I was at this one. The place almost fell down because Phil Lesh had not sung a song in years (except three days before in Hampton, Virginia).
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BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
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There are some awesome auds of those Spectrum shows floating around.
I had just had 4 impacted wisdom teeth extracted and looked like a chipmunk.
I also had an awesome codeine prescription for the pain and I felt none during that 3 show set.
I sympathize, having had an extraction and titanium implant installed this afternoon. I’m currently waiting for the next wave of pain meds to kick in. If one’s good, two must be better, eh? BTW, a couple of Halcion before the surgery really help to take the edge off as long as you have a designated driver to get you there and back.
Too bad I’m so far from Philly, we could do Chip ‘n Dale impressions.
I was at the Hampton show, and the place did fall down when they broke that Box o’ out…
And I still miss Merl:
Funny story.
I used to have the same free period in High School as Blues Traveler bass-man Bobby Sheehan. We used to drive around in his Honda Civic and listen to the Jerry Garcia Band shows from the Keystone with Merl Saunders.
A few years after we graduated I went to see Blues Traveler at the Roseland in NYC on New Year’s Eve. I was in the front row jamming out when Bobby saw me and he started flipping out, pointing at me, pointing at Merl (who was playing keyboards for them that night). Later I saw him and we both laughed about how bizarre it was for him to be playing with Merl while I watched from the front row.
to pick nit:
well, hadn’t sung lead.
I saw the first “Tons of Steel” (12/28/84 SF), and IIRC at that point Phil really hadn’t sung at all for a long time. I don’t think any of us had noticed the extra mic on stage. When Phil came in on the harmony part a roar went up that drowned him out.
http://www.archive.org/details/gd79-12-01.sbd.set2.clugston.319.sbefail.shnf
As a student of the Grateful Dead, as a vocalist and guitarist, one of Phil’s problems in my opinion is that he tried to sing outside of his natural range for so long that he trashed his vocal chords.
I think he would have been better to sing in the lower ranges, Unbroken Chain is more natural even though he hated the cut that was released. But many musicians are not natural singers to my ear, the bass player from the Moody Blues sings the same way to me.
Phil was reluctant to undergo surgery to remove the polyps on his vocal chords that resulted, a sentiment I can agree with. But his singing voice always sounded strained to me and not relaxed, like he was trying to fill the high harmony even though it was such an effort for him to do so. He always sang insanely high accompanying backing vocals, and I think he paid for it.