The Evolution of Grateful Dead Covers

Deadhead Cannabis Show

Exploring the Grateful Dead's Legacy

In this episode of the Deadhead Cannabis Show, Larry Mishkin takes listeners on a nostalgic journey through the Grateful Dead's music, focusing on a concert from September 30, 1993, at the Boston Garden. He discusses various songs, including 'Here Comes Sunshine' and 'Spoonful,' while also touching on the band's history and the contributions of key figures like Vince Wellnick and Candace Brightman. The episode also delves into current music news, including a review of Lake Street Dive's performance and updates on marijuana legislation in Ukraine and the U.S.

Chapters

00:00 Welcome to the Deadhead Cannabis Show

03:39 Here Comes Sunshine: A Grateful Dead Classic

09:47 Spoonful: The Blues Influence

14:00 Music News: Rich Girl and Lake Street Dive

24:09 Candace Brightman: The Unsung Hero of Lighting

38:01 Broken Arrow: Phil Lesh's Moment to Shine

42:19 Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds: A Beatles Classic

48:26 Marijuana News: Ukraine's Medical Cannabis Legislation

54:32 Bipartisan Support for Clean Slate Act

01:00:11 Pennsylvania's Push for Marijuana Legalization

01:04:25 CBD as a Natural Insecticide

01:10:26 Wave to the Wind: A Phil Lesh Tune

01:13:18 The Other One: A Grateful Dead Epic

Boston Garden

September 30, 1993 (31 years ago)

Grateful Dead Live at Boston Garden on 1993-09-30 : Free Borrow & Streaming : Internet Archive

INTRO: Here Comes Sunshine

Track #1

0:08 – 1:48

Released on Wake of the Flood, October 15, 1973, the first album on the band’s own “Grateful Dead Records” label.

The song was first performed by the Grateful Dead in February 1973. It was played about 30 times through to February 1974 and then dropped from the repertoire. The song returned to the repertoire in December 1992, at the instigation of Vince Welnick, and was then played a few times each year until 1995.

Played: 66 times

First: February 9, 1973 at Maples Pavilion, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA

Last: July 2, 1995 at Deer Creek Music Center, Noblesville, IN, USA

But here’s the thing:

Played 32 times in 1973

Played 1 time in 1974

Not played again until December 6, 1992 at Compton Terrace in Chandler, AZ - 18 years

Then played a “few” more times in 1993, 94 and 95, never more than 11 times in any one year.

I finally caught one in 1993 at the Rosemont Horizon in Chicago with good buddies Marc and Alex.

My favorite version is Feb. 15, 1973 at the Dane County Coliseum in Madison, WI

SHOW No. 1: Spoonful

Track #2

:50 – 2:35

"Spoonful" is a blues song written by Willie Dixon and first recorded in 1960 by Howlin' Wolf. Released in June, 1960 by Chess Records in Chicago.

Called "a stark and haunting work",[1] it is one of Dixon's best known and most interpreted songs.[2]Etta James and Harvey Fuqua had a pop and R&B record chart hit with their duet cover of "Spoonful" in 1961, and it was popularized in the late 1960s by the British rock group Cream.

Dixon's "Spoonful" is loosely based on "A Spoonful Blues", a song recorded in 1929 by Charley Patton.[3] Earlier related songs include "All I Want Is a Spoonful" by Papa Charlie Jackson (1925) and "Cocaine Blues" by Luke Jordan (1927).

The lyrics relate men's sometimes violent search to satisfy their cravings, with "a spoonful" used mostly as a metaphor for pleasures, which have been interpreted as sex, love, and drugs.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame listed Howlin' Wolf's "Spoonful" as one of the "500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll".[9] It is ranked number 154 on Rolling Stone magazine's 2021 list of the "500 Greatest Songs of All Time",[10] up from number 221 on its 2004 list.

In 2010, the song was inducted into the Blues Foundation Hall of Fame "Classics of Blues Recordings" category.[12] In a statement by the foundation, it was noted that "Otis Rush has stated that Dixon presented 'Spoonful' to him, but the song didn't suit Rush's tastes and so it ended up with Wolf, and soon thereafter with Etta James".[12] James' recording with Harvey Fuqua as "Etta & Harvey" reached number 12 on Billboard magazine's Hot R&B Sides chart and number 78 on its Hot 100 singles chart.[13] However, Wolf’s original "was the one that inspired so many blues and rock bands in the years to come".

The British rock group Cream recorded "Spoonful" for their 1966 UK debut album, Fresh Cream. They were part of a trend in the mid-1960s by rock artists to record a Willie Dixon song for their debut albums.

Sung by Bob Weir, normally followed Truckin’ in the second set. This version is rare because it is the second song of the show and does not have a lead in. Ended Here Comes Sunshine, stopped, and then went into this. When it follows Truckin’, just flows right into Spoonful.

Played: 52 times

First: October 15, 1981 at Melkweg, Amsterdam, Netherlands

Last: December 8, 1994 at Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Arena, Oakland, CA, USA

MUSIC NEWS: Lead In Music

Rich Girl

Lake Street Dive

Lake Street Dive: Rich Girl [4K] 2018-05-09 - College Street Music Hall; New Haven, CT (youtube.com)

0:00 – 1:13

"Rich Girl" is a song by Daryl Hall & John Oates. It debuted on the Billboard Top 40 on February 5, 1977, at number 38 and on March 26, 1977, it became their first of six number-one singles on the BillboardHot 100. The single originally appeared on the 1976 album Bigger Than Both of Us. At the end of 1977, Billboard ranked it as the 23rd biggest hit of the year.

The song was rumored to be about the then-scandalous newspaper heiress Patty Hearst. In fact, the title character in the song is based on a spoiled heir to a fast-food chain who was an ex-boyfriend of Daryl Hall's girlfriend, Sara Allen. "But you can't write, 'You're a rich boy' in a song, so I changed it to a girl," Hall told Rolling Stone.

Hall elaborated on the song in an interview with American Songwriter:

"Rich Girl" was written about an old boyfriend of Sara [Allen]'s from college that she was still friends with at the time. His name is Victor Walker. He came to our apartment, and he was acting sort of strange. His father was quite rich. I think he was involved with some kind of a fast-food chain. I said, "This guy is out of his mind, but he doesn't have to worry about it because his father's gonna bail him out of any problems he gets in." So I sat down and wrote that chorus. [Sings] "He can rely on the old man's money/he can rely on the old man's money/he's a rich guy." I thought that didn't sound right, so I changed it to "Rich Girl". He knows the song was written about him.

1. Lake Street Dive at Salt Shed

Lake Street Dive is an American multi-genre band that was formed in 2004 at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.[1] The band's founding members are Rachael Price, Mike "McDuck" Olson, Bridget Kearney, and Mike Calabrese. Keyboardist Akie Bermiss joined the band on tour in 2017 and was first credited on their 2018 album Free Yourself Up; guitarist James Cornelison joined in 2021 after Olson left the band. The band is based in Brooklyn and frequently tours in North America, Australia, and Europe.

The group was formed in 2004 as a "free country band"; they intended to play country music in an improvised, avant-garde style.[3] This concept was abandoned in favor of something that "actually sounded good", according to Mike Olson.[4] The band's name was inspired by the Bryant Lake Bowl, a frequent hang out in the band's early years, located on Lake Street in Minneapolis.

Great show last Thursday night my wife and I went with good friends JT and Marni and Rick and Ben. Sitting in the back near the top of the bleachers with a killer view of the Chicago Sky line looking west to southeast and right along the north branch of the Chicago River. Beautiful weather and a great night overall. My first time seeing the band although good buddies Alex, Andy and Mike had seen the at Redrocks in July and all spoke very highly of the band which is a good enough endorsement for me.

I don’t know any of their songs, but they were very good and one of their encores was Rich Girl which made me smile because that too is a song from my high school and college days, that’s basically 40+ years ago. Combined with Goose’s cover of the 1970’s hit “Hollywood Nights” by Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band it was a trip down memory lane.

I would recommend seeing this band to any fan of fun music. They were all clearly having a great time.

Katie Pruitt opened and came out to sing a song with LSD.

In 2017, Pruitt was awarded the Buddy Holly Prize from the Songwriters Hall of Fame[4] and signed with Round Hill Records.[5]

Her EP, OurVinyl Live Session EP was released in March 2018.[6] She was named by Rolling Stone as one of 10 new country artists you need to know[7] and by NPR as one of the 20 artists to watch, highlighting Pruitt as someone who "possesses a soaring, nuanced and expressive voice, and writes with devastating honesty".[8]

On September 13, 2019, Pruitt released "Expectations", the title track from her full-length debut. Additional singles from this project were subsequently released: "Loving Her" on October 21, 2019,[9] and "Out of the Blue" on November 15, 2019.[10]

On February 21, 2020, Pruitt's debut album, Expectations, was released by Rounder Records.[11][12] She earned a nomination for Emerging Act of the Year at the 2020 Americana Music Honors & Awards.[13] In the same year, she duetted with Canadian singer-songwriter Donovan Woods on "She Waits for Me to Come Back Down", a track from his album Without People.[14]

In 2021 the artist was inter alia part of the Newport Folk Festival in July.

Recommend her as well.

2. Move Me Brightly: Grateful Dead Lighting Director Candace Brightman

Candace Brightman (born 1944)[1] is an American lighting engineer, known for her longtime association with the Grateful Dead. She is the sister of author Carol Brightman.

Brightman grew up in Illinois and studied set design at St John's College, Annapolis, Maryland.[1] She began working as a lighting technician in the Anderson Theater, New York City, and was recruited by Bill Graham to operate lighting at the Fillmore East.[3] In 1970, she operated the house lights at the Chicago Coliseum with Norol Tretiv.[4] She has also worked for Janis Joplin, Joe Cocker and Van Morrison.

After serving as house lighting engineer for several Grateful Dead shows, including their 1971 residency at the Capitol Theatre, Port Chester, she was recruited by the band's Jerry Garcia to work for them full-time.[1] She started working regularly for the Dead on their 1972 tour of Europe (which was recorded and released as Europe 72), and remained their in-house lighting engineer for the remainder of their career.[1] One particular challenge that Brightman faced was having to alter lighting setups immediately in response to the Dead's improvisational style. By the band's final tours in the mid-1990s, she was operating a computer-controlled lighting system and managing a team of technicians.[5] Her work inspired Phish's resident lighting engineer Chris Kuroda, who regularly studied techniques in order to keep up with her standards.

Brightman continued working in related spin-off projects until 2005.[1][7] She returned to direct the lighting for the Fare Thee Well concerts in 2015, where she used over 500 fixtures.

Now facing significant financial and health related issues.

3. Neil Young and New Band, The Chrome Hearts, Deliver 13-Minute “Down By The River” on Night One at The Capitol Theatre

My buddies and I still can’t believe Neil with Crazy Horse did not play their Chicago show back in May this year. Thank god he’s ok and still playing but we are bummed out at missing the shared experience opportunity that only comes along when seeing a rock legend like Neil and there aren’t many.

SHOW No. 2: Broken Arrow

Track #5

1:10 – 3:00

Written by Robbie Robertson and released on his album Robbie Robertson released on October 27, 1987. It reached number 29 on the RPM CanCon charts in 1988.[23]Rod Stewart recorded a version of "Broken Arrow" in 1991 for his album Vagabond Heart.[24] Stewart's version of the song was released as a single on August 26, 1991,[25] with an accompanying music video, reaching number 20 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart and number two in Canada.

This ballad is not to be confused either with Chuck Berry's 1959 single or Buffalo Springfield's 1967 song of the same name, written by Neil Young.

"Broken Arrow" was also performed live by the Grateful Dead from 1993 to 1995 with Phil Lesh on vocals.[28] Grateful Dead spinoff groups The Dead, Phil Lesh and Friends, and The Other Ones have also performed the song, each time with Lesh on vocals.[29]

Played: 35 times

First: February 23, 1993 at Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Arena, Oakland, CA, USA

Last: July 2, 1995 at Deer Creek Music Center, Noblesville, IN, USA

SHOW No. 3: Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds

Track #9

2:46 – 4:13

"Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles from their May, 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. It was written primarily by John Lennon with assistance from Paul McCartney, and credited to the Lennon–McCartneysongwriting partnership.[2] Lennon's son Julian inspired the song with a nursery school drawing that he called "Lucy – in the sky with diamonds".

Shortly before the album's release, speculation arose that the first letter of each of the nouns in the title intentionally spelled "LSD", the initialism commonly used for the hallucinogenic drug lysergic acid diethylamide.[3] Lennon repeatedly denied that he had intended it as a drug song,[3][4] and attributed the song's fantastical imagery to his reading of Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland books.[3]

The Beatles recorded "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" in March 1967. Adding to the song's ethereal qualities, the musical arrangement includes a Lowrey organ part heavily treated with studio effects, and a drone provided by an Indian tambura. The song has been recognised as a key work in the psychedelic genre. Among its many cover versions, a 1974 recording by Elton John – with a guest appearance by Lennon – was a number 1 hit in the US and Canada.

John Lennon said that his inspiration for the song came when his three-year-old son Julian showed him a nursery school drawing that he called "Lucy – in the Sky with Diamonds",[4] depicting his classmate Lucy O'Donnell.[5] Julian later recalled: "I don't know why I called it that or why it stood out from all my other drawings, but I obviously had an affection for Lucy at that age. I used to show Dad everything I'd built or painted at school, and this one sparked off the idea."[5][6][7]Ringo Starr witnessed the moment and said that Julian first uttered the song's title on returning home from nursery school.[4][8][9] Lennon later said, "I thought that's beautiful. I immediately wrote a song about it."

According to Lennon, the lyrics were largely derived from the literary style of Lewis Carroll's novel Alice in Wonderland.[3][10] Lennon had read and admired Carroll's works, and the title of Julian's drawing reminded him of the "Which Dreamed It?" chapter of Through the Looking Glass, in which Alice floats in a "boat beneath a sunny sky".[11] Lennon recalled in a 1980 interview:

It was Alice in the boat. She is buying an egg and it turns into Humpty-Dumpty. The woman serving in the shop turns into a sheep and the next minute they are rowing in a rowing boat somewhere and I was visualizing that.[3]

Paul McCartney remembered of the song's composition, "We did the whole thing like an Alice in Wonderland idea, being in a boat on the river ... Every so often it broke off and you saw Lucy in the sky with diamonds all over the sky. This Lucy was God, the Big Figure, the White Rabbit."[10] He later recalled helping Lennon finish the song at Lennon's Kenwood home, specifically claiming he contributed the "newspaper taxis" and "cellophane flowers" lyrics.[8][12] Lennon's 1968 interview with Rolling Stone magazine confirmed McCartney's contribution.[13]

Lucy O'Donnell Vodden, who lived in Surbiton, Surrey, died 28 September 2009 of complications of lupus at the age of 46. Julian had been informed of her illness and renewed their friendship before her death.

Rumours of the connection between the title of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and the initialism "LSD" began circulating shortly after the release of the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band LP in June 1967.[24][25] McCartney gave two interviews in June admitting to having taken the drug.[26][27] Lennon later said he was surprised at the idea the title was a hidden reference to LSD,[3] countering that the song "wasn't about that at all,"[4] and it "was purely unconscious that it came out to be LSD. Until someone pointed it out, I never even thought of it. I mean, who would ever bother to look at initials of a title? ... It's not an acid song."[3]

McCartney confirmed Lennon's claim on several occasions.[8][12] In 1968 he said:

When you write a song and you mean it one way, and someone comes up and says something about it that you didn't think of – you can't deny it. Like "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds," people came up and said, cunningly, "Right, I get it. L-S-D," and it was when [news]papers were talking about LSD, but we never thought about it.[10]

In a 2004 interview with Uncut magazine, McCartney confirmed it was "pretty obvious" drugs did influence some of the group's compositions at that time, including "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", though he tempered this statement by adding, "[I]t's easy to overestimate the influence of drugs on the Beatles' music."

In 2009 Julian with James Scott Cook and Todd Meagher released "Lucy", a song that is a quasi-follow-up to the Beatles song. The cover of the EP showed four-year-old Julian's original drawing, that now is owned by David Gilmour from Pink Floyd.[59]

Lennon's original handwritten lyrics sold at auction in 2011 for $230,000.

A lot of fun to see this tune live. Love that Jerry does the singing even though his voice is very rough and he stumble through some of the lyrics. It is a Beatles tune, a legendary rock tune, and Jerry sings it like he wrote it at his kitchen table.

Phil and Friends with the Quintent cover the tune as well and I believe Warren Haynes does the primary singing on that version. Warren, Jimmy Herring and Phil really rock that tune like the rock veterans they are.

The version is fun because it opens the second set, a place of real prominence even after having played it for six months by this point. Gotta keep the Deadheads guessing.

Played: 19 times

First: March 17, 1993 at Capital Centre, Landover, MD, USA

Last: June 28, 1995 at The Palace of Auburn Hills, Auburn Hills, MI, USA

MJ NEWS:

1. Ukrainian Officials Approve List Of Medical Marijuana Qualifying Conditions Under Country’s New Legalization Law

2. Federal Marijuana And Drug Convictions Would Be Automatically Sealed Under New Bipartisan Senate Bill

3. Pennsylvania Police Arrest An Average Of 32 People For Marijuana Possession Every Day, New Data Shows As Lawmakers Weigh Legalization

4. CBD-Rich Hemp Extract Is An Effective Natural Insecticide Against Mosquitoes, New Research Shows

SHOW No. 4: Wave To The Wind

Track #10

5:00 – 6:40

Hunter/Lesh tune that was never released. In fact, the Dead archives say that there is no studio recording of the song.

Not a great song. I have no real memory of it other than it shows up in song lists for a couple of shows I attended. Even this version of the tune is really kind of flat and uninspiring but there are not a lot of Phil tunes to feature and you can only discuss Box of Rain so many times. Just something different to talk about.

Played: 21 times

First: February 22, 1992 at Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum Arena, Oakland, CA, USA

Last: December 9, 1993 at Los Angeles Sports Arena, Los Angeles, CA, USA

OUTRO: The Other One

Track #16

2:30 – 4:22

"That's It for the Other One" is a song by American band the Grateful Dead. Released on the band's second studio album Anthem of the Sun (released on July 18, 1968) it is made up of four sections—"Cryptical Envelopment", "Quadlibet for Tenderfeet", "The Faster We Go, the Rounder We Get", and "We Leave the Castle". Like other tracks on the album, is a combination of studio and live performances mixed together to create the final product.

While the "We Leave the Castle" portion of the song was never performed live by the band, the first three sections were all featured in concert to differing extents. "Cryptical Envelopment", written and sung by Jerry Garcia, was performed from 1967 to 1971, when it was then dropped aside from a select few performances in 1985. "The Faster We Go, the Rounder We Get", written by Bill Kreutzmann and Bob Weir and sung by Weir, became one of the band's most frequently performed songs in concert (usually denoted as simply "The Other One").

One of the few Grateful Dead songs to have lyrics written by Weir, "The Faster We Go, the Rounder We Get" became one of the Dead's most-played songs (being performed a known 586 times[2]) and most popular vehicles for improvisation, with some performances reaching 30+ minutes in length. The song's lyrics reference the influence of the Merry Pranksters and in particular Neal Cassady.[2] Additionally, the line "the heat came 'round and busted me for smilin' on a cloudy day" - one of my favorite Grateful Dead lyrics - refers to a time Weir was arrested for throwing a water balloon at a cop from the upstairs of 710 Ashbury, the Dead’s communal home during the ‘60’s and early ‘70’s before the band moved its headquarters, and the band members moved, to Marin County just past the Golden Gate Bridge when driving out of the City.

In my experience, almost always a second set tune. Back in the late ‘60’s and early ‘70’s either a full That’s It For The Other One suite or just The Other One, would be jammed out as long as Dark Star and sometimes longer. During the Europe ’72 tour, Dark Star and the full Other One Suite traded off every show as the second set psychedelic rock long jam piece. Often preceded by a Phil bass bomb to bring the independent noodling into a full and tight jam with an energy all of its own.

The Other One got its name because it was being written at the same time as Alligator, one of the Dead’s very first tunes. When discussing the tunes, there was Alligator and this other one.

I always loved the Other One and was lucky enough to see the full That’s It For The Other One suite twice in 1985 during its too brief comeback to celebrate the Dead’s 20th anniversary.

Played: 550 times

First: October 31, 1967 at Winterland Arena, San Francisco, CA, USA

Last: July 8, 1995 at Soldier Field in Chicago

Birthday shout out:

• Nephew, Jacob Mishkin, star collegiate baseball player, turns 21and all I can say is “no effing way!” Happy birthday dude!

And a Happy and healthy New Year to those celebrating Rosh Hashanah which begins this week.

.Produced by PodConx

Deadhead Cannabis Show - https://podconx.com/podcasts/deadhead-cannabis-show

Larry Mishkin - https://podconx.com/guests/larry-mishkin

Rob Hunt - https://podconx.com/guests/rob-hunt

Jay Blakesberg - https://podconx.com/guests/jay-blakesberg

Sound Designed by Jamie Humiston - https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamie-humiston-91718b1b3/

Recorded on Squadcast