Jerry Garcia Band – Jerry Garcia Band: Live 30th Anniversary Standard Ed. (Vinyl 5LP Box Set) ***

Available on Vinyl for the First Time in Celebration of 30th Anniversary with Over Two Hours of Music Across Five Standard Weight LPs Plus New Liner Note Essays by Bill Walton and Steven Hyden!

Pressed to vinyl for the very first time in celebration of its 30th anniversary, the Jerry Garcia Band features over two hours of magic across five standard weight LPs and includes new liner note essays by Bill Walton and Steven Hyden. Originally released on CD and cassette in 1991, Jerry Garcia Band showcases the band on the stage Garcia graced more than any other – the Warfield Theatre. Though several studio records were made since the band’s inception in 1975, Jerry Garcia Band holds the distinction as the only live document Garcia produced during his lifetime.

The selections are a veritable tour de force that reveal the depth of his song-book and exquisite abilities as a performer and band-leader. The collection includes the band’s, arguably, definitive performance of Dylan’s “Tangled Up In Blue,” along with a handful of other staples by the Bard. Smokey’s “The Way You Do The Things You Do” is another easy highlight with vocals so soft and sweet they’re certain to put a smile on anyone’s face. While “Don’t Let Go” showcases the band’s considerable chemistry that allowed them to paint so freely outside the lines.

As Hyden notes in the album’s new liner note essay, “The result on Jerry Garcia Band is an album that feels, in the best possible sense, like church, a sacred sanctuary that a community visits when it needs to be reminded of its better and purer selves… a work of incredible warmth and wisdom that can reboot and then refresh even the weariest of hearts.”