Garcia said “We were great for seconds on end.” I was lucky to see Jerry play for about 1,000,000 seconds exactly. Thanks for your 1,000,000 views here . Dave Davis wrote this blog for 500 posts and 5 years from 2015 to 2019. Contact me at twitter @gratefulseconds

Friday, October 18, 2019

Down and Out in New York City, February 11-14, 1970

This is likely the best 90 minute sequence in Grateful Dead History

 
Dark Star [30 minutes] > That's It For the Other One [30 minutes] > Turn On Your Lovelight [30 minute], the best version is Dick's Picks 4. Youtube can take you from Dark Star through the next hour and one half.

These runs are so famous there is not much to add. I'll just add some nuggets from local papers like the Voice, East Village Other, NY Times, Daily News et al.  For real analysis go to deadessays or long lost dead links where stars like Light Into Ashes, and Corry can tell you all. Also Owsley's link at the bottom is a must as well. 































  Deadlists
Band Grateful Dead
Venue Fillmore East
Location New York, NY
Date 2/11/70a - Wednesday posters tickets, passes & laminates
One [18:50] ; Black Peter ; Cryptical Envelopment > Drums > The Other One [#5:19] > Cryptical Envelopment [4:33] > Dire Wolf [4:21] ; Casey Jones [ 4:37]

Band Grateful Dead
Venue Fillmore East
Location New York, NY
Date 2/11/70b - Wednesday posters tickets, passes & laminates
One [1:20:46] ; Intro [0:30] ; Not Fade Away [11:58] ; [0:02] % Cumberland Blues [4:39] % [0:08] ; Cold Rain And Snow [5:16] ;[0:04] % [0:14] ; High Time [6:48] % [0:09] ; Me And My Uncle [2:58] ; [0:06] % [0:07] ; Dark Star [16:20] > Spanish Jam [9:23] > Turn On Your Lovelight [32:49] ; [0:49]
Encore [5:51] ; Intro [0:13] ; Uncle John's Band [5:14] ; [0:24]

http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/february-12-1970-unganos-new-york-ny.html

TAPES FROM FILLMORE EAST FEBRUARY 1970

Reportedly it was during this Late Show that clever and industrious Fillmore East stagecrew members including John Chester and Alan Mande managed to patch a Revox reel-to-reel deck with 15-inch reels into the PA feed underneath the stage, and the moment when our circulating SBD tape picks up the Dark Star, 10:23 after its opening, is the moment when they managed to get their jury-rigged system up and running. Circulating copies of this SBD master break off 3:41 before the end of the Lovelight; perhaps this cut is on the master. In addition to this 45 minute from 2/11/70 our enterprising heroes taped the Late Shows on the 13th and 14th (but apparently not the Early Shows), and copies of these tapes have been in circulation since the early 70s.

Bear also ran SBD masters of the 13th and 14th, and much of this material has now been released on Bear's Choice and Dick's Pick 4. However, it is unclear whether there is any SBD from the 11th in the vault. For the Dick's Picks 4 release, Jeffrey Norman patched gaps in the vault SBDs of the 13th and 14th using the surreptitious second SBD masters -- good karma all around. The GD Records / Polygram Records CD, "Allman Bros Band Fillmore East February 1970," (GDCD 4063) releases tape of the Allmans from this run and may contain tunes from this date.

Recently, SBD tapes of the Early Shows from 2/13 and 2/14 have come into circulation, in FM and pre-FM copies.


Band Grateful Dead
Venue Fillmore East
Location New York, NY
Date 2/13/70a - Friday posters tickets, passes & laminates
One [50:48] ; Cold Rain And Snow [5:27] ; [1:03] ; Beat It On Down The Line [2:01] ; [0:27] ; Good Lovin' [1:41] > Drums [2:04] > Good Lovin' [4:41] % [0:33] ; Mama Tried [2:31] > Black Peter [9:12] ; [1:50] ; Hard To Handle [6:12] % Saint Stephen [6:35] > Not Fade Away [9:02]
Encore [4:41] ; Casey Jones [4:27] ; [0:14]


Band Grateful Dead
Venue Fillmore East
Location New York, NY
Date 2/13/70b - Friday posters tickets, passes & laminates
One [2:48:09] ; Intro [1:15] ; China Cat Sunflower [2:53] > Jam [2:07] > I Know You Rider [4:13] ; [0:53] ; Me And My Uncle [3:10] ; [1:07] ; Dire Wolf [3:58] ; [0:59] ; Smokestack Lightnin' [18:00] ; [5:22] ; Monkey And The Engineer [1:37] ; [0:53] ; Little Sadie [2:45] ; [0:15] ; Wake Up Little Susie [2:36] > Black Peter [7:20] ; Uncle John's Band [6:50#] ; [3:12] ; Katie Mae [3:57] ; [2:54] ; Dark Star [29:21] > Cryptical Envelopment [1:56] > Drums [7:36] > The Other One [13:48] > Cryptical Envelopment [6:38] > Turn On Your Lovelight [30:12]
Encore [3:15] ; Tuning [0:56] ; And We Bid You Good Night [2:19#]
.

Band Grateful Dead
Venue Fillmore East
Location New York, NY
Date 2/14/70a - Saturday posters tickets, passes & laminates
One [1:05:17] ; Cold Rain And Snow; Dark Star [23:31] > Saint Stephen [6:42#] > The Eleven [#8:59] > Turn On Your Lovelight [23:33] ; [0:33]

Band Grateful Dead
Venue Fillmore East
Location New York, NY
Date 2/14/70b - Saturday posters tickets, passes & laminates
One [2:26:05] ; Intro [1:51] ; Casey Jones [4:29] ; [0:05] ; Mama Tried [2:31] ; [1:24] ; Hard To Handle [6:06] ; [3:18] ; Monkey And The Engineer [1:32] ; [0:43] ; Dark Hollow [2:37] ; [0:43] ; I've Been All Around This World [4:02] ; [0:18] ; Wake Up Little Susie [2:22] > Black Peter [7:19] ; [0:04] % Uncle John's Band [5:#54] ; [2:30] ; Katie Mae [3:19] ; [0:20] % [2:31] ; Dancing In The Street [9:15] ; [0:25] ; China Cat Sunflower [3:09] > Jam [2:37] > I Know You Rider [4:18] > High Time [6:41] > [0:10] > Dire Wolf [4:06] ; [0:44] ; Alligator [3:44] > Drums [12:48] > Me And My Uncle [3:07] > Not Fade Away [13:59] > Mason's Children [3:53] > Caution (Do Not Stop On Tracks) [14:25] > Feedback [8:42] > And We Bid You Good Night [1:39] ; [0:14]
Comments Late Show total time 2:26:05 +. Early and Late Show total time 3:31:22 +. Timings are from the SBD tape in circulation except for the tunes included in Dick's Picks 4, which are timed from the CD.

From Bear's website
Dick's Picks v.4, Grateful Dead Records (GDM)1996.
Here are more songs from the shows I derived Bear's Choice from... lacking those parts previously released in Bear's Choice. It is a kind of musical "puree" made by mix-and-match. I had little say on the format here. In fact, I was criticised for suggesting that each night be released as a whole show (with the Bear's Choice parts included) on separate albums,in a set. But then, what do I know about such things? Perhaps if there is enough interest they may eventually do it. Each show was many hours long- way to long for more than a single show per night. I don't know about Love's usual gigging habits,but the other two bands liked to play long sets. Two set changes took time- the Allmans played a relatively long set, each night filled two 45 min reels- and there were jams. Love's set was pretty short, about 45 minutes. Sat night's set went on until well after midnight, Note on the box says "ends 5:38 AM. The Dead always played long shows in those days, during which they took a break, dividing their set into two parts as was the practice for almost their whole career. There are some missing tapes from 11 Feb and of some of the jams, also for a couple of Love's sets, tape was short and Love did not impress me, and I had not real interest in keeping them in my diary- so with the vain hope each night that they would improve, I used the same reel of tape over- thus I only have the last show- all their sets were less than 45 min and thus fit on a single reel. I always recorded all the bands and all the sets I mixed on all my shows like some people keep a diary, at least so long as I had enough money to buy reels of blank tape- sometimes I didn't, but cassettes were also made of all shows. We are going to search the cassette boxes to further details on these shows.

Ok, everybody- time for a little more history. I want to correct of a bit of false information about this series of shows which originated with Dick Latvala. It was his idea there was an "early show" and a "late show" on each night, which was based on the fact that this was a usual practice at the Fillmore East at the time for other shows. He claimed I must not have recorded any of the bands first sets, or somehow (not explained), only those tapes from the series were lost. This was based on his interpretation of some remarks made by Zacherle as he introduced the the Dead's (only) show on Saturday, which began shortly after midnight on Sunday. He persisted with this nonsense in spite of my efforts to convince him otherwise- which I found odd- since I was there and did the setups and did the sound mix for all three bands, while he was not even in the hall. The truth is that the year before the Dead had told Bill Graham they would not again do two shows on a night at the Fillmore East after a double show booked in Feb '69 with Janis Joplin and her new band Cosmic Blues. The band normally played two sets (you could call it a "split set") with a short break- 30+ min average, and did not like having to play veryshort sets to two different audiences, with a break of considerable length between sets. Also we- the crew- had protested about all the extra work we had to do setting up and tearing down for two shows. At that time, NO other venue required this practice, only FE. I think this is why Bill scheduled three bands for this series of shows, perhaps as a kind of get-even for our refusal to go along with his routine.

Anyone who managed to pass 6th grade math can figure out there could not have been two shows with three bands in a night- but for those who are math-challenged I will spell it out for you: Show starts at 8PM ...actually it never in the real world started exactly at 8, The show was quite late starting on Sat, apparently due to some problems with the gear- I don't remember the details. Allmans then played over an hour, averaging approximately an hour and fifteen minutes to an houra nd a half (check out their album). They played the same set of songs in the same order each night, with some jamming on Saturday. Allmans have a large setup similar to the Dead, with two drummers. First set change takes 30 min, rushing, 45 min at normal pace. Second act Love plays a very short set, between 30 and 45 minutes. The second set change took 45 minutes due to the two large setups which had to be moved. The Dead played in a split set format as usual, with the second set starting off with acoustic, and then segueing into electric, total Dead with the inter-set break was about 2 and a half to three hours, rather a bit shorter than (the sometimes seen in those days) four full hours, except for the Sat night show- which ended at well past 5 AM- according to my note on the tape box, at 5:58 AM. Add this all up, and you get a total of an absolute minimum of 5 hours and fifteen minutes to a max of a bit over 8 hours (Saturday's show lasted ~9 hours including the extensive jams- none of which have been included on CD release- and something I am pushing for. There also were jams each night (can't find all the tapes of the jams). The second show start time at FE on nights the usual two show format was followed was 11:30, with a one hour audience clearance break, so the first show always ended at 10:30,and the FE staff were like a mob of Nazis on that timing. Even an F student in math can see that there is only two and a half hours total time for both music and set changes available between 8 and 10:30. Let me state here unequivocally, that there were NO "early or late shows" which no-one, for some unexplained reason bothered to record- (FE sound staff also made secret-from me- recordings in the basement fro a tap in the PA lines- and their tapes duplicate mine except the used larger reels and had some bits not on my tapes due to my changing reels in mid song. I say unexplained, because I even have tapes of the sound checks in my archives. Actually to be accurate there were no "late shows", since the shows all were ticket for and officially started at ~8PM during this run. Anyone who can come forward with a genuine ticket (verifiable by GDP and BGP as authentic) for any show in this run with a starting time other than 8PM will be given US $1000 cash by me personally. Hey-- why don't all those who so fervently believe (while none were there on the nights) that there was indeed two shows- why don't you all get together and start a fund by collecting $100 from each believer and put it in a trust. If I prevail on this, I get the whole kitty, and if I am proven wrong, each person gets his or her $100 back and the person who can prove it gets my $1000. Put your money where your foolish mouth is. I am tired of hearing this bloody nonsense.

As a further note, the band did not play any "other venues" in NYC during the period around the date (nor in fact, around any other date, anywhere while on tour). They were under contract to BG, and trust me, he would never allow any band he contracted to any of his venues to play anywhere else in the vicinity, especially near the date. This had been a critical factor in the demise of the Carousel Ballroom in San Francisco in 1968.

There are many tapes in circulation which claim to be of "rare" shows. The reason these shows are "rare" is usually because they never happened. In addition there are many tapes in circulation which are not as marked. The only way a person can be sure the tape in their hand is of the show written on the box is if they were at the show and recorded the tape themselves on their own machine. From the feedback I have had, and the tapes I have listened to, I estimate 30% or more of both audience and "board" tapes/CD's are either mislabeled or faked.
[liner notes]

http://www.thebear.org/albums.html

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