The Grateful Dead
Augusta, Maine
October 12, 1984

Lineage: Nakamichi CM-100 mics with CP-4 shotgun caps to a Sony D-5 stereo cassette recorder

This fall East Coast tour of 1984 was the first "entire tour" that I went on. My buddy Tony Bolton came across some cash shortly before tickets went on sale, and we sent in our mail order for two "tour ticket packs" .. two tickets for each night. (Thanks Tony, without your generosity, I could have never made these gigs).  I am not sure, but this may have been the first and only time that you could buy the whole tour in bulk.  Either way, when those tickets came in the mail, we were absolutely out of our heads with delight, as we got great seats for all the shows that were not general admission seating arrangements. We began to make preparations for the tour, including lining up a ride, as neither of us had a dependable car at the time!  I had met an older cat named Mike Rice at a local festival in September, and he had a dependable car but no tickets.  We figured (correctly) that we would be able to get Mike tickets at each show, so we set off on our journey.  

We took with us two Nakamichi CM-100 mics with all the different capsules, and two Sony D-6 tape decks.  We bought a new mic stand before the Richmond show on 10/6, and Mike bought a brand new Sony TC-D5M in New York City right after the Richmond show, so his deck was brand new for the remainder of the tour, and we made a lot of great recordings with it. We picked up a few more decks along the way, and we always had many patchers, so we always had a good number of decks plugged into our rig.  On this particular night, as with most shows on this tour, Tony Bolton and I ran most of the decks, and our buddy Mike roamed the show to take photographs. This particular recording was made Dead Center right in front of the soundboard.  We were truly in the sweet spot. We kept the mic stand at about 6-7 feet per the developing rules for tapers. Remember that this was the last tour before an "official" taper section was created.  The Fall colors in Maine were at their peak, and we were able to camp right at the venue.  It was a GREAT environment for a 2-night stand.  I recall at this 10/12 show they kept the house lights low during halftime, and they opened the loading dock bay doors so that the folks outside could hear and even see the band.  It was a small venue, and even though they had the doors opened, I don't recall any rush of ticketless fans storming the venue.  It was a very chill scene, and the magic was palpable.  I think that history holds that it is unanimous that this 2-night stand at Augusta, particularly this second night, was the highlight of the whole tour, if not the entire year.  Our expanding crew came out of the show with a bunch of killer master tapes, and this particular one was from one of the D-5 decks plugged into our rig.  This tape has been mothballed for 25 years, and now it is in the hands of the GEMS crew.  I think that you will agree that it is among the finest recordings that came out of the venue that night, if not THE finest.  We had consistent good luck and some GREAT taping locations for most every show on this tour.  Augusta was no exception.  

Sadly, many of the 1984 master tapes have been lost, "borrowed", or misplaced over the years.  We did some early digital transfers of some of them probably 15 years ago using a standalone CD burner, including the Augusta shows.  The CDs of my 10/11 show were recently located, and that show was seeded here a short while back.  A CD>EAC>CD>CD>CD>SHN copy of an early transfer of one of our 10/12 tapes made it into circulation many years ago, and both of those still sound great, but this one may just top all of those, as it is a long lost analog master that is getting the GEMS treatment on gear that was not available so many years ago.  HUGE thanks to the GEMS crew!

I have made contact with an old taping buddy that in the late 1990's "borrowed" DOZENS of my 1984-1990 analog masters, and I am working on him to dig them out of storage and get them to the GEMS crew.  I'm crossing my fingers that he will come through some day.

Anyway, here's hoping that this one makes it out for the 25th anniversary of one of the greatest shows by The Grateful Dead that I was ever blessed to witness.  Thank you to all involved (and there are a LOT of you), for making this happen.

Greg Holtz
October 2009

Master Cassette >> Nakamichi DR-1 >> Korg MR-1000 at 1bit/5.6mHZ DSD 

Korg AudioGate Software for DSD to PCM WAV conversion at 24bit/44.1kHz
Transfers, Editing and Mastering by Jamie Waddell on the GEMS Edit Station 
Weiss Saracon for 16 BIT 44.1kHz SRC and POWR-3 Dither 
TradersLilHelper for FLAC8   SBE FREE
Meta-Data with Tag&ReName

Originally seeded at www.shnflac.net Lossless Legs on 
the 25th anniversary of this Historic Concert.

a Project **GEMS** Production

Set One
Tuning
Feel Like A Stranger 
It Must Have Been The Roses
On The Road Again
Jack-A-Roe
It's All Over Now
Cumberland Blues
The Music Never Stopped

Set Two
Cold Rain And Snow 
Lost Sailor > 
Saint Of Circumstance > 
Don't Need Love > 
Uncle John's Band >
Drums >
Space >
Playin' Reprise > 
Uncle John's Band >
Morning Dew
Encore
Good Lovin'


It's Really Good.

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