:09)--
e-t01. How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) [10:53] % [0:17]
e-t02. Catfish John [13:45] [0:06] %
e-t03. /Someday Baby [#9:47]
e-t04. /Run For The Roses [#5:15] % [0:28]
e-t05. When I Paint My Masterpiece [8:20] [0:03] % [0:33]
e-t06. Mississippi Moon [7:33] [0:04] ->
e-t07. Deal [11:56] (1) [0:08]

! ACT1: JERRY GARCIA BAND #21a
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - guitar, vocals;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - organ;
! lineup: John Kahn - bass;
! lineup: David Kemper - drums;
! lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - vocals;
! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals.

JGMF:

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

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19831206-01

! db: http://etreedb.org/shn/18818 (aud, shnf); http://etreedb.org/shn/123065 (mixed 1st gen auds, flac1644); http://etreedb.org/shn/123066 (mixed 1st gen auds, flac2496); http://etreedb.org/shn/135010 (this fileset).

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/My2seLLcXhN2

! JGBP: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2011/11/flynn-theater-153-main-street.html

! band: http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/jerry-garcia-band-personnel-1975-1995.html. Note that as of 3/23/2016 I am listing DeeDee Dickerson instead of Gloria Jones. It has traditionally been thought that JGB #21a had a very short run, and that Gloria entered ca. 9/30/83. But the paperwork for the late '83 JGB tour is very clear that DDD is on the bus.

! R: field recordist: unknown

! R: field recording gear: 2x Sennheiser 441 > Sony TC-D5m

! R: field recording location: Row D

! R: transfer: Playback on Sony TC-D5m to Sony PCM-M10 96kHz/24bit

! R: nice tape. Some very metallic PA feedback early on

! P: d-t02 CJ great CJ! Pretty good scrubbing 11:25 or so, good guitar again 11:52.

! R: e-t03 Someday Baby clips in

! P: e-t03 SB yikes, he can't hit the high notes at all, it's cringe-inducing. Puts some nice guitar effect on 7:25.

! R: e-t04 RFTR clips in

! e-t07 (1) JG: "Thanks a lot. See ya later."

! P: early show overall doesn't really move me, despite a nice CJ.

12/6/83b

Jerry Garcia Band
Flynn Theater
153 Main Street
Burlington, VT 05401
December 6, 1983 (Tuesday) - 10 PM (late) show
Senn 441 flac2496 shnid-135014



--(7 tracks, 78:13)--
l-t01. [0:08] Sugaree [12:57] [0:02] % [0:16]
l-t02. Cats Down Under The Stars [9:30] [0:02] % [0:15]
l-t03. Mission In The Rain [11:21] [0:02] % [0:11]
l-t04. The Harder They Come [10:58] [0:02] %
l-t05. /Gomorrah [5:58] [0:04] ->
l-t06. Dear Prudence [13:05] ->
l-t07. Tangled Up In Blue [13:15] (1) [0:05] %

! ACT1: JERRY GARCIA BAND #21a
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - guitar, vocals;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - organ;
! lineup: John Kahn - bass;
! lineup: David Kemper - drums;
! lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - vocals;
! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals.

JGMF:

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

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19831206-02

! db: http://etreedb.org/shn/18818 (aud, shnf); http://etreedb.org/shn/123065 (mixed 1st gen auds, flac1644); http://etreedb.org/shn/123066 (mixed 1st gen auds, flac2496); http://etreedb.org/shn/135010 (this fileset).

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/My2seLLcXhN2

! JGBP: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2011/11/flynn-theater-153-main-street.html

! band: http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/jerry-garcia-band-personnel-1975-1995.html. Note that as of 3/23/2016 I am listing DeeDee Dickerson instead of Gloria Jones. It has traditionally been thought that JGB #21a had a very short run, and that Gloria entered ca. 9/30/83. But the paperwork for the late '83 JGB tour is very clear that DDD is on the bus.

! R: field recordist: unknown

! R: field recording gear: 2x Nakamichi CM-100 (CP-1 capsule) > Sony TC-D5m

! R: field recording media: Sony UCX-S 90

! R: field recording location: Orchestra, left, row Q, seat 2

! R: transfer: Playback master on Sony TC-D5m to SOny PCM-M10 96kHz/24bit

! R: l-t01 starts off with some start-of-tape swishing, sounds like a nice pull.

! P: l-t01 Sugaree is characteristically strong for the period. I am really liking the figures he is weaving late 8 over 9, crowd liking it too at 9:15, suggesting fanning 9:25, crowd excited, this is really good guitar, natch.

! R: l-t05 Gomorrah clips in

! l-t07 (1) JG: "See ya later. Thank you."

On the Bus with the Garcia Band

I was going through the tour documents for the Jerry Garcia Band's November-December 1983 tour, which was unusually long. I haven't compared the various JGB tours, but this one and/or the late '77 tour are the two longest I can think of, without double checking.

I have more documents from the 70s than the 80s, so I don't know how uncommon this was in the latter decade, but I note that the big middle of the tour involved lots of overnight bus trips, something I have never picked up for any other tour.

The above is a rough map of the tour once the road tripping started, from Cleveland forward. (They had played 11/23 in Chicago and had Thanksgiving Day off, flying on Friday 11/25 to Cleveland.) I figure almost 3,200 miles on the bus, most of them (in the grey-shaded boxes) overnight from the previous night's show. So, on Friday, 12/2 they played the Tower in Upper Darby (outside of Philly), presumably ending rather late (they were wont to do that), hopped a bus for 300 overnight miles to Boston, played two shows, and hopped another bus 275 miles to Long Island, gigged at SUNY Stony Brook, and did 325 miles up to Vermont right after that show, enjoying a much-needed night off on Monday 12/5. What a hectic touring pace!

Again, this strikes me as exceptionally uncommon. They must have been in dire financial straits, or maybe it just seemed like a good idea at the time. I can't imagine how that bus must have smelled, nor do I wish to try.

p.s. DeeDee Dickerson is on the tour documents. This confirms irrefutably what I found on an ad from the tour a while back, i.e., that she was still with the band at this point, and didn't end her stint with the JGB in summer '83 as has been previously understood.

DeeDee Dickerson Discography

I recently posted a little bit of information from the John Scher Presents program for JGB 5/31/83. It included a little bio on the various band members.

In comments, nick picked up on Dee Dee Dickerson's work with Pharoah Sanders, and posted link to Donna Dickerson at discogs.I had not known her name was Donna. Anyway, following Nick's lead, I combed through discogs and allmusic and tried to put together a little discography.

Because Google Docs's embedding technology sucks, here's a direct link. The technology sucks in other ways, as for example by dropping the right most "notes" column I have made in my Excel spreadsheet, but I deal with that now.

I sing the blues, where has it led?

LN jg1983-05-31.jgb.all.aud-vita.76578.flac1644

On Tuesday, May 31, 1983, the Jerry Garcia Band (#15c) lit up an SRO West 52nd Street institution, the venerable Roseland Ballroom, with one of the finest shows of the 1980s.  On any given night, Jerry Garcia could deliver the fucking goods, and this is the fucking goods. Everything crackles. I have titled the post with a line from the show opening "Rhapsody In Red", the big rocker from 1978's Cats Under The Stars that worked beautifully with Jerry's grungy, metallic, 1983 JGB sound. This one is a rip-snorter.

I notice Greg Errico's deep, thudding percussion this night and Melvin being a little tentative. I feel Garcia very much in an R&B space, shaking his sweaty mane and tearing the shit out of several solos. Very high energy show. See notes.

The John Scher Presents program for this night is nothing to write home about, aesthetically. But I'll post scans of the last two pages, with a few comments.

John Scher Presents program for JGB at Roseland Ballroom, 5/31/83-6/1/83, p. 3.

Standard little band bio, of course. But check out these details, some of which hadn't quite stuck in my brain.

MELVIN SEALS | Organ | Has quite an extensive background in Broadway productions having worked on four shows, including " Evolution Of The Blues". Other music talents he's worked with include Oscar Brown, Buddy Miles and Elvin Bishop, as well as Maria Muldaur and Chuck Berry. Melvin is a producer for a company out of Nashville and has produced such Gospel greats as the Hawkins Family. The Martin Luther King television special is one prestigious project he has participated in. Melvin has been with the Garcia band for three years now, and also directs the current female singers in the band.

I have to check this info against what I know. But I found the last line, about Melvin directing the female singers, to be very interesting. I had always assumed that Kahn dealt with arrangements, but this implies a more elaborate (and possibly alternative) set of arranging responsibilities.

JACKIE LA BRANCH | Backup Vocals | A recent addition to the band, she has been mainly singing gospel with the San Francisco Inspirational Choir, and has worked with Maria Muldaur on gospel tunes.
DEE DEE DICKERSON | Backup Vocals | Another recent addition, she has been working with some of the industry heavies for years. Her long list includes Herbie Hancock, Taj Mahal, Pharaoh Sanders, and Quicksilver Messenger Service.

Both these girls have been a welcome addition to the band and the audience's enjoyment is evident. The ladies are great!

I sure would like to know more about the ladies, and be in touch with them if at all possible. If you know them, please have them be in touch! I'd like to learn more.

Finally, a little piece of capitalism from the back cover:

John Scher Presents program for JGB at Roseland Ballroom, 5/31/83-6/1/83, p. 4 (back cover).

I am sure there had been lots of GD and JGB cross-promotions over the years, but for whatever reason this struck me. I love how, for lack of something else to draw attention to, the ad for the GD's Go To Heaven promotes it on the basis of including "Don't Ease Me In," perhaps the only time in history capitalism managed such a crass feat. The Run For The Roses selections don't look that appealing either, come to think of it. Oh well. Play on, Jerry.

Jerry Garcia Band
Roseland Ballroom
239 West 52nd Street
New York, NY 10019
May 31, 1983 (Tuesday)
Vita flac1644 shnid-76578

--set I (7 tracks, 50:32)--
s1t01. tuning [0:37]
s1t02. Rhapsody In Red [10:17] [0:04] %
s1t03. They Love Each Other
s1t04. That's What Love Will Make You Do ]10:03] % [0:04]
s1t05. Valerie [6:48] [0:04] ->
s1t06. How Sweet // It Is (To Be Loved By You)
s1t07. Run For The Roses [5:00] (1) [0:06]

--set II + encore (8 tracks, 68:33)--
-- set II (7 tracks, 60:44)--
s2t01. tuning [0:15]
s2t02. The Harder They Come [15:16] [0:03] % [0:12]
s2t03. Mission In The Rain [9:28] [0:03] % [0:06]
s2t04. Mississippi Moon 
s2t05. Tangled Up In Blue [12:15] [0:03] %
s2t06. /Gomorrah [5:49] ->
s2t07. Deal [8:25] (2) [0:03] % [0:02]
--encore (1 track, 7:49)--
s2t08. Midnight Moonlight [7:43] [0:06] %

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #15c
! Lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! Lineup: John Kahn - el-bass;
! Lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards (Hammond B-3 organ);
! Lineup: Greg Errico - drums;
! Lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals;
! Lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - vocals.

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/19830531-01

! db: http://etreedb.org/shn/4416 (unknown MAC shnf); http://etreedb.org/shn/6624 (senn 441 shnf); http://etreedb.org/shn/15617 (Cohen shnf); http://etreedb.org/shn/76578 (Vita flac1644, this fileset).

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/06/roseland-ballroom-239-west-52nd-street.html

! band: JGB #15c (http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/jerry-garcia-band-personnel-1975-1995.html)

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/oGXPs

! R: field recordist: Jim Vita

! R: field recording gear: 2x Sennheiser 421 > Sony D-5 (Maxell UDXLII)

! R: transfer and FLAC encoding by David Minches:

Master played back on Nakamichi Dragon > ART DI/O > Digital Audio Labs Card Deluxe soundcard > Cool Edit 2000 > flac encoding > FLAC.

! R: shnid-4416 note: 04/07/2007, jjoops-garcia: "The cassette flip at the start of Run for the Roses suggests that this could be from Vita's master, though of course it's possible that others besides Vita got caught flipping there. "

! historical: Diamorphine, 2014-04-23 00:35:35: "Saw both shows and still remember being blown away by the Don't Let Go [on 6/1]. The place was hot and packed with people and the music just rumbled inside of you. It's seeing shows like this, with the band just feet away from you, the whole place dancing, made the thought of JGB at MSG or the like totally impossible." http://bt.etree.org/details.php?id=571647

! P: s1t02 RIR hot hot hot late 5 acid molten playing, tearing the shit out of it over 6-minute mark. No warmup needed this night - he is fully frothed here. 6:35ish some interesting tone. Very fluid in 6:40 range, hot, tight, fast, sharp, lots of good adjectives for this, over 7. Pulling a little 7:11 ff, more pulling train whistle 7:17. Letting it breathe post 7:30. Man, so nice. On any given night, Jerry Garcia could deliver the fucking goods, and this is the fucking goods. 8:20 churning some chunkier stuff, 8:33, 8:38 pure metal strumming, chunky percussive but shorter pulls interspersed with those earlier longer phrases, 9:08, he's Chuck Berry, signalling back to the song. Seizes the '1' at 9:23 and sings. Wow. That is a masterpiece of a performance right out of the gate.

! P: s1t03 TLEO is not a song I love, but this version is really good.

! P: s1t04 TWLWMYD from 4:45 there is some exemplary playing, then he does some very well controlled pulls around 5:05 and 5:10 - check this out. More energy 5:30, another turn round the bases. 6:05 he steps back and comps, Melvin is a little slow to take the cue. He's playing 6:15ff, but not loud at all. Now 6:30 he does a big B3 swoop. Still super low in the mix, but that could be the tape. See also a similar reaction I have from, when, 8/11/84? Melvin coming in with about a 'C' grade feature. Now louder over 7. There you go, big fella, lean into it, groove to it, loosen up! (Then again, maybe he was tearing it up, but wasn't mixed loud!) 7:30ff Garcia steps up for some guitar playing, playing of the guitar. Hitting real hard over 8, tight and clean and fluid, an extra up 8:15, great tone, and yet another run 8:27ff! Really hot. Everything has something extra this night. Wow. Errico does a big run down 9:21 ish,  hits again 9:34, he's awesome. Gar gives it his best R&B head shake.

! P: s1t05 Valerie the shit Garcia is doing 4:30 is absolutely evil. He lands cleanly on "I ain't afraid of the cold cruel world outside" ... he sounds great. He's really got his R&B-guy-singing-about-his-baby working well this night.

! R: s1t06 HSII some kind of tape nastiness @ 4:10.

! P: s1t06 HSII even this rocks this night! He puts a filter on in the 4-minute range, a little more flavorful tone, and he's really hitting some great notes through the minute mark. Melvin steps up post 5 with his nice HSII solo that he did. Garcia only comes to lead 6:30, and he is awn fiyah. 6:58 more high register work, 7:16 nice pull. He is one with Motown, huge chords 7:30, really loud, loud major chording guitar playing to the "open my eyes at night" @ 7:44. This is a huge performance to this point. Huge. Man, Jerry loved NYC.

! P: s1t07 RFTR I love that he played this extra song. He could very well have called it after that incendiary HSII. But he is not settling on this night. So, tip o' the cap. His voice is starting to sound a little ragged, but his guitar playing is great and the band is very tight.

! R: s1t07 RFTR 0:02 - 0:07 patched (crossfade) from Mark Cohen's master; Nak 700s > Sony D-5.

! s1t07 (1) JG: "We're gonna take for a few minutes. We'll be back in a little while."

! P: s2t02 HTC classic JGB version of this song. Notes shoving each other aside 5:30, another set of scaling runs 6:05ff. Fingers are going a mile a minute. His voice sounds tired, I am worried about some of these tunes coming up.

! P: s2t03 MITR has pep. Good but brief fan @ 7:15

! P: s2t05 TUIB very hot. Garcia puts some big effects on late 7 over 8 and this is rockin'. More big effects 8:39, more a minute later. Very expressive, articulate, powerful guitar work. Still really extending his phrases a minute later, not phrases, sentences, or even mere paragraphs, but whole narratives, hits a great little note 11:07. Wow, this is absolutely rockin'. Errico is BANGING.

! R: s2t06 Gomorrah clips in

! P: s2t07 Deal is also hot. Listen to little run 5:28. Whole band is on, but Jerry is smokin' hot.

! s2t07 (2) JG: "Thank you. See ya later."

! P: s2t08 MM even Midnight Moonlight has it all this night. What a show.

Gloria's First Night Out? Update: NO

LN jg1984-01-08.jgb.all.aud-CC.xxxxxx.flac2448

update: I now believe this is the first night out for Gloria Jones.

update2 (4/16/2020): I no longer believe this is the first night out for Gloria Jones. I now believe that 7/10?/84 enjoys that distinction.

First show of 1984, Sunday night at 492 Broadway. This setlist differs from what was traditionally listed, e.g., at TJS. My notes don't reveal much. I think someone is asking about the personnel at note 1, but I can't quite make it out. I am trying to clean out my "to work on" soundfiles, so there might be a few more Closet Call posts and other randomalia.

Jerry Garcia Band
The Stone
412 Broadway
San Francisco, CA 94133
January 8, 1984 (Sunday)
92 min Closet Call aud (flac2448)

--Set I (6 tracks, 55:58)--
s1t01. How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) [7:43] (1) [0:27] % [0:26]
s1t02. I'll Take A Melody [13:46] [0:03] % (2) [0:02]
s1t03. Someday Baby [7:43] %
s1t04. Love In The Afternoon [10:09] %
s1t05. Run For The Roses [5:02] [0:08]
s1t06. Rhapsody In Red [10:19] [0:10] %

--Set II (5 tracks, 36:24)--
s2t01. /Cats Under The Stars [9:08] % [0:11]
s2t02. Mission In The Rain [10:51] [0:04] %
s2t03. /Gomorrah [5:46] [0:08]
s2t04. Tore Up // Over You [9:#29] [0:02] % [0:02]
s2t05. Midnight Moonlight// [0:43#]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #21a
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-b;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards (Hammond B3 organ);
! lineup: David Kemper - drums;
! lineup: Gloria JonesDeeDee Dickerson - vocals;
! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals.

JGMF:

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

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19840108-01

! JGC: http://jerrygarcia.com/show/1984-01-08-the-stone-san-francisco-ca/

! db: none as of 7/25/2012; https://etreedb.org/shn/136978 (this source)

! map: http://goo.gl/maps/L0BBt

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/07/stone-mothers-412-broadway-san.html

! band: JGB #21a (http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/jerry-garcia-band-personnel-1975-1995.html)

! historical: first Garcia show of 1984.

! R: audience > 1st gen cassette (Maxell XLII90, no Dolby) Nakamichi BX-300 playback (Dolby off) > Pyle Pro cables > WaveTerminal 2496 > Samplitude 10.1 Download Version (record @ 24 bits/48kHz, normalization (98%, set II only) > CD Wave 1.98 (tracking) > Trader's Little Helper v2.4.1 (FLAC encoding) > foobar2000 (tagging).

! R: Quite a clean tape. Apparently as chick near tapers tells us about a minute in, "it sound[ed] so good!" in the room, too. This has a upfront feel to it. Vocals are a little low.

! s1t01 (1) audience member: "Who's in the band, Jerry? [unsure: "//new faces in five years"]

! P: Jerry's voice sounds relatively decent for this stage of the game. Things would deteriorate over the course of 1984. I imagine that the week-plus without playing (since GD 12/31/83) probably helped conserve the voice.

! s1t02 (2) guy with French accent talking just before Someday Baby

! setlist: TJS lists Tangled Up In Blue after LITA, and does not show RFTR or RIR. I don't know where the TUIB listing comes from. There is a splice after LITA, but it's extremely brief, almost as if the taper hit pause and unpaused immediately, as RFTR made itself heard. I can hear the same female crowd member (Chatty Cathy, I'll call her) on both sides of the splice. She is talking through the whole early part of the show.

! R: s2t01 Cats clips in

! P: s2t02 MITR some vocal clams as he makes the statement at the start.

! R: s2t03 Gomorrah clips in, just a couple of notes missing

! R: s2t04 TUOY cut @ 4:14, not much missing

! Disclaimer: This is part of a "Closet Call" project aimed at making missing Garcia dates available for study. These are "warts and all" ... straight transfers of the source cassettes with editing only of the most offensive tape transitions and such. If you don't like hiss, possible speed problems, etc., etc., then move along. And, to anticipate a FAQ: no, I don't plan on doing 16/44s of these. Thanks to wk for supplying these tapes!

There is World-Class Guitar Playing Here (JGB at the Arlington in Santa Barbara, May 19, 1984)

LN jg1984-05-19.jgb.all.aud-rossi-ford.124791.flac1644

Really great tape. And, while things are a little bit uneven, there's a lot to like in this performance. The arrangements are generally tight and the guitar playing can be outstanding. This band is together. Melvin plays colorfully, drums strong and bass nice and thompin'. Garcia does a lot of very sophisticated layering and building, playing around with tempo, tone, amplitude, etc. etc. Some very creative work. The vocals are not good, but they are not as bad as they would become later in the year. All in all, I'd totally recommend this show to someone, with the proper caveats.

Bias is such a pain in the neck. I am pretty sure that I listen to this show for signs of what I know I believe will come in late 1984: Rock Bottom. But this ain't it, not yet. Pretty interesting listen, all in all. Thanks to the folks involved in getting this into the world, from taper Adam Rossi on through.

Jerry Garcia Band
Arlington Theatre
1317 State Street
Santa Barbara, CA 93101
May 19, 1984 (Saturday)
85 min Rossi via McCue-Ford shnid-124791

--set I (4 tracks, 39:55, missing ca. 10-12 minutes at end)--
s1t01. How Sweet It Is To Be Loved By You [10:18] [0:04] %
s1t02. They Love Each Other [8:40] [0:03] % [0:14]
s1t03. Let It Rock [9:39] [0:05] % [0:05]
s1t04. I Second That Emotion [10:45] -> Tangled Up In Blue// [0:03#] %

--set II (4 tracks, 45:31)--
s2t01. [0:13] Cats Under The Stars [10:09] [0:03] %
s2t02. Knocking On Heaven's Door [13:56] ->
s2t03. Dear Prudence [13:23+0:02] ->
s2t04. Midnight Moonlight [-0:02+7:44] (1) [0:04]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #21a
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-b;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards (Hammond B3 organ);
! lineup: David Kemper - drums;
! lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - vocals;
! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals.

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/19840519-01

! db: http://etreedb.org/shn/108319 (unlineaged aud); http://etreedb.org/shn/124791 (this fileset, now deprecated - d'oh!); http://etreedb.org/shn/125760 (complete show, best available).

! opener: Robert Hunter

! map: https://maps.google.com/maps?q=1317+State+Street+Santa+Barbara,+CA&hl=en&sll=38.997934,-105.550567&sspn=7.229361,16.907959&t=h&hnear=1317+State+St,+Santa+Barbara,+California+93101&z=17

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2011/09/arlington-theater-1317-state-st-santa.html

! band: It has long been thought that Gloria Jones started with David Kemper in July of 1983. But that is clearly wrong. DeeDee Dickerson was definitely around through 1983. I have conjectured that Gloria began with the new year in 1984, but I now think that is wrong, too, because the Rowe review names all of the band members except the drummer, and he says it was DDD and not Gloria. It's possible he had some kind of old information, but it doesn't seem like it. As of this note (7/28/2018), it feels like DDD was around at least through this show, and Gloria arrives ... sometime later. update 20200418: I have now pinned this as 7/28/84. We shall see how long that conclusion holds.

! review: Rowe, Mark. 1984. Extended Jams From Jerry Garcia Band. Daily Nexus (U.C. Santa Barbara), May 24, 1984, p. 8A.

! seealso: JGMF, "The Auds Have It" [5/18/84] and "Don Dearth Was My Third Grade Teacher, And He Was A Taper: JGB at the Stone, May 12, 1984".

! seealso: JGMF, "Killer Sugaree and final DDD: JGB at Country Club, Reseda, May 20, 1984"

! tags: 1984, Arlington Theatre, Santa Barbara, CA, drugs, Adam Rossi, SoCal, JGB

! field recordist: Adam Rossi;

! field recording equipment: Nakamichi 300 > Sony D5;

! field recording media: cassette;

! source tape: master cassette > Sony D6 > unknown Akai home deck > TDK SA90 (Bill Murath's copy, shared by Mark McCue);

! source transfer: Nakamichi Dragon > Lunatec V3 (24/88.1) > Lynx AES 16AES(e) > WaveLab 7.2.1 (UAD-2) > .wav @24/88.2 > Apogee UV22HR/Crystal Resampler > .wav @16/44.1 > xAct (conversion and tagging) > flac16; transferred, edited and mastered by Alex Ford - June 2013.

! R: seeder comment: Thanks to Bill Murath who originally made the 1st gen cassette copy that I transferred.

! R: seeder comment: Last but NOT least, thanks to Mark McCue for loaning me his cassette for the transfer.

! seeder notes: historical: Great American Music Band played the Arlington Theatre on 4/24/74 (without Jerry). Kingfish w/ Bob Weir and Robert Hunter opening also played the Arlington Theatre on 10/29/86.

! setlist: song selection: I am not a huge fan of this first set list, especially given that we don't really get to hear TUIB. TLEO, LIR and ISTE would not typically be my favorites. I like set II a little better, especially CUTS. A 45 minute second set is a fucking ripoff, though. He always talked about how he didn't want to burn his audience, and I think he mostly held up a pretty good standard in that regard. But during 1984-1985 there were some pretty short shows. SoCal seemed to get its disproportionate share of them, with the May 1985 Beverly Theater incident indicating that at least some of the crowd was willing to express its displeasure. Good for them. At least on this night (5/19/84), the food is pretty good even if the quantity's a bit small, which I can't say for 5/31/85.

! R: this is a really, really nice tape.

! R: s1t01 noise and static from 0:00 - 1:35. A little overloaded.

! P: s1t01 HSII Jerry reals tries to belt some stuff out at the end of HSII, but it's phlegmatic.

! P: s1t02 TLEO Jerry's vocal struggles continue. Furthermore, he seems to be adding a measure to the chorus section that everyone else is struggling to stay with. It's Jerry vs. the rest of the band, and I don't blame them. He's pretty wrecked. Over 2-min, he's trying to figure the vocals out. He sounds scratchy, but he's starting to warm up. Late 5-min over 6-min mark, his guitar playing picks up, musical inspiration and manual dexterity meet, say a hot hello to each other, then Jerry layers 'em together a few different ways, pulls 'em apart and puts 'em together, like competitive cup-stacking.

! P: s1t03 LIR is also a little flabby, definitely "lose in the cage" as the P-90X guy's friend might have said.

! P: Observation after LIR. This is a night in which the heroin is working against the vocals and any kind of musical discipline, but the cocaine more than compensates on the instrumental side. Magnesial guitar playing, welders' gear and a release from liability to be up front. That is a first set impression. The second set starts off sluggighly but is probably considerably above averge. The Arlington remains an American masterpiece, leafy classisicist pastels, old Hollywood neon, deep, plush, supportive seats. Somehow there's a stone breeze, like the kind you get walking inside a grotto, church or wine cellar in the Mediterranean summer. Mid-May in Santa Barbara at the Arlington, just like July at the Bowl, can approximate natural and human perfection, true harmony. Jerry Garcia does not attain perfection on 5/19/84. Far from it. There will be moments from three months later in which I don't think he even attains professionalism, not a light criticism. But there is world class guitar playing here. This is the end of Jerry's "metal" period, which in the GOTS context I date from around February 1981 and which continues through about August 1984, in which the vocal quality and certain disciplines decline, but this is often compensated by especially incendiary guitar playing, clearly evident in LIR here. His rock-star fanning of early 1981 reappeared from time-to-time, as in mid-1983by which time it had taken on a more feedbacky sound. By '84 things were really metallic, not rattling your fillings so much as vibrating them at high pich. All told, things are a little feverish with Jerry, around this time, he's running really hot. In three months he'd start his descent to rock bottom, that hair-raising inexorable slide, no guardrails, to January 18, 1985.

! historical: Santa Barbara shows are woefully underdocumented, because it's a town that doesn't need to project itself, for whatever reason. No-one has gone through the local papers (sounds like a trip is in order!). Very few recollections and stubs and pix pop up.

! R: s1t05 very beginning of Tangled Up In Blue is audible, then cuts out.

! P: s2t01 CUTS Starts off sluggish, but in the 5-minute mark we hear heavy metal Jerry and my faith is restored. Through the six minute mark he has a little less grunge, but he's sustaining at a much higher level of grunge than he had been before the earlier filth. I think he pushes on one dimension (say, grunge), then pulls that back to 75% of the peak (but 200% of the prior peak, or something like that), builds up another dimension, etc. Then he runs some phrases and ideas through it. It's definitely equivalent to paragraphing language, hell, it's equivalent to managing a work flow ... lots to stack up and integrate. My main gripe with many versions of CUTS as that he didn't know how to cut it off, and this one definitely outlives its usefulness by the end.

! P: s2t02 KOHD the arrangement is just so perfect, and the playing is gorgeous. The crowd is occasionally yipping with appropriate delight at what this band is laying down. Everyone is locked in. Kemper the pulse, John the swing, Melvin the color, Garcia's poetic intellectualism. Melvin takes a nice lead figure in the 7-min mark. Love love love the reggae arrangement of KOHD they settled on in 1981 and which stayed very fresh all the way to the end. Melvin hits another high around 8:20, Garcia does a big pull and some plucky stuff 8:20-8:30 mark.

! P: s2t04 MM could be such a throwaway to end the shows of this period, when he was racing through to get back to his drugs, first and foremost. These vocals are indifferent, but the guitar playing is stellar. Great run late 1 over 2 minute mark. Another nice run 2-min mark, some big funky Chording. Now, here, he could have gotten back to the vocals @ 3:24ish, but instead he takes another run. I am not going to do it, but I bet a very micro analysis of better vs. worse versions of this song during this period would find him taking this extra turn on a good night and turning it down on a bad one. But this is conjecture. Melvin nice solo 4-min. The set overall still feels short, but I guess I wouldn't feel totally ripped off, because they did bring good energy. Last night of the mini SoCal tour.

! s2t04 (1) JG: "Thanks a lot, see y'all later."

Second Gig for the new Sextet: Rissmiller's 10/27/82

LN jg1982-10-27.jgb.s1s2p.aud-CC.xxxxxx.flac2448

Jerry Garcia Band
Rissmiller's Country Club
18415 Sherman Way
Reseda, CA 91335
October 27, 1982 (Wednesday)
83 min s1s2p Closet Call aud

--set I (7 tracks, 57:16)--
s1t01. crowd and tuning [0:28]
s1t02. How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) [8:43] %
s1t03. ... They Love Each Other [8:11] [0:08] % [0:32]
s1t04. Valerie [7:34] [0:11] % [0:19]
s1t05. I Second That Emotion [9:57] % [0:09]
s1t06. The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down [7:53] [0:03] %
s1t07. Dear Prudence [12:57] (1) [0:05] %

--set II (4 tracks, 25:41, presumed incomplete)--
s2t01. crowd and tuning [0:21]
s2t02. Sugaree [11:16] [0:16] %
s2t03. Run For The Roses [5:25] [0:04] % [0:07]
s2t04. Let It Rock [8:12] %

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #15b
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-bass;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - organ;
! lineup: Greg Errico - drums;

! lineup: Elisecia Wright - vocals;

! lineup: Shirley Faulkner - vocals.

JGMF:

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

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19821027-03

! db: shnid-137997 (better transfer of source tape noted here)

! map: http://goo.gl/maps/wR2rw

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/06/rissmillers-country-club-reseda-theatre.html

! metadata: This date has been mysterious, for such a contemporary one in such a large media market. It was not mentioned in the McNally-Arnold JG List. As of 12/9/2012, the only hard evidence for this was  the picture (via TJS-RIP) of the Rismiller's marquee, reading "The Jerry Garcia Band Oct 27 28" (seen here). It is surprising that no ticket stubs or participant recollections have emerged. The setlist is similar to what we have from clean provenance for the show on the 28th, but it is not identical. I have compared the two performances and I conclude that this is, indeed, a distinct set of music. I have a theory about what happened: I suspect that this first show was unadvertised (beyond the marquee). Maybe Jerry's people agreed to just a percentage of the door, or something, so they could have a Wednesday-night warmup for the new girls. This is consistent with a broader pattern in the Garcia Band, of breaking in new players midweek and off-the-beaten path. They want to have them broken in before they put 'em before the Keystone regulars.

update20170325: I have now seen the tour documents (at the Grateful Dead Archive at McHenry Library, UC Santa Cruz), and the show can be confirmed.

! R: 4th gen audience cassette (Maxell XLII90, no Dolby) > Nakamichi BX-300 playback (no Dolby) > Pyle Pro cables > WaveTerminal 2496 > Samplitude 10.1 Download Version (record @ 24 bits/48kHz) > CDWave 1.9.8 (tracking) > Adobe Audition 3.0 (cross-fades, etc.) > Traders Little Helper 2.4.1 (FLAC encoding, level 8) (flac2448).

! R: This is fundamentally a nice tape, notwithstanding several cassette gens.

! R: s1t02 HSII badly oversaturated, brickwalled to start. Levels come down about 30 seconds in.

! P: s1t02 HSII Jerry's voice sounds a little wrecked.

! R: s1t03 TLEO fades in, a few beats missing

! P: s1t04 Valerie JG flubs the first verse vocals. Nice vocal inflection on "growled at you". Pretty nice guitar solo 4-minutes in. Doesn't completely ignite at first, but then 4:30ff, late 4-min mark, some fuzz and distortion. Good, not great.

! P: s1t05 ISTE is peppy.

! P: s1t07 DP 9-min mark Jerry's playing is very fluid. He's making perfectly symmetrical circles, which, as anyone who has ever tried to hand-draw one can attest, is not easy to do. Very airy and nice. No rush, but not ponderous. Exploratory.

! R: s1t06 TNTDODD levels way way down

! R: s1t06 splices after song, then returns to the start of "Run For the Roses". I can't tell whether this RFTR fragment is actually from in front ot the RFTR in this fileset (s2t03), and it's just a scrap of tape, but I saved it anyway. Who knows that it is.

! s1t07 (1) "We're gonna take a break. We'll be back in a little while." Good sized crowd.

! P: s2t02 Sugaree Jerry's vocals are very expressive. He sounds engaged. Melvin some nice swirls behind the action during the first verse. JG some nice fanning 8-min mark. Again, late 9-min mark, Jerry is giving the vocals his all. Not bad.

! P: s2t03 RFTR starts off a little tentative. I note that the backing vocalists aren't as present with the oohhh-ooohs and "run for the roses!" exclamations, behind the verses, as they would later become. Noting that this is the second show with the ladies, I would suggest that they don't quite have the arrangement fully worked out. The tentative instrumental and vocal start to the song almost seems to reflect this, as if Jerry needs some fill under his feet to really dig in, as the song requires. It'll be interesting to hear when this particular lineup puts the fuller vocal arrangement in. Of course, the musical execution falls apart once in the 3-min mark, as well. Melvin isn't very audible during the verses either. In some, there are some holes in the sound, especially under and around the verses, that need to be filled. Garcia can't carry it vocally, though he doesn't sound bad yet.

! Disclaimer: This is part of a "Closet Call" project aimed at making missing Garcia dates available for study. These are "warts and all" ... straight transfers of the source cassettes with editing only of the most offensive tape transitions and such. If you don't like hiss, possible speed problems, etc., etc., then move along. And, to anticipate a FAQ: no, I don't plan on doing 16/44s of these. Thanks to wk for supplying these tapes!

! URL: http://jgmf.blogspot.com

Second night out for Kemper: The Stone, 7/21/83

Second night out for drummer David Kemper and Gloria Jones. See also "First Night Out for Kemper: The Stone, 7/20/83 (WED)."

This was conventionally considered the second show for vocalist Gloria Jones, but the late '83 Garcia Band tour still featured DeeDeeDickerson, raising doubts about a summer time switchover. It's still possible, but as of now I consider it questionable.

Kemper, of course, was an absolute rock for Garcia for 11 years. So much to say, so little time.
Jerry Garcia Band
The Stone
412 Broadway
San Francisco, CA 94133
July 21, 1983 (Thursday)
84 min CC aud

--set I (6 tracks, 45:36)--
s1t01. //How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) [5:05] [0:07] % [0:02] %
s1t02. /They Love Each Other [7:44] [0:19] % [0:06]
s1t03. Let It Rock [7:13] ->
s1t04. Run For The Roses [4:36] [0:11]
s1t05. Simple Twist Of Fate [12:18] [0:04]
s1t06. Deal [7:46] [0:06] %

--set II (5 tracks, 38:28)--
s2t01. /Cats Under The Stars [6:59] [0:34] % [0:21]
s2t02. Mission In The Rain [8:44] [0:13]  % [0:29]
s2t03. /Love In The Afternoon [7:25] [0:28]
s2t04. Gomorrah [5:47] [0:06]
s2t05. Midnight Moonlight [7:15] [0:08] %

! Band: Jerry Garcia Band
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-b;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards;
! lineup: David Kemper - drums;
! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals;
! lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - vocals.

JGMF:

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

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19830721-01

! db: none as of 12/23/2012.

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/07/stone-mothers-412-broadway-san.html

! map: http://goo.gl/maps/L0BBt

! historical: This show is of primary historical interest as the second show of a new lineup, and the first of this group to a core audience (San Francisco), albeit on a Thursday night. After nine months Greg Errico leaves the Garcia Band kit for the last time, while the foundational David Kemper newly arrives, where he'd stay almost without interruption through the end of 1993. It had been thought that vocalist Gloria Jones replaced DeeDee Dickerson at these shows, but that turns out to have been incorrect, and DeeDee remained in the fold through 5/20/84.

! R: 4th gen aud (Maxell XLII90, no Dolby) > Nakamichi BX-300 playback (no Dolby) > Pyle Pro cables > WaveTerminal 2496 > Samplitude 10.1 Download Version (record @ 24 bits/48kHz) > CDWave 1.9.8 (tracking) > Adobe Audition 3.0 (cross-fades, etc.) > Traders Little Helper 2.4.1 (FLAC encoding, level 8) (flac2448).

! R: Not a great tape. Wow, flutter, maybe slow (or fast, who can really tell?). Low levels.

! R: s1t01 HSII cuts in, several minutes missing.

! P: s1t03 LIR is quite hot. In the 4-minute mark, Jerry is getting some nice raunch, then a little double-time gallop heading through the 5-minute mark. Some very nice playing here.

! P: s1t04 RFTR starts off kind of a cluster.

! P: s1t05 STOF Jerry is completely lost with the words to start the song. A relatively early instance of just sheer mumbling into the mic. Tries it again at the first verse, I think, "sat together in the park".

! R: this could very well be running fast in set II. Levels are low in set II. Vocals are nice and close in set II.

! R: s2t01 CUTS clips in

! R: s2t01 nice to hear the enthusiastic Stone crowd.

! P: s2t02 MITR Jerry can still pull off the vocals, at least on occasion. His voice is a little thin and reedy, but he is still able to hit these notes without too much pain. At various points, MITR was a real barometer of Garcia's vocal health. The backing vocals are tight, the arrangement seems solid. MITR is good, and the crowd is appreciative.

! R: s2t03 LITA clips in

! P: notice that this show and the night before are pretty short.

! Disclaimer: This is part of a "Closet Call" project aimed at making missing Garcia dates available for study. These are "warts and all" ... straight transfers of the source cassettes with editing only of the most offensive tape transitions and such. If you don't like hiss, possible speed problems, etc., etc., then move along. And, to anticipate a FAQ: no, I don't plan on doing 16/44s of these. Thanks to wk for supplying these tapes!

First Night Out for Kemper: Keystone Palo Alto, 7/20/83 (WED)

LN jg1983-07-20.jgb.all.aud-CC.xxxxxx.flac2448

First night out for drummer David Kemper and Gloria Jones. (See also "Second night out for Kemper: The Stone, 7/21/83".)

This was conventionally considered the first show for vocalist Gloria Jones, but the late '83 Garcia Band tour still featured DeeDeeDickerson, and as of 2020 I am quite sure that DDD was around until 5/20/84, and Gloria came in on 7/28/84.

Kemper, of course, was an absolute rock for Garcia for 10+ years. So much to say, so little time.

Jerry Garcia Band
Keystone Palo Alto
260 South California Avenue
Palo Alto, CA 94306
July 20, 1983 (Wednesday)
83 min CC aud

--set I (6 tracks, 36:33)--
s1t01. crowd and tuning [0:32]
s1t02. Cats Under The Stars [6:47] [0:08] %
s1t03. Catfish John [9:36] [0:14] %  [1:06]
s1t04. That's What Love Will Make You Do [6:04] [0:02] %
s1t05. Mississippi Moon [7:04] ->
s1t06. Run For The Roses [4:40] (1) [0:19] %

--set II (6 tracks, 46:48)--
s2t01. crowd and tuning [0:11]
s2t02. I'll Take A Melody [14:35] [0:07] % [0:03]
s2t03. Love In The Afternoon [8:05] [0:04] %  [0:06]
s2t04. Gomorrah [5:50] [0:05] % [0:07]
s2t05. Dear Prudence [10:50] ->
s2t06. Tangled Up In Blue// [6:44#]

! Band: Jerry Garcia Band #21b
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-b;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards;
! lineup: David Kemper - drums;
! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - vocals;
! lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - vocals.

JGMF:
! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; ... = fade in/out; # = truncated timing; [ ] = recorded event time. The recorded event time immediately after the song or item name is an attempt at getting the "real" time of the event. So, a timing of [x:xx] right after a song title is an attempt to say how long the song really was, as represented on this recording.
! TJS: http://www.thejerrysite.com/shows/show/1710. Note that my set II list doesn't match.

! db: none as of 12/22/2012. Now shnid-137756 via Andrew F.'s correct transfer.

! map: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=260+South+California+Avenue,+Palo+Alto,+CA&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=0x808fbae5ae350fad:0x6c804e95a91a9587,260+S+California+Ave,+Palo+Alto,+CA+94306&gl=us&ei=OELhTsmSKIX10gG1iNWxBw&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CB0Q8gEwAA

! venue: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/11/keystone-sophies-260-s-california-ave.html

! personnel: David Kemper's understood public debut with the Jerry Garcia Band, replacing Greg Errico. It's not clear how or why the switch was made.

! personnel: Previously understood as Gloria Jones's understood public debut with the Jerry Garcia Band, replacing DeeDee Dickerson, but this seems to be wrong.

! historical: the primary historical interest here lies in the JGB debuts of David Kemper on drums (who would play continuously until early 1994, except October 7, 1985-December 22, 1985, when Gaylord Birch beat the skins) and Gloria Jones on vocals (who would stay with JGB continuously until the end). There are a few hiccups here and there around the drumming and vocals, but overall the group seems reasonably well together. The next night is even better. NB that, as was habitual, Garcia broke in his new players off the beaten path (Palo Alto) and midweek (Wednesday) before unleashing the hometown crowds (SF and Berkeley) on them.

! R: 2nd gen aud (Maxell XLII90, no Dolby) > Nakamichi BX-300 playback (no Dolby) > Pyle Pro cables > WaveTerminal 2496 > Samplitude 10.1 Download Version (record @ 24 bits/48kHz) > CDWave 1.9.8 (tracking) > Adobe Audition 3.0 (cross-fades, etc.) > Traders Little Helper 2.4.1 (FLAC encoding, level 8) (flac2448).

! setlist: TJS set II goes MITR, LITA, DP > TUIB. The basis of the setlist is not clear --it's just an old "ftp.gdead.berkeley.edu" reference-- and that's too short. The setlist here seems more plausible.

! R: may run fast

! R: s1t01 CUTS muffling first minute of CUTS

! song: Cats Under The Stars (s1t01): took a hiatus 3/22/78. TJS says it came back http://www.thejerrysite.com/songs/show/897 1/8/83 at The Stone, for which there is no known tape. Then JGB plays it six times in three nights out east (June 3-5, 1983, early and late shows), then this version. It definitely sounds a little raw.

! P: s1t01 CUTS I said it sounds a little raw, which is true. But it's also hot as hell.

! R: s1t02 CJ is brickwalled with significant distortion. This is fatiguing to listen to.

! P: s1t02 CJ 7-minutes in Jerry and Melvin do some nice call and response.

! P: s1t04 TWLWMYD has some some nice bursts of honey guitar playing right at the start.

! P: Garcia's voice is definitely on the downhill slide to Elmer Fuddsville. It's not there quite yet, but it's losing diaphragm and gaining scratchy sinus and throat - not a good tradeoff.

! R: s1t05 MM missing first few notes, badly oversaturated

! R: s1t06 RFTR anomaly right at track transition, but it was on the source tape.

! s1t06 (1) JG, breathless and rushed: "Thanks a lot. We're gonna take a break for a little while and we'll be back in a few minutes."

! P: a good solid show.

! Disclaimer: This is part of a "Closet Call" project aimed at making missing Garcia dates available for study. These are "warts and all" ... straight transfers of the source cassettes with editing only of the most offensive tape transitions and such. If you don't like hiss, possible speed problems, etc., etc., then move along. And, to anticipate a FAQ: no, I don't plan on doing 16/44s of these. Thanks to wk for supplying these tapes!

The Last Quartet Show

LN jg1982-10-23.jgb.all.aud-knudsen-GEMS.112275.flac1644

This show is the last for the short-lived October '82 quartet configuration, which did a quartet of shows on 10/13/82, 10/21-22/82, and this night. In Guerneville on the 24th, backing vocalists would augment the ranks. If I am not mistaken, this could be the last show the JGB ever played as a quartet (in case you were wondering).

I have made a series of posts discussing band personnel/membership issues in 1981-1983.

• Early 1981 (Melvin Seals);
• 1982 vocalists (Liz Stires, Julie Stafford);
• 5/31/82 (Liz Stires, Julie Stafford);
• 10/13/82 (Greg Errico);
• Late 1983 vocalists (Jacklyn LaBranch, DeeDee Dickerson Gloria Jones).

This "membership" theme isn't properly considered/elaborated in social science work on institutions/organizations, as far as I am concerned. It should be central: after all, we are dealing with social aggregates.

Investigating the margins of each membership era -- a little before and, to a greater extent, a little after any personnel change -- can be interesting in lots of ways. The early 80s are particularly interesting, for all kinds of reasons. First, there are lots of personnel changes, giving us lots of little natural quasi-experiments to think about. Variance is good. Second, substantively, I think the evidence suggests that Garcia was really looking for a stable band, but it took him several years to get the blend just right. So there's some amount of tension in this nearly-interstitial music. Garcia and the other band members have to focus, listen to each other and generally engage each other more than at other times. In lots of ways, the Garcia Band would challenge Jerry less and less over the years, and this seemed to be how he liked this band. It was a comfort band. He got challenged enough for his taste with the always more dissonant Grateful Dead. But during these moments of breaking in new personnel that equation is in some ways reversed, or at least the positions of JGB and the GD are closer to each other on the comfort or consonance <--> dissonance dimension.

Third, as I have argued in some of the posts linked above, "break-in" shows for new members were more likely than the average gig to be weeknight and off-the-beaten-path (see discussion of the almost-certainly-didn't-happen 6/24/81 Salinas gig for another engagement with that theme).  Partly as a consequence, they were less likely to have been taped, and as a consequence of that there has been more uncertainty around who was where, when, when they showed up and left, where it was and what they played, who subbed for whom whenever that was, and so on. Thank goodness that there have been listmakers over the years to help with all of this, something about which I'll have more to say. Here I'll just say thank goodness for all of the intrepid, foreword-looking and generous tapers such as Jeff Knudsen, who rolled tape while tripping the Keystones fantastic during this period. Tapers, your work is very important and much appreciated. Thanks.

One of Jeff's tapes is Saturday, 10/23/82 at the Keystone Palo Alto at 260 California Avenue in Palo Alto, CA, 94306. As far as I know this is the only recording to make it out of the club that night, and it's a nice tape. Gotta love that the guy just danced to the music with a couple of cheap mics under his armpits, running to a cheap deck sitting in plain view on the table, and made a tape that's fun to listen to and historically important.

This is the last of four shows by the Garcia/Kahn/Seals/Errico quartet (10/13/82, 10/21/82 and 10/22/82 being the others). They are still warming themselves up, though I have to say that Errico drums like a mofo. The next night, in out of the way Guerneville, would see the introduction of Jacklyn LaBranch and DeeDee Dickerson as Garcia's backup singers. Ms. LaBranch would be a JGB fixture ever-after, her 12.5 years in the band surpassed only by constant bandmate Melvin Seals (14.5 years) and the one and only John Kahn (ca. 25 years).

Anyway, a few listening notes for the record.

Jerry Garcia Band
Keystone Palo Alto
Palo Alto, CA 
October 23, 1982 (Saturday)
77 minute Jeff Knudsen audience recording

--set I (4 tracks, 32:07, missing 1 song)--
s1t01. How Sweet It Is [8:37] [0:02]
s1t02. % (1) Catfish John [11:02]
[missing It's No Use]  
s1t03. // I Second That Emotion [#6:42] -> 
s1t04. Run For The Roses [5:36] (2) [0:06]

--set II (4 tracks, 43:43, missing 1 song)
s2t05. (I'm A) Road Runner [8:27]
s2t06. The Harder They Come [14:24] [0:04]
[missing Valerie]
s2t07. // Dear Prudence [11:56] [0:10] ->
s2t08. Midnight Moonlight [8:24] (3) [0:23] dead air [0:03]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-bass;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards (Hammond B3 organ);
! lineup: Greg Errico - drums.

JGMF:

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

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19821023-01

! db: http://etreedb.org/shn/112275/ (this recording).

! R: field recordist: Jeff Knudsen

! R: field recording location: front row of tables

! R: field recording equpiment: Marantz SuperScope microphones > Aiwa HS1 cassette master.

! R: subsequent analog history: master cassettes > 1st generation cassette by Jeff himself.  Note: "All his collection is such.  This was done by him to get the show in order on tapes, as set one was recorded on both tape sides 'A', and set two was recorded on both sides 'B'."

! R: transfer to digital domain: 1st gen cassette > Apogee Mini ME 24/96 > Apogee Mini DAC > Wavelab 6.0 by Matt Smith.

! R: digital domain: edited and mastered by Jamie Waddell on the **GEMS** Edit Station at 24 bit 96kHz. Weiss-Saracon for conversion to 16 bit 44.1kHz. TLH for FLAC8 Tag&Rename for MetaData SBE Free.

! R: Meta: A **GEMS** Production     www.shnflac.net      March 2011

! R: seeder note: Recorder was turned off between some songs

! Seeder note: Huge thanks to Jeffrey for sharing his recordings and Matt Smith for the transfer work

! From info file: Jeffrey Knudsen Equipment: AIWA-HS1 Cassette Deck and Marantz SuperScope microphones. Location:  "I always taped from the front row tables with the recorder simply laying on the table in full view. There was a piece of tape over the red 'on' light and the mics were black with black chords. I took napkins from the venue and folded a wad up and taped the two mics together with the napkins separating the front ends and the back end were together. That way the mics had some angular separation. I then put the whole mess in a black sock and stuck it in my armpit.  Everyone stands the moment the show starts (except at the front row balcony tables in Berkeley) so I would point my shoulder at the stage when Jerry was instrumental and then I would point my shoulder up to the overhead monitors when he sang. In Berkeley I just had the mics taped, in a sock and laying on the table, and pointing at the stage."

! More taper info, from info file: "This run of shows (10/21-22-23/82) were that last shows of 1982 that I was able to record before I moved to Barbers' Point, Hawaii.  I was in Party Mode #342.67b for the whole weekend and just had a hard time with that miserable 'pause' button. It was very distressing to look down and see the recorder not working and having no idea what happened. Well, that is not exactly true. LSD was in the mix -- go figure. Such was the price to pay for such a good time. This torrent is the first time that this show has been circulated. Hopefully another version will show up so the whole show can be patched together."

! Historical: This is the only known recording of the final show of the Garcia/Kahn/Seals/Errico quartet of October 1982 (10/13/82, 10/21/82, 10/22/82, 10/23/82). As I have often noted in connection with personnel/band membership issues, and especially in the first half of the 1980s, the pivotal shows during fluid periods were often a little off-the-beaten path and less likely to have been taped. Despite this being a Saturday night show, my hunch is that the Keystone Palo Alto was just less likely to host a taper on any given night than the other Keystone clubs. That's conjectural, though testable. Anyway, as we know the next night would see a gig waaaay off the beaten path -- at River Theater, Guerneville, CA -- and the introduction of Jacklyn LaBranch and DeeDee Dickerson as Garcia's backup singers. Ms. LaBranch would be a JGB fixture ever-after, her 12.5 years in the band surpassed only by constant bandmate Melvin Seals (14.5 years) and the one and only John Kahn (ca. 25 years). Ms. Dickerson stayed on through 1983.

! R: tape is quite solid. Not super-high definition, but I can hear all of the instruments and the vocals reasonably distinctly.

! s1t02 (1) Taper talk. Guy in crowd yells "rock and roll!". Maybe in response, or maybe in response to something else, taper says "Your wish come true" right on the opening notes to Catfish John. So not sure if he is affirming that it's "rock and roll!" or to someone's (unheard) call of Catfish John as the next tune.

! P: s1t02 CJ Jerry's voice is sounding a little strained, a little fragile.

! P: transition from s1t03 ISTE to s1t04 RFTR is a "true" one, in the sense that Jerry spins it out. It's not a long, well-developed segue, but it's not a pause/stop-for-a-3-count segue, either. Somewhere in between. At this time frame and in the state he was in during it, that's pretty adventuruous. Remember, too, that Errico is just getting warmed up (only his 4th show in this go-round with JGB, which would last through June 5, 1983 out on the east coast). So it's nice to see Jer pushing things even just a little.

! P: s1t04 RFTR ends with an off-beat, just a new band not 100% sync'd up. Sounds like maybe Garcia was considering another song, but discretion being the better part of valor he sheepishly gives the (2) "We'll be back in a few minutes" setbreak announcement.

! P: s2t05 RR bad vocal clam in first verse, on "toothbrush".

! R: s2t07 Dear Prudence comes in before the second ("let me see you smile / ... / like a little child"), maybe 2-3 minutes missing here?

! P: s2t07 at the end of Dear Prudence and heading toward Midnight Moonlight, you can hear that they still aren't 100% meshed. Right at the end of DP Jerry, John and Melvin are keying right into Midnight Moonlight, but it takes 10 seconds to indicate it to Errico and get him with them. Not a criticism of him, by any means -- fourth show in for him on this stint, and they hadn't done this segue yet. Things are hanging, and then Errico just starts pounding out a rock rhythm for Jerry to jump onto. He jumps on in the wrong key, but recovers OK and things manage to take shape.

! s2t08 Mid Moon This whole version is quite a standout because of Errico's playing, which really pushes Garcia not just pacewise, but in terms of driving his voice a little harder. That said, I think I hear why JG wants backup singers. His voice just can't hold it at the end. I bet he walked off stage and said to John "find me a few chick backup singers".

! d2t08 (3) JG: "Thanks a lot, see you later."