My transcription didn’t get very far using this method. I couldn’t believe the intricacy! I couldn’t fathom how it was being done.Īnd I don’t think I actually understood very many of the words-they were more like part of the instrumentation, like the poetry of HD Moe that I later came to love because he used words in this way to create a stained-glass verbal image.įirst, I started in the time-honored method of lifting the needle from the groove and setting it back just a bit to try to catch the words. I lay on the floor of their living room, and stared at the cottage-cheese ceiling, and watched the patterns form and re-form there, to the music that was playing-such a delicate constellation of intertwined guitar notes. And that night, I put it on my parents’ record player-an old Magnavox console-when they were somewhere out and about, and listened. She told me I should buy the triple Europe ’72 album, so I did. She was a huge Deadhead, and I was a neophyte. I was home for Christmas break from college, and a friend and I went shopping for records. I relish each new dive into this song.Īnd I’m not sure why this is. I don’t tire of the interplay between the words and the music. I don’t tire of it musically, or lyrically. And I have spent many hours with it over the years, never getting tired of it. This song opened my ears to the band in a big way. And in particular the Europe ’72 recording. I mean, if I had to whittle it all down to just one song I could bring with me, this would be it. Celebrating the start of a new year seems like an appropriate occasion, so let’s look at what is probably my number one desert-island song. I wasn’t sure exactly why, but I had been saving “China Cat Sunflower” for a special occasion. (I’ll consider requests for particular songs-just private message me!) Therefore, the best part, I would hope, would not be anything in particular that I might have to say, but rather, the conversation that may happen via the comments over the course of time-and since all the posts will stay up, you can feel free to weigh in any time on any of the songs! With Grateful Dead lyrics, there’s always a new and different take on what they bring up for each listener, it seems. Also noted with pleasure is the appearance of “Box of Rain,” which the Dead performed live sparingly.Here’s the plan-each week, I will blog about a different song, focusing, usually, on the lyrics, but also on some other aspects of the song, including its overall impact-a truly subjective thing. As usual, it’s the medleys that hold the most jaw-dropping feats of improvisational derring-do the first night’s “Dark Star/Eyes of the World/Mississippi Half-Step Uptown Toodeloo” is seamlessly sublime (or is that sublimely seamless?), while the second night’s “Truckin’/The Other One/Eyes of the World/”Morning Dew” covers a prodigious amount of terrain, from raucous to frenzied to lilting to lyrical in the space of nearly one glorious hour. These two 1973 concerts take place about two weeks after the Dead added a large number of new, jazzy numbers to their repertoire, one of which (“Eyes of the World”) plays a central role in both shows excerpted here (though these are not complete shows, only one song, “Deal,” that was played either of these nights does not appear here in at least in one version). 28-2/26/73 Pershing Municipal Auditorium, Lincoln, NE 2/28/73 Salt Palace, Salt Lake City, UT.
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