This is a tagged version of shnid: 86607

HISTORY AND TRACK LIST:
1971/08/21
Mickey's Barn,
Novato CA


Source: Recorded on a Sony TC-24 with supplied Sony stereo mic**
Lineage: AUDMC > Nakamichi Dragon (no Dolby) > Sony D7 DAT > optical digital
cable (DTC-700 was the playback unit) through a Zefiro ZA2 soundcard,
tracked and normalized in Sound Forge and burned to 2 cdrs (61:47 and 42:41)
using CD Architect. Nothing from the original tapes was omitted; one or two
quick fades were done to make cuts less abrupt.
Quality: ****
_____________________________________________________________________________

--Setlist--
101-d1t01 - //Jam #1
102-d1t02 - Wall Song -> Jam -> Wall Song// *
103-d1t03 - Jam #2
104-d1t04 - tuning Part 1
105-d2t01 - //tuning Part 2
106-d2t02 - Jam #3
107-d2t03 - Jam #4
108-d2t04 - Tuning Jam #1
109-d2t05 - Stars & Stripes Forever tuning
110-d2t06 - Ghost Riders In The Sky Jam
111-d2t07 - Whinin' Boy Blues
112-d2t08 - Tuning Jam #2
113-d2t09 - Tore Down

* tape flip? at 29:18.
____________________________________________________________________________

Setlist and review by Adrian M. Johnson <jelly@thebigj.demon.co.uk>

The tape was stopped and restarted between each track; there is no major
loss at the start of any of the tracks except perhaps the very first one.

The order on my existing tape, and as listed in the compendium, was Ghost
Riders, Winin' Boy Blues, Jam #1 >> Jam #4, with a tape flip (and c.
1 minute loss) during the Wall Song reprise and Jam #4 cut at about 11:30.
So basically, my understanding of what is the generally circulating tape
(and I must have put a dozen or so copies of it into circulation is by and
large the bulk of the session, slightly shuffled to get as much as possible
on. What these discs add are a bit of continuity where the cassette ran out,
plus another song.
Oh yes, and a noticeable improvement in quality.

So, what is it? As you'll have gathered from Easy Ed's post, it's a bunch of
musicians just kicking back and jamming. No particular place to go, but good
stuff all the same. The sound is quite dense on a lot of the jams, with 2 or
perhaps 3 guitars a lot of the time, as well as piano and/or keyboards,
which are noticeably quiet, (when they are not unnoticeably so!). Maybe it's
got something to do with the set-up, and probably it's got rather more to do
with the informal nature of it all,but instruments seem to come and go during
the longer numbers. Not that there's anything wrong with that; this is guys
just playing for fun rather than a chamber recital. Pretty much every track
has drums, bass, and 2 guitars minimum; anything else is mentioned if I
noticed and remembered to make a note. No guarantees that they play/are
audible for the entire track.

Jam #1
(I was tempted to call this the Quickfire jam, since it's both fairly rapid
and briefly flirts with the Fire On The Mountain riff at one point) We fade
into something that's already started and been going for an indeterminate
length of time, with both organ and piano in the mix. It starts slow and
majestic (sort of a Morning Dew feel), picks up at about 1:30 when the
drummer really ups the pace to sort of Viola Lee Blues climax speed. (The
drumming on this track seems louder and fiercer on this track than the
rest of the session) The tempo drops slightly at 3:10, but is still pretty
quick. The rhythm guitar is much louder than lead, and there's possibly a
3rd guitar in here. About 5:15 the jam drops into a quickish Fire On The
Mountain type riff which it mutates out of quite quickly, although still
playing around with the theme. The piano also seems to have gone. Jams
around this theme, builds to a crescendo then the guitars drop out, leaving
just bass and drums at 11:00; an amazing piece of Phil ensues for about half
a minute then the odd tinkle of piano reappears as this winds down at 11:45,
to finish at 12:19

The Wall Song->Jam->The Wall Song
Starts with organ which is replaced by simple piano. This is a fairly
unadorned version of The Wall Song (Garcia, Lesh and Kreutzmann played on
the released version of this which came out on the Crosby and Nash album in
Summer '72, and it'd been played at the PERRO sessions at the turn of the
year as well); Crosby sings at least some of the lyrics on the initial
instalment of the song. There is some introspective lo wer-register soloing
by Garcia reminiscent of some of the Hartbeats Dark Star jamming. After
about 16 minutes it moves to into an uptempo jam; about here I think we get
Cipollina coming in and picking up the guitar that was lying around and
joining the melee. The jam drops back into an instrumental Wall Song reprise
just before 24:00. There's a slight tape flub towards the end, which I
guess may have been a quick flip.

Jam #2
Starts with an organ in the mix, a piano is added a little later. It's a
mid-tempo jam which picks up in tempo. Towards the end there's either a
"shaky" flute or weird guitar noise, or something else which my
non-musician's ear can't quite pin down. Pretty much stops just short of
18:00. I'm guessing that this is the jam after Cipollina had been out to
get his own guitar out of his car - it's definitely him, but different to
the previous jam to my ears, more like his usual trademark quiver.

Noodle #1
various instruments deciding what to do next

Noodle #2
continuation of pondering what to do (Easy Ed has put a slight overlap in
here so DATers can stitch it back together if required, or if we ever get a
single DVD audio standard...)

Jam #3
organ, probably a third guitar as well. Mid tempo jam, which early on sounds
not dissimilar to the way Terry & The Pirates were to play Rodney Crowell's
"Ain't Living Long Like This". This one is a real beauty; not a moment's
respite from some great straightahead jamming, guitars nicely weaving in
and out of each other.

Jam #4
Organ as well. Another mid-tempo jam this sounds a little like the
instrumental break in Silverado Trail by Terry & The Pirates from the 1990
CD of that name. There's a little bit more light and shade in this than the
previous jam, a bit more room within the structure to manoeuvre. There's a
nice sustained increase in intensity until about 11:45, at which point we
get a slight tape flub (original flip?) and a quietish coda.

Tuning Jam #1
Similar tune to the mindless "here we go, here we go, here we go" hant so
beloved of soccer fans over here; probably either from a traditional ditty
or something classical.

Ghost Riders In The Sky Jam
Fairly standard run through, with some nice leadwork from Cipollina

Winin' Boy Blues
Again a fairly straight run through. Sounds like the good Mr Weir singing,
and he sounds at home with song. I'm surprised the Dead didn't play this
more often; perhaps it was too much thought of as a Tuna song.

Tuning Jam #2
This sounds familiar, like some old-time music hall tune or something

Tore Down
Piano on this one; standard bluesy song. Doesn't sound like Bob's singing;
can't put my finger on anyone it might sound like.

So who's on it?
Well working from Rick's notes, other than Lesh and Hart, I'd say it's
obvious we have Cipollina from the Wall Song jam onwards; he's pretty
prevalent, as are the rhythm section at times. Obviously we have Crosby
for the Wall Song, and probably for the Jam before (Jam #1). I think we
have Garcia on all of disc 1, and possibly the first long jam on disc 2,
if not the second as well. Bob's obviously in there for at least some of
the time. Keyboards? I dunno. I've seen suggestions of Nicky Hopkins
sometimes, but he's remarkably laid back and doesn't seem to take a solo
at all; generally it doesn't sound busy enough to be him. I wonder if
Pete Sears was perhaps around at the time. That said, the keyboards on
The Wall Song are obviously by somebody who doesn't earn their living as
a keyboard player; they're pretty elementary. Maybe Bob or Crosby play some
of them? Other guitarists? maybe? And since this grew out of a taping
session of the New Riders, I guess there's likely to be the odd NRPS-er
in there. I think we can definitely rule out anybody from the Airplane or
Hot Tuna, since I understand they played Cobo Hall in Michigan on
20 & 21 August. However, since Spencer Dryden was drumming for NRPS by
this time, I think he may well be on some of the tracks; it certainly sounds
to me like his jazzier feel on Jam #1. Additionally I understand from
Rick via Easy Ed that he doesn't remember Barry Melton being there (I've
heard Melton rumoured as a possible participant; he was on Mickey's Rolling
Thunder album recorded around that time), and that he thinks the rock
drummer from Shanti (Frank Lupica, I believe) played on one of the tracks
early in the session.

So there we go, a bit of a mystery, but nothing that takes away from the
performance. I think it's a pleasant and mighty fine collection of
spontaneous music luckily captured. Anybody who enjoys the jamming on the
PERRO tapes will appreciate this, I think, as will any Cipollina fans. It's
definitely one for the Phil fans and the Crosby completists, and it's a nice
example of Garcia's work on one of those not-so-common occasions when he
wasn't expected to be the driver.

Rick shared these words about this recording:
"The New Riders of the Purple Sage were going to be taped by KQED (PBS) at
Mickey Hart's Ranch in Novato and a friend asked me if I wanted to go
(thanks Michael!). When we arrived, a stage was setup outside and there
were lots of familiar San Francisco music scene people and their families
present. The vibes were hip, and good, to say the least. The opening group
was Shanti, followed by the New Riders. When the taping was finished some
musicians meandered into Mickey's barn where he had a modest recording
studio set up. When I walked in Jerry Garcia and David Crosby were trying
some things out (Fresh Green Grass). I turned on my cassette recorder,
lashed my mic to an open mic stand, and sat down to enjoy a remarkable
early evening of music. Phil Lesh, Mickey Hart, Bob Weir, John Cipollina
and others floated in and out of the lineup. At some point Crosby left,
then Garcia. John had come in and had picked up a Rickenbacker slide guitar*
that he detailed with his characteristic Quicksilver sound. He went to his
car for his ax and came back to do his part in this recipe for jam. I taped
until they all stopped, we all said good-bye and left..
Enjoy this recording of a spontaneous day. Recorded on a Sony TC-24 with
supplied Sony stereo mic**. Not a bad unit for the day."

* Rick adds "It probably was a Rickenbacker. It was the small grey kind you
could put on your lap and play."

** it was the mike that came with the recorder- don't remember the
microphone model #

Easy Ed adds: the master analog cassettes were played back with no Dolby in
a Nakamichi Dragon to transfer to a Sony D7 DAT, which was then transferred
to PC via optical digital cable (DTC-700 was the playback unit) through a
Zefiro ZA2 soundcard, tracked and normalized in Sound Forge and burned to
2 cdrs (61:47 and 42:41) using CD Architect.
Nothing from the original tapes was omitted; one or two quick fades were
done to make cuts less abrupt.
As far as song titles are concerned, we're hurting. possibly appearing
(but not in this order) are: Fresh Green Grass, Ghost Riders in the Sky,
Winin' Boy, I'm Down and maybe Stars and Stripes Forever and Carousel Song.
As you can hear, Rick paused his recorder in-between 'songs' or 'jams' that
day. Rick adds, "My tape has some bits of me asking a guy near me to be
quiet. I go shhhhhhh and say something"
That is a beautiful thing, Rick asking that person not to play tambourine
right near his microphone, which tapers all over the world should be
thankful for and take lesson from. Even if they could keep a beat, which
this person couldn't quite do.

Copies of this recording have been made for a few folks over the years, but
only analog copies. This is the first time a digital transfer has been made
directly from the master tapes.

posted at Losslegs Legs by:
Richard Starlight 10/02/07
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