Customer Reviews

Dead Set

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This album contains some of the greatest Grateful Dead songs of all time. Words of advice: If you're looking for the long, trippy jams which made the Dead famous, look somewhere else. If you're looking for a collection of tight, live Dead songs that never extend past eight minutes or melt into each other, this one's for you.

This album, recorded circa 1981, was played and recorded quite well. Some people may look down on this set because the Dick's Picks series is obviously far superior- and they are right. These people must realize that this set was made before the DP series project came into the mainstream. Therefore, considering that, I think that the sound quality should be taken with a large grain of salt (not to mention "Live Dead" and "Europe 72").
The CD starts off with "Sampson and Deliah"- without Donna Godchaux on vocals (almost as annoying as Yoko Ono). Weir gave it his best with loud and fiery vocals.For the new and not as observant,"New Minglewood Blues" was remixed with different lyrics than what the band originally played. Otherwise, good. "Little Red Rooster"- with Weir on slide guitar/Garcia on lead guitar, was a real pressure cooker of blues and rock.
Now, the highlights. Like the other reviewers, I share the opinion that this version of "Friend of the Devil" is unique. Here,unlike the studio version on "American Beauty," the song starts off with a gentle, slower melody- sounding almost like it was played acoustically, but wasn't. Instead of a fast paced song, Garcia played the song slow enough that you can understand the lyrics w o r d f o r w o r d.The drumming was also slowed down to a steady rhythm.
The song "Candyman" was played with the same geltleness as the latter, with pronounced, sharp leads. Also on "American Beauty," this song added a gentle touch to this album.
Phil Lesh (bass, vocals)shined with his lead vocals in "Passenger"- which he co-wrote. With the help of keyboardist Brent Mydland, the set continued with the same good-ole jam style of music.
Even through "Space" and Rhythm Devils" (one of many highlights of the talented percussionist Mickey Hart and drummer Bill Kreutzman), the band exhibited their usual talent of bridging songs together. That is done best when: Hart finishes hammering on "The Beast(a series of large drums)," Garcia first played a note every 3 seconds, every 1 second- abstract chords on his guitar. Garcia, joined by Weir and Hart, plays a variety of abstract chords, then S L O W LY evolves into a melody- which is the beggining of "Fire on the Mountain." Beautiful transition. The set continues until "Brokedown Palace," which consisted of few drum beats and minimal guitar playing, but mostly vocal. Otherwise, a great encore.
Good CD, and a RARE occasion of hearing "Friend of the Devil" being played as it was played the. Buy the CD, and you will enjoy as well.

I bought this after reading the reviews here, and I was pleased to discover that Dead Set is nowhere near as bad as some make out. Just because it doesn't have the "second set" long jams doesn't make it not worth listening to.

What you DO get is a bundle of shorter songs, similar to the type the Dead played in their first sets. And they're all good! Time after time I was surprised and impressed with the way the band treated numbers that you might think wouldn't yield any new secrets - but they do. There isn't a clunker in the group.

All I can do is echo the positive reviews here. The slow Friend of the Devil is great - I didn't think it would work, but it does. All the tracks stand comparison with other versions of the song, either studio and live.

This isn't the absolute very best of the Dead on record, but considering the Dead were head and shoulders above any other group it's still essential listening.

Okay, everyone who has 350+ hours of live CDs in their collection will tell you that there is better Dead around than this, and they will be right, but this disk sounds better than any Dick's Picks or two-track live tape/CD.

This is one of the recordings that first turned me on to the Dead, back in the mid 1980's. It's an excellent introduction for someone who isn't familiar with their music, forgoing the less accessible (to a newcomer) jams that dominate the Dick's Pics series for some very accessible songs.

Samson and Delilah, Passenger, Deal, Franklin's Tower, and Greatest Story all rock hard. Minglewood is a straight-forward driving macho blues. Friend of the Devil and Candyman are sweet countrified throwbacks to a simpler time, as is the moving Brokedown Palace that ends the set. The Fire on the Mountain is simply incediary.

On the downside, some of the songs are edited for time, significantly shortening them. You'd never know it unless you'd heard the original unedited versions, though. Deadheads who have been around will despair at the lack of any serious jamming on this record, but I see it as a strength, and there's plenty of noodling on the archival releases.

A couple of notes:

The sound is excellent due to the recording mixing micrphones suspended above the audience in the halls (the Warfield in San Fransisco and Radio City Music Hall in New York) with the standard live multi-track recording process.

Phil does not sing on Passenger. That's Bob and Brent. At the time of this recording, Phil did not sing at all on stage.

This disc is a companion to the mostly acoustic and very folky Reckoning CD, also recorded during the same concerts.

Bottom line: If you are looking to find out what this Dead stuff is, this album is a great start. Once you're hooked, go grab some Dicks Picks and Live/Dead.

How can you not like this album? Rarer tracks, good versions of them, great musicly all around. Great fast vesion of Candyman, nice slow version of Friend of the Devil. The transition from Rythm Devils to Space to Fire on the Mountain is amazing. This is one of my first experiences with the dead, and Ive always loved it and it brings back good memories. If you already love the dead or you just wanna check them out, give this one a shot.

First time I played this CD I was blown away by the slow sexy "Friend of the Devil". I think the seriously powerful punches Phil throws in the refrains are a great counterpoise to the folksy flavor of this rendition.

I heard "Fire on the Mountain" for the first time ever on this disk and was delighted at my good find.

This album has some great material, but it's a poor reflection of the band's playing. Brokedown Palace and Franklin's Tower sound pretty good, but this disc overall doesn't seem to capture the energy of a real Dead show. It's worth listening to, but there are better sets out there.

The original CD version of this album is unavailable. And that is a good thing. A new, remastered version has been made, but currently is only available in the boxset The Golden Road. If you don't want to buy that boxset, but want this, wait until the remastered version comes out (don't by this original version used).

Even in the LP version, this was not a great live album, when compared to the Dead's previous live albums (except maybe Steal Your Face). All of the gread Dead live albums brought out something new. They just weren't live retreads of the same material on previous studio albums. Also the sound quality was excellent and the audience noise was edited out, so it sounded as good as a studio recording.

Steering from the path of previous live albums, this album does include much audience noise. There is cheering and screaming in the middles of songs. It isn't as bad as some other groups, but it is still distracting and unnecessary.

About half of the tracks on this album are just retreads of studio material, without anything new or interesting added. They are rather pointless, when the studio versions are better. These include Sampson and Delilah, New Minglewood Blues, Candyman, Loser, Greatest Story Ever Told and Brokedown Palace.

There are some great tracks, that are worth having, like the slowed down version of Friend of the Devil, and the very energetic Fire On the Mountain and Deal. At this time, the band was very tight and energetic. These are fantastic renditions of those songs (although, I have heard even better versions).

A poor job was done putting this album on CD the first time. The track Space was dropped because of time considerations (at that time, the maximum lenghth of a CD was only 74 minutes). On some of the import versions, Space was kept, but Drums was dropped. Also, the reports are that the sound quality was weak on the original CD's.

The remastered CD is much, much better. The sound quality is better, all the tracks are included and there is a bonus CD that is better than the original.

WHY WAS A TRACK DROPPED OFF THE ORIGINAL CD? When the CD was developed, the original target time was 74 minutes. But variation in the bit size and sample speed was allowed, to allow for manufacturing variations. But, the manufacturing is so precise, those sloppy specs are not needed. To get 80 minutes on a CD, manufacturers started using the far side of the limit, with the smallest bitsize and fastest sample rate.

This starts off just like the second half of the show I saw in Alpine Valley, Wisconsin. Lawn lights out, drums started pounding, and 30+ thousand people started bouncing up and down like pogo sticks.

At the time, the sound was state-of-the-art, though this album does not sound as clean as shows recorded after they switched to in-ear monitoring.

I really like the perfomances here, unlike the reviewer who felt they added nothing to the studio albums. Maybe the remembrance has something to do with it...but additionally this album covers a range from fast and uptempo to slow and doodling, showing different facets of the band.

This is the first Grateful Dead music I ever heard in the early 80's when I was in high school and it is a set that I have always come back to. As others have pointed out, Friend of the Devil is special and I think Fire on the Mountain is quite incendiary. However, my favorite song on this disc has always been Passenger. Normally, I am not a big fan of Phil's vocals but he nails this one to the wall. Also, just in terms of "hard-rockness", this Passeger has to be one of the Dead's hardest rocking moments.