Grateful Dead

dead.net the official site

What's in store here?
> Just the standard format of a single show on 3 discs?
> A single show spread over 4 discs? (a handful of shows qualify)
> 2 shows on 4 discs? It's the same as Dave's 36 and 40.
> a compilation of highlights of 4 shows each on their own disc?

I got on the wagon a little late with Dave's Picks. It would be cool to do re issues if that is monetarily feasible. The way they sell out so fast to include some of the accompanying merch, one would think there are folks out there wanting this stuff. I do pre order the sets now and the box sets. Keep em coming. Dead Ahead!

I recently got the CD/DVD of Lynyrd Skynyrd 1976 Knebworth, and it totally sounds like crowd noise was overdubbed. What’s even worse is that the audience track sounds like it was recorded indoors, but Knebworth was an outdoor show.

As a former musician the “I’ve got yer free bird right here” was used often.

My favorite was our buddy used to come to our shows, walk up to the stage and start yelling “ya know the one thing that would make you guys good?…lessons!”
or, the ultimate, “don’t quit yer day job”

I dig a good matrix. I’ve copied the audio off some of the DVDs and I think some of those sound great.
I believe Dave’s 8 11/30/80 is a good matrix? I’ll take a good matrix over just a SB any day, but…
I agree that the crowd feed has to be used appropriately though.

I get historically why SBs became the “thing”, but the don’t sound very natural at all.

There are lots of examples of times when audience reactions really add to the experience of live recordings. But also times when it’s like a laugh track on a sitcom.

On the one hand, there’s stuff like Van the Man’s Too Late to Stop Now record, with some great audience interactions that sound real and spontaneous and really add to the experience.

On the other hand, there’s stuff like Kiss Alive, where they overdubbed loads of loud cheering to make it sound like, wowie wow, you’re hearing the most excited crowd at the most exciting concert that ever happened!!!! When in reality it’s just a bunch of overdubbed sports stadium crowd roars. It’s an easy trick, and one that was used on lots of live recordings from the ‘70s, from Lou Reed’s Rock and Roll Animal to Frampton Comes Alive.

On the other other hand, there’s the Dead. I always respected the fact that their officially released “live” albums didn’t need a laugh track. Unofficial recordings and audience tapes are different, of course. You take what you can get. But now we’re getting some of these hybrids, where Dave seems to be augmenting the vault tapes with audience recordings that inevitably have more crowd noise. So far, there’s only been one—DaP #36—where I thought there was too much audience. Hope it stays that way.

I believe I’ll walk down by the railroad with my cherry wine.

I used to like listening out for that girl who asks Jerry if he is still teaching banjo, just before the band go into "If I Had The World To Give" at Winterland on 10/17/78. It was clearly audible on the tape I used to have, but when the track was included on the bonus disc for Road Trips Vol.1 No. 4 they missed it off. Boo.

BTK - That is a great comeback from Garcia about his beard! I’ve never heard that one, but it’s priceless. Garcia had such a great sense of humour. Didn’t he ask a Broadway matinee audience on his Lunt-Fontanne Theatre run who was skipping work to see the show, and when it sounded like everyone was clapping affirmative, he asked tongue-in-cheek “Who is running New York!?”

A shout out (pun intended) to the dude that told Joni Mitchell she had “more class than Richard Nixon, Mick Jagger, and Gomer Pyle combined!”

Some lady in the crowd shouted at Garcia, Hey Garcia, why did you shave your beard off and Garcia answered back, Why did you shave yours off. It's on a tape from 1970, could be 5/15/70, but maybe someone in here knows exactly which day it is.

A friend of mine had twins.. they were very young but could speak so ~3-4 years old? We were eating at a brewery/wood oven pizza place and this Bluegrass band was playing for free in the grate room. During a song break I got them to heckle two requests with great enthusiam, one then the other. "Fweee Burd" followed by "Dawk Strawer" in an unmistakable toddler accent.

The band (and crowed) cracked up but you could tell they had no idea what to make of it. They did play an old and in the way tune later on in the set.

I guess you had to be there, but it was pretty funny.

Some humorist shouted during the quiet time between songs at a Jewel performance in Telluride's town park. She responds while flipping him off, "I've got a bird for you. And it's free!".
Cheers!