drums>space wrote:cleveland feb 15th!
I WOULD RATHER HAVE A COVER BAND KEEPING THE SPIRIT OF THE DEAD GOING THAN HEARING NO DEAD AT ALL! Lighten up you know what i mean? Just DANCE DANCE DANCE!!!!
The Sprit Of The Dead....let me give you my take on this. I will start off by saying that DSO is comprised of a bunch of GREAT musicians who DO the Dead to a T. They are not simply a cover band, they are a TRIBUTE BAND. Their Bobby does all the Bobby moves with Bobby's exact Modulus Blacknife & rig, their Jerry is GREAT (I know he plays a PRS, or something) but is a great Jerry, etc...I'm not a huge Barracco fan. Great energy, but way too busy of a player for me - he never stops playing. I've seen him play many times...just never did it for me. BUT, I digress...
The SPIRIT of the Dead, IMO, is the moment. Re-creating the moment, is very much UNlike the Dead. So, again - they are AMAZING at what they do, but is very much not in the SPIRIT of the GD, but their music IS the GD. The trading of DSO tapes, IMO, is inane. It makes NO sense. As good as they are (again, in MY opinion), I'd rather listen to the GRATEFUL DEAD's version of 10/9/89, rather than DSO's version of 10/9/89. AND, guess what the GD's ticket prices were to the infamous Warlocks shows of 89? $25 for GA seats.
I play in a GD COVER band. You can see US for $5. Now, we're not as tight as DSO. We're good, IMO, but maybe not as good as musicians as they are. We don't recreate the moment and that is not our intention. OUR intention is to rehearse the structure of the songs and go out there and JAM, baby. Take the songs & play 'em like WE play 'em. It'd be very interesting to hear DSO play non GD stuff...just play.
I don't know their names, so excuse my ignorance. Their Weir (who even LOOKS a lot like a young Bobby) does not add "his own flavor" as one person put it. Every single, solitary lick that I saw him play came from Bob Weir's arsenal. I've studied Bob Weir for a long, long time. So has their guy.
Again, I'm not taking away ANYTHING from DSO...they are phenomenal at RECREATING the experience. BUT, the true experience of "Without A Net" is lost, IMO.
Rock on!
www.theCAUSEjams.com
"Once in awhile, you can get shown the light in the strangest of places, if you look at it right." - R. Hunter
"If we had any nerve at all, if we had any real balls as a society, or whatever you need, whatever quality you need, real character, we would make an effort to really address the wrongs in this society, righteously." - Jerry Garcia