Every Deadhead has their own tale of what particular period or year was the most magical for Jerry Garcia and crew. Anyone who\u2019s read my past reviews knows I consider 1977 to be an amazing period for the Grateful Dead; some of the shows they played during this time that have been released on CD have proven to be spellbinding in their own unique ways.<\/p>\n
Dick\u2019s Picks Volume Ten<\/i>, a three-CD set covering nearly their entire show at Winterland from December 29, 1977, doesn\u2019t quite have that same level of magic that other shows from that year had (to my ear, at least). It\u2019s not a bad show by any means, but it doesn\u2019t crackle with energy like earlier shows from that year.<\/p>\n
In a sense, it almost feels like Garcia is doing everything he can with his song selection to keep things at a basic plod. \u201cJack Straw\u201d is a solid enough opener, but going right into \u201cThey Love Each Other\u201d just doesn\u2019t feel natural. At times, it feels like the musical equivalent of a tennis match. Bob Weir serves \u201cMama Tried\u201d; Garcia counters with \u201cLoser.\u201d It\u2019s a strange kind of yin\/yang thing, but the audience was eating it up gladly.<\/p>\n
The second set is where things finally start to get tighter. Opening things with \u201cBertha\u201d is always a good start, and stretching \u201cPlaying In The Band\u201d across several songs (including throwing in a brief jam before \u201cDrums\u201d) is kinda fun. Having \u201cChina Cat Sunflower\u201d resurrected for the first time in several years is also a nice touch.<\/p>\n
The question, though, has to be why the late Dick Latvala didn\u2019t choose to present this show in its entirety. Look, I admit I was never the biggest Donna Jean Godchaux fan. But there were so few times she was allowed to lead the band with her vocals; hearing \u201cSunrise\u201d from the then-recent Terrapin Station<\/i> album would have been more than appropriate. (\u201cIt Must Have Been The Roses\u201d was the other song from the show that didn\u2019t make the cut.) Who knows, maybe the source tapes weren\u2019t in good enough shape on these two songs.<\/p>\n
That said, I\u2019m not going to fault Latvala for substituting four songs from the following night\u2019s Winterland performance to round out the set, even if this particular version of \u201cEyes Of The World\u201d wasn\u2019t necessarily their strongest.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s difficult for any band to maintain a high level of excellence on any extended tour, and not every show is going to live up to what someone else views as a highlight. Enough people believe the show captured on Dick\u2019s Picks Volume Ten<\/i> was a high-water mark for this era of the Grateful Dead; far be it from me to say they\u2019re wrong. Hell, chances are they\u2019d tell me some of the shows I love from this era were ones they viewed as inferior. To my ears at least, this particular set is good, but not quite on the medal stand when it comes to superior performances. As Latvala put on all his releases from this series, \u201cCaveat emptor.\u201d I might not go back to this one as often as I do others in the Dick\u2019s Picks<\/i> series, but it does have some solid moments, and is enjoyable overall.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":35432,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5668],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-47328","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-grateful-dead","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47328","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=47328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/47328\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/35432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47328"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=47328"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=47328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}