Garcia said “We were great for seconds on end.” I was lucky to see Jerry play for about 1,000,000 seconds exactly. Thanks for your 1,000,000 views here . Dave Davis wrote this blog for 500 posts and 5 years from 2015 to 2019. Contact me at twitter @gratefulseconds

Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Playing In The Band (Reprised): A Surprising Analysis

Even in chaos like the Grateful Dead, this is usually a method to their madness. Take for example, the creation of Playing In the Band (Reprise).

In Blog Post http://gratefulseconds.blogspot.com/2015/10/complete-list-of-my-playing-in-band.html, I noted 117 Playing In he Band sandwiches. Each of the 117, occurred, within the same show.
30 Trips selects for 1984, the famous August 12, 1984 show from Augusta, Maine as the initial location of what Dead Base 11 calls "Playing Reprise". 17 more Reprises follow over a nearly 10 year period, and what is interesting is that in 16 of the 18 cases, the ending of Playing completes a version of earlier in the week, often the previous show or beginning of a run. In 11 of the 16 cases, the song is complete in the same city.  In five, the Dead complete Playing in a different city.
Someone in the band was having fun with the fans. Since so many versions occurred during the Bruce Hornsby years, I blame that prankster for this.  He was always motivating the boys. The surprise in the analysis is that the Dead only "forgot" twice to open the jaw before ending the song later. Almost, like they were tracking it (Bobby's job?, Phil's?).

Photo from video of  August show Video is here


< Unfortunately, I never saw some an animal. But, for those interested, here is a complete list of Playing In The Bands completed later in the week:
  1. 10/11/1984 Augusta 10/12/1984 Augusta Both Nights of 2 Night Run
  2. 10/28/1984 Berkeley 11/2/1984 Berkeley Middle 4 Shows of 6 Night Run
  3. 3/19/1986 Hampton 3/21/1986 Hampton 1st and 3rd Nights of 3 Night Run
  4. 7/2/1989     Foxboro 7/4/1989  Buffalo  First Multi-City Version; Next Show
  5. 9/19/1990 MSG 9/20/1990 MSG Back to Back, Middle of Run
  6. 12/8/1990 Chandler 12/9/1990 Chandler Both Nights of 2 Night Run
  7. 3/23/1991 Albany 3/25/1991 Albany 1st and 3rd Nights of 3 Night Run
  8. 3/31/1991 Greensboro 4/1/1991 Greensboro Both Nights of 2 Night Run
  9. 6/9/1991    Hebron 6/11/1991 Charlotte 2 Nights, 2 Towns
  10. None 6/17/1991 Giant's Oops Forgot to Open Jaw
  11. 8/12/1991 Cal Expo 8/16/1991 Shoreline 2 Nights, 2 Towns
  12. 9/6/1991     Richfield 9/9/1991    MSG 2 Nights, 2 Towns
  13. 3/11/1992 Nassau 3/12/1992 Nassau Both Nights of 2 Night Run
  14. None 3/18/1992 Philly Oops Forgot to Open Jaw Again
  15. 12/3/1992 Denver 12/6/1992 Chandler 2 Nights, 2 Towns
  16. 12/16/1992 Oakland 12/17/1992 Oakland Back to Back, Middle of Run
  17. 1/24/1993 Oakland 1/25/1993 Oakland Back to Back, Middle of Run
  18. 9/28/1993 Boston 9/29/1993 Boston Both Nights of 2 Night Run


For this analysis, I eliminated the "April Fools" version in Portland (also Maine!) on 3-31-1985 where the band inverts the song, playing Reprise, then the main verse into Day Tripper as April Fools Day nears. The August 1984 version is playing now


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