1 month ago
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Some reads for you
From a new blog
http://newdeadfan.com/2009/05/18/85/
A reprint of an older article
How to get into the Dead
From a new blog
http://newdeadfan.com/2009/05/18/85/
A reprint of an older article
How to get into the Dead
On Dead Sprituality..
Saturday, May 16, 2009
Friday, May 15, 2009
What a great time @ Shoreline!
What a great couple of shows! Last night's was our daughter's first Shoreline Dead show and how handy her favorite song -Terrapin-was played!
As soon as I get the chance (after I take a mighty nap) I'll try to post more stuff!
Such a nice time I don't know where to jump in?
How nice it was to see our friends from RD Jamaica last night -They made the trip up from So Cal- (((Steve, Annie,Mike, Jeff & Sherry, Matt)))
This not my clip but thought you might enjoy it!
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Did you listen to Bobby, Phil and Warren at Kfog?
Now you may watch some of the show too-
The Dead - "Friend of the Devil" from KFOG on Vimeo.
Posted by jharrington on May 11th, 2009 at 2:59 am | Categorized as Concerts | Tagged as Grateful Dead, Jim Harrington, Shoreline, The Dead
By Jim Harrington
There is a little game that Deadheads like to play. It’s a twist on the “Name That Tune” TV show, in which fans try to figure out what the band is going to play next.
Jenny DeMaria was feeling ready for the challenge on Sunday, as the (formerly Grateful) Dead settled in for the first of two nonconsecutive nights at its old stomping grounds of the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View.
“I know more about the Dead than anyone in this entire place,” the San Rafael resident stated for anybody willing to listen. “I don’t want to toot my own horn, but I know what I know and I know it.”
With that, the band – which currently includes four Grateful alums, bassist Phil Lesh, vocalist-guitarist Bob Weir, drummer Bill Kreutzmann and percussionist Mickey Hart, plus new additions Warren Haynes on guitar and Jeff Chimenti on keys – began noodling out something vaguely resembling the start of a song.
“It’s either `Terrapin (Station),’ `Spanish Jam’ or `Eyes (of the World),” DeMaria said with some degree of confidence. “Actually, I think it’s `Stella (Blue).’”
A few minutes later, the music finally began to take form, and the sold-out crowd of 22,000 fans erupted as the band’s choice became clear.
“Oh,” remarked DeMaria, “it’s `Sugaree.’”
That snapshot reveals more than any one song ever could about why this band manages to stay so popular. It sheds more light than a 15-minute jam or an epic guitar solo on how the Dead – even without its most popular player, Jerry Garcia, who died in 1995 – can still sell some 40,000 tickets to its two shows at Shoreline.
In a nutshell, it’s because no other band in the history of rock ‘n’ roll has ever fostered a greater sense of community than the Dead has done over its 45-year career. People wear their knowledge of the group like badges of honor, and just how much history you have with the act – which is illustrated by such seemingly oddball practices as being among the first to “name that tune” – really matters.
It all comes down to people feeling like they’re part of something bigger than themselves, and each Deadhead believes he or she has played a role in the long, strange trip that took the band from the small Bay Area clubs in the ‘60s, through the Yale Bowl in New Haven, CT, and Chicago’s Auditorium Theatre in the ‘70s, straight to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in the ‘90s.
In these modern times, when people are known to text, instead of talk, to someone sitting in the very same room, the significance of feeling connected to something cannot be overstated.
That’s why Deadheads don’t just attend shows – they live for them.
In that regard, there hasn’t been much to live for over the last few years. The Dead stayed off the road for some five years, while its members focused on individual projects, which surely factors into the huge ticket demand for this tour. Sunday’s show sold out the very day tickets became available, although ducats still remain for the second Shoreline date, on Thursday.
The two-set concert, which also included a lengthy encore that pretty much qualified as a third set, ran over three hours and featured more than a dozen Dead classics as well as a few surprises.
The sextet kicked off the show by breathing new life into one of its most storied multi-song jams, “Help on the Way”/”Slipknot”/”Franklin’s Tower.” Haynes – the busiest musician in the Bay Area this week, as he juggles his duties with the Dead with two shows with the Allman Brothers, tonight and Wednesday, at the Fox Theater in Oakland – played the biggest role in making this jam feel so fresh.
Many guitarists have tried to fill Garcia’s shows over the last 15 years, both with the Dead and in such ensembles as Phil Lesh and Friends, and most have come across, at best, as weak imitations. Haynes, on the other hand, seemed intent to sidestep Garcia, and put his own stamp on the material. He was aided greatly by Weir, whose unorthodox rhythm work, so clearly rooted in the jazz tradition of “comping,” will probably never get the recognition due.
Any lingering notion that these players might be past their primes was crushed late in the first set when the group flew into “Birdsong,” an improvisational tour-de-force that included several breakneck changes and oozed with sustained drama. That vibe would carry over to the beginning of the second set as the Dead wrung “Unbroken Chain” and “The Other One” for all they were worth.
Following the still-controversial “drums/space” segment – the purely improvisational portion of the show, which some fans love and others utilize as a chance to hit the bathrooms – the group refocused its talents on mounting a splendid attack on “Sugaree,” then surprised fans with a spot-on cover of the Rolling Stones’ “Gimme Shelter.”
Most of the encore was devoted to “St. Stephen” and “The Eleven,” which were blended in a fashion that made it nearly impossible to tell where one song ended and the other begun. The show closed with “Touch of Grey” as 22,000 fans chanted the lyric that is every bit as relevant to the band and its community today as it was when the song was first released in 1987:
“We will survive.”
The Dead in concert
When: 7 p.m. Thursday
Where: Shoreline Amphitheatre, 1 Amphitheatre Parkway, Mountain View
Tickets: $41-$101, 650-967-3000, www.livenation.com.
Set list:
Set 1:
“Help on the Way”
“Slipknot”
“Franklin’s Tower”
“Good Lovin’”
“Cassidy”
“Birdsong”
“Uncle John’s Band”
Set 2:
“Unbroken Chain”
“The Other One”
Drums/Rhythm Devils/Space
“Sugaree”
“Gimme Shelter”
“Sugar Magnolia”
Encore:
“St Stephen”
“The Eleven”
“Touch of Grey”
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Bob Weir & Ratdog at the Greek Theater in Los Angeles
Bob Weir & Ratdog will perform at the Greek
Theater in Los Angeles, CA on Saturday,
September 5, 2009. The age limit is 6 years
and older. Doors open at 6:30 PM. Showtime
is 7:30 PM. Reserved seats are available via
mail order for $54.00 per ticket and available
via credit card for $57.00 per ticket. Rear
reserved and bench seats are available via mail
order for $44.00 per ticket and available via
credit card for $47.00 per ticket.
The first mail/fax in dates for this performance
are Tuesday, May 12, 2009 through Friday,
May 15, 2009.
Tickets are also available for all of the
Bob Weir & Ratdog performances listed on
http://www.gdtstoo.com/GDTSTOOBobWeir&RatdogSummer2009.html
The Crew of GDTS TOO
May 12, 2009
Bob Weir & Ratdog will perform at the Greek
Theater in Los Angeles, CA on Saturday,
September 5, 2009. The age limit is 6 years
and older. Doors open at 6:30 PM. Showtime
is 7:30 PM. Reserved seats are available via
mail order for $54.00 per ticket and available
via credit card for $57.00 per ticket. Rear
reserved and bench seats are available via mail
order for $44.00 per ticket and available via
credit card for $47.00 per ticket.
The first mail/fax in dates for this performance
are Tuesday, May 12, 2009 through Friday,
May 15, 2009.
Tickets are also available for all of the
Bob Weir & Ratdog performances listed on
http://www.gdtstoo.com/GDTSTOOBobWeir&RatdogSummer2009.html
The Crew of GDTS TOO
May 12, 2009
Show me the Monet!
I'm going to get my own Monet!
Amongst the jillion-and-one elements supporting The Dead’s Spring 2009 Tour is the artwork -- from the interactive spiral galaxy logo on the Tour’s home page, to the nifty musical minuteman dude on the Tour’s laminated working passes, to the designs on the Tour T-shirts sold at the merch stands in the lobby. And if you’ve been to a gig lately, you’ve likely noticed a particularly fine new T-shirt, quite unlike any we’ve seen before...
In advance of each tour, Merch-Maestro George Bross solicits artwork possibilities from various folks, from which he picks the designs that become the tour's trophy T-shirts. This time around, one of the submitted artworks came from Monet Weir, Bobby’s 11-year-old daughter: it’s a lovely, blossomy, viney-twiney take on the familiar skeleton-and-roses motif, done up in yer classic blue, red and white. Monet thought of the drawing she gave George as just a suggestion, really: a rough idea, a sketch, a template if you will, which -- should it by happy chance be chosen for a T-shirt -- would then be whisked away and turned over to some professional-type artiste person to be turned into professional-type artwork. But Maestro George, in one of those moments of insight, foresight, and white-light clarity, swiftly perceived that Monet’s drawing was not a sketch or suggestion or template for any artwork at all, oh no -- Monet’s drawing WAS the artwork. So he had a bunch of T-shirts made up, and, well, hotcakes should only sell this well.
Trouble was, they were only available in Children’s Size L, because the thinking was that it was a children’s shirt. Now Children’s Size L fits some women but not all, and no men to speak of, which to no one’s surprise except maybe George’s left a whole lot of disappointed Deadheads at the merch tables. Well, positive group-think has been applied to this pickle, and the cognitive leap has been made from “shirt for a kid” to “shirt by a kid”, and now Monet’s wonderful design is available on T-shirts in sizes to accommodate pretty much everyone. Get one for yourself (and your inner child) today.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Thursday, May 07, 2009
Tuesday, May 05, 2009
Hey!
After all the admission dust settled, UCSC found they did indeed have space for my daughter!
After poking around the UCSC website- here's some info I found for folks coming to Shoreline for Dead shows:
The Dead '09: Shoreline
We'll be there.
For those of you catching a miracle and being lucky enough to get tickets for the two Shoreline, Mountain View concerts of The Dead '09 tour on May 10th and 14th, stop by the UCSC Grateful Dead Archive booth, say hello, and help us out financially. We'll be there and we'll be fundraising to help process and preserve the Archive. Any amount helps and goes to pay for supplies, equipment and staffing -- all needed to secure the Archive for the future and to make it accessible to fans and scholars now. We'll be selling Grateful Slug t-shirts and also taking donations. (If you're from out of the area and still want to contribute , here's how to make a donation:
Online gifts can be made at: http://library.ucsc.edu/give
After all the admission dust settled, UCSC found they did indeed have space for my daughter!
After poking around the UCSC website- here's some info I found for folks coming to Shoreline for Dead shows:
The Dead '09: Shoreline
We'll be there.
For those of you catching a miracle and being lucky enough to get tickets for the two Shoreline, Mountain View concerts of The Dead '09 tour on May 10th and 14th, stop by the UCSC Grateful Dead Archive booth, say hello, and help us out financially. We'll be there and we'll be fundraising to help process and preserve the Archive. Any amount helps and goes to pay for supplies, equipment and staffing -- all needed to secure the Archive for the future and to make it accessible to fans and scholars now. We'll be selling Grateful Slug t-shirts and also taking donations. (If you're from out of the area and still want to contribute , here's how to make a donation:
Online gifts can be made at: http://library.ucsc.edu/give
T-Shirts can be ordered here.
Thank you Travis!
.......
Strangers Stopping Strangers, Just to Shake Their Hand:
The Dead
Saturday, May 2, 2009
The Spectrum
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
With demolition of the Spectrum scheduled for September, this was to be the final concert ever put on at the legendary Philadelphia arena and expectations were running high. Such expectations are typically a bad sign for deadheads, who know well that our boys tend to disappoint at the big ones, noting lackluster performances at Woodstock, the pyramids in Egypt, and a handful of Bonnaroo festivals. Yet this time the band came to play, the audience came to listen, and for one more night we found ourselves at the center of the universe.
Late in the second set, as the band was winding down the improvisational section Drums->Space that they do each evening, guitar player and vocalist Bob Weir struck the first chord of the 1960’s post-apocalyptic folk song Morning Dew. What followed was a storybook excursion to a place that only the Grateful Dead know. With a blood-red rose affixed to his microphone stand and a woman in a long, flowing Spanish flamenco dress synchronistically twirling in the light of the hallway behind his left shoulder, Weir led the band through this much-loved Jerry Garcia staple. They charged through a solid rendition of Dew that was both respectable in its own right and respectful of the audience’s collective memory of and love for Garcia. The energy in the arena built and built, until Weir belted out the final line: “I guess it doesn’t matter, anyway.”
And the crowd went wild.
Weir was clearly drained and the band came to a complete stop not typically found in this segment of their concerts, milling about the stage as if both to collect themselves and to give the audience the space we needed to dwell in the moment. Others have noted that this performance seemed to be a particularly emotional one for Weir, almost bringing him to tears. At a lull in the crowd’s roar, I noticed bassist Phil Lesh walk over and give Weir the celebratory fist bump made famous by the President and First Lady. Extremely proud of my lifelong hero and thrilled by yet another triumphant display from our home team, I cupped my hands in front my mouth and yelled “Attaboy, Bobby!” from my 6th row, just-right-of-center seat. Even though I was close to the stage, I assumed that my voice would be lost in the crowd. However, the very moment after I screamed out my message of approval and support for the tribute he had just paid to his fallen friend, Weir changed his stance to face my direction and, guitar in hand, took a slight bow. I was stunned and unsure of what had just happened. I’ve read enough skeptical philosophy to know that the juxtaposition of two events in time does not necessarily indicate causation. Yet through my doubts, I do know what occurred; for a brief moment in time I was recognized and thanked by a person to whom I have been, and will be, eternally grateful.
- TravisP
.......
Strangers Stopping Strangers, Just to Shake Their Hand:
The Dead
Saturday, May 2, 2009
The Spectrum
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
With demolition of the Spectrum scheduled for September, this was to be the final concert ever put on at the legendary Philadelphia arena and expectations were running high. Such expectations are typically a bad sign for deadheads, who know well that our boys tend to disappoint at the big ones, noting lackluster performances at Woodstock, the pyramids in Egypt, and a handful of Bonnaroo festivals. Yet this time the band came to play, the audience came to listen, and for one more night we found ourselves at the center of the universe.
Late in the second set, as the band was winding down the improvisational section Drums->Space that they do each evening, guitar player and vocalist Bob Weir struck the first chord of the 1960’s post-apocalyptic folk song Morning Dew. What followed was a storybook excursion to a place that only the Grateful Dead know. With a blood-red rose affixed to his microphone stand and a woman in a long, flowing Spanish flamenco dress synchronistically twirling in the light of the hallway behind his left shoulder, Weir led the band through this much-loved Jerry Garcia staple. They charged through a solid rendition of Dew that was both respectable in its own right and respectful of the audience’s collective memory of and love for Garcia. The energy in the arena built and built, until Weir belted out the final line: “I guess it doesn’t matter, anyway.”
And the crowd went wild.
Weir was clearly drained and the band came to a complete stop not typically found in this segment of their concerts, milling about the stage as if both to collect themselves and to give the audience the space we needed to dwell in the moment. Others have noted that this performance seemed to be a particularly emotional one for Weir, almost bringing him to tears. At a lull in the crowd’s roar, I noticed bassist Phil Lesh walk over and give Weir the celebratory fist bump made famous by the President and First Lady. Extremely proud of my lifelong hero and thrilled by yet another triumphant display from our home team, I cupped my hands in front my mouth and yelled “Attaboy, Bobby!” from my 6th row, just-right-of-center seat. Even though I was close to the stage, I assumed that my voice would be lost in the crowd. However, the very moment after I screamed out my message of approval and support for the tribute he had just paid to his fallen friend, Weir changed his stance to face my direction and, guitar in hand, took a slight bow. I was stunned and unsure of what had just happened. I’ve read enough skeptical philosophy to know that the juxtaposition of two events in time does not necessarily indicate causation. Yet through my doubts, I do know what occurred; for a brief moment in time I was recognized and thanked by a person to whom I have been, and will be, eternally grateful.
- TravisP
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