Liner Notes:
"It occurred to me a while back that since we'd been
releasing more-or-less complete shows in our vault series,
it might be interesting to search out some of the rarer
material (P.A. tapes and other reference sources culled from
shows that wouldn't have made it out complete), that could
stand on its 'historical relevance.' I also was looking for
an excuse to put out some of my old favorites."
- Phil Lesh
Dancin' In the
Streets
[11:40]
April 12, 1970, San Francisco, CA
"We always thought of this as a kind of 'hippie anthem' as
much as anything else - I remember driving down a street in
Santa Monica on the way to the beach sometime in '66,
hearing it on the radio and thinking 'we GOTTA do this tune'
- we were never that great as Vandellas, as you'll hear on
this version, but we liked to use it as a vehicle for
stretchin' out and jammin' hard on two chords
Coltrane-style, and this performance reflects some of the
best of that."
New Speedway
Boogie [8:07]
Unknown 1970 acoustic
"It's probably well known that this song was written in the
aftermath of Altamont; this version is one of the earliest,
and has a much snakier groove to it than we later gave it.
This isn't really 'acoustic;' Bob plays acoustic, and the
rest of us are electric. This tape was found in a box of old
stuff marked 'unknown' in the bowels of the vault. Who knows
what else we might find in there?"
Viola Lee
Blues [19:43]
April 26, 1969, Chicago, IL
"The definitive early GD jammin' tune - the first one we
ever really stretched out beyond all recognition, by using
what we called then 'shifting gears' - which is really
nothing but a twenty minute accelerando, influenced by the
North Indian music that we were listening to a lot of at
that time. This version has a riff towards the middle (at
about 12:20, played by me) that we later expanded and used
extensively - unfortunately, none of those performances seem
to have survived."
Easy
Wind [8:04]
May 15, 1970, New York, NY
"One of Pigpen's best tunes - the contrast between the
straight-ahead bogaloo rhythm and a slow blues triplett
groove made it really expressive, as did the lyrics 'ballin'
a coal-black steel jack-hammer,' etc... (also contains a
classic sample of P.A. feedback during Pig's harp lead -
truly authentic)."
Mason's
Children
[6:07]
January 2, 1970, New York, NY
"A tune that never made it onto an "official" album - who
knows why? Maybe we just decided we didn't dig it all that
much at the time (maybe we never performed it that well,
either - judge for yourselves). Anyway, it's turned out to
be one of the most requested (for release) tunes in our
history. Go figure."
Hard To
Handle [7:34]
August 6, 1971, Hollywood, CA
"A hyperdrive version (from an audience tape) of Otis
Redding's classic macho anthem distinguished by some intense
jamming and a 'very' responsive crowd (I don't remember why
they were so excited - maybe Pig was doing some strange
dance),"
The Music Never
Stopped [8:55]
July 17, 1989, East Troy, WI
"One of my fav Bobby tunes - I always enjoyed playing this
one 'cause the changes really challenged us to try different
stuff - also the two-part jam at the end usually builds to a
grand climax..."
Jack-A-Roe
[5:52]
May 17, 1977, Tuscaloosa, AL
"When I first met Jer, he was playing acoustic guitar and
singing old folk ballads. This song, along with 'Fennario,'
'Whiskey In The Jar' and 'Matty Groves' is my all-time
favorite of those that he used to do (at parties as well as
gigs). The feeling in this performance is vastly different
from the faster way we did it later on - it has a kind of
loping, banjo-frailing groove to it that I find very
appealing."
In The
Midnight Hour
[31:49]
September 3, 1967, Rio Nido, CA
"We were once accused of playing this song for 45 minutes -
this version isn't quite that long, but it's the longest I
could find. This was recorded at a Russian River resort
ballroom on Sunday night of Labor Day weekend - I don't
think there were more than 25 people there, but we played
our little hearts out for them anyway. Pig does his patented
'Git your hands outta yo' pockets-git on up an' dance' rave,
and the band keeps endlessly inventing new stuff behind him.
We had to master this one in mono, because it was recorded
with vocal mikes on one track and the whole band on the
other."
Visions of
Johanna
[10:23]
March 18, 1995, Philadelphia, PA
"One of Dylan's greatest songs, and one Jer always had a
particular affinity for - I only wish we'd done it more
often. I find his guitar lead on this version unutterably
poignant."
Box of
Rain [5:11]
July 19, 1989, East Troy, WI
"This song means a lot to me personally, as I understand it
does to many others - I've wanted to put out a live version
for quite a while now, so here it is..."
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Credits:
Produced by John Cutler & Phil Lesh
Tape Archivist: Dick Latvala
Club Front Engineer: Jeffrey Norman
Mastered by Joe Gastwirt/Ocean View Digital
Publishing by Alan Trist
Liner Notes by Phil Lesh
Special Thanks to Jill Lesh, David Gans & Peter
McQuaid
Cover Art by Liquid Blue Design Department (Shawn
Kenney)
Photography by Rob Cohn
Package Design by Amy Finkle
Add this album to your collection today!
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