Customer Reviews

Steal Your Face

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

 

 

It's amazing how history gets quickly forgotten. At the time of its release this album created a stink - even the band disowned it as a poor record of their "closing week" in Winterland, 1974, when it seemed as if the Dead was heading for retirement.

It does not stand up well at all. No thrill, passion, excitement, and a bizarre choice of material given the wealth of good performances from the same run of shows. Lacklustre sums it up. If you have seen the Grateful Dead movie, this is from the same era. And traditionally it rates as the poorest ever official release by the Dead.

Not a fitting memnorial. You have, thankfully, a whole host of better material to choose from. Same era? Look at Dicks Picks , the Boston 1974 show. Avoid this.

The sound, considering it was from the wall of sound era, is poor. The song selection is weak. Basically it doesn't stand up well compared to the other releases from the same time period- Dicks Picks 1, 7 and the soon to be released 13.

The reviews so far seem to be split regarding song choice, sound quality, and performance. I think the song choice is pretty good, in the sense that some of the selections are hard to find on other live albums; not exactly "greatest hit" material, as some other reviewers have said, but interesting. Regarding sound quality, it's not exactly the best recording that I've ever heard, but was nevertheless acceptable for me. But I'm not all that picky in the sound quality department anyways. Performancewise, they do sound a little tired, but heck, they're still the Dead at their prime!

I'm no deadhead, I'm just a fan who spends about 45% of my day studying Dead history, Dead facts, looking for old rare live shows, fingering Dead songs on guitar, bass, and occasionally drums, and looking for any Dead tribute bands playing within 100 miles of my city. I've never seen the Dead live though, that's the reason I am not a Dead head, however I have heard over 100 live dead shows (www.archive.org) and this live album is good! Most people say they sound tired, and lazy, well cry me a river, it's the Grateful Dead, just a bunch of guys trying to have a good time with a crowd full of people tryin to dance to this music. The Dead are not clean cut young men who are classically trained (besides phil) to sing or play there instruments, or let alone harmonize. Good lord, the dead are horrible at harmonizing, but Bob Dylan can't sing, play more than 5 chords in a song, or play harmonica, but he's made something of himself. Fans are judging the Dead too harsh. Let up, these are the same group of hippies that traveled the country with Ken Kesey, intaking Acid by the ton.

I think this one stays in print because of the cover art.

I didn't purchase this on CD for many years because of the poor sound quality of the record. Surprise Surprise. The CD sounds very good and the music is from a period where the band was musically very strong. During this period the band was very creative and although they cover many other artist's materials on this CD the music is tight. Jerry plays and sings during a time when his voice was very golden. I am so glad that I finally bought this as it brings back many memories from this period.

I agree with the fan from Seattle, in term's of sound quality, Although not great it sounds better than my old album. By no mean's is the sound bad. The music on these c.d's is cool, song's written by Johnny Cash,Marty Robbins and Chuck Berry are covered. (Berry's Promised land is great!) U.S. Blues, from the Grateful Dead movie alone makes these two disck's worth owning! There are twelve other song's beside's the two mentioned above. Worth a spot in your c d collection!

I don't know what the other writer is talking about. The songs here are excellent. Especially noteworthy is the piano playing of Keith Godchaux. I don't understand why Keith's playing never got more notoriety as his piano blends in very nicely with Jerry's guitar. The live versions here are done very creatively without overkill on the jams. Maybe I'm different but I say BUY BUY BUY!!!!!

Originally i was going to give this disc one star, but seeing it is the dead, it warrants one more. If you haven't bought this disc already, skip it. There are far better recordings out there. The only good thing about this disc is the song selection. Sound quality isn't the best, and the band sounds tired. Move on.

Not one of the best live grateful dead recordings. Go for One from the Vault first. It's from about the same time but is much more solid. I'm not saying this album is bad, but there is much better stuff out there.