Context: 19681009-19681013 Express Times listings

McHenry Library at UCSC has one random roll of the great San Francisco Express Times from the turbulent year of 1968.  I have some holes in my collection of listings from that paper in that year, had lots of other really specific stuff to get into, but had a few brief moments to spin some film.

I was so rushed that I didn't get proper citation information on this. Anyway, a few tidbits as notes to self and others.

Miles Davis at the Both/And on 10/9/68. Awesome. Not listed in plosin's amazing Miles Ahead data, I have inquired. Given a time machine, I'd be at the Matrix, but the opportunity cost is great!

YellowShark, a few things to note:

10/9/68 Freight and Salvage hoot/open mic
10/11/68 Freight and Salvage John Shine
10/11/68 BCT Note: Benefit Concert for People's World

Very odd paucity of music listings. Wonder why?

Next time I am in Santa Cruz, I'll try to get scans of the 1968 SFET/GT listings.

Right now, I only have the following SFET/GT listings for the year (... dir *1968*):

SFET19680515-listings.jpg
SFET19680605-listings.jpg
SFET19680710-listings.jpg
SFET19680724-listings.jpg
SFET19680814-listings.jpg
SFET19680814-listings2.jpg
SFET19681009-approx-listings-19681009-19681013.jpg
SFET19681113-listings.jpg
SFET19681120-listings.jpg
SFET19681127-listings.jpg
SFET19681218p15-listings.jpg
SFET19681224-listings.jpg

Of course, the Yellow Shark spreadsheets supply lots of stuff not in the SFET, but I do like me some integrality in data sources!

Context: September 1976 BAM Listings

Up to three pages, lots of ads. Well done, hip young capitalists!

p. 25 finds the usual stuff. I am a little confused about address of the Green Earth, here listed as 1810 Market, with another place, the Omnibus, at 1821 Haight. I assume this is a typesetting problem, need to double-check. Some Country Joe and Barry Melton action.

 p. 27 not much to light me up, a Quicksilver gig at Sophie's.

 p. 28, Crabshaw's Outlaws at West Dakota (1505 San Pablo, formerly New Orleans House), and an interesting looking gig at the Lonbranch on 9/23, featuring (for me) Merl and the Little Onion (John Cipollina), who would later play together in the Dinosaurs, I believe.

Context: August 1976 BAM Listings

Context: July 1976 BAM Listings

I intend this stuff for future historians, not to take up Corry's precious time!

BAM no. 5 sees the live music listings expanding to two pages. Probably the same quantity of listings, but now there are ads to go along with them. The publication is doing some business!

Lots of interesting stuff here, as always.

On p. 27, we find some more Roadhog, some more Merl Saunders and Aunt Monk, a gig in Capitola by a little known outfit called Fat Chance. Bloomfield is around - I am not systematically coding his gigs in, just too much to do!

p. 28 has the Keystone listings, which I do record systematically.

Context: June 1976 BAM Listings

Here are the live music listings from BAM no. 3.

Here's the snapshot I take. Jerry confederates, most. I like these Comfort listings just to put some foundation under the idea that they were a going concern when they partnered up with Hunter the next year. And this would be the Kingfish quartet, sans Robert Weir (whom I wish well).

Context: May 1976 BAM listings

More color.

May 21, 1976, Garcia Band plays Orpheum in San Francisco, while Garcia's erstwhile bandmate, Merl, is stuck playing Fonzie's in San Jose, the latter mostly still orchards and low riders rather than silicon and Teslas. And other fun stuff.

Oh, and it looks like Mingus didn't play Keystone Korner in May '76. I suspect that tape I have labeled as May is actually from the previously mentioned run in April.

Context: April 1976 BAM listings

So here's a first example of my sources and methods for context. It's a scan of the music listings from the first issue of BAM ("Bay Area Music") magazine, April 1976.

Here are the things that went into the spreadsheet:

• the listings for Ruby, which was Tom Fogerty's band of the period;
• the listings for the Meters, who, I think, shared a bill or two with JGMS in November 1974, which Kreutzmann loved, and at least one song of which JGMS covered ("Just Kissed My Baby");
• the Roadhog listings (for Corry);
• the Mingus gigs (because one of my favorite Mingus recordings is from KK the next month);
• the Eddie Harris gigs, because I thought this might be Merl's cousin?;
• the Bloomfield gigs, for no apparent reason;
• Gravenites, see Bloomfield;
• Mandel, because he once shared a stage with Jerry (Matrix late 1968);
• the Rowan Brothers, for heavy Garciacentric relevance;
• the David LaFlamme band, shared stage with Garcia (with NRPS in February 1971, I think 2/28/71).

 More madness than method, of course, but there you go.

Context

As I contemplate writing some of this stuff up for a more general (less maniacal) readership, I see that I am going to have to write plain English in book form and refer back to the blog in endnotes. So I can drop all of the random little tidbits here, which is what I do anyway.

Some of the voluminous research I have done involves, for lack of a better term, context: developing the palette of colors surrounding the Garciaverse. With the help of Corry and the Yellow Shark, we have compiled a spreadsheet of musical events now numbering over 40k. This has distinct historical value, of course, especially the early stuff that forms the Yellow Shark's main focus. For me, it helps me gain some perspective: I see what else was going on in the same clubs that Garcia played (contemporaneously or otherwise) and down the street from his gigs on the same nights he was playing; I see what bands that shared Garcia bills, players that shared the Garcia stage were doing; how the venues evolved and the players moved along in their careers; und so weiter.

I am contemplating a series of "Context" posts that might lay out some of the raw materials underpinning these data - mostly calendar listings, ads, reviews, etc. from local papers. This also allows me to make a methodological point: I am rather haphazardly entering events into my spreadsheets. I am interested in the Longbranch, for example, because Jerry played there (8/27-28/71 and 10/1-2-3-/71 with the New Riders). But I just don't have time/interest to make a complete history of the Longbranch, as interesting as that might be.

If, instead, I put out some raw materials, maybe future historians will find these data useful. So I'll try to put that stuff out there as much as I can.

JGMS: January 6-7-8, 1972, Keystone Korner

I had a Friday, January 7, 1972 Garcia-Saunders gig at Keystone Korner based on an ex post discussion by Ken Hunt in the San Francisco Chronicle (1). But a bit of sniffing reveals a Thursday-Saturday run, January 6-8. No TJS, so update your own spreadsheets.

(1) Hunt, Dennis. 1972a. Guitarist Jerry Garcia Never Stops. San Francisco Chronicle (January 10), p. 42.

This should be related to an earlier "new to the list" post.

Don Dearth Was My Third Grade Teacher, And He Was A Taper: JGB at the Stone, May 12, 1984

 LN jg1984-05-12.jgb.all.aud-dearth.85568.flac1644

Quite a nice performance, quite a nice tape, pulled by my 3rd grade teacher from Burton School (Lafayette, CA), the lovely Don Dearth. I like the Cats and the Knockin' here.

Jerry Garcia Band
The Stone
412 Broadway
San Francisco, CA 94133
May 12, 1984 (Saturday)
Dearth shnid-85568

--set I (5 tracks, 51:07)--
s1t01. //Sugaree [#11:48] [0:21] %, dead air [0:12], [0:27] %
s1t02. [0:05] Catfish John [10:15] [0:18]  %
s1t03. //Simple Twist of Fate [#12:35] [0:02] ->
s1t04. Run For The Roses [5:13] ->
s1t05. Deal 5:19 // abut s1t06. //Deal +4:20 (1) [0:09] %

--set II (5 tracks, 50:49)--
s2t01. [0:07] Cats Under The Stars [8:39] [0:12] % [0:17]
s2t02. Knockin' On Heaven's Door [14:31] [0:06]
s2t03. Russian Lullaby [12:57] ->
s2t04. Gomorrah [5:48] [0:12] %
s2t05. [0:03] Midnight Moonlight [7:46] (2) [0:10] %

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #21a
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - guitar, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - bass;
! lineup: Melvin Seals - keyboards;
! lineup: Jacklyn LaBranch - backing vocals;
! lineup: DeeDee Dickerson - backing vocals;
! lineup: David Kemper - 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/19840512-01

! JGC: http://jerrygarcia.com/show/1984-05-12-the-stone-san-francisco-ca/

! db: http://etreedb.org/shn/25240 (Flair-Corleypatch shnf); http://etreedb.org/shn/85568 (Dearth flac1644, this fileset).

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

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

! band: JGB #21a (http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/jerry-garcia-band-personnel-1975-1995.html). Note that, historically, #21a, with Kemper, DDD and Jacklyn, was thought to have ended sometime in 1983 (alternately, 7/20/83, 9/30/83, or 12/13/83). But I now believe it ran through this May 1984 SoCal tour, with #21b kicking in July '84.

! seealso: JGMF, "The Auds Have It - JGB at Irvine Meadows, May 18, 1984" and 
 "There is World Class Guitar Playing Here" [re 5/19/84].

! R: field recordist: Don Dearth

! R: field recording location: "real up close"

! R: field recording gear: Sony D6C w/Sony Stereo Microphone

! R: field recording media: TDK SA90

! R: transfer: Nakamichi CR3A (no Dolby) playback > HP computer > Sound Forge (Vol@5.6db) > CD Wave > flac, by John Moses.

! R: retrack by jgmf

! R: what a great tape! Right up in your face, my goodness.

! R: s1t01 Sugaree cuts in

! P: s1t01 @ 1:40 Melvin steps up for some bright and beautiful leads. Jerry drops beautifully on the 1 to "though you was a cool fool", maybe in the wrong key so bring it down a touch. Nice Sugaree.

! R: s1t03 STOF cuts in; tape weirdness 6:50.

! P: s1t03 STOF bass lead 6:22-9:02.

! R: s1t05-s1t06 joined tracks to new s1t05. Tape flip? Just a drop. Lots of static at this point.

! P: s1t05-s1t06 Deal is really good. :13 into second piece he produces some piercing feedback. Takes it to another tempo level 1ff of the second piece, and Kemper is amazing, and Garcia is mixing the earlier feedback into very long scalar circles, swings into Deal 1:45, or quotes it, more feedback 1:55, high run down the frets 2:00, great playing.

! s1t05 (1) JG gives a set break announcement, but I can't make it out.

! R: s2t01 CUTS start vocals are inaudible to start.

! P: s2t01 CUTS Jerry sounds pretty focused, as does the whole band. Goes big pretty early on 4:15 into some very raunchy spaces. Second half of 4 Kahn is playing, does that same three-note run 5:04. Man, Kemper is such a rock for Garcia! He is killin'. @ 5:35 Jerry is full on rock star, still just shredding, now softens his tone back up 5:50 ish. So that was a very cool minute and-a-half of guitar work with the pedal to to the metal, so to speak. Back to the '1' perfectly 6:15, Kemper. Jerry remembers the words!

! P: s2t02 KOHD perfection @ 3:52, big note 4, crowd likes. Great, great early 80s JGB KOHD right there. Absolutely representative. Garcia gave several extra vocal flourishes, never really stumbled. He sounds sharp this night. Bass lead 5:25ish - John is giving it his all, good energy. Not sure the sequences of notes are crafted totally successfully ... still playing over 8, quite good. In fact I'd say this is some especially good John Kahn bass playing. Climbs again 8:25. That's at least 3 and and half minutes of Kahn leading, and it is not terrible.

! P: s2t03 about a minute in the waitress can be heard taking drink orders, maybe last rounds, and there's a little taper talk, lady friend and taper.

! P: s2t05 JG (2) inaudible, maybe "see ya later" or "have a nice night". The former is more likely.

Richard Loren: High Notes

Richard Loren is publishing a memoir in November. This I am very much looking forward to!

http://www.jambands.com/news/2014/07/29/former-grateful-dead-manager-to-release-memoir

Former Grateful Dead manager Richard Loren will release his memoir, High Notes: A Rock Memoir: Working with Rock Legends Jefferson Airplane Through The Doors to the Grateful Dead, in November. The book, which features a forward by David Grisman, recalls Loren’s journey through the turbulent era of rock’s ascendancy.
...
High Notes, which was written in conjunction with Stephen Abney, is broken up into four sections:
Part One: New York City – My life with Jefferson Airplane, The Doors and the Chambers Brothers
Part Two: Stinson Beach, California – David Grisman, the Rowan Brothers, Garcia-Saunders, Old and in the Way
Part Three: The Grateful Dead – Politics, Grateful Dead Movie, Garcia Bands, Egypt, Saturday Night Live, Alaska, Radio City Music Hall
Part Four: The Grateful Dead Merry-Go-Round – Germany, Mississippi River Boat, Watch the River Flow, Sirens of Titan, Garcia-Grisman.

Oh my goodness. Stinson and all the rest of it, Sirens of Titan, Gar-Gris ... so many Garciacentric little nuggets. I cannot wait to read this!

Positively Garcia

http://visionsofdylan.blogspot.com/2014/07/positively-garcia-howard-weiners-new.html

Jamming in the shadows of the Grateful Dead, the Jerry Garcia Band thrilled devoted fans for three decades with an alchemist’s brew of blues, rock, jazz, and gospel, as well as Motown and Dylan covers. Positively Garcia is the story of the rise of the Jerry Garcia Band from their early California club gigs through the band’s glory days in the early ‘80s. Author and Garcia aficionado Howard Weiner ranks JGB’s greatest shows, and explores the sublime solos and transcendent moments from those performances in essays that are accompanied by rare concert photos. JGB left behind an unprecedented trail of sonic inspiration, yet this rich musical legacy is largely unheralded. The chronicles of Positively Garcia shine a new light on an intimate and essential slice of Garcia’s prolific career. In the second part of this book, Weiner—a veteran of sixty JGB shows—recalls all the joys and madness associated with extreme touring. For Weiner, pursuing JGB was all business, and he took it very personally. 

Sounds interesting. Looking forward to it!

AHATT

All Hooteroll?, All The Time

Image: http://www.matiklarweinart.com/artworkgallery.php. See also http://connecthook.wordpress.com/2011/09/05/pair-of-pentychs/ for a little bit more.

Sebastopol Benefit: March 22, 1978

LN jg1978-03-22.jgb.all.sbd-ladner.19832.shn2flac

As a prelude to a review of the off-to-a-great-start GarciaLive 4 release of the Sebastopol 3/22/78 benefit show, here are some fragmentary listening notes from a year ago on the rough circulating sbd copy.

It appears that I engaged the question of the pianist on that very date over at Corry's post (probably now getting lots of traffic!) on the show - scroll down to comments.  I was clearly unclear on who's doing what. For I example, I was convinced that Keith was playing on LITA (s2t06), though the release belies this.

I plan on listening a little and then posting more extensively. Hate fragmenting conversations too much, but anyway.

Jerry Garcia Band
Veterans' Auditorium
282 S. High Street
Sebastopol, CA 95472
March 22, 1978 (Wednesday)
118 min degraded sbd shnid-19832 shn2flac

--set I (5 tracks, 46:43)--
s1t01. How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) [6:45] [0:18]
s1t02. Catfish John [9:00] [0:08] %
s1t03. Simple Twist Of Fate [10:37] [0:13] % [0:02]
s1t04. I Second That Emotion [10:05] [0:08]
s1t05. The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down// [9:27#]

--set II (8 tracks, 71:28)--
s2t01. Harder They Come [11:39] [0:27]
s2t02. Mission In The Rain [11:11]
s2t03. Cats Under The Stars [7:53] [0:06] %
s2t04. Gomorrah [6:27] %
s2t05. Mystery Train [8:22] [0:15] % [1:46]
s2t06. Love In The Afternoon [9:30] [0:03] %
s2t07. I'll Be With Thee [5:06] ->
s2t08. Midnight Moonlight// [8:42#]

! Band: Jerry Garcia Band
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - el-g, vocals;
! lineup: John Kahn - el-b;
! lineup: Keith Godchaux - piano (xxx);
! lineup: ?Ozzie Ahlers - piano (xxx)?;
! lineup: Buzz Buchanan - drums;
! lineup: Donna Jean Godchaux - vocals;
! lineup: Maria Muldaur - vocals.

JGMF:

! R: symbols:

! TJS: http://www.thejerrysite.com/shows/show/1362

! JGC: http://jerrygarcia.com/show/1978-03-22-veterans-hall-sebastopol-ca/

! db: http://db.etree.org/shn/19832 (this fileset)

! map: http://goo.gl/maps/JJgfV00

! venue:

! band:

! preview: Mason 19780320

! ad: Press-Democrat (Santa Rosa, CA), March 3, 1978, p. 8B


! expost: Scully 1978

! seealso: Corry, "March 22, 1978 Veterans Hall, Sebastopol, CA: Jerry Garcia Band (Ozzie Ahlers-piano?)," Hooterollin' Around, http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2013/07/march-22-1978-veterans-hall-sebastopol.html.

! historical: Garcia attended Analy High School in this off-the-beaten-path Sonoma County town, and I guess we think he gigged a little during that time. Benefit for the Sonoma County Stump. and for the Slide Ranch, a Marin retreat for Bay Area ghetto kids run by the GD's extended family.


! R: source: SBD > CM(x) > CDR > WAV > SHN.

! R: shn2flac conversion by jgmf 7/12/2013.

! R: seeder Comments: "Multiple analog generations with a significant amount of hiss.  Sound quality is a bit spotty and gets even spottier by the end of the second set.  End of last song of each set is clipped."

! R: I'd add the there are surely speed fluctuations all over the place.

! P: seeder comment: "Very primitive and open-ended jamming sounding 'Cats Under the Stars' in its lucky #7 performance.  Sounds like a band having a great time."

! R: seeder comment: "Thanks to H.Angus for source CDRs. DAE (EAC 0.9b4, offset corrected, secure mode) > sector boundaries confirmed (shntool) > SHN (shorten 3.4) > FTP via C.Ladner/candyman FTP. MisSHN ITR, 10/03." shn2flac jgmf 7/12/2013.

! P: s1t02 CJ these harmony vocals are not very together.

! R: s1t05 TNTDODD ctuts out, maybe a half minute or a minute missing.

! P: s2t04 Gomorrah, DJG says at the start "This is a true story."

! R: s2t05 the tape wow and flutter is really, really painful to hear.

! P: s2t05 MT noticing the drummer's insistent steel horse rhythm.

! s2t05 interesting long tuning, piano ... my brain delights to think it could be them sitting Ozzie down at the piano bench ... maybe KG passed out. Sounds like drummer is working on tempo, too. Why, if they just came off xxx gigs in xxx nights? But it still sounds like Keith playing piano, too bad.

! personnel: Keith definitely playing on LITA(s2t06)

//notes end

Fieldwork Pictures

A small sampling. I have many more. I was looking for a pic of the Marin County Clerk and Recorder's office, but couldn't find it. I think I took pix of the Inn of the Beginning and the Cabaret in Cotati. Definitely have one of Macky around here somewhere. I have posted a few snaps from Olompali.

Anyway, here are a few more. Ahhh, beautiful Bay Area ...

Marin Civic

2400 Fulton Street

SF Civic

Marin Civic

River Theater, Guerneville

Bear's Lair, UC Berkeley

JGB 10/27/78 pix [update: and saga] [update2: and listening notes]

Jerry Garcia Band at Washington State College, Cheney, WA, October 27, 1978

Ben Upham's wonderful shot of Jerry Garcia at Washington State College, 10/27/78

Updates

Since I already have a post on this show specifically, let me accompany Upham's beautiful pix with some less beautiful details about how this thing went down.

This, from a report the day before the show (Spanjer 1978):

The concert, featuring former members of the Grateful Dead, was originally scheduled as a 'Dead' concert and would have cost $25,000. But SARB learned in late September the artists could not appear under that name because of pending record company suits. It was too late to schedule another act, however, so SARB members decided to rename the headliners 'The Jerry Garcia Band and The Bob Weir Band of the Grateful Dead' and to pay $21,000 for the act. [NB this strictly violated the contractual terms of the JGB, at least.] Negotiations with Monarch, the agency representing the groups, reduced total band cost, including equipment and agent fees, to $17,000. But sparse ticket sales and other difficulties continued to plague the show.

As of Tuesday before the Friday show, only 600 tickets had been sold, whereas the break-even number was 3,000. The school would lose $8,646 if 2k tickets moved.

The students weren't that thrilled about all of this. An earlier letter to the editor of the campus paper ("Music blues," Easterner, October 12, 1978, p. 4) presented some different math, asserting that they'd need to sell 4,600 tickets to break even (70% of the full-time student population!) and lamenting that they could have had Chicago for much lower cost.

In the end, the school lost $15 grand on the show. Ouch.

Handill for JGB 10/27/78 at Washington State College, Cheney, WA.
Image courtesy of Ben Upham

Pretty colors on that handbill, though.

And oh, why the hell not - some listening notes follow. Crazy that I note nothing about my favorite tune, Reuben and Cherise, but here we are.

Jerry Garcia Band

Performing Arts Pavilion, Washington State College

1375 Swoop Lane

Cheney, WA 99004

October 27, 1978 (Friday)

unknown aud shnid-89723

--set I (6 tracks, 64:50)--

s1t01. dead air [0:03] //How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) [8:39] [0:07] % (1) [0:50]

s1t02. Catfish John [11:34] [0:05] % [0:41]

s1t03. That's What Love Will Make You Do [8:50] [0:02] % [0:09]

s1t04. Russian Lullaby [13:15] [0:06] %

s1t05. I Second That Emotion [11:51] ->

s1t06. Mystery Train [8:33] (2) [0:04]

--set II (7 tracks, 50:25)--

s2t01. crowd and tuning [0:29]

s2t02. Love In The Afternoon [8:53] [0:27]

s2t03. Tore Up Over You [8:54] [0:06]

s2t04. Reuben And Cherise [6:30] [0:22]

s2t05. Gomorrah [6:14] [0:06]

s2t06. I'll Be With Thee [5:35] [0:03]

s2t07. Midnight Moonlight [12:42] (3) [0:02]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia Band #4

! lineup: Jerry Garcia - guitar, vocals;

! lineup: Donna Godchaux - vocals;

! lineup: Maria Muldaur - vocals;

! lineup: Keith Godchaux - piano;

! lineup: John Kahn - bass;

! lineup: Buzz Buchanan - drums.

JGMF:

! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; ... = fade in/out; # = truncated timing; [x:xx] = 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/19781027-03

! JGC: http://jerrygarcia.com/show/1978-10-27-reese-court-eastern-washington-state-university-cheney-wa/

! db: https://etreedb.org/shn/18291 (s1s2p aud shnf); https://etreedb.org/shn/89723 (this fileset).

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/mXRb6uVrhNB2

! band: http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/jerry-garcia-band-personnel-1975-1995.html

! historical: Like "Grateful Dead Three Ways" (Selvin 1975), this show presents an interesting wrinkle on cross-promotion between Jerry and his brothers, because here it's just "big brother" Jerry and "little brother" Bob, the dyad that went deepest on the emotional and financial levels. Emotionally, yeah, brothers of the most loving kind, big teaching little all the tricks, little giving big his unadorned loyalty, to the point of keeping the big dog's drugs, apportioning them out as needed. We might learn differently if Weir ever writes a book, but I can't recall in the record any documented incident of Garcia and Weir fighting - perhaps the Dead's late summer '68 "Firing" of Weir and Pigpen comes closest. All of Weir's side projects worked paydays with the Garcia Band - Kingfish in the second half of 1975, Bob Weir Band on the three-gig fall '78 joint "tour" of the Pacific Northwest, and Bobby and the Midnights in June 1982. Now, the rest of the guys mostly didn't run going concerns on the side, so it's not necessarily about Jerry and Bob, but about whatever bands were gigging and recording (from '78 on, for Clive Davis in both cases). It's really the 1987 joint real estate venture that puts a point on it, for me.

! preview: "Weir, Garcia, Muldaur Here," Spokesman-Review, October 26, 1978, p. ?;

! expost: Sowa 1978;

! JGMF: http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/07/jgb-102778-pix.html;

! pix: URL https://fineartamerica.com/profiles/ben-upham?tab=artworkgalleries&artworkgalleryid=307624, photog Ben Upham.

! historical: Homecoming for EWU. Monarch Entertainment was running this tour for JGB, here co-promoting with the school for a $3,500 production fee (sound, lights, etc.). The wage had been typed in as $8,250 guaranteed, but that was lowered to $6,500, plus percentages above certain gross and on cost savings. Gross potential of $42,250-$48,750.

! exante: "Letter to the editor: Music blues," Easterner, October 12, 1978, p. 4; asserts that Weir got $7k and JGB got $9,500, lamenting that the show would have to sell 4,600 tickets (70% of the student body) to break even, and further lamenting that they could have gotten Chicago for less than $10k.

! exante: Spanjer 1978, noting extremely low ticket sales just a few days before the show.

! preview: "Weir, Garcia, Muldaur Here," Spokesman-Review, October 26, 1978, p. 17;

! recollex: Upham ND;

! expost: Sowa 1978; refers to it as the "Grateful Dead concert", notes the event lost $15k for the school and blames the student activities group for late, scanty promotion.

! R: source: MAC > ? > CD > EAC > FLAC. jjoops notes: "I received this source from Stephen Maeder, who thought it might have been recorded by Pat Lee or Mark Severson. But it now seems that neither of them is responsible for this recording." The taper remains a mystery.

! R: This is an aud with lots of room feel. Some collectors take that to be code for "it's a boomy audience tape by some random, using God-knows-what gear from God-knows-where". I don't mean that. I love when a tape conveys the shapes of the notes in the space in, around and through which they are bouncing. This tape really captures the sound of this band in this gym. That there's some up-close clapping between songs is a feature, not a bug. Nice job, mystery taper - thank you! There's a little fuzziness, maybe overload, around the vocals. Seeder: "Set II levels are lower, especially prior to Midnight Moonlight. Someone more talented and so inclined may well wish to fiddle with this, but I left it as I received it, but for a few fades on tape transitions."

! P: seeder notes: "The show is more on the mellow, groovy side than on the fiery side, but I think you'll enjoy it." Band is tight, contrast Buzzy in his one year with the Band. Jerry is a little bit hoarse, but so far, third song in, not too bad.

! R: s1t01 How Sweet It Is cuts in

! P: s1t01 HSII The band sounds great right out of the gate. There's a kind of focus to these late Buzzy-Godchaux Garcia Band shows that astonishes. Keith Godchaux takes the first feature in How Sweet It Is, late 2 over 3, and the man is alert and firing. 

! s1t01 (1) color: freak yells, in kind of a faux Spanish accent, with great enthusiasm, "García!", as in, "he's here!", and the crowd energy spikes to about an 8 (out of 11).

! P: s1t04 RL Garcia's first run set forth a large number of very long phrases, occasionally punctuated. Beautiful, mellow listening. Keith took second feature, then John took one (meh), then Jerry sort of fronting but almost like all three featuring together, Jerry doing some more running around.

! s1t06 (2) JG: "We're gonna take a break for a little while. We'll be back a little later."

! s2t07 (3) JG: "Thanks a lot. We'll see y'all later on."

Keystone Berkeley's Smitty

Garcia Talks Locally, Fall 1972

Staska, Kathie, and George Mangrum. 1972. Rock Talk by KG: Jerry Garcia discusses Grateful Dead, albums. Hayward Daily Review, October 12, 1972, p. 42.

It's a marvel to study Garcia interviews over the years in all kinds of ways. The man could talk as knowledgeably, engagingly, expansively, and articulately as he played the guitar, which is really quite something.

By way of preface, let me note the out-of-town selection bias exhibited by published interviews - locals barely bothered, but journalists in every burg across the country wanted to write Garcia up when he or the Dead came to town. This has all kinds of observable implications. One I'd note in passing is that it reinforces Garcia's remarkable ability to find an oral formulation that worked, and to stick with it,when it came to the inevitable stock questions about the Acid Tests, all that. He spoke to lots of people he didn't know - good to have a rap ready. Out-of-town stuff is probably also more tied up in commercialization than most local chats, a record to promote or, more likely, just trying to sell out the local basketball shed. It's not good or bad, but to me it's worth remembering that for a lot of what we read Garcia saying, he's on the road talking to people who aren't from where he's from. We get something of Garcia's self projection, from the outside looking in.

Local interviews for lots of periods were more rare. Corry often notes that most media just weren't that interested, a lot of the time. For many years (e.g., probably the second half of the 70s and the first half of the 80s) you'd only write up Garcia for a really slow news day.

This interview seems to have the commercial pretext of promoting the Dead's forthcoming Europe '72. This gives way to a small, slightly grainy, but interesting snapshot of the local context of Jerry Garcia, fall 1972. Among other things, he seems accidentally anti-commercial.

First, about the column. Kathie Staska and George Mangrum ran the amazing "Rock Talk by KG" column in the Hayward Daily Review throughout the 1970s in an unlikely passage from school paper to legit townie news. Hayward is an East Bay town between Oakland and Fremont, a crossroads (I580 and I880 join up, and Mission Blvd. starts running south all the way to Mission San Jose). It's surely a real property-rich spot nowadays, but I have it as "generic East Bay" in the 1970s. Anyway, good little town, and from this spot K and G reported on the Bay Area music surrounding Garcia when he wasn't on the road. They did a great job not just with San Francisco but also with the Berkeley roots music places (Mandrake's, New Orleans House, Longbranch Saloon) forgotten joints like the Bodega down in Campbell, the Marin clubs, all of it. Nice mix of touring acts, one-offs, and local favorites. In short: this is a great local music news column for a guy like me.

Second, I don't know the date of the chat (not really an interview), but I conjecture that it took place at the Dead's Winterland gig on October 9, 1972. (A propos of nothing, the article characterizes that gig as a benefit for the Dead's roadies, "who have been with them for six years".) The article appears on 10/12, and Gar says that Europe '72 will be available locally on 10/15. (FTR: deaddisc has it November 1972 [Warner Brothers 3WS-2668],while wiki says November 5.) The interviewer asks about the Tom Fogerty record, which I take to be Excalibur (Fantasy 9413, October 1972). It all just feels like October to me, though the only hard limits we have are between 8/25 and 10/11. The resolution is not great, but I am pretty comfortable with the 10/9 dating.

Anyway, here are a few shutterclicks.

Garcia Had A Lot of Album Credits in This Period

KG: It sounds like every album we pick up has your name on it. It would seem that you spend quite a bit of time on other people's albums.

Garcia: It's just an illusion. I don't actually spend that much of my life doing it. Each one of those albums represents about two days in the studio, maybe less, sometimes more. It doesn't represent that much ... accumulated time.

Fogerty Record

KG: One of the latest examples of this is on the new Tom Fogerty album.

JG: It has [sic] a chance for me to play different styles than I normally play.

Goodness, I wish he had taken the bait. He sounds rushed. I don't think he's on record anywhere about Tom Fogerty. But here's a chance for him to sell some vinyl - that's why they're together, I presume - and he sort of whiffs. Silly, anti-commercial man. On the other hand, this is a great GOTS quote: "a chance for me to play different styles than I normally play".

August 1972 BCT Dead Shows

The Dead played a four-of-five night run August 21-22 and 24-25 at the Berkeley Community Theatre, selling it out (I think?) for Bill Graham and finding some utterly transcendent moments, as during a hellfiring "The Other One" on the second night. I don't think I have ever met a Deadhead who doesn't love these shows.

Garcia, not so much.

KG: How did your last concert in the area (Berkeley) go for you?

JG: The four days at the Berkeley Community Theatre weren't our best performances. They could have been a lot better in my opinion. We haven't done a good show around here for quite awhile. Generally speaking, when we play here it's during our off season because when we're touring, we're usually touring the rest of the country.

When we've been working is when we're best. When we did the Berkeley show [sic] we hadn't been playing in quite awhile. It was more of a warmup for us for going out on the road.

Two thoughts.

First, huh. I think he's too hard on himself. If ever there was proof of the proposition that Jerry often articulated, that the Grateful Dead experience was totally subjective, this might be it. Anyway, de gustibus and all that. I hope he at least liked Veneta!

Second, I guess this is the piece that frames in the local vs. the road thing for me. Nothing earth-shattering, but an interesting perspective, and one that resonates . It has often been said that, for many years, the Dead played their best shows on the east coast. There's something to this, the people are different, sure, but also the energy of the road, that diesel taste of airline fuel in your nose, the zing. Home is home, if you're lucky.

Merl Saunders - May 28, 1972

Corry has done more than anyone to probe into the relative blank spot that is summer 1972 for the Jerry Garcia - Merl Saunders live aggregation.

• http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/10/john-kahn-live-performance-history-1972.html (general)
• http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/03/summer-1972-pierce-street-annex-san.html (Garcia with Guaraldi at Pierce Street Annex

As Corry says in the latter post, linking to the former: "there were almost no Garcia-Saunders shows in 1972, save for a two-week window in late June-early July, when Kahn and Saunders seem to have been back in town."

I have nothing major to add, just a tiny listing I found for Merl to play in the City on 5/28/72:

May 28, 1972: Merl Saunders and Friends and the Flowing Stream Ensemble, S.F. Museum of Art, McAllister at Van Ness, 2-4 pm, free.

I suspect that careful work spinning through SF Chronicle listings (which has not been done, to my knowledge, for the 1971ff period which interests me) will uncover more. In the meantime, here's a random one.

Harpur College NRPS set

"Enough about the Dead, how was the New Riders' set?" - one guy, once

Any Deadhead worth her salt knows the Harpur College gig from May 2, 1970. It's a monster, one of the Dead's best, and long-circulating from FM tapes; it has blown a lot of minds.

I don't remember hearing much about the New Riders set from this night's Evening With the Grateful Dead, so I thought I'd check it out.

Performance: NRPS "meh", but Bobby Ace is real good

Sometimes, things aren't much noted because they aren't really noteworthy. I'd say that's the case here: this is easily the weakest of the sets played this night.

Arrangements need work. Nelson needs more volume and/or confidence. Marmaduke's grating singing gets in the way of enjoying his great songwriting. Garcia and the rest of the band sound fine, but this is only really their second night out and they can't quite unstick the cobwebs wisping over their ears and through their fingers.

I really like the Bobby Ace interregnum. Bobby was coming into his own as a guitarist, singer and stage presence at this time, and this is the perfect feature for the beautiful young man, in well-worn boots, jeans and collarless shirt, with the long pony tail and the handsome persona. The songs are simply wonderful. See my little sketch of the Bobby Ace repertoire here. "Sawmill" is a great little Garciaverse rarity. Country legend Mel Tillis wrote the tune and first released it in 1959 (deaddisc), and the Riders' idol Buck Owens covered it, but it was Tillis's 1973 version that hit #3 on the charts (wiki). This is a great tune! "The Race Is On" also hit #3 on the country charts, for George Jones in 1965. The Dead played it a bunch in 1973, and in the 1980s revived it whenever they'd play on Kentucky Derby Day (e.g., 5/3/86, 5/6/89, 5/5/90), always a vernal treat for Bay Area fans. Merle Haggard got all the way to #1 in August of '68 with "Mama Tried", soon also picked up by the Dead. I prefer the NRPS arrangement, as I do with MAMU. These songs just sound great with steel.

Context: On Campus, May 1970

Still, the context is super interesting. "Harpur College", known to Deadheads the world over for the monster show played on this night. But this was An Evening With the Grateful Dead, and I don't recall seeing much discussion of the evening's middle set by the Dead's white country cousinage, the New Riders of the Purple Sage. This particular zoo got rolling on Friday, May 1st at little Alfred College in upstate New York and steamed into Binghamton for a Saturday show which is an indispensable part of the GD Legend on the East Coast, its economic lifeblood for fifty years. A large generation of baby-boom (and post) northeast corridorians and other city dwellers bought tickets at the time and now buy beautiful, multimodal nostalgia, delivered to the couch, street, car and garden. The Dead were a San Francisco band cashing New York checks. "Harpur  College" - every Deadhead, at least, knows those two words. See the Wolinsky review for some flavor.

More broadly, say "college campus" and "Spring 1970", and I am all ears, because this was a really weird time in American history, worth recalling as we consider our current polarization. The Dead played colleges on both sides of the May 4th Kent State shootings. You remember those, "four dead in Ohio" as CSNY put it, and this:

John Filo's Pulitzer Prize-winning photo of Mary Ann Vecchio screaming over the dead body of Jeffrey Miller, May 4, 1970, Kent State University.

On May 4, 1970 members of the Ohio National Guard fired into a crowd of Kent State University demonstrators, killing four and wounding nine Kent State students. The impact of the shootings was dramatic. The event triggered a nationwide student strike that forced hundreds of colleges and universities to close. H. R. Haldeman, a top aide to President Richard Nixon, suggests the shootings had a direct impact on national politics. In The Ends of Power, Haldeman (1978) states that the shootings at Kent State began the slide into Watergate, eventually destroying the Nixon administration. Beyond the direct effects of the May 4th, the shootings have certainly come to symbolize the deep political and social divisions that so sharply divided the country during the Vietnam War era. (Lewis and Hensley, ND).

 Here's the Dead's itinerary, in the thick of things:

• 5/1: Alfred College
• 5/2: Harpur College
• 5/3: Wesleyan
• 5/4: NRPS free show in the Central Park bandshell!
• 5/5: no show
• 5/6: MIT (free in Kresge Plaza)
• 5/7: MIT (DuPont Gym)
• 5/8: SUNY Delhi
• 5/9: NRPS free show in Boston, then gig at Worcester Polytechnic Institute
• 5/10: Atlanta

The Dead's set furiously rages and is truly of its time. The NRPS set is just some guys trying to get it together, which I guess we could say is timeless.

Listening notes below the fold.