What I’m about to say might get me hung in effigy by the
\nbrotherhood and sisterhood of Deadheads out there, but here goes:
\nWhen the Grateful Dead were on, they were incredible. But when they
\nwere off, it could sometimes be painful to listen to them.<\/p>\n
I got to thinking about that when listening to
\nDick’s Picks Volume Three<\/i> the other day. This two-CD set
\ncaptures Jerry Garcia and crew in concert at Pembroke Pines,
\nFlorida on May 22, 1977. While there still are some great
\nperformances on this set, the bulk of the show tends to be weighted
\ndown in mediocrity that was surprising to hear from the Dead. What
\nmade this show stick out in the mind of the late Dick Latvala (the
\nbeloved tape librarian for the Dead) I’ll never quite understand.
\n(Hey, are you guys taking resumes?)<\/p>\n
Now, I have fond memories of this particular section of the
\nDead’s history. I used to be in possession of an audience tape from
\na show just a week prior to this particular concert, and the energy
\nlevel was so high, it would have buried the needle. It was fun to
\nhear songs like “Estimated Prophet” as they made their birth cries,
\nhaving just been released on
\nTerrapin Station<\/i>. More importantly, the band was on that
\nnight. I don’t know what ever happened to that tape, but I miss
\nit.<\/p>\n
Why there would be so much difference between shows one week
\napart is surprising, to say the least. It just seems like things
\nget off on the wrong foot with “The Music Never Stopped,” a song
\nthat was always “iffy,” to say the least, in my mind, and they
\nnever were able to capture the magic.<\/p>\n
Oh, it’s not that Garcia and crew didn’t try. Bob Weir inpresses
\nme with the take on “Estimated Prophet,” a track that could well be
\none of the most underrated of the Dead’s numbers. And I’ve got to
\nadmit that I even was enthralled with this version of “Samson And
\nDelilah,” a song I don’t particularly care for. If the Grateful
\nDead can get me interested in
\nthat<\/i> song, then things have to be going well, you’d
\nthink.<\/p>\n
Alas, this isn’t the case. Garcia seems off for most of the
\nnight, even to the point where one of my favorite medleys, “Help On
\nThe Way \/ Slipknot! \/ Franklin’s Tower,” is stretched far too long.
\nGarcia seems to lazily take on the verses of “Help On The Way,” and
\n“Franklin’s Tower” seems like it goes on for infinity. If I heard
\nGarcia drawl out “Roll away the dew” one more time, I thought I was
\ngoing to put my foot through my stereo speakers. I love that song,
\nbut 15 minutes was pushing it in this case.<\/p>\n
For that matter, Garcia seems perfectly happy to stick with the
\nplodding numbers throughout
\nDick’s Picks Volume Three<\/i>. From the too-slow start of
\n“Sugaree” (which does have its moments in Garcia’s guitar work) to
\nthe lifeless take on “Wharf Rat” to the almost suicidal performance
\nof “(Walk Me Out In The) Morning Dew,” Garcia is just off all
\nnight. And some people would agree that when Garcia was out of it,
\nhe could easily drag the band down with him. (And I’m sorry, but I
\nwould not be disappointed if I never again heard “Sunrise”. Thank
\nyou very much.)<\/p>\n
There are, of course, going to be those who disagree with me,
\nand say that
\nDick’s Picks Volume Three<\/i> is the kind of CD that you should
\nbe worshipping every note of. To them I say: go fetch a tape of the
\n5\/15\/77 show in St. Louis, listen to that puppy a few times, and
\nthen tell me that I’m off my rocker.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":25219,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5668],"rating":[5619],"class_list":["post-36424","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-grateful-dead","rating-rating-c"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36424","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36424"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36424\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36424"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36424"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36424"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36424"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}