Grateful Dead Daves Picks

"Basketball and music have always been alike for me, the celebration of life and all other good things. These two art forms represent the best of teamwork, constant motion, creativity, leadership, communication, focus, execution, friendship, loyalty, cooperation, hope, opportunity, purpose, sacrifice, discipline, honor, and fun. Fun to play. Fun to practice. UCLA and the Grateful Dead embody the highest levels of this celebratory joy. At UCLA, it was endless fun, every day, in every way. We couldn’t wait to get there, to get going — though it was never as much fun as when the Grateful Dead came to play with and for us." - Bill Walton

A sealed, unlabeled box sat undisturbed for decades on a shelf in the Grateful Dead’s San Rafael tape vault on Front Street, its contents an enduring mystery, even to those few with access to the vault. All David Lemieux knew about that box when he became the Dead’s archivist was that it contained tapes belonging to Bear—Owsley Stanley, the Dead’s first soundman and architect of the Wall of Sound. Even in the Dead Heads’ Holy of Holies, the taped-up box was tantalizing. But this was Bear’s personal property, and so he didn’t touch the box out of an abiding respect for the elder luminary of sound. Bear’s archive of Sonic Journal recordings had been kept safe for him for years within the Grateful Dead’s vault—over 1,300 reels of tape stored in heavy-duty cartons like old banana boxes. At any time, David could have popped the tops and explored them to his archivist heart's content. But they were off-limits without the nod from Bear.

The final 2018 installment of the Grateful Dead’s Dave’s Picks live archival series will feature the band’s show at the Capitol Theatre in Passaic, New Jersey on June 17, 1976. The 3-CD set is limited to 18,000 individually numbered copies mastered to HDCD specs by Jeffrey Norman.

April 26, 1983 was the Dead's second night of a two-show stand at The Spectrum. The sextet - which at the time featured guitarists Bob Weir and Jerry Garcia, bassist Phil Lesh, keyboardist Brent Mydland and drummers Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann - opened with Shakedown Street. Surprisingly, this will be the first version of Shakedown Street issued as part of a Dave's Picks release.