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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 13, 1977)
Terrapin Station Dead’s latest production loses live sound Terrapin Station The Grateful Dead Produced by Keith Olsen Arista Records The first album they didn’t pro duce themselves, Terrapin Sta tion represents a bit of a change for the Dead. There are sounds on i: The Grateful Dead. They’ve been around a long time (their first album was recorded over 10 years ago) but have managed to change and grow. Over the years the band has picked up a group of fanatic followers, some of whom probably didn't like the change represented by the Dead s new album, Terrapin Station. the album (which were produced in the studio) that really couldn’t be made during live perfor mances. ‘ Estimated Prophet" (written by Bob Wier, who plays rhythm guitar) is really the only new song on the first side that s worth much. Wier’s role in the band has changed over the years (he was most prominent about the time his single album, Ace, came out) and while he's a bit of a male chauvinist (he was responsible for the song “Sugar Magnolia”), he writes songs that are complicated, but listenable. “Passenger” (written by bassist Phil Lesh) is a rocker that is, sim ply put, terrible. And while “Sun rise” (written by Donna God chaux) is a pretty tune, it doesn’t stand up to repeated listenings like some other Grateful Dead tunes. The other songs, “Dancin’ in the Streets" and “Samson and De lilah,” are tunes the Dead had done live for a while but the album wouldn’t have suffered if they had left "Dancin’ in the Street" off. While “Samson and Delilah” (ar ranged by Wier) has an interesting rhythm, “Dancin’ in the Streets” just won't stand the transition from performance to vinyl. The second side has only one song, “Terrapin Station,” and is pretty good, especially at the first. Toward the end it gets too orches trated (with a choir and French horns) but it’s a logical extension of Blues for Allah, viewing the studio as a different environment than performances. While it’s a lit tle short, the song displays some of the talent the Dead have. Garcia does the vocals, and the drumming of Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann is impressive. It’s too bad “Terrapin Station” wasn’t among the songs the Dead played at their recent Portland concerts (Oct. 1 and 2) because it would have been interesting to see what was done with it live. On the whole, the album lacked the impact of others the band has put out. While the first side rep resents the Dead's move over the last couple of years to cash in on the big bucks being spent on music, the album’s well worth ad ding to your collection. As for the concerts, Paramount lines are a real drag; Saturday night’s crowd was a little young; but it was good to see the Dead again. As is always the case when they play out of San Francisco, the Dead played an awful lot of tunes (it wasn’t until Sunday that they turned more towards anonymous music), but they played a lot of old (Continued on Page 10B) The River (Continued from Page 3B) another. The rhythms of life, of growth and change and coming of age, of understanding and accept ing both the promises of life and its disappointments, are the essence of the film. Finally, just as the river and the natural order form the physical context for the film s story, so death and birth perfectly define its spiritual context. Death and birth are absolutes that make all other experiences, by their sheer lack of permanence, seem tnvial. At the end of the film, the three young women whose interest in the same man has dominated the story, all receive letters from him; as they sit down to read them, they hear the sound of a crying new born baby, and, in the face of the event that heralds, simultane ously rise and discard the sud denly unimportant letters. Life is timeless, its rhythms, deeply em bedded in the natural universe: joy, suffering, confusion, and tranquility, and even birth and death, are experiences to be ac cepted, not rebelled against. In the most striking visual coup of the film, Renoir shows a series of characters sleeping in the af ternoon heat, the camera moving in toward some, pulling back from others. The final sleeping figure, the film s central character and narrator, is awakened from her rest, and shortly later approaches a tree. As she does so, the camera gently pans to reveal yet another reclining figure, the body of her dead brother. The matter-of-factness with which the film introduces the fact of death emphasizes yet again how all human experience is of the same cosmic fabric; even death is simply another state of being, dif ferent from sleep in degree rather than in kind. Ultimately, it is possible to do no more than hint at and savor a few of the glories of The River. At this level of artistry, criticism is virtually irrelevant; no commentary can be nearly as valuable as a simple re minder that the film is playing Fri day through Tuesday at Cinema7. The River's co-feature, Ohayo (Good Morning), Japanese mas ter Vasujiro Ozu's wry and whim sical look at the generation gap, is itself a delight. The two in combi nation form a program not to be missed. FT1"-"-™-”" TODAY & TOMORROW ONLY! 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