AFM6 San Francisco Sessions Dataset, 1967-1972

Tony Orbasido was running the American Federation of Musicians' Local No. 6 in San Francisco when I started asking him about researching in whatever papers they had. What they had was two 4-drawer filing cabinets stuff with studio recording contracts. I think the union didn't keep gig contracts in hard copy beyond 3-4 years for space reasons, and there were no gig contracts relevant to me.

This was before I could take legible cellphone pictures. I had to run Xerox copies of what I wanted. In later years, I progressively digitized these paper copies. The sample is biased with respect to anything in the Garciaverse, because I was explicitly looking for and only gathering out to Spudfactor = 1 musicians, in addition to Garcia himself. As I have reported, the Jerry Garcia and Grateful Dead contents of these files was dramatically light. I think Tony O said someone had come through and gathered them up. This could well have been the Jerry Garcia Estate, but I do not know that. Anyway, within the limits of the media I was working with, I was able to go through 1967-1972 pretty thoroughly.

I published the Garcia-relevant stuff in batches. By way of making an index, here they are.

San Francisco Sessions, 1967-1968 (August 4, 2015)

San Francisco Sessions, 1969 (August 5, 2015)

San Francisco Sessions, 1970 (August 9, 2015)

San Francisco Sessions, 1971 (July 3, 2016)

San Francisco Sessions, 1972 (November 18, 2017)

Altogether, this is my AFM6 San Francisco Sessions Dataset, 1967-1972

August 1971 Crosby super session / double album project to end the Vietnam War?

update: Never Trust A Prankster :)

via GIPHY

Bruce Rostenstein was an ouststanding rock columnist for the American University Eagle in the early 1970s. That paper has been digitized, and like so many other college papers, offers up all kinds of goodness for the intrepid researcher.

His October 29, 1971 column brings forth something I have never heard about. Noting the success of George Harrison's Bangladesh benefit concert, he reports, on the basis of some seemingly pretty clear documentation (including side-and-cut information), about a star-packed double album project spearheaded by David Crosby to end the war in Vietnam.

The concept itself is mind-boggling; one LP will feature Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young with all new material, and the other record will have the boys playing with some of the biggest names in rock. As for the business end, Crosby has arranged for Atlantic Records to distribute the [sic] on the special Empathy label.

Word of the project leaked, and Croz had to give more info to the rock press. It included the following stuff put togther in "mammoth sessions" over five late August days at Electric Lady Studios:

A-1: the original Byrds: unidentified tune
A-2: Captain Beefheart (sax and guitar), Stephen Stills (organ), Jeff Beck (guitar): a seven minute cut called "Feet"
A-3: Michael Bloomfield, Stills (organ), Jack Casay (bass), Joey Covington (drums): "I Just Don't Know", an autobiographical Bloomfield tune, his first original in two years
A-4: members of the NRPS and Poco, "with an extended pedal steel guitar solo by David Grisman of the New Riders": "Sagebrush"
A-5: a 23-second spoken intro by Richard Meltzer
A-6: Jerry Garcia (guitar, vocals), Jack Casady (bass), Graham Nash (organ), Ringo Star (drums): a nine minute version of "Goodnight Irene"
B-1: Dr. John, Eric Clapton, various percussionists: "Bayou Madness" (impromptu/original)
B-2: Leon Russell (piano), the Tulsa Tops, Merry Clayton and Claudia Lenear (vocals), Billy Preston (organ): "Funky Oklahoma Mama" (a new Russell original)
B-3: Russell, Neil Young (guitar), ?others?: "Rock 'n' Roll Forever" ("Supposedly this eight and a half minute cut is a fusion of 'Maybelline', 'Long Tall Sally', 'Whole Lotta Shakin' Goin' On', 'Sweet Sixteen' and 'Summertime Blues'")
B-4: Buffalo Springfield: "On the Way Home"
B-5: Paul McCartney (bass), Linda McCartney (piano), Crosby and Stills (acoustic guitars), Clapton and Nils Lofgren (electric guitars), Phil Lesh (bass): a ten-minute instrumental called "What Is Reality"?

Along with the record, word has it that the Maysles brothers donated their services and filmed the entire session for a television special which may be aired as early as mid-January. The release date of the record is indefinite. Some say as early as December 15th, others say not before January.

OK, so my question to you, dear friends, is is this a real thing that I missed? Or??

Dating the September 1971 Lion's Share Gigs

Consider this a throwback post, in that it does what the blog started out doing, and that's just trying to correct and fill out metadata around Garciavents. Here, I argue that the material we know from circulating tapes as 9/24/71 is actually from the next night, 9/25/71, also at the Lion's Share in San Anselmo. The post also serves to pin down a third set of music from the four played this weekend, from newly digitized (and, as of today, circulated) tape of what, I argue, should be seen as the 9/24/71 late show.

Tom Fogerty left Creedence Clearwater Revival on February 1, 1971 (Boucher 1972), seeking to escape the domineering shadow of his little brother John and carve out his own musical identity. Around May 26, 1971, he first sat in with Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders and their unnamed group, at the Keystone Korner in San Francisco. He gigged on and off with them for a year-and-a-half, while also doing all kinds of studio work at The House That Creedence Built (Fantasy in Berkeley). He continued collaborating on Merl's Fire Up into late spring '73 before exiting the Garciaverse. Some of his correspondence with Merl lives in the GD Archives, and from what we can glean he was a sweet and generous guy who was very fond of his labelmate. He continued to play and record through ongoing back problems, fell on some hard personal times, and apparently contracted HIV/AIDS from an unscreened blood transfusion connected with a back surgery in the early 80s. This led to his untimely demise from a tuberculosis infection at the age of 49 on September 6, 1990.

I have yet to come to a clear understanding of my own of the mix of music and commerce (especially, the role of Fantasy Records) in the "Tom Fogerty Era" of the Garcia-Saunders group, partly because, outside studio recordings, so few tapes of them playing live are available to hear. The first pop up almost four months after his arrival, in September 1971, with two widely-circulated sets from the Lion's Share which I will focus on here. After that, the next tape comes June 30, 1972 at the Korner, and then December 28, 1972, again in San Anselmo. That's it - though tape exists of September 20, 1971 at the Inn of the Beginning in Cotati, and December 5, 1972 at the Boarding House in the city, it does not circulate. And, while he figured in some billings early in 1973, it seems highly unlikely that he ever gigged with these guys after 1972. 

We currently list 48 Tom Fogerty events at Jerrybase, we have a few setlists from newspaper reviews and attendee recollections, and now pieces of five shows. Tragically, all of our JB listings are for public events. Fantasy has remained completely opaque in terms of session dates, which I estimate might number in the few dozens from 1970 or 1971 through 1974 or 1975.

As a result of all of this, the little tape that we have is precious. I have spent considerable time with it trying to glean some insight into the Fogerty Era. It's risky to extrapolate much from the little we can hear, of course. But it seems clear that he and Jerry shared a love for 50s R&B numbers such as Hank Ballard and the Midnighters' "Annie Had A Baby" (1954), The Four Deuces' "W-P-L-J" (1956), and Jimmy Reed's straighter blues "Baby What You Want Me To Do?" (1959), the latter of which the Dead played a few times but none of which is known to have appeared in any other GOTS configuration. They also played Jesse Winchester's super-sweet "Biloxi" from his 1970 debut, and a bunch of tunes that otherwise seem part of the Garcia-Saunders repertoire of the period, insofar as we can know it.

The Lion's Share gigs on September 24-25, 1971 were well advertised and, in a refreshing change of pace, Fogerty's name preceded Garcia's. Yayyy, Jerry! (We celebrate this because the guy just wanted to play, he didn't need or necessarily want top-billing). Maybe it was just done alphabetically. Anyway, only the Berkeley Tribe specifies early (9 PM) and late (11:30 PM) shows. The ads all identify Jerry Corbitt, Billy Cox, and Charlie Daniels (yes, the one you've heard of) opening, though for some reason Jerrybase currently shows Loading Zone and Congress of Wonders the first night instead of them. Gideon and Power were also on the bill the second night, per the Lion's Share calendar.

My partner David Minches and I have just had the pleasure of working with 1971-1972 Lion's Share soundman Lou Judson to arrange a fresh transfer of these old tapes. The three from this September 1971 weekend present, first, a Sony PR-150 labeled "Friday 24 Sept 71 last 1/2 hr)".

The labeling is confirmed by the end of the recording, where the emcee says "Jerry Garcia, Merl Saunders, Tom Fogerty and Bill Kreutzmann. They'll be back tomorrow night, for another two shows, along with Jerry Corbitt and Charlie Daniels. Come back and bring your friends. Thank you for comin', and good night." So this is clearly 9/24/71b. As you will hear when the seed hits the ether, this is distinct music that has never circulated among collectors.

It seems that there probably was a first reel from this night, but, alas, it remains MIA.

But wait, you say - don't circulating filesets already purport to include 9/24/71b? Indeed, they do. But these tapes clearly establish that they are mis-dated, and derive from the second night. Lou's other two reels from the weekend are Sony SLH-180 stock, and clearly labeled "September 25 Saturday '71 first set" and "September 25, 1971 second set".

The material on these tapes corresponds to the material that has long circulated as 9/24/71. But it is actually 9/25/71.

Last thing to do is pin down what we can from the partial setlist for 9/24/71b, and post listening notes from all three sets of material. That stuff follows.

~~~~~

Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders
Lion's Share
60 Red Hill Avenue
San Anselmo, CA 94960
September 24, 1971 (Friday) - Late Show / reel #2
Judson MSR > HD 2022

--end of late show (6 tracks, 5 tunes, 30:28)--
19710924-l-t01. [0:46] Annie Had A Baby [3:21] ->
19710924-l-t02. W-P-L-J [3:48] [1:07]
19710924-l-t03. Baby, What Do You Want Me To Do? [5:16] [1:08]
19710924-l-t04. I Was Made To Love Her [7:51] [1:05]
19710924-l-t05. The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down [5:31]
19710924-l-t06. outro (2) [0:36]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - electric guitar, vocals;
! lineup: Tom Fogerty - electric guitar, vocals;
! lineup: Merl Saunders - keyboards;
! lineup: Bill Kreutzmann - drums.

JGMF:

! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; ... = fade in/out; # = truncated timing; [m:ss] = recorded event time. The recorded event time immediately after the song or item name is an attempt at getting the "real" time of the event. So, a timing of [m:ss] right after a song title is an attempt to say how long the song really was, as represented on this recording.

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19710924

! db: none in circulation from this date. The following are mistakenly dated 9/24/71, but are actually 9/25/71: https://etreedb.org/shn/4497 (early and late, via Shriver shnf); https://etreedb.org/shn/137584 (Reel Master 10inch Master Reel@7.5ips 1/2trk > DAT, via Eaton-Scotton-Miller-SirMick); https://etreedb.org/shn/138213 (raw version of shnid-137584)

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/FCaYZGNhk21VzhvF6

! JGBP: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/06/lions-share-60-red-hill-avenue-san.html

! personnel: NB no bass.

! R: field recordist: Lou Judson

! R: field recording gear: PA line out > Viking 88

! R: field recording media: Sony PR-150 1/4" x 7" @7.5ips stereo (tape "GS6")

! R: lineage: MSR Sony 854-4 playback > Sound Devices 744T (24 bit / 96kHz wav) > editing and mastering by David Minches, July 2022.

! t02 (1) @ 4:27 JG: "No dancing in the Lion's Share. At least - nobody's dancing in the Lion's Share. [inaudible] dancing right around here [inaudible] I don't know [inaudible]

! R: t05 some kind of noise in TNTDODD, not sure if it's tape or equipment

! t06 (2) JG: "Thanks a lot folks. See y'all later." Emcee: "Jerry Garcia, Merl Saunders, Tom Fogerty and Bill Kreutzmann. They'll be back tomorrow night, for another two shows, along with Jerry Corbitt and Charlie Daniels. Come back and bring your friends. Thank you for comin', and good night."

~~~~~

Jerry Garcia & Merl Saunders
Lion's Share
60 Red Hill Avenue
San Anselmo, CA 94960
September 25, 1971 (Saturday)
Judson MSR > HD 2022

--early show (7 tracks, 6 tunes, 51:56)--
e-t01. Introduction (1) [1:09]
e-t02. Save Mother Earth [11:38] ->
e-t03. Imagine [5:19] (2) [2:28]
e-t04. One Kind Favor [8:45] [1:25]
e-t05. I Was Made To Love Her [9:53] [0:32]
e-t06. Baby, What Do You Want Me To Do? [3:47] [0:04] %
e-t07. Biloxi [6:51] [0:06]

--late show (7 tracks, 51:55)--
l-t01. [0:15] Hi-Heel Sneakers [8:36] [1:10]
l-t02. Man-Child [10:21] ->
l-t03. Summertime [10:07] [1:14]
l-t04. That's A Touch I Like [5:47] (3) [1:52]
l-t05. Annie Had A Baby [2:55] ->
l-t06. W-P-L-J [3:17] [0:13] %
l-t07. [0:19] The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down [5:40] (4) [0:09]

! ACT1: Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders
! lineup: Jerry Garcia - electric guitar, vocals;
! lineup: Tom Fogerty - electric guitar, vocals;
! lineup: Merl Saunders - keyboards;
! lineup: John Kahn - electric bass;
! lineup: Bill Kreutzmann - drums.

JGMF:

! Recording: symbols: % = recording discontinuity; / = clipped song; // = cut song; ... = fade in/out; # = truncated timing; [m:ss] = recorded event time. The recorded event time immediately after the song or item name is an attempt at getting the "real" time of the event. So, a timing of [m:ss] right after a song title is an attempt to say how long the song really was, as represented on this recording.

! Jerrybase: https://jerrybase.com/events/19710925

! db, mistakenly dated 9/24/71: https://etreedb.org/shn/4497 ("MSR>1C>D etc.", via Ryan Shriver and Danny Metz); https://etreedb.org/shn/137584 ("MSR>DAT etc.", via Paul Scotton and SIRMick); https://etreedb.org/shn/138213 (raw transfer of Scotton DAT). Prior to 8/9/2022, no sources have circulated dated 9/25/71, which is the correct date for this material.

! map: https://goo.gl/maps/FCaYZGNhk21VzhvF6

! JGBP: http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2012/06/lions-share-60-red-hill-avenue-san.html

! R: field recordist: Lou Judson

! R: field recording gear: PA line out > Viking 88

! R: field recording media: 2x Sony SLH-180 1/4" x 7" @7.5ips 1/4 trk stereo (tapes "GS7" and "GS8")

! R: lineage: MSR Sony 854-4 playback > Sound Devices 744T (24 bit / 96kHz wav) > editing and mastering by David Minches, July 2022.

! e-t01 (1) JG: "Hey - whoever it is that controls the lights, could ya turn 'em down, these ones here? Ahh, yes. Keep it going ... thanks, great. You can turn 'em down even farther ... that's good. [To band] Can you guys see well enough?" Tom: "Oh yeah, for sure." Emcee: Let's have a warm welcome for Jerry Garcia, Tom Fogerty, Merl Saunders, and ... friends." JG: "That's, uh, John Kahn and Bill Kreutzmann, are the 'friends'." Emcee: "Thank you." JG: "Don't mention it."

! P: e-t02 SME very slowly paced. @ 7:30 JG pedals in a little wah or whatever that is. Things getting melty in 9.

! e-t03 (2) Tom: "Can we get some beer and apple juice, please?" JG: "And a little bit of light - just the tiniest little bit" [some chuckles].

! R: e-t07 Biloxi patched in from shnid-137584. How it could be complete there and not here is a mystery ...

! P: l-t01 HHS Tom's buzzsaw tone fatigues my ears

! P: l-t02 Man-Child John starts rumbling fantastically in 6

! l-t04 (3) Tom: "Can we please have some beers and, uhh, two apple juices?"

! R: l-t07 TNTDODD in mono

! l-t07 (4) JG: "Thanks a lot. Good night."

The Good Ol' Grateful Deadcast: Season 3 - Episode 9: Skull & Roses 50: Garcia

All about Jerry's first solo record, Garcia, recorded 50 years ago last month. Great stuff, and then also a little pedantry from yours truly.

The Good Ol' Grateful Deadcast is a national treasure!

Rolling Thunder Data

Rumor has long had it that Mickey has a massive trove of tape and information related to recordings made at his barn studio, a.k.a. Rolling Thunder, at 2495 Novato Blvd. between about 1971 and sometime in the early 1980s. As usual, Corry has done outstanding work pinning some of this down, but there's probably oodles more to learn.

If anyone here knows or is in touch with Mickey's people -- I saw yesterday they were sharing on social media the SF Chronicle preview I posted of the July 30 - August 1, 1970 New Riders (headlining) and acoustic GD shows at the Lion's Share -- please let him/them know I will help organize their data pro bono, so long as I can use them. I will create a giant database of times, people, tunes, etc. etc. As Mickey's amateur musicology involves him in collecting sounds, instruments, and stories from musicmakers in far-flung locales, so my amateur musicology would have me poring over Rolling Thunder data.

In the meantime, I have just spent some time in the Grateful Dead Archive on the beautiful campus of UC Santa Cruz, and I came across some Warner Brothers' interoffice memos supplying information about some of the dates on which the material appearing on Mickey's Rolling Thunder album (Warner Brothers BS 2635, September 1972) was recorded. The earlier document, dated 9/7, is full of handwritten notes, while the latter, from a week later, is cleanly typed. I should not that one scribble on the earlier document says these are dates on which recording began.

Me being me, I tabulate the existing credit information from deaddisc (linked above) with the new information on dates. (Click to enlarge.)

Table xxx. Recording credits and information for Rolling Thunder from Warner Brothers interoffice memos. Source: "Business: Rolling Thunder Productions, 1972-1973," Grateful Dead Archive, Special Collections, UC Santa Cruz, MS.332.ser. 2, box 20, folder 11.

Where the dates align, I obviously pin those. Where they conflict, I make a judgment: that recording was centered in 1972 and not 1971, except for The Chase, which was NOT recorded two months after the memo was written.

Me still being me, of course, the Garcia information draws my eye. (Jerry) Garcia is credited on four tracks: "The Chase" (begun 11/6/71), "Deep, Wide and Frequent" (begun 4/14/72), "Pump Song" (4/6/72) and "Gran'ma's Cookies" (7/20/72). While we can't be entirely sure he attended the initial sessions for any song, it makes sense to pin down the ones we can, and I will do so at Jerrybase with the confidence parameter set to "Uncertain Date" for the ones that don't conflict. Alas, two of the four *do* conflict, dated to when Garcia was manifestly in Europe and thus not, in body at least, at Hart's Barn. So those will just have to float, for now - unless and until Mickey et al. make it possible for me, or someone, to commune with more Rolling Thunder data.

BONUS EYE CANDY: Warner Brothers' Circular (its "weekly news device") pimping Rolling Thunder:

New-to-The-List from the Digitized Chronicle

After spending X hours over X years spinning microfilm to try to find the needles of unListed Garcia gigs in the haystack of the Chronicle, the paper has been digitized.

Je ne regrette rien!

That said, I was able to find a few listings for The List. At this point, I cannot imagine we are missing more than a handful of Bay Area gigs about which information was actually printed somewhere.

2/15/71 JGMS at Matrix (via JLW "Something Else").
11/3/71 JGMS at Keystone Korner ("" "").
12/22/71 JGMS at Keystone Korner ("" ""). Just says Jerry Garcia, presume JGMS.
12/28/71 JGMS at New Monk ("" "").
12/29/71 JGMS at New Monk ("" "").
1/31/73 JGMS at Keystone Berkeley (via listings). This one turned up on a search for Tom Fogerty, who is listed, because JG is listed as Jerry Garcilea.

Update your Lists.

New-to-The-List from the Examiner, 1970-1972

In addition to the tantalizing May 20-21, 1969 Garcia gigs at the Matrix, the newly-digitized Examiner has yielded a good number of previously unlisted, mostly-midweek Garcia gigs. A little list  from 1970-1972 follows.

update: see also a subsequent list from 1973-end

11/2/70 (Monday): Jerry Garcia / BBHC / Ice / Cleveland Wrecking Company. Harding Theater. Benefit for A Learning Place. I don't know if this would have been NRPS or JGMS; I am listing as JGMS for no particular reason.
! Listing: San Francisco Sunday Examiner and Chronicle Datebook, November 1, 1970, p. 27;
! Listing: San Francisco Examiner, November 2, 1970, p. 35.
! seealso: https://jgmf.blogspot.com/2019/11/ca-november-1-2-1970-fragments.html.

1/5/71 (Tuesday): JGMS at Matrix
! listing: San Francisco Examiner, January 5, 1971, p. 24.

2/4/71 (Thursday): JGMS at Matrix
! listing: San Francisco Examiner, February 4, 1971, p. 25.

3/30/71 (Tuesday): NRPS at Matrix. I interpret this as warmup for the east coast tour. BTW, they also played the next night, according to a redacted source, so we can add 3/31/71 (Wednesday), same band and room.
! listing: San Francisco Examiner, March 30, 1971, p. 24.

11/24/71 (Wednesday): JGMS at Keystone Korner. Garcia's first-known gig for Freddie Herrera had happened the night before Thanksgiving the year before with the New Riders. Jerry and Merl reprise the gig on its first anniversary.
! listing: San Francisco Examiner, November 24, 1971, p. 20.

1/18/72 (Tuesday): JGMS at Lion's Share
! Listing: San Francisco Examiner, January 18, 1972, p. 21.

3/1/72 (Wednesday): JGMS at Keystone Berkeley (formerly New Monk). I now understand this to be the very first night for the so-named Keystone at the corner of University and Shattuck. It's a fitting indicator of the centrality of Garcia to Freddie's enterprises that he would play this opening night at the old Monk. (See also "Jerry and Freddie, mid-March 1972".)
! Listing: San Francisco Examiner, March 1, 1972, p. 33.

6/3/72 (Saturday): JGMS at Keystone Korner
! Listing: San Francisco Examiner, June 3, 1972, p. 10.

8/31/72 (Thursday): JGMS at Keystone Berkeley
! Listing: San Francisco Examiner, August 31, 1972, p. 31.

12/26/72 (Tuesday): JGMS at Keystone Korner. This one puzzles me, because the KK would have been under Barkan's ownership at this point. Barkan has narrated that he once hosted Jerry and Merl (after he started booking the room on July 7th), but didn't dig the vibe and stuck thereafter with jazz. This could well be that very gig. I still don't know what to make of a listing for JGB at KK four years later, of course ...
! Listing: San Francisco Examiner, December 26, 1972, p. 28.

A Party For Mother Earth

It's actually much, much prettier than it looks in this picture.

New Riders headlining "A Party for Mother Earth", benefiting the Bear Commune, Friends and Relations Hall, 660 Great Highway, June 3, 1971.

Enter Tom Fogerty

update 20230712

I have no idea why I inferred Tom Fogerty saw JGMS at Keystone Korner on 5/20/71. It seems more likely to have been 5/22/71, and his arrival may mark why they made tapes of the next two nights.

Further, I have no idea why I inferred he first joined in Berkeley on 5/26/71, when Tuesday 5/25 is even more likely, based on the "off-night" clause of The Iron Law of Breaking in New Band Members.

So, as of 7/12/2023, I am calling 5/22 the visit and 5/25 Tom's debut.

/update 20230712

A couple of years ago I discovered this youtube content called "Goodbye Media Man", featuring video of Tom Fogerty, Merl Saunders, Bill Vitt, various studio engineers and others unknown to me, working on a track by that same title.

Here is the description (published October 9, 2013):

Tom was the original singer of the Blue Velvets and the Golliwogs, both of which evolved into Creedence Clearwater Revival. Tom Fogerty had the chops to be a star in his own right. Within the band (Doug, Stu, Tom and John), Tom was overshadowed by younger brother John, who's talent was clearly evident. "Goodbye Media Man", recorded in 1971, was Tom's first solo single after leaving Creedence. A great track with solid musicianship and hooks. To my knowledge, this is the first time this video has been posted. Tom left us far too soon, passing on September 6, 1990. Back in the day, he was a friend, and I miss him - Ken Levy, Brooklyn NY / Addlestone, Surrey England

Wow.

I continue to be amazed at the material that continues to crawl out of the woodwork. It gives me hope for the Golden State Country Bluegrass Festival (GSCBF) film, among many other things. This post will pin down the metadata but also talk about how remarkable is the wealth of material we have available to study, across many different media - and why we get to enjoy that wealth.

Metadata
Location

Appears to be Berkeley, both at Fantasy Studios and at Tom Fogerty's professorial manse with a bunch of kids running around.

Date

The video is only dated 1971. Recall that Tom Fogerty had announced on February 2, 1971 that he was leaving the lucrative Creedence Clearwater Revival over differences with the band's dominant force, his little brother John, and to spend more time with his four children.[1] We also know that the House That Creedence Built, the new Fantasy Studios facility at 10^th and Parker in Berkeley, had come online right around this time. Local journo students Kathie Staska and George Mangrum ("KG") ran an amazingly rich column in the Hayward Daily Review starting in February, and got a tour of the new facility from the one and only Ralph Gleason, now working full time for Saul Zaentz at Fantasy.[2]

KG reported on March 11 that Tom had started work on his solo album.[3] Just after the solstice, on June 24th, KG reported that the record was done and was set for release the next week,[4] also noting that he'd be part of Merl Saunders's band for a release on the same label. On June 29th, Robert Hilburn noted in the LA Times that "Goodbye Media Man" was set for imminent release. So the video presumably features material from this late-winter to early-summer span. Intriguingly, a youtube posting of the "Goodbye Media Man" single associates a date of "the 17th of June 1971" with it:

With all of this, the studio film could come from anywhere between March and June, but I strongly suspect that the home material is from closer to June, as the single neared or achieved completion. Update: John Wasserman mentioned that Tom was cutting "Goodbye Media Man" in his Chronicle column of June 21st, so this is very much in the nearing-completion stage - right around the solstice.

Forging The Garcia-Fogerty Connection

Our Hero comes up in the interview, and I think this comment sheds some light on the Tom Fogerty version of the Garcia-Saunders band.[5] Tom says

I only want to jam around right now and perform with as many people as possible. I’ve learned more about music this last month [i.e., May-June] from meeting other people than during the whole time while I was with Creedence ... One night, I just happened to go over to Keystone Korner. Merl Saunders had invited me over to hear him and Bill Vitt and Jerry Garcia, and within a week I was up on the stage with 'em. And, uh playin' with 'em, and at that point I decided that that was ... the kind of music that I wanted behind the song. It was within about three days that the thing came together with Merl.

When might this have been, exactly? Let's investigate. Jerry and Merl had played the following Keystone Korner gigs from the first Freddie Herrera - Jerry Garcia Joint through mid-1971:

Table xxx. Garcia at Keystone Korner, 11/25/70-6/16/71. Follow this link for a more complete table of Garcia's Keystone Korner gigs. Click image to enlarge.

Tom's narrative and the overall evidence best fits Tom having seen JGMS on 5/20/71,[6] and sitting in with them on Wednesday 5/26/71. This frame fits "within a week" from Tom's filmed reckoning, and I am pretty confident about the interval, if not the specifics. "Three days" from Tom is a little unclear to me, certainly could suggest it was other nights than the ones I pinpoint. So, why these?

This is going to get really convoluted, and, despite my best efforts, I assume it will be somewhat hard to follow. You can just take my word for it, or you can try to follow me into the data.

First, there is tape of 5/20/71 and 5/21/71, the first out of the Garcia Vault and the second locked away there until its 2020 release. May 11, 1971[7] and these tapes represent the earliest-audible Garcia-Saunders performances (perhaps as many as eight months after they started gigging![8]), and they precede a four-month gap that audibly ends when Lou Judson becomes the second Marin County soundman to run PA tape of The Group in late September. The 5/20/71 tape escaped into the world because Garcia had it amongst his stuff when, ca. Christmas 1975, MG threw him out of Sans Souci --on which the couple had closed on ... May 5, 1971!-- and he shuffled off to Deborah's for the first time. Debbie took possession of the tape, someone found a way to copy it, and now anyone can hear it.

Second, I submit that the fact that Jerry had this tape amongst his personal stuff is not innocent with respect to the very question we are considering. I think he had the tape "pulled", either initially recorded or pulled out of wherever most of his tapes were kept, or both, precisely so Fogerty could give it a listen. We know the Dead were in the habit of pulling recent tapes to prepare their incoming members, e.g., the "Houseboat Tapes" of August 1971 that they gave Keith Godchaux to listen to. I think Jerry lent it to Tom or dubbed it for him so he could come up to speed with the band and its material.

Third, and with respect to the late boundary, I glean one other possible tidbit of information from the table above, in the advertising patterns. I am almost certainly over-reading this, but the Thursday-Friday-Saturday 5/20-22 run looks like Big Nights - advertised in the Chron, weekend shows, some real buzz. Even Tuesday 5/25 gets a Wasserman mention, which may well have been enough to sell the gig out. But 5/26, Wednesday, gets a measley mention in the Trib's "Bay Sounds" items, which usually ran more toward jazz and soul. Probably a much quieter night for Tom to step up and play some for the first time, dontcha think? I can't adduce all of the evidence here, but it is as close to an Iron Law as exists in the Garciaverse that new players are broken in off-nights, off-the-beaten-path, or both.

Art and Commerce

For Garcia of this vintage, the aesthetics of any musical choice should go without saying. He wanted to play more music with good players than the Dead could afford him (especially in this very fallow period between the closing of the Fillmores East and West). As Corry and I have elaborated, Tom Fogerty advened alongside huge changes in The Group's approach and repertoire, from spacey organ jazz to all kinds of Americana, white (The Band's "Dixie Down", Jesse Winchester's "Biloxi", some good ol' rockabilly), black (Stevie Wonder, Motown, etc. etc.) and everything in between, mostly more or less contemporary stuff. In short, I think Fogerty came in because Jerry wanted to sing some tunes, wanted to bring in more white contemporary, and Fogerty could sing, play rhythm guitar, and bring in some new material. [update: the release of the pre-Tom 5/21/71 Garcia-Saunders gig gives the lie to the idea that it was all space jazz pre-Tom, with white-roots-flavored stuff coming in with him. Dixie Down, Mystery Train and arguably a few others were already in the repertoire. This is a case where fragmentary tape evidence led us {at least me} a little astray.]

But there were almost surely also commercial logics operating here, too. Whether they came from Jerry, from Merl, from Tom, from Saul Zaentz (or Ralph Gleason), and/or others, I can't know. But Fantasy Records stands at the center of this.

Indeed, I want to revise my conjecture above about why the May 20-21, 1971 JGMS tapes were made (and recorded in 4-track, no less). This was long before Rex and then Betty started taping Jerry, so why is there this one pair of shows? I said a few paragraphs ago that it was so Tom could bone up. I think that's half-right – it was so Tom could bone up, and Tom joining this operation cannot be separated from Tom making records for Fantasy, Merl making records for Fantasy, etc. etc. Remember that Merl invited Tom down to the club. He might have had a purpose in mind - say, to make a Group for Jerry that would record on Fantasy and make them all rich, what already wasn't, and them richer what already was. Corry and I have concluded that Fogerty's arrival served a sea change in the Garcia-Saunders aggregation, taking it from space organ to Dylan, Band and Motown numbers. (update: we overstated the discontinuity here. The 5/21/71 show has "Dixie Down", for example.) Why this big artistic shift? Quite possibly, to work up some more commercially viable material than the "out-there" jams they had been doing. Hooteroll? (Douglas 5, December 1971) would cover the space-organ piece of the market for the jazz heads, while The Group could do some white and black contemporary tunes for the dormitory set. It's all made to order, including an eager press. Indeed, two days after writing about Fogerty's upcoming release, our intrepid collegians K and G found themselves at the New Monk in Berkeley, where Tom, Merl and Jerry were holding forth for a standing-room-only crowd, just blocks from Fantasy.[9]

Conclusion

I feel quite confident, though not certain, that Tom Fogerty first sat in with JGMS on May 26, 1971. I also think Fantasy Records was the Prime Mover behind this partnership.

Now, Garcia and Tom did end up on Merl's Heavy Turbulence (Fantasy 8421, 1972), which looks to me like it could have been recorded in 1971, and Fogerty's Excalibur (Fantasy 9413, October 1972) which, though seemingly released later, feels roughly contemporary. Merl's Fire Up (Fantasy 9421, 1973) feels more like 1972, though of course it's pretty hard to say. But Fantasy's big golden goose feast, 1973's Live at the Keystone (Fantasy F-79002), featured the Fogertyless quartet of the aforementioned goose plus Merl and the Kahn-Vitt rhythm section. As best we can tell, Tom left the fold at the end of 1972 after eighteen months with The Group. What happened? I dunno, but I welcome your speculations in comments.

---

[1] “Tom Fogarty [sic] Leaves Creedence,” San Francisco Chronicle, February 3, 1971, p. 42.

[2] See also Staska and Mangrum 19710225.

[3] Staska and Mangrum 19710311.

[4] Staska and Mangrum 19710624.

[5] I have written at length around all of this. See "Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders at the Matrix - A Dialogue" (with Corry Arnold), URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/09/jerry-garcia-and-merl-saunders-at.html; "Jerry Garcia & Merl Saunders & Tom Fogerty Sat-Sun, New Monk", URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/09/jerry-garcia-merl-saunders-tom-fogerty.html; and "Tom Fogerty, Merl Saunders and Friends - June 25, 1971 Keystone Korner", URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/09/tom-fogerty-merl-saunders-and-friends.html.

[6] See "'JGMS 5/20/71' is probably really JGMS 5/20/71," URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/09/jgms-52071-is-probably-really-jgms-52071.html.

[7] See "JGMS: Matrix, May 11-12, 1971," URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/09/jgms-matrix-may-11-12-1971.html; "'Hey Merl, you wanna do that tune in 'G'? Get spaced out a little?' LN jg1971-05-11.jgms.partial.aud.28784.flac1644," URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/09/hey-merl-you-wanna-do-that-tune-in-g.html.

[8] "When did Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders first play together?" URL http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2010/11/when-did-jerry-garcia-and-merl-saunders.html.

[9] Staska and Mangrum 19710701.

Stinson History

Stinson Beach Music Scene Time Line: 1960s to the Present

The site above was just brought to my attention. I can't find an email for anyone in the organization based on a cursory search, so I thought I post some reactions here.

The prompt for all of this is the newly digitized source for the OAITW gig at the Stinson Community Center on September 30, 1973, same source tape as an older source I have sketchily blogged. I haven't had time to look back at this in detail, but I also want to pin Corry's post on an early OAITW gig at a Stinson Beach bar.

The point of this post is to post some corrections and ask some questions about entries in the Stinson Historical Society page that heads the post. If anyone knows any of the principals and wishes to draw their attention to the corrections, they might be interested.

“Blows Against the Empire” and “Mexico” (1969) - Jefferson Airplane

Recordings for BATE started in July 1970, just to be clear. Not sure what the Stinson connection is supposed to be here.

1970 – Peter Rowan moves to Stinson Beach from Mill Valley, where he had been playing in bands such as Seatrain and Earth Opera. Also recently been spending time playing with bluegrass legend Bill Monroe. He moves into a house on Calle del Ribera and pays $100/month in rent. He ends up writing one song inspired by Stinson Beach: “Riding the Rainbow in the Sky,” which was never released on a record.

The liner notes to Breakdown say PR arrived in Stinson Beach in October 1972.

8/27/71 - Jerry Garcia and others play at the club known as “The Red Whale,” which is located where the current Stinson Beach Water County District is located on Highway One just past the turn off for Calle del Arroyo. It would later be renovated and renamed “The Brigg.” Still later, it would be renovated again and renamed the “Over the Hill Bar and Grill.”

Mmmmm, a specific date which I don't have. I would love to know the source of this information! In the meantime, I will add it to my spreadsheet. I am presuming this would be the NRPS warming up earlier in the day before gigging at the Longbranch this night, but of course I can't be sure.

One rumor has it that the only time Jerry Garcia met John Lennon was during this time period in Stinson Beach.

Sounds familiar, but I will pin this possible crossing here.

Autumn 1972 – Jerry Garcia & David Grisman play bluegrass music several times, with Jerry practicing his banjo whenever he can after they bumped into each other at Ed’s Superette as Garcia was buying cigarettes.

I thought the story of their hooking back up in Stinson was that Pete Rowan walked Dawg (or vice versa) up the hill to Garcia's. This doesn't rule out that they bumped into each other at Ed's Superette, of course.

January 1973 – ... After playing at “Avila's Barn,” Jerry Garcia names David Grisman "Dawg" after he saw dog following Grisman on the beach at Stinson.

Avila's Barn doesn't ring a bell to me, though I bet that if I check Corry's "unknown bar" post it's mentioned there. update: I think the name is not "Avila" but Avella - so, Avella's Barn. I have changed it in my tag.

1973 [sic] - Goldie Rush starts Round Records above Ed’s Superette in 1973

First, the name "Goldie Rush" was new to me, and it shouldn't be, because apparently she was heavily involved in Round Records. Second, though, 1973 is too early, at least for "starts" in any formally institutionalized sense. Round Records was incorporated in the state of California on January 22, 1974.

1977 [sic] – David Jenkins (guitar) and Cory Lerois (keyboards) move to Stinson Beach, both members of the band Pablo Cruise. Lerois buys Mountain Girl/Jerry Garcia’s old house, and does a major remodel.

No. This was early 1978.

1979/1980 – The band “The Edge” is formed by Lorin Rowan, Mark Stein, Jim Dillon, Keith Glanz and Ozzie Ahleve [sic]

Correction: last fellow's name is Ozzie Ahlers.

Scotty's Jam

Does anybody have the state-of-the-art understanding of what the "Scotty's Music Store 5/14/70" / "Jetty's Music Theater 12/7/71" NRPS jam session really is? TIA.

update

Looks pretty certain to have been 12/9/71 at Scotty's Music Store. Here is some info from JGBP (thanks!).

Jerry plays a Zane Beck D-10 pedal steel and also Lloyd Green's old double neck Sho Bud with the yellow streak on the front owned by Scotty, a flat top guitar [6] and a brand new 1972 Micro Frets Spacetone guitar.

"The next time that the Dead came to St. Louis and the New Riders were with them and both bands came to the store and we had a kind off the wall jam session. Sometimes Buddy Cage would play the steel and then I would play. I owned Lloyd Green's old double neck Sho Bud with the yellow streak on the front and that is the guitar we played on. They came to the store one more time and anytime they would get within 200 miles of St. Louis they would call me and I would take my reel to reel tape recorder to the motel and took several tapes of the Steel Guitar Convention with me and after their concert we would listen to them the rest of the night. I took pictures and even put up a mike and recorded that jam session. I sold Jerry a double neck MSA and when it came time to pay for it the manager said to me, "What's our price"? Jerry put his hand on his shoulder and said, You pay this man full price!" Wow! Jerry and I corresponded for awhile and we exchanged LP's with each other. It's odd - a guy devoted to pure country and one of the most respected guys in rock and roll getting together and being so friendly with each other. Jerry Garcia and DeWitt "Scotty" Scott, Bob Weir and the rest of the band were very friendly too!" [4]

"That jam at Scotty's was interesting, and Scotty remembers a few details. Most interestingly is the smoking' hot lead guitar player. Scotty remembers his name I think. He was a Gibson rep out doing his midwest rounds and happened to be stopping thru St. Louis that day. He was there for the jam, and was totally unrelated to NRPS or Jerry. It really wasn't a performance as much as an impromptu jam. The Dead/NRPS were in town, and at that time Jerry no longer played steel with them, hence Cage's presence. A bunch of local hippie/deadheads found their way and crammed into Scotty's for the little jam. Rick Rhamberg was there and recalls this Nashville Gibson rep guitarist all duded out in his country getup and they didn't know who he was, but he sure could rip.” [5]

"My store is small but both bands were here and they sat on the floor and we were crowded but everyone enjoyed it. What they liked about meeting at my store is that I did not take advantage of their being here by letting everyone know that they were coming. Jerry, especially, liked that. All this is packed in boxes and stored away. I did not even mark on the boxes what was in them back in those days. I would have to search many, many boxes to find any thing that I have on those guys. About the recording. I only made one. Buddy Cage played steel guitar for awhile and I played steel guitar for awhile. Everyone had their go at singing and playing the flat top guitars.” [4

"And that was the night of the jam session. Even if I didn’t partake, there was a big enough cloud for everyone.”[1]

"Buddy Cage, Chuck Berry and many others have been here several times. There have been many jam sessions at this store and the one with Jerry Garcia is in the top ten.” [3]

The Grateful Dead performed at the Fox Theater, St. Louis, MO later on this date.

1.) http://www.scottysmusic.com/bio.htm

2.) Hitsman, Steve, comments, 2000-07-19, http://steelguitarforum.com/Archives/Archive-000003/HTML/20011227-1-010467.html

3.) Scott, Michael, comments, 2013-06-07, email to author.

4.) Scot, DeWitt, robthewordsmith, comments, 2010-10-12, http://archive.org/post/329204/scottys-music-store-jam.

5.) Jim F., comments, 2010-10-14, http://archive.org/post/329204/scottys-music-store-jam

6.) Scott, Michael, photographer, 1971-12-09.

Lenny Hart's term of employment

I had never quite seen this much specificity on the dates around Lenny Hart, but in combination with some other factors (Gar talking about the situation with Rakow at the Family Dog, which the GD were playing through 3/1/70), this really seems pretty precise.

Hart was arrested July 26 in San Diego on a Marin County warrant charging he embezzled more than $77,000 between May 22, 1969 , and March 2, 1970, while he was employed as business manager of the group.

And specifics on Lenny's Perfidy: 

During the time he served as business manager, Hart wrote six checks, totaling $35,200, on the Dead’s account made out to the “Sunshine Company.” An investigation revealed that the Sunshine Company maintained an account at the same bank and the account was in the name of Leonard B. Hart, according to Thomas. The affidavit also said that Jerry Garcia, a member of the Grateful Dead, told San Rafael police that MGM Studios wrote $11,000 worth of checks for music composed by Garcia. The checks were made out to Hart, as trustee of the group, but neither Garcia nor the group ever saw the money".

! ref: "Rock Group Embezzling Case is Set," Independent-Journal, August 10, 1971, p. 5.