Save Your Face

This mix presents heavily edited versions of five long, exploratory, thematic grooves from the Grateful Dead’s 1975 Blues for Allah sessions at Bob Weir’s studio (Ace’s):

• Groove #1
• Groove #2
• Distorto
• Proto 18 Proper
• Blue Noodle Soup

(This is the second installment of Save Your Face mixtapes based on “The Complete Circulating 1975 Ace’s Sessions (2026).” You’ll find the first one here.)

In the edits presented on this mix, I have condensed the full recordings by removing the less interesting parts throughout each track. The original combined length was about 60 minutes, while these edits total about 40 minutes.

The objective was to tighten these often exciting but loose performances into thrilling, streamlined “jams” with no slack. In pursuit of that, I have removed many passages of music, ranging from nine seconds to more than a minute.

I cut the places where Jerry was between guitar solo ideas. I shortened passages where the band settled into a pattern for longer than made sense for a composition or a listener. I removed places where the band returned to the theme’s base for a while, before taking the next leap into its elaboration. These grooves adhere to fixed patterns, so removing pieces doesn’t break the flow. It just enables an editor to create gentle corners and a forward velocity that the full-length recordings lack. 

Comprised of only the most interesting passages, these edits create the illusion of performances that sound more like… well… performances. Baggy explorations now come across more like tracks for a rock/funk/fusion LP. I’ve known these recordings for many years, and even I was shocked and delighted by the transformations. 

41 minute mp3 mix zipped up here. All tracks sourced/edited from the lossless “Complete Circulating 1975 Ace’s Sessions (2026).”

• Groove #2 Condensed (2/28/75, 5:17) - originally 10:07
• Proto 18 Proper Condensed (2/28/75, 7:18) - originally 11:36
• Blue Noodle Soup Development Condensed (4/2/75, 2:36) - originally 5:06
• Blue Noodle Soup Condensed (3/11/75, 9:58) - originally 16:46
• Groove #1 Condensed (2/28/75, 10:11) - originally 14:14
• Distorto Condensed (2/28/75, 6:13) - originally 8:07

Some additional notes:

• Distorto gradually developed into Crazy Fingers. Both Blue Noodle Soup and Proto 18 Proper received more organized treatments elsewhere in the sessions. However, those takes don’t have the fire of exploration.
• The remarkably prolific 2/28/75 session also included the long/earliest performances of a protean King Solomon’s Marbles and the EAC Jam changes (which developed into The Music Never Stopped). Neither of those contained enough meat to be worth carving into a shorter event.
• The file set you’ll download carries the album title “Sand Castles: 1975 Ace's Selections 5 - Grooves Regrooved (SYF mix).” This ties it to the previous SYF Ace’s curations and disambiguates it from other presentations of this material.

Cover image: John Hilgart, based on his photograph of an ice cream cone melting down a sidewalk in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware.

This mix curates four hours of music from the 24-hour “Complete Circulating 1975 Ace’s Recordings (2026).”

It is not a summary of the sessions. It is not chronological. It is not archivally-minded. It is emphatically a Save Your Face joint: Isolate something specific in Grateful Dead music, and sequence it into a cool listening trip.

(Save Your Face has shared links to the complete sessions and a great, summary compilation that guides you through all aspects of the sessions - Angels in Flame. I helped with those, but they were not Save Your Face mixtapes.)

In the case of this mix, I sought 1975 Ace’s passages that are more like live performances than rehearsals. They capture the band playing in earnest, rather than just running through changes, or settling into a groove without shape or development. 

The result is a fierce and wonderful version of “live” Dead and the final chapter of “jazz Dead.” It is all instrumental, except for Franklin’s Tower. 

Unsurprisingly, Slipknot and King Solomon’s Marbles loom large, as they appeared early in the sessions and went through many changes. The Blues for Allah suite (BFA > Sand Castles & Glass Camels > Strange Occurrences in the Desert) also featured many nice variations of its three elements. 

Beyond that core, the mix features two more album songs (Help on the Way and Franklin’s Tower) and everything that includes improvisational jamming: The Nines/Orpheus, No Name, A Lost Soul, the Proto-Fire jam, and a big, 1974-like jam in the middle of a Blues for Allah sequence. 

I have edited start points to manage creaky beginnings (of performance or tape source) and to keep every second compelling. I have also re-equalized quite a few tracks that were stabby or murky.

To avoid repetition of very similar takes of the same song from the album sessions proper, I have omitted some solid performances and included some takes of Slipknot without the preceding Help on the Way.

The selections are organized into four albums/playlists, each an hour long, and each intended to be a unique musical/listening arc through the themes and variations. 

The four sequences are tagged as different albums in the metadata, but all tracks are numbered consecutively, 1-36, across the set. So, if you want to re-tag it as one big “album,” rather than four small ones, that’s easy to do.

Download mp3s here. All tracks derived from the lossless Complete set (2026).

* Indicates two tracks where there’s an edit within the track. For the short Blues for Allah, I chose the first, most basic cycle through the pattern from a longer track and terminated it with the drums from the end of that track. For the edited King Solomon’s Marbles/Stronger Than Dirt, I started the track at the eruption of the Stronger Than Dirt riff and kept going until the reintroduction of the King Solomon’s Marbles riff, which I then terminated with the very end of the song. This track provides a handy needle-drop and way to compare the two riffs, with very nice playing in between. Otherwise, no razor blades were applied between the beginning and end of tracks on this mix.

Cover image: Adapted from a photograph of the band at Ace’s in 1975 by Stephen Barncard (also the producer/engineer of American Beauty).

The Grateful Dead spent most of 1975 creating new music from the ground up inside Bob Weir’s home studio - “Ace’s.” 

At long last, the chaotic, circulating tapes from these sessions have been sorted into a uniform, complete collection. A devoted band of fan-archivists discovered approximately 24 hours of unique material on the tapes - eliminating duplications, identifying the best source for each minute, and solidifying the dating of all material.

As a result, listeners and scholars can now follow the Dead’s creative process across the year, from protean ideas through (and beyond) the recording of “Blues for Allah,” packed with additional hours of music that was only ever played in these sessions. (There are gaps in this audio development story, because some session tapes do not circulate.) 

The archivist group outputted two audio collections, each with its own, information-rich set of liner notes: 

You can download “The Complete Circulating Ace’s Recordings” (24 hours) here, choosing between FLAC and MP3. This collection is organized as individually dated folders - archive style - rather than carrying a single “album” name. The folder also contains the liner notes separately. These notes are a significant contribution to Dead scholarship - highly recommended.

These 24 hours of chronological sessions, including every note, noodle, and chat, is an amazing fly-on-the-wall experience, when you’re in the mood for it. However, it’s probably not the best way for most people to encounter this new-and-improved version of the 1975 sessions.

The curated “Angels in Flame” compilation presents approximately half of the material (~ 11 hours), organized in a more listener-friendly way. In addition to including at least one version of every theme/song pursued in the sessions, it tracks the development of many musical ideas from their earliest appearance to their final (or last known) form. It even curates some of the best banter. The liner notes for “Angels in Flame” provide detailed commentary on each theme/song.

You can download “Angels in Flame” as FLAC and MP3 here, plus the liner notes unique to the compilation.

Anything more you’d like to know about the music or the archival project itself can be found in the liner notes for each set.

This is one of the most personally important Grateful Dead curations I’ve assembled under the Save Your Face moniker. It presents Jerry Garcia knocking 16 of his classic songs out of the park, in a period known for his creakiness and errors.

This is a necessary demonstration, IMHO. It’s terrible that decades after Garcia’s death, no attempt has been made to put a respectful and powerful coda on his career, in the form of a curated, final-years, live Grateful Dead album.

I first encountered many of these performances during Save Your Face’s extensive post-Hornsby-era mixtape project some years ago. Gradually, “amazing versions” and “versions to beat” emerged, as I continued to relisten to those mixes. 

To determine IF they could be beaten, I listened to every 1993-1995 soundboard recording of Garcia-sung songs, with a focus on those for which terrific lead vocals are the necessary starting point for a great performance. I confirmed many of my existing picks and found some new-to-me takes that I liked better.

I skipped over jammier songs like “Dark Star” and “Fire,” and avoided covers with the exception of “Morning Dew” and two Garcia-owned traditionals. Ultimately, it's a Hunter/Garcia joint.

Other Hunter/Garcia compositions are missing because no version checked all of my boxes:

• A soundboard mix in which Garcia’s vocals are very present
• Garcia in command of the lyrics
• Garcia singing with passion and nuance
• An exciting and involving collective performance, with memorable details
• Everyone properly represented in the SBD mix
• No intrusive “bad tones”

On the basis of these restrictive filters, I ended up with 16 performances that continue to thrill me after many, many listens. 

The ever-generous Mr. Completely (Tyler) supplied me with the best source FLACs for all tracks, so these performances are as high fidelity as possible.

Are there little flaws here and there? Sure. Are these performances practically perfect in every way? Yes. 

May you rest easy, Jerry Garcia. 

***

Cover art: Al Hirschfeld

2 hours and 17 minutes

• Help on the Way > Slipknot! (edit) (3/22/93 Atlanta > 10/18/94 NYC)
• Jack-A-Roe (3/27/94 Uniondale, NY)
• Bertha (3/21/94 Richfield, OH)
• Black Peter (7/31/94 Auburn Hills, MI)
• Crazy Fingers > Playin’ Jam (3/24/93 Chapel Hill, NC)
• China Doll (6/18/93 Chicago, IL)
• The Wheel > (7/26/94 Maryland Heights, MO)
• Attics of My Life (7/26/94 Maryland Heights, MO)
• Wharf Rat (7/19/94 Noblesville, IN)
• Peggy-O (edit) (6/26/94 Las Vegas, NV)
• Stagger Lee (10/15/94 NYC, NY)
• Stella Blue (3/21/94 Richfield, OH)
• Terrapin Station (10/1/94 Boston, MA)
• Comes a Time (10/9/94 Landover, MD)
• Morning Dew (3/27/94 Uniondale, NY)
• Brokedown Palace (12/19/94 Los Angeles, CA)

Downloads

320kbps MP3s derived from lossless

FLAC files

Editing Notes

There are two edits (but no re-EQ anywhere):

• The “Slipknot” following this great “Help on the Way” didn’t cut it, so I appended a different performance, terminated by its “Franklin’s Tower” coda.
• “Peggy-O”: The band skipped a whole verse (seamlessly), which makes The Captain less of an asshole. This led to verse confusion after the instrumental break. However, the band re-approached and corrected their error. I’ve edited out the 30 seconds of confusion. And yes, a missing verse is a big “vocal error,” but it doesn’t interrupt anything; it just modifies the story.

Immediately before their famous 8-27-72 performance in Veneta, Oregon (released as “Sunshine Daydream”), the Grateful Dead played four shows over five nights at the Berkeley Community Theater (August 21, 22, 24, 25).

Much of the playing in Berkeley was as great as “Veneta Eve” would imply. The final show of the run (8/25/72) was officially released as “Dave’s Picks vol. 24” in 2017 - an excellent choice.

The Save Your Face curations of the first three nights have been around for a while, but I thought it might be handy to re-present them in a single post, with both mp3 and streaming links. 

After taking a week off, and having played only one show in the previous three weeks, The Dead played six shows in eight days: 

• San Jose: Sunday 8/21
• Berkeley: Mon-Fri (taking Wed off)
• Veneta: Sunday 8/27
• After Veneta, they took another week off.

So, the Berkeley run constitutes almost all of the prologue to Veneta: An extended, Bill Graham-sponsored, small theater, home-town residency for The Dead, in the midst of a very busy year. All things considered, it must have been a chill, comfy week for the band, and the level of the best playing suggests that they were both relaxed and focused over four nights at the community theater.

In fact, they had only played seven shows following Pigpen’s departure - the first being July 16 at Dillon Stadium in Hartford, CT. Arguably, you can hear the post-Pigpen Dead finding and stabilizing their new course over a workweek in this cozy local venue. Many Heads (including me) revere Fall ’72. This is where it starts, IMO. 

Cover art by Saul Steinberg.

Monday & Tuesday, August 21-22

Download mp3s for one or both nights

Stream both nights on Youtube or Archive

Monday (73 minutes)

• Introduction
• Friend of the Devil
• Sugaree
• Stella Blue
• He’s Gone
• Dark Star >
• Space >
• Keith’s Jam
• Uncle John’s Band
• Introducing Keith and Donna
• Playin’ in the Band

Tuesday (70 minutes)

• Birdsong (instrumental edit)
• All That Top 40 Shit
• The Other One
• Not Fade Away >
• Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad >
• Hey Bo Diddley > Not Fade Away
• Playin' in the Band

Thursday, August 24

Download mp3s

Stream on YouTube or Archive

Thursday (110 minutes)

• Introduction 
• Greatest Story Ever Told
• Mississippi Half-Step
• Truckin’
• Brown Eyed Women
• Jack Straw
• Bird Song
• China Cat Sunflower > I Know You Rider
• Sugaree
• One More Saturday Night

• Playin’ in the Band (15:09)
• Dark Star > (13:01)
• Space > (8:39)
• Jam > (4:26)
• Interlude > (1:06)
• Morning Dew (13:04)
• Sing Me Back Home (9:56)

This mix includes the 12 instances of “Dark Star” played by the Grateful Dead in the post-Hornsby period, 10 of which had verses and two of which were jam-only. The final, six-piece combo played its first “Dark Star” in June 1992 and its last in March 1994.

This is a wonderful period for variations on the “Dark Star” theme and for the weird, deep, free improvisation that one traditionally thinks of as part of “Dark Star” – all that stuff that happened between the first hint of the melody and whatever named song eventually followed.

In the 1990s, those two parts were separated: “Dark Star” was primarily an exploration of the melodic theme (6-9 minutes, with a verse), while “Drums” and “Space” became the expansive zone of open exploration, diverse in sounds and musical angles. 

The “Dark Stars” of this period are pleasing because their infrequency prevented them from having any set flavor. The ones that don’t even have the formal opening are often particularly beguiling. On 6/18/92 they played the verse instrumentally. And consider Garcia’s unique approach on the final version from 3/30/94 in Atlanta.

The late versions are, objectively, fresh variations on the eternal, ongoing “Dark Star jam,” an effect I’ve amplified by editing out the verses of all but the first and the last performances on this mix. Listen to the music play.

To demonstrate my assertion that Drums/Space held the other half of “Dark Star” in the 1990s, I’ve made a layer cake mix that intersperses the song/melody with a goodly number of intriguing Drums and Space segments.

The Space passages almost all come from the December 1992 and February 1993 runs in Oakland, CA (eight shows, total). The first of those runs featured “Dark Star” material on three nights (first verse, space jam, second verse).

The passages separating the “Dark Star” material are sometimes quite short, but I think they have a sufficient palette-cleansing/anticipation-of-return effect to make the persistent “Dark Star” recurrences satisfactorily orgasmic for the listener.

If you venerate 1969 suite-like “Dark Stars,” where only part of it is actually the melody, or 1974 “Dark Stars,” where most of it might not be the melody, etc… then you should love this. Tons of melody + lots of carefully curated WTF.

I chose the running order based on the character of the passages and the dynamic flow of the whole. Segues were mostly impossible, but fade-outs where needed worked out fine. There are a few deliberate jump cuts, but otherwise all tracks stand alone.

Two-hour mp3 mix zipped up here (dates/cities included in tags)

• Walk On Drums
• Dark Star (first verse)
• Hectic > Peaceful Space
• Dark Star
• Ringing Drums
• Fluttering Space
• Dark Star
• A Jerry Story
• Dark Star
• Dark Star w/David Murray
• A Jerry Story
• Didgeridoo Drums
• Dark Star Jam
• Jamming w/Ornette Coleman
• Dark Star Space > Jam *
• Dark Star
• A Spontaneous Composition (Correction: This is a theme from "Tubular Bells!")
• Dark Star
• A Perilous Space
• Dark Star
• Chase Sequence Space
• Dark Star
• A Jerry Story
• Dark Star (second verse)
• Walk Off Space

* I forgot to indicate "> Jam" in the mp3 title tags

Cover art: Holt School Mathematics textbook cover detail (8th grade volume), circa 1976. Graphically, this Holt School series was very nice, each volume iterating on the same abstracted composition of the four basic math functions (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division), which I think adequately reflects the philosophy of this mixtape.

Jesse Jarnow pointed out that Phil Lesh takes over the Grateful Dead for six, extended, abstract bass adventures during the December 1973 shows.

Here are those passages, in chronological order, gently segued, totaling 39 minutes. The first one gives you a couple of minutes to orient yourself before Godzilla reaches the power station.

These are not bass solos (other players present), but Phil steps beyond the normal zones of 1973-1974 collective abstraction to establish his own soundscape plots - dropping bombs, embracing distortion, shifting an octave, firing off drones and tones. The band generally steps back to give him a canvas, with much of the accompaniment minimal and often gentle. It is paradoxically violent and soothing music.

39-minute mp3 mix zipped up here (dates/cities included in song titles)

Cover art: Howard V. Brown for the May 1934 issue of Astounding Stories. It reminds me a little bit of the cover of Neil Young’s abstract distortion album “Arc,” while also inviting you to hear this music in color.

This mix includes four isolated, exceptional examples of the distinctive jam the Grateful Dead often played after “Terrapin” in the final years. Four musical leaps in the same direction, totaling 16 minutes.

In this period, there is a decisive moment when - or a brief transitional period during which - the climactic Terrapin riff gives way to a breezier space. Instead of grinding the Terrapin riff out forever, the band turns a corner into a different zone.

Does the Terrapin Bounce Jam rise to the level of an official Grateful Dead “thematic jam?” Possibly, because it is distinct from earlier Terrapin jams and contemporary Playin’ jams (which it shares a vibe with). I feel that at many moments, it could turn toward or back to either/both of those zones. It is something like a fresh space in a Venn diagram comfort zone for 1993-1994 Dead - a “Terraplayin’ Jam.”

Whatever its thematic taxonomy, this jam WAS an exceptional comfort zone for the final band. The rhythm section locked into a peppy groove, while responding fluidly to the melodic players – Phil Lesh performing a wild, sinuous ballet across the groove. Bob Weir finding the right accents and places to punctuate. Vince Welnick providing essential melodic elements.

And Jerry Fucking Garcia, genius lead guitarist, operating in a wide-open space - unencumbered by rote requirements - laying down spellbinding narratives. He employed many tones, natural and MIDI, not just changing channels for novelty but seeing the next place he wanted to take things and paying it off.

To illustrate/celebrate this corner of Grateful Dead, I’ve chosen just four particularly developed, short, and corner-turning examples. 

The jam/theme/turn/bounce appeared most of the time after Terrapin in the final years, but not always as an assertively self-contained jam. The Terrapin riff could extend farther in, creating a hybrid. The band could get pretty fierce for a long time within the “Terrapin Bounce” rhythm, without carving out a shape or turning dramatic corners. The jam could open up into a farther out thing or wind itself down, coherently, toward Drums. 

Download 16 minutes/four versions of the jam on mp3s here

• 9/17/94 (4:39)
• 7/23/94 (4:25)
• 1/26/93 (3:11)
• 4/4/94 (3:23)

Cover art: Gyokusho Kawabata 1842-1914

If you’d like more versions and a bigger 1993-1994 context for this jam, try this older and much longer Save Your Face mix:

Notes and mp3s

Streaming

This mix celebrates Brent Mydland’s arrival on “Shakedown Street” in 1979 and the particularly excellent “disco Dead” that resulted. I’ve chosen seven 1979 performances to edit to semi-instrumentals: intro > solo section > final chorus & jam.

1979 is arguably the most deeply funky year for “Shakedown Street,” early Brent being exactly what the song - and the rest of the band - had been waiting for. Things really go to outer space in the Halloween performance. 

The seven versions presented here are those for which there’s a soundboard recording that makes every player clearly audible and present – ensuring a properly syncopated and detailed groove. 

“Shakedown Street” is not as easy to edit as many other Dead songs, but it only requires two splices, so I hope you’ll put up with a few moments of awkwardness in exchange for the extended, jammy experience. 

71-minute mp3 mix here

• 8/13/79 (7:52)
• 8/31/79 (10:10)
• 10/25/79 (10:57)
• 10/31/79 (13:43)
• 11/25/79 (9:23)
• 11/29/79 (8:21)
• 12/26/79 (10:24) 

Cover art: Richard Biffle

The Grateful Dead remained an experimental band to the end. This mix arranges portions of 1995 “Spaces” from 11 cities/runs, February through May, into several listening arcs, totaling two hours.

In 1995, certain themes recurred regularly in the open improv sections of shows, arguably making them a jam or jams that ought to be named. You’ll hear them in the “Philadelphia Suite” that leads this mix, and then more insistently and extensively in the “Thematic Suite” that follows.  

I’ve also assembled a different flavor of improvisation into a “Melancholy Suite,” which highlights a quest for strange, gentle beauty. This portion of the mix sometimes aligns with the decade-spanning Save Your Face compilation “Chamber Music.”

And lastly, there are several great outliers from the above categories, with which I’ve concluded the mix.

Lesh said the Dead were always playing “Dark Star,” even when they weren’t. This is that music in 1995. 

1h 50m mp3 mix zipped up here (dates/cities included in song titles)

Philadelphia Suite (18 minutes)

• Three nights edited into a single track. It was a run packed with notable passages, which I’ve melded together.

Thematic Suite (49 minutes)

• Nine segments from various shows, indexed as separate tracks

Melancholy Suite (31 minutes)

• Eight segments from various shows, indexed as separate tracks

Outliers (13 minutes)

• Three segments from three shows

Cover art: Detail from “Bed” by Robert Rauschenberg