Phil Lesh Appreciation Society: Enter the Philzone...

[Zootsuitbass]

God Bless Betty Cantor

[spacebassed]

Originally Posted by Zootsuitbass

God Bless Betty Cantor

Amen to that!!!

[edwinhurwitz]

Originally Posted by spacebassed

...btw, Edwin, do you know how that bass is wired? Maybe passive vol/tone, vol/tone and a master vol?? I'll admit that I was never a huge fan of that bass, it was a step backwards, IMO. I also didn't care for the Ken Smith or the Ritter - the Ken Smith just didn't fit Phil's style and the Ritter lacked the presence of the Modulus.

Ken Smith and Jens Ritter make beautiful instruments, but Phil belongs on a Modulus.

I have no idea how it was wired. My assumption is that is if it isn't passive, then it's probably just a pair of buffers with passive tone controls. However, that is idle speculation and probably not even worth the inconvenience to the electrons by posting it.

Thanks for the kind words, everyone. Life is a challenge but it all is made worth it by a single smile from Xander!

[Todd GT5]

Hey, I've got to be in on this! I saw my first show in 1979 in San Jose. I worked on some of Phil's basses while at Modulus in the early 80's too.

I have always loved Phil's playing and tones. I'm looking forward to seeing all the posts here.

-Todd

[sven kalmar]

phil,s backround from "classical" music is important. Both him and jerry playing modal stuff alot. Thats what i do a lot too when fooling around with my basses. Playing scales and melodies. Phil making his own lines that create depth and multidimentionality to the music.So i guess jerry and phil complimented each other to the point of telepathy...

[sven kalmar]

i guess you guys have read his book. If not i would recommend it. Honest and well written.

[Big Brother]

Originally Posted by edwinhurwitz

No doubt! 1980 was actually when I started moving away from seeing the band. I saw most of the shows I saw between '76 and '79 and then discovered Bootsy, Fela Kuti, etc. I checked in every so often after that, but I found that Brent bothered me more and more, especially the keyboard sounds. While that first east coast tour he did in '79 was pretty wonderful and the blast of new energy felt good, I began to miss Keith, who I felt let the band breath and go to more places. It's probably not fair to attribute all the changes to Brent, but it just felt different as they went into the 80s. Of course, my friends' older brothers all said that about the 70s and that I missed the good stuff that happened in '68 and '69, so what are you going to do?

I always wanted to see the Europe 73 tour more than any other, I didn't start catching them live until '86. Funny though, I never saw Keith but I always felt that way too about Brent. He had his moments but he never seemed to quite fit in with the sound to me, his tone especially seemed too klangy and didn't fit in.

Vince seemed lost at first but I caught some of the last shows and he was really adding something nice at the end, it would have been interesting to see what he could do with more time.

[Bassman8416]

What strings do you think Phil is using these days...I heard from someone "supposedly" close to him say nickel rounds, that he no longer uses Smith Slick Rounds, which seems to make sense being he doesn't have the purple wrapping these days

[spacebassed]

Originally Posted by Bassman8416

What strings do you think Phil is using these days...I heard from someone "supposedly" close to him say nickel rounds, that he no longer uses Smith Slick Rounds, which seems to make sense being he doesn't have the purple wrapping these days

I had heard that he was using Ritter's string sets, but I can't say for sure.

[Zootsuitbass]

Xander's Smiles!!

Beautiful....

[Zootsuitbass]

Here's a version of Birdsong from the acoustic runs at Radio City. Decent example of the Irwin's tone.

6 mins of "Jam in E" ... LOVE!!!! IT!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYA16z2-xFg

[spacebassed]

One of my favorite parts of that show is at the beginning when Phil's having technical difficulties, Bobby wants to move along without Phil and Jerry protests, saying "I want the bass. The bass is an essential part of music - we can't play without the bass."

[Dave Klausner]

Originally Posted by Zootsuitbass

God Bless Betty Cantor

Pretty interesting article on the Dead's archives:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2...urrentPage=all

Oh, and sign me up!

[spacebassed]

Originally Posted by sven kalmar

phil,s backround from "classical" music is important. Both him and jerry playing modal stuff alot. Thats what i do a lot too when fooling around with my basses. Playing scales and melodies. Phil making his own lines that create depth and multidimentionality to the music.So i guess jerry and phil complimented each other to the point of telepathy...

Absolutely, you can tell by listening to Phil that he has a background in composition. You can also tell he loved Bach - a lot of Phil's approach is classic counterpoint. I particularly enjoy the way he leads the jams in Phil & Friends.

[spacebassed]

Originally Posted by Dave Klausner

Pretty interesting article on the Dead's archives:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2...urrentPage=all

Oh, and sign me up!

Great read! It's a shame Betty hasn't seen any money from the selling of her tapes. When the 1980 Radio City shows were released she wasn't credited or compensated, and as a result lost her home to foreclosure. But she's still truckin' - recording and running sound for the choir at GLIDE Memorial Church every Sunday (and taking the bus 2 hours each way to get there). I kind of miss the days of opening the mailbox to find it stuffed full of manila envelopes - what a great feeling that was.

BTW, here is a list of the "Betty Boards":

02.18.71 Portchester, NY, whole show, Dolby A decoded
02.19.71 Portchester, NY, whole show, Dolby A *not* decoded
02.20.71 Portchester, NY, whole show, Dolby A decoded
02.21.71 Portchester, NY, whole show, Dolby A decoded
02.23.71 Portchester, NY, whole show, Dolby A decoded
02.24.71 Portchester, NY, whole show, Dolby A decoded
04.05.71 Manhatten Center, whole show, Dolby A decoded
04.06.71 Manhatten Center, whole show, Dolby A decoded
04.07.71 Boston Music Hall, whole show, Dolby A *not* decoded
04.08.71 Boston Music Hall, whole show, Dolby A decoded
12.14.71 Ann Arbor, MI, whole show
05.04.72 Paris, Fr, 1st set only
05.07.72 Bickershaw Festival, Other One to end of show
08.21.72 Berkeley, CA, 2nd set only
08.22.72 Berkeley, CA, 2nd set only
08.25.72 Berkeley, CA, 1st 45 minutes only
08.27.72 Veneta, OR, beginning of show through most of Dark Star
03.16.73 Nassau Coliseum, 1st set through middle of Playing, beg. of Dew to end
03.21.73 Utica, NY, whole show, water damage on tapes causes some distortion
03.22.73 Utica, NY, 1st set plus very end of Other One to end
03.24.73 Philadelphia, PA, Bobby McGee to end of show
03.28.73 Springfield, MA, WRS Prelude to end of show
05.26.73 Kezar Stadium, whole show
06.22.73 Vancouver, BC, beg. of show through most of Other One
08.00.73 Wake of the Flood outtakes
06.10.76 Boston Music Hall, whole show
06.11.76 Boston Music Hall, whole show
06.14.76 Beacon Theater, whole show
06.15.76 Beacon Theater, whole show
various parts of the above four shows, intercuts
06.29.76 Chicago, Ill, whole show
02.26.77 San Bernadino, CA, whole show, DBX type I decoded
05.05.77 New Haven, Conn, whole show, DBX type I decoded
05.07.77 Boston Gardens, whole show, DBX type I decoded
05.08.77 Ithaca,NY, whole show, DBX type I decoded
05.09.77 Buffalo, NY, whole show, DBXtype I decoded
09.28.77 Seattle, Wash, middle of Jack Straw to end of show, DBX type I decoded
09.29.77 Seattle, Wash, whole show, DBX type I decoded
10.01.77 Portland, Ore, whole show, DBX type I decoded
10.02.77 Portland, Ore, whole show, DBX type I decoded
04.06.78 Tampa, Fla, Good Lovin through end of show
04.07.78 Hollywood, Fla, whole show
04.08.78 Jacksonville, Fla, whole show
04.10.78 Atlanta, GA, whole show
04.11.78 Atlanta, GA, whole show
04.12.78 Duke University, whole show
04.14.78 Virginia Tech, whole show
04.15.78 William & Mary College, whole show
04.16.78 Huntington, WVa, whole show
07.07.78 Red Rocks, whole show
07.08.78 Red Rocks, whole show
12.31.78 Winterland, Me and My Uncle through end of show
04.22.79 San Jose, CA, middle of Estimated through middle of Around & Around
09.27.80 Warfield Theater, Acoustic set
10.04.80 Warfield Theater, Acoustic set
10.06.80 Warfield Theater, Acoustic set
10.09.80 Warfield Theater, Acoustic set, and 1st 45 min of 1st set
10.10.80 Warfield Theater, Acoustic set
10.11.80 Warfield Theater, Acoustic set
10.13.80 Warfield Theater, Acoustic set

[edwinhurwitz]

Originally Posted by spacebassed

BTW, here is a list of the "Betty Boards":


08.27.72 Veneta, OR, beginning of show through most of Dark Star

Does that mean that someone took over for the rest of the show? The whole tape does circulate, but that might be mixes from the multitrack. It was one of the first really, really, good sounding DATs I got back in the early 90s. It was mindblowing how good it sounded.

Speaking of which, I'm transferring a bunch of CDRs and DVDs I have lying around, which go from the 60s to the 80s, including some videos, to a hard drive. Does anyone want them? The only deal is that you have to take all of them! Quality ranges from mp3 to audio CDs to FLAC and SHN and the video is pretty wide ranging as well. There's also some side projects, like Phil and Friends, Go Ahead, Brent and Kreutzmann's band, Crusader Rabbit and bunch of other random whatnot. There's even Pat Metheny, Jaco, maybe some Miles and Joni Mitchell and some other stuff. It's going to be a big box, so I'd prefer to keep it in the US, just to keep my shipping costs reasonable.

So far, I've been randomly gifting them to people in my neighborhood with appropriate stickers on their cars and a window slightly rolled down, which is fun thinking about them looking on their car seat and seeing mysterious music, but it would be easier to just unload them onto a willing recipient.

[spacebassed]

Originally Posted by edwinhurwitz

Does that mean that someone took over for the rest of the show? The whole tape does circulate, but that might be mixes from the multitrack. It was one of the first really, really, good sounding DATs I got back in the early 90s. It was mindblowing how good it sounded.

I'm not sure what the story is with that - there are several different SBD sources that circulate for that show. Maybe that's all there is from Betty's source and the rest is patched from one of the other complete sources. That was the show a group of film students videotaped which became the infamous "Sunshine Daydream" movie:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UHpx72ifdE

Originally Posted by edwinhurwitz

Speaking of which, I'm transferring a bunch of CDRs and DVDs I have lying around, which go from the 60s to the 80s, including some videos, to a hard drive. Does anyone want them? The only deal is that you have to take all of them! Quality ranges from mp3 to audio CDs to FLAC and SHN and the video is pretty wide ranging as well. There's also some side projects, like Phil and Friends, Go Ahead, Brent and Kreutzmann's band, Crusader Rabbit and bunch of other random whatnot. There's even Pat Metheny, Jaco, maybe some Miles and Joni Mitchell and some other stuff. It's going to be a big box, so I'd prefer to keep it in the US, just to keep my shipping costs reasonable.

Nice offer! Now that I've gone digital I like doing the occasional hard drive trade - take a copy of your collection on an external drive and send it off to the recipient, they copy your collection, then copy their collection to your drive and return it. It's a good way to spread around the music while retaining some or the personal aspect of the trading days - maybe we can do some of that in this thread. Downloading torrents is convenient, but it's sterile and impersonal.

[spacebassed]

Also, another note about Veneta '72 is that Phil had only recently began using the McIntosh power amps, the Fender Dual Showmans were still being used as preamps. It really cleaned up his tone - no more power tube distortion!

[MLysh]

Interesting side note: The night that I vividly remember hearing every single note Phil played; clear, fat, and resonant, he was playing a finish-stripped Fender Jazz bass.

[edwinhurwitz]

Originally Posted by spacebassed

I'm not sure what the story is with that - there are several different SBD sources that circulate for that show. Maybe that's all there is from Betty's source and the rest is patched from one of the other complete sources. That was the show a group of film students videotaped which became the infamous "Sunshine Daydream" movie:

I had thought that it wasn't film students but an actual crew assembled by the pranksters who got somewhat pranked themselves. They had only planned to film some of the show, so they didn't bring enough film stock to cover the whole show. It's tragic that there is so much missing, but otoh, it's amazing that we have everything we do, especially the Dark Star.

You can definitely see some good shots of the MC3500s. It was before the 2300s showed up, so he had 1400 watts of tube power! My dream rig, but at almost 150lbs per amp, I don't think so.

I hope they release the official version soon. I've got a pretty good copy, but they showed a really good print at some theaters a few years ago with some additional footage. From what I understand, it's a case of people not signing releases. Zane Kesey was distributing video cassettes for a while, but it was the older cut.