Category Archives: Grateful Dead

Cover versions, Grateful Dead, The South

Video: The South covers Grateful Dead – Scarlet Begonias

Video
scarlet-1
The South (Tou Scene, Stavanger 2013)

She had rings on her fingers and bells on her shoes.
And I knew without askin’ she was into the blues.
She wore scarlet begonias tucked into her curls,
I knew right away she was not like other girls, other girls.

This is a very fine interpretation of The Dead’s Scarlet Begonias. We’ve seen them do it live (they work it into Allman Brothers’ Jessica, it works!) and it is a fitting honor to The Grateful Dead. They have made it a bit more “swampy”, they have made their own original take on it. Here it is live in studio.

The South – Scarlet Begonias:

Let us include the original as a bonus.

The Grateful Dead – Scarlet Begonias (New Years eve, 1978):

– Hallgeir

Grateful Dead, Music Calendar

Today: The late Jerry Garcia was born in 1942 – 71 years ago

Jerry Garcia 69346-7

Jerome John “Jerry” Garcia (August 1, 1942 – August 9, 1995) is best known for his lead guitar work, singing and songwriting with the band The Grateful Dead. Though he disavowed the role, Garcia was viewed by many as the leader or “spokesman” of the group.

One of its founders, Garcia performed with the Grateful Dead from 1965 until 1995. Garcia also founded and participated in a variety of side projects, including the Saunders-Garcia Band (with longtime friend Merl Saunders), Jerry Garcia Band, Old and in the Way, the Garcia/Grisman acoustic duo, Legion of Mary, and the New Riders of the Purple Sage (which Garcia co-founded with John Dawson and David Nelson). He also released several solo albums, and contributed to a number of albums by other artists over the years as a session musician. He was well known by many for his distinctive guitar playing and was ranked 13th in Rolling Stone’s “100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time” cover story.

jerry garcia 3

Guitarist, singer, and songwriter Jerry Garcia was best known as a founding member of the Grateful Dead, the rock band for which he served as de facto leader for 30 years, 1965-1995. Concurrently for much of that time, he also led his own Jerry Garcia Band (JGB), and he performed and recorded in a variety of configurations and a variety of styles, particularly styles of folk and country music, sometimes switching to banjo or pedal steel guitar for the purpose. But the Grateful Dead remained his primary musical outlet, and he performed thousands of concerts with them and appeared on dozens of their albums (many of them live recordings), 28 of which reached the Billboard chart during his lifetime, including the million-sellers Workingman’s Dead, American Beauty,Europe ’72, Skeletons from the Closet: The Best of Grateful Dead, What a Long Strange Trip It’s Been: The Best of the Grateful Dead, and In the Dark, and another eight that went gold. – From Allmusic (William Ruhlmann)

 jerry garcia 2

Lagacy:

  • Garcia was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the Grateful Dead in 1994.
  • In 2003, Rolling Stone Magazine ranked Jerry Garcia 13th in their list of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time.
  • According to fellow Bay Area guitar player Henry Kaiser, Garcia is “the most recorded guitarist in history. With more than 2,200 Grateful Dead concerts, and 1,000 Jerry Garcia Band concerts captured on tape – as well as numerous studio sessions – there are about 15,000 hours of his guitar work preserved for the ages.”
  • Seattle rock band Soundgarden wrote and recorded the instrumental song “Jerry Garcia’s Finger”, dedicated to the singer, which was released as a b-side with their single “Pretty Noose”.

Jerry Garcia Band – I shall be released (fantastic version, great guitar playing!):

Album of the day – Keystone Companions – The Complete 1973 Fantasy Recordings:

Other August-01:

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Grateful Dead, Great albums, Music Calendar

Today – The Grateful Dead released “Workingman’s Dead” in 1970 – 43 years ago

Grateful dead - workingman's dead

Workingman’s Dead, in part inspired by the rustic soul of the Band, ranks as the Dead’s studio masterpiece, followed closely by American Beauty. The focus is on the songs, rather than the jams, and these would provide the focal point of an era, spanning 1969–74, when the Dead played some of the most remarkable concerts in American history, virtually every one available in some incarnation thanks to the band’s dedicated tapers.
~rollingstone.com

Uncle John’s Band:

Wikipedia:

Released June 14, 1970
Recorded February 1970
Genre Country rock, rock
Length 35:33
Label Warner Bros.
Producer Bob Matthews
Betty Cantor
Grateful Dead

Workingman’s Dead is the fifth album by the rock band the Grateful Dead. It was recorded in February 1970 and originally released on June 14, 1970.

In 2003, the album was ranked number 262 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

GratefulDead-1970-WorkingmansDead

Of course they don’t sing as pretty as CSNY–prettiness would trivialize these songs. The sparse harmonies and hard-won melodies go with lyrics that make all the American connections claimed by San Francisco’s counterculture; there’s a naturally stoned bemusement in their good times, hard times, high times, and lost times that joins the fatalism of the physical frontier with the wonder of the psychedelic one. And the changeable rhythms hold out the promise of Uncle John’s Band, who might just save us if we’ll only call the tune. Inspirational Verse: “Think this through with me.” A
~Robert Christgau (robertchristgau.com)

Garcia has commented that much of the sound of the album comes both from his pairing with Hunter as well as the band’s friendship with Crosby, Stills and Nash. “Hearing those guys sing and how nice they sounded together, we thought, ‘We can try that. Let’s work on it a little’” commented Garcia.

Workingmans_Dead

 

Track Listing:

All songs written by Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter except where noted.

Side one

  1. “Uncle John’s Band” 4:42
  2. “High Time” 5:12
  3. “Dire Wolf” 3:11
  4. “New Speedway Boogie” 4:01

Side two

  1. “Cumberland Blues” (Garcia, Hunter, and Phil Lesh) 3:14
  2. “Black Peter” 5:41
  3. “Easy Wind” (Hunter) 4:57
  4. “Casey Jones” 4:24

Musicians:

  • Jerry Garcia – lead guitar, pedal steel guitar, vocals
  • Bob Weir – guitar, vocals
  • Pigpen (Ron McKernan) – keyboards, harmonica, vocals
  • Phil Lesh – bass, vocals
  • Bill Kreutzmann – drums
  • Mickey Hart – drums
  • Tom Constanten – keyboards on reissue live bonus tracks “Dire Wolf”, “Black Peter”, “Easy Wind”, “Cumberland Blues”, “Mason’s Children”

Additional musicians

  • David Nelson – acoustic guitar on “Cumberland Blues”

Album @ spotify:

 Other June 14:

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Bob Dylan, Grateful Dead

The Grateful Dead – Ballad of A Thin Man (video)

grateful dead hapton 1988

Bob Weir’s first take on “Ballad Of A Thin Man”… and its a great one.

This is not an easy song to cover, but I do feel Grateful Dead did capture the spirit of the song.. and it feels right.

Hampton Coliseum
March 27, 1988
Hampton, VA US

Another live version was released on the album “Postcards of the Hanging“:

April 1, 1988 at Meadowlands Arena in East Rutherford, NJ:

-Egil