Grateful Dead

dead.net the official site

A while back you all were discussing the tuning between songs. I bought myself the yellow 71 box for Christmas. I highly recommend it. Especially for those like me who still haven't received Dave's 32 yet. The 7-2 show is worth the price of the box! Anyway, it is funny to me that during the first sets of these shows they spend 1 to 3 minutes tuning between every song but very rarely tune at all in the second set. Did the instruments cosmically stay in tune for the second set?

So, for some reason, it seemed a good idea to check out 1968 from 30TATS today. Short show (or set), but 65% Pigpen on vocals. Short and sweet, just like "they" say. C'mon Dave's 33!!

Here's a tasty little Dancin'>Wharf Rat> Dancin' sandwich:

https://archive.org/details/gd1976-10-14.143276.set2.sbd.goodbear.shnf

....thats the one I went to!
Getting back in some Dead after a self imposed sabbatical apparently. Been binging on South Park big time so forgive me.
Postcards Of The Hanging got my attention, so I answered. The only Dylan that is better than Dylan is the GOGD doing Dylan.
And if case some didn't get my dad joke the other day....Thermos Tat. As in thermostat! Don't touch the thermostat! I'm guilty of saying that quite often, but I'm a dad.
And yes. Neil Peart was Rush's primary lyricist. A lot of people don't realize that.

Still doing Rush observances,
Just finished watching the Time Machine BluRay.

It’s Hopslam season.
Watch for it in a store near you within the next few weeks (hopefully it makes it to your area).

https://www.bellsbeer.com/beer/specialty/hopslam-ale

Still drinking Two Hearted?
Two Hearted River:
https://youtu.be/wO08WJMp1FQ

Back in the day they only had mics, pickups were not usually used on acoustic instruments. In 1980 they were and more importantly the technology had improved greatly. Even better is the use of both mics and the direct line pickups. That’s what they utilized in 1980. Also, the mics they used back then probably weren’t as high quality like they used later on....
The signal path back then was probably a passive splitter with one leg to the main mix/PA board and another to the tape system, or possibly only 1 feed to the main board with some kind of Aux mix out to tape. This is hard to do because your trying to mix 2 completely different things with just one board so the EQ is usually not good on at least one of the mixes...unless your aux is before the EQ stage. But I’m not sure they had that kind of functionality back then?
In 1980, it overall would have been the same, but most likely using an active splitter and much more processing etc.
The old stuff sounds so bad mostly because they were trying to get acoustic instruments as loud as drums and electric stuff I.e., the bass, and there is no good way to accomplish this, especially with the tech back then. Thus the mixer would often roll off certain frequencies to try and get more gain without feedback, but that’s why they often sound bad; sacrifice tone for hall volume etc..Today there are feedback suppression devices which help too.

That's what I thought. I have to admit.. I like the clarity of the 1980 acoustic sets but I often wonder how the older stuff might have sounded if it were better recorded.

..but that's just me. Still glad they did it. 15 years before MTV Unplugged you have the Grateful Dead.

The Dead just played to the mics in 1970 and in 1980 they were plugged in. I read an interview with Garcia and Weir saying how they got sounds that were not really musical while playing to the mics, maybe they were referring to feedback. I personally liked the 1970 sounding acoustic guitars more than 1980.

Too bad they didn't record all of it.

I have been pondering something for years.. and think I might have figured it out. To my ears, the acoustic stuff on 5/15/70 sounds better, by far, than any of the other 1970 acoustic stuff with the exception of Bears Choice. So my question or hypothesis is.. did they plug in the acoustic guitars or were they playing to the mics and the mics were wired to the reel to reel mix?

For Warfield/Radio City they must have had pickups on the acoustic guitars, they sound so clean and were recorded on multi-tracks. ..but most of the 1970 acoustic sets sound muddy to me.

Does anyone know the answer to this? My hypothesis is they were playing to the mics in 1970 but it's not a well informed hypothesis. For a point of reference, on the 1987 Jerry Garcia Acoustic Band run at Lute Fontaine, David Nelson's guitar was picked up by the mics, it was not wired directly to the tape mixing board.

1970 is Magical (at least the good shows :D )

..as for 80's Matrix releases, I agree Dave's Picks 8 Matrix (11/30/80 Fox Theatre) sound great and is an improvement from both the soundboard and the audience (at least to my ears). It's a win/win. I can imagine redo's of this are more problematic than one might guess. First, we need absolutely killer audience tapes (Thanks Dr. Bob.. that Wagner source is sublime) and second, there must be a willingness from all parties to do this, likely meaning the audience masters need to be donated for the cause. Then there is the remastering process. I bet it's tricky.
Fingers crossed though, #8 is great!