Here is the latest news from David Gans, producer and host of the Grateful Dead Hour.
Grateful Dead Hour no. 1156
The Grateful Dead Hour is made possible in part this week by Grateful Dead Productions, announcing Road Trips volume 4 number 1, two complete shows recorded in May of 1969 at the Big Rock Pow Wow in Florida, Beautifully recorded by the legendary Owsley Stanley. Rare recordings from a peak year in the band’s history. Information, listening party, message board and more at dead.net – where you’ll also find “30 days of Dead,” a new music download every day throughout the month of November.
David Nelson Band norcal tour continues
Please read my review of Friday night’s David Nelson Band show and then do yourself a huge favor and plan to attend one of these shows:
SUN, NOVEMBER 7
Moe’s Alley, 1525 Commercial Way, Santa Cruz CA
THU, NOVEMBER 11
w/ Great American Taxi
Ashkenaz, 1317 San Pablo Ave, Berkeley CA
FRI, NOVEMBER 12
w/ Great American Taxi
Hopmonk Tavern, 230 Petaluma Ave, Sebastopol CA
SAT, NOVEMBER 13
Humbrews, 856 10th St., Arcata CA
SUN, NOVEMBER 14
w/ Great American Taxi
The Barn @ Nelson Family Vineyards, 550 Nelson Ranch Rd., Ukiah, CA
Lots more info on these gigs – show times, ticket ordering, hotel info, etc, here. And there’s also the Hawaii tour in January, with special guest Peter Rowan.
Grateful Dead Hour no. 1155
Week of November 8, 2010
Part 1 37:38
Grateful Dead 12/4/71 Felt Forum, New York City
ME AND BOBBY MCGEE
COMES A TIME
EL PASO
SMOKESTACK LIGHTNIN’
CUMBERLAND BLUES
ONE MORE SATURDAY NIGHT
Part 2 18:47
7 Walkers
CHINGO!
Peter Rowan Bluegrass Band, Legacy
JAILER JAILER
Grateful Dead 12/4/71 Felt Forum, New York City
JOHNNY B. GOODE
This week we hear the end of set 1 and the encore of 12/4/71, the opener of a 4-day run at the Felt Forum in New York City. Set 2 fills the whole of next week’s program without the encore, so I had to toss “Johnny B. Goode” into this week’s show.
The 12/5 show was broadcast live on the radio and made it into the collections of many an early-’70s Deadhead. It was also pressed into vinyl by bootleggers – which is how I happened to get hold of it in the early days of my own Deadheaddom out in California, before I found out about tapes and trading.
The new CD by 7 Walkers is really, really great! Papa Mali is the front man, Bill Kreutzmann is the drummer, and Robert Hunter wrote the lyrics to most of the songs. Killer grooves, dark and swampy songs, and brilliant production touches by multi-instrumentalist Matt Hubbard.
The Peter Rowan Bluegrass Band is classic in feel but it’s got that special Peter Rowan spirituality that sets it apart from the more traditional sound. I hope “Jailer Jailer” inspires you to listen to more from Legacy and other Peter Rowan CDs.
Support for the Grateful Dead Hour comes this week from:
Response Records, presenting the debut, self-titled CD from 7 Walkers, featuring Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann, guitarist/vocalist Papa Mali, New Orleans bassist George Porter Jr. and multi-instrumentalist Matt Hubbard. The new release features a guest appearance from Willie Nelson and original songs co-written with longtime Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter. It’s available now on CD and limited edition 180-gram vinyl. More information is available at www.7Walkers.com.
Grateful Dead Productions, announcing Road Trips volume 4 number 1, two complete shows recorded in May of 1969 at the Big Rock Pow Wow in Florida, beautifully recorded by the legendary Owsley Stanley. These are rare recordings from a peak year in the band’s history. Information, listening party, message board and more at dead.net – where you’ll also find “30 days of Dead,” a new music download every day throughout the month of November.
Concert review: David Nelson Band 11/5/10
I heard the David Nelson Band in San Rafael last night. I got there late but made up for lost time by going deep into the Zone during their set-1-ending “Any Naked Eye.” After it was over, Rob Bleetstein said, “That’s the best ‘Playing in the Band’ I’ve heard in twenty years!” And I did not disagree: the Nelson Band has several songs that traverse musical regions defined by the Grateful Dead – not surprising, given that Mookie Siegel (keyboards) and Barry Sless (guitar and pedal steel) are Deadheads and their association with Nelson began in a tribute band called Dead Ringers.
My wife became a Nelson Band fan when we want to Hawaii with the band in January of this year (I was the opening act on the six-show tour), so when this DNB tour was announced we ordered tickets immediately and wound up with a ringside table. So I had a front-row seat right next to Barry’s pedal steel, with a great view of bassist Pete Sears and drummer John Molo.
I wound up spending a lot of time in the Zone during this show. This band has the collective-improvisation mind-meld of the early-’70s Grateful Dead, riding in a powerful groove built by Sears and Molo. Molo can, and often does, play melodically along with Barry’s guitar, and in the next section he’ll be providing punctuation for staccato passages while maintaining an irresistible groove. Pete’s bass playing is breathtaking, holding down the bottom in a way that Phil Lesh sometimes didn’t bother with and simultaneously contributing deliciously to the harmonic conversation happening upstairs.
Like his old friend Jerry Garcia, David Nelson has a great ear for songs and a strong sense of narrative in his playing and in the construction of the band’s sets. “Til things we’ve never seen will seem familiar,” as Hunter wrote in “Lady with a Fan” – and the inverse, too: We start down a familiar path and wind up in a whole new place, with the listening and dancing audience and the performers onstage all hearing something new and amazing, tension and release and ecstatic discovery, gliding back to earth occasionally only to be launched into another song and another thrilling voyage.
This band gives me something rare in the days past Jerry’s prime: an opportunity to forget where we are and what time it is, for “seconds on end” and even longer.
P.S. I had my digital recording device with me, and I am going to broadcast some of this show on KPFA next Wednesday. I wish I had gotten there early enough to hear (and record) “Where I Come From,” a great Hunter-Nelson song and the title track of the most recent NRPS CD. I will probably broadcast “Any Naked Eye.”
David Nelson Band 11/5/10 Palm Ballroom, San Rafael CA
Set 1: Rocky Road Blues, Light Up or Leave Me Alone > Ballad of Casey Jones, Two Soldiers, Where I Come From-> Impressionist Two-Step, Fennario, Any Naked Eye
Set 2: Iko Iko-> Different World-> Give Me Love-> This Wheel’s On Fire-> The Wheel-> Joker’s Lie, Suite at the Mission > Iko Iko
Encore: Beat It on Down the Line
The tour continues through next weekend. Details here.