Fallout from the Phil Zone

Live at Fillmore East 2-11-69	Hundred Year Hall: 4-26-72	Fillmore West 1969 The 1969 double album Live/Dead holds a special place in the Deadhead universe; indeed, many band members and their inner circle consider it to be the band's best overall collection as well. This expanded, three-CD edition is culled from the same February/March '69 shows at th...	Three from the Vault Readied in the early '90s (but not released until the summer of 2007) this multi-tracked document of a strong twenty-song, two-hour set by the Dead from February 1971 in Port Chester, NY brims with subtle pleasures and myriad rave-ups. The sound is immaculate throughout, thanks t...	Steppin' Out with the Grateful Dead: England '72
Fillmore East: April 1971	Infrared Roses	Two from the Vault	Birth of the Dead This two-disc collection assembles rare pre-Warner tracks recorded in 1965-66 for the Autumn (6 cuts, 4 previously unreleased) & Scorpio (8 cuts, 6 previously unreleased) labels. Also included are "Fire in the City," an ultra-rare collaboration with Jon Hendricks on Disc 1, & ...	The Closing of Winterland This 4 CD set contains the entire Grateful Dead performance from the Closing of Winterland on 12/31/78, mixed from the 24-track analog master tapes, and includes a 24-page booklet containing photos and essays.

CD is good, Too Hard To Handle Is Incredible
There are some nice selections on this disk (the first Jack A Roe performed by the Dead), but nothing that is a truly must have, other than the Too Hard To Handle. The track is from an audience mic of a 1971 performance and the sound quality is exceptional. I grew up going to Dead shows in the 80's and was accustomed to the crowd interaction when the crowd had a well versed familiarity with the Dead's material. Here there is this raw excitement you can hear from the crowd's reaction. The way that they respond to Jerry's solo is just like an old fashioned revival - the energy just keeps escalating in the crowd response and Jerry in turn just keeps ratcheting up his playing until the house sounds like it going to come down. Amazing!

Has Some Nice Stuff
It's a good idea - put out a release with interesting versions of songs, many from the band's early years, where the whole show won't ever be coming out for one reason or another. You get to hear some early Dead here, and it's generally enjoyable. You get a hard-rocking "Hard to Handle" that transcends in energy if not sound quality the other versions that I've heard. You get a very nice "Visions of Johanna".

A great medley of peak Grateful Dead recordings
This 2-cd set is a sort of GD sampler platter, selected by bassist Phil Lesh from 30 years of live performances. The half-hour "In the Midnight Hour" is hilarious (at one point, Pig tries to get Bobby to dance with a girl in the audience!). There is also a tearfully beautiful version of Dylan's "Visions of Johanna" recorded just a few months before Jerry's death - the way he pours his own pain into the song is simply heartbreaking. There's not a single track that I don't like in this set, and some, such as "Hard to Handle" and "Jack-a-Roe," are my favorite versions in my collection. There's not much continuity in the album - you would never mistake this for a recording of a single concert - but the playing is outstanding throughout.

Hard to Handle
This CD is a strange mix of great Dead songs, you can tell each track is really significant to Phil. Great versions of New Speedway Boogie, Viola Lee Blues, Music Never Stopped, and a 30 minute Midnight Hour with Pigpen at the top of his game. However, the highlight of this 2 disc set is by far, HARD TO HANDLE, containing one of the best Jerry solos captured on tape.

Phil has damn good taste
I don't buy a bunch of Grateful Dead Concert tapes or the CDs that are being made from them now. My main interest in the group is the early days, before the taping became a big part of the concerts and when the band played every night as if it might be their last. I bought this set because it was cheap - at a used books store, and because there was a live version of "Viola Lee's Blues" to be heard. On at least three occasions when I lived in San Francisco I watched the Dead fail to get through this monster they Jerry built onto a Cannon's Jug Stompers blues without at least one painful halt. It always became a major guitar pile up on the freeway of psychodelia. (If you have the 12 cd set you can listen to four or five crashes in one 25 minute version included as an extra on the first Greatful Dead cd). I'd also heard a few taped versions over the years and didn't expect this would be any different. But as I said before it was cheap and there were a couple Pigpen tunes I wanted to have, so I shelled out. Now I suspect I'm going to end up shelling out a lot more (yes I bought the 12 CD set but I have an excuse for that), even though I doubt I'll find much better. The three Pigpen songs are all excellent although the sound is rough. The version of "Dancin' in the Streets" sounds like my memory of the old Sunflower bootlegs I wore out 25 years ago and there is a nice version of the "girl who disguises as a man to join her love at war" song(s) called Jack-a-Roe. The last 2 cuts on the second cd are both weak. Garcia's voice was shot long before 1995, and listening to him gasp out "Visions of Joanna" is truly painful. "Box of Rain" was always a song that started with a few good solo verses and ended with several choruses of the thinest weakest harmony singing the Dead ever did (and that's saying a lot). A live version has the added disadvantage of the same weak harmonies being sung terribly out of tune. It ain't a pretty picture. But those are the only losers in about 2 hours of music - and they do come at the very end so you can hit the old remote and move on to something else or go back and play "The Midnight Hour" again, and again, and again... Thank you Phil - good album. I've taken up residence in The Phil Zone