The Grateful Dead Return to the Garden

The Grateful Dead return to the Boston Garden after a 10 year hiatus. In September of 1991, the Dead were one of the most successful touring Rock bands in America. Boston was hoping for a potential $10 million  economic boost from their six night run  between 9/20 to 9/26. These are sweet shows for this time period. Click on mvyradio.com this week another episode of Shakedown Stream™ featuring the Dead back at the Garden. Plus, you can check out some past episodes from this month by clicking these links. 

Boston Garden 9/20/91

Boston Garden 9/22/91

February Fillmore

The Grateful Dead shows from the Fillmore East of February 1970 are considered the best damn Dead shows - ever. A strong statement for sure, especially coming from a DeadHead who does not subscribe to these type of proclamations, but, these shows from February 11th, 13th & 14th, 1970 are quite good. We are already familiar with this run of shows from the "Bear's Choice" album released in 1973 or even Dicks Picks #4. Each night has a  Dark Star or Turn on Your Lovelight or new songs from "Workingman's Dead." On the 11th, the band are joined by the Allman Brothers, Peter Green and other musicians for a monster jam of Lovelight. The 13th and 14th shows treat us to the first acoustic Dead with Dark Hollow, Monkey & the Engineer, Little Sadie, Wake Up Little Suzie>Black Peter and Pigs' vintage Katie Mae. I now appreciate the quality of these recordings more now than ever. The sound engineering and recording of Owsley Stanley or the Bear are exquisite. Also, it should be noted that the Grateful Dead and Bear were busted 2 weeks earlier down on Bourbon Street, New Orleans before this run of shows at the Fillmore East, New York City. Bear would eventually be jailed on Feb 27th, 1970 for violating his bail conditions, and yet, it was still important to him to be at the Board for these shows on 2/11, 2/13 & 2/14 and Thank God he did. 

"Close Encounters" - 1978

Some very precious Betty Boards Tapes have been returned to the Grateful Dead's Vault (it's a long story). And one of those shows is one that I always treasured as a teenager - the 1/22/78 Eugene, Oregon show. Jerry Garcia  plays with the "Close Encounters" melody from Stephen Spielberg's movie. Ya know, the one where these 5 notes allow the Earth people to communicate with the Aliens or vice versa. Anyway, apparently Garcia saw the movie a couple of times when it came out in the Fall of 1977 and Jerry played the melody during >>space>> right before he went into St. Stephen; a totally splendid Dead moment! In honor of the 40th anniversary of this amazing show we featured in Shakedown Stream last week on mvyradio.com. You can enjoy it for yourself CLICK 01/23/18. 

Also, this week's episode will feature more of the Grateful Dead from 40 years ago at the Uptown Theatre in Chicago, IL. 

Fall of 1983

October ended on Shakedown Stream with an amazing Grateful Dead show from Marin County Veteran's Auditorium in San Rafael, CA from 10/31/83. Jerry and the boys played the last St Stephen ever performed; one of three they did in the Fall of '83 (NYCity & Hartford). It also wraps up our theme for the month of the evolution of new songs such Touch of Grey and Throwing Stones plus the newer songs My Brother Esau and Hell in a Bucket. It sure was fun to go back and check out the first performances of these songs and reminence my days as a teenage deadhead from 1982 and 1983. Right On mvyradio.com. 

Jerry '72

Our Jerry Garcia special on Shakedown Stream™ shall continue during the entire month of August. In listening to Jerry playing from 1972 with keyboardist Merl Saunders moved me brightly to feature more of Jerry & Merl from '72. This week's featured show features The Lion's Den, San Anselmo, CA (1/20/72) displaying Jerry at his very best. Also, more of the Dead's  Ramble On Rose and Jerry's Loser (his 1st solo album that debuts Loser was released on 1/20/72). And lastly, we are playing every Dark Star from the Europe '72 tour every week (10x DarkStars). Please join us for the next couple of weeks for more of these beautiful Jerry Garcia solos from 1972. It is timely because Jerry played many instrumental versions of John Lennon's song "Imagine" during this time period. Peace, Jer Bear

Jerry's Space - August 1st - 9th

It's Jerry Time! Every year, right around this space and time, we gather-round to remember that particular melody from our favorite pied-piper Jerry Garcia. Oh the days of yore, how I yearn for thee. Come one, come all to Shakedown Stream™ with JerBear on mvyradio.com for two (2) weeks of lots and lots of music from Jerry Garcia with the Grateful Dead, the Jerry Garcia Band and other little bits and pieces from Jerry's Space. 

1984

Of all the years combined of the Grateful Dead's live shows, 1984 is the least represented of their 30 year run. That's probably because it was not a good year; Jerry was not doing well. His health was quite poor from chronic opiate use as well as being overweight, smoking cigarettes and wearing red t-shirts. It is hard to find too many stand-out shows, however, down on Shakedown Stream™, I think we found some sweet nuggets worthy of our attention. In our unlimited devotion to the month of July's '84 quest, we  featured five (5) shows from '84. Check them out here:

• Berkeley Community Theatre (11/3)
• Hampton Coliseum (4/14)
• The Greek Theatre (7/15)
• Ventura County Fairgrounds (7/22) 
• Carrier Dome, Syracuse, NY (10/20)

May '77 - Get Shown the Light

DeadHeads across the USA and all over the World are opening their "May 1977 - Get Shown The Light" box set released by RHINO records this week. I got mine yesterday! The box includes the all-time popular Cornell show from May 8, 1977, plus the New Haven (5/5), Boston (5/7) and Buffalo (5/9) show too. The once lost Betty Board reel-to-reels of these shows have finally made it to the Dead's Vault and remastered by Jeffrey Norman (he does all the Dead's stuff). Join us this week and every other week this month for the 40th anniversary of the Grateful Dead's Cornell show.  Click on >> http://www.mbvyradio.com. Right On !

1987 Grateful Dead

Hey Now - Join us down on Shakedown Stream™ as we continue our conversation about the Grateful Dead's run of shows from 1987 at Madison Square Garden, NYCity. A few of the songs were apart of the TV Broadcast of Farm Aid Live III. Please remember where our food comes from and let the light into your dinner table. Support the Slow Food Movement. Click us out @ http://www.mvyradio.com. 

"One Way or Another, This Darkness Got to Give"

"Do we keep on coming or stand and wait with the sun so dark and the hour so late?" 

Hey now, Unbroken Jane here, guest blogging at Jer Bear's invitation. He asked a little while ago what song I think would be appropriate for the month of December and without hesitation I said "New Speedway Boogie".  In more ways than one, darker days are upon us. Each year the first three weeks of December mean less and less sunlight until the Winter Solstice. This year it happens at 4:44 AM Eastern Time on Wednesday, December 21, so if you start listening to that week's stream at midnight, you'll probably be awake when it happens! 

To welcome the light and keep away the dark, I'd like you to keep these folks in your heart in the weeks and months to come...our Native American brothers and sisters at Standing Rock...our LGBTQ brothers and sisters...our immigrant brothers and sisters...our Muslim brothers and sisters...and anyone that is afraid of the dark. Light a candle, curse the glare and remember...

"One way or another, this darkness got to give..."

NorthWest 1977 & The Wolf

On September 28, 1977, the Grateful Dead returned to the road beginning with four shows in the Northwest - Seattle, Washington & Portland, Oregon. I have to admit, in preparing for this month's theme, I unwittingly discovered that the song "Dire Wolf" was performed at this show for the first time since 10/19/74. I also discovered why they broke out "Dire Wolf" on this night -- it was the same night Jerry Garcia brought out the famous Wolf guitar. I was so stoked to learn these synchronistic Dead facts that I decided to devote September to both the song and guitar. I even heard a difference in the music between the guitars Garcia played during the shows of September 1977. Jump into Shakedown Stream and enjoy the sounds of the Wolf guitar in the upper NorthWest Fall Tour 1977 shows.