Musings on the Most Ridiculous Band I Can't Stop Listening To

Tag: 1971 (Page 3 of 6)

Bret Michaels Stole His Look From Pigpen

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“Dammit, Weir: you look like a serial killer in them spectacles!”

“Nah, Pig. Girls like the glasses.”

“Girls like your pretty little face in spite o’ them things!”

“Well, you know, Pig: God love ya, but you’re not really the one to be criticizing others’ accessories.”

“You’re showin’ your unworldliness, Weir! The Pig’s a damn fashion plate! Hell, the Pig’s the whole damn fashion table! My hat’s corduroy!”

“I didn’t even know they could do that with corduroy.”

“A more versatile fabric than given credit by the public! You got corduroy, denim, and leather and you got all you need!”

“Oh, I don’t know, Pig. Think you’re leaving out underwear and socks. Gotta be cotton.”

“Underwear can be leather! ‘Cept then you’re living in a different part of San Francisco!”

“I would bet there’s an unwritten history linking the hippie and gay subcultures of our beloved City by the Bay to be unearthed by an enterprising writer.”

“Weir, who you talkin’ to?”

“You know: them.”

“Quit it with your damn occultism and metafictionality, boy!”

“Semi-fictional.”

“Cease your balderdashing!”

“Okay.”

We Toile In The Fields

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Hey, Garcia. Whatcha doing?

“Smoking and drinking.”

That sounds fun.

“Well, you know, man: it is. Why people do it so much, right? Besides: when in France, drink and smoke.”

Is this that weirdo gig at the French guy’s house?

“There was gonna be a festival in Paris, or near there, anyway; got cancelled. We’re staying here, enjoying the hospitality; I think someone has a super 8 camera or something.”

Rich hippie benefactor?

“We do attract ’em, don’t we?”

Yup. Garcia?

“Yeah, man?”

Your hand looks like The Thing from The Thing.

“With Kurt Russel?”

Yeah.

“Great movie. Fuck off.”

Sure.

Sufi, Don’t Bother me

Cryptical Development has a first-hand account from the 3/24/71 show I just posted about: go read it. Then come back here, because I have stolen all the photos accompanying the well-written tale and will say witty things about each, or maybe just one, or the whole post could suck.

Who knows what the future holds?

Okay, you back? Wonderful. You always come back to me. No one else has what you need. No other website–

I’m going to cut you off early on this one.

–touches your buttocks like I…dude. Stop interrupting.

Stop being weird.

I’m not being weird. I just want to rub my wordboner on strangers’ eyeballs.

That right there. That’s the weird I mentioned. Stop doing it.

My posts are boners made of words: they’re full of life, and I want people to look at them.

Just show the pictures of the hairy white people making a racket.

billy phil bobby jerry peanut

Which points out another interesting aspect of this show: Peanut!

Also, this was apparently a benefit for the Sufis, who did this:

sufi bullshit

“PUT.

“THAT FIRE.

“OUT.

“SCHMUCK.”

“Oh, hey, Bill. We were just–”

“Don’t you ‘Hey, Bill’ me, you goddamn maniac. Put that fire out!”

“Oh, Bill: this is a sacred fire.”

“I don’t care if it’s the Pope’s Zippo lighter! Put it out! Put it out now!”

“You can’t just ‘put out’ a sacred fire, Bi–”

PSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHH

PSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHH

PSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHH

PSSHH

PSSHH

PSSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHSSSSSSSSSHHHHH

“It’s out, man.”

“Well, it was a sacred fire. I wanted to make sure. WINTERLAND IS MADE OF WOOD AND OILY RAGS! No fires!”

billy phil sufi choir 3:24:71

The Sufis chanted and then their choir came out; the Dead played with them for the last few numbers, but there’s no tape.

Hero of the Picture: Billy, who cares so little about any of this Sufi bullshit that he doesn’t even want to punch a Sufi dick. (Sufi dicks spin when you punch them.)

bobby jerry peanut pig 3:24:71

And here’s another shot of Peanut, and Pig with the last bit of fat he’d ever have.

Maybe One Day Your Name Will Be in Lights

Well, this is neat: from Fillmore: The Last Days, which is highly recommend if only for Bill Graham’s pre-planned tantrums (he would have made the best reality TV star), this is Bobby and Garcia doing Johnny B. Goode. I assume the rest of the band was there, but the recording does not show them.

Of note: Garcia’s mobility and Les Paul Jr.; Bobby’s neck-thrusts, bitchin’ sneakers, and Gibson Something-Or-Other.

Lean And Mean

band 1971 bw

1971 was the last time there were this few Grateful Deads. They were briefly placed on the Endangered List until someone realized the Endangered Species Act wouldn’t be passed until ’72, and by then there were either one or two more Grateful Deads depending on what month you’re talking about.

Also: Billy’s deaf, too, now? Right? You’re not allowed to be a young man that close to giant amplifiers without being an old man who leaves the closed captioning on his TV at all times.

Also also: Billy’s monitor may or may not be propped up with a hardcover book. Good job, Precarious. That’s some fine stuff-proppin’.

Obsessives, Assemble!

Saturday night sleuthing time, Enthusiasts!

The great Jesse Jarnow, whose book Heads can be pre-ordered over at Amazon, presents a mystery. From the bowels of the GDAO comes this shot:

band capital theater 71

The Archive lists this shot by Stephen Gilbert as occurring in November of 1970, but even a Junior Enthusiast will notice that there’s only one drummer, and must be from the February run.

Who will be the hero that TotD needs, but not the one he deserves, and certainly not the one he ordered? I say we take up this challenge as a way to inaugurate the new joint. Let us lead with success.

Again, you’re asking other people to do your work for you.

I’m crowd-sourcing a problem.

Okee-dokee.

Besides: I got nothing. Jarnow thinks that Garcia might be playing Peanut, the experimental Alembic guitar, but the image is not clear enough to tell. I yelled “enhance” at it, but nothing.

Is that Peanut? Can we use Garcia’s boots or terrible haircut as a signpost? What does Idaho look like? (During the day; at night, Idaho looks like everywhere else.)

The game is afoot.

Helping Keep Austin Weird

Earlier, I posted that oral history of the Dead in Austin; it goes on about Manor Downs, and one of those very shows got into the 30 Trips box: 7/31/82. I can’t link to the new mix, but this one is a Charlie Miller SBD with a bunch of good reviews, so it can’t suck.

Also from the oral history, here are two pictures of the Dead in Austin. They’re from–I think–the ’71 shows captured on the Road Trip release, and feature a terrible idea: see if you can spot it in this group shot.

band young austin bw
Did you spot the terrible idea? You have to enlarge the picture, so luckily there’s a better shot.

jerry strat numbers bw
Even if you’ve taken only a little tiny bit of acid, those numbers are going to start meaning shit. That will become distracting.

Keep Austin Weir

Commentator and second cousin to an alligator Cgrand reminds us of a great show, 11/15/71, immortalized as Road Trips 3.2, which you can dig out of your hard drive or listen to on Spotify if you want to hear the whole thing. The remaining versions on the Archive have iffy-at-best mixes, so here’s the good part of the show: Dark Star>El Paso >Dark Star> Casey Jones.

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