Grateful Dead Album: “Go to Nassau”

I don't know where people get off proclaiming that 1980 was some sort of bad year for the Dead. Personally, and I know others feel the same way, I think the early Eighties were great years for the Dead, as they broke new ground musically, and brought in a young Brent Mydland - whom out of all the keyboardists the Dead had, was BY FAR the most talented. I don't know, maybe I'm biased - my favorite Dead recordings have always been 9/1/79 (Rochester, NY), 1/13/80 (Oakland,CA), Dead Reckoning, and anything from the Summer Tour '85. More recent additions to that list are Dick's Picks volume 6 (Hartford '83) and Dick's Picks volume 13 (Nassau '81).

Technically speaking, this two-disc set blows any Dick's Pick recording out of the water. The depth, clarity and sound separation is unbelievable. And who says, as far as the songs go, there is nothing new here? Try to find another Minglewood Blues played anywhere close to the way they do it here.

If you know how to appreciate clean, crisp mixes, and crystal clear Phil bass lines that rumble the neighbor's china, Go to Nassau is a must.

I actually enjoy a lot of the 1979-1981 period. Yes, a lot of the freeform exploratory jamming of the 1977-78 period is not there. But there are some good crisp shows from this period. Brent has not come into his own yet but he is a welcome addition to the fold after the way Keith played(or I should say not played) during the 1976-79 period. His vocal harmonies are a welcome change as well. Let's face it, Donna's live vocal harmonies were atrocious. This show is good, not great. It will not blow your mind by any stretch. The sound quality is very good and it has some good moments. A lot of people were bashing 1980 as a horrible year, it had some great moments too. Let's not forget the Warfield/Radio City run. 1982-1984 were some horrible years. Talk about uninspired playing. Yikes. Jerry was such a mess during those years it is painful to listen to. His health wasn't much better during 1985 but the shows got better. Has anyone ever noticed (or is it just me) that during the 1983-1986 period there are very few pictures of Garcia taken. If you look at say an old Relix from that period they will have a lot of pictures of the rest of the band and very few of Garcia. It's almost as if they were trying to protect him by omitting his pictures. There was no denying the guy was a complete mess. Look at the cover of the book Playing in the Band by David Gans. You can actually see all the soot and residue of the tips of his fingers from the heroin that he was smoking. All in all this CD is worthwhile to have in your collection if you're a head. The Nassau from 1981 that became a Dick's Picks is much better show from this period.

I enjoyed this two disc set very much. Obviously I loved "Althea," probably my favorite Grateful Dead song. "High Time" was great, nice and slow, the way you want that song. Naturally "Uncle John's Band" was excellent, also a bit of a slow song. Of course that song is like grilled cheese, very difficult to screw up. I also enjoyed as always the upbeat songs such as "Good Lovin'" and "I know You Rider." "Looks Like Rain" also was very well done. If you could not tell, I liked this CD alot and think it is worth a try for any Deadhead.

This release is just what any deadhead could ever want. It's got some great live dead and remains fairly short, this is good in that this release is great for commuting/in-betweenclasses listening, a "quickie" if you will. While stopping and changing tracks during a show is frowned upon because of the spontaneity involved in the "experience" we can do it with this release because it's a compilation of two nights and isn't in order anyways. The first set is sweet, the straw>franklins is beautiful, and the rest is awesome but what REALLY hit me HARD was the Lazy>supplication, it was freaggin' amazing, possibly my fav. ever! Disc 2..ahh..disc 2..Most would think it couldn't get better than disc 1 after listening to it, but your wrong...SO WRONG. The stranger>althea is suberb along with the energy filled sailor>saint. The playing sequence that follows is WONDERFULL. I could go on and on about this release in detail, but I reccomend this to EVERYONE/ANYONE who likes good music, especially deadheads.

This album has not left my cd player in months. It is simply amazing. Although I am a big fan of the earlier dead recordings, my favorite era of the dead is the late seventies, early eighties shows, when their catalog of tunes was getting huge. With this release, there is no sense in buying their studio album Go To Heaven, as it takes all the notable tracks and improves them greatly. This is a mostly Bob Weir album with stellar versions of Lightning-Supplication, Sailor-Circumstance, and Althea. Not to mention a slightly rare Peggy-O. This album is unbelievable and I HIGHLY reccomend it to anyone!