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carvinkeeper12I just finished a class titled Artists & Audiences. It was taught by Robert Christgau, and was a combination music history and music criticism class. The first paper was a short discussion of one of your favorite bands (I did Mindless Self Indulgence), the second was about a pre-rock figure (I wrote about Richard Wagner and The Ring Cycle), and the final was again writing a long discussion about a band.
For this third paper, I had a tough time deciding who I wanted to write about. I'd already tackled They Might Be Giants, so they were out. The Dresden Dolls have also appeared in papers for two separate classes, so they were also out. I thought about writing about Led Zeppelin, as they were the first band I got really obsessed with, but a part of me decided I didn't want to. Then I realized that since this was supposed to be partly a research paper, I should do The Grateful Dead.
My parents are Deadheads. I've always known that. I know the basic members of the band, and many of the songs, but I never actually knew the full history of the band. So, I decided I could use this as a way to maybe figure out my parents a little better. I did, but not in ways I expected because I decided to focus the paper on the Dead's attitude towards the bootlegging of their shows and how it greatly differed than most other bands' views on the subject. I went and found some really interesting articles on the subject, and even formally interviewed my mom. It's been fun, and multiple of my parents friends requested copies before I even had decided what I was focusing on. I decided to reproduce it here as well.
Rare, Encouraged Illegality
or
How Being Raised on the Grateful Dead Helped Me Question Authority
Ever since I can remember, I have been listening to bootleg tapes of Grateful Dead concerts. My parents claim that they own all of the band’s studio albums, but I can only recall seeing one in vinyl and maybe two CDs. It is the tapes that get played most often, the tapes that I am familiar with and that taught me to appreciate live shows so much. By growing up listening to those tapes (and by tapes I mean bootleg recordings of live shows) I expect that seeing bands live will throw a new twist on a familiar song. How will it differ from when they recorded it? How will it differ from the first time they played it? How will it differ from the last time I saw it? There will always be a difference – even with bands that perform their music close to the studio version every time. Taping live shows and expecting them to be different every time seems to be a mentality almost completely unique to Deadheads. Most bands play their songs live exactly as on the record because their fans expect that. Most bands try to punish those taping their concerts. The Grateful Dead did not. Their fans followed them on tour for twenty years, taping the shows the whole time. If anything, allowing fans to tape their shows the Dead formed a stronger bond with their fans, setting themselves apart from most other bands in existence.
The Grateful Dead formed in 1965 in San Francisco. The original band included Jerry Garcia (guitar/banjo/vocals), Bob Weir (rhythm guitar/vocals), Phil Lesh (bass/vocals), Ron “Pigpen” McKernan (keyboards/vocals), and Bill Kreutzmann (drums). They began as The Warlocks, but needed to change their name due to another band already recording under that name. There are several stories on how the name The Grateful Dead was picked, but the important thing is that it stuck and became synonymous in many ways with the hippie movement, especially the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. Over their existence there were several lineup changes. Mickey Hart joined in 1967 as a second drummer, taking over more exotic percussion parts and adding another layer to Kreutzmann’s straight-ahead jazz/r&b sound. Between 1968 and 1970 they also added TC Constanten as a second keyboardist, allowing Pigpen to play other percussion and take over more vocal lines. As Pigpen took ill and was asked by doctors to not tour, Keith Godchaux took over as a replacement and ended up staying with the band after Pigpen’s death in 1973. Godchaux’s wife Donna also joined as a backup vocalist, adding a new sound to the band by introducing interesting harmonies throughout the ‘70s. The couple left in 1979 and Keith was killed in a car crash in 1980. Brent Myland joined as the replacement keyboardist and vocalist; this lineup remained fairly stable, except for various sit-in musicians, until Myland’s death in 1990. Vince Welnick was brought in as the final replacement until the death of Jerry Garcia in August of 1995 caused the remaining members to decide to put the band’s existence into the past tense. However, beginning in 1998 rotating lineups of the original members and friends played Grateful Dead tunes as The Other Ones before adopting the name of The Dead in 2003. After their 2004 tour, disagreements arose between Bob Weir and Phil Lesh over who from their side projects would fill out the band. This lead to an indefinite hiatus for the band which was only broken in 2008 when they were asked to play a benefit for Barack Obama. After rehearsals they decided to do another tour in April and May of 2009, with an appearance at the Rothbury Festival in Minnesota in July.
The varying musical background of the members contributed to their unique sound, which became called jam band. They are credited with helping to define the psychedelic rock sound of the 1960s, and some even argue they can be labeled as progressive rock. It is improvisational rock and roll with influences from every genre imaginable. Most songs feature heavy jazz and blues elements, with bluegrass and folk undertones cropping up almost as often. Their first few albums were reflections of their live shows, but in the early ‘70s they condensed the studio versions of songs to a more straightforward, pop format, saving their jamming for the live show. This departure between album and live helped contribute to the Dead’s status as a cult band. People began following them on tour because the improv guaranteed that the show would be different every night. Fans were fascinated to see the differences in setlist: what they chose to open with, what the encore was, how the songs flowed into each other, and whether a song would be left unfinished only to be brought back and closed later in the set. Eventually patterns emerged. Usually the band would alternate authors, first playing a song written by Jerry, then one by Weir, then another one by Jerry, etc. Also, in the beginning at least, Phil Lesh would rarely sing live. Though he sang on the studio albums he wouldn’t usually open his mouth at concerts.
Fans following the band on became known as the Deadheads, a lifestyle in its own right. The band encouraged their live shows to be a place of happiness. Even though some of the songs were about unhappy subjects or down-on-their-luck characters, the overall vibe of the concert was positive and welcoming. People gathered before shows, and those following the band on tour tended to make crafts and other goods to sell in the parking lot before the event started each night. It even became normal for people to show up to concerts without tickets, standing along the roadway with their arm raised and one finger up to indicate that they needed a “miracle.” This was both a song reference (to “I Need a Miracle”), and an indication that they would be willing to buy any extra ticket you might happen to have. Another surprise was that those selling the tickets didn’t scalp them for the longest time. They would be sold at cost or even at a discount. My mom reports that she didn’t encounter anyone scalping Dead tickets until the late ‘80s. Among older fans this spirit still lives on – at a Phil and Friends show this past October my mom sold our group’s extra ticket to a stranger at cost, never thinking they might be willing to pay more for a chance to see the sold-out show. Another way to get tickets was by mail order. This had very specific directions, requiring you to write on the outside of the envelope which venue you wanted tickets for and which night at that venue you wished to attend. Inside you would place a money order made out to Grateful Dead Tickets. If anything were wrong, the envelope would just be sent back. Deadheads took this as another opportunity to be creative; there are whole coffee-table books dedicated to pictures of the intricate artwork adorning many of the envelopes sent in over the years.
The trend of recording the band’s shows began early on, as an estimated 2200 out of their total of about 2350 concerts are available, somewhere. The understanding between the band and the fans has always been that as long as the tapes are merely traded or given to friends, and not sold for profit, the practice would be allowed to continue. At first, people would merely bring a microphone into the concert somehow, and bootleg the show from wherever they happened to be standing. Quickly, people realized that since the soundboard was in an ideal place to hear the overall mix of the music, they should stand near the soundboard for the best quality recording. The band already had it on record that they did not mind taping (Jerry Garcia is quoted in several places as saying “when we are done with it, you can have it”) but eventually the forest of seven-foot microphone stands in front of the soundboard impaired the view of the engineers. To remedy this problem, the band began selling special ‘taper tickets’ that allowed them into a designated area directly behind the soundboard. All fans knew this, and out of respect for the tapers and those who collected tapes the portion of the crowd right around the tapers section would remain fairly quiet. In other places concertgoers might be dissecting and discussing the concert as it went on, but around the tapers they would try to refrain from adding audience noise. The number of tapers at each show would vary, but there could be hundreds. Extra special to collectors are those tapes recorded by people with sophisticated enough equipment to be allowed to patch into the soundboard. These recordings tend to be of higher quality and are lacking audience noise altogether.
As technology advanced from the 1960s, the quality of recordings increased. Technologically savvy fans were skilled at capturing recordings of near-soundboard quality, and some people became obsessed with collecting as many shows as possible of the highest possible quality. The invention of both the CD and the Internet aided these collectors. First of all, CDs could be easier to store than tapes, and afforded yet another opportunity for Deadhead art. Second, the Internet allowed serious collectors to find each other more easily in order to add to their collections. A family friend who wanted to get more serious in his collecting met one such collector in the parking lot of a show, and was brought into a secretive website group or directory for tape trading. Nobody in my family is sure exactly what it was, but we speculate it was a way for people to create and share lists of the high-quality tapes they owned and were willing to trade. However, those in charge were very selective in who they allowed to access the database, so we assume they wanted to keep it from being flooded with lower quality recordings. While the hardcore tapers were secretive and wanted to trade their highest-quality tapes for other highest-quality tapes, people like my parents relied on the generosity of friends making copies of good shows they acquired to share, and pass these on to others who would appreciate them. As time goes on, though, people labor to create packaging and cover art for the unique shows they have taped, and have begun to sell them in order to recoup the costs for the materials and shipping of this creativity. As such, there are now record stores that have bins of bootlegged tapes available for sale, though for much less than a studio record or the live collections put out by the band. It was through rooting through such a bin that my parents came across a recording of the famous performance at the closing of the Winterland Ballroom on New Years of 1978-1979. It is one of my favorites of the tapes we have, and it was on heavy rotation in the car right after its purchase.
After going almost exclusively to Dead shows during her late high school and college years, my mom was shocked when she realized that the Grateful Dead were one of very few bands that had this attitude towards the taping of their shows. And yet, the vast majority of people in the music industry see the taping of live shows as a betrayal by a fan and a form of theft. They are not unfounded in this view. It is true that there are people who will attempt to tape the rehearsals of bands, during which they are not at their best or are practicing new material that they do not want the public to hear yet. They believe that people who trade tapes will forgo spending money for sanctioned live recordings or studio albums. And it is true that those people exist. There are those who would prefer a free, but high quality tape of a concert or rehearsal over an even higher quality recording that costs money.
To be honest, I can’t really find much to say on the side against the taping of concerts. In my personal opinion I am all for fans recording and trading tapes of their favorite bands’ live shows. I understand the argument of asking them to not sell bootlegs for profit, but otherwise I do not see any harm in allowing people to create these memory keepsakes for themselves. Personally, beyond the Grateful Dead, I have gathered bootlegged recordings of live shows by Led Zeppelin and They Might Be Giants. In the case of Zeppelin, I have never been able to see them live, and probably never will be able to. It is nice to have a copy of a show from when they played in my hometown of Seattle, especially because it is a show with a story. The entire band was sick, and it is full of mistakes, but knowing the tale and being able to hear how it affected one of my favorite bands is a great and fascinating experience. I have managed to attend several They Might Be Giants shows, but having recordings of two of the ones I attended is a great gift. I am able to re-live the experience, listening to banter that made me laugh but I had forgotten. One of them is from the first show of theirs I ever attended, and when I was at it I did not know the band and their library well enough to fully appreciate what a wonderful show it was. If I were to see that show for the first time now, being much more familiar with their catalogue, it would definitely be my favorite show of theirs I have seen. By having a copy of it, I am able to appreciate it in a way I didn’t then. I can also pass it along to other fans who were unable to attend a historic, first-time-sold-out Beacon Theater concert. Or, I can share it with friends who I might be taking to the next show in order to get them excited for what they are about to witness.
Tapers record live shows out of their love for the band, not to cause detriment. They do it to be able to bring people there who were unable to attend. They do it so that when they are going senile they can better remember events important to them. They do not turn a profit from the recordings, and see themselves as spreading the love of the band to others. There is evidence to support this too. Between 1980 and 1987, the Grateful Dead did not release a studio album, yet they continued touring. And yet, their audience grew for the entire seven years in which only old studio material was available and the only new product emerging were the tapes that fans were trading and playing for their friends. When they did finally release their next studio album in 1987 it went platinum and became the fastest-selling album of their career.
The band has even used the tape collectors as a resource, enlisting an archivist named Dick Latvala to create Dick’s Picks, a series of collections of high-quality and favorite collections of the songs from various live shows. This has proven commercially viable to the point that they have released 36 volumes between 1993 and 2005. They have also released their From the Vault collection based on multi-track recordings taken through the soundboard, but this is only viable for a limited supply of shows. Dick has access to a great many more from tapers that he can pick the best of the best from to re-master and enhance the quality of as much as possible.
There are drawbacks to taping live shows, yes, but overall it seems that bands and fans both benefit from the practice. Allowing fans to record live shows, as the Grateful Dead were one of the first to do, creates an atmosphere of trust and allows the fans to connect to the music in a deeper way. And isn’t that – connection and emotion – really why music, why all art truly exists?
It was also a lot of fun to write this because I'm heading to my first Dead show three days after I get home. May 16th they finish up the tour they're currently on at The Gorge in George, Washington. I'm not completely positive it will be my first Dead show, but the concert I do remember was when I was small. I can really only remember being surrounded by my parents' Deadhead friends and tye-dye. It was at Memorial Stadium in Seattle, so it may have been during Bumbershoot, but my dad thinks it also might have been The Jerry Garcia Band or several other acts that attracted the same Seattle hippie scene. So, this May will be my first official Dead show. It's going to be a great time, and researching for and writing that essay has given me a nice anticipation.
For this third paper, I had a tough time deciding who I wanted to write about. I'd already tackled They Might Be Giants, so they were out. The Dresden Dolls have also appeared in papers for two separate classes, so they were also out. I thought about writing about Led Zeppelin, as they were the first band I got really obsessed with, but a part of me decided I didn't want to. Then I realized that since this was supposed to be partly a research paper, I should do The Grateful Dead.
My parents are Deadheads. I've always known that. I know the basic members of the band, and many of the songs, but I never actually knew the full history of the band. So, I decided I could use this as a way to maybe figure out my parents a little better. I did, but not in ways I expected because I decided to focus the paper on the Dead's attitude towards the bootlegging of their shows and how it greatly differed than most other bands' views on the subject. I went and found some really interesting articles on the subject, and even formally interviewed my mom. It's been fun, and multiple of my parents friends requested copies before I even had decided what I was focusing on. I decided to reproduce it here as well.
or
How Being Raised on the Grateful Dead Helped Me Question Authority
Ever since I can remember, I have been listening to bootleg tapes of Grateful Dead concerts. My parents claim that they own all of the band’s studio albums, but I can only recall seeing one in vinyl and maybe two CDs. It is the tapes that get played most often, the tapes that I am familiar with and that taught me to appreciate live shows so much. By growing up listening to those tapes (and by tapes I mean bootleg recordings of live shows) I expect that seeing bands live will throw a new twist on a familiar song. How will it differ from when they recorded it? How will it differ from the first time they played it? How will it differ from the last time I saw it? There will always be a difference – even with bands that perform their music close to the studio version every time. Taping live shows and expecting them to be different every time seems to be a mentality almost completely unique to Deadheads. Most bands play their songs live exactly as on the record because their fans expect that. Most bands try to punish those taping their concerts. The Grateful Dead did not. Their fans followed them on tour for twenty years, taping the shows the whole time. If anything, allowing fans to tape their shows the Dead formed a stronger bond with their fans, setting themselves apart from most other bands in existence.
The Grateful Dead formed in 1965 in San Francisco. The original band included Jerry Garcia (guitar/banjo/vocals), Bob Weir (rhythm guitar/vocals), Phil Lesh (bass/vocals), Ron “Pigpen” McKernan (keyboards/vocals), and Bill Kreutzmann (drums). They began as The Warlocks, but needed to change their name due to another band already recording under that name. There are several stories on how the name The Grateful Dead was picked, but the important thing is that it stuck and became synonymous in many ways with the hippie movement, especially the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco. Over their existence there were several lineup changes. Mickey Hart joined in 1967 as a second drummer, taking over more exotic percussion parts and adding another layer to Kreutzmann’s straight-ahead jazz/r&b sound. Between 1968 and 1970 they also added TC Constanten as a second keyboardist, allowing Pigpen to play other percussion and take over more vocal lines. As Pigpen took ill and was asked by doctors to not tour, Keith Godchaux took over as a replacement and ended up staying with the band after Pigpen’s death in 1973. Godchaux’s wife Donna also joined as a backup vocalist, adding a new sound to the band by introducing interesting harmonies throughout the ‘70s. The couple left in 1979 and Keith was killed in a car crash in 1980. Brent Myland joined as the replacement keyboardist and vocalist; this lineup remained fairly stable, except for various sit-in musicians, until Myland’s death in 1990. Vince Welnick was brought in as the final replacement until the death of Jerry Garcia in August of 1995 caused the remaining members to decide to put the band’s existence into the past tense. However, beginning in 1998 rotating lineups of the original members and friends played Grateful Dead tunes as The Other Ones before adopting the name of The Dead in 2003. After their 2004 tour, disagreements arose between Bob Weir and Phil Lesh over who from their side projects would fill out the band. This lead to an indefinite hiatus for the band which was only broken in 2008 when they were asked to play a benefit for Barack Obama. After rehearsals they decided to do another tour in April and May of 2009, with an appearance at the Rothbury Festival in Minnesota in July.
The varying musical background of the members contributed to their unique sound, which became called jam band. They are credited with helping to define the psychedelic rock sound of the 1960s, and some even argue they can be labeled as progressive rock. It is improvisational rock and roll with influences from every genre imaginable. Most songs feature heavy jazz and blues elements, with bluegrass and folk undertones cropping up almost as often. Their first few albums were reflections of their live shows, but in the early ‘70s they condensed the studio versions of songs to a more straightforward, pop format, saving their jamming for the live show. This departure between album and live helped contribute to the Dead’s status as a cult band. People began following them on tour because the improv guaranteed that the show would be different every night. Fans were fascinated to see the differences in setlist: what they chose to open with, what the encore was, how the songs flowed into each other, and whether a song would be left unfinished only to be brought back and closed later in the set. Eventually patterns emerged. Usually the band would alternate authors, first playing a song written by Jerry, then one by Weir, then another one by Jerry, etc. Also, in the beginning at least, Phil Lesh would rarely sing live. Though he sang on the studio albums he wouldn’t usually open his mouth at concerts.
Fans following the band on became known as the Deadheads, a lifestyle in its own right. The band encouraged their live shows to be a place of happiness. Even though some of the songs were about unhappy subjects or down-on-their-luck characters, the overall vibe of the concert was positive and welcoming. People gathered before shows, and those following the band on tour tended to make crafts and other goods to sell in the parking lot before the event started each night. It even became normal for people to show up to concerts without tickets, standing along the roadway with their arm raised and one finger up to indicate that they needed a “miracle.” This was both a song reference (to “I Need a Miracle”), and an indication that they would be willing to buy any extra ticket you might happen to have. Another surprise was that those selling the tickets didn’t scalp them for the longest time. They would be sold at cost or even at a discount. My mom reports that she didn’t encounter anyone scalping Dead tickets until the late ‘80s. Among older fans this spirit still lives on – at a Phil and Friends show this past October my mom sold our group’s extra ticket to a stranger at cost, never thinking they might be willing to pay more for a chance to see the sold-out show. Another way to get tickets was by mail order. This had very specific directions, requiring you to write on the outside of the envelope which venue you wanted tickets for and which night at that venue you wished to attend. Inside you would place a money order made out to Grateful Dead Tickets. If anything were wrong, the envelope would just be sent back. Deadheads took this as another opportunity to be creative; there are whole coffee-table books dedicated to pictures of the intricate artwork adorning many of the envelopes sent in over the years.
The trend of recording the band’s shows began early on, as an estimated 2200 out of their total of about 2350 concerts are available, somewhere. The understanding between the band and the fans has always been that as long as the tapes are merely traded or given to friends, and not sold for profit, the practice would be allowed to continue. At first, people would merely bring a microphone into the concert somehow, and bootleg the show from wherever they happened to be standing. Quickly, people realized that since the soundboard was in an ideal place to hear the overall mix of the music, they should stand near the soundboard for the best quality recording. The band already had it on record that they did not mind taping (Jerry Garcia is quoted in several places as saying “when we are done with it, you can have it”) but eventually the forest of seven-foot microphone stands in front of the soundboard impaired the view of the engineers. To remedy this problem, the band began selling special ‘taper tickets’ that allowed them into a designated area directly behind the soundboard. All fans knew this, and out of respect for the tapers and those who collected tapes the portion of the crowd right around the tapers section would remain fairly quiet. In other places concertgoers might be dissecting and discussing the concert as it went on, but around the tapers they would try to refrain from adding audience noise. The number of tapers at each show would vary, but there could be hundreds. Extra special to collectors are those tapes recorded by people with sophisticated enough equipment to be allowed to patch into the soundboard. These recordings tend to be of higher quality and are lacking audience noise altogether.
As technology advanced from the 1960s, the quality of recordings increased. Technologically savvy fans were skilled at capturing recordings of near-soundboard quality, and some people became obsessed with collecting as many shows as possible of the highest possible quality. The invention of both the CD and the Internet aided these collectors. First of all, CDs could be easier to store than tapes, and afforded yet another opportunity for Deadhead art. Second, the Internet allowed serious collectors to find each other more easily in order to add to their collections. A family friend who wanted to get more serious in his collecting met one such collector in the parking lot of a show, and was brought into a secretive website group or directory for tape trading. Nobody in my family is sure exactly what it was, but we speculate it was a way for people to create and share lists of the high-quality tapes they owned and were willing to trade. However, those in charge were very selective in who they allowed to access the database, so we assume they wanted to keep it from being flooded with lower quality recordings. While the hardcore tapers were secretive and wanted to trade their highest-quality tapes for other highest-quality tapes, people like my parents relied on the generosity of friends making copies of good shows they acquired to share, and pass these on to others who would appreciate them. As time goes on, though, people labor to create packaging and cover art for the unique shows they have taped, and have begun to sell them in order to recoup the costs for the materials and shipping of this creativity. As such, there are now record stores that have bins of bootlegged tapes available for sale, though for much less than a studio record or the live collections put out by the band. It was through rooting through such a bin that my parents came across a recording of the famous performance at the closing of the Winterland Ballroom on New Years of 1978-1979. It is one of my favorites of the tapes we have, and it was on heavy rotation in the car right after its purchase.
After going almost exclusively to Dead shows during her late high school and college years, my mom was shocked when she realized that the Grateful Dead were one of very few bands that had this attitude towards the taping of their shows. And yet, the vast majority of people in the music industry see the taping of live shows as a betrayal by a fan and a form of theft. They are not unfounded in this view. It is true that there are people who will attempt to tape the rehearsals of bands, during which they are not at their best or are practicing new material that they do not want the public to hear yet. They believe that people who trade tapes will forgo spending money for sanctioned live recordings or studio albums. And it is true that those people exist. There are those who would prefer a free, but high quality tape of a concert or rehearsal over an even higher quality recording that costs money.
To be honest, I can’t really find much to say on the side against the taping of concerts. In my personal opinion I am all for fans recording and trading tapes of their favorite bands’ live shows. I understand the argument of asking them to not sell bootlegs for profit, but otherwise I do not see any harm in allowing people to create these memory keepsakes for themselves. Personally, beyond the Grateful Dead, I have gathered bootlegged recordings of live shows by Led Zeppelin and They Might Be Giants. In the case of Zeppelin, I have never been able to see them live, and probably never will be able to. It is nice to have a copy of a show from when they played in my hometown of Seattle, especially because it is a show with a story. The entire band was sick, and it is full of mistakes, but knowing the tale and being able to hear how it affected one of my favorite bands is a great and fascinating experience. I have managed to attend several They Might Be Giants shows, but having recordings of two of the ones I attended is a great gift. I am able to re-live the experience, listening to banter that made me laugh but I had forgotten. One of them is from the first show of theirs I ever attended, and when I was at it I did not know the band and their library well enough to fully appreciate what a wonderful show it was. If I were to see that show for the first time now, being much more familiar with their catalogue, it would definitely be my favorite show of theirs I have seen. By having a copy of it, I am able to appreciate it in a way I didn’t then. I can also pass it along to other fans who were unable to attend a historic, first-time-sold-out Beacon Theater concert. Or, I can share it with friends who I might be taking to the next show in order to get them excited for what they are about to witness.
Tapers record live shows out of their love for the band, not to cause detriment. They do it to be able to bring people there who were unable to attend. They do it so that when they are going senile they can better remember events important to them. They do not turn a profit from the recordings, and see themselves as spreading the love of the band to others. There is evidence to support this too. Between 1980 and 1987, the Grateful Dead did not release a studio album, yet they continued touring. And yet, their audience grew for the entire seven years in which only old studio material was available and the only new product emerging were the tapes that fans were trading and playing for their friends. When they did finally release their next studio album in 1987 it went platinum and became the fastest-selling album of their career.
The band has even used the tape collectors as a resource, enlisting an archivist named Dick Latvala to create Dick’s Picks, a series of collections of high-quality and favorite collections of the songs from various live shows. This has proven commercially viable to the point that they have released 36 volumes between 1993 and 2005. They have also released their From the Vault collection based on multi-track recordings taken through the soundboard, but this is only viable for a limited supply of shows. Dick has access to a great many more from tapers that he can pick the best of the best from to re-master and enhance the quality of as much as possible.
There are drawbacks to taping live shows, yes, but overall it seems that bands and fans both benefit from the practice. Allowing fans to record live shows, as the Grateful Dead were one of the first to do, creates an atmosphere of trust and allows the fans to connect to the music in a deeper way. And isn’t that – connection and emotion – really why music, why all art truly exists?
It was also a lot of fun to write this because I'm heading to my first Dead show three days after I get home. May 16th they finish up the tour they're currently on at The Gorge in George, Washington. I'm not completely positive it will be my first Dead show, but the concert I do remember was when I was small. I can really only remember being surrounded by my parents' Deadhead friends and tye-dye. It was at Memorial Stadium in Seattle, so it may have been during Bumbershoot, but my dad thinks it also might have been The Jerry Garcia Band or several other acts that attracted the same Seattle hippie scene. So, this May will be my first official Dead show. It's going to be a great time, and researching for and writing that essay has given me a nice anticipation.
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