tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5195590583641426943.post1475999310133975038..comments2024-03-26T23:10:34.814-07:00Comments on Grateful Dead Sources: December 29, 1969: Boston Tea PartyLight Into Asheshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06943335142002007213noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5195590583641426943.post-37861630518011278902022-09-18T13:22:36.130-07:002022-09-18T13:22:36.130-07:00Ahh, I just sent you the Crouse piece, but you are...Ahh, I just sent you the Crouse piece, but you are way ahead of me!Fate Musichttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05648291938690043423noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5195590583641426943.post-70881597479337756992021-06-17T21:13:10.583-07:002021-06-17T21:13:10.583-07:00I added a very short review from the Boston Globe ...I added a very short review from the Boston Globe that I overlooked earlier. It's notable that both reviews only specifically mention songs in the first set, so it's quite possible neither reporter stayed for the second set. At the end of the first set Garcia says, "We're gonna take about ten minutes' break and then come back and play for several hours." (The Dead don't fulfill this promise, but you can see how it might scare off reporters on a deadline.)<br /><br />This review's positive although very generic in how it treats the Dead, they could be any old band. The writer's lack of knowledge is revealed when he says they did "many tunes from past LPs"....well, actually only three in the whole show. But oddly enough, he does know the name of one of the unreleased tunes, "The Mason Song." This wasn't introduced in the show, so I can only guess he conferred with the other reporter! <br />He says they started "with a fairly moving tune only to be halted by an equipment failure" - this was probably Cold Rain & Snow, after which the Dead complain about equipment problems (as usual) and Bear stops the tape to fix them. So the delay isn't as long on tape as it was at the show.Light Into Asheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06943335142002007213noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5195590583641426943.post-17960088847103461232017-11-03T01:29:44.824-07:002017-11-03T01:29:44.824-07:00A short but remarkable piece. I can't think of...A short but remarkable piece. I can't think of any other article from the early years that gives a detailed description of how the Dead wrote a brand-new song - one the reporter hadn't heard before. The Dead had debuted Mason's Children on 12/19/69, and this article declares they'd written it on the 18th! Well, that might not be quite true, but the account of writing the song may be how it happened - he could only have heard it from the Dead themselves - and they might have called it "The Mason Song" at the time. <br />The song was for the rock-Western film Zachariah that they were supposed to appear in, but later pulled out of. (Being put together rapidly for the film, with lyric ideas drawn from the screenplay, may explain why it's a little out of keeping with the other Workingman's Dead songs, and why the Dead dropped it after just a couple months.) A few days later, at the Fillmore East on 1/3/70, they introduced the song with a joking story of its origins: <br />Phil: This here song we wrote for a movie which was gonna be shot in a parking lot – no, it was a drive-in restaurant – no, it was a drive-in movie – in downtown Albuquerque, was it? (Jerry: Something like that.) Yeah, with parked cars for an audience.<br />Jerry: We decided not to do it finally.<br />Bob: But we’re gonna do the song anyway.<br /><br />The article also briefly covers the Dec 29 show, where Mason's indeed brought the first set to a crashing finish. Mama Tried was the second song (on tape) - funny that the writer calls it an old Everly Brothers song, since Merle Haggard had released it just a year earlier (the Everlys covered it on their Roots album).<br />At that point, the Dead were moving into a more straight rock-oriented style, which is reflected in the description here: "unfrilly, straightforward body music." (The jamming on the next night wouldn't fit this!) I assume the "full-chested blues" is Easy Wind, but I don't know what the "wonderful, bouncy instrumental" could be - our tape might be missing some of the second set, or the reporter might have been drifting in and out... <br />As usual, the Dead get people dancing - very unusually for such an early review, Weir's guitar-work is praised. Light Into Asheshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06943335142002007213noreply@blogger.com