Grateful Dead

2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. (TBD) / Amazon Canada (TBD)
2LP (The Best of The Grateful Dead Live, Vol. 1 1969-1977): Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. (TBD) / Amazon Canada (TBD)

How to distill the Grateful Dead's enormous live legacy into one collection?  Rhino gives the massive undertaking its best shot with this new 2-CD anthology, featuring 19 tracks drawn from live albums released on Warner Bros. and Arista during the group's tenure, as well as several select archival titles released after Jerry Garcia's passing in 1995. (This includes a track from the Cornell show of last year's stellar May 1977: Get Shown The Light, considered by many to be among the group's absolute best live performances.) From a rousing rendition of "St. Stephen" from a Fillmore West gig in 1969, captured on the Dead's inaugural live album Live/Dead, to Garcia's final performance with the band on "So Many Roads" in Chicago in 1995, the cream of the crop is all here.  Also due for release is a vinyl version, The Best of The Grateful Dead Live Vol. 1: 1969-1977, which replicates the material from the first disc of this set on two 180-gram LPs.