Begin with the end in mind
July 25, 2003 | Arts & Culture
Michael J. is trying to hustle us out the door but the most amazing psycho-musical event just occurred and I had to report. Chill out dude, what's the rush?
Grateful Dead, Fox Theater, Atlanta GA, May 19, 1977, second set: An eleven minute Terrapin followed by an eleven minute Playin'. They're drifting around the cosmos, exploring measures of ten; I'm taking a shower, packing, snacking; 20 minutes later they're still noodling along and then suddenly they sing the final line from Uncle John's Band: "Woh, oh what I want to know is how does the song go?" and I think, "Did they just play Uncle John's? Wow, really smooth transition from Playin', I hardly noticed." And then, BANG, Garcia hits the opening chords of Uncle John's, plays a beautiful solo to start the song and leads into the first verse - starting the song by playing the ending. This is the sort of musical head games they pulled off all the time in the Good Olde Days. Since the audience was in various stages of deconstructive consciousness the groupmind impact was phenomenal, leaving us today with only the phenomenological documentation. Praise be the vault releases.
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