Grateful Dead :: Dick’s Picks Volume One

Caveat emptor: The recording herein has been lovingly remastered directly from the original two-track master tape and is therefore not immune to the various glitches, splices, reel changes and other aural gremlins contained on said original. Dick’s Picks differs from our From The Vault series in that we simply did not have access to complete shows (nor the modern mixing capabilities afforded by multitrack tapes). But we think the historical value and musical quality of these tapes more than compensates for any technical anomalies… In other words, what you hear is what you get. And what you get ain’t bad.

So reads the CD booklet accompanying Dicks Picks Volume One, as penned by its namesake–the late Grateful Dead archivist Dick Latvala. The concept for the series was eight years in the making, and ultimately yielded 36 entries, culminating with the 2005 release of the band’s performance in Philadelphia, PA in September of 1972. Recorded December 19, 1973, at Curtis Hixon Hall in Tampa, Florida, this first entry finds the band touring behind the October release of Wake of the Flood, the first album on their own label, Grateful Dead Records. The lineup that evening was nimble, consisting of Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann, Bob Weir and Keith Godchaux. Conspicuously absent from this era of the group is Donna Jean Godchaux who stayed off the road due to pregnancy.

Classic ’73 Dead in vibe (languid, mellow, jazzy), the disc kicks off with a fourteen minute extrapolation of Wake centerpiece “Here Comes Sunshine”. As renditions of the tune go, this reading remains absolutely definitive. Another selection that is in and of itself worth the price of admission is the inclusion of “Nobody’s Fault but Mine”. Clocking in around six minutes, the Blind Willie Johnson cover drips with pathos as the band locks into a groove before sliding into a sixteen minute jam. Three other tracks from the new album make an appearance (do check out the evening’s rendering of “Weather Report Suite”) buttressed by a host of usual suspects from the era.

In celebration of its 30th anniversary, Volume One was recently reissued as a 4-LP set via Real Gone Music. For vinyl pundits this is notable as it marks the first time the set’s contents have been remastered for the format via the original analog tapes. Though spread out over the course of two CDs, concessions were made by Latvala and Phil Lesh in regard to editing/re-arranging the material culled from the evening’s two sets (e.g. the aforementioned “Here Comes Sunshine” originally sits 3/4 of the way through the first set). Upon release, Dead purists were bummed. As such, this new vinyl edition attempts to make amends with the inclusion of material absent from the original ’93 release (and yes, this includes the notoriously excised Phil Lesh bass solo). For the completest, a soundboard recording of the entire concert, sans modification, can be found via archive.org.

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