2-27-94 - The Cosmic tease

That's a bit cruel.   Not unlike Dylan Sound Checking st stephen in 95 and sending the lots into chaos.  

Thanks for posting

I was all the way up top far from the stage

never forget how the crowd slowly erupted as they figured out what Jerry was doing.

Had to listen to it twice to hear the CC tease.    The last one 9/35/76 is a great one

T

9/25/76

https://archive.org/details/gd76-09-25.sbd.aj.246.sbefail.shnf/gd76-09-2...

I was on the floor, back left of the soundboard. The vibe went from elated to deflated in 3/5 of a second.

Jerry became reserved in the last years and put the breaks on whenever the band started getting too cosmic. So it looked and sounded to me at the time. It also seemed that Phil was the one pushing and urging Jerry and the rest of the band to take it further.

As the 90s rolled along, Jerry seemed a lot more happy and relaxed playing with Grisman and his own band than he did with the Grateful Dead.

Grateful Dead in hindsight should probably have taken another hiatus and altered history.

I was right on the floor for this, such an amazing tease. I had a really fun time that run!
My only time at Oakland.

I am sure that it was a cool tease to see, but it’s probably better that they didn’t play it all the way through, sounded sloppy.  I saw the return of Unbroken Chain at the Spectrum and while it was exciting, listening back... not so much so. 

Oops not even a return, a debut.  That being said saw Phil do it a bunch of times post GD and it was great.

Yeah, that was sort of a bummer when they went into Wharf Rat after playing a full blown intro to Cosmic Charlie.  Audible collective groan.   Have to say though that the Dragon Dance Jam with all the dragons, banners, etc. was one of the sickest things I have seen at a show.   Had no idea that was going to happen.  The UJB jam was also deep, dark. and heavy.

Ken, that Dragon parade was amazing! I recall it was a year of the dog, and there were some dog sounds bounced around the room during the Jam, and a skeleton dog rose up on a line to the higher ceiling. I mean, that's my memory, I'd love to see vid to fully recollect. Awesome chinese new year vibes for this new england kid. Very memorable show.

I was at that show, but I can't remember exactly where I was or what I was doing. I do have a dim recollection that they had worked on CC during the sound check, but for me that era of shows tend to all lump into a single haze so I'm not clear on that.

I do remember once reading an interview with Jerry where he said that he didn't much like Cosmic Charlie, that it was a difficult song to play and he didn't think it flowed, or something like that. It's pretty clear that he was heading into the song that night, but at the last minute he probably just figured, "Eh, fuck it, I'm not playing it" and just dropped into Wharf Rat.

"Never trust a prankster" is a handy card to be able to play. 

Overall I was never one to care much about rarities or breakouts or whatever, I always just wanted them to be in a good groove, and then it didn't matter much to me what songs they played. Unfortunately, those good grooves were few & far between for me during those final years, but I still usually had a good time at the shows.

As for Unbroken Chain, IMO that's one they should have left on the shelf. The one version I saw was at the last GD show I saw, which is also very possibly the worst GD show I ever saw, and that clunking, staggering version was nothing but deeply depressing to me, as was the rest of that terrible 2nd set.

But Jerry, being the true hero he was, left us with a beautiful Brokedown Palace encore, which turned out to be a very nice way to say goodbye.

Thanks for posting... was there and remember that disappointment about the CC tease ..and went to Sam Wo's in the city for Chinese food at 4 in the morning on way back to friend's house.   Good times.

Talk about memories. We used to go to Yung Kee in Oakland Chinatown after Auditorium (Kaiser) shows. The visuals were intense. It was a sensory experience with a lot a laughing.