Round Records Shares Additional Jerry Garcia ‘Before The Dead’ Recordings

By Andy Kahn May 4, 2018 • 7:35 am PDT

Jerry Garcia 1962 Crop

Photo by Sara Katz

Round Records will release a five-LP limited edition and four-CD box set of Jerry Garcia’s earliest known performances entitled Before The Dead. Two more tracks from the forthcoming archival release have been made available in advance of the collection’s May 11 release.

Garden & Gun premiered two songs featuring Garcia with two different pre-Dead groups. First is a January 1964 recording of a Black Mountain Boys performance at Top Of The Tangent in Palo Alto, California. Garcia and his writing partner Robert Hunter and future New Riders Of The Purple Sage band mate David Nelson, as well and Sandy Rothman and Geoff Levin perform “Salt Creek,” a traditional instrumental popularized by bluegrass legend Bill Monroe. Listen here:

The second single premiered by Garden & Gun features Garcia with the Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers performing on June 11, 1962 at Boar’s Head Coffeehouse, Peninsula Jewish Community Center in San Carlos, California. Garcia and Dick Arnold and Marshall Leicester play the Irish ballad “Legend Of The Johnson Boys” on the newly shared track. Listen here:

Before The Dead begins with recordings from 1961 and continues through the summer of 1964. Documentarian Grateful Dead publicist and author Dennis McNally and Brian Miksis produced and curated Before The Dead. The box set presents a 32-page book featuring Miksis’ thorough liner notes, as well as track-by-track essays, listening notes, other essays, rare photos and memorabilia.

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Before The Dead Cover

Before The Dead Tracklist

SIDE ONE:

Bob and Jerry
May 26, 1961
Brigid Meier’s Sixteenth Birthday Party
Menlo Park, California

  1. Santy Anno
  2. I Got A Home In That Rock
  3. Oh, Mary Don’t You Weep
  4. All My Trials
  5. I Was Born Ten Thousand Years Ago
  6. Blow The Candles Out
  7. Rake And A Rambling Boy
  8. Trouble In Mind

SIDE TWO:

Jerry Garcia, Marshall Leicester, and Robert Hunter
July 1961
Boar’s Head Coffeehouse, Carlos Book Stall
San Carlos, California

  1. Brown’s Ferry Blues
  2. Jesse James

    3. Jerry Garcia and Unknown Musician
    Summer or Fall 1961
    Boar’s Head Coffeehouse, Carlos Book Stall
    San Carlos, California

  3. Down In The Willow Garden
  4. Long Lonesome Road
  5. Railroad Bill
  6. The Wagoner’s Lad
  7. Katie Cruel
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SIDE THREE:

Sleepy Hollow Hog Stompers
June 11, 1962
Boar’s Head Coffeehouse, Peninsula Jewish Community Center
San Carlos, California

  1. Cannonball Blues
  2. Little Birdie
  3. Sally Goodin
  4. Hold That Woodpile Down
  5. Legend Of The Johnson Boys
  6. Shady Grove
  7. Sweet Sunny South
  8. Man Of Constant Sorrow

SIDE FOUR & FIVE

Hart Valley Drifters
Fall 1962
KZSU Radio Studio A, Stanford University
Stanford, California

  1. Band Introductions
  2. Roving Gambler
  3. Ground Speed
  4. Pig In A Pen
  5. Standing In The Need Of Prayer
  6. Flint Hill Special
  7. Nine Pound Hammer
  8. Handsome Molly
  9. Clinch Mountain Backstep
  1. Think Of What You’ve Done
  2. Cripple Creek
  3. All The Good Times Have Past And Gone
  4. Billy Grimes, The Rover
  5. Paddy On The Turnpike (Boys, My Money’s All Gone)
  6. Run Mountain
  7. Sugar Baby
  8. Sitting On Top Of The World
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SIDE SIX:

The Wildwood Boys
February 23, 1963
Top of the Tangent
Palo Alto, California

  1. Roll In My Sweet Baby’s Arms
  2. Jerry’s Breakdown
  3. Standing In The Need Of Prayer
  4. Mule Skinner Blues
  5. Saturday Night Shuffle
  6. Pike County Breakdown
  7. The Little Sparrow
  8. We Shall Not Be Moved

SIDE SEVEN:

Jerry and Sara
May 4, 1963
Top of the Tangent
Palo Alto, California

  1. Deep Elem Blues
  2. Will The Weaver
  3. I Truly Understand
  4. Long Black Veil
  5. The Man That Wrote That Home Sweet Home Never Was A Married Man
  6. Foggy Mountain Top

SIDE EIGHT:

Black Mountain Boys
Fall 1963
Top of the Tangent
Palo Alto, California

  1. Barefoot Nellie
  2. She’s More To Be Pitied
  3. Noah’s Breakdown
  4. Who Will Sing For Me?

    5. Black Mountain Boys
    January 10, 1964
    Top of the Tangent
    Palo Alto, California

  5. Salt Creek
  6. Monroe’s Hornpipe (Jody’s Hornpipe)
  7. Rosa Lee McFall
  8. John Hardy/Closing Theme

    9. Black Mountain Boys
    March 6, 1964
    Top of the Tangent
    Palo Alto, California

  9. Katie Kline
  10. Walkin’ The Dog

SIDE NINE:

Black Mountain Boys
March 6, 1964
Top of the Tangent
Palo Alto, California

  1. Paddy On The Turnpike (Boys, My Money’s All Gone)
  2. Love And Wealth
  3. Sourwood Mountain
  4. If I Lose
  5. Homestead On The Farm (I Wonder How The Old Folks Are At Home)
  6. Stoney Creek
  7. Salty Dog Blues
  8. Love Please Come Home
  9. Make Me A Pallet On The Floor
  10. Darlin’ Allalee

SIDE TEN:

Black Mountain Boys
March 6, 1964
Top of the Tangent
Palo Alto, California

  1. In The Pines
  2. Raw Hide
  3. Black Mountain Rag
  4. True Life Blues
  5. Medley: Devil’s Dream–Sailor’s Hornpipe

    6. Black Mountain Boys
    Spring 1964
    Top of the Tangent
    Palo Alto, California

  6. Drink Up And Go Home

    7. Asphalt Jungle Mountain Boys
    Summer 1964
    Top of the Tangent
    Palo Alto, California

  7. These Men Of God
  8. Roll On Buddy
  9. Goodbye Old Pal
  10. Back Up And Push

Note: The 4-CD Edition is comprised of the following – CD 1: Sides 1 & 2; CD 2: Sides 3, 4 & 5; CD 3: Sides 6, 7; and CD 4: Sides 8, 9 & 10

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