JGB in Chumash Country: Campbell Hall, UCSB, February 5, 1977

In my writeup of the Garcia Band's 11/20/76 gigs at the Pismo Theatre, I noted that Jerry urged the crowd to come see ol' Hoyt Axton in a couple of weeks. "He'll be down here doin' a benefit for Redwind, which is just a good scene, about forty miles from here, a lot of good people workin' real hard."

I elaborated:

The RedWind Medicine Camp was a Native American community, chiefed by the last full-blooded Chumash, Semu Huaute, located in rugged San Luis Obispo County. In correspondence, Bob Sewana Saenz explains: "Jerry visited me in SLO after a show at the Pismo Beach Theater in late 1976. I drove him and a few band members to Semu Huaute's (Chumash) Red Wind Medicine Camp. I showed him a school project that we were in need of funds to develop for the many children there." I presume they went up on Saturday, and came back down in time for Jerry to play his shows. He must have been moved, because he speaks. Even more importantly, he puts his money where his mouth is, headlining a benefit for the RedWind Foundation at UCSB on February 5, 1977 - but I'll get to that later.

Later is now. On 1/19/77, the UCSB Leg. Board approved the benefit gig, to be put on by Bob Sewana Saenz's Band Aid in support of Red Wind. The pre-show publicity doesn't mention this - nothin' in re benefit status of this event. But the documents are clear that the Garcia Band not only played the gig, but lent the promoter $1,000 to help put it on, a pretty righteous thing to do and part of a small inflection in benefits Garcia played in '77 (see also 6/23/77 for the Forest People of Camp Meeker and 8/12/77 for Greenpeace).

The shows don't move me all that much, though the late show "Don't Let Go" has some interesting passages. I find the sociometry more interesting, on three fronts.

First, there is a second guitar player present, playing country style backing licks. As noted on the 11/20/76 post, I know who this is but am holding it back for the book (major scoop! - not really). But, this player was present on nearly every known show from the first half of 1977, raising the question of whether this was a distinct band configuration as opposed to just a guest shot. These are academic questions also impossible to answer, but it's nevertheless interesting that a heretofore unknown aggregation appeared regularly as late as 1977.

Second, Chris Sobik drew my attention to a second female vocalist, and indeed we find Maria Muldaur providing backing vocals for both shows. This is the earliest Maria engagement with the JGB. update: that lasted for almost a day.  I have now heard her on 9/12/76. She had sat in with Jerry and Merl several times in '74 (and one night, 10/12/74, the Garcia-Saunders-Fierro-Kahn-Humphrey aggregation backed her for a whole set), and at least once with the Legion of Mary in '75. (This post seems to cover the bases.) But, while Corry has JGB #4, with Maria a full member, emerging on 11/15/77, she had already joined the band onstage at least 9/12/76, this night (February 5th), July 2-3 (without Donna Jean), August 7, August 12 (Greenpeace benefit), and maybe others from this slow period for the JGB.

Oh yeah, one last thing: Deborah Koons made this trip with Jerry. FYI.

Listening notes after the jump.

A Party For Mother Earth

It's actually much, much prettier than it looks in this picture.

New Riders headlining "A Party for Mother Earth", benefiting the Bear Commune, Friends and Relations Hall, 660 Great Highway, June 3, 1971.

Black Roots about Native Americans?

I am thinking about Native American musical influences on Garcia.

As far as I can tell, they are mediated by whites: Hank Williams's "Kaw-Liga," Bill Monroe's "Cheyenne,"Peter Rowan's "Land Of The Navajo" (which the latter inspired).

Is there any black traditional music with Native American narrative or musical themes? Like, any old banjo tunes about the Seminoles?

Some notes on classifying Garciaverse Musics

In narrating Jerry Garcia's Musical Life Outside The Grateful Dead, I think in terms of the various musics he played.

One cut is geographic: 1) world vs. 2) American.

In terms of musics he directly quasi-publicly performed, The World is mostly only reggae and Indian music (e.g., Diga). He got some stuff from Canada, but it was either Americana (e.g., The Band) or pan-white pop (e.g., Bruce Cockburn's "Waiting For A Miracle") - not what I'd call "Canadian music".

Everything else from The World comes to Garcia pre-mediated through America.

Within the second bucket, I want to distinguish a) indigenous music (Hawaiian, Native American) from b) music made by non-indigenous peoples.

As noted above, Native American music came to Garcia pre-mediated by whites. When he played "Native American", he was playing white renderings of that music. I am guessing he jammed around at Hart's with Rolling Thunder and others -- I wonder if there are calendars, diaries, tapes?? --, but it falls sort of short of my fuzzy event threshold ("musics he directly quasi-publicly performed").

It seems like the same is likely true of the other indigenous American music that Garcia engaged, Hawaiian.  Let me put it another way: he directly heard Hawaiian music (grandmother Tillie loved it - McNally 2015, 36), but in playing pedal steel guitar he was playing what white people were doing, inspired by the islanders' music. So it doesn't get the full-on music font.

b) is the set of musics that get the special font and the central real estate in my table on Garciaverse musics.

Jerry Band at the Pismo Theatre

On Friday-Saturday, November 19-20, 1976, the Jerry Garcia Band played four improbable gigs at the stunning Pismo Theatre in foggy, salty, sandy, lovely little Pismo Beach, California. If you only know it from Bugs Bunny, I urge you to pass through it some time (though I have not done so in more than twenty years). It is the quintessence of that part of the California coastline.

Commenter nick had listened to 11/20/76 not too long ago and mentioned it, also noting a guest rhythm player in "Don't Let Go".  I confess that I listened without recalling the putative guest shot, and I didn't even hear it! It was only in polishing my notes that I was reminded about it, and went back to check it out. It's very subtle, until about 5:18 when it comes forward a bit more. It's pretty basic chording on an electric guitar, nothing particularly distinctive, which is fine. (Though, once I alerted my ears to it, it became quite repetitive.) But it makes me wonder whether this guy (probabilistically speaking) isn't present in other parts of the set. Could be, and I just missed it.

Who is it? Well, this is the earliest known entry in the late-1976 to early-1977 second guitarist experiments. John Rich plays pedal steel at the December 21-23 Keystone Family shows. But there is a second guitarist also on 1/29/77, 1/30/77 and 4/9/77, and while I initially thought it was Mr. Rich, I have determined that it is someone else, and further that that someone else should also be associated with 2/5/77, 2/6/77 and 4/10/77. This might just constitute a hitherto-undocumented "Era" of the Jerry Garcia Band, the only one to feature two guitars (earlier two-guitarist situations, whether with Tom Fogerty, George Tickner, or mystery players (2/16/74, 7/12/74) all predated JGB, and in the latter case would be construed as guest shots rather than (ongoing) band membership.

If forced to wager, I'd say the guy here is the same guy playing in the first half of 1977, whose name I'll reveal once I get a chance to engage him directly. I don't like that this stretches his known timeline back a month --I'd feel better if this fell within the January-April window, for which there is good contemporary evidence-- but he's my best guess. Of course, it could have been any one of a dozen guys within driving distance of Pismo, and I just don't know.

Musically, meh. The shows are long and stretched out, clocking in well over an hour and a half each, and this show doesn't suffer from the turgid tempos of so many of any its 1976 brethren. It just doesn't move me.

I like the "After Midnight" in the early show. But "Don't Let Go", as it almost always is in any show in which it made an appearance, is the highlight, though this is far from the best version out there. Keith does some very interesting multiplets in the 12 minute mark, John Kahn takes a very uncommon-for-the-song lead piece on his electric bass, Jerry steps up a few minutes later with some really cosmic stuff, but too-briefly, Tutt drives with some amazing foundational and flourish work underneath him, and for awhile it's really great. But they end up just repeating "don't let go" an awful lot to the crowd, and ten minutes of real highlight isn't much in three hours of time. I have a well-known bias against 1976, but I think it's reasonably well-deserved. There's nothing wrong with this, it just doesn't light me up.

One last point: Jerry Speaks. More than that, he advocates (after TLEO in the late show): "I'd like to remind you all to come down here and see old Hoyt Axton, December 10th and 11th. He'll be down here doin' a benefit for Redwind, which is just a good scene, about forty miles from here, a lot of good people workin' real hard. Hope you can make that one." This is the only time since the 60s (it hadn't happened since, that I can recall, and would never happen again, that I can think of) that Garcia directly pitches a charity to the crowd. Jerry was mostly mute from stage by this time except for his setbreak announcement and parting word. But he was especially averse to advocating anything. What's going on here?

The RedWind Medicine Camp was a Native American community, chiefed by the last full-blooded Chumash, Semu Huaute, located in rugged San Luis Obispo County. In correspondence, Bob Sewana Saenz explains: "Jerry visited me in SLO after a show at the Pismo Beach Theater in late 1976. I drove him and a few band members to Semu Huaute's (Chumash) Red Wind Medicine Camp. I showed him a school project that we were in need of funds to develop for the many children there." I presume they went up on Saturday, and came back down in time for Jerry to play his shows. He must have been moved, because he speaks. Even more importantly, he puts his money where his mouth is, headlining a benefit for the RedWind Foundation at UCSB on February 5, 1977 - but I'll get to that later. [edit: done!]

 
Detailed listening notes, references, etc. below the fold. There's a funny beach bum who keeps yelling "fried chicken!" for no apparent reason, and a little other color.