Heading into October, we have some terrific Grateful Dead music to cover this week, including a good selection from the brilliant September-October, 1976 tour.

Our first track this week is from Springfield, MA, on 10/2/72, and features a slightly different main jam for the era, which is to say no Dark Star or Other One. Instead, the band embark on a purposeful, efficient jam of Truckin’>Jam>Morning Dew, with lots of exploration throughout. This is the final night of one of the greatest tours of the band’s first 10 years, a run that would pick back up a couple of weeks later in St. Louis (with a quick stop at Winterland on 10/9/72). Many consider this to be one the best tours in the band’s history, and with three Dick’s Picks from the tour already released (DP 11, DP 23 and DP 36), there is a good case to be made for that claim.

Next we’ll step into 1976, during the band’s second major tour after their return to the stage in June. From 10/1/76 in Indianapolis, we have the second set jam, a typically unique 1976 sequence featuring Dancing In The Street>Drums>The Wheel>Ship Of Fools>Dancing In The Street>Goin’ Down The Road Feeling Bad>One More Saturday Night. 1976 was filled was crazy and inspired second set sequences like this. From the next night in Cincinnati, we have the first set closing combination of Let It Grow>Might As Well; 1976 was a banner year for Let It Grow, and this one is no exception to that year’s hot versions. Also from 10/2/76 in Cincinnati is the second set jam featuring Dancing In The Street>Drums>The Other One>Stella Blue>The Other One>Sugar Magnolia (we hope you don’t mind two Dancing In The Streets this week). The head and the tail of this jam are missing from the master reels, but the 40+ minutes in between are certainly worth hearing. Finally from 1976, we have three selections from the tour-closing show in Detroit. From early in the first set we have the combination of Sugaree-Minglewood Blues and from later in the first set we have one of the best Scarlet Begonias in a year in which they played plenty of great renditions, and the set-closing The Music Never Stopped, with a gorgeous outro jam.

Be sure to check in next week when we’ll have some great music from 1984, 1989, plus some other excellent material. As always, we encourage you to email with questions or comments. It’s always great to hear from you.

David Lemieux
vault[at]dead.net