Grateful Dead
Date 1983-08-21
Frost Amphitheatre
Palo Alto CA

d1t01 - tuning
d1t02 - Cassidy
d1t03 - Dire Wolf
d1t04 - Me and My Uncle
d1t05 - Big River
d1t06 - Althea
d1t07 - Little Red Rooster  //
d1t08 - Big Railroad Blues
d1t09 - Let it Grow

d2t01 - Samson and Delilah >     ^
d2t02 - China Cat Sunflower > I Know You Rider ///
d2t03 - Playin' in the Band >
d2t04 - drums >
d2t05 - space >
d2t06 - The Wheel >
d2t07 - Throwin' Stones >    //
d2t08 - Not Fade Away
d2t09 - encore break crowd
d2t10 - Baby Blue
d2t11 - Johnny B. Goode      *

//  Tape Flip
/// Tape Swap
^   Loud crackle from PA at start
*   Missed start as we had started taking gear apart

Source: MAC Beyer M201's X-Y 7'up > Sony TCD5M no dolby
            TDK MA-R90 x 2
Location: ~125 feet from stage, DFC
Transfer: Nakamichi CR-5A (24/96) > Tascam DR680|SD > i7Windows7
          Audacity > cdwav editor > TLH flac level 8
          This is 16 bit copy
Mastered:    Executive Crew Kyle Holbrook Chris Kidwell
Transferred: Kyle Holbrook
==========================================================================================================================
The tour story:
The back story:
Chris Kidwell and I were in Portland ME preparing to drive to Syracuse to drop me at home and for Chris to pick up Tom and head out west for the late summer tour. They had planned this trip and Chris was in his Saab which now I recall so well as I wound up taking Tom's place. This after Tom called Chris and said he had to be home for the first 10 days of the trip and couldn't travel with us as planned. Originally we were going to travel in two cars but now we had to alter the plan. As we drove to Syracuse I came up with this plan to tell my girlfriend Fran and the guys that I have no choice, I have to stand in for Tom in Chris' car. I had about 4 hours to prep! We had to gather all the new toys we had made for the mic mount we had built on the new very lightweight stand all of which Olvy and Mike had helped to locate and build. We also made plans to meet Tom and whomever made the trip with him hopefully by Eugene.

We took off in the Saab and it took about 55 hours to get from Portland to Syracuse to San Francisco with Chris having driven the majority of the way out until well past Illinois. We met my friend Howard Terry who we were staying with in the city (as Howard called his adopted city of San Francisco). We arrived about 4 AM the day of the first show, August 20th.I'm pretty sure we made the show but we did not make a recording. (This may also be the reason that we met Aaron Yamaguchi)

On this second show day I recall eating dim sum in the market district and heading to the show. Howard drove like a New York cab driver which made this trip down to Palo Alto humorous (really almost any car ride with Howard was an experience). We wound up setting up on the Jerry side of the board just below the soundboard riser. The Frost Amphitheatre is a picturesque venue with the Stanford university clocktower behind the stage and the beautiful tree lined landscape all along the sides. I remember families with strollers all along the top of the hill toward a flat area then under the trees were people laying down, lounging and grooving. The Cassidy opener is a masterpiece with a funny vocal duplicate line by Bobby. The band came out with the intent to play hard. At one point, during my first set highlight of Althea, the tonality of Jerry's guitar and vocal just floated in that pristine California air. I know Chris also keyed on this tune because afterward all during our travel up the coast to the Portland show he kept singing and replaying "this space is getting hot"; what a version it is! The boys ripped into a Big RR Blues with Jerry just searing into two long solos. The set ending Let it Grow was a Bob Weir standout although there was some great drumming and guitar playing during the jams, the second interlude is so mellow at times it seems listening back now that the moments of spareness, just a few tones from one or three instruments per melody string are what makes this song so masterful. Ahh, that Bobby and Jerry symbiosis was beautiful in those moments.

The Second set is short. It is also extremely well played aside from two or three vocal flubs. Samson and Delilah reminded us it was a Sunday with Bobby doing his usual early 80's theatrics during his vocals. The drums and space are some performance- representative of the best of that interlude in this timeframe. On this specific recording the drums were captured very nicely with the ability to hear each drummer's individual cadences and kick/snare combos. The China > Rider > Playin sequence is so so nice. The band at it's finest, in a finally sunny afternoon, considered a hometown show for them so probably many family members attending and they certainly enjoyed themselves throwing down a classic Grateful Dead set for the Sunday faithful. The transition into Wheel out of Space startled me the first "re" listening, it is so subtle; they are spacing out then within 20 notes they are sliding into the intro of the tune. I am biased as Wheel is one of my favorite Jerry/GD tunes, but this version seems special to my old ears. Brent's keyboard and harmony vocals added so much it's often tough to recall he was only in the band 3.5 years by this point. The Throwing Stones > Not Fade Away combo was starting to become a twosome but this is still in the middle stages of the evolution of the way they orchestrated it. More aggressive vocals and less time comping between verses is how I characterize this days' styling. There is a very long, slow outro of the NFA drumbeat and Bobby hitting harmonics with Jerry leaving about 60 seconds before Bob at the end. They do a strong Baby Blue encore, leave the stage then surprise everybody, I think Bill Graham too, by coming back on and ripping out a Johnny B Goode second encore! "old man voice": "In all my Dead shows I saw less than ten double encores, rare indeed".

- - - - sbes at end of sets

    length     expanded size    cdr  WAVE problems  fmt   ratio  filename
     1:14.42       13152428 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.4980  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t01.flac
     5:02.64       53423372 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6256  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t02.flac
     4:03.13       42895820 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.5907  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t03.flac
     2:52.34       30420812 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6127  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t04.flac
     6:59.12       73939868 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6297  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t05.flac
     8:39.72       91720988 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6038  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t06.flac
     8:46.59       92925212 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6114  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t07.flac
     6:21.69       67370732 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6303  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t08.flac
    12:43.63      134741308 B   -b-   --   ---xx   flac  0.6197  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t09.flac
     7:46.34       82282412 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6060  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t01.flac
    13:22.34      141552812 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6061  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t02.flac
    12:30.74      132474092 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6031  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t03.flac
     7:31.06       79570556 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.5228  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t04.flac
     6:16.24       66382892 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.5075  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t05.flac
     5:32.51       58684796 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6028  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t06.flac
     8:17.09       87692012 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6218  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t07.flac
    10:19.45      109297484 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6035  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t08.flac
     1:23.18       14683580 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.5210  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t09.flac
     6:57.35       73641164 B   ---   --   ---xx   flac  0.6009  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t10.flac
     4:06.68       43555376 B   -b-   --   ---xx   flac  0.6592  gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t11.flac
   140:49.01     1490407716 B                            0.6012  (20 files)

gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t01.flac:faee586801e91df25b0e4c112a6a2d46
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t02.flac:f0813e720456431b228b10931db728aa
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t03.flac:2281490e917bcadb0c4d790583833a4a
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t04.flac:9459fccae80fa83bdc23d629659dc1c6
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t05.flac:ef771db3479a9bdf9d08575922310105
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t06.flac:c5744d070db7daf90565302d3d1c7585
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t07.flac:58c94501b6943771e97391395dbbe8c8
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t08.flac:5cb0b8d1487cfa100c48aa14276fcf4b
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t09.flac:af1614665c2b26b1b69da95028e47852
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t01.flac:ce58d4b560fa28ae71bade1c6d753a2e
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t02.flac:33f96aa66402e48f9dc93074a96aadbf
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t03.flac:51bfd9a2ee5718f61d14abd557475773
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t04.flac:279d543374dd564cb2879b55b4c53adb
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t05.flac:a0c4da829da84fa7a1df5a5b2a829d7b
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t06.flac:1d29c397179e7e8c9fb2c99c72235c41
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t07.flac:acd91108b636f8646537f47979bea0c9
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t08.flac:07d9f645487930a9e058ed9f8427356e
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t09.flac:aba88bdfdfbd3771cd83ab5077c08c1f
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t10.flac:6879f58d318e91d2ba0c33b25715fcd6
gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t11.flac:e68acba436caf7b12815794ee06f3d9e

8c5cc9d16894a398e988543f971a1bee *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t01.flac
38c872c7e62ee0a6126c994c8798bd8e *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t02.flac
ec9ab5d2412ddcb91c0fb5aa77fa405d *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t03.flac
721864586025e454f7b57646fa614019 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t04.flac
a503da121f1d8a0f9803589574c2fd77 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t05.flac
c99f3213a79f0b6cd45bdf77c9cc7c88 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t06.flac
52bc1f79bd51f2449674993e28db773a *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t07.flac
c1b89b9342c17fe41680149efe7be486 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t08.flac
fea4bf3ef8cca65efc32c4e05267c630 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s1t09.flac
2600ace4d6b521c565ae061f2674df19 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t01.flac
0bcc385468382ac2274b7f56fee9c927 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t02.flac
e1ce76275df52ea11eb9d22f3222000e *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t03.flac
c29782b71291589b404e19d14fbc0b6c *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t04.flac
88997c096115f59f45fbee52d8ef73c0 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t05.flac
4d74733431d2ae284452ccf380bcf801 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t06.flac
4002323bc8d9fbdc7ceafa4b231d9328 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t07.flac
e96e00547d265fbf97ae8023a3d9ce01 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t08.flac
598e77e919042821c0298f23ea5c16f5 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t09.flac
b542f5706404facd86241272eaf290f8 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t10.flac
729ff4f6b2b424d86749f0fe522a30d8 *gd1983-08-21beyerm201-16s2t11.flac