For now, sit back and relax to one of my favorite songs. My father plays a fine rendition of this tune on his old guitar. For a number of years in my boyhood, he actually led me to believe he'd composed it himself. I believe it goes without saying that our relationship has never fully recovered.
As we continue our series "Grateful Dead: Band Beyond Description," here's a guest post from Luke Muellerleile, who I was lucky enough to attend the 5/10 Dead show with along with two other friends. Put on your reading glasses.
Ah Mother American Night (The Dead Live @ Shoreline 5-10-09) Link to setlist and recording: click here
Happy belated Mother's Day to all, especially you moms of "Dead" fans. It should be noted that Stew, Tyler, Adam (Witt) and I allotted adequate time to call up our mom's amid the din at the Shoreline Amphitheater parking lot in Mountain View, CA last Sunday as we prepared to see the Dead for the first time on the 2009 tour. As Stew pointed out last week this was just two days after May 8th, which marked the 32nd year anniversary of perhaps their most heralded show (or at least recording) at Cornell. Needless to say they rose to the occasion, as the jazzy/funky opener of Help on the Way seamlessly melting into a Slipknot! teaser then "rolling away the dew" into Franklin's Tower definitely set the tone. We proceeded to groove the first set in "AARP land", according to Stew, as we found ourselves in reserved seating. It happened that after a late start over to the show (we were unavoidably detained), Stew's skinny ass somehow navigated through the entrance without having his ticket torn off. So I says to him, I says, "You need to push that luck as far as you can..." and we (all 4 of us) proceeded to part the proverbial red sea of ticket-examiners to an open patch of orange seats in what could only be the 32nd row (no idea actually). It definitely brought back memories of jumping the fence to the reserved section at Float-Rite for Dylan and The Dead!
Here's a good version of the Help/Slipknot from 1990:
And Franklin's Tower from a decade earlier:
Stew and I decided (or rather I forced him) to be totally unoriginal and play the "Pick 5" game as well. The process of selecting the "5" took place sporadically throughout the weekend and I took great strides to ensure Stew was caught completely off-guard every time I solicited him for a "Pick". Not surprisingly, he came out swinging with an early pick, Good Lovin' - unfortunately I had already nabbed Franklin's Tower and also selected Bird Song from the first set. It seemed that our lists morphed into wishful thinking about songs we love that we hadn't seen live yet. For me, Bob Hunter's tribute to Janis Joplin was way up there:
All I know is something like a bird within her sang All I know she sang a little while and then flew on
Unfortunately, as of 5/15, Bird Song was left off the archive recording - so was the killer "Drums" segment with the flying and the magic, but here it is on you tube:
Uncle John's Band closed off the first set in sing-along style, but it was becoming increasingly clear that our stay in the lush seats was coming to an end. By then opening of the second set, we'd relocated to more familiar territory on the lawn, and were witnessing the emergence of the best version of the band I've heard since the days of Jerry (in my humble opinion). The core 4 were clicking, with exceptional Phil-bombing on the second set opener 'Unbroken Chain' (another pick of mine), Bobby rockin' out on 'The Other One', and the 'Rhythm Devils' completely stealing the show - no fault of the barely clad, fire-dancing females in accompaniment. Jeff took over nicely on the keyboards in 'The Other One' and 'Sugaree' and had Witt face-melting on more than one occasion. Warren's licks were appropriately sentimental in the twangy 'Sugaree' out of Space, but promptly upped the anty with a second rendition of the 'Gimme Shelter' cover on the tour (perhaps you'll recall where the first occurred). The second set closed with further anticipation, as if Sugar Magnolia was preheated the oven for something grander - Mickey did suggest before the show that the "curfew" was lifted due to the late start, so perhaps we were about to see...
A triple encore! After a heartfelt Phil rap, they jumped right into St. Stephen. This was a special moment where you could really sense the collective vibe coming together - and I'm not just talking about getting my fourth song right. The crowd was serendipitously synchronized and so was the band. About 10 minutes into St. Stephen they broke out a Foxy Lady-esque interlude, then in the subsequent The Eleven jam there were definite signs of the Allman Bros style in Warren around 7:45 minutes...perhaps and ode to Blue Sky? I totally missed the soloing sample of Foxy Lady (someone pointed it out to me since) and I didn't catch the Allman Bros riff until a second listen - but I do recall Bobby starting a little too early in one of the St. Stephen verses. Ahem...and to close off the show properly if not popularly, the "Dead" chimed out their all-but-sanctioned national anthem, Touch of Grey. It was a fitting send-off to the "apocalyptic scene" (according to Witt) that awaited us in the parking lot. And it went on to comfort me the little time I was awake during my 6:20AM flight back the next morning...
Its a lesson to me, the devils and the east and the free The abcs we all must face, try to save a little grace
Good times - I hope we will survive to see many more.
The Definition of 'Talent' Sometimes you have to just sit back and appreciate the breadth of someone’s talent. Scott Hansen is one of these people. Splitting time between ISO50 – his visual work, and Tycho – his electronic/ambient music project, he is in the business of creating, and is rather good at it.
Explore the above links and support local music AND art.
Unrelated Musical Editorial: So I recently read an interesting article. A study just found that people who download music illegally, aka pirates, are 10x more likely to buy music than those who don’t (read it here).
And in all honesty this doesn’t surprise me. What I do wonder about though, is what will the music industry’s response be? Essentially they just found out that the people that steal from them are actually their best customers. That’s like bank robbers who rob a bank, and then deposit said stolen money into the very same bank.
And on the whole, music sales are down, so what then? Does the bank run advertising imploring robbers to rob them? Is this analogy even working anymore?
No.
But many questions come to mind:
Does this mean that when people download more music, they get into more music, and therefore end up buying more music? Or is this simply an extremely accurate way to tell between those who are very into music and those who aren’t?
Do record labels offer more free downloads or relax their special interest politicking and prosecuting?
Will this be all the evidence record labels need to convince their artists to follow in the footsteps of Radiohead and NIN? Are their approaches even similar to this?
Does this mean that the stupid fucking drummer from Metallica will finally shut up?
I think there are answers to all these questions, and it’ll be interesting to see how it all plays out.
You may have noticed that in recent years that some artists have started to go all out with their album releases. Additional content above and beyond the album has become the norm as a reaction to slumping album sales as internet downloading (both legal and illegal) has increased its foothold. Bands are now faced with the choice of either taking the risk on an album only release or offering bundled incentives that will entice listeners and fans to buy a hard copy rather than download.
One recent example of this phenomenon are the three recent "Flatlands" releases from West Coast electronic artist Nalepa. The original album was released earlier this Spring on the 1320 Records label (STS9, Pnuma Trio, Eliot Lipp, JFJO) and features the gorgeous and cerebral ambient music of Steve Nalepa. Self described as "glitch-dub", Nalepa's style of music seems initially understated and relaxed but after only a short time of listening the atmospheres he creates become unique and engrossing.
Around the same time, another album was released entitled "Flatlands: Remixes" which, as you may have guessed, contains remixed versions of tracks from the original album. This round of songs feature a host of artists and a much wider variety of styles ranging from downtempo to dub to dance. Here is a side by side example of an original Nalepa track "Monday" compared to its remix by the Glitch Mob.
Third in the trilogy of Flatlands releases is "Flatlands: Video", a stunning compilation of visual interpretations of Nalepa tracks. Having not only been an influential musician, Steve Nalepa is also heavily involved in the visual end of artistic expression often combining both in his performances. This video is a nod to that cooperative creativity and showcases some truly amazing talent from a handful of visual artists. Here is a taste of what "Flatlands: Video" has to offer (watch full screen in High Quality mode):
All three of these releases are available on their own but can also be bought as a bundle at a discounted price giving listeners (and watchers) a chance to try one or two or to go the distance and get all three. The full package is definitely worth it.
Use this next time you need some music to set the mood when you are making a montage for your epic crime movie, taking a pretty girl home in the car from a wine tasting, or sliding around downtown in your best hipster getup. Trust me ....
If you dig that, check this out: Embed was disable so you have to go to youtube ... do it you lazy bastard http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuHlGD6wuPI&feature=related
