Friday, July 2, 2021






















June 27-28,1969: santa rosa veteran's auditorium, w/jorma kaukonen, jack casady, joey covington, and the cleanliness & godliness skiffle band.

the poster detailing this run, advertised the dead at the top of the bill for 3 nights of music--friday and saturday (june 27-28) at the veterans memorial building in santa rosa, and sunday (june 29) at a place called the barn in rio nido. it would seem that the rio nido show didn't materialize as neither a tape or a setlist exists. jorma & jack weren't using the name hot tuna for their local gigs, and these performances with covington were an early, electric iteration of the tuna. CGSB were a locally popular berkeley band, who had released one album on the Vanguard label in 1968.

the friday and saturday night shows offer a nice snapshot of the grateful dead in transition. eight days after the release of aoxomoxoa and a year shy of the seminal workingman's dead, the boys use these concerts to dig into old stuff and to work out a bunch of newly penned tunes. jerry breaks out his newly acquired pedal steel on a number of songs, which he only recently had begun playing in public with john dawson, david nelson and a few others, starting in may. another interesting side-note is that mickey hart was late for the opening show and the dead asked CGSB drummer, tom ralston, to join kruetzmann until hart arrived. word is that ralston was quite surprised to be asked to sit in with the dead with no preparation. listening to the performance, it seems he did just fine.

the friday night show begins with a spirited take on the johnny horton tune slewfoot, with weir on acoustic guitar, jerry playing pedal steel, and peter grant sitting in on 5-string banjo. a mama tried > high time pairing is next. both tunes are in their embryonic form, but come off sounding quite good. dupree's diamond blues is already taking shape and is the only aoxomoxoa tune they'll play in the set. a couple of workingman's songs-casey jones and dire wolf, a down and dirty big boss man, and the standard '69 sitting on top of the world later, we arrive at the extended jamming portion of the night, with a magnificent dark star suite. it's loaded with twists and turns, and is surely one of the standout versions of the year. the oft-coupled st. stephen is a smoker but, unfortunately, the eleven that follows is cut prematurely. the show concludes with a twangy take on curly putman's green, green grass of home, and a slow and almost perfect rendition of dylan's it's all over now baby blue.

the second of the two consecutive dates at the veterans auditorium kicks off exactly like the first: cowboy bob crooning out slewfoot, with garcia on pedal steel and green picking his banjo. silver threads and silver needles follows and includes more steel work from jerome. mama tried is next, with jerry switching to electric guitar; like the previous night it's played at a slow tempo and highlights grant's dobro prowess. after a playful chiding of bear for non-existent drum monitors, weir introduces john dawson. the two of them sing a duet on me & my uncle, something they would later do during the 1970 nrps sets. a well received doin' that rag follows. at the conclusion of the a cappella section, jerry immediately begins strumming the opening chords to high time, which is nicely done with tight harmonies. the show concludes with a pigpen sandwich. first, a slow grinding i'm a kingbee, with a bluesy solo from garcia. a straightforward sittin' on top of the world follows before returning the spotlight to pig proper, as the band kicks into high gear with turn on your lovelight. the lengthy and well-jammed lovelight serves as the high point of the performance and brings the short, but thoroughly enjoyable show to a close.

the 70 minute set seems to indicate that the dead got started late on this night and were up against a local curfew. as the audience clamors for more, the announcer explains that the santa rosa police won't let the show go past midnight: "i'm sure they'd like to play all night, but we have to stop now...there'll be a jam session tomorrow night at 8:00 o'clock, they'll be here." of course, the dead didn't return to the auditorium the following evening. based on the exceptional and diverse offerings presented at these two memorable gigs, one can only imagine that it most certainly would have been satisfying.

https://archive.org/details/gd69-06-27.sbd.samaritano.20547.sbeok.shnf

https://archive.org/details/gd69-06-28.sbd.cole.3300.sbeok.shnf
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