favorite favorite favorite favorite

As noted in other reivews, the tape sounds superb. Absolutely beautiful. Soft, rich, clear, enveloping.



I was at these shows and the rest of the West Coast run but I'll review the tape and not my original experience. Given my lysergic headspace at the time (this was actually my birthday show, the first I was old enough to attend) there's no point in attempting a historical account anyway. Cal Expo was no Frost or Greek, but it sure wasn't bad, and along with Autzen (which is much bigger but had an unparalleled Deadhead scene) was the best venue I saw the band in in 1990.



Good Times starts off with some mix problems which clear up soon enough. Most versions of this song are similar and I usually enjoy them all, this is no exception. Stranger starts off sloppy but comes together fine and any version that's not a trainwreck is always welcome. Solid start to the show.



Peggy-O is a lovely uptempo version with a little slip at the start but two solo sections. It's probably because something goes awry during the first one, but it's not bad, he just has to reset halfway through, and the second one is very clean and great. The superb tape quality shows off his sparkling tone beautifully in the second solo in particular. Can you tell I love this song?



Cowboy tunes. You dig em or you don't. This is my least favorite pairing but that's okay.



The Loser, Masterpiece, Loose Lucy sequence is all very crisply played and fun. The band is sharply focused and playing well. These versions aren't amazing or unique but they're great and are elevated by the wonderful sound, you can hear all the nuances or just enjoy the overall sound field. Great little setlist segment too, talk about a nice middle of set 1!



Cassidy is another cleanly done excursion with Garcia laying a very articulate line across the multiple peaks at the end of the jam. The rest of the band never quite blows this one out the way they sometimes did, where the whole thing goes hurtling suddenly sideways, but it does have the stairstepping elevations and converging lines that give latter Brent era versions that psychedelic punch. A fun little Don't Ease with nice B3 work out front by Brent wraps up the set.



Maybe you just don't like Victim or the Crime. Fine, it's your loss. I was off tour by the time it got seriously overplayed anyway. I think it's a fucking great song when played with energy, the chords are insane and Jerry goes nuts on it a lot of the time. This is a good one with a nice peak and lots of shredding. Hilarious contrast with the move into Touch, a song that could kill a second set pretty easily, but this version has everything you can ask for from the tune - particularly the big full band chords at the end. I'm predisposed to dislike this tune having seen it a bazillion times but it works for me here.



Victim, Touch, now LL Rain, this has officially moved into "questionable setlist" territory - I can hear the heady tour kids bitching from here, almost 24 years later. But good playing wins out over the on-paper setlist every time, unless you're a stats chump. And guess what, the first half of 1990 is full of wonderful, stratospheric versions of this song and you have to count this among them. It's not among the very best of the year, the ones where Garcia goes hyperspatial on the ending countermelody theme, but it's beautiful and fine. If you can't like this song, again: your loss. This is really good.



What would really be ironic is if the on-paper heavyweight of the setlist, Terrapin, were to fall short of what came before it performance-wise. But I don't hear it that way, unlike some other reviewers. You can hear Jerry's voice roughen up but not severely, and he doesn't forget any lyrics, which matters more to me. The full band dynamics are together from the beginning and the first main jam, in Lady With A Fan, is lovely and reasonably extended. The fanfare section isn't super intense but there's a lot going on; Phil's really active and Garcia finds some real classy voices as he cycles through the changes. The intensity actually peaks later in the fanfare which is interesting. There's no unique outro jam which keeps it from joining the real heavyweight versions of spring tour or later in the summer but it's definitely a good strong Terrapin.



Damn, the big drums sound seriously incredible in this recording. Make that "all the drums." Such stereo! Well, a little overpanned at some points, could use a little more matrixing of the audience in this part to keep the soundfield steady. In headphones it gets pretty unrealistic sounding at times. But them tones! Goot sheet mang.



Similarly, this Space segment is an exercise in "wow that sounds great." Nothing super crazy happens, but Garcia's tone is just off the rails, especially a minute or so before the end. Turn it up loud and jsut swim around in it for a minute.



A Fantasy - Jude - Watchtower sequence is pretty typical for '90 for sure, but when Jerry came to play these are all tunes that would let him go for it. And so it goes here, he cues both Fantasy and Watchtower and brings the A game to both. Brent's B3 could really be a little more front and center in the mix for this part. I liked the Hey Jude coda sometimes, this one seems a bit perfunctory to me though. As for Watchtower a lot of people hate on Bob's vocals and that's fine but the big fella would often do his heaviest shredding of the night in this song. I was in the zone for this one and missed the famous crazy-person stage crash discussed on some other source pages for this show. Regardless: howling shred time! Whoo!



I love every Stella Blue that's played with feeling and without major flubs. This one is lovely. It has that famous "moment of silence" that brings the crowd to a still point. No big outro solo; he's already done plenty of that for the night, I guess.



Always hilarious when people criticize Bobby versions of tunes Pig used to do by comparing them to the Pig versions. Come on people. We know it was heavier back in the day. Bob knew it too. Just think of it as a different song really. MIDI haters really focused on this song too, for Jerry's baritone sax sound. So much hating for a fun little crowd-energy wrapup tune! Whatever. Phil's into it, it's fun, enjoy it or don't.



Pretty sure this was the last time I saw Black Muddy. A pretty little song, not bad, not one of the greats, I'd usually pick something else, but always ended up enjoying it. This one is finely done and I liked it. A little mumbly towards the end and the very end cuts suddenly to a (fine but lesser) audience tape.



I rated the 8th as 4 stars to balance out an unfairly negative review. This show is a legit 4 stars for the era and is definitely better than the night before. In fact it's a prototypical 4 star show: really well executed, kind of a normal setlist, nothing that just screams "must hear" but no bad moments, a wonderful tape, just a classic example of 1990 Dead.



- March 28, 2014Classic 4-star 1990 show, beautiful recording