Dennis McNally reads from On the Road
She’s On the Road Again
Mexicali Blues
When I Paint My Masterpiece
He’s Gone->
The Other One w/ Dennis McNally – Ratdog 8/12/07 Boarding House Park, Lowell MA
From a report on the event by Gary Lambert, posted on DeadNet:
No one who was there will soon forget what happened in the shadow of the old cotton mills of Lowell, Massachusetts on the warm mad night of August 12th, when Bob Weir, RatDog and a small but fortunate group of locals and latter-day pilgrims gathered in Jack Kerouac’s hometown to…. commemorat[e]… the 50th anniversary of the publication of a book that shook the foundations of American literature, and forever changed the lives of many who read it: On The Road, the magnum opus of the Beat Generation, written by Lowell’s most distinguished literary son, Jack Kerouac…. Not only is Dennis [McNally] the longtime publicist and official historian for the Grateful Dead, but he also holds a doctorate in American History from the University of Massachusetts. And his doctoral thesis just happens to have been on the subject of one Jack Kerouac. Said thesis was later adapted into one of the most widely praised Kerouac biographies, Desolate Angel: Jack Kerouac, The Beat Generation and America…. McNally [] took the microphone just after intermission and delivered a splendid reading of the opening passages of On The Road, accompanied on piano (just as the Beat poets were often accompanied by great jazz musicians) by Jeff Chimenti, who with perfect empathy underscored Kerouac’s words with bits of standards and bebop classics. And then, deep into the second set, Dennis returned, during a ferocious jam in the middle of “The Other One,” to read the novel’s great closing segment. As with the earlier sequence, he read from Kerouac’s original and uncensored autobiographical draft, in which the characters still had their real names….
Dark Star->
DSO Jam->
Ripple – Dark Star Orchestra, Ithaca – 30 Years Later (5/8/07)
Interview with DSO drummer Rob Koritz re DSO Rex Caravan Tour
See Line Woman – Ollabelle, Riverside Battle Songs
Blind Willie McTell – Jewels and Binoculars, Ships with Tattooed Sails
Erik Yates and Sharon Gilchrist live in the KPFA studio:
Great Many Things
Walker
Six Weeks (Erik solo)
Take Me away
Erik Yates and friends (Sharon Gilchrist, Hot Buttered Rum bandmates Aaron Redner and Bryan Horne, et al.) perform tomorrow night (September 6), 9pm at the Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Avenue in Berkeley.
What is the current line-up of Ratdog (or on the above recording)?
This is Ratdog with Steve Kimock filling in for Mark Karan.
This was a very special show. I had gone from home in the Boston area down to the Gathering Of The Vibes festival in CT and also saw an excellent Ratdog show there the night before, but I left the festival a day early to make it back up to Lowell for this show.
Between this intimate outdoor venue and the special occasion in tribute to Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady, it was a wonderful night indeed. It was the first time that I was so inspired as to buy the concert CD at the show, and I played an excerpt from Bobby and Dennis’ show opening talk about Neal Cassady, and the excellent version of The Other One from the second set, on my radio program two days later.