Pacific Northwest '73-'74: The Complete Review

     If you've been paying any attention at all the the Dead world, you should know that one of the most anticipated box sets ever was just released.  Pacific Northwest '73-'74: The Complete Recordings is, well, exactly what it sounds like.  Six shows taken almost a year apart from the Vancouver, Portland, and Seattle (in that order each year).  I would try to give you some historical background, but after reading Nicholas Meriwether's official write-up I feel left with either blatant plagiarism or a half-assed recreation of his efforts.  So instead I urge you to find someone with a PDF of his write-up, because while wordy it's a very good read.  With some great pictures!

     Roy Henry Vickers designed the box, and I can easily say without hesitation or hyperbole that it is the best looking box set (that we own).  I'm a sucker for the geometrical designs of May '77 (the original one), but this box and the album art overall are far beyond.  He incorporated his culture's art into a box that perfectly encapsulates the music, and it's enhanced by his avoidance of traditional Dead iconography.  Sure there are some skeletons, skulls, and bears, but all in very different contexts than you would expect from the Dead.  Maybe it's just projection, but I'm already associating elements of each show's album art with the music contained within, and even if I'm crazy it still enhances the listening experience.  Especially combined with the quality of the sound, which is way better than the bootlegs of these shows that I've had for years; it's like listening to them for the first time!

     This is another case where doing a song-by-song review would be too long and honestly kind of boring, so I'll just list some highlights for each show below.  One of the interesting things about these shows is actually how similar they are.  Even the '74 shows have very similar setlists to the '73 shows, which isn't too unusual in and of itself as far as the typical Europe '72 material is concerned.  But with 5 China > Riders, 5 Great Stories and 5 Race Is On's (the races are on?) the shows really do feel to be cut of the same cloth, or at least echoes of the same vibe.  While the shows are so obviously interrelated, they also capture different facets of that vibe I mentioned, sometimes getting spacey, other times getting ferocious, and generally just getting plain weird.  So let's get weird!

• 1973-06-22  Vancouver
• This show is a great way to start off the box.  It's very high energy, and has a special crystalline feeling to it that could be attributed to any number of factors, some of which aren't exactly legal.
• One of the songs that was most hyped for this box was the Bird Song from this show, it's easy to see why.  While '72 versions have a lot of drive and melt to them, these rarer '73 versions have a lot more open space and ambience to them.
• This is a truly incredible Playing in the Band.  Pretty much any version from this '72-'73 is going to transport you somewhere far out, but instead of one blazing mess of weirdness, this Playin' instead is made up of several smaller thematic elements.  This is more like a '76 version in that respect, but still very '73 in its fluidity and agility.  There's even a little bit of Mind Left Body Jam in there from Phil, which as far as I remember was only paired with Playin' one other time (12/02/73).
• Here Comes Sunshine is the secret hero of this show, another great jam vehicle that they inexplicably dropped after this year.  A lot of the Spring versions of this song fall flat for me compared to the stately and pristine versions from the Fall.  While this one isn't exactly pristine, it does stand apart from Spring versions due to its energy.  It sounds almost like they're going to totally break the ending jam open like they did in Boston two months prior, but they eventually decide to close it out.
• The Black Peter here is exactly perfect for the era.  No big fireworks like in post-hiatus versions, just laid-back psychedelic fever music.
• Of course the big vehicle in this show is He's Gone > Truckin' > The Other One > Wharf Rat.  There's no jam after He's Gone, they just go right into Truckin'.  They jam on Truckin' for a bit after the verses, and then everyone gets out of the way for Phil and Billy (as this section is labeled on some tapes) to shred the fabric of the universe.  Even Billy drops out for a bit while Phil gets really metaphysical.  You expect him to slam into The Other One at several points, but instead he crafts a totally unique jam that Jerry and the others can't help but join in on.
• They mellow down and Keith starts getting grokky with his Rhodes, and eventually they twist over to the Other One, though they don't spend much time on the theme.  Once they finish the first verse they evoke the second one by coming across an empty space, and really exploring it.  I was struggling to find words for this, and landed on a foreground of silence with a background of noise.  There is a lot of deliberate and heavy silence, but at the same time behind that you can hear them making a wallpaper or a tapestry of feedback that never quite breaks the surface.
• 1973-06-24  Portland
• The problem with reviewing multiple shows is that you can't help but compare them and try to figure out which is "better."  As a result of that, I feel compelled to say that this show may be the weakest of the box, but considering that it's a show with an amazing Dark Star > Eyes and one of the best Box of Rains (boxes of rain?) of the year, "weakest" is not the word I would otherwise use to describe the show.
• I had been listening to a lot of later Dead recently, so these early Looks Like Rains and They Love Each Others were very welcome changes to me.  LLR used to be so soft and delicate before it became and Jerry and Bob rave-up.  And of course everyone loves a sprightly '73 TLEO!
• Donna is so great on this show.  Not only does she refrain from murdering Bob when he comes in at the wrong time in BIODTL, she also slays You Ain't Woman Enough.
• This Dark Star, as I mentioned above, is fantastic, and not quite typical of the era.  Sure it does have some of the hallmarks, like Phil's 6 jam/proto-solomon jam, but it also features some unusual elements, like a short drum break before the first verse.  It starts out the same way as any other from the era, teasing the theme but ultimately abandoning it until Phil takes the reigns.  Instead of a big, crashing feedback > bliss evolution post lyrics, it just spaces out into a nebulous void until they start Eyes up from nothing.
• There are some questionable chords at the beginning of Eyes that could be attributed to tuning, jazziness, fuck-ups, or just general weirdness.  After than that it's as straightforward as Eyes can be.  Phil hadn't yet started doing his solos in the outro jam, and this is a pretty tight and clean version, especially through the last few changes and 7 jam.
• Phil introduces Saturday Night with, "now since it's Sunday night," because he's a Prankster.
• 1973-06-26  Seattle
• This one might be my favorite of the '73 shows.  It's maybe not as tight as Vancouver, possibly due to technical issues throughout, but I think the playing is just a bit more inspired.
• I really like the opening pairing of Casey Jones > Greatest Story, a transition that as far as I can tell was never done before or after this, even though it works so well!
• This is probably the best China > Rider of the '73 shows, very smooth and confident transitions, and again totally inspired playing.
• The second set jam sequence of this show is what really ties it all together for me.  It's same basic set-piece as Vancouver, but this time He's Gone is a lot slinkier, and they jam it out instead of going right into Truckin'.  Bob name drops Seattle in Truckin' without missing a beat, which is honestly pretty impressive.
• They keep the post Truckin' jam short and Billy flies into some fast and primal drums, followed after not too long by Phil's intro to the Other One. They do a lot more with the theme in this one, really flexing their muscles.  Phil keeps dropping short bombs that Jerry and the others spin off of.  They start to drift off a bit, and instead of coming back into the vocals, they swing into a suddenly sweet Me & Bobby McGee.  Normally when they do these weird sandwiches, the "straight" song in the middle has unusual hints and shades of psychedelia, but this one is so crisp could have been plucked from a first set.
• Once they finish it though, Phil is eager to get back to being as weird as he possibly can.  They get to through the first verse, and then all bets are off.  The rest of the song is pure madness, and Phil is maddest of all, putting his speakers (and mine!) through wave after wave of clawing feedback.  This should come with a warning about operating heavy machinery while listening because...damn.  Phil is working with some very powerful forces here.
• Instead of doing a ballad, or even doing the second verse of the song, Bobby slides into Sugar Magnolia.  Maybe he thought the local authorities would be hot on their tails after that Other One, so it would be best to skedaddle before they could fully collect their brains off the floor.
• 1974-05-17  Vancouver
• Jumping forward almost a year, the band is arguably the best it ever was.  All the new material from '73 had been fully assimilated or abandoned, and the new songs were starting strong out of the gates.  The Wall of Sound had grown into its final form, this being its fourth show fully assembled, and the band was already pretty adept at utilizing it.  While listening to a soundboard of the Wall kind of misses the point as far as audio clarity in the real world is concerned, but you can still hear how cleanly and separately the different instruments were amplified.  Jerry's Wolf guitar especially sounds huge and expansive here, every note clearly heard.
• While it's debatable whether or not this was the best year for the band, it's a hard fact that it was Keith's best year.  Not only was his piano amplified the best it ever would be, this was the year Keith became a master of the Rhodes.  He has some great Rhodes playing in '73, and even some cool electric piano (maybe it's a Rhodes?  I'm not a gear head) in Fall of '72.  But by '74 Keith could play that sucker like no one else.  He could be aggressive, spooky, atmospheric, or all at once, playing it more like an organ (and better than he played the organ) than anything else.
• This show features a relatively rare '74 Dire Wolf.  They playing is good but it is way too slow for me.
• Playing in the Band is as big and deep as you would expect for '74, and there's maybe a hint of them thinking, "I wonder how long we could do this for..." before they do decide to wind it up.  Phil really demonstrated just how rumbly he could get the Wall to be.
• Truckin' here features one of Bobby's worst Truckin' scores as far as lyrics go.  The whole first verse goes right out the window, and he's late for the second verse, but besides some musical ribbing the rest of the band doesn't miss a beat.  They slide smoothly into Nobody's Fault, with Jerry singing instead of just soloing over the lyrics section.  They jam out of it on the theme for a bit before getting real weird and spooky.  You can hear them figuring out where to head from here as they melt down, until Jerry kicks them into Eyes.
• This Eyes has a rocking feel, not as in rock and roll but more like a boat rocks on the water.  It has a certain sway and pulse to it as it unfolds.  The song really opened up from '73 to '74: the solos between verses got stretched out, and the members of the band all know it so well that they can play around the beat instead of just doing the main riff while Jerry solos.  The outro jam on this one is phenomenal, Jerry and Phil totally dominating the soundscape while still listening and reacting to everything else the band was playing.
• 1974-05-19  Portland
• This is the show that they're releasing on its own from the box set, like 5/8/77 & 3/20/90 from previous boxes, and in some ways it's easy to see why, and in others it's a little puzzling.  There are Wall Problems for a good chunk of the concert, including totally obscured vocals from Sugaree to El Paso.  Bobby makes a statement about them difficulties, but those same difficulties make it hard to hear what he's actually saying.  That said, the playing in this show is maybe the best all around of the box, and to put it delicately, the second set kicks a lot of ass.
• Half Step was almost two years old at this point, and is already showing signs of the grandness that it would have post-hiatus.
• Loose Lucy & Money Money kind of go hand in hand for me, two very syncopated and free songs that take advantage of how tight the band was, while also inviting them to loosen up a little.  Money Money sometimes even breaks into 7/4 time, which is part of what makes it such an interesting song to me.  Sure the lyrics aren't ideal, but the music is so angular and exciting, it's a shame they didn't keep it around, maybe tweaked the verses.  To me it's not glorifying misogyny any more than Me & My Uncle or Jack Straw glorify murder, it's just supposed to paint a picture of that character, including how evil they are.  But maybe I'm just justifying it so I can listen to Phil's bass line during the bridge...
• '74 was the best year for China > Riders, and this one has got to be the best of the box.  It just feels so much more complete and full than the '73 versions.  It's very well suited to the bigger sound they got out of the Wall.
• Throughout the marketing of this box, Lemieux kept coming back to the Truckin' sequence from this show, and I can say with confidence that it was not overhyped.  Truckin' started getting jammed out in '72 right before Europe, but in '74 it was repurposed to be a springboard for any kind of musical idea, not just The Other One (or Eyes or Dark Star occasionally).  They usually set it up with a thematic jam like Mind Left Body (which does appear here for a bit) or Spanish Jam, but other times it would go into totally new territory; this is one of those times.  They do touch on MLB, but then they go into something far more hard rocking than I was expecting.  Instead of cavernous echoing feedback this is a driven, bursting-with-life-and-spirit, masterpiece of rock and roll.
• It goes into Not Fade Away, but that almost Primal energy is still present throughout.  Instead of the normal flowing transition into GDTRFB they break the jam down a bit with a little call and response between Jerry and Keith, and then shift naturally into it.  Just exactly perfect.
• 1974-05-21  Seattle
• These '74 shows are a great presentation of Billy's Jazz Drummer Phase.  In the Grateful Dead Movie, he described his drumming as basically dancing, and it's easy to hear that.  He's not holding down the beat so much as flitting around it, trusting that the rest of the band can keep time as well as he can (and they do!).  He plays so free and syncopated in ways totally different from any other year, and it really does sound like he's trying to be a jazz drummer.  Later in the year he got a little too frantic (*sniffsniff*) and the music got a little sloppier, but here in May it totally works.
• This show is obviously known for having the longest Playing in the Band, but that means the rest of the setlist is often overlooked.  You can tell that the band is on tonight right from the start, and call me crazy but I think it's Keith who thanks the audience after Me & My Uncle.  It doesn't sound like anyone else, except maybe Billy, but I think it's Keith.
• Every one of Jerry's solos feels like it's ready to totally burst free of all restraints, like every song should be 47 minutes long tonight.
• There's a lot of great slide work from Jerry on Row Jimmy and Weather Report Suite.  I can't imagine what that must have sounded like in person.  Wolf already so big and and present on the Wall, and then you add that slide to it?  Fughettaboutit.
• We may never know exactly why the Dead played 47 minutes of Playin' this night.  Did they decide beforehand that they were going to play it as long as possible?  Did they just get lost in the powers of the Wall and had no idea how long they were playing?  Did anyone in the band get bored halfway through but had to wait for the rest of the band to circle back to the escape line?  Whatever the case, this PITB is heavy duty stuff.  Different themes come and go as Jerry and Phil dive in and out of tangles of feedback.  It's hard to say much more about it because it's just so dense and filled with ideas, all you can do is listen to it over and over and catch something new each time.
• The setlist "normalizes" a little bit after Playin' winds up, but they release they still had some weirdness left in them and start up a quick and fuzzy Eyes.  It's really a very straightforward Eyes for '74, in that it's fantastic and exciting, but it isn't 20 minutes long.  Not that you can complain about the length of a song after that Playin'!  They settle down into a very nice Wharf Rat, probably my favorite of the box.

     All in all, as good as the box looks, it sounds even better.  It ties six different shows together from the same locations just a year apart, providing not just snapshots of the different years but a way to track the Dead's growth within that year.  Between the changes that happened Summer and Fall shows of '73, the recording of Wake of the Flood, the epic run at Winterland in February '74, the creation of the Wall, and the projects the band members had done on their own, the difference, they were in a lot of ways a changed band by the '74 tours.  But these Northwest shows have a shared energy that bridges the time between them, producing some of the best music the Dead have released.