Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Completely Conspicuous 512: From the Mars Hotel

I'm joined by guest Phil Stacey as we discuss the Grateful Dead's album From the Mars Hotel. Listen to the episode below or download directly.


Show notes:
- Recorded at CompCon world HQ on the 13th birthday of the podcast
- The Dead's 7th studio album, came out in June 1974
- Watergate hearings were the big news story
- Beer was a lot cheaper back then
- In '74, there was a good variety of rock acts releasing important albums, plus funk
- Mars Hotel had some classic Dead songs
- Phil Lesh sang two songs, which was rare, and Bob Weir had one
- Garcia is in prime form on this record
- The Dead was touring with the "Wall of Sound," a massive "distortion-free" speaker setup
- Playing larger venues
- The cost was so high that they eventually quit touring for a few years
- Maybe the last great Dead studio album
- The Grateful Dead Movie was taken from the final shows of this tour
- Working out new songs in the live setting
- Rivalry between lyricists Robert Hunter and John Perry Barlow
- The Dead would play with guest musicians from time to time including Pete Townshend, Branford Marsalis, Santana, Huey Lewis
- The Dead probably got some airplay on FM rock radio in the '70s
- Rock radio has changed a tremendous amount over the years; it's mostly corporate, formatted now
- College and online stations have the most freedom
- Second-tier album in the discography
- Pretty representative of the Dead's sound
- Next: Blues for Allah

Completely Conspicuous is available through the iTunes podcast directory. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

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