Watkins Glen Experience
I Had Not Been To The Woodstock Festival, So Watkins Glen Was My Chance To Go To Woodstock In Style: A Tent, Cooler, Ice, Food, Beer, And A 61 Chrysler
Newport, And My Friend Arti.
We Had 2 Brand New Sony Ecm-22P Electret Condenser Microphones And The Trusty Hitachi 222Trq Stereo Cassette Recorder.
The Concert Was Scheduled For Saturday, We Arrived Tuesday Afternoon, Set Up Camp A Ways From The Concert Field. Friday Morning There Was A Rumor That The
Sound Check Was Going To Happen Later That Afternoon, And That Ticket Holders Would Be Allowed In. Friday, Just Around Noon The Gates Were Opened. We Headed
For The Front, Our Goal 40 Feet Out Dead Center From The Stage. Unfortunately There Were People Already There, The Only Prime Real Estate In That Vicinity
Was Covered By About 2 Inches Of Water, As It Had Been Raining Off And; On All Week. The Promoters Were Thoughtful Enough To Supply Bottled Water, Pallets Of
It, To The Ticket Holders. Seizing The Opportunity We Gathered 4 Wooden Pallets And Walked Them All The Way Up To The Prime But Flooded Area. We Placed The
Pallets Over The Water And Squared Them, Put Coverage On Top And Presto, We Were Dry And Soon Would Be High. We Were About 40 Feet, Dead Center From Stage,
Or About Halfway Between The Soundboard And; The Stage.
We Had Brought 4, 4 Ft Long 1 Inch Wide Metal Conduit, With Couplers, To Hoist The Microphones. Everything Was Set As The Band Took The Stage. We Had Our
Mikes Up, Way Up, And With The Surprise Of The Friday Event, The Crowd Was Not So Dense, Making Us Quite Visible From The Stage.
There Were Flyers Circulated By The Promoters Which Threatened That There Was To Be No Recording Of The Concert Cords Would Be Cut The Flyer Stated.
The Band Went Through There Sound Check, We Went Through Ours, The Sound Was A Little Strong, Especially With Our Mikes So High And Close, We Were Thrilled.
I Do Not Remember If There Was A Complete Band Song As The First Soundcheck Tune. If It Was, We Either Had The Pause Button On Or Were Not Ready. I Do Not
Remember Either Way.
The Levels Attenuated Properly Towards The End Of The Set, And Then The Allmans Came On. We Decided Not To Record The Brothers. Next The Dead Came On, As
They Began To Play Phil Lesh Looked Out And Asked Are You All Ready Out There We Thought He Was Talking To Us, But Weren T Sure. Everything Was Going
Fine, The First Set Was Drawing To A Close. It Was During Bird Song That We Were Accosted Suddenly By A Big Red Headed And Bearded Goon, Who Waded Through
The Crowd And Demanded That We Cease Taping Immediately And Wanted Our Tapes And Our Blanks . I Was Standing, Arti Crouched Down And Began Fiddling, I Kept
Yelling At The Goon To Waste Time And Keep The Jackass Busy So As Not To Actually Be Able To See Or Get His Paws On Our Stuff. He Was Also Distracted Looking
Behind Us To Locate His Next Victim, Anyone Who Was Taping The Show. Arti Came Up, Handed Him A Cassette Tape And 1 Box Of Tdk Sd90 Tapes, It Was Half Of Our
Supply. The Goon Grabbed Our Stuff And Took Off Behind Us. Arti Had Given Him A Blank, Good Thing Because The Tape We Were Using For The Dead Was Also The
One We Had Used For The Band S Sound Check.
We Stopped Taping, Our Tape Ends In The Middle Of Bird Song.
The Set Ended And During The Break It Got Dark. We Hand Held The Mikes And Taped The Spectacular 2Nd Set With That Awesome Jam, We Were Shaken, Paranoid, But
Determined To Pull This Off.
Saturday, We Decided To Lower The Mikes, Using One Four Foot Section Hand Held Just About Head Level. This Is Why You Can Hear Lots Of Audience During The
Saturday Show.
Also, With The Crowd Gathering And The Inevitable Crush Of The Latecomers To The Front, This Caused Jostling Even Up On Our Pallets. Arti And; I Kept Watch Over
The Deck And Recording Levels. There Were 2 Other &Quot;Friends, Mitchell +1&Quot; Who Held The Poles With The Mikes. The Instructions Were To Keep The Mikes Down At
Head Level. This Is Why There Are Multiple Dropouts Of The High Frequencies, Mainly On The Left Side. The Mikes Were Separated, Held By 2 People Who At Times
Could Not See Each Other. There Are Periods When The Stereo Image Is Better Than Others. The Idea Was That Any Recording Would Be Better Than No Recording.
Also, It Rained Throughout The Day, Mainly During The Band S Set. At A Couple Of Points It Rained So Hard We Stopped Recording And Covered Everything, Even
The Wires. That Is Why There Is No Garth Solo During The Rain.
On Saturday :
The Dead Played First, We Were Paranoid And Did Not Take Our Eyes Off The Goon Squad On Stage. We Operated In Stealth Mode For The Band, Who Played Next.
The Allman Brothers Played In The Dark, We Were Not So Paranoid By Them, We Had Also Peaked During The Band, So We Were A Little More Composed. This Was My
First Association With Genesee Cream Ale, Which We Had An Ample Of Supply In The Cooler.
I Have Not Traded This Show Ever, The Only People Who Had Copies Were 3 Of Us And A Small Circle Of Trusted Friends.
It Would Be Nice To Get A Sound Board Of The Band S Set, One Exists, For The Bogus Live From Watkins Glen Official Lp Contains A Few Soundboard Tunes, As
Does The Bands &Quot;To Kingdom Come&Quot;, An Entire Sound Board Of This Show Would Be Great.
Ever Wonder Why The Dead Shows Were All Taped But The Supporting Bands Were Not
I Think The Playing Order Was:
Friday July 27, 1973 The Soundcheck
1 The Band
2 Allman Bros
3 Grateful Dead
Saturday July 28, 1973 The Concert
1 Grateful Dead
2 The Band
3 Allman Brothers
4 Summer Jam (Members Of All 3 Bands Playing)
Tech Notes:
2 Sony Ecm-22P Electret Condenser
Microphones Into
Hitachi Trq-222 Stereo Cassette Recorder
Using Tdk Sd-90 Cassette Tape
Transferred The Mc Using A Sony Tc We-175 Deck With A Dbx 2231 Eq
To A Sony Rcd W500C, Which Is A Standalone Cd Recorder
Master Audience Cassettes ≫ Eq ≫ Cdr ≫ Eac ≫ Cdr ≫
Eac ≫ Wave ≫ Trader'S Little Helper ≫ Flac
Jim Cooper January 2010
The Band
Raceway,
Watkins Glen Ny
Disc 1
Friday July 27, 1973
The Sound Check
1 Instrumental
2 Audience
3 Instrumental
4 Audience
5 Don T Do It
6 Audience
7 W.S. Walcott Medicine Show
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Disc 2
Saturday July 28, 1973
The Concert Part 1
1 Audience/ Tuning
2 Instrumental
3 Audience
4 Introduction
Sam Cutler And; Bill Graham
5 Goin Back To Memphis
We Ve Got A Visitor
Comments About Parachutist Who Sadly Would Die
6 Audience
7 Lovin You Is Sweeter Than Ever
8 The Shape I M In
9 The Weight
10 Stage Fright
1I Shall Be Released
12 Don T Do It
13 Endless Highway
14 Genetic Method
15 Chest Fever
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Disc 3
Saturday July 28, 1973
The Concert Part 2
1 The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down
2 Across The Great Divide
3 Instrumental
4 Holy Cow
5 Audience
6 Life Is A Carnival
7 Saved
8 Up On Cripple Creek
9 Audience
10 Share Your Love
11 Wheels On Fire
12 W.S Wolcott Medicine Show
13 Slippin And; Slidin
14 Audience Idiot Demands Allmans
15 Rag Mama Rag
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Disc 4
Saturday July 28, 1973
The Concert Part 3
Summer Jam (Various Members Of)
Allman Brothers, The Band And; Grateful Dead)
Watkins Glen, Ny. Raceway
July 28, 1973
After The Main Event
Rick Danko
1 A Change Is Gonna Come (1St Take)
2 A Change Is Gonna Come
3 Rick And; Crowd Converse
4 Rainin In My Heart
5 It Hasn T Been Planned
6 Tuning And; Direction As Various Musicians Converge And; Proceed To Mill About And; Play
7 Richard Manuel Vocal Have You Ever Been Mistreated
8 Go Jerry
9 Da Di De Day Rick Vocal
10 Not Fade Away
11 Level Checking
12 Let Me Wrap You In My Warm And; Tender Love Rick And Jerry Vocals
13 Reelin And; Rockin
14 We Want Our Money Back
15 Mountain Jam
16/17 Amazing Grace
18 Mountain Jam
Images For All Shows As Well As Full Size Images For This Show.
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