216. 1994-03-30

14832 Atlanta 10:29

Verse melody at 2:52.
Main theme at 4:18.
First verse at 4:48.
Goes into Drums.


The final Dark Star follows a Playing in the Band that gets rather freaky at the end. Garcia kicks it off, and right away it is a bit more laid-back than the last one—the funky and frenetic approach seems to have been a one-off. Nevertheless, it bounces along nicely, moving at a good clip.


What the hell is Garcia doing starting at 2:02? He’s got some really freaky stuff happening, like he’s tuning a radio; then there’s a rather Hawaiian rendering of the verse melody at 2:52. The playing here is completely unlike anything we’ve heard in a previous Dark Star! When they hit the main theme, Weir almost takes the lead for a moment. There’s a sense of possibility here, and the crowd seems to recognize this with a cheer when they hit the verse.


Jerry follows the verse with some more conventional Dark Star leads, which are welcome here…now we’ve got four minutes for this to go somewhere. As usual, it will have to go out without falling apart entirely, as the latter is a constant danger when Drums are in the offing. By around 7 minutes in, the music has quietened considerably. There’s a little segment where Jerry and Vince are the focus, and Weir drops out for a little while.


We get hints of Sputnik, and at 7:41 Garcia sounds like he wants to start playing Comes a Time! He works a little melodic bit that sounds like the intro to the former, and Vince follows him. The drummers are very restrained throughout this segment; their time is coming, but they allow this delicate jam to unfold. Garcia keeps his Comes a Time lick going, with various permutations, but the band doesn’t quite coalesce around it—rather, they seem content to let it spill away and to cede the stage.


It's very difficult to evaluate this one—even though the band almost certainly didn’t know this would be the last time, it has sentimental force nevertheless. There’s not a whole lot to it, really; on the other hand, and fittingly enough, it has elements that are absolutely unique. What an amazing thing Dark Star is, that it could last so long and go so many places. We are fortunate to have these recordings, and in the end the finale could have been a lot worse. Even though their commitment to Dark Star waned in the last few years, they were still trying new things to the last.


What was said:

215. 1994-03-16

139174 IL 11:15

Main theme at :06 and 4:20.
First verse at 4:31.
Goes into Drums.


This time there is no spacey jamming preceding Dark Star—Long Way to Go Home ends with a vocal coda (which the audience seems to love!) and Garcia, again playing the Lightning Bolt with the acoustic patch, immediately plays the introductory riff. We’ve now arrived at that portion of the Dead’s career many would prefer to pass over in silence, but Jerry sounds really good here, breaking off crisp licks as the band plays a tight and bouncy take on the two-chord pattern.


In fact, this might be the funkiest take on the introductory jam we’ve yet heard, and Garcia’s staccato licks are almost reminiscent, at times, of Shakedown Street. They’ve found a whole new feel here, and it’s a delight to hear, as the protean qualities of Dark Star are still in evidence after 26 years. They know they’ve caught something, and they lean into it—it’s not spacey or mysterious, but it is the sound of the Grateful Dead finding a groove. They’re also going pretty fast, and this is particularly evident when Jerry sings the verse, for which they do not slow the tempo, as they sometimes did in the past when it got brisk in the intro jam.


They continue as they started after the singing subsides, and now Garcia’s line gets more melodic and majestic, even as the band cranks away. They get the idea, though, and soon the music starts to stretch and breathe. The tempo is still quick, but the gestalt changes to something more expansive, if still rather tightly structured. When Lesh climbs at 8:00 things start really popping, as guitar and bass embark on their familiar winding dance.


Welnick is rather timid tonight, almost sounding like TC at times as he swirls around without substantially affecting the direction of things. Weir stays within the funk concept for the most part, which works just fine. Lesh and Garcia have given us a moment, though, and now it’s going to wind down in the direction of Drums, which take an increasingly tribal approach to the funk template that’s been set.


This is surprisingly good, if a bit limited. They explore a single tempo and beat, but they do it really well, and it is engaging throughout. It is perhaps a conservative decision to maintain the tempo throughout the verse--there will be no reset, no need to find a new approach--but it works well enough. This is way better than I expected (or feared).


What was said: