The Grateful Dead Dark Star

[vajerzy]

Holy Crap- look at this!!

http://cgi.ebay.com/GRATEFUL-DEAD-FILLMORE...1QQcmdZViewItem

If I can get this price- consider mine sold- even for half this amount....

[Chalupa]

Holy Crap- look at this!!

http://cgi.ebay.com/GRATEFUL-DEAD-FILLMORE...1QQcmdZViewItem

If I can get this price- consider mine sold- even for half this amount....

Damn! I thought I scored when I sold my copy for $310.

[WD45]

OMFG I am never going to get to hear this.

Will Phil and Bobby get the hint and put out an un-numbered 2nd edition of this already? Aaaagh!

[WorldB3]

My old home town to get 30 years worth of GD archives.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?.../DDML109ACN.DTL

Grateful Dead archives going to UC Santa Cruz

On Friday, Bob Weir and Mickey Hart are scheduled to announce that the archives of the legendary band - 30 years worth of correspondence, business records, merchandise and memorabilia, including stage backdrops, a large "Blues for Allah" stained-glass artwork a fan gave the band in 1978 and some of the life-size skeletons of the band members for the 1987 "Touch of Grey" video shoot - will be donated to the UC Santa Cruz archives.

[Spontooneous]

My old home town to get 30 years worth of GD archives.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?.../DDML109ACN.DTL

Grateful Dead archives going to UC Santa Cruz

On Friday, Bob Weir and Mickey Hart are scheduled to announce that the archives of the legendary band - 30 years worth of correspondence, business records, merchandise and memorabilia, including stage backdrops, a large "Blues for Allah" stained-glass artwork a fan gave the band in 1978 and some of the life-size skeletons of the band members for the 1987 "Touch of Grey" video shoot - will be donated to the UC Santa Cruz archives.

Wonder if the letter I wrote in '76 is included.

(Note that they're getting support from the CEO of Seagate. Dead downloads take up a huge part of my hard drive. Now I know, it's a plot!)

[Chalupa]

My old home town to get 30 years worth of GD archives.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?.../DDML109ACN.DTL

Grateful Dead archives going to UC Santa Cruz

On Friday, Bob Weir and Mickey Hart are scheduled to announce that the archives of the legendary band - 30 years worth of correspondence, business records, merchandise and memorabilia, including stage backdrops, a large "Blues for Allah" stained-glass artwork a fan gave the band in 1978 and some of the life-size skeletons of the band members for the 1987 "Touch of Grey" video shoot - will be donated to the UC Santa Cruz archives.

Thanks for posting this info.

[jazzbo]

Finally (assuming this all pans out) a "Road Trips" unquestionably great to buy: Summer '71 soundboards not known before:

http://www.glidemagazine.com/hiddentrack/g...n-the-way/#more

[Quincy]

Finally (assuming this all pans out) a "Road Trips" unquestionably great to buy: Summer '71 soundboards not known before:

http://www.glidemagazine.com/hiddentrack/g...n-the-way/#more

Ho ho, that "Dark Star" that's raved about is sandwiched between a "Playin'" and a "Bird Song"! Hope they include all of that! (though I know the '71 Playings weren't the stretched out monsters they later became.) A "Darkness Jam," a great "Other One" and a SNB 8-6-71 "Hard To Handle" as a bonus. Yeah I like full shows, but I really appreciate a well edited comp. Let it be so!

[Spontooneous]

From the AP:

PETALUMA, California (AP) _ Alton Kelley, an artist who helped created the psychedelic style of posters and other art associated with the 1960s San Francisco rock scene, has died. He was 67.

Kelley died Sunday of complications from osteoporosis in his Petaluma home, according to his publicist, Jennifer Gross.

Kelley and his lifelong collaborator, Stanley "Mouse" Miller, churned out iconic work from their studio, a converted firehouse where Janis Joplin first rehearsed with Big Brother and the Holding Company.

The pair created dozens of classic rock posters, including the famous Grateful Dead "skull and roses" poster designed for a show at the Avalon Ballroom, as well as posters and album covers for Journey, Steve Miller, Jimi Hendrix and The Beatles.

Kelley and Miller's work influenced other well-known names in the genre such as Rick Griffin, who moved to San Francisco in 1966 after seeing their psychedelic posters and soon started producing his own.

For inspiration, the pair scrutinized old etchings and photos, took in the youth culture of the time and dug through public libraries, often breaking out into laughter until they were asked to leave by the librarian, Miller recalled.

"We were just having fun making posters," Miller told the San Francisco Chronicle. "There was no time to think about what we were doing. It was a furious time, but I think most great art is created in a furious moment."

Born on June 17, 1940, Kelley met Miller in 1965, at the epicenter of the hippie movement — San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district — and soon recognized their ability to work together, in their words "riffing off each other's giggle."

In recent years, Kelley's artwork focused on paintings of hot rods and custom cars, which were sold as fine art and printed on T-shirts.

He is survived by his wife Marguerite Trousdale Kelley; their children Patty, Yosarian and China; his mother, his sister and two grandchildren.

[jazzbo]

Road Trips Vol. 3, August 1971, is now available for order:

http://www.deadnetstore.com/roadtripsv1n3.aspx

Includes some material recorded on my sixteenth birthday on the bonus disc!

[WorldB3]

Road Trips Vol. 3, August 1971, is now available for order:

http://www.deadnetstore.com/roadtripsv1n3.aspx

Includes some material recorded on my sixteenth birthday on the bonus disc!

Good news. Can't beat a 1971 Hard To Handle.

Speaking of the Winterland Box I don't know if a moment or a song makes it worth the box set but that Dark Star is one for the ages. I have had the soundboard MP3 of it for years but the remaster is like hearing it brand new. Check out around the 22:00 minute mark when Keith lays down the groove after Phil's bass solo and then the MLB Jam before Eyes. Incredible.

[jazzbo]

Yes, it's great.

To me, Keith, and the recorded sound of his piano, makes these shows something special.

[Peter Johnson]

I was on the fence about the Winterland box--but I do love the Godchaux years, and I'm guessing the general concensus is "must have"? I have had scattered bits of these on tapes of varying quality over the years...but for 9 bux/CD, seems like it's not really rocket science...

[jazzbo]

I don't think you'll be disappointed. These cds sound like no other live Dead cds I have in a way. They claim a process called "Clarity" is used to digitally correct tiny bits of wow and flutter etc. The sound is amazing! Really good performances too.

[Quincy]

I don't think you'll be disappointed. These cds sound like no other live Dead cds I have in a way. They claim a process called "Clarity" is used to digitally correct tiny bits of wow and flutter etc. The sound is amazing! Really good performances too.

I'll second this. I had all 3 shows and had traded/downloaded for upgrades of 11-11 a total of 3 times. For me the biggest surprise was 11-9. We all know 11-11, and 11-10 has the "sandwich," so 11-9 gets overlooked (also because there a just so many great shows in late '73 - hell, all of '73, but I digress.) 11-9 is a superb show, and like Lon says the sound is amazing, and the improvement in sound quality over the circulating really makes it stand out. I was a bit concerned as these aren't multi-tracks, but having heard this I'm onboard for more "Clarity" releases. Of all things it's often 1st set songs that make me pause, like "They Love Each Other," or the weird bit of magic that Bobby adds to songs...of course hold onto to yourself for the mind-melting "Playing" and the like. I often have at least a few seconds of "buyer's remorse" with $100> purchases, but not with this.

[kenny weir]

Krugman on the GD in the NYT:

Best quote: "In the long run, we are all the Grateful Dead."

I know a bunch of people for whome that will be an utterly horrific concept!

Op-Ed Columnist

Bits, Bands and Books

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Do you remember what it was like back in the old days when we had a New Economy? In the 1990s, jobs were abundant, oil was cheap and information technology was about to change everything.

Then the technology bubble popped. Many highly touted New Economy companies, it turned out, were better at promoting their images than at making money — although some of them did pioneer new forms of accounting fraud. After that came the oil shock and the food shock, grim reminders that we’re still living in a material world.

So much, then, for the digital revolution? Not so fast. The predictions of ’90s technology gurus are coming true more slowly than enthusiasts expected — but the future they envisioned is still on the march.

In 1994, one of those gurus, Esther Dyson, made a striking prediction: that the ease with which digital content can be copied and disseminated would eventually force businesses to sell the results of creative activity cheaply, or even give it away. Whatever the product — software, books, music, movies — the cost of creation would have to be recouped indirectly: businesses would have to “distribute intellectual property free in order to sell services and relationships.”

For example, she described how some software companies gave their product away but earned fees for installation and servicing. But her most compelling illustration of how you can make money by giving stuff away was that of the Grateful Dead, who encouraged people to tape live performances because “enough of the people who copy and listen to Grateful Dead tapes end up paying for hats, T-shirts and performance tickets. In the new era, the ancillary market is the market.”

Indeed, it turns out that the Dead were business pioneers. Rolling Stone recently published an article titled “Rock’s New Economy: Making Money When CDs Don’t Sell.” Downloads are steadily undermining record sales — but today’s rock bands, the magazine reports, are finding other sources of income. Even if record sales are modest, bands can convert airplay and YouTube views into financial success indirectly, making money through “publishing, touring, merchandising and licensing.”

What other creative activities will become mainly ways to promote side businesses? How about writing books?

According to a report in The Times, the buzz at this year’s BookExpo America was all about electronic books. Now, e-books have been the coming, but somehow not yet arrived, thing for a very long time. (There’s an old Brazilian joke: “Brazil is the country of the future — and always will be.” E-books have been like that.) But we may finally have reached the point at which e-books are about to become a widely used alternative to paper and ink.

That’s certainly my impression after a couple of months’ experience with the device feeding the buzz, the Amazon Kindle. Basically, the Kindle’s lightness and reflective display mean that it offers a reading experience almost comparable to that of reading a traditional book. This leaves the user free to appreciate the convenience factor: the Kindle can store the text of many books, and when you order a new book, it’s literally in your hands within a couple of minutes.

It’s a good enough package that my guess is that digital readers will soon become common, perhaps even the usual way we read books.

How will this affect the publishing business? Right now, publishers make as much from a Kindle download as they do from the sale of a physical book. But the experience of the music industry suggests that this won’t last: once digital downloads of books become standard, it will be hard for publishers to keep charging traditional prices.

Indeed, if e-books become the norm, the publishing industry as we know it may wither away. Books may end up serving mainly as promotional material for authors’ other activities, such as live readings with paid admission. Well, if it was good enough for Charles Dickens, I guess it’s good enough for me.

Now, the strategy of giving intellectual property away so that people will buy your paraphernalia won’t work equally well for everything. To take the obvious, painful example: news organizations, very much including this one, have spent years trying to turn large online readership into an adequately paying proposition, with limited success.

But they’ll have to find a way. Bit by bit, everything that can be digitized will be digitized, making intellectual property ever easier to copy and ever harder to sell for more than a nominal price. And we’ll have to find business and economic models that take this reality into account.

It won’t all happen immediately. But in the long run, we are all the Grateful Dead.

[WorldB3]

My copy of Road Trips #3 arrived yesterday.

Only got through disc 1, its still a bit odd hearing the Dead as just a quartet or with Pig and no keyboards.

Raw and energetic with Phil and Billy leading the way. If your a Phil fan you will love this.

Interesting if somewhat abrupt transition to Bird Song from Dark Star, you can hear the onstage dialog of the band members during the transition.

[AllenLowe]

nice record

[vajerzy]

Saw Phil and Friends a few nights ago- it was pretty good and he played about 3 hours total. Good musicians with him- especially some guy names Jackie Greene. I admit I got bored a little during parts of it. I think I had more fun people watching- I had on a polo-type shirt, jeans and sneakers and I was overdressed. Long time since I smelled reefer.

Anyway- Phil is doing well and he was smiling through the whole show- good to see!

[WorldB3]

Saw Phil and Friends a few nights ago- it was pretty good and he played about 3 hours total. Good musicians with him- especially some guy names Jackie Greene. I admit I got bored a little during parts of it. I think I had more fun people watching- I had on a polo-type shirt, jeans and sneakers and I was overdressed. Long time since I smelled reefer.

Anyway- Phil is doing well and he was smiling through the whole show- good to see!

Jackie Green is local bay area guy, pretty good song writer too. I think my first dead show I went to in the 80's I wore a preppy Izod t-shirt but nobody gave me a hard time, I guess they thought I was just a Bobby fan.

Has anybody else heard the Road Trips # 3 yet. I think its the best one so far.

Edited June 19, 2008 by WorldB3

[vajerzy]

I'm ordering mine by this weekend. I enjoyed the 1st 2- the 2nd one I like better than the 1st. I'm still working my way through the winterland box.

[Quincy]

Has anybody else heard the Road Trips # 3 yet. I think its the best one so far.

My live entry to the Dead was from '71 with Skull & Roses. But once I started collecting I grew to prefer almost every year from '69-'78 to '71. Part of it is the way they stretched stuff out by the next year (such as Playin'). I do hold the April Fillmore shows in high regard though, and 8-6-71 is a favorite show, and DP 2 is excellent & underrated. Oh there are other dates too, but given my druthers I'd pick some other year.

Roadtrips 3 brings a new appreciation for what they were doing then. Once again the sound is terrific and I love where Phil is in the mix! And for heaven's sake, if one doesn't have the 8-6-71 "Hard To Handle" you must buy this soon to get the bonus disc. One of thee finest things ever (and I'm not Pigpen's #1 fan either.) So yes, I like this one a lot!

I like what they're doing in this series (at least the past 2), from song choices & editing & soundwise as well. Look forward to the next one!

[WorldB3]

Has anybody else heard the Road Trips # 3 yet. I think its the best one so far.

My live entry to the Dead was from '71 with Skull & Roses. But once I started collecting I grew to prefer almost every year from '69-'78 to '71. Part of it is the way they stretched stuff out by the next year (such as Playin'). I do hold the April Fillmore shows in high regard though, and 8-6-71 is a favorite show, and DP 2 is excellent & underrated. Oh there are other dates too, but given my druthers I'd pick some other year.

Roadtrips 3 brings a new appreciation for what they were doing then. Once again the sound is terrific and I love where Phil is in the mix! And for heaven's sake, if one doesn't have the 8-6-71 "Hard To Handle" you must buy this soon to get the bonus disc. One of thee finest things ever (and I'm not Pigpen's #1 fan either.) So yes, I like this one a lot!

I like what they're doing in this series (at least the past 2), from song choices & editing & soundwise as well. Look forward to the next one!

I agree, after listening to this I have a new appreciation for 71. The energy level and playing by everybody on this new road trips is something. Phil, Billy and Jerry are amazing through out. For those who thought 71 didn't have any jams really needs to hear this.

There is certain something, a "blackness" (not really coming up with the right word) and energy in the way they played Blues and RnB tunes with Pig as opposed to after he left.

As much as I love 77 as it was my gateway to the Dead (hell throw a dart at May 77 if your looking for a good show) I now hear it in a different way, while something was gained something was also lost. Hearing the slow versions of FOTD or St Stephen makes me appreciate the raw energy of 70-71 all the more. You can hear as a band they are just more into it.

[kenny weir]

Has anybody else heard the Road Trips # 3 yet. I think its the best one so far.

O yeah - it's the best of the three by a mile - and for me, even superior to the 73 Winterland box. Great sound.

[WorldB3]

Has anybody else heard the Road Trips # 3 yet. I think its the best one so far.

O yeah - it's the best of the three by a mile - and for me, even superior to the 73 Winterland box. Great sound.

wow, I don't know. I was just listening to 11-9 for the first time this weekend and it sounds so sweet. Keith is just a monster on that show. I need to plan a "Staycation" this summer and just immerse myself in the Winterland Box and the 71 Road Trips. Couldn't be happier with both of these so far.