Velvet Underground: Live 1969 vs. Grateful Dead: Live/Dead

Man, considering how much I like the Velvets, it's pretty interesting that I have next to no interest in any of their live recordings.

I'll always choose a group reinventing rock, in their own image, over white boys imitating Otis Redding re "Lovelight".

― VyrnaKnowlIsAHeadbanger, Saturday, February 17, 2018 12:53 PM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

The Grateful Dead, led by a half-Spanish-American vocalist/guitarist, helped reinvent rock/blues/folk/bluegrass as improvisational and experimental music that was not infrequently equally avant-garde as that of the Velvets, if not moreso. Just as John Cale played with La Monte Young, Phil Lesh and Tom Constanten studied composition under Luciano Berio and played alongside fellow student Steve Reich. And just as Lou Reed was a New York (well, actually, Long Island) Jew inspired by African-American jazz musicians, Mickey Hart was a New York Jew inspired by not just the same (though of a less avant-garde ilk than Reed; that interest was more Lesh's domain) but also by Latin-American and African percussion, and who had gone further and actually played with notable jazz musicians before joining the Dead. It was, yes, an Irish-American "white boy," Ron McKernan, who sang that Joe Scott sang made famous by Bobby Blue Bland, among many other blues and r&b classics including an Otis Redding tune, but he did so after being immersed in blues and r&b from a very early age by his father, a dj at a primarily African-American radio station, as well as in African-American society growing up in Palo Alto, CA, whose then-incorporated Eastern half in whose bars he began hanging out as a teenager became majority-black in the early-mid '60s.

except for 'what goes on' 1969 version yep xp

moo vaughn i <3 u

The answer is so obviously live/dead... get with it dorks

otm

Back in yr stinky hippyhole deadheads

― Οὖτις, Friday, 29 May 2015 00:58 (two years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

no u

Live 1969 would be even more perfect had it contained "Foggy Notion."

David Allan Coe's son Tyler on why he hates the Dead--he posts on FB all the time about his love for the Velvets' live recordings, 25 minutes of "Sister Ray."

(And 25 minutes of "Sister Ray" is about 20 minutes too much, even on the studio record, my interest does flag after a certain point, tho some of it's brilliant.)

man I haven't listened to the studio Sister Ray in many, many years but I do remember feeling like it was worth it if you rode it out. when the vocals come back in, the feeling that you've been somewhere very different. not unlike dark star really, only with worse musicians and a harsher vibe

The Grateful Dead, led by a half-Spanish-American vocalist/guitarist, helped reinvent rock/blues/folk/bluegrass as improvisational and experimental music that was not infrequently equally avant-garde as that of the Velvets, if not moreso. Just as John Cale played with La Monte Young, Phil Lesh and Tom Constanten studied composition under Luciano Berio and played alongside fellow student Steve Reich. And just as Lou Reed was a New York (well, actually, Long Island) Jew inspired by African-American jazz musicians, Mickey Hart was a New York Jew inspired by not just the same (though of a less avant-garde ilk than Reed; that interest was more Lesh's domain) but also by Latin-American and African percussion, and who had gone further and actually played with notable jazz musicians before joining the Dead. It was, yes, an Irish-American "white boy," Ron McKernan, who sang that Joe Scott sang made famous by Bobby Blue Bland, among many other blues and r&b classics including an Otis Redding tune, but he did so after being immersed in blues and r&b from a very early age by his father, a dj at a primarily African-American radio station, as well as in African-American society growing up in Palo Alto, CA, whose then-incorporated Eastern half in whose bars he began hanging out as a teenager became majority-black in the early-mid '60s.

― Moo Vaughn

to sum up, "live/dead" qualifies as "record collection rock" just as much as any of the velvet underground's records do

Neither are RCR but let's not that start all that again.

The cut of What Goes On on Live 1969 makes me so happy.

Organ doin its thing.

The answer is so obviously live/dead... get with it dorks

― global tetrahedron, Saturday, February 17, 2018 7:08 AM (eight hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

We need more provocations like this tho

Thank you. Not sure why I felt like posting that at 6am but here we are

i haven't listened to either of these in a million years but i was listening to a CD of this live stuff a lot last year and if you squint its kinda like VU and the Dead had a baby. in 1966.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lr1YzUDPl-E

If David Allen Coe's son is our barometer for divining good music I guess I should stop caring about the whole thing altogether

sorry dorks, i think it's still Live 1969 for me.
https://c1.staticflickr.com/4/3954/33198341933_419da7563b.jpg

lmao

Lol

also, i listened to rock and roll animal this week and it remains outrageous that it's just about four years removed from Live 1969.

Why?

David Allan Coe's son Tyler

no wai

listening to the 5/6/70 "Dancin' in the Streets" and lol'ing heartily at the idea of the Velvet ever being anywhere near the level of the last five minutes or so of this

The answer is so obviously live/dead... get with it dorks

otm

― she carries a torch. two torches, actually (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Saturday, February 17, 2018 2:36 PM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

Do tell

'Ocean' is sublime Velvets, but I think I have to go with Live/Dead. If it had been a 68 show from the La Cave run, or the early 69 Boston Tea Party sets then they'd win it for me though.

If you want to hear the Dead at their most Velvets-like, I say 6/14/68. I just finished a little write up on it:

http://deadessays.blogspot.ca/2018/02/buzz-saw-music-fillmore-east-june-14.html

There's also a really great essay on the Velvets vs Dead on the same site that's worth checking out:

http://deadessays.blogspot.ca/2010/09/velvets-and-dead.html

love it! i too dig crummy lo-fi AUDs, this to me is far superior to the dick's picks soundboard of the same show (especially from playin' in the band onward)

https://archive.org/details/gd73-12-02.aud.vernon.17278.sbeok.shnf

your essay immediately made me want to queue up that show, fyi

hell yeah, there need to be more lo-fi aud dead tapes and fewer crispy boards

i don't even know what makes a board "crispy" for that matter

nothing against betty boards mind you but especially with a band like the dead the vibe is important

glad this stuff is still downloadable from the archive, stream is nice but only goes so far

speaking of which, whitehallunity's post on 6/14/68 had me checking out the monterey 6/14/69 dark star

it was good! i've never been into '69 dark stars previously, not even the "live/dead", but damn i liked this one. anyone got a dl link? i don't think it's ever been released and i couldn't find any live torrents. lossy wd be fine

im all giddy right now queuing up this 6/14/68 show

and great essay man

velvet underground was mostly bland/boring

And Lovelight on Live 69 still sucks!

Listening to the Skull & Roses album earlier, I was struck by how “The Other One” (Live at Fillmore East, 4/28/71) kind of has a VU 1969 sound.

I almost expected to hear Lou’s voice come in – “Spanish lady come to me….”

Skull and Roses now getting thee Deeluxe 50th Anniversary treatment, even though Live/Dead did not(and even though L/D is better).
It's best to get The Complete Matrix Tapes and Live 1969, because each has stuff the other doesn't: the former is complete, the latter also has toasty Texas tapes. I could live w out some Matrix bits (glad to see that Live 1969 assembler Paul Nelson left out some impulsively rawwky, corny guitar ventures), but it's always good to have complete, so can pick and chose faves.

I love S&R, it was the album that finally made the Dead "click" for me... something about the energy of the performances, idk

I like both groups, but nothing from Live/Dead or Live 1969 except the CD bonus track "I Can't Stand It". Don't know why these records seem so inert to me (though I'm not into live albums as a rule).

haven't heard the CDs, don't know how they compare audio-wise w the orig. 2-LP---which always sounded enough like an audience tape that it's unlikely to win over listeners who aren't into live albums as a rule (also some who are).

Although in my case, playing music louder usually helps.

OK, there is someone here who has heard "Live 1969" and likes nothing from it *backs slowly out of room*

I wouldn’t worry about it, the VU are not a big college town band.

The jams they play would not excite you.

(xp) He didn't like their new direction

There was always the minority take:
live VU can be awesome but 69 live is dull as dishwater imo. I know lotsa people love that jangly pastoral VU style but to me it really amplifies a lot of weaknesses in Lou's writing, weaknesses that can be submerged in pure volume.

― Joan Crawford Loves Chachi, Sunday, May 24, 2015
Don't agree that it's just jangly or that there are important weaknesses in Lou's VU songs, but either way, the Gymnasium set is a satisfying Cale-era onslaught, prob still posted here and there.

― dow, Sunday, May 24, 2015 10:23 AM (six years ago) bookmarkflaglink

"heavenly wine and roses seems to whisper to me when you smile"

Delmore Schwartz lols from the grave at that line

― Joan Crawford Loves Chachi, Sunday, May 24, 2015
Agree that it's almost Lou's worst VU-era line, though at least sounds drunk, like the guy waitin' for Jane may well be, so in context not too bad----"remember that the city is just a flower made out of clay" is the one that makes me want to dig him up and kill him again.

(Don't remember why I mentioned the Gymnasium set just then, but yeah it's very strong in its way duh)

dow -- do you prefer the Matrix Tapes to the Quine Tapes?

Minority take from known contrarian shocka