The Brief History of Dark Star>Morning Dew

Originally published on August 26, 2016 at 521pm

At the very height of the Grateful Dead, between 1972 and 1974, the band performed the magical medley of Dark Star>Morning Dew one dozen times. You can hear all of them by clicking above.

This combination is the very pinnacle of the Grateful Dead experience. And I believe it's the very essence of the Grateful Dead, the wild space of the greatest song ever written by the band moving beautifully into a pace-slowing cover song that the Dead made their own, run at the creation of the group.  It's funny, if you check the Dick Lavata clips below, he basically calls every version of Dark Star>Morning Dew, "the greatest version ever".   Some goodies are here

1972 Versions, 7 of 12

05-18-1972  Munich        Dark Star [26:28] > Morning Dew [11:12]   Europe 72 Complete
05-23-1972  London        Dark Star [31:12] > Morning Dew [11:17]   Europe 72 Complete
08-24-1972  Berkeley      Dark Star [27:14] > Morning Dew [13:00]   The Perfect Show
09-21-1972  Philly           Dark Star [37:06] > Morning Dew [11:05]   Dick's Picks 35
10-18-1972  St Louis       Playing In The Band [15:50] > Drums [2:45] > Dark Star [28:25] >                                                        Morning Dew [11:07] > Playing In The Band [5:13]    1st Playing Sandwich
11-13-1972  KansasCity  Dark Star [31:19] > Morning Dew [11:09]  Philo Stomp Dick's GEMS
12-15-1972  Long Beach Truckin' [11:37]> Dark Star [21:24]> Morning Dew [12:39]


http://www.agitators.com/gd/dick_1972.html

The 'Dark Stars" from 8/21 and 8/24 are enormous. I need to
re-listen to the 8/22 show, but it seems to me that the show from 8/24
might be the winner here.

 Now to the really exceptional material. First up is
9/21/72- Philadelphia Spectrum.  This show is one of my favorite shows
ever. This version of "Dark Star->Morning Dew" might be the best one!
(there is a jam segment that is very unique and thrilling, and one that I
don't really think that I have ever heard before.)

The next most exciting show, is the middle night of the run of three at
the fabulous Fox Theater, in St. Louis, Mo. , October 18, 1972. It took me
awhile to hear this show correctly, but now it is a clear example of one
of the very best, with a couple of unusual and unique treats within the
"jam" segment before "Morning Dew".

Long Beach (12/15) was
another matter. Although I don't think of it in the same class as the
shows at the end of November, it does contain some excellent playing in
the 2nd set jam that is highlighted by a long "jam" section that follows
"Truckin", which contains some improvisational jamming that is especially
unique, and then comes "Dark Star"! Sounds great, right?  Unfortunately
the only part that one notices as "Dark Star"  are the lyrics. As soon as
the words are over, the playing resumes in the unique style that preceeded
"Dark Star". This very interesting part continues for many minutes before
the chords of "Morning Dew" become apparent. 

1973, The Duo


09-11-1973  Williamsburg Dark Star [22:09] > Morning Dew [12:41]
10-19-1973  OklahomaCity Dark Star [27:04] > Mind Left Body Jam > Morning Dew [8:12]

http://www.agitators.com/gd/dick_1973.html

The 9/11/73-Williamsburg, Va. show is another favorite of
mine. Well actually it isn't a favorite in the sense of the whole
show, but it certainly has one of the finest examples of the famous
medley "Dark Star->Morning Dew". (which, BTW, I find the
9/10/74- Alexandra Palace to be one of the highest of the high
versions!!!)

I guess we can say with confidence that things take on new
meanings on 10/19/73 in Oklahoma. This could easily have been
the first of the DP series, except for the absolute awesomeness of
"Here Comes Sunshine" on 12/19 /73. This has to be yet another
example of the "top version ever", of "Dark Star->Morning
Dew"!!! (and the jam within this incredible medley, of course!)
There is another excellent version of "Eyes of the World" that
goes into "Stella Blue" as the first encore!

1974, The Trio


02-24-1974  SF                  Dark Star [28:57] > Morning Dew [13:35]
09-10-1974  London          Dark Star [30:53] > Morning Dew [12:37]   Dick's Picks 7
10-18-1974  SF                  Seastones [24:38] > Jam [17:40] > Dark Star [17:37] > Morning Dew    
                                            [12:56]

http://www.agitators.com/gd/dick_1974.html

I was never too thrilled by the opening 3 shows at Winterland. Clearly 
the 2/24/74 night is the one to get and give a good listen.

We all know how I felt about the shows at the Alexandra Palace in 
London (9/9->11). (see 1973)

Out of the 5 shows that closed the year at Winterland, I feel that 
the middle 3 are worthy of attention. I guess that 10/18 might get the 
nod over-all, but since these are multi-track recordings, I don't have a 
whole lot of effect on whether these are released or not.

With Filler

03-16-1973  Nassau          Dark Star [26:30] > Truckin' [8:26] > Morning Dew [11:33]
08-01-1973  Jersey City    Dark Star [25:34] > El Paso [4:12] > Eyes Of The World [17:27] >                                                        Morning Dew [13:29]

Kinda/Almost
08-17-1991 Shoreline        25 Years ago this month Smokestake>He's Gone>Drums>Space>70
                                            seconds of a Dark Star Jam>Morning Dew>One More Saturday Night

In Reverse :)
12-31-81      Oakland          > Space [7:40] > The Other One [11:09] > Not Fade Away [7:28] >                                                       GDTRFB [7:21] > Morning Dew [10:44];  Dark Star [15:16] > Bertha                                                   [6:32] > Good Lovin' [10:03]

timings from deadlists.com

In my era of the Dead, they once played this medley nearly in reverse. This was the only known reverse medley that ever occur, however the band played Dew followed by Dark Star on at least four occassions in the first set in shows in 1969.

Some comments are below
On The Bus: Review of May 23, 1972 in London
The "Dark Star" is everything you want from the song in 1972. The initial jam is melodic and fast, as the band finds new grooves and permutations of the theme to explore with fervor. They descend into a quick spacey jam that is cut short with a brief drum interlude. Phil joins Billy for quick, melodic drum-and-bass duet, and then it's off into deep space. Jerry plays wandering lines with that harsh yet clean tone, as Bobby, Keith, and Billy strive to find weirder and weirder ways to play the rhythm, ultimately settling on dissonance and chaos. Jerry finds some semblance of form coming out of the chaos, and Keith peppers his meandering notes with crashing piano chords. Billy swings like the rhythmic beast he is, and Phil helps steer the groove back to the light. Jerry takes some coaxing, but eventually they find release and re-emerge with the "Dark Star" theme, crisp and clear. However, it's clear this one traveled a long, arduous road to get back to the song. It must all seem trivial to Jerry, and he signals the dawn with the opening chord of "Morning Dew." What an epic way to end this sequence, with the gently building guitar lines eventually exploding into the crescendo and the nuclear ashes settling on the soundsphere. Ladies and gentlemen, we're not yet halfway through the first set!!

Review of December 15, 1972 Long Beach for Teens :)

Dead Listening
http://www.deadlistening.com/2009/10/1972-august-24-berkeley-community.html
http://www.deadlistening.com/2008/04/1972-october-18-fox-theatre.html
Blair (I am getting to you soon)
http://www.dead.net/features/blair-jackson/blair-s-golden-road-blog-dark-star-crashes?page=6
Reddit
https://www.reddit.com/r/gratefuldead/comments/49pbpo/best_dark_star/
Heady
http://headyversion.com/song/184/grateful-dead/morning-dew/
Clubhouse
http://www.gratefuldeadprojects.com/dark_star.html
Kirkville
http://www.mcelhearn.com/the-darkest-star-shines-the-brigthest/

The Field Trip: Keseys Farm, August 27, 1972

user445149239 · 1972-08-27 | Old Renaissance Faire Ground^ps^ - Bird Song

This show has been considered one of the very best, or even the very best Grateful Dead concert in history. The last Deadbase poll run in Deadbase 10 as well as my recent twitter poll both say so.

https://twitter.com/gratefulseconds/status/1287806591475970048

Wasn't even scheduled until August 1972.   Band had a Santa Barbara show scheduled

Has crazy good versions of all of these songs

• Promised Land
  Sugaree
  Me and My Uncle
  Deal
  Black Throated Wind
  China Cat Sunflower
  I Know You Rider
  Mexicali Blues
  Bertha
  
  Playing in the Band
  He's Gone
  Jack Straw
  Bird Song
  Greatest Story Ever Told
  
  Dark Star
  El Paso
  Sing Me Back Home
  Sugar Magnolla
  Casey Jones

Here is the music from that day

New Riders set

Dead set

Indie Sunshine Daydream film

From Howard Weiner's Deadology II:

8-27-72 Old Renaissance Faire Grounds – Veneta, OR: The Grateful Dead launch this second set with thirty-one and a half minutes of consistent “Dark Star” bliss. If I were paid to edit this version down to thirty minutes, I would refuse the assignment. Every second of this performance is engaging. Perhaps a few “Dark Stars” have greater peaks, but few have a never-ending stream of virtuosity that compares to Veneta. This “D Star” takes off with an air of confidence. In the previous set, the band blitzed through what is widely recognized as the greatest version of “Playin’ in the Band.” Phil’s on top of the world in Veneta. His bass blasts create aural astrological charts. The improvisation glows and gleams—a polished musical score that seemingly materializes effortlessly.

Weiner, Howard. Deadology Volume II: The Evolution of 33 Grateful Dead Jam Anthems (p. 141). Kindle Edition. 

From Jesse Jarnow's Heads:

NAKED POLE GUY, ascend! In a hairy sun-stroked flash he bounds from the roof of a backstage equipment truck and scampers to a sweet perch behind the Grateful Dead while the band plays “Jack Straw” in the melting Oregon heat. At this moment in late August of 1972, more vividly than any other, the Grateful Dead’s territory is completely manifest in front of them as they play for 20,000 people at a hippie-organized benefit in the northwestern countryside. It is a different America here, a wide-open and complete product of a peace-loving, postcolonial, psychedelic culture that for the past decade has staked increasing claims on portions of the tangible continent. And the day’s music is the most complete rendition yet of this developing psychedelic ritual, helping to further consecrate this specific patch of land. The Dead are already midway through the second set of the afternoon when Naked Pole Guy arrives in the frame, but it’s been a magical day already. Jerry Garcia spoke of the presence of “invisible time-travelers” at Woodstock, and the Dead’s gig at the Oregon Renaissance Faire Grounds has its share, too. For starters, there’s the crew of tripping longhairs capturing just as much as they can on their limited film stock. Naked Pole Guy will become legend! A human freak flag boogying in the breeze while, just below, the Grateful Dead jam incandescently for the Oregon heads! Go Naked Pole Guy, go! It’s the nearby Springfield Creamery and its friendly bubble-lettered storefront sign that kicked the cosmic gear works into motion and why the Dead’s performance might be seen as a symbolic pivot point for an entire way of life up there in the Northwest. The backstory reads like a psychedelic exploitation musical: small-town hippies market new-fangled organic yogurt, run afoul of the squares, need to save the family farm, call in the Dead. And that’s exactly what’s playing out on this insane sweltering day here in the field with all these naked tripping people.

Jarnow, Jesse. Heads: A Biography of Psychedelic America (pp. 58-59). Da Capo Press. Kindle Edition. 

https://jambands.com/features/2013/09/20/talking-sunshine-daydream-with-ken-babbs-kesey-the-dead-little-kids-and-dogs/

https://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/oct/08/grateful-dead-sunshine-daydream-veneta-oregon

A total of 20,000 free-spirited Deadheads descended on the fairground and to have been among them would have been a teenage English hippy's sunshine daydream. Alas, I was stranded several thousand miles away, still struggling to escape the drab conformity of lace-curtained 70s suburban Britain. Better late than never, many years later, on a sweltering hot August day in 1999 I made a pilgrimage to visit Kesey on his Oregon farm. Several of the surviving characters from Wolfe's book, including Mountain Girl (Carolyn Garcia) and the Intrepid Traveller (Ken Babbs), showed up to meet me. We hung out in the sunshine, had a barbeque and listened to tapes of the Dead, reliving memories of the day when the band had played perhaps its greatest ever show for Kesey's farm.

What is most striking about the recording from that sun-kissed day is the fluidity with which the Dead absorbed and transmuted every genre of vernacular American music, from blues, folk and gospel to country, R&B and rockabilly, and fed them into some of the most audacious, freewheeling rock'n'roll ever made – past and future, outlaw spirit and hippy idealism fused into a soundtrack for a brave new frontier that birthed an alternative sub-culture which survives to this day.

An epic psychedelic jam around Dark Star full of vaulting, freeform improvisation mutates alchemically into a loping take on Marty Robbins' cowboy ballad El Paso. Merle Haggard's country weepie Sing Me Back Home, delivered hauntingly in Garcia's reedy but expressive voice, gives way to the Dead's surging, feelgood acid anthem Sugar Magnolia, with its irresistible sunshine daydream refrain. Throw in the loose-limbed rhapsody of Chuck Berry's Promised Land, the psyched-up folk-blues racination of I Know You Rider and the group's own storied, myth-making compositions such as Truckin', Casey Jones and Playing in the Band and you have cosmic American music at its most potent and joyous.

The Year Before in the Pacific Northwest: Portland at the Paramount, July 26, 1972

"Hey Man, you got the wrong band. Don't believe everything you read in Time Magazine" says Phil as they slip into the Mexicali Hat Dance.  Despite the official release of day 2 as Download Series #10 (and 6 tunes from night one), Day four is the one.

The Year Before in the Pacific Northwest, The Dead hit  Four-Shows at the Paramounts Tour July 21-26, 1972

But frankly, I'd take any of these Summer 1972 gems.

The Dead rocked a sold out quartet of shows at the Paramounts in Seattle and Portland in front of about 12,000 fans.  Wow please invent a time machine and bring me back.

Oh and the Dead had such a good time they returned to Oregon for a Field Trip in August :)

  

Focus on July 26, the #6 show for 1972 in Deadbase 11,  a very high ranking in a very strong year.  If you need the music  Sadly Pigpen was home sick.

While many disagree on the strength of this show, when it appeared in 1991 as a new 1972 SBD it got a lot of buzz in the Dead community.  I personally love the look and feel of this one and especially the Dark Star>Comes A Time.  Give it a shot!

Set 1:

d1t01 - Tuning

d1t02 - Cold Rain And Snow

d1t03 - Black Throated Wind

d1t04 - Mississippi Half-Step

d1t05 - Mexicali Blues

d1t06 - Sugaree

d1t07 - El Paso

d1t08 - China Cat Sunflower >

d1t09 - I Know You Rider

d1t10 - Jack Straw

d2t01 - Tennessee Jed

d2t02 - Playing In The Band

d2t03 - Casey Jones

Set 2:

d2t04 - The Promised Land

d2t05 - He's Gone

d2t06 - Me And My Uncle

d2t07 - You Win Again

d2t08 - Greatest Story Ever Told

d2t09 - Ramble On Rose

d3t01 - Dark Star >

d3t02 - Comes A Time

d3t03 - Sugar Magnolia

d3t04 - Brown Eyed Women

d3t05 - Beat It On Down The Line

d3t06 - Stella Blue

d4t01 - Not Fade Away >

d4t02 - Goin' Down The Road Feeling Bad >

d4t03 - Not Fade Away

Encore:

d4t04 - One More Saturday Night