Grateful Dead Fans Speak Up!

*waves*

Though I'm a lightweight at 40 albums. Kevin will trash everyone else 

I gave up buying after Rocking The Cradle, not that it was poor (far from it) but it dawned on me that there were only so many versions of Going Down The Road Feelin' Bad I needed!

Check my avatar and my post 2 minutes ago on the live albums thread. Deadhead since 1968 - only 17 live shows (all in England); about 2 foot of vinyl and 6 foot of cds

Not a 'DeadHead' (well, not in that regard) but do give them a frequent spin.  G

Blues For  Allah and 72' European Tour are  always on my top list.

Pev... it was your avatar that inspired the post :-) It got me wondering.

My first show was 1987... saw about 75 live shows. I've got tons of live shows in FLAC and pretty much every official CD release including Spring 90 and the Europe 72 Box.

My vinyl collection (for all music) is just getting started as I just bought a TT... what do you recommend as far as GD goes? I've got the Warner LP reissues, Reckoning reissue (phenomenal), Wake of the Flood (Mobile Fidelity). I'm very interested in getting Europe 72 Vol. 2 as I understand that was mastered from the original analogue tapes. Anything special you can recommend?

And Pev... if you caught 17 shows... all of them in England, I'd have to think that would have been the majority of the UK shows played in the bands career.

Graeme.. just saw your post in the live album thread... I'm a big Neil fan also... just picked up the Live at Massey Hall LP 2 days ago and have been loving it!

Love 'em. Only saw them once, Hallowe'en 1990 at Wembley. They weren't on top form that night but it's still one of the best gigs I've ever been to.

Prefer the spacier or jazzier stuff to Bobby's cowboy songs (so would take "Anthem of the Sun" and "Blues for Allah" over "Am Beaut"). I have all the studio albums but much prefer the live stuff.

Fave songs include:

"Help/Slip/Frank"

"Eyes of the World"

"Playin' in the Band"

"Wharf Rat"

"Begonias/Fire"

"China/Rider"

Yes.   Saw them several times in San Francisco in the 80's.

I saw them for the first time in the Spring of 1979, and about 50 times total until Jerry's death.  Almost all of my shows were east coast US shows, other than one Oakland Coliseum show (Chinese New Years) and one in Tempe Arizona.  I saw a lot of Jerry Garcia Band shows, Garcia and Grisman, Bob Weir, Bobby and the Midnights, etc., shows too.  I'll still go see Bob Weir, but have no interest in the Further stuff.  Or Phish -- never transitioned to a Phish phan; I was too sad over Jerry's death maybe.

I too just posted two fav. live albums in that threat -- One from the Vault and Reckoning.  Probably my single favorite recordings other than those two are from the closing run at Fillmore East, especially the second set on 4/28 with Dark Star > St. Stephen> Not Fade Away > Goin' Down the Road > Not Fade Away.

Been a fan since their version of Morning Dew   & Good morning little Schoolgirl

I don't own any Grateful Dead albums. Can I have a few recommendations please.

Tim

I'd say Live/Dead is a good place to start (that was the beginning of my own journey), but others may have their own suggestions...

Also:

Europe '72

Workingman's Dead

Reckoning

Grateful Dead (Skull & Roses)

Anthem of the Sun

Blues for Allah

Whatever you do, DON'T GO ANYWHERE NEAR Dylan & The Dead

Similar history to Bart's -- first show in '73, last in '91, and approximately 70 shows in between.

My favorite venue was the Uptown Theater on the north side of Chicago, where I saw them many times In the mid-to-late 70's.  The Dead's sound system and the Uptown's acoustics was a match made in heaven.

Hard to pick a favorite album, but I really enjoyed the recent release of "Winterland (May 30, 1971)" on vinyl.  The band was in rare form, and the sound quality is amazing.

Hook

I went to the State University of New York at Geneseo from 1976 to 1980, and although I never got to see the Dead, the college was definitely a "Dead-head" school, and you either learned to love 'em or hate 'em, there was very little middle ground.  I grew to appreciate them and in ripping my CD collection as I went through the "G's", I realized there were Dead albums I wanted and didn't have.  (Steal You Face, Terrapin Station, "Skull & Roses", plus more live stuff.)  I am not a Deadhead, but I definitely like them.

Of course, the internet reveals where Jerry learned how to play guitar.

And in the 90's I used to go partying in Deep Ellum.

big time fan..... the best "classic rock" band.I can give or take the whole scene that surrounds the band.  I have seen many shows and appreciate tours of certain years, but the studio albums is where the money is.   soooooo  good.

-patrick

"And Pev... if you caught 17 shows... all of them in England, I'd have to think that would have been the majority of the UK shows played in the bands career."

I was young and poor so I only saw 3 shows on the 1972 tour - 2nd night at Wembley, second night at the Lyceum and the Bickershawe Festival but they were all truly awesome as the recordings prove

Seen every UK show since so was there on Halloween 1990 -didn't they just have to do Werewolves of London as the encore? My favorite UK  show was the 2nd night at the Alexandra Palace in 1974 (immortalised in Dicks Picks 6) and the weakest was the night before...

In 1992 I treated myself to a holiday in California with tickets for a 3 night run at the Shoreline but Jerry was unwell and the shows were cancelled

I saw Bob Weir's Ratdog when they came to the UK and they were excellent - Bobby even did a fine job singing Jerry songs such as "Loser" much to my surprise - made me realise the music can live on after Jerry.

Sorry to ramble on but hey - non Deadheads aren't going to read this thread anyway!

"My vinyl collection (for all music) is just getting started as I just bought a TT... what do you recommend as far as GD goes? I've got the Warner LP reissues, Reckoning reissue (phenomenal), Wake of the Flood (Mobile Fidelity). I'm very interested in getting Europe 72 Vol. 2 as I understand that was mastered from the original analogue tapes. Anything special you can recommend?"

A good vinyl issue you may not have is One From the Vault - a triple from August 13 1975 - a really good Phil mix. I also have a double bootleg vinyl of the same show with a slightly different track list called Make Believe Ballroom - back in the day this was rated as pretty much the holy grail of Dead bootleg vinyl. A really fun vinyl issue is Deadicated - an album of Dead songs covered by other artists - Bill plays quite a few of these on Radio Paradise. The dub/reggae version of Estimated Prophet by Burning Spear is my favourite bass test track (Winston Rodney became a Deadhead and wrote a couple of songs about Jerry after he died). 

As far as the mainstream releases I love them all but prefer the original issues of Anthem and Aoxomoxoa to the remixes - maybe because the original mixes were chemically hardwired into my brain back in the day! I do love Reckoning and use it as my main arbiter when choosing hifi. I also think Dead Set is their most underrrated album - but Steal Your Face on vinyl is a waste of plastic! Without a Net is pretty good - don't know why they didn't reissue it with the 2nd box set.

Hope this helps

Pev

Count me in ... I have the original vinyl copies of the albums between the debut and Blues for Allah and 36 albums in digital format. Haven't bought any for a while. My favourite Dead record is Anthem of the Sun, which I think is a milestone in recorded music. As they moved in to more song based records they created some really good tunes with interesting lyrics and having 3 distinctive writers meant a contrast was always there ... Weather Report Suite, Unbroken Chain, Birtha ...  

If buying Anthem then I recommend the remixed version on HDCD, which I think sounds better than my first pressing original mix (sorry Pev). The remix was available a year or so after the original on vinyl, but only available on import. My understanding is Phil Lesh was not satisfied with the original. I saw a documentary on it once with Phil discussing in detail the way it was mixed. 

Whichever version you like best, it is a truly great album. 

Two From The Vault which focuses on Anthem is a great recording, but I only have it on CD. 

Dr. Mark.... my brother went to St. Bonaventure in Olean in the mid / late 80's... definately a GD school and where he gained an appreciation, which was then passed onto me. Went to Geneseo a few times to watch St. Bonaventure play hockey against Geneseo... my brother played for the Bonaventure team.

Funny story... my brothers first show was the Philly Spring run in 1987. He had no idea about the band, but his friends dragged him along insisting he would love it. Had 1st row tickets right in front of Jer for the first night, and was hooked after that. Nice initiation. We saw alot of shows between 1987-1995, but never got back to row 1.

Count me in.

Saw most of the London shows after "Europe 72" but sadly missed that one and the Bickershaw and Hollywood (UK) festivals.

Last time in the UK was the night before haloween at Wembley, not one of the greatest but a poor Dead show was still better than many others best.

It has always amazed me how many people who have never heard them  are surprised that the Dead played country-rock and acoustic sets, I think the name invokes a sort of fear of being assaulted by heavy-metal thrash and guitar shredding - not that there is anything wrong with that.

My fave album - American Beauty.

My fave Dead moment - the few minutes including and following "Inspiration Move me Brightly" on the much maligned "Terrapin"

Ron

The Paris shows from that 1990 Europe tour are my favorite shows from that run. The Wembley shows were not super tight, but are a fun listen anyway.

I think the true fans were always there for the music. In my case, as a 19 year old when I started going to shows, the circus around the band was fun at first... but got old pretty quick. One of the nicer things about the post Jerry era has been able to see the boyz in more friendly confines (theatres as opposed to hockey rinks and stadiums), and less of the circus chaos outside the stadiums. Not to mention the insane pat downs etc. on entry to the venues back in the day.