Save Your Face

This 2-LP-length mix gathers together wonderful Summer ’82 takes on the Grateful Dead’s subtler, slower, prettier songs. The band was tight, the singers were in strong voice, and the soundboard mixes put it all together very nicely. 

It’s a great moment to check in on these songs and on the band’s capacity for beauty and nuance in the early 1980s.

In performance, these songs were flanked by utterly different material and vibes - bombast on all sides. On this mix, birds of a similar feather get to vibe together. 

When you pull aside an artist’s gentler material, the dynamic range of that material expands to fill the listening universe. But even without that effect, I wouldn’t call the material on this mix “mellow,” by any measure. It is tremendously muscular music, thanks to the combination of snug grooves, well-narrated tales, synchronized turns, fine detailing, and good soundboard mixes.

I’ve arranged things to provide an accelerated first-set > second-set arc (without consideration for where the songs appeared in the actual shows).

This is the second of five mixtapes drawn from the tour, which I’m numbering and posting in no particular order. Each tries to provide a different angle on the music. With exceptions for “Playin’” and “The Other One,” no songs are repeated. They’ll collect under the blog tag GD Summer ’82. Please don’t complain until all five mixes have posted.

102-minute mp3 mix zipped up here (dates and venues included in mp3 tags)

• Improv: Jerry’s Whimsy (Austin)
• To Lay Me Down
• Althea
• It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue
• Black Peter
• Peggy-O
• Row Jimmy
• Looks Like Rain
• Friend of the Devil
• Bird Song
• Improv: Jerry’s Whimsy (Red Rocks)
• Improv > The Wheel
• Lost Sailor >
• Saint of Circumstance

This 2-LP-length mix approximates 1971’s “Skull and Roses” album using selections from the Grateful Dead’s 1982 Summer Tour. Substitutions have been made to round out the affect/effect and anomalies included to honor some as-performed continuities. 

The 1982 Summer Tour was very strong, and the soundboard mixes are mostly quite satisfying, though their ambiance varies. (I skipped one audience-only show and one soundboard-sounds-weird show - both Red Rocks at the start of the tour.)

This is the first of five mixtapes drawn from the tour, which I’m numbering and posting in no particular order. Each tries to provide a different angle on the music. With exceptions for “Playin’” and “The Other One,” no songs are repeated across the mixes. They’ll collect under the blog tag GD Summer ’82. Please don’t complain until all five mixes have posted.

For this mix, the basic Skullfu*k recipe holds: half a crackling, short-song, high-on-cocaine, rock-and-roll-cowboy album, and half a deeper dive into more expansive territory. 

97-minute mp3 mix zipped up here (dates and venues included in song tags)

• On the Road Again
• Mama Tried
• Big Railroad Blues
• It’s All Over Now (I Used to Love Her)
• Me & My Uncle
• I Need a Miracle >
• Bertha
• Don’t Ease Me In
• Playin’ in the Band
• Jam > The Other One >
• Not Fade Away
• Wharf Rat
• Goin’ Down the Road, Feelin’ Bad
• Johnny B. Goode
• Satisfaction >
• Brokedown Palace

Cover art: Hilgart, a high-resolution scan of a detail of a classic comic book ad, channel-shifted.

Check out Jerry Garcia’s dulcet-toned, falsetto vocals, on top of his one-man-band backing track demo. It’s tragic he didn’t add a lead guitar part to this recording.

Garcia struggled to sing this melody live, possibly to a greater degree than any other song he wrote for himself to sing. That’s reasonable, given the ask. The challenging portions of the vocals are just three short verses, but they are demanding. They each require a zero-to-correct, hard-hitting start, and all the lines end in melisma. When you get to the chorus, it’s nearly foolproof, but the verses…

Hard to do, when you’re singing loudly on top of cranking live Grateful Dead, and you can’t just adjust things to suit wherever your Jerry-voice happens to be this year or this tour. This demo gives Garcia all the repose he needs to execute a disco vocal to match his musical disco vision - in a more expressive way than on the highly-processed studio album recording. 

He probably should have shopped the song out to the major disco acts of the era, who could have supercharged the vocals and made it a hit. It should have been a hit. It’s one of the great disco compositions, but there’s no single recording that backs up that assertion.

I have no issues with the way the Grateful Dead played the song – it’s one of my top five GD vehicles – but there aren’t many performances on which you’d give Garcia an “A” for his execution of the verses. Which is unfortunate, given the greatness of the song and its stature in the Dead canon.

Cover art: Detail of Gilbert Shelton watercolor, 1978

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This mix presents 78 minutes from an unreleased concert with an extraordinary second set. It was one of Brent Mydland’s final shows. Video of the full concert aired as a “Shakedown Stream” in 2020.

The show was a perfect storm of sorts. The first set transpired in miserable heat and humidity, periodic rain, and a thunderstorm that cut the power in the middle of a song. Then the rain ended, the sun went down, a little breeze kicked up, and a monster second set blew us away.

This mix provides the full second set, minus the opening “Iko Iko,” “Drums,” and “Space.” The former was made mushy by Hornsby guesting on accordion, and the latter weren’t very interesting. Fortuitously, I found a way to flow the “Playin’ Jam” into “The Other One” so smoothly that you’ll never find the edit. 

Seemed like the the “album experience” had to lead with the second set, so several terrific first set songs became an extension of the “Brokedown” encore. 

78-minute mp3 mix zipped up here

• Playin’ in the Band >
• Uncle John’s Band >
• Playin’ Jam
• The Other One >
• Stella Blue >
• Not Fade Away
• Brokedown Palace
• Friend of the Devil
• Loser
• Big River

Cover: Rothko, Untitled (Blue, Green, and Brown)

This mix provides 78 minutes of music from the two shows that made me stop attending Dead concerts.

Making this mix, I’ve concluded that a significant part of what turned me off those two nights was the mix. 

I went into the shows predisposed to be disappointed (but ready to be turned on). I’d only seen Vince on solo keys twice before (and still missed Brent), I had no interest in new songs, and I was hoping for a very different setlist, based on what I’d never seen performed live. 

And I also hated Garcia’s lyric lapses in the period; when a song was going great, I’d still be on pins and needles wondering whether he was going to remember the first line of the next verse.

For all those reasons, the Chapel Hill shows were disappointing. But those things don’t matter in 2021, when you’re curating tapes, and you’ve come to know and love the late-period band and memorized 60 hours of their best tracks. 

However, there’s that other dependency: Is the mix any good? Pleasing to listen to?

I didn’t remember much about the music of the Chapel Hill shows, but I did remember the sonic, aesthetic experience. The music seemed insubstantial and unfocussed. It was hard to inhabit.

My pal and I attributed that to the band, but listening to the tapes, I think it was the guy at the mixing board who created the estranging experience. 

There are the usual, random Healy failures. One night, Garcia’s vocals are quiet and Welnick’s keys are too loud. The other night, Welnick is often hard to hear, even when he’s soloing. Sometimes Weir’s guitar is too loud.

But even when nothing like that is obvious, there’s a hard-to-put-your-finger on lack of balance, dynamics, presence… The “Terrapin” seems to be played well, but everything delicate about it is trampled by the mix, etc. The players are playing together, but Healy has built little walls between them.

So, I had to kill a lot of seemingly very nice performances to make a mixtape that you can “get into” properly. As always, I tried to hide the defects to the point where you might not notice them (if I hadn't drawn attention to them!). I think the result is quite enjoyable, though not the first 1993 Save Your Face mixtape I’d point you at.

I post it nonetheless, as part of my journey through all the shows I actually attended. Points of interest include:

• An exquisite, entirely-on-point Crazy Fingers with a long jam
• A nice example of this period’s “Jam Out of Terrapin”
• The only Spanish Jam of 1993
• An extended jazzy zone with the Space excerpt (Garcia/Weir!) and the Eternity edit
• Garcia's “trumpet” on “Women Smarter”

78-minute mp3 mixtape zipped up here

• New Minglewood Blues
• Big River
• Lazy River Road
• Man Smart, Women Smarter
• Playin’ in the Band
• Crazy Fingers
• Spanish Jam >
• Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad
• Jam After Terrapin
• Space excerpt
• Eternity (instr. edit)
• Liberty 

This mix presents 80 minutes from the first night of the Dead’s 1991 two-show run in Greensboro, NC. The second night is curated separately, here (same cover art).

I haven’t previously offered a mixtape from this show, because two of the most outstanding songs (Samson and Eyes) were released as filler on Dick’s Picks 17: September 21, 1991 Boston. The Samson is incendiary, and the long Eyes is both wonderful overall and has a truly magnificent passage; between the first and second vocal sections, Hornsby finds a magical riff, Jerry and the band latch on for Hornsby’s extended solo, and then Jerry delivers a great “flute” solo that is loud enough in the soundboard mix to really kick, for once. (When he turned on that effect, he almost aways got quieter than his natural sound.)

I am offering up a mixtape of the show now, because I’m going through all the shows I actually saw (merely 11) and discovering the best stuff I witnessed. The next night in Greensboro delivered the “Dark Star” I’d been waiting for, and this first night gave me the extraordinary “Eyes” to match. Big numbers checked off.

Never knew ’til now that I caught a notable, short “Might as Well” resurgence, or that the second half of this “Around and Around” was something I’d prize 30 years later.

More comments on the performance and the Hornsby/Welnick era below the track list.

80-minute mp3 mixtape here

• West LA Fadeaway
• Cassidy
• Samson & Delilah
• Eyes of the World >
• Playin’ in the Band
• The Wheel >
• Around & Around
• Might As Well

More talking: 

I am ambivalent (song by song) about the Hornsby/Welnick keyboard double-up. Hornsby was as wonderful a keys player as any they had, and I’m a committed Welnick fan in the 1994-ish moment (and credit both his and the drummers’ restraint for the magic of the band’s final “sound”). 

However, there’s often too much going on in the overlap period, with Hornsby playing an actual piano forcing Welnick’s sounds into unpleasant places, to keep him distinct from everyone else playing chords and fills into the collective, mid-range-frequency, -rhythm, -harmonics zone. (“Nice solo, Vince, but what instrument are they making you play?” But also, it is not a bit worse than that f*cking accordion.)

All that said, the too-many-players issue was often not an issue at all, resolving itself into a sonic slab that is quite exhilarating and distinct, as on this “West LA Fadeaway.” And a lot of the time, everyone was so respectful of each other that you have no visceral sense of two keyboards (and Weir, and two drummers) getting crowded. For example, this “Eyes.”

People complain about Welnick’s “tones,” and I get that, but I also think these people are talking primarily about 1991-1992, rather than his post-Hornsby playing. (e.g., the best of 1993-1994)

As the post-Hornsby, solo keyboardist, Welnick chose more natural piano sounds for the most of his playing, displayed his jazzy harmonic instincts all over the place, and become a nuanced accompanist who didn’t insert the constant aggro-horny energy of Brent Mydland. He was restrained and thoughtful. 

Welnick was relegated to the texture guy, the sheets-of-synths-guy, for a couple of years, then he got his shot as a full participant in a smaller combo, and I think he made his mark. So, this mixtape from a ’91 show is more about Hornsby than Welnick. Just saying, don’t shoot off your mouth about Welnick until you’ve done all the listening homework. 

This mix presents 74 minutes from the fourth and final show of the ’88 Alpine Valley run. It was the best of the four and is the only one with a good soundboard. 

These were the first shows I attended. Spread over five days, during a heat wave and drought, in the middle of nowhere, it was a massive tribal experience of the first order. I’d see better shows later, but I never experienced anything like this scene again.

The big deal of this show is the tremendous “Morning Dew.” I'm no "Hey Pocky Way" expert, but this is instantly my favorite version, with Brent on fire and the mix doing all the right things. The drummers are too thumpy on "Roses," but it's a pleasing version of a song that was uncommon in the later years.

I’ve struggled to get into 1988 via tapes, but the sweet spots of this show have given me a foothold. 

74-minute mp3 mix zipped up here

• Iko Iko
• Hey Pocky Way
• It Must Have Been the Roses
• Bird Song
• He’s Gone
• Gimme Some Lovin’ >
• All Along the Watchtower >
• Morning Dew
• Believe it or Not
• Brokedown Palace

This mix condenses the Grateful Dead’s ’94 summer tour into a shortlist of performances of beloved, pre-1979 originals, totaling three hours – the length of a show.

This is a sub-curation of much more extensive Save Your Face mixes from the tour – part of our gentle, ongoing campaign to turn people on to the Dead’s final years. None of this music has been released.

If you’re dubious of, or barely exposed to 1994 Dead, then this is an easy gateway mix. If you dig it, there’s an October ’94 mix built on the same principles, which has been making Heads happy for several years.

These are all unedited SBD performances. The only slight cheat is the “Jam Out of Terrapin” from Chicago, which is possibly the most perfect version of this latter-day, delightful innovation. It augments an exceptional full “Terrapin” from a different show, which took a unique and long course of its own.

There are no vocal lapses, except for a brief “Stella Blue” event.

3-hour mp3 mix zipped up here (all dates and places included in the song title tags)

• Cassidy
• Bird Song
• Black Peter
• The Music Never Stopped
• Eyes of the World
• The Wheel >
• Attics of My Life >
• Sugar Magnolia
• Wharf Rat
• Estimated Prophet
• MIDI Jam
• Terrapin Station > Jam
• Playin’ in the Band
• Jam Out of Terrapin
• Stella Blue
• One More Saturday Night

This mix curates material from the two Paris shows of the Dead’s seven-show trip to England, Germany, and France in September 1974. The Paris shows were the last before the band's famous October run of "farewell shows" at Winterland. 

The three London shows were generously sampled on the official release “Dick’s Picks, Vol. 7,” which is augmented by this Save Your Face mix. The Dijon, France show was included in the “30 Trips Around the Sun” box set.

The unreleased shows are therefore Munich (9/14) and the two Paris shows sampled here.

The problem with the Paris tapes is that the soundboard mix doesn’t include Weir’s guitar. They are excellent performances, and the soundboards are otherwise quite nice… but most of the music just doesn’t make any sense without Weir’s rhythm, harmonics, and occasional featured-player passages. 

On the other hand, there’s also quite a bit of music that does deliver a robust, complete-feeling listening experience – the 1974 magic arriving nearly intact to surprise and delight. 

Weir’s guitar does show up here and there, most importantly on this great “Scarlet.” 

I’ve edited the lesser of the two “Eyes” to the final section of the jam, when the band had come to a full stop, then worked their way back into the jam. The “Uncle John’s” vocals were harsh, but the music cooked, so that’s presented as an instrumental. This is a notable Seastones for becoming a full band performance along the way. The few fake segues that were required worked out well.

September 20: 70-minute mp3 mix zipped up here

• Scarlet Begonias
• Weather Report >
• Let It Grow >
• Stella Blue
• Truckin’
• Eyes of the World Jam >
• Not Fade Away >
• Goin’ Down the Road Feelin’ Bad

September 21: 90-minute mp3 mix zipped up here

• Uncle John’s Band (instrumental edit)
• Eyes of the World >
• China Doll
• Seastones > Full Band Freakout >
• Playin’ in the Band
• Morning Dew

The calendar above shows all the dates on which The Grateful Dead played a concert between their Europe 1972 tour and their last show of 1974.

• Black-boxed date: A show
• Green highlighting: An official release (in whole, or a significant, curated part)
• Yellow highlighting: A Save Your Face mixtape (including a significant portion of the show)

Note on the highlighting: If it is not absolutely obviously green, it is yellow.

Note on the black boxes: Look also for a dot below the date. A few dates got boxed by the shows around them, but were not show dates.

Quite a few dates have turned green since I first used this tool to track my 1972-1974 listening/curation project, three-five years ago. Additional Save Your Face mixes since then have turned numerous other dates yellow (Fall ’72 and September '74, mainly).

Credit to Dave Lemieux for dropping pins into spaces that were previously empty in the official release category. The only clusters of shows that are not well represented by official releases (green) are the last three months of 1972, likely due to poor soundboard mixes, and early 1973, likely due to sloppy playing. (Jams were great at both times, however.) Also, most September 1973 shows featured the horn section, which is both their appeal and a barrier to their release.

You can align dates with specific releases using this handy tool. 

Seeing the entirety of performances from this period (black boxed dates), all at once, always shocks me. For me, it’s the era of infinity Dead. Strange to see it rendered so finitely, with so many months with zero or few shows. 

Speaking of infinity, if you’re a 1972-1974 Head, SYF has some more esoteric comps to check out - just China>Rider jams, all the era’s Spanish & MLB jams, vast Dark Star mashups, summer ’73 Phil Jazz Jams, etc. There’s no way to put those on the calendar, but you can find most of them in the Thematic Exploration category of the library.