Welcome back, as we continue our ride through the month of May in the Grateful Dead’s recorded history, with stops in 1972, 1977 and 1978.

This week we’ll start our voyage in Paris, France, on the first night of the two night stand in the city of lights. From the second set, we have this magnificent, typical-of-Europe-’72 jam featuring Jam>The Other One>Drums>The Other One>Me and Bobby McGee>The Other One>Wharf Rat. These two Paris shows were loaded with good music, with some if it making it onto the Europe ’72 album. Hopefully some day we’ll see a France ’72 album released featuring music from these two shows, plus Lille on 5/13/72.

Next up, from five years plus a day later on 5/4/77 at the Palladium in New York City (check out last week’s Tapers’ Section for more music from this run), we have this very tight, very inspired second set jam of Terrapin Station>Playing In The Band>Comes A Time>Playing In The Band. As I mentioned last week, this run of shows, and the entire tour, featured a very unique jam/song sequence virtually every night, and this one is no exception.

From a year and a day later in Hanover, NH, we have the second set closing jam from 5/5/78 featuring Not Fade Away>Stella Blue>Around and Around, Werewolves of London. This was the first night of the second half of a very good tour, with the first half taking place 4/6/78 to 4/24/78 and the second half taking place 5/5/78 to 5/17/78, with plenty of great stuff during these five weeks, including the 5/10&11/78 shows that have been immortalized as Dick’s Picks Vol. 25.

Lastly this week, from the next night on 5/6/78 in Burlington, VT, we have the show-opening quintet of songs, consisting of Sugaree, Minglewood Blues, Beggy-O, BIODTL, Loser.

Stop in next week for more great music, from 1970, 1973 and 1978. Some very good stuff coming up.

David Lemieux
vault@dead.net