Original Listing Description

Offered for sale is a vintage concert handbill from a very historical venue called "The Barn" from 1967 (Scotts Valley, CA), which features the bands Spirits, New Delhi River Band, and Peter and his Group, and represents an early branch of the Grateful Dead Family Tree, as the "NDRB" was the first incarnation of the band New Riders of the Purple Sage founded by David Nelson and Dave Tolbert (members of Jerry Garcia's Blue Grass Music circle in Menlo Park CA)(see bio info below). The item measures 7.25" x 6", is in VERY-GOOD condition (see description above), and is very suitable for display in a permanent collection. The asking price is $124.99 + FREE shipping / handling ($12.95 value; US Domestic only), and is the only example of its kind offered for sale on eBay. Thanks for visiting my auction listing, and feel free to contact me with further questions.New Riders of the Purple SageNew Riders of the Purple SageNew Riders of the Purple Sage in 2015. Left to right: Buddy Cage, Michael Falzarano, Johnny Markowski, David Nelson, Ronnie Penque Background Francisco, California, U S GenresProgressive rockYears active1969–1997 2005–2017LabelsColumbiaMCAA MRelixMembersDavid NelsonMichael FalzaranoRonnie PenqueJohnny MarkowskiPast membersSee LineupsWebsitethenewriders comNew Riders of the Purple Sage is an American country rock band. The group emerged from the psychedelic rock scene in San Francisco in 1969 and its original lineup included several members of the Grateful Dead.[2][3] The band is sometimes referred to as the New Riders or as NRPS History[edit]Origins: early roots of the New Riders can be traced back to the early 1960s Peninsula folk/beatnik scene centered on Stanford University's now-defunct Perry Lane housing complex in Menlo Park, California where future Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia often played gigs with like-minded guitarist David Nelson. The young John Dawson (also known as "Marmaduke") also played some concerts with Garcia, Nelson, and their compatriots while visiting relatives on summer vacation. Enamored of the sounds of Bakersfield style country music, Dawson would turn his older friends on to the work of Merle Haggard and Buck Owens and provided a vital link between Timothy Leary's International Federation for Internal Freedom in Millbrook, New York (Dawson having boarded at the Millbrook School) and the Menlo Park bohemian coterie nurtured by Ken Kesey.Inspired by American folk music, rock and roll, and blues, Garcia formed the Grateful Dead (initially known as The Warlocks) with blues singer Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, while Nelson joined the similarly inclined New Delhi River Band (which would eventually come to include bassist Dave Torbert) shortly thereafter. Although they lacked the managerial acumen and cultural cachet of the Grateful Dead and elected to remain in East Palo Alto, California unlike the former group, which soon relocated to the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco, the New Delhi River Band were needed] by late 1966 to be the house band of The Barn[4][5][6] (one of the region's few viable concert venues outside of San Francisco) in Scotts Valley, California. The group continued to enjoy a cult following in Santa Clara and Santa Cruz Counties through the Summer of Love until their dissolution in early 1968.After a period of inactivity Nelson contributed to the Grateful Dead's Aoxomoxoa (1969) sessions and served as the caretaker of Big Brother and the Holding Company's rehearsal space while guitarist Peter Albin and drummer David Getz undertook a European tour with Country Joe & the Fish following the schismatic departure of Janis Joplin and Sam Andrew from the former band in December 1968. During this period Nelson and Garcia played intermittently in an early iteration of High Country, a traditional bluegrass ensemble formed by the remnants of the Peninsula folk scene. Nelson was set to serve as lead guitarist in the reconstituted lineup of Big Brother that coalesced later in 1969 and thus may have contributed to some of the recordings on Be a Brother (1970) during this transitional period Dawson—who dropped out of Occidental College in December 1965 and remained in Los Angeles for several years thereafter, "hanging out with musicians and weirdos"—had returned to Los Altos Hills by early 1969, allowing him to contribute to the Aoxomoxoa sessions and briefly enroll at Foothill College.[7][8] After a mescaline experience at Pinnacles National Park with Torbert and Matthew Kelly, he began to compose songs on a regular basis.[7] Some (such as "Glendale Train" and "I Don't Know You") were traditional country pastiches; a number of others ("Last Lonely Eagle", "Garden of Eden", and "Dirty Business") found him working in a "psychedelic country" fusion milieu redolent of Gram Parsons' nascent Flying Burrito Brothers. "Henry", a traditional shuffle with contemporary lyrics about marijuana smuggling, also dates from this period.Dawson's vision was prescient, as 1969 marked the emergence of country rock via Bob Dylan, The Band, The Flying Burrito Brothers, Poco, the Dillard & Clark Band, and the Clarence White-era Byrds. Around this time, Garcia was similarly inspired to take up the pedal steel guitar, and an informal line-up including Dawson, Garcia, and Peninsula folk veteran Peter Grant (on banjo) began playing coffeehouse and hofbrau concerts together when the Grateful Dead were not touring. Their repertoire included country standards, traditional bluegrass, Dawson originals, and a few Dylan covers ("Lay Lady Lay", "You Ain't Goin' Nowhere", "Mighty Quinn"). By the summer of 1969 it was decided that a full band would be formed and David Nelson was recruited to play lead guitar.In addition to Nelson, Dawson (on acoustic guitar), and Garcia (continuing to play pedal steel), the original line-up of the band that came to be known as the New Riders of the Purple Sage (a nod to the Foy Willing-led Western swing combo from the 1940s, Riders of the Purple Sage, which borrowed its name from the Zane Grey novel) consisted of Alembic Studio engineer Bob Matthews on electric bass and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead on drums; bassist Phil Lesh also played sporadically with the ensemble in lieu of Matthews through the end of the year, as documented by the late 1969 demos later included on the Before Time Began archival release. Lyricist Robert Hunter briefly rehearsed with the band on bass in early 1970 before the permanent hiring of Torbert in April of that year.[9] The most commercially successful configuration of the New Riders would come to encompass Dawson, Nelson, Torbert, Spencer Dryden, and Buddy Cage.Vintage NRPS: 1969–1982[edit] New Riders of the Purple Sage" Armadillo World Headquarters poster by Michael E. Arth 1974After a few warmup gigs throughout the Bay Area in 1969, Dawson, Nelson, and Torbert began to tour in May 1970 as part of a tripartite bill advertised as "An Evening with the Grateful Dead". An acoustic Grateful Dead set that often included contributions from Dawson and Nelson would then segue into New Riders and electric Dead sets, obviating the need to hire external opening acts.By the time the New Riders recorded their first album in late 1970, there were several personnel changes. Hart temporarily left the Grateful Dead in February 1971. Although Hart contributed to two tracks on the album, former Jefferson Airplane drummer Spencer Dryden replaced him in the New Riders prior to his departure from the parent group. Dryden would remain with the group for ten years, ultimately serving as the band's manager.Their first album, eponymously titled was released on Columbia Records (under a contract informed by Clive Davis's long-term aspiration to sign the Grateful Dead) in late 1971. It proved to be a moderate success comparable to the Dead's releases of the era, peaking at No. 39 on the Billboard 200 chart.[2] Entirely composed by Dawson (in comparison to the more egalitarian songwriting of later releases), the record was driven by Garcia's pedal-steel playing.With the New Riders desiring to become more of a self-sufficient group and Garcia needing to focus on his other responsibilities the musician parted ways with the group in November 1971. Seasoned pedal steel player Buddy Cage was recruited from Ian and Sylvia's Great Speckled Bird to replace Garcia. The band's second album, Powerglide (1972), was the first to feature this line-up. The Powerglide album art included a notable caricature of the band members drawn by Lore Shoberg.1973's The Adventures of Panama Red included a Nelson-sung cover of Peter Rowan's "Panama Red" that steadily gained traction as an enduring FM radio staple. The album peaked at No. 55 in Billboard[2] and, albeit as a sleeper hit, marked the band's commercial zenith; in 1979, it was certified gold by RIAA.In the mid-1970s, Radio Caroline adopted the song "On My Way Back Home" from the Gypsy Cowboy album as the station's theme tune. The song was well-suited to the station's album-oriented format of the time, and included the lyric "Flying to the sun, sweet Caroline".The New Riders of the Purple Sage continued touring and releasing albums throughout the late 1970s and early 1980s to an increasingly fallow reception;[2] none of the albums that followed New Riders (1976) charted on the Billboard 200 in antipodal contrast to the widespread mainstream success of the outlaw country movement (exemplified by Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings) and such second-wave country rock groups as The Eagles, Pure Prairie League, and Firefall. The band continued to open several Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia Band shows in 1977 and 1978, including the final concert preceding the closure of Winterland Ballroom on December 31, 1978.In 1974, Torbert left NRPS; he and Matthew Kelly co-founded the band Kingfish (best known for Bob Weir's membership during the Grateful Dead's late-1974 to mid-1976 touring hiatus) the year before. Initially he was replaced by Skip Battin (formerly of Skip & Flip and the early 1970s lineup of The Byrds), who briefly emerged as the dominant creative force in the band due to his prolific songwriting collaboration with controversial Hollywood impresario Kim Fowley. Stephen A. Love of Rick Nelson's Stone Canyon Band and the Roger McGuinn Band replaced Battin after he left the group to co-found a reconstituted lineup of The Flying Burrito Brothers in 1976. Shortly thereafter, Spencer Dryden relinquished his performance duties to manage the group in 1977. His musical replacement was Patrick Shanahan. Allen Kemp joined on bass in 1978 before emerging as a co-frontman on guitar and vocals, contributing prominently to the songwriting for the band's last major label release, 1981's Feelin' All Right.[10]"The Barn" during the mid-to-late 60s, if you visited The Barn in Scotts Valley on a Friday or a Saturday evening, you could hear, not the mooing of cows, but the raucous sounds of rock music. The Barn, which advertised many big-name musicians, featured in Tom Wolfe's Merry Pranksters saga The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, was the go-to place for the hippie community seeking an evening’s entertainment. It was, as Wallace Baine wrote in his 2009 Santa Cruz Sentinel article, “the epicenter of the flower-power movement.” A grandiose description perhaps for a cow barn standing in a field in a quiet, conservative community.There are differences of opinion, or versions shall we say, as to who actually performed at The Barn and who attended. Here are some of the versions. According to several 60s blogs and Scotts Valley residents I’ve talked to, entertainers included Country Joe and the Fish, Janis Joplin and Big Brother and the Holding Company, New Delhi River Band, SF Mime Troupe, and Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band. There are posters floating around online advertising Country Joe, although the print, with its swirly, bulbous, lava-lamp like lettering, is quite hard to read. There are no posters for attendees like hippie culture icon Ken Kesey and his Merry Pranksters. But there are accounts and pictures of Further, the 1939 school bus with the psychedelic designs that Kesey, Neal Cassady, and other Pranksters rode during their historic cross-country trek to the 1964 New York World’s Fair. There are accounts that after they left Kesey’s home in La Honda they stopped off at Scotts Valley and parked Further at The Barn for about a month before proceeding on. There are rumors that the Rolling Stones did sound checks at The Barn. It is said the album cover photographs for Country Joe’s "Electric Music for the Mind and Body" album, which many consider to be the greatest psychedelic album of all time, were taken at The Barn.Why all the uncertainty about The Barn? Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that recollections of those haze-filled days more than 50 years ago seem even hazier now. As ex-hippies are wont to say about those times, if you remember what was going on, you weren’t there. The faded memories and the versions, nevertheless, sparked my imagination and my curiosity to dig further.In the 1960s, the Santa Cruz Mountains and the neighboring City of Santa Cruz began to wake from its slumber. The University of California at Santa Cruz opened, along with the Hip Pocket Bookstore and the Catalyst Coffee Shop in downtown Santa Cruz, transforming that sleepy beach resort into something more interesting, and hip. Highway 17, snaking its way through the mountains and down to the coast, offered a number of offbeat attractions to ensnare visitors. Santa’s Village, The Mystery Spot, and Axel Erlandson’s “Tree Circus” (later to become known as The Lost World because of the added 25-foot tall steel dinosaurs) beckoned bored children riding in the backseats of their cars to beg their parents to stop. The Barn, with its psychedelic murals and light shows, joined the list of curiosities that would beckon a different kind of visitor: the fledgling number of hippies, some of whom were living in nearby communes that were springing up.The Barn, according to information from the Scotts Valley Historical Society, originally operated as the Frapwell Dairy Barn from 1914 to 1948. After that, it was remodeled as a sort of community center gymnasium theater In the mid-60s, Eric Nord, known as Eric "Big Daddy" Nord, a Beat Generation-era nightclub owner who founded the hungry i in San Francisco, and a poet, actor, and hipster as well, who newspaper columnist Herb Caen called the "king of the Beat Generation," converted the barn into The Barn. But it was a Santa Cruz clinical psychologist named Leon Tabory who took over its operation and later bought it who turned it into the happening place it became for a few short years in the late 60s.With these stories and pictures buzzing in my brain, I set off for Scotts Valley. I didn’t expect to find The Barn because I learned from news clips and from Jay Topping of the Scotts Valley Historical Society that it was torn down in 1991. But I wanted to find the spot where it once stood, to soak up as best I could a few of the vibes of its bygone days that I hoped might still be blowing in the wind, so to speak. The quiet, pastoral Scotts Valley of the 60s is today an affluent suburb, a springboard to a string of smaller communities up and down Highway 9, the other route to the coast that offers a long, mountainous drive through pine-scented redwood forests.The Barn stood, it seems, at the corner of Granite Creek Road and Santa's Village Drive, just off Highway 17. For some reason, I expected the area still to be a pastoral, remote expanse, but it isn’t. It is now a busy intersection (well, busy for the area). A church, a self-storage building, and a small strip shopping center stand where cows once munched on grass and hippies later flocked in their retreat to the land, hoping to recapture a simpler time while getting high to the accompaniment of sophisticated, big-city sounds. The Barn of bygone days housed a larger upstairs area that accommodated basketball games (hard to imagine) and theater performances and a smaller downstairs area that served as a coffee house. Psychedelic murals and strobe lights enhanced the happening space. As I stood at that intersection, I tried to imagine the eclectic blues folk country rock sound of Country Joe, or the frenzied wailing of Janis, or the starkly different, simple folksy tunes of The Dead, but the whoosh of the traffic and the lack of a grassy plain prevented that.Much of the reputation of The Barn is wrapped up in the persona of Taboury, who, according to Blaine’s article, “first brought the full-blown hippie aesthetic to the county.”

Note: This item has been sold and is no longer available. This page serves as a historical price reference for Grateful Dead collectors and appraisers.