The WELL: inkwell.vue.301: Nicholas Meriwether, "All Graceful Instruments"

#144: Nicholas Meriwether (nicholasm) Sat 30 Jun 07 13:20

Sat, 30 Jun 2007 13:20:00 PDT

Thanks for hanging out and reading! That goes for all who simply read and didn't post questions or thoughts ... thanks for merely checking the convo out and seeing what the state of "Dead studies" is. [Read entire topic]

#143: No hablo Greenspa*ol (sd) Fri 29 Jun 07 13:23

Fri, 29 Jun 2007 13:23:00 PDT

dug this nicholas. thanks [Read entire topic]

#142: Nicholas Meriwether (nicholasm) Fri 29 Jun 07 05:42

Fri, 29 Jun 2007 05:42:00 PDT

Naw ... it'll take a while longer before Dead studies can claim, as Garcia did, that if we hang out long enough we'll get some credibility ... besides, respectability is overrated. [Read entire topic]

#141: Robin Russell (rrussell8) Thu 28 Jun 07 06:28

Thu, 28 Jun 2007 06:28:00 PDT

Thank you!!

Next stop, Respectability? [Read entire topic]

#140: Nicholas Meriwether (nicholasm) Wed 27 Jun 07 14:05

Wed, 27 Jun 2007 14:05:00 PDT

Thanks Cynthia, and thanks especially Xian for being the lead interviewer on this ... but thanks to all who asked such thought-provoking questions, posted even more thought-provoking anwers, and generally made this the best interview I could have imagined or hoped for. I'll continue to catch up on some older posts and questions, but wanted everyone to know how much I appreciated your participation, commentary, and insights. Thank you, all! [Read entire topic]

#139: Cynthia Dyer-Bennet (cdb) Wed 27 Jun 07 09:21

Wed, 27 Jun 2007 09:21:00 PDT

What a great conversation this is! I can hardly believe two weeks have gone by already. Thanks so much for joining us, Nicholas, and for so ably leading this interview, Christian.

Though our spotlight has turned to a new author, please know that if you're able to do so, you're very welcome to stick around longer. This topic will remain open for additional questions and comments indefinitely, so we hope you'll keep going. If you have other obligations that are demanding your attention, then we appreciate you having shared your time with us and hope to see you back here again in the future. [Read entire topic]

#138: Gary Burnett (jera) Tue 26 Jun 07 13:56

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 13:56:00 PDT

First time I ever saw moe. was in the back yard of a frat house in New Brunswick, New Jersey as well.

Not to mention dancing to a Dead cover band in the front yard of an eating club in Princeton (not knowing either Nick or Christian at the time!)

Steve's point about the symbiosis between the band & the audience being a hinderance in some ways is interesting. Certainly it resulted in some horrifically lazy performances over they years. On the other hand, some of the band's most adventurous songs in the later period (e.g. "Victim Or The Crime") were not always well accepted by large portions of the audience, despite the degree to which they undeniably pushed at the margins of "Grateful Dead music."

(I highly recommend Shaugn O'Donnell's essay on Victim & its relationship to Bartok in AGI, by the way!) [Read entire topic]

#137: Steve Bjerklie (stevebj) Tue 26 Jun 07 13:41

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 13:41:00 PDT

It strikes me that a reasonable argument could be made that the Dead's devotion to its audience, and vice versa, worked to hinder the band's musical explorations and development rather than encourage them. This is anecdotal, sure, but consider the example of Miles Davis: famously disdainful of the audience, yet arguably the most continuously progressive successful musician in American history. [Read entire topic]

#136: went taxis cowboy (xian) Tue 26 Jun 07 13:20

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 13:20:00 PDT

The Dead deliberately played East Coast colleges from very early on, so that led in way to the collegiate and even preppy Deadhead type.

DMB got its start playing frats, I believe.

Re "Did the band ever write anything new that was close to the open-endedness of "Dark Star" again? That song structure dates from 1967," I'd point to Bird Song as close. Not quite as spare, and yes written in 1971 or thereabouts, but in the '80s it was the closest thing we got to Dark Star and at times it was very out there.

I'd say Slipknot! (1975) was pretty open, if structured at either end.

But the trend was clear, yes. [Read entire topic]

#135: has DSO ever done an acid test set? (sd) Tue 26 Jun 07 12:22

Tue, 26 Jun 2007 12:22:00 PDT

I'm interested in the rise of the fraternity and sorority kids as Deadheads. Its easy to suppose that they are pre-sorted into the joiner slot. They had the time on their hands and the money to get to shows without too much effort. The band and deadheadism was already widely known so there wasn't any real strain on their imaginations to decide to join. and, who doesn't like a little kind bud and a night out instead of studying for a polysci final?

It looked like to me that they fed the Phish and DMB groups early on, too and maybe lead the way into the application of the travelling party and easy acceptance of any vaguely jammish band as worth following ideas. [Read entire topic]