From the category archives:

Videos & DVDs

The Subdudes: Live at the Rams Head / Unplugged at Pleasant Plain

Music Double DVD
Disc 1: 60 min Documentary
Disc 2 : 100 min live concert

Live Dead – The Grateful Dead in Concert (Downhill from Here, Ticket to New Year’s, View from the Vault)

Live Dead: The Grateful Dead in Concert is a great sampler of live performances from the latter third of the Grateful Dead’s career. Like all Dead performances, there’s a fair amount of chaff with the wheat, but among the three discs–Ticket to New Year’s, View from the Vault, and Downhill from Here–fans will find many gems, as well as extra footage not available on VHS. Ticket to New Year’s, taped on New Year’s Eve 1987 at the Oakland Coliseum, is among the band’s best filmed performances, featuring a robust “Terrapin Station,” a (blessedly short) Space and Drums that segues sweetly into the stoner fave “Dark Star,” and an unflinchingly bluesy “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door,” sung by Jerry Garcia with clear-eyed wistfulness. View from the Vault, taped July 8, 1990 (16 days before keyboardist Brent Mydland died of an overdose), in Pittsburgh, offers both great versions of Dead classics (including “Eyes of the World,” “Let It Grow” and “He’s Gone”) and an intimate look at the dynamics that few could notice when attending a stadium show, including wonderful interplay between Garcia and Mydland. Downhill from Here, shot in the summer of 1989 at Alpine Valley Music Theater in East Troy, Wisconsin, features cheesy, unnecessary video effects. It is redeemed by Garcia’s blistering guitar solos during “Deal” and “China Cat Sunflower/I Know You Rider,” a spacey pairing of “Uncle John’s Band” with “Playing in the Band,” and the tender ballad “Standing on the Moon.” –Dave McCoy and Anne Hurley

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Classic Albums: Grateful Dead – Anthem to Beauty

Videos & DVDs

This installment of the Classic Albums series follows the making of two Grateful Dead albums, the fiercely experimental Anthem of the Sun and the understated masterwork American Beauty, which spawned melodic gems like “Sugar Magnolia” and “Ripple.” Between the archival scenes and contemporary interviews with band members, the DVD shows a band making seismic inroads in pop music–and five young guys coming to terms with artistry, mortality, and, yes, the pursuit of happiness. There is priceless footage of Neal Cassady driving Ken Kesey’s bus and of the Dead, surrounded by martini-sipping hipsters, on Playboy After Dark. The best scenes involve band members talking about specific songs (you will never hear Phil Lesh’s “Box of Rain” again without thinking of it as a gift to his dying father) or deconstructing a tune by playing each track separately. Intimate and surprisingly cohesive, Anthem to Beauty is a rare glimpse into how the Dead’s magic was made. –Anne Hurley

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A Head’s Tale

Videos & DVDs

The summer of 2002 was a pinnacle point for head culture. Phish had been on hiatus for 2 years, Phil Lesh and Friends were revived, and continuing the live tradition of the Grateful Dead, and the largest Jamband festival in history took place successfully in Tennessee, attracting over 100,000 kids, and avoiding almost all media radars. Independent Canadian filmmaker, Greg Hemmings puts his thumb out and hitches to the festival lots from the Southern states, to the Rockies, to the East coast of Canada armed with his DV camera, capturing the Spirit of the people and the music that makes this unique subculture tick.

Live performances by:

Grand Theft Bus
Jukejoint
Bullfrog
The Jimmy Swift Band
Adam Klipple & Drive-by Leslie
The Slip
Mark Wilson & The Way It Is

Plus extra soundtrack from:

The Aaron Macdonald Band
Big Fish Eat Little Fish
Nero
Jomomma
GTB
JSB
The Slip
Love Bug Tribe
Cable
Diesel Dog

A Heads Tale makes it evident that people from all walks of life gather at these festivals, each to experience on common thing. -Kyle Cunjak (The Argosy)

… A Head’s Tale is the product of that passion, and showcases the music and people who share his Gregs vision of what music can do for your soul. -Nina Chiarelli (The New Brunswick Reader)

It reminds me of the way if felt for that first time and still feel when i am immersed in “the scene” Music is the catalyst, but the people make it work. Bravo! -Shane Shapiro (Revolving Door)

…after watching a Head’s Tale and seeing just how absolutely freaking fantastic that experience can be – you can bet I’ll be heading out to witness and experience the festival scene too! See y’all this summer! -Mr. Fantasy (jambands.ca Community member)

…the best JAMBANDS documentary ever. I’ve watched it 10 times so far. -Graham Pearson (jamhub.ca)

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Phish Tracking

Videos & DVDs

This short film by bassist/songwriter Mike Gordon follows his band Phish during their recording of the album Hoist. Gordon’s unique camera work as well as editing are featured in this one of a kind documentary.

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Phish – Bittersweet Motel [VHS]

Videos & DVDs

Phishheads may be hard-pressed to define what they love about their idols, the Vermont-based jam band Phish, but they know it when they see it–and hear it. And Bittersweet Motel, the 2000 documentary by Todd Phillips, serves up exactly what they want: generous dollops of the band’s free-form, jazz-laced music and by-the-numbers backstage glimpses of the musicians relaxing during rehearsals, between sets, and after hours. The 84-minute film follows a year in the life of the band, from the happening called the Great Went in Maine in August 1997 through the band’s 1998 European tour (but inexplicably, the film begins with Europe and ends with the Great Went). Along the way, viewers are treated to long snatches of band favorites like “Wilson” and “Down with Disease.” Affable singer-guitarist Trey Anastasio is the focus of most of the nonmusical scenes, trying to explain the band’s cult appeal, or griping about lunk-headed critics who are all too dismissive of the band’s often-stellar virtuosity. It’s clear that wearing the mantle of the Grateful Dead–especially since the 1995 death of Jerry Garcia–is a mixed blessing for Anastasio, who bristles in one interview about Dead comparisons. Phillips, who directed the fascinating but discredited documentary Frat House and the Tom Green vulgarfest Road Trip, does have an eye for the absurdly comic, especially evident in the few scenes he features of stoner Phishheads, who follow the band from show to show. Bittersweet Motel may not earn the band any new converts, but fans will find more than enough to satisfy those long dry spells between tours. –Anne Hurley

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Phish – Live in Vegas

Videos & DVDs

Studio: Wea-des Moines Video Release Date: 11/12/2002

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Phish – Bittersweet Motel

Videos & DVDs

This takes a look at the iconoclastic musicians of phish one of rock & rolls most successful touring bands. This documentary tracks the band over the course of a year – on & off stages across the united state europe & at home in vermont. Studio: Image Entertainment Release Date: 03/06/2001 Run time: 84 minutes Rating: Nr

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