Great songwriters - Robert Hunter (Grateful Dead, Bob Dylan etc)

Robert Hunter - Tales Of The Great Rum Runners (1974 USA 2024 double disc remaster)

Robert Hunter's work as a solo artist with a deluxe reissue of his 1974 debut, Tales of the Great Rum Runners. While Hunter is widely revered as the primary lyricist for the Grateful Dead, this series will explore the depth of his solo work, offering a renewed appreciation for his exceptional artistry.

Originally released in spring 1974, Tales Of The Great Rum Runners marked the inaugural release on Round Records, an offshoot of the newly formed Grateful Dead Records. Among its 13 tracks were several destined to become staples of Hunter's live repertoire, like “Boys In The Barroom,” “Rum Runners,” and “It Must Have Been The Roses.”

Recorded at Mickey Hart's converted barn studio in Novato, California, the album reveals Hunter's multifaceted talents and features him singing and playing various instruments, including guitar, tin whistle, and bagpipes on “Children's Lament.” He was accompanied by a revolving cast of Bay Area musicians on the album, including Jerry Garcia, Keith and Donna Jean Godchaux, and Mickey Hart of the Dead, as well as guitarist Barry Melton (Country Joe & The Fish), bassist David Freiberg (Quicksilver Messenger Service/Jefferson Starship), and pedal steel guitarist Buddy Cage (New Riders Of The Purple Sage).

Tales Of The Great Rum Runners (Deluxe Edition) comes with 16 previously unreleased bonus tracks, offering new insight into the album's evolution. Among these are alternate versions of six songs that made the album (“Keys To The Rain” and “It Must Have Been The Roses”), plus ten gems that did not (“The Word,” “Buck Dancer's Choice,” and “Elijah.”)

Tracks

Disc 1 (Original album 1974)

1. Lady Simplicity - 0:21

2. That Train - 4:37

3. Dry Dusty Road - 2:20

4. I Heard You Singing (David Freiberg,  Robert Hunter) - 3:38

5. Rum Runners - 3:07

6. Children's Lament - 4:17

7. Maybe She's A Bluebird - 2:01

8. Boys In The Barroom - 1:09

9. It Must Have Been The Roses - 3:31

10.Arizona Lightning - 3:36

11.Standing At Your Door - 4:33

12.Mad - 4:13

13.Keys To The Rain - 4:16

All compositions by Robert Hunter except track #4

Disc 2 (Previously Unreleased) 

1. Boys In The Barroom - 1:12

2. Elija - 2:08

3. The Word  - 1:56

4. Rum Runners - 3:10

5. It Must Have Been The Roses - 3:37

6. Road Hog - 2:51

7. Green Briar Song  - 2:15

8. Reelin’ And A-Pitchin’ - 3:40

9. Briney Deep - 3:05

10.Children’s Lament - 4:23

11.Lady Simplicity - 0:22

12.Southern Fried Shuffle - 2:29

13.West Virginia Steel Guitar - 2:36

14.Buck Dancer’s Choice  - 2:05

15.Boats - 2:23

16.Keys To The Rain - 4:19

Music and Lyrics by Robert Hunter

URBANASPIRINES | TRIBUTE TO PHIL LESH by KOSTAS

Phil Lesh (March 15, 1940 – October 25, 2024) 

Grateful Dead (7 Albums)

lovely tribute to Phil Lesh, bassplayer of the Grateful Dead, with a seven album selection from Urbanaspirines’ Kostas who does his usual thorough and extensive review of an innovator who frankly reinvented the instrument he mastered!

Philip Chapman Lesh (March 15, 1940 – October 25, 2024)was an American musician and a founding member of the Grateful Dead, with whom he played bass guitar throughout their 30-year career. 

After the band's disbanding in 1995, Lesh continued the tradition of Grateful Dead family music with side project Phil Lesh and Friends, which paid homage to the Dead's music by playing their repertoire, as well as songs of the members of his own group. 

From the debut album (here to classic like American Beauty to Working Man’s Dead to Live Dead Anthem of the Sun to Aoxomoxia, Skull & Roses of 1971 seven of the most classic Dead albums assessed and revisited here. I went through a mini jag of listening to the Dead again last year and listened to over some thirty albums but these seven are worthy of anyone’s collection. If you don’t have ANY (where ya bin!?) then these will do nicely and all feature Phil I think!

read on here . . . .

UPDATE:

There was some discussion on Kostas’ page about the back cover of Aoxomoxia and who was portrayed in it when the Dead stayed (and hosted Leary acid tests) at the famous Olompali commune inhabited by the Shoen Ones so called, where the picture was taken. They rented the house and stayed there for about two months only

There was also some discussion nearly ten years ago now that Courtney Love was featured in the foreground as one of the children (far right). This is not the case The children were from the commune The Chosen Ones and the girl featured on the right mistakenly identified as Love is actually Bill Kretzmann’s daughter Stacey. 

"The Grateful Dead leased Olompali for the months of May and June in 1966 and visited the ranch several times over the next three years. In 1969 they returned for a photo shoot for the back cover of their album, Aoxomoxia. Pigpen is lying in front. Jerry Garcia is on the left with the tree trunk behind him. In addition to the band, members of the Merry Pranksters and the Chosen Family Commune were also included in the photo. The blonde girl in the left front and the blonde girl sitting next to Garcia are the daughters of my brother-in-law Jim Hagedorn’s cousin, Paula McCoy."

Deadhead sources documented this back in 2015. 

read on here . . . .

“The (San Francisco/Haight-Asbury) Summer of Love began one afternoon at Olompali.” Ken Kesey, author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.

Phil Lesh (1940-2024)

Phil Lesh, whose expansive approach to the bass as a charter member of the Grateful Dead made him one of the first performers on that instrument in a rock band to regularly play a lead role rather than a supporting one, died on Friday. He died surrounded by his family his wife and two sons and our thoughts go out to them. He was 84. 

Dylan/ Lesh 11-10-99...West L.A. NFA

Wonderful psychedelic portrait from O’Leary

Happy Trails Phil!

Reflections upon the Olympics (1992) 2024

Now I am not at all interested in competitive sports but am aware that France has the Olympics on this year and it’s on now starting this past weekend. I am minded of this story if only  because of the involvement of the Grateful Dead! 

 

Bob Dylan on Jerry Garcia

 

Now I get the Grateful Dead and have quite a bit down in the vaults here in the gulags but didn’t really listen to them for the longest time. My old school friend ‘Bill’ loved them and played me Working Man’s Dead when it came out and then I tried certain albums but only relatively recently did I try to appreciate them more listening to over 20-40 boots and albums. I associate them with that whole San Francisco cabal of Tripsters and like Big Brother, The Airplane, Country Joe and others thought the couldn’t really PLAY! Learning their chops through the haze of substance abuse and acid trips with Tim Leary and others. I liked certain tracks (Keep On Trucking’ a novelty hit for me but Magnolia and others I would listen to) and then . . . . . . left them alone again! 

Their endless jams several hour long bootlegs and recording EVERYTHING they ever played attitude meant I couldn’t really GET it anymore. Who has the TIME these days? So this quote made me sit up and take note . . . . . here is Bob on Jerry the heart of the Dead!

Bob Dylan on Jerry Garcia: “There's no way to measure his greatness or magnitude as a person or as a player. I don't think any eulogizing will do him justice. He was that great, much more than a superb musician, with an uncanny ear and dexterity. He's the very spirit personified of whatever is Muddy River country at its core and screams up into the spheres. He really had no equal. To me he wasn't only a musician and friend, he was more like a big brother who taught and showed me more than he'll ever know. There's a lot of spaces and advances between The Carter Family, Buddy Holly and, say, Ornette Coleman—a lot of universes, but he filled them all without being a member of any school. His playing was moody, awesome, sophisticated, hypnotic and subtle. There's no way to convey the loss. It just digs down really deep.” - #bobdylan

#jerrygarcia #gratefuldead

 Some notes from the ‘tinterwebbie mcthingie!

Nearly forgot Ry Cooder’s birthday alongside this staggering portrait photo

Photo by Clive Arrowsmith

Happy 76th Birthday Maestro!

"In my point of view, it’s that when I was younger, let’s say 12 or 13, what I was trying to do was to learn how to play like the records. I heard banjo. Bluegrass. I said, “I’m going to learn to do that.”

Not to copy somebody—you don’t wanna play exactly like Earl Scruggs note-for-note. I never wanted to do that, but just get to where I could play that type of music, which was great because later on, when I was recording, if I felt I needed some skills, I knew I could play blues and I understood open tunings. Therefore, if I want to play a Blind Blake song, I knew exactly what those notes were. So that I could play it, and I could please myself and then hear it back in the recording studio. That’s a key difference because you don’t do that. I knew you never wanted to be somebody who studied source materials, with the idea that you were gonna replicate Uncle Dave Macon on the array mbira.

It’s interpretive, of course, but it’s completely unexampled and completely creative and new. New being a kind of a silly word, but I mean different. A way to re-envision. But somebody like me or somebody like Dan Gellert and Rayna Gellert, for that matter, on fiddle, we learned the original because we liked it. So, when you hear something you like, you want to do it, too. That’s all. I wanted to do it well. But you don’t necessarily stop there. Because I always knew if I was gonna record, there would be very little point in doing all that music, whether it was Charlie Poole or Lead Belly or Blind Blake or somebody, note-for-note wouldn’t work because they already did it, so it was already done to perfection. If you love the record so much, you’re so impressed with this—so imprinted by it—then you had to do something about it. But what was that gonna be? That was gonna be to develop it a little and see how far you could go or see what sounded good. Do you like the playback? Go in the booth and listen. Got to record. Fantastic. Did I succeed? I don’t know. Sometimes I thought the ideas were good, the execution was questionable.  But what you did with this record and have been doing for quite some time, is to completely recast the whole entire thing."

Interview  By Whalebone 

Jerry Garcia in front of the Grateful Dead’s “Wall of Sound” in 1974. The PA system would come to weigh more than 70 tons, and contain hundreds of amps and speakers that stood over three stories tall and 100 feet wide.

and people wondered how rock stars ended up with tinnitus?  

Photo by Mark Junge

Did you think of Jimi as coming out of the blues tradition?

Stevie Ray Vaughan: Some people don’t see it. Some people really do see it. See, I don’t know whether to call Hendrix a blues player along with a lot of the originals, but he did go and play with a lot of those people. He did do a lot of it during that heyday, before he got famous. It’s like he was on the tail end of something.

- That whole R&B movement.

SRV: Yeah. And a lot of it wasn’t even the tail end. A lot of it was the peak of it. He was doing that stuff as it was going on, you know. See, in his music, I hear not just the newer stuff that everybody seems to think was a lot different – and a lot of it is – but to my ears, there’s just as much of the old-style warmth.

- The blues style.

SRV: Yeah! Like “Red House.” I hear it in that. I hear it in just the way he approaches things. Even though he was not ashamed at all of doing some things different, I still hear the roots of the old style. I mean, not just roots, but the whole attitude of it.

I think a lot of it’s his touch and his confidence. I mean, his touch was not just playing-wise, but the way he looked at it, like his perspective. His perspective on everything seemed to be reaching up – not just for more recognition, but more giving. I may be wrong about that, but that’s what I get out of it. And he did that with his touch on the guitar and his sounds and his whole attitude – it was the same kind of thing.

Interview By Jas Obrecht   - 1989

Stevie Ray Vaughan - Voodoo Chile Live in Austin Texas

Photo: Bruce Weber 2014

Dr. John: 

I would like to have done enough good stuff so that maybe somebody who does remember something will say, "He did the best he could with it all". That’s all anybody can do. I’d like to have that thought somewhere along the line, if there’s a thought at all. I mean I come from the city of spirits. N’awlins has more people in touch with the spirit kingdom than most places. The point is that we respect our ancestors. In day by day livin’ and survivin’, it’s not your first thought. Right? Music keeps things alive in its own way. It’s a powerful thing. That’s why I believe if you touch someone with music, then we’ve done something. I’ve been tryin’ to reach different angles of hittin’ people with some truths, making nice music and hittin’ them with something that’s not really a nice thing to say. If you hit them from both angles, maybe they’ll get something out of it because it doesn’t seem like a real dismal event

Listen, nobody’s perfect. We all make some serious, crucial mistakes. We all do some things that sidetrack us from the direction you was goin’ on. You wind up takin’ a detour somewhere and you didn’t intend that, but it happens. You’ve got to do everything you can that’s possible to make a better world to live in, to get to a point where you can say, "Hey – I feel good about this". It’s hard to do. N’awlins has been through a lot of mess. I’ve been through a lot of mess. Everything goes through a lot of mess. The way to get past all of that is to take action. If you do it right, you’ll get somewhere beyond all that. Sometimes you take a path that feels right and down the line, it turns out not be the path you wanted. It may have wound you up in some place you never wanted to be in the first place. Well, you gotta get a look at that and make an ol’ manoeuvre and so something else. This kind of stuff happens. Freq-uently.

Cian Traynor , June 25th, 2010 -  Quietus 

THE GRATEFUL DEAD WITH BOB DYLAN - AKRON 1986 | Big O

Dead on Bob

This is good fun . . . from Big O . . . . just avoid the trolls!

the text is worth a read too!

+ + + + +

Joe Taysom, faroutmagazine.co.uk:

When The Grateful Dead opened up for Bob Dylan and Tom Petty, 1986: Do line-ups get much better than The Grateful Dead opening up for Tom Petty and Bob Dylan? Almost definitely not. In 1986, the three iconic artists decided to play a limited run of five shows which would immediately assert themselves into the history books.

The Grateful Dead, a band so well known for operating within their own lane, had forged themselves a unique path and often backed away from the overly commercialised scene. The area that they had handcrafted centred around them and their Deadhead fans. Nothing else, according to the group mentality, was relevant so it came somewhat of a surprise decision for the band to agree to an opening slot Dylan and Petty but nonetheless a pleasant surprise.

The stadium shows that The Grateful Dead agreed to take part in saw the triad of iconic acts kick things off in Minneapolis on June 26 before moving on to Akron on July 2 then to Buffalo on July 4 and then finishing the tour in Washington for two shows on July 6 and 7 which would create memories that would last a lifetime for those lucky enough to be in attendance.

Bob Dylan and Tom Petty appeared the perfect choice to opt for if you could pick anyone to open up for, and their decision to take the slot was met with acceptance from their adoring fans. Another reason which also made The Grateful Dead’s army of dedicated fans accepting about the plan to join forces with Dylan and Petty for the dates is that they only agreed to do four shows rather than the whole 22 tour dates—a decision which proves that money wasn’t their primary motive.

The tour came at an incredibly peculiar time for Bob Dylan. As well as not being revered as the inspirational musical genius that he is today, the singer had yet to really crack the charts and his glow was beginning to fade. His career was nosediving. It was a situation that would eventually land him on a farewell tour alongside The Grateful Dead.

In Dylan’s autobiography, he recalls: “Everything was smashed. My own songs had become strangers to me, I didn’t have the skill to touch the right nerves, couldn’t penetrate the surfaces. It wasn’t my moment of history anymore.” Dylan felt pushed aside and was more than happy to take his place in the history books one of the greats.

Following the tour, Dylan came to a realisation: “Tom was at the top of his game and I was at the bottom of mine”. Dylan was ready to retire—sick of the downward spiral he was struggling against but he instead decided to go out for one final jaunt a year later alongside The Grateful Dead in 1987 who had blown the mercurial songwriter away on the tour with Tom Petty the previous year with Dylan and The Dead being a match made in heaven, which re-lit a fire in his belly that is still on fire today.

Perhaps the reason why these two seminal artists were such a perfect match for each other was largely down to their love of experimentation with both Dylan and The Grateful Dead never playing the exact same show twice. The shows they played together the following year were largely sneered at by the masses, but Dylan and Dead loved every minute of there chaotic time they shared together, which is ultimately the only thing a true artist should care about.

+ + + + +

Big O thanks Charlie Miller for sharing the show at Dime.

+ + + + +

Disc 1

Track 101. Tuning 2:18

Track 102. Alabama Getaway 4:47

Track 103. Greatest Story Ever Told 6:23

Track 104. They Love Each Other 7:57

Track 105. Little Red Rooster 8:14

Track 106. Don’t Think Twice, It’s Alright 3:36

Track 107. It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue 6:56

Track 108. Candyman 8:20

Track 109. Me And My Uncle 2:56

Track 110. Mexicali Blues 4:16

Track 111. Don’t Ease Me In 3:03

Track 112. China Cat Sunflower 5:25

65 mins

Disc 2

Track 201. I Know You Rider 5:24

Track 202. Playing In The Band 7:38

Track 203. Desolation Row 9:49

Track 204. Drums 9:03

Track 205. Space 7:07

Track 206. Truckin’ 6:19

Track 207. Black Peter 8:16

Track 208. Sugar Magnolia 7:01

Track 209. Encore Break 2:26

Track 210. Box Of Rain 5:00

68 mins

Notes:
- Little Red Rooster, Don’t Think Twice and Baby Blue with Bob Dylan
- Playing In The Band jam and Desolation Row without Jerry
- Patch source recorded by Michael Hessberg
- Thanks to Joe B Jones for his input on the pitch correction

The Grateful Dead - Oregon 78 - So Many Roads

 THE GRATEFUL DEAD

The companion piece to the Dead gig posted by So Many Roads t'other day has finally made an appearance and extremely fine quality recording it is too!

The Grateful Dead - Eugene Oregon - 1978 - So Many Roads

Two versions here! (sic?)

You know I enjoy the Dead when I am in the mood and sometimes it takes them a while to warm up . . . . . .that can seem like days and you can have lots of fun guessing how much gear they are carrying . . . . . (sic) but what I never get is how come after Pigpen's death they had an entire career with people featured who couldn't sing! Jerry and Bob even with a backing singer in Donna Godchaux and whilst we get used to Jerry I can't say I favour anything sung by Bob at all and it mystifies me. the endless LOUD noodling style belies the fact they learned to play alongside Big Brother, Country Joe's 'Fish' et al . . . . they occasionally hit a stellar guitar place thanks to Garcia but boy a singer would have sure helped!!I am aware of course this is anathema to Dead Heads but please compared to their eventual musical accompaniment you can't learn to have a voice worth listening to and fans who took the stage I understand that was the principle of punk rock after all that anyone could do it but sheesh . . . . . . . 

So Many Roads says:

Grateful Dead 1978 - #2: As promised, here's the 2nd half of our Same Tour, Different Show set that features the Grateful Dead in 1978. This one is a soundboard recording from Oregon from June 25, 1978, 43 years ago today. By the way, this was another all day festival, with Eddie Money, The Outlaws and Santana all leading in for the Dead.

Enjoy! if only for a moment . . . . .  

Mountain Girl - Love-In 1966 - CAROLYN GARCIA - Gene Anthony photographer

COOL HIPPIE CHIC!

Mountain Girl at the Love-In, 1966 - Photo by Gene Anthony

 How contemporary does she look here?! Fashionwise she could be dressed like this last week! 

Carolyn Elizabeth Garcia (née Adams; born May 7, 1946)

NEVER GOT OFF THE BUS - SFGATE

ROBERT HUNTER- Live in New Haven CT- 1997 - So Many Roads

 ROBERT HUNTER

Friend of Bob Dylan and Jerry Gracia and uniquely 'different' as writers go there is this . . . .

Robert Hunter New Haven 1997 - So Many Roads

'So Many' says:

In the spring of 1997, 2 years after his Jerry Garcia’s death, Robert Hunter was on tour, playing his unique versions of the classics that he and Garcia had penned for the Grateful Dead. This soundboard recording captures Hunter in New Haven on May 11, 1997, 2 dozen years ago today.

 

 

The Grateful Dead - Las Vegas Silver Bowl 1991 Vols I & II - So Many Roads

Yesterday I are bin mostly listening to The Grateful Dead . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Two great sets from  So Many Roads superb soundboard quality and great set lists from Las Vegas back in 1991 at the Sam Boyd Silver Bowl April 27th and 28th

The Grateful Dead - Las Vegas 27/4/1991 - So Many Roads

and then yesterday this one from the following day

The Grateful Dead - Las Vegas 28/04/1991 - So Many Roads

Really good addition to anyone's Dead collection highpoints all round too many to list or mention and it was just nice to sit on back and choogle (it's a word!) along with the Dead in the prime again here

So Many Roads says:

As long time readers of this blog know, I've spent numerous posts discussing the Dead's renaissance between 1989 and 1991. The number of official releases from that period is a testament to the caliber of the band's performances in that era, as they include:

• a show from Philadelphia from July 7, 1989
• the Giant Stadium Shows from July 9 and 10, 1989
• The 2 night stand at RFK Stadium from July 12 and 13, 1989
• the famed Warlock shows in Hampton Virginia on October 8 and 9, 1989 
• the Meadowlands NJ concert on October 16, 1989
• the Landover, Maryland show on March 15, 1990 
• the Knickerbocker arena run from March 24 to 26, 1990; 
• 2 (yes 2) box sets from Spring 1990, featuring every show from that tour - the only other tour to be released in its entirety besides Europe 1972
• a show from from Mountain View CA from June 16, 1990
• a show from from Pittsburgh from July 8, 1990
• the Madison Square Garden concerts from September 14 to 20, 1990. 
• a show from Paris from October 27, 1990 
• a show from Washington DC from June, 14, 1991
• the Giants Stadium shows from June 16 and 17, 1991
• a show from Pine Knob from June 20, 1991 
• a show from Madison Square Garden from September 10, 1991, featuring Bradford Marsalis 
• a show from Boston Garden on September 25, 1991 

Without a doubt, these 3 years marked the last great run of the Dead's incredible career. So with that as backdrop, we'll bring you 2 shows from the Dead's Spring 1991 run, from Las Vegas,  starting with this soundboard recording from April 27, 1991, 2 decades ago today.