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6/29/76: auditorium theatre, chicago, IL.
mangrove valley has been up and running for over 4 years now and not once have i ventured to write about a grateful dead show played later than 1975. the reasoning behind this choice is not based solely on the huge stockpile of incredible pre-retirement tapes to explore and deconstruct on the archive, it’s also largely informed by a simple personal fact: i’m a full-on early years dead freak. despite my adoration of the noisy, unhinged experimental stuff of old, i’ve certainly hedged towards the later seventies by including three of the four 1975 dates, with detailed posts/links to the largely instrumental SNACK benefit concert, the bob fried memorial boogie at winterland featuring jerry garcia & friends, and the excellent bob menke field-recording from lindley meadows. my only omission is the great american music hall performance, which has been more than well-documented and digitized for posterity in the one from the vault release. as an aside, i even included a brief post about the alan bershaw transfer of bob gurman’s studio reel that documents the first of the blues for allah practice sessions at bob weir’s mill valley home.
so, what made me want to stray from my longstanding focus on gigs played prior to the 1 ½ year hiatus from touring? the answer arrived via the united states postal service in late march in the form of the new june 1976 box set. listening to the five shows and fifteen discs that make up this fine compilation has given me a whole new appreciation for the comeback year with its small concert halls and revamped sound system. my curiosity was fired after communing with the boston, new york city, and passaic dates contained within the neatly packaged set, and i promptly dove into the archive for a more discerning listen to the 1976 canon. a few shows into my foraging, i landed on the final performance of the 4-night run at the old auditorium theatre in chicago. but before i gush about the 6/29 performance, let me set the table with a few details about the dead's reentry into the touring fold.
much has been written about what promoted the philosophical shift that transitioned the dead from the big stadium wall of sound touring machine to a band that opted for smaller venues and a compact dual PA system. garcia summed it up nicely when he told local san francisco tv host, father john riley, in an interview the same month the band announced its return: “we felt that [we] reached the end of a certain level, that cul-de-sac, in terms of a rock ‘n roll group. what we call the mega-gig, the huge stadium, we played in those…[and] we felt that it was a dead end. it got to be totally controlled, airplane to motel, motel to gig, heavy security, nobody near the stage. what’s worse, it’s reflected in [how] those very large places deal with people, that cattle prod methodology. lots of cops, lots of frisk lines, lots of tightness. what we wanted to do was definitely not that. so it became a question of what we wanted to do?”
what they did was unprecedented for a rock band at that time. in a radical new attempt at direct marketing, the dead announced it's first 18 shows of the bicentennial via Dead Heads with instructions about how to mail order tickets. the notice included the following language: "we don't want to pack around the equipment necessary to do ultralarge productions. in plain fact, we don't want to play giant gigs at all-so we're going back into smaller places, keep promotion way down and give you first crack at tickets." and that's how it went down. the shows were announced and the fans rabidly ate up the tickets and prepared for the revamped grateful dead, that featured the return of second drummer mickey hart after a half-decade absence. to make things-as bobby ace often liked to espouse-"exactly right," the group situated themselves at san francisco's orpheum theatre for a final round of technical rehearsals at the end of may. and to spice things up a tad more before embarking on their east coast run, they added a july 2nd tour closing show at jersey city's roosevelt stadium. the stage was set.
the culminating concert of the brief june tour finds the band in extremely solid form and demonstrates in spades the stripped-down, retooled, reinvented version of the good old grateful dead. the first set kicks of with a rare tennessee jed opener that sets the tone for the evening. jerome belts out the lyrics and rips through a few very satisfying solos. two weir-sung numbers and a sweet, lilting take on peggy-o later, the band rolls out their last live performance of the JGB staple, mission in the rain. tonight's take is downright stirring. of note, donna godchaux's backing vocals on the hunter-garcia tune are gorgeous; she has fully integrated into the band by now and her time performing with jerry's side projects has really helped her smooth out her delivery and work with the monitors during live shows. a bit further into the first frame, the band delivers a barrelhouse version of the weir-barlow combo lazy lightning > supplication. the first two cuts from the recently released kingfish LP get an extended treatment, with some nice ensemble jamming on the backend. a long and tasty row jimmy is next, with just the right amount of slide work from jerome, followed by a music never stopped > might as well 1-2 punch that must have had a good number of folks feverishly spinning in the aisles.
the second set opens with the weir-led arrangement of reverend gary davis's sampson and delilah. this is a new tune for the band and will be a regular part of their repertoire and be played countless times over the next 20 years. this early take is a bit rough, but satisfying all the same. candyman is next. written in 1970, the song has been in obscurity for most of the years since, but now it comes into new focus and character. garcia's fill passages are delicate and transportive and, much like his ethereal pedal steel solo on american beauty, communicates the blues. after a rather lengthy bit of tuning up, the band beyond description plunges headlong into the centerpiece of set two. playing in the band has certainly been a vehicle for exploration and inventive jams since the europe '72 tour, and tonight's take is no exception. this version starts out rather innocently and quickly drops into a rich, jazzy improvisation. this initial jam soon digresses into a more dissonant soundscape; a few different grooves ensue with various members trading melody figures under jerry's extended leads. soon a new jam emerges, the drummers shift their rhythmic pattern, and the band slides effortlessly into the wheel. released on jerry's solo record in 1972, this tune doesn't get its live debut until this tour. this is their fourth performance and it's already beginning to take shape. about five minutes into the song the dead, as they often do, take a detour. garcia starts hinting at the other one, and this soon turns into a fast-paced jam with a driving piano riff by keith. the dance continues for a few more minutes before dropping into an open, free-form space that the band seems happy to mine for a while. in time, the incohesive becomes a connected, familiar groove and the group finds their way back to playing in the band. the retooled st. stephen is next, complete with a rocked out not fade away in place of the william tell bridge. and if that wasn't enough, there's still room for an upbeat one more saturday night and a funky u.s. blues encore.
recorded by betty cantor-jackson and mastered by scott clugston, this performance is aces from top to bottom. plug in some headphones and see for yourself. i'm guessing you'll dig it as much as i have.
