88501 Boston 20:56
Main theme at 6:08.
First verse at 6:41.
Sputnik at 14:12.
Main theme at 18:37.
Second verse at 1921.
Goes into St. Stephen.
Garcia begins with a repeated melody and then drops back; at the outset, Lesh dominates the proceedings, as Weir is playing the basic two-chord pattern, and TC begins on the ROR and then sort of hangs in the background, playing some variations on the main theme. Garcia swoops in at 1:07, then backs off again until 2:13, when he finally gets started.
At 2:59, Garcia gets into one of the repeating patterns that have been so common lately, and then starts to vary it and move about. At 3:39 he gets into a groove with the bass notes there’s a little eddy starting at 3:59, and they seem ready to break out of the theme pattern a little. They pedal along in place for about a minute, until Garcia starts flashing the theme at 5:09. He hints at it even more strongly beginning at 5:32, but they’re not ready to go there yet. At 6:08 he is flashing the theme again, and although he never quite plays it, this seems to serve as the first iteration, as the band falls into line behind him, and at 6:41 the first verse arrives.
Garcia swoops in with feedback immediately after the repetition of the opening theme, and the band descends into some weirdness right away. Suddenly this section has become something quite different here; it still establishes tension, but in a much more maximal and oddball way. In the midst of the swirl, at 8:39, Garcia begins spiraling upward, signaling the arrival of the middle jam, and things swing back toward relative normalcy.
At 9:12 Garcia plays a lick from The Eleven that we’ve heard once or twice before, but he quickly moves on from it. Lesh starts hinting at a minor chord as the jam gets moodier for a bit, until it swings back toward a brighter feel at about 10:04. A little after the 11 minute mark the jam seems to get into a holding pattern, and one wonders if Sputnik is coming. At 12:14, Garcia is flashing the insect effect, and the guiro enters rather prominently, and Sputnik seems imminent. They still hold off for a while, though, as the jam again picks up steam.
At 13:43, Garcia starts playing a percussive chugging thing as Lesh and Weir step out a bit. Sputnik finally arrives at 14:12, with Garcia alternating arpeggios with little stabbing moves. Sputnik seems to end at about 15:32, with Garcia playing some bass string licks, and getting into a bit of a duet with Lesh down there before climbing out again. The insect weirdness seems to be forgotten this time, and there’s not really a space section.
At 17:12 things start to kick up, as Garcia plays some high howling licks, and we head toward a peak, then a valley and another peak just after the 18 minute mark. Garcia seems ready to break into Bright Star, but this never comes, and we get the main theme at 18:37. In lieu of Bright Star, however, there is nevertheless a pretty satisfying post-Sputnik peak here, or really two.
All the real weirdness is packed into the build-up just after the first verse this time. Overall another fine version; Dark Star has come a long way over the past two months.
What was said:
JSegel:
Here we have the last night of the run, the announcer says “I said it last night, I’ll say it again, the best Rock and Roll band in the world” and they launch into “He Was a Friend of Mine,” a slow country number! ok then. But Dark Star is next, second song of the set.
Some noodles, with Phil jump starting the intro. Somebody in the Audience yells “Morning Dew” and they say, “NO, **** you. You gotta stick around to hear Morning Dew.”
It is a hand-drums and shaker intro jam, very mellow Bob + Phil jam for a while. We’re moving slowly into this evening. Jerry in at 2 minutes, but also with a hesitancy, some weird notes, and some little eddies in the flow. He doesn’t settle really, just exploring some wide intervallic phrases, and some chromatic pull-offs, interesting stuff. Eventually he gets into the mode, but he’s got some weird ideas of where to take it, he does the AG-AE riff on the low strings for a while before 4”. He’s easily distracted into little exploratory bits, some cool backing from TC, in his classic arpeggios and such. At about 5” he goes for a long upwards run using the classic rock riff thing, groups of three notes, down one then back up, to the next note in the pentatonic. (Is there a name for that? Weedelee weedelee weedelee. Every guitarist does that, even still. I’m gonna do it as soon as I can!) Oddly he lands on a C natural, the minor third of A, where usually this mode has a C#. Back down to the B, Bb, then B and into the intro theme jam a bit, before directly starting a song-form jam for a minute but they’re still caught up with some ideas of using flatted notes. Back to the theme heading to the verse. Jerry’s really playing around with chromatics beforehand, the leading tones to the notes he’s circling in on.
TC cops the weedelee downwards for backing the first line! Ok, interesting. Line two has the syncopated rhythm strongly, though not loudly, and Jerry hits some weird notes. Mild casting about on the Searchlight line. Phil is chomping at the bit to head into the jam
Which almost gets through its counterpoint intro before there’s feedback and cymbals, bells, everybody goes outside into space! Wow, this is new and interesting. JG finally pegs some lead notes and the band sort of comes back together, but the band sounds like they want to go somewhere for sure. JG plays some strong lead material, but oddly drifts past some other (semi)known riffs, like the thing he plays in The Eleven right before they start the eleven beat phrase. Then he backs off his tone, Phil take some chord tones as if it’s gonna go elsewhere, but comes into the Dark Star chords-ish. JG seems fascinated by sets of notes quite often this evening. And breaking the mode, and switching tones between pickups and tone knobs.
A riff almost starts in the 11:30 area, but it doesn’t take off and they take the level down We can hear TC doing his arpeggios. At 12.5” the weird guiro is coming in to freak people out. Jerry falls into repetitive short phrases, then continues that endless lead, throwing some wild notes out of the runs, here’s one that jumps out high, here’s one that’s a minor note outside the mode we’re in. He brings it to the lower strings and taps out, PL and BW take it. JG follows with melodic flourish. Sounds like a Sputnik is coming but nobody is settling into the classic arpeggio until almost 15 minutes. And even then, it’s not the same as before, they’re playing with bits of it. Oh, Bill is in on drums, almost didn’t notice. When it drops down, it Jerry is playing with the sputnik idea, but then he goes off into some weird riff territory. And again, outside the mode, he gets fascinated by some riffs that are not in the normal DS territory, He’s chasing something else tonight! Trying out some new tricks too, some sweep arpeggios. (Take note, metal guitarists, this was 1969.)
Both drumsets start pounding away in the 17th minute. Everybody is circling around something, like hawks looking down from high in the air, we’re sort of sounding like it may burst into the Bright Star, but it doesn’t and when it comes down, JG hits the theme like, “what? We were here the whole time.”
Into Verse 2, people cheer loudly “what just happened?”
Vocals sound pretty good, all parts. Outro seems longer to me before St Stephen starts and into the rest of a long long show.
Really interesting version closing out the Ark run.
pbuzby:
4/23/69 is odd in that there are three Charlie Miller SBD sources on the Archive. Like some other 1969 shows, it was apparently recorded to both reel and cassette and the first source was only from the reels and had some big cuts, that they later patched with the cassettes (and then the third Miller source replaced some "flawed portions" including the end of Dark Star). Speaking of sources, there is an upgrade of 4/11/69 on Lossless Legs today.
Mr. Rain:
I liked the relaxed flow in this one. Since this is the third Dark Star in 3 days at the Ark, I get the feeling that Jerry's intentionally not playing some of the same familiar themes and trying to make this one a little fresher.
Great recording, from a reel master this time. (The Miller 98968 source patches the last minute of Dark Star from a cassette copy which is noticeably noisier.) Pigpen's on congas again, Mickey (?) on the shaker. TC's warbling away in the back.
A promising start with Jerry playing this pretty counter-melody which is so nice I wonder why he doesn't do that every time! His usual opening pause then stretches out for quite a while as the band vamps along.... Then a minute later, a grand entry! But no, false alarm, he's out again.... (Guitar trouble?) Finally, two minutes into it, he starts soloing. The effect already is a little more calm & mellow than most Dark Stars.
Jerry does a lot of repeating & developing melodic statements in his lead...likely including some motifs he's done before (like that bass riff after 3:35, he also played on 4-15). The opening jam doesn't go for any strong peaks, it just ambles pleasantly, and gets quieter as it goes along. But Bill's eager to contribute, and he adds some cymbal splashes after 5:30. They flow naturally into the main theme & verse.
The moment the verse is done -- whoa, Jerry's off in feedback! The whole pattern's destabilized, and the rest of the band takes off with him. For a minute they're in a beautiful quasi-meltdown space -- none of the usual bell-tolling, but Jerry does some eerie string-chiming instead. This is a brand-new approach, and it works so well I wonder why they haven't done it before!
Jerry takes a strong opening to the main jam. But interestingly, it soon quiets down and gets pensive...after 9 minutes they're in evocative territory. (Bill's laying out at this point, which is unusual, but the guiro & congas are going strong.) By 11-12 minutes they're in a hypnotic quiet, gentle spot...then Jerry finds a series of repeated notes that launch him into a more intense lead. The other guys add some propulsion, and the cymbals & drums come in!
Jerry finds a moment to slip in a Sputnik...this one seems shorter & prettier than the norm. (Notice the 3 percussionists adding quiet touches.) The band must be expecting the insect weirdness, but Jerry takes a left turn and carries on with some gnarly soloing. The jam carries on in its quiet low-key manner, until around 17 minutes both drums come tumbling in and the band gets louder & heavier. It sounds like Jerry's heading for a Bright Star -- but no, he feints, and tries a different direction. Can he come up with a new climax on the fly? Well no, not this time...the band's surging, but he sort of chokes up and retreats to the theme. Nice try, anyway. (This reminds me of his attempt on 4-20 to end the jam without a Bright Star climax.)
The return to the theme is nice. The 3 percussionists are very apparent here, adding quite a clatter on top of the theme. Big applause for the second verse!
This was a surprisingly quiet Dark Star a lot of the time; the typical high-points weren't the highlights; bonus points for Jerry trying to make it different. The middle part is especially effective & tantalizing. The big noisy space after the verse is pointing the way to future Dark Stars.
Adamos:
Feels breezy at the start; guiro and maracas are prominent in the mix. Lots of Phil too who is the driving force early on with the others accenting until Jerry steps forth around 2:10 and heads out. Jerry’s playing touches on some familiar ground but it almost has a casual feel; the overall pace is still somewhat brisk, kind of like cruising along on a country road.
Then immediately following the first verse things change. There’s some guitar feedback and the whole thing starts to swirl about; something is building and brewing and itching to take off. Starting around 8:34 Jerry does this brief run up of notes and they set out. However what feels like it might be a collectively energetic passage quickly shifts gears and by 9:15 or so they’re in a different, more contemplative zone. Jerry’s spidery guitar explores in various directions with guiro and maracas remaining prominent as well. Around 11:00 things settle further, Jerry is playing more quietly, TC’s swirls fill in; at 12:08 there’s a hint of weirdness, more scratching. Things are picking up again, Jerry sounds really good, the emotion swells then eases off again, cowbell at 13:42 then they kind of collect themselves and head towards Sputnik.
Sputnik is relatively short but building and pretty with lots of percussion and cymbal. It dissolves but not into insect weirdness; instead Jerry plays this edgy riff buttressed by Phil and Bill and then they kind of wander about for a bit. Around 17:10 they surge upwards and it feels like Bright Star is coming yet it never arrives; by 18:20 they’ve eased off again and then hit the main theme at 18:37 and slowly make their way to the second verse.
An interesting version that is different in its own ways. The opening segment isn’t quite a microcosm like other recent performances but post verse has some unique aspects. The notion of wanting to mix it up a bit after playing Dark Star three nights in a row at the same venue would make sense.
Mr. Rain:
Ah yes, Mickey seems to have added the cowbell as a regular part of Dark Star's final stretches lately. I was hoping he'd bring back the glockenspiel!
You wouldn't think Dark Star was a tune calling for three drummers, but here we are.
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