NEW! Grateful Dead - Europe 72 - VOLUME 2

In case you have not heard..........


The Tour That Keeps On Giving: Here’s Europe ’72: Vol. 2!

$16.99
Europe '72: Vol. 2
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Did you feel left out by all the hoopla surrounding the Europe ’72: The Complete Recordings mega-box? Or maybe you thought: “Geez, I don’t really need 22 shows on 73 discs in a box the size of a small refrigerator. But I sure did love the original Europe ’72 album back in the day. And now that you mention it, Hundred Year Hall, Steppin’ Out and the Rockin’ the Rhein became favorites of mine, too! It would be kinda cool to hear more from that tour.”

Well, it’s your lucky day, pal. We’ve got you covered! Ready for release on September 20 is Europe ’72: Vol. 2, a two-CD set featuring 20 newly mixed, never-before-released gems from that epic and historic tour. As most of you know, engineer Jeffrey Norman spent many months mixing down the 16-track master tapes from every show on the tour for the humongo-box, while mastering ace David Glasser put the final polish and brought the sonics up to HDCD specs. You may have heard various circulating soundboard tapes from these shows through the years, but trust us, you haven’t heard the music sound quite like this before! Meanwhile Grateful Dead vaultmeister and box producer David Lemieux was tasked with coming up with a two-disc compilation that would work as a worthy successor to the classic original album, 39 years later!

And there was this guiding philosophy: There would be no songs that appeared on the original 3-LP set. Whoa! No “Truckin’”? “Morning Dew”? “China Cat”? Nope! But what’s here is magnificent, including a spectacular, nearly hour-long combo of “Dark Star” > “The Other One” from the famous Bickershaw Festival in Engalnd (5/7/72); a kickin’ version of “Not Fade Away” > “Goin’ Down the Road” > “Not Fade Away” from the super-charged first night of the tour in London (4/7); and the always-moving “Sing Me Back Home” from the last night of the tour (5/26). There’s also a wonderfully varied selection of other tunes from Copenhagen, Paris, Frankfurt and Luxembourg, including favorites such as “Bertha,” “Playing in the Band,” “Good Lovin’,” “Black-Throated Wind,” “Sugaree,” “Deal” and many more.

“One cool thing,” David Lemieux told us recently, “is that we ended up including several songs that the band had pulled from the master reels for the original Europe ’72, but which, for whatever reason, didn’t make the cut. That was really the impetus to get this thing rolling—that there was a lot of stuff on the cutting room floor that the band had slated for the original album at some point.” (You can find our entire interview with David here.)

Finally, we should note that the artwork on the album is by none other than Stanley Mouse who, along with his late partner Alton Kelley, created the memorable “Ice Cream Kid” and “Rainbow Foot” images for the original Europe ’72 package. Yep, it’s the return of the Kid! “Trouble comes in many flavors,” Mouse cryptically commented recently. “Ice Cream Kid is in hot water. The jury is out. His only defense is love.”

For ordering info and the complete track listings for Europe ’72: Vol.

 

I will be getting this one, as I missed out on that mega-box set edition....

 

Being discussed in the existing thread about the complete Europe 72 box set.

 

I think this 2 CD set is far enough away enough topic from the 60 CD to deserve it's own thread.

 

The other thread is 37 pages and counting. This fine release would get lost in that one.

 

What a great tour! '72 would certainly be near the top of my wayback machine destinations. Catch the Dead in Europe in the spring; come back to the states and catch the Stones and Zep through the summer and finish off with some more Dead in the Fall. Can't forget to catch my birth in September!

 

I got the e-mail about this yesterday. Some great tracks on this 2 disc release and no repeats from the original 3 album Europe 72 release. I'll definitely be getting this one.

 

Here's the tracklist, copied over from the other thread:


Disc 1

Bertha – Tivolis Koncertsal, Copenhagen (4/14/72)
Me and My Uncle – Wembley Empire Pool, Wembley (4/7/72)
Chinatown Shuffle – Tivolis Koncertsal, Copenhagen (4/14/72)
Sugaree – Olympia Theatre, Paris (5/3/72)
Beat It On Down the Line – Theatre Hall, Luxembourg (5/16/72)
Loser – Tivolis Koncertsal, Copenhagen (4/14/72)
Next Time You See Me – Olympia Theatre, Paris (5/4/72)
Black-Throated Wind – Tivolis Koncertsal, Copenhagen (4/14/72)
Dire Wolf – Jahrhundert Halle, Frankfurt (4/26/72)
Greatest Story Ever Told – Olympia Theatre, Paris (5/3/72)
Deal – Olympia Theatre, Paris (5/4/72)
Good Lovin’ – Jahrhundert Halle, Frankfurt (4/26/72)
Playing in the Band – Strand Lyceum, London (5/24/72)

Disc 2

Dark Star – Bickershaw Festival, Wigan (5/7/72)
Drums – Bickershaw Festival, Wigan (5/7/72)
The Other One – Bickershaw Festival, Wigan (5/7/72)
Sing Me Back Home – Strand Lyceum, London (5/26/72)
Not Fade Away – Wembley Empire Pool, Wembley (4/7/72)
Goin’ Down the Road Feeling Bad – Wembley Empire Pool, Wembley (4/7/72)
Not Fade Away – Wembley Empire Pool, Wembley (4/7/72)

 

This is a cool release. I've got the big-deal box coming in a couple of weeks, but this will make a great companion release / sampler.

I'd also like to see an E72 Revisited, with original album in the underdub format, pre-sweetening. That would really be a logical release, or an option for a deluxe package, which I may have to assemble myself.

(I am, however, under-whelmed by the new Mouse art, which I find pretty disappointing - my 2 cents.)

 

This may not be possible. I'll be curious if the box reveals details about this.

 

One of the interviews with Lemieux or Norman about the complete box revealed that the original non-overdubbed live tracks still exist for Europe '72 (there had been rumors that the band had recorded over them when doing the later touchups in the studio for the LP) and that they were going to use as many of them as possible on the box set (I think there were some that weren't usable for various reasons, so they reverted to the overdubbed versions in those cases). But I don't know what the demand would be for a reconstituted "more pure" Europe '72 rerelease, given that some of the customer base for that will be buying the box. Of course, since the multitracks are all being remixed for the new box, there will be other differences between the E '72 album and the box as well, so maybe down the line there will be more distillations of the box for the more casual fan.

 

I've already pre-ordered and will be receiving the big box, too. You can't have too much!

 

I assume all of the tracks on this 2 disc set are also on the box set too. Or is there a song(s) on the 2 disc set that are not on the box set? Wouldn't it be possible to make your own 2 disc set from the box set tracks? I know, I know, there are GD fans who want every release.

 

For those of us who already have all the currenty released Europe material, and don't want to go all out for the box, this is a wonderfully thought out release, and a great way to sample the new mastering.

 

I would say the answers are (1) Yes, (2) No, (3) Yes, and (4) Absolutely Yes...

 

I'm sure one could compile all the tracks on e72 Vol 2 from the big box, but I would sure hope they are going to be providing some nicer edits or segues between the tunes than we could do by just assembling the tracks on a disk.

And re a deluxe edition of the original E72, I suspect there could be reasonable interest, but if I had to bet, I'd say I'll have to compile it myself, with clumsy segues across the tracks.

 

Good point about the segues. Since the tracks on the new 2 disc set are from different shows, I hope they are seamlessly mixed with no silence between the tracks.

 

There are 2 interviews about this on dead.net you could read if you had any interest in it. In one of them, they speak about having to use a 2 track tape to cover a missing part in the multi-track. They are good at assembling things, every single Dick's Picks has had music edited out.

 

I would assume. That would really make it a proper companion to the original. Any thing less would be disappointing.

 

Here's a short interview with Lemieux about Europe '72 Volume 2. He says that he made himself a "new" version of the original E '72 with the box set mixes to listen to "just for kicks." He also emphasizes the "Dark Star" > "Other One" sequence from 5/7/72 as the centerpiece of the set.

 

The Steppin' Out release a few years back was also from multiple E72 shows blended together with no gaps between songs. I think it's safe to assume this Vol. 2 release will be similar.

 

I am pleased the Grateful Dead are releasing this. I couldn't swing the 60 disc set, and as much as I like the band, I'm not sure if I would have ordered it regardless. I am happy they are releasing "highlights." Still, it may have been more interesting had they made this a 3 or 4 disc compilation - or even released a complete show from the run. But, nevertheless, I'll enjoy checking this out.

 

Although they are from earlier mixes you should still be able to find:

Hundred Year Hall (two-CD, highlights from 4/26/72)
Rockin' The Rhein (three-CD, complete show from 4/24/72)
Steppin' Out (four-CD, highlights from the eight shows they played in England in April and May)

 

This is an excellent companion piece to Europe 72. The complete set would be overkill for me, but this will be a worthy addition to my collection. I'm a bit disappointed they didn't pick Dark Star from Rotterdam (the longest Dark Star ever performed), but since that runs into "Sugar Magnolia" which is already on Europe 72 I guess they couldn't include it because of their "no europe 72 tracks" policy.