Le Front Street Sheiks -> Reconstruction

"whaddya think, John, is that a flatted 5th or a raised 4th?"

 

Some inchoate notes on Jerry and jazz circa mid 1978:

Thanks to JGMF, we now have some public documentation of a very brief but very interesting moment in the JGB story, a brief side trip into a parallel universe where Garcia, Kahn, and Godchaux were a jazz piano combo.

JGMF once quoted (edit: here) an interview with John Kahn from 1987 where he casually mentioned the eyebrow-raising fact that, since 4/5 of the JGB lived near each other, they would regularly get together at the Godchauxs' house (mostly without Ron Tutt) and just play:

"We'd go through everything. We had Dylan songbooks and we'd do stuff like play everything from Blonde on Blonde. Then we'd do all sorts of Beatles songs. It was great. Most of it never even got past that room.
"We were real close for a while. We had this trip where we'd call ourselves the Front Street Sheiks and we'd play dumb piano jazz and stuff like that. We did some recording down at the rehearsal place [Front Street in San Rafael] right after they got their 24-track, just to see if the machine worked. We'd be down there every night of the week playing these old songs like "All the Things You Are," "Night in Tunisia," things like that." (Golden Road, Winter 1987, 29-30)

Tantalizing!  Both Kahn and Godchaux had jazz backgrounds, and Garcia of course had dabbled in jazz a bit under the guidance of Merl Saunders.  But now thanks to information that has been shared at the wonderful new Jerrybase site (seriously: it is wonderful), the picture comes slightly more into focus with four documented sessions at Club Front in June 1978 as either "Le Trio Clube" or the "Front Street Sheiks."

 

Repertoire

6/13/78: My Funny Valentine, Satin Doll, Georgia On My Mind

6/14/78: Satin Doll, Georgia On My Mind

6/26/78: Instrumental, Satin Doll

6/27/78: Don't Blame Me

The "repertoire" is made up of some pretty old and conservative standards; Kahn mentioned using songbooks and it's possible that one of them owned a copy of The Real Book (a popular grey market 'fakebook' of common practice jazz tunes). Garcia was already comfortable with "My Funny Valentine" and "Georgia On My Mind" from the Garcia/Saunders days.  "Satin Doll" (Ellington) and "Don't Blame Me" (a 1930's showtune recorded by dozens of singers and instrumentalists) are things that Godchaux would have likely played many times in his pre-Dead life as a cocktail bar pianist. Although Donna Godchaux is not mentioned in the Jerrybase info, Kahn did mention "Keith and Donna were always together, so Donna sang with us, too" and all of these songs were standards for vocalists as well as jazz instrumentalists.  Kahn also mentioned "A Night in Tunisia" and "All the Things You Are," both bebop-era warhorses. That instrumental could be anything. A few months later the JGB played Miles Davis' "So What" live, seemingly out of the blue, but perhaps that was in the mix here as well.

Timeline

Corry and Joe have done the heavy lifting with the late 1978 timeline as it relates to Reconstruction, when a lot was happening on both the GD and JGB fronts. It is worth familiarizing yourself with:
http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/11/reconstructing-reconstruction-january.html
http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2014/11/risky-reconstruction.html

But for my own purposes, I will reiterate a bit from their posts:

• Garcia, Kahn, and Godchaux are messing around with jazz standards sometime in June 78 (and possibly earlier?).
• The gear at Front Street is upgraded from a 16-track to a 24-track machine in June 78 (presumably for the Dead to record Shakedown Street there) and GKG take advantage of this to hang out and lay down some of these jazz tunes.
• The Dead then get busy for most of August (recording Shakedown Street, with Kahn pitching in on overdubs and mixing duties) and September (going to Egypt, then canceling shows in London to return home and finish the album).
• Garcia sits in with Merl Saunders' band for a one-off benefit gig at a Haight/Ashbury club on 10/3/78.  afaik, this is mostly still a mystery.  The band's style is fairly similar to Reconstruction (no horns, though), but the setlist includes a somewhat stylistic outlier: "So What."
• The Keith & Donna JGB play their last known gig on 11/3/78 and, for the first known time, play "So What."
• The Dead are on tour in November, Garcia is hospitalized with bronchitis, shows are postponed, and the Dead are back on the road intermittently from mid-December through January.
• Reconstruction debuts with Garcia on 1/30/79, after a week of rehearsal during a break in the Dead's touring schedule.
  

 

So what?

Kahn described Reconstruction as a project he put together in Dec 1978 to play more jazz and to be able to gig when Garcia was on the road with the Dead, but also to potentially include Garcia when he wasn't: "I wasn't really planning on Jerry being in the band originally, and then when he was in the band it sort of changed everything from what the plan was" (Jackson, Garcia, 306).  It must have been an appealing fit for Garcia, who for the first time in eight years had no side-band of his own: the timing was good, the environment was appealing (a no-commitment, no-hassle gig), and the both concept and the material were fresh and challenging.  As the narrative has it, Garcia rose to the occasion for nine months in a final flash of inspired glory, but GD politics pulled him away, and Reconstruction's breakup symbolically marks an end to Garcia really pushing himself musically and settling into a more complacent rut for most of the next decade (see also: heroin; Garcia had moved in Rock Scully in this same period).

Is that narrative this changed by the fact that Garcia was actually "playing jazz" of his own accord six months before Reconstruction began?  It might be, it might not.  Given that Kahn seemed to suggest a lot of Garcia's material (starting with Compliments in 1974), it would make sense that he nudged Garcia this time as well.  Maybe it was just for laughs -- or maybe the idea of a JGB that incorporated jazz tunes (as Garcia/Saunders and Legion of Mary had done) was a viable option in their minds in mid-1978?

Also: I feel like "Russian Lullaby" is always left out of these discussions of Garcia engaging with jazz, but it's a jazz tune by pretty much any metric, and he played it regularly before, during, and after this period.

Also: This "Front Street Shieks" era of jazz is very different from the stripe of jazz that Reconstruction played -- I have more to say at some point re: Reconstruction as a jazz band -- which was different, for that matter, from "So What," and from the slightly earlier 20's-era swing Garcia played in the Great American Music/String Band in 1974 (see here).   And heck, also from some of the other jazz tunes played by the Legion of Mary.  That's a wider range of jazz music than I had expected and may warrant a separate post.

Also: One thing that did also come to mind was a story that drummer David Kemper told about working with Bob Dylan.  Dylan would assemble his band to rehearse for a tour and they would spend days playing in a certain style and carefully learning material that Dylan didn't seem to intend for performance.  Garcia and Kahn playing old jazz chestnuts doesn't seem to quite fit that model, but I don't know.

Or, of course, it's possible that all this timing is a coincidence and that we shouldn't make too much of these few "jazz sessions" in the bigger scheme of things.  But, for now, please to add refutations, corrections, additions, speculations, etc.

4/28/79: aud tape ephemera

4/23/79, by Chris Stone

This is one of those aud tapes that I love more for what's happening between songs than for the actual music itself.  It's a really good pull (taper unknown) of just the first set of a typically enjoyable but fairly unremarkable Reconstruction show.  I was most impressed by Garcia's long solo in Nessa, riding a fierce and very fast groove with aplomb.  I'm also impressed by the amazingly good save during the flub in the transition at the end of an otherwise great I'll Take a Melody, but I suppose that kind of thing isn't technically a highlight (although, seriously, nice save!).  Also, if you're listening on headphones, watch out when Garcia hits that effect pedal for his solo in Struggling Man -- whoa!  But otherwise, there's not much to say about the music itself.

Like 10/24/78, however, there are a couple of little nuggets to savor between the songs, if you find value in this kind of thing.  It starts with a good-natured doof asking after the opener, "what is this? oh, a recorder? [then, in response to his buddy, who was probably like, "no, sherlock, it's a toaster oven, keep talking into it"] I didn't know what it was!"   A minute later, someone (the same guy?) explains, "they were in Frisco and someone told them Reconstruction was playing here, so they got on the bus and came here."  Oh for the days when you heard Jerry was playing tonight and just hopped on the bus.

This is probably more up JGMF's alley, but after I'll Take a Melody a different guy hollers, "why didn't you play last night?"  Hmm.  gdsets lists a 4/27/79 date at the Centennial Hall in Hayward, CA (just across the Bay from Palo Alto) with no setlist, and a setlist for 4/26 at the Keystone in Berkeley (but no tape).   Centennial Hall (capacity 1500) seems like an odd venue for Reconstruction, particularly sandwiched in between two Keystone dates.  Was it canceled?  Or, apropos of the fact that Reconstruction played in Hayward a few months later without Garcia, could it be possible that the comment is just be directed at him?

[edit: can't believe I forgot to mention the bomb-drop whistler.  There's a dude who figures on several Jerry aud tapes from this era who does this persistent whistle like a bomb dropping (or like Wile E. Coyote falling off a cliff).  I always find him a little irritating, particularly since he seems to amp it up when Garcia is soloing, but it's not bad enough on this tape that you'd even notice it.  I think 12/17/79 is one tape where it's pretty bad.  Anyway.  Who the heck was this guy?  What was his deal?  I think about these things listening to tapes like this.]

Finally, my favorite: just a second before the above hollering, you can hear a guy ask, "you like it?" and a little kid respond, "yeah!"  Go dude for bringing your kid to see Reconstruction!  Sorry, but as a parent of smallish children, this tickles the heck out of me.  See also 1/15/72 (a great tape for many reasons, not least for the little kid who heckles Save Mother Earth in the first set), 9/30/73 (kids playing near the stage as OAITW starts Panama Red, of all things), and an honorable mention to 9/20/76 (I think?) with the baby crying during Russian Lullaby.  Okay, so it's a short list so far.

You may now return to your regularly scheduled programming.

[Feb 2022: update!  The second set is now in circulation!  So I will hopefully circle back to this one.  Also, courtesy of Jerrybase, I see that Bettyboard cassettes exist for this show, so who knows, maybe someday...]

 

4/17/79: we in church today!

wrong Nicasio gig, but I love this poster

Good gravy, this place was tiny!  According to jgbp, the Rancho Nicasio was a resturant/bar that held all of 150 people, in a tiny, idyllic Marin County enclave.  Their site has some nice pictures (funny coincidence, but Peter Rowan and the Rowan Bros are playing there tonight.  Anyone got an extra (plane) ticket?).  I assume the place was far enough off the beaten path that most Bay Area heads wouldn’t have bothered (I get that sense from posts like this about west coast deadheads’ willingness to travel in the late 70’s).  But thankfully taper Phil Jaret did, and his recording is the only one that we’ve got at the moment (the newer transfer is pitch-corrected).  It’s a pretty good, upfront recording that sounds fine on headphones.  Not pristine, but it hits all the right spots and is plenty satisfying, and the music makes it well worth it.

The main reason to sing its praises is another (heretofore unknown to me) version of the mighty Sama Layuca, mislabeled in both filesets as Welcome to the Basement.  It’s not quite as wild as the nutso 3/30/79 performance (ahem), mainly because only Ed Neumeister and Garcia take solos (Ron Stallings, Merl, and John Kahn also all get a turn in the 3/30 version).  But holy moley, they throw down hard here.  Garcia’s chomping at the bit, but Neumeister goes first.  The band grooves hard underneath him, slowly loosens their grip, lets it get wild and hairy, then locks it back down, then loosens up again, and so on.  I don’t know if Stallings was having a problem with his horn, but there’s a bit of float-time after Neumeister’s solo until Garcia steps up to bat and just nails it.  After the same wild back-and-forth, it spills into some loud noisy space — listen close to how seamlessly Gaylord Birch snaps back into the groove of the song as the return for the ending.  He’s such a fantastic drummer: over a very fast tempo (like 175 bpm), he easily shifts from tight control to unhinged freer playing with nary a stumble.  Impressive!  I associate him mainly with funk and R&B, but he more than holds his own in a freer context like this.

The rest of the show is pretty hot, too.  Less than a week before the Dead debuted with Brent Mydland [edit: there's a long rehearsal tape that circulates dated 4/16/79], Garcia sounds like he’s pushing harder than usual.  He’s particularly on fire during a breathtaking tear through Another Star — very fast, but precise, and totally synched up with the horns’ accompaniment that frames the solo.  He comes to a great (and perfectly timed) climax, then basically starts over immediately for a second go-round!  He also seems pretty fired up for a long Soul Roach, not a song that usually registers for me, but he’s really belting here.  Linda Chicana, Mohican and the Great Spirit, Long Train Running; all the instrumentals sound great, and they dig in pretty hard on the vocal rave-ups Lovely Night for Dancing and Make It Better.  After the a cappella ending to Lovely Night, Merl says something like, “yeah, we in church today!”  Amen to that, Merl.

postscript: if you're inclined, take a close listen to Ron Stallings' sax solo in the show-closing Long Train Running.  That sounds like a soprano sax after his tenor solo, but the transition sounds way too quick for it to be Stallings switching horns (he does play soprano in Sama Layuca, though).  Could it be a guest musician?  Jaret's aud tape is tightly edited between most songs, so if something was said, we don't have it.  It's no big thing, but it's worth noting.

3/30/79: Sama Layuca

[edit, Dec '17: FYI, it turns out that the correct date is likely 3/31, not 3/30.  see jgmf.]

I’ve been a bit dormant with the late onset of winter around these parts (reading, family, work, jazz) and not listening to as much Dead or Garcia, but I did want to give some shine to a pretty remarkable gem I stumbled upon from an unknown-to-me Reconstruction show: 3/30/79 at the Catalyst in Santa Cruz, CA (a very nice aud recording).  Sama Layuca was a McCoy Tyner tune that Reconstruction performed only a small handful of times (only five versions circulate), and while the earliest performances stuck to the usual head/solos/head format of most of Reconstruction’s jazz numbers, two other versions were rare occasions for the band to open up into freer, more uncharted waters.

On 3/30/79, Sama Layuca starts off with Stallings and Neumeister soloing over a tight groove that stays stable but threatens to unmoor itself, and by the time Garcia steps up front, things have started to fray and stretch.  His solo is outrageous, essentially one loud, fiery duel with drummer Gaylord Birch, with Kahn at his heels.  Saunders picks up the pieces, but Kahn’s solo tips things back into loud, noisy Space as Garcia rears back up.  It's all pretty crazy stuff, much more akin to a fired-up GD Space jam than anything Reconstruction usually did.  The only other version (or indeed any other Reconstruction performance) that gets this far out is another Sama Layuca from a few months later, 8/10/79.  Garcia, now rocking his brand-new Tiger guitar, takes it to similar places but winds up drifting away from the song and into a gentle, floating, spacey interlude that segues into Dear Prudence.  Just as sweet, but not quite as demented.

The rest of 3/30/79 is fantastic, maybe one of the better Reconstruction shows I’ve heard, but Sama Layuca is the clear highlight.  It’s definitely worth checking out, particularly for those not sold on the “disco” sound of this group.

btw, jgmf's huge Reconstruction overview a must-read for anyone into this particular side trip of Garcia's.  I have more to say on the significance of this band to the overall arc of Garcia's side career, but that's for another time.

with Reconstruction, 4/23/79, courtesy jerrygarcia.com

RIP Wilton Felder

RIP to Wilton Felder (Sept 27), who was a great saxophonist and a monster bass player.  How monstrous?

(and that’s Paul Humphrey on drums)

To name a few more: Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get It On (Paul Humphrey again!) and I Want You, Joni Mitchell (Court and Spark, Hissing of Summer Lawns), John Cale (Paris 1919), 70’s soft-rock staples like “Piano Man” and “Summer Breeze”, and a personal guilty pleasure fav of mine, Michael Franks’ The Art of Tea.  He’s on Grant Green’s wonderful Live at the Lighthouse, another funky jazz record that’s near to my heart.

But his main gig was playing tenor sax with the (Jazz) Crusaders.  I’ve heard that Felder wouldn’t play sax with anyone else, saving himself solely for the group’s sound — and they definitely had a sound, soulful and funky, that never endeared them to the jazz cognoscenti despite recording a load of successful albums.  I guess you'd call them underrated these days, but I’ve never heard a bad record of theirs (although, to be honest, I’m not crossing the 1974 line).  Scratch is a stone classic with at least one tune that may be of interest to JGBheads circa 1979-1980.  I contend that the Crusaders’ sound (and instrumentation) was a key influence on Kahn and Saunders as they created Reconstruction.  Phil Lesh was about as far from Wilton Felder as bass players got, but I'd bet you anything he was one of Kahn's favorites.