43. 1969-02-28

139196 Fillmore West 20:04
Main theme at 3:27.
First verse at 4:06.
Sputnik at 11:12.
Verse melody at 17:26.
Main theme at 18:09.
Second verse at 18:30.
Goes into St. Stephen.


Dark Star comes out of Other One tonight. TC is at times more prominent in this particular mix (although this is not consistent), and we hear him come in right away with the ROR. Although it isn’t flashy—in fact it’s generally fairly simple—tonight’s mix allows us to hear how TC’s playing has become increasingly complementary and effective. Garcia sounds out of tune at the outset.

The introduction today has a distinct feel—not exactly tentative, but it lacks drama and direction, as though the band is holding open a space that was already there and waiting for them; rather than trying to get something happening, they go to the verse fairly early here. Garcia does something different with the exit from the verse this time, playing with the volume knob for a bit before he reverts to the familiar bell sound. He hammers on this for what seems a little longer than usual, and when he starts his lead it is in a questioning mood, as opposed to the confident burst of the previous night. The band is attuned to this mood, and the jam begins in a brooding manner. The music gains intensity as Garcia plays a quasi-Bright Star passage beginning at 8:21. As with the previous night, the dynamics of the band are subtle, as they avoid going all in early, while hitting smaller crescendos such as this one. Again, the variety of volume and intensity suggests that they are all paying close attention to one another.

Some feedback spikes lead into Sputnik, and these continue throughout this section; I had a hard time determining who was generating it, as all three string players are otherwise audible throughout, but I think it must be Weir (and Mr. Rain corroborates this below).

As Sputnik ends in a swell of feedback, the band almost comes to a halt, with Lesh and Garcia hinting at the main theme until Weir starts playing a funky little riff (13:35) which they latch onto, with Lesh eventually integrating his part for the verse. This goes on for several minutes. Garcia lays out until around 15:05, when he enters and starts building (apparently) toward Bright Star or something functionally similar. This opens up a space for TC, but he doesn’t do much with it; his playing is an important part of this Dark Star but, although he has complained that Garcia didn’t give him enough room, he doesn’t seem to want to be a lead player.

At 16:38, Garcia starts playing a circular passage that seems to be heading for one of the familiar peak moments, and by 17:01 he sounds like he’s heading for Bright Star; instead, he winds up playing around the verse melody, until the latter bursts forth in earnest at 17:26. This serves for a denouement, as they soon head for the verse.

Perhaps the most remarkable thing about this Dark Star is that it’s so different from the night before, as they executed that one so successfully, but there is no attempt to replicate the results of the 27th. Instead, we get a rendition that has a markedly different feel—this feels brooding and deliberate, and while the playing is confident and intense, they avoid any dramatic peaks tonight. There are lots of interesting things happening, and it seems that we’ve entered a new era—not in the sense that we now know what to expect, but rather that the scope of our expectations has greatly expanded. It feels like faint praise to say that this is one of the best versions they have yet played, as the leap forward on the 27th makes that the only version fit for comparison, so I will just note that this is a really good one!


What was said:

pbuzby:
Did an initial listen to 2/28/69 for the first time in a few years and my thought was that it was like going back to 1968 - faster tempo than 2/27, no "Mountains" segue, Bill on maracas much of the time, and the jam mostly cruises along with less of the drama of 2/27.

Comparing a few of the sources I find that this version on the Fillmore West 1969 set changes speed and ends up noticeably fast, while db.etree source 139196 is slow. 132672 has what sounds to me like correct speed. There is a small cut/reel change in the 16-track shortly before the second verse, that the official release (and some/all of the unofficial sources) patches with the two-track.


Mr. Rain:
Even in 1969 it's rare to hear Dark Star coming right out of the Other One! Perhaps the one transition I like even more than Mountains of the Moon. (It's nice to hear the audience applause at the start too.) This time I think Jerry catches Phil off-guard when he abruptly starts Dark Star. But Jerry seems uncertain at the beginning, and there's a distinctly more tentative feel than 2-27. Not a whole lot of exploration in this intro jam, they head quickly to the verse.
Bill stays off the drums tonight, it's just maracas to accompany the opening. The maracas are louder on 139196, but the organ's harder to hear on this copy. On the copies where TC is louder, I think he's actually a bit too loud....his playing is kind of creepy and spidery but isn't meant to be in the foreground since he shadows Jerry so much. (I think he was playing better on 2-27 too.)
I like how Jerry briefly experiments with a different volume-knob entry into the middle jam, but then he repeats the tolling-bell for a long time (almost a full minute!). It's cool how Mickey builds up his gong crashes in response and the band's mood gets more tense as Jerry adds some ominous feedback. Instead of the jam bursting in like on 2-27, they keep things subdued and simmering...maybe too much so, the jam feels like they're drifting without direction, hoping something turns up. But after the tolling-bell, from about 6:20 to 8:10, Jerry plays this absolutely lovely melody line, kind of like a slow-motion Spanish Jam, giving this a distinctly melancholy mood.
It's definitely Bob doing the intentional peals of feedback before they enter Sputnik (more clear on 132672), a nice touch! Sputnik is a lot faster-paced & syncopated, even more jaunty tonight....both Jerry & Bob open up the feedback coming out of it. Bill joins in on some gentle drumming after Sputnik, and Jerry sits out for a while after 13 minutes, so between Bob & Bill the rest of the band gets into a neat little fast-paced Dark Star groove. (One odd thing, TC's volume level dropped significantly before the Sputnik so he's barely present for a few minutes, even in the Fillmore West box mix.) When Jerry comes back, things don't really take off, instead they coast down almost to a halt again with a strange little Alligator-style Jerry/Bill/congas interlude. (Mickey's on the scratcher, so yes, that's Pigpen showing up in the middle of this Dark Star!) Around 17 minutes suddenly the band re-enters with a surge of energy and they soar into a strong verse melody. This has a very uplifting effect, a little burst of energy & melody coming after the extended low-key coasting, and Bill's drumming is good here too. But....there's not going to be another bright-star climax tonight, they flip the off switch and glide right to the second verse. (I think the switch to the alternate tape source comes after 18:00....my timings are from 132672, they differ on other copies.)

One thing's for sure, the Dead won't play the same Dark Star twice! If they do it one way, however successful, they'll take a different tack the next night. In spite of 2-28 on the whole being an incredible show, this wasn't really Dark Star's night to shine. It's kind of a regression....it doesn't come near the heights of 2-27, it's more comparable to the Dream Bowl versions. I agree about the brooding feel: it's faster-paced but more uncertain, it doesn't really build up a strong sustained atmosphere but kind of drifts here & there without big peaks. (Maybe coming right after the Other One didn't help?) The highlights are the feedback-filled Sputnik and Jerry's Spanish line after the verse.


Just listened to three mixes in a row, which I recommend if you like this broody Dark Star....you can hear different instrumental nuances in each. But the tiny differences in pitch won't change your impressions. On the FW version, Phil is louder so his interplay with Jerry is more apparent -- same with TC.
One thing that struck me was how closely they follow Jerry's mood. I mean, there's no place where they zig but Jerry zags, no clash -- they're right on top of his every turn. This could easily have been a more bombastic Dark Star, but they let him follow a more quiet path tonight.


adamos:
It is remarkable how different this one is to the night before; subtler with a brooding, contemplative mood yet compelling in its own way. The beginning does seem tentative, almost like they hadn't fully decided to play Dark Star after The Other One and then it takes them a little while to get it going.

I really like the part after the first verse which has a unique feel. Around 6:32 (on the Fillmore West Complete version) Jerry bursts out for just a brief moment and then takes it right back down again and plays this beautiful wandering thing with a bit of edge to it that is really appealing. After a couple of minutes they reach a strong peak but it's not a total blast off and things shift again into that subtler, brooding vibe. There's a kind of dream-like quality to the jam as they slowly make their way to Sputnik.

You can really hear Phil underneath during Sputnik. The guitars draw the ear due to their intensity but I was digging the bass. He leads things coming out of it too or at least holds it down while they collect themselves and decide where to go next, and Bobby steps forth with his riff that begets a nice groove. By around 15:55 it sounds like it's just Jerry, Bill and Mickey on guiro for a bit, then the others slowly come back in and suddenly they are are at a peak again leading into the verse melody.


JSegel:
That fact that these nights are so different is basically the crux of why Dark Star is the track we are here about isn't it? It's amazing how mercurial the band could be, of course especially Jerry "I don't like to choose one thing or the other" Garcia who seems to want to try it every possible way, he is expanding his creativity in soloing by leaps and bounds over the course of this period.
The band's growth during this development of Dark Star has been incredible to listen to, and I find it funny also that they choose different ways to play the song every night, even the solid developments like the exaggeration of the rhythmic changes in the verse that come to a point in the course of tour where everyone is playing them together, and then suddenly the next night, it's only Phil and he's doing the changes with a soft touch. It's great!

As far as Tom Constanten goes... Well, I've been thinking about his contributions for a couple months now, so a personal note here: while I may be probably the only person who likes those cheesy Vox organ tones, I’m realizing I'm not that into what TC plays. As much as Pigpen ‘wasn’t a keyboardist’ or whatever, his playing was cool, and on Dark Star, that Repeating Organ Riff was cool and weird. I hear TC coming into the groove with the band a bit here in 3/1/69 (full writeup in a bit), there are sections where it seems like he’s interacting with the band in short statements tossed back and forth, but overall his choices are sort of basic, scales or arpeggiated chords that still seem to lie outside the music somehow (in Dark Star, anyway—to me). He’s an oddball addition to the various musical talents of the ensemble, that’s for sure. He really works on the songs that need "color" like the pseudo Harpsichord on Mountains of the Moon, but as an improvising musician he's just playing patterns.

Like I mentioned the Live/Dead version isn't any more etched into my musical memory than any of these others, so I'm still trying to take this run as a whole, in a way, many possible ways to develop the song in different ways. I may try to write up a post-weekend run summary of all four.


Mr. Rain:
Yes, the Dark Stars from this period have been a much more varied bunch than I expected. The map destinations may the same but they take different roads in between each time. By now it's like they're flaunting it, deliberately finding something totally new in each performance.


Agreed on Constanten. He's been disappointing in his Dark Star work so far (maybe he was disappointing for the band too). Now, he might get better later in the year, so there's hope for improvement. Usually he's been so low in the mix you kind of have to imagine him, but now that we can hear him clearly it's like, "eh, didn't need him turned up after all."
Part of the situation was out of his control -- he was a piano player, with no experience on the organ; and Jerry barely gives him any breathing room. Even so, he plays some cool bits and surprises now and then, but in general he sticks to decorative patterns, following the band but not really adding interesting leads or stepping up when he does have space. It's like his goal is to be an unobtrusive backdrop. But granted, he'd been playing shows with them just a few months and they'd been developing together for years. He might have done very little live improvising before this, I don't know, but this was all a new field for him.


pbuzby:
In his book T.C. mentioned that when the band started critiquing his playing Garcia said he wanted him to play "more like a source and less like a sideman." T.C. tried but never got there.