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Grateful Dead - Workingman's Dead (1970) [MFSL Remastered 2014]

Posted By: Designol

Date: 30 May 2023 10:43:20

Workingman’s Dead defies the erroneous belief that the Grateful Dead never attained brilliance in the recording studio. Forever prized for natural sonics, Workingman’s Dead attains audiophile reference status courtesy of this first-ever hybrid SACD version. As flawless as any rustic album ever released, the 1970 set now brims with soaring harmonies, organic execution, intertwined textures, and uncomplicated structures.

The first Grateful Dead album to eschew cosmic jams and complex signatures, Workingman’s Dead stakes its existence to great songs, homespun warmth, and bare essentials. Its wistful, relaxed state—immediately apparent via the innocent album-opening invitation “Will you come with me?” on “Uncle John’s Band”—owes to the circumstances and conditions surrounding its creation. At the time, the Dead owed a considerable financial debt to Warner Bros. and were hobbled by a recent drug bust and financial scandal. Most significantly, the band was recovering from—and reacting to—the tragic events of the Altamont Music Festival and symbolic end of the peace and love era.

As such, Workingman’s Dead acts as a retreat from chaos and uncertainty, its songs emblems of simpler times and pleas for compassion in the face of hardship. Lyricist Robert Hunter said he aimed to capture the vintage elements of late 1940s country-and-western jukebox singles as well as old blues classics. In that vein, fare such as the Bakersfield-leaning “Cumberland Blues,” pastoral ballad “Dire Wolf,” and bluesy “Easy Wind” hit the mark. Leader Jerry Garcia’s occasional pedal-steel underpinnings arrive as a bonus.

Of course, aside from the economical concision and thematic consistency, the genius of Workingman’s Dead resides in the group’s expressive harmonies. Taught by Crosby, Stills and Nash, the Dead produce live “air blends” of multi-part vocal harmonies that provide the foundations of nearly every track. “Uncle John’s Band,” “High Time,” “New Speedway Boogie” (with the iconic refrain “One way or another/This darkness has got to give” referencing the ill wind that greeted the new decade), and the radio favorite “Casey Jones” practically float on the ensemble’s communal vocal bed.

As the '60s drew to a close, it was a heavy time for the quickly crumbling hippie movement that had reached its apex just a few years earlier in 1967’s Summer of Love. Death and violence were pervasive in the form of the Manson murders, fatalities at the Altamont concert, and the ongoing loss of young lives in Vietnam despite the best efforts of anti-war activists and peace-seeking protesters. Difficult times were also upon the Grateful Dead, unofficial house band of San Francisco’s Summer of Love festivities and outspoken advocates of psychedelic experimentation both musical and chemical. The excessive studio experimentation that resulted in their trippy but disorienting third album, Aoxomoxoa, had left the band in considerable debt to their record label, and their stress wasn't helped at all by a drug bust that had members of the band facing jail time. The rough road the Dead were traveling down seemed congruent with the hard changes faced by the youth counterculture that birthed them. Fourth studio album Workingman's Dead reflects both the looming darkness of its time, and the endless hope and openness to possibility that would become emblematic of the Dead as their legacy grew. For a group already established as exploratory free-form rockers of the highest acclaim, Workingman’s Dead's eight tunes threw off almost all improvisatory tendencies in favor of spare, thoughtful looks at folk, country, and American roots music with more subdued sounds than the band had managed up until then. The songs also focused more than ever before on singing and vocal harmonies, influenced in no small way by a growing friendship with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. The band embraced complex vocal arrangements with campfire-suited folk on "Uncle John's Band" and the psychedelic cowboy blues of “High Time.”

Review by Fred Thomas, Allmusic.com

Grateful Dead at Allmusic
Grateful Dead Website
Grateful Dead at Wiki

Tracklist:

01. Uncle John's Band (4:48)
02. High Time (5:16)
03. Dire Wolf (3:16)
04. New Speedway Boogie (4:10)
05. Cumberland Blues (3:18)
06. Black Peter (5:46)
07. Easy Wind (5:01)
08. Casey Jones (4:30)

EAC log

Exact Audio Copy V1.3 from 2. September 2016

EAC extraction logfile from 11. July 2017, 21:13

The Grateful Dead / Workingman's Dead (2014 MFSL)

Used drive : PLEXTOR CD-R PREMIUM Adapter: 1 ID: 1

Read mode : Secure
Utilize accurate stream : Yes
Defeat audio cache : Yes
Make use of C2 pointers : No

Read offset correction : 30
Overread into Lead-In and Lead-Out : No
Fill up missing offset samples with silence : Yes
Delete leading and trailing silent blocks : No
Null samples used in CRC calculations : Yes
Used interface : Native Win32 interface for Win NT & 2000
Gap handling : Appended to previous track

Used output format : User Defined Encoder
Selected bitrate : 768 kBit/s
Quality : High
Add ID3 tag : No
Command line compressor : C:\Program Files (x86)\Exact Audio Copy\FLAC\FLAC.EXE
Additional command line options : -6 -e -p -V -T "ARTIST=%artist%" -T "TITLE=%title%" -T "ALBUM=%albumtitle%" -T "DATE=%year%" -T "TRACKNUMBER=%tracknr%" -T "GENRE=%genre%" -T "PERFORMER=%albuminterpret%" -T "COMPOSER=%composer%" %haslyrics%–tag-from-file=LYRICS="%lyricsfile%"%haslyrics% -T "ALBUMARTIST=%albumartist%" -T "DISCNUMBER=%cdnumber%" -T "TOTALDISCS=%totalcds%" -T "TOTALTRACKS=%numtracks%" -T "COMMENT=%comment%" %source% -o %dest%

TOC of the extracted CD

Track | Start | Length | Start sector | End sector
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––-
1 | 0:00.00 | 4:47.53 | 0 | 21577
2 | 4:47.53 | 5:15.67 | 21578 | 45269
3 | 10:03.45 | 3:16.06 | 45270 | 59975
4 | 13:19.51 | 4:09.61 | 59976 | 78711
5 | 17:29.37 | 3:18.23 | 78712 | 93584
6 | 20:47.60 | 5:46.00 | 93585 | 119534
7 | 26:33.60 | 5:00.47 | 119535 | 142081
8 | 31:34.32 | 4:29.52 | 142082 | 162308

Track 1

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\01 - Uncle John's Band.wav

Pre-gap length 0:00:02.00

Peak level 96.9 %
Extraction speed 8.9 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC D5E829DD
Copy CRC D5E829DD
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [9420DE19] (AR v2)
Copy OK

Track 2

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\02 - High Time.wav

Pre-gap length 0:00:03.50

Peak level 73.2 %
Extraction speed 9.9 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 7C713088
Copy CRC 7C713088
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [992CE130] (AR v2)
Copy OK

Track 3

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\03 - Dire Wolf.wav

Pre-gap length 0:00:02.89

Peak level 73.9 %
Extraction speed 10.5 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC F57E804D
Copy CRC F57E804D
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [ADCDAD94] (AR v2)
Copy OK

Track 4

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\04 - New Speedway Boogie.wav

Pre-gap length 0:00:02.72

Peak level 78.1 %
Extraction speed 11.2 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 9266883D
Copy CRC 9266883D
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [750D0277] (AR v2)
Copy OK

Track 5

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\05 - Cumberland Blues.wav

Pre-gap length 0:00:04.73

Peak level 73.3 %
Extraction speed 11.6 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC 0DCCF355
Copy CRC 0DCCF355
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [76A08466] (AR v2)
Copy OK

Track 6

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\06 - Black Peter.wav

Peak level 69.6 %
Extraction speed 12.7 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC AA675BF8
Copy CRC AA675BF8
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [64D35403] (AR v2)
Copy OK

Track 7

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\07 - Easy Wind.wav

Peak level 90.7 %
Extraction speed 13.4 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC CC2B9EC2
Copy CRC CC2B9EC2
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [E4A9AE96] (AR v2)
Copy OK

Track 8

Filename C:\tmp\00_RIPS\08 - Casey Jones.wav

Peak level 83.2 %
Extraction speed 13.8 X
Track quality 100.0 %
Test CRC ACEB0440
Copy CRC ACEB0440
Accurately ripped (confidence 13) [D0C6BB25] (AR v2)
Copy OK

All tracks accurately ripped

No errors occurred

End of status report

–– CUETools DB Plugin V2.1.6

[CTDB TOCID: H23pbv_F0v6I1EG5SBLcYhZiDpE-] found
Submit result: H23pbv_F0v6I1EG5SBLcYhZiDpE- has been confirmed
Track | CTDB Status
1 | (13/13) Accurately ripped
2 | (13/13) Accurately ripped
3 | (13/13) Accurately ripped
4 | (13/13) Accurately ripped
5 | (13/13) Accurately ripped
6 | (13/13) Accurately ripped
7 | (13/13) Accurately ripped
8 | (13/13) Accurately ripped

==== Log checksum 9F519247C31C7DCF7A7A41B3DA1D2C7FE8DC045DE0DD4E5340F4C42CD93A30A4 ====

DR log

foobar2000 1.2 / Dynamic Range Meter 1.1.1
log date: 2017-07-22 23:46:49

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Analyzed: Grateful Dead / Workingman's Dead
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

DR Peak RMS Duration Track
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
DR11 -0.27 dB -15.14 dB 4:48 01-Uncle John's Band
DR10 -2.70 dB -16.31 dB 5:16 02-High Time
DR12 -2.62 dB -16.82 dB 3:16 03-Dire Wolf
DR10 -2.14 dB -15.12 dB 4:10 04-New Speedway Boogie
DR10 -2.69 dB -16.24 dB 3:18 05-Cumberland Blues
DR11 -3.14 dB -18.47 dB 5:46 06-Black Peter
DR12 -0.84 dB -15.39 dB 5:01 07-Easy Wind
DR10 -1.59 dB -13.07 dB 4:30 08-Casey Jones
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

Number of tracks: 8
Official DR value: DR11

Samplerate: 44100 Hz
Channels: 2
Bits per sample: 16
Bitrate: 870 kbps
Codec: FLAC
================================================================================

All thanks to original releaser - mclarenspy

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