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Styrbjorn

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Grace Slick said she won't perform anymore, because "no one wants to see some old woman on the stage", many years ago. That's sad she has to think that way, even if it's true in a way. If a performer's voice or musicianship is still intact, there's no reason to have to feel that way. Plenty of performers I still see that are over 60 are actually better now - they're off drugs and more serious than back then. Although older men like Mick Jagger are spoofed on occasionally for still doing what made them famous, woman are particularly picked apart for their looks. I've never put anything into that, it's not a supermodel runway - it's music.

I'd love to see Grace baby perform again :)

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I can't see anything that would change her mind. She wants to be known as a painter, now - and thinks she needs to stay off the stage, to keep the image of what she was intact, it seems... Closest your gonna come is her daughter, China.

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Hart: The Dead Happy To Rock Again For Obama

grateful_dead_01l.gif

The Grateful Dead

Gary Graff, Detroit

Illinois Sen. Barack Obama's presidential run might pay dividends for Deadheads this year.

Three of the Grateful Dead's surviving members -- Bob Weir, Phil Lesh and Mickey Hart -- reunited for a February fundraiser for Obama in San Francisco, and Hart tells Billboard.com it could happen again.

"We're not making plans, but I think we stand at the ready to be of service," Hart says. "We're all deeply into this, into Barack Obama and the thought of taking this country back in some shape or form, what's left of it -- it's probably one thing we can all agree on! So, you bet, I would spend a night with my brothers for that any time, any place."

To read the rest of the article click here.

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An old deadhead friend that lives in Hawaii these days says he knows Bill Krutzman, but I don't see his name mentioned. He was the original drummer, and pretty good, I thought. Why they recruited a second drummer, Hart, and what he was up to - was strange to me...

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I can't see anything that would change her mind. She wants to be known as a painter, now - and thinks she needs to stay off the stage, to keep the image of what she was intact, it seems... Closest your gonna come is her daughter, China.

Wooohhhoooooooooooo I'd like to get close to China Kantner alright......like mom like daughter :):). Returning to Grace, she's good at painting too but we all like to remember her for her cool voice :).

Edited by dragster
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Definitely start with American Beauty and Working Man's Dead, their two best studio albums. They were recorded at the same time, not only did the Dead tried to get Warner Brothers to release them as a double album, after their live double album didn't sell, but they wanted to call the album "Skull Fuck". I wish I could have seen the looks on those record company excetutive's faces when the boys floated that bright idea!

But seriously the Grateful Dead is one of the very few bands that were as good live as the Zeppelin. Maybe better since the Dead could pull out any one of 60-70 songs at any time. I guess that's what doing two tours per year plus benefits and Holidays (New Year's Eve, Madri Gras, Chinese New Year's. etc.) will do for you. What other band could work without a setlist? Zappa's bands are the only ones I can think of! (esp. the 1988 10 peice band, almost 100 different songs played on that tour plus about 60 more rehearsed!)

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  • 3 months later...
Definitely start with American Beauty and Working Man's Dead, their two best studio albums. They were recorded at the same time, not only did the Dead tried to get Warner Brothers to release them as a double album, after their live double album didn't sell, but they wanted to call the album "Skull Fuck". I wish I could have seen the looks on those record company excetutive's faces when the boys floated that bright idea!

But seriously the Grateful Dead is one of the very few bands that were as good live as the Zeppelin. Maybe better since the Dead could pull out any one of 60-70 songs at any time. I guess that's what doing two tours per year plus benefits and Holidays (New Year's Eve, Madri Gras, Chinese New Year's. etc.) will do for you. What other band could work without a setlist? Zappa's bands are the only ones I can think of! (esp. the 1988 10 peice band, almost 100 different songs played on that tour plus about 60 more rehearsed!)

Candyman is one of my favorites. One of my friends told me that during the sixties there was a guy in San Francisco nicknamed Candyman, and I guess this song is about him, but I forget his real name. Apparently he had a predecessor from the 1800s.

Those who can remember that far back can recall the day when, on the sidewalks of downtown San Francisco, you could buy an assortment of wares ranging from marshmallows to collar buttons.

Taking them one by one, and not including the street doctors and itinerant quacks, who merit a separate examination all their own, there was first of all a noted candy man who peddled a sort of rock candy. Dignified and with complexion and features that led his customers to believe he was a Creole, he was always clad in white - white duck trousers, white shirt, white apron, white baker's cap, white cotton gloves. He did not carry the candy himself; it was borne on a brightly decorated tray by a boy who followed him at a respectful distance. His cry was a nasal "Boss, boss!" repeated over and over, and because of this cry he became known as "the boss candy man." Toward the end of the '80s, he had numerous imitators. He first appeared in San Francisco in about 1885.

http://imgs.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi...=024&sc=200

Edited by eternal light
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Candyman is one of my favorites. One of my friends told me that during the sixties there was a guy in San Francisco nicknamed Candyman, and I guess this song is about him, but I forget his real name. Apparently he had a predecessor from the 1800s.

Jerry's voice sounds like he's almost crying in this song, but it is pretty cool. Hot Tuna does a song called "Candyman", but it's most likely an old traditional blues tune - or Rev. Gary Davis?

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Jerry's voice sounds like he's almost crying in this song, but it is pretty cool. Hot Tuna does a song called "Candyman", but it's most likely an old traditional blues tune - or Rev. Gary Davis?

The sadness in -jerry garcia's voice is in quite a few songs, thats an element to his voice and expression of lyrics. I'm thinking of -stella blue and -black muddy river off the top of my head. Its interesting though, because with the somber songs, sometimes you dont pick up on that vibe...sort of -stairway to heavens effect as well.

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lol a lot of intertribal weirdness

Still Truckin': The Dead Reunite in Pennsylvania

Their tensions behind them, the Dead play their first show in four years

The first call came into Penn State's Bryce Jordan Center in mid- summer: A concert promoter asked venue officials to hold some dates at the school's indoor arena in the fall. The promoter wouldn't identify the band and didn't until he called back to ask if October 13th would be available for a Barack Obama benefit with Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann. "We went, 'Wow,' " says Bernie Punt, director of sales at the venue. "We knew right then this was going to be unique."

Within minutes of the announcement, Deadheads had snapped up all 15,000 tickets for the first show in four years by the surviving members of the Grateful Dead. On the night of the October 13th concert, which also included the Allman Brothers Band, fans from as far away as Stockholm whooped it up as the Dead launched into the trademark shuffle of "Truckin'." Joined by Allmans and Gov't Mule guitarist Warren Haynes and keyboardist Jeff Chimenti from Weir's band Ratdog, the reunited Dead resurrected standards like "Touch of Grey" and "U.S. Blues," as well as spaced-out jam classics "Dark Star" and "St. Stephen." "It was great fun," Weir says. "We speak a language no one else speaks, and we have intuitions about each other's approaches that no one else can have. It's there it doesn't go away."

Yet the fact that so much time had passed between Dead shows is an indication of the rupture the band suffered with the death of Jerry Garcia in 1995. Weir, Hart, Lesh and Kreutzmann eventually reunited first as the Other Ones and, in 2003 and 2004, for tours billed as the Dead. But despite pulling in almost $18 million, the 2004 Wave That Flag Tour was strained onstage and off, as the bandmates attempted to work out their post-Garcia roles.

"It spawned all kinds of petty disagreements," says Hart. "There was a lot of intertribal weirdness." Adds Kreutzmann, "When people are having a hard time with their personalities, it goes without saying that the music's gonna suffer also."

Tensions within the band only deepened the following year, when infighting broke out over concert bootlegs posted by fans on the archives.org Website. "They take advantage of you," says Kreutzmann. "They give your music away for free, and then they sell advertising." The band insisted the recordings be pulled, but Lesh disagreed and went public with his thoughts. The site was eventually allowed to stream free soundboard recordings, but by then the four men were barely on speaking terms.

The fence-mending began with business. In 2006, Grateful Dead Productions reached a licensing agreement with Rhino Entertainment to handle the group's entire musical legacy; with that, some of the friction over money was reduced. Then, in February 2008, Lesh, with the help of his son Brian, organized an Obama benefit at the Warfield theater in San Francisco. He invited the other members of the Dead, and Hart and Weir accepted (Kreutzmann had just returned home to Hawaii from a long trip). Together, the three played Dead classics like "Sugaree" and "Playing in the Band," and, tellingly, the Beatles' "Come Together." "It broke the ice," recalls Hart. "We were able to let some of these skeletons in our closet just fall away."

Around the same time, Weir was asked by a senior official in the Obama campaign if the band would be willing to re-form for a swing-state benefit closer to the election. "I said, 'Well, I'll try,' " says Weir. The calls went out, and in September, the Dead reunited at Weir's rehearsal space in San Rafael, California. The revived Dead spent two days dusting off songs they hadn't played in years. Everyone was careful not to push too hard Hart says the group "tried to keep it as relaxed and open as possible. People were not stepping on each other. They were trying to cooperate."

As the band admits, the set was far from flawless. Weir forgot a few lyrics ("I had a senior moment it's gonna happen"), and Lesh's "Unbroken Chain," from 1974's From the Mars Hotel, was so tricky that the group was still practicing it during soundcheck.

Yet the band reconnected over its shared musical heritage. "During 'Dark Star,' it went wild, and I forgot where we were," says Kreutzmann. "That's great. Mickey and I are getting along better now. The egos are out of the way." After the show, Lesh was overheard raving about Weir's singing a sign itself of lessening friction and the bandmates toasted each other backstage.

"We wanted to play uncomplicated, easy stuff, just have a nice time," says Hart. "Did we play our best? Nooo. Did we play our worst? Absolutely not. It was a healing ceremony." Further shows, including a possible spring tour, are now being discussed. "It felt good, and I'd be way the hell up for it," says Weir, echoing sentiments of his mates. But if more concerts do occur, the Dead face their biggest challenge: holding themselves together after the most tumultuous years in the group's existence. "This isn't an easy thing," says Hart. "To be honest, I thought the odds were not in our favor. The only way it would happen is if we came together and liked each other again. We're ongoing now, but I don't know where we're going."

[From Issue 1065 November 13, 2008]

http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/240...in_pennsylvania

Edited by eternal light
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I never realised that "When I Paint My Masterpiece" was a Bob Dylan song. I have heard the Dead/Bob Weir cover it many times, but have never looked at who wrote it - until reading an article about Dylan recently. Great song rendition by Grateful Dead - love them/it!! Especially in the summer when cooking out! :thumbsup;

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I never realised that "When I Paint My Masterpiece" was a Bob Dylan song. I have heard the Dead/Bob Weir cover it many times, but have never looked at who wrote it - until reading an article about Dylan recently. Great song rendition by Grateful Dead - love them/it!! Especially in the summer when cooking out! :thumbsup;

I just noticed that Furthur (the latest project featuring Weir and Lesh) will be here on the same night as the New Riders of the Purple Sage in July. It would be cool if some sort of collaboration were to happen between the two.

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5121Dje%2B73L._SL500_AA280_.jpg

It was just brought to my attention that Workingman's Dead was released 41 years ago today. I'll never forget vying for a copy of this at the Tape Deck in Goldsboro, NC more years ago now than I care to remember. I scored this and my friend ended up with a copy of Skeletons From the Closet.

Edited by Jahfin
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My introduction was Workingman's Dead, which is probably why I've always been more of a fan of their acoustic, song-based stuff than the jammy live explorations. It has it's place too since they cemented their reputation as a live band but it took me a while to fully appreciate it.

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My introduction was Workingman's Dead, which is probably why I've always been more of a fan of their acoustic, song-based stuff than the jammy live explorations. It has it's place too since they cemented their reputation as a live band but it took me a while to fully appreciate it.

My first Grateful Dead concert was one of those improvisational jams of which you speak.

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My first Grateful Dead concert was one of those improvisational jams of which you speak.

Every one of their concerts was improvisational to one degree or another. I saw them four times between 1989 and 1995 and enjoyed them every time. What made the live stuff sink in with me in a bigger way was finally hearing some of the studio albums (such as Blues For Allah) which sounds positively sterile compared to how those songs were performed live.

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My introduction was Workingman's Dead, which is probably why I've always been more of a fan of their acoustic, song-based stuff than the jammy live explorations. It has it's place too since they cemented their reputation as a live band but it took me a while to fully appreciate it.

w00t :P

Who's iggerant now, l337? Didn't they learn you nuthin' at the Little School On The Prairie?

:pwnd:

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Every one of their concerts was improvisational to one degree or another. I saw them four times between 1989 and 1995 and enjoyed them every time. What made the live stuff sink in with me in a bigger way was finally hearing some of the studio albums (such as Blues For Allah) which sounds positively sterile compared to how those songs were performed live.

That was after Pig Pen died. I met him one day in 1970.They were kind of trippy in those days.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNjDNEpFB5Y&feature=related Edited by Silver Rider
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