Vince Welnick and his tone

I think his skills and playing were fine, and the hate for the sound of his keys is over-blown.

IMO Vince was and continues to be unfairly held as the focal point of what was wrong with the band at that time, probably because most couldn't bring themselves to direct their ire at the heroes, so Vince unfairly has always taken it on the chin.

He may not have been the perfect fit and his sound may have been "plinky" at times, but Vince Welnick was the least of what was wrong with the band during his years.

Lance makes a lot of fair points. I'm not really a Vince fan or anything like that but I don't think he was all that bad. Hr did screw around too much with those new piano sounds. Might have been better time spent to find a decent tone and stick with it. That being said, I think Hornsby was worse. He didn't really give too much energy into his playing and his accordion playing could have been left out and no one would have noticed. Was more just using it as a stepping stone for his own career, at the time. A lot of the times it seemed like he was watching Jerry's chords because he didn't even know the songs they were playing. I saw him play some dead tunes at a festival one year in 2012 and it actually seemed like he appreciates the music a lot more now. But yea I think lance is kinda spot on. Those were just some rough years in general. Jerry was worse than Vince most of the time in 94+95

Vince was at his best when Bruce wasn’t there to step all over everyone 

Vince helped bring some interesting covers into the mix:  It's All Too Much, Baba O'Riley, Strawberry Fields, Rain.  His original contributions were better than Phil's and as good as Weir's.  It's too bad he wasn't turned loose on the B-3.

Pretty sure that Japan gig was a Valentines show. Caught the one they did at the Fillmore. Excellent show.

In the GD, Vinnie was put in a somewhat impossible position throughout his entire tenure. He did it with professionalism and a smile on his face, which is more than you can say for his counterparts.

From a skills perspective, he wasn't hired as some type of improvisational jam master. He was a long standing professional keyboard player who could sing great harmony. And that's exactly what he did. If Garcia wanted him replaced, he would have been gone lickity split in David Kemper-like fashion.

The rig issue has long been discussed. Would he have been better received if he had more input on creating his own fabric of sound? Not sure on the answer to that question but it would have been interesting to see.

I never saw Vince.

Blame Bralove? 

i don't believe he was a good fit.

I only saw Vince.

two months after brent's death they were back at it, right? 

strange. 

Valentines show. Caught the one they did at the Fillmore. Excellent show>>>

Agreed, archive has the goods, Charlie Miller board: https://archive.org/details/valentines1995-02-14.mtx.miller.117207.flac16

Bob Weir
Vince Welnick
Bobby Vega
Henry Kaiser
Prarie Prince

Love's Made A Fool Of You, Greatest, Queen Jane, Man's World, Ain't That Peculiar, Cream Puff War, Schoolgirl, Playin'

Playing With Fire -> Spoonful ->Playing With Fire -> Take Me To The River  It's All Too Much

Japan 8/27/94 another good recording: https://archive.org/details/bobweir1994-08-27.sbd.flac16/weir1994-08-27-...

Greatest, Queen Jane, Rooster, Playin'> Baba>TNK> Watchtower> Lovelight    Saturday Nite   Band is called Special K and the Cereal Killers

Ahh Vince, poor guy, he had his moments, just not too many of em. Never liked his tinny sound, voice or keys.

After the super nova Brent no 5 other guys could do. 

Yes, it was weird that the band barely skipped a beat and only cxld 2 shows of a 3-show Shoreline run, with JGB picking up one night - if I recall correctly. I saw Brent's last shows and Vince's first shows and it was too obvious of the gaping hole left in Brent's absence. I am not sure whom if anyone would have been a better or worse fit under the circumstances as they pressed on to the Europe tour but the band clearly wanted to keep it going. Vince never fully convinced me but I did like "some" of his keyboard work and he could hit some extended high vocals which added a new layer or dimension to what could be some downright chilling and freaky spooky results.

Yo, Vinny!

>>>>two months after brent's death they were back at it, right? 

strange

I agree. Thought it was kinda cold. But I guess the show must go on. They had an empire to feed.

post dead Vince:

Vince Welnick Stops by Studio E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Ep2UJAGCDs

Part 1 / Missing Man Formation @ Studio E 10.4.96

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IXISeryJIYY

Part 1/ David Gans, Vince Welnick, Merl Saunders, Bobby Vega / Interview / 6.21.96

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYU52G9xySc

whether or not he was made to play the type of keys he did or not, I don't know. All I do know is they were terrible. After being such a brent fan and seeing the 1st Vince show, I was like WTF!??!! He spent much of the show smoking cigarettes and was lost...

to replace the power of the B3 and Brent's vocals with that, was....disappointing. 

i don't really blame him, nor hate the guy. tough spot to be in.

however, toe stepping or not, hornsby was on another level of musicisanship. you only need to see his interaction with jerry to see how much he dug it.

I admit, sadly had to turn off the shakedown stream last night in the middle of bird song because I just couldn’t handle the Casio sounds.

I did not like Vince's keyboards. Tinny, contrived sounds full of electronic bells and whistles, without much power, brought the energy down. While he did not totally ruin every song, sometimes his shitty sound trivialized the flow of the jams, perhaps getting in the way of something potentially better.

Vince sang the high part of the harmonies fairly well, which was the reason he got the gig over more talented keyboardists like Pete Sears, for example. Perhaps if Rob Baracco or Mookie Siegel were more well known in 1990, either of those 2 guys would have been a better fit than Welnick. 

Bruce Hornsby was a breath of fresh air, and made the post-Brent transition a positive one. No doubt that he would have been the band's #1 choice if he wanted to be a full time Grateful Dead member. The period that Bruce played as de facto band member was the best of the post-Brent years. Bruce is a superior musician, with X-factor, who grooved well with Jerry and was not debilitated by hard drug use. The GD was so lucky to have him!

After Bruce left, and we were stuck with just Tinny Vinny on keys, the music suffered. True that Vince was not the only reason that the band went down hill from 92-95, but he was a big part of the decline. I like the song Way To Go Home, and enjoyed it in concert, but the rest of Vince's songs were weak, and the Beatles covers were mostly anticlimactic.

Jerry's deteriorating condition was more of a factor than a weak keyboardist, but the weak keys were a downer. Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds always looked better on set lists than the actual performance of the song, usually mailed in as an encore without much high spirited energy. They did a little better with Tomorrow Never Knows, but still it was disappointing that the GD weren't able to fully explore those great psychedelic Beatles songs with the full GD extended jam treatment. 

I enjoyed the whole may 1991 concert streamed last night. It was not the best ever, but still a damn good show. Perhaps the cold, windy weather affected things to the point that full X-factor was not to be reached that night. I did not attend. I was traveling en route with my first wife, moving from Ringwood, New Jersey to San Anselmo, California, enjoying spring skiing in Colorado's Arapahoe Basin.

A few weeks later, my first shows as a California resident were Jerry Garcia Band at The Warfield "Church" with Melvin's full B3 sound and the gospel of the Jerryettes - Fuck Yea! After that I saw all the NorCal GD shows at Shoreline, Oakland, and Cal Expo in Sacramento, and most of the Jerry shows, including the magical acoustic Garcia/Grisman gigs. Overall, I enjoyed JGB at The Warfield much better than GD shows from 1992-95. Many reasons for JGB being better than GD during that era, but one solid factor is that the full soulful sound of Melvin, Jackie & Gloria were a whole lot better and more inspiring than anything Vince could offer. 

>>>I did not like Vince's keyboards. Tinny, contrived sounds full of electronic bells and whistles, without much power, brought the energy down

Just like Jerry's midi space?

Vince was a good keyboard player.  He would not have gotten the gig otherwise.  His sound sometimes sucked, largely because of the folks behind the soundboard, but so did Brent's, Keith's, and Pig's at times.  Keith was the best of them, but even his skill was often limited at times by his exclusive grand piano sound. 

In some respects, I fell sorry for Vince.   His enthusiasm for the gig was evident at the shows.  While the rest of the band's energy sometimes seemed like they weren't really happy to be there, Vince was always smiling and waiving to the crowd.  Imagine going from being nearly broke and living in a barn to being on stage in the biggest and most lucrative rock in roll circus of its time and then have it disappear in a flash when Jerry died.   Wish he would have embraced his Tubes past more after it was all over and not have gotten so fixated on his fall from GD grace after the whole Rat Dog bus incident.  

If you want to hear Vince's potential, check out the first Phil and Friends show from 94.

I am not familiar with the specific effects of Jerry's midi space, or the full extent of the Grateful Dead's electronic gadgets in the 90s. Surely, the electronic invasion was from more than just Vince's equipment. I did not always enjoy the Drumz segment from 1993-95. Instead of huge powerful blasts on actual drum heads that would echo my heart beat and blow me away, Mickey ventured into more goofy, subtle experimental electronic sounds. It may have been thrilling for Mickey at the time, but it was just weird to me, and not interesting or inspiring. 

In the end, the ultimately dissed was handed to Vince post Jerry when the remaining band memebers snubbed him with The Other Ones. Not saying it wasn't entirely justified but they were done with him.

>>>>the ultimately dissed was handed to Vince post Jerry when the remaining band members snubbed him with The Other Ones.

Talking about the Phil Zone of old, I recall seeing a pic someone posted of Vince puking at the 2002 Alpine Valley shows after he showed up and played a gig on his casio in the parking lot.

Again, if he had just told himself, I am luckier than 99.99 percent of all musicians for having been in the biggest touring band of the 90s plus being a member of the Tubes, rather than dwell on the snub, maybe he would be still around playing tunes and spreading good vibes.  Sad.

> his toy, plinky keyboard sound with the Dead
> his tinny sound
> the Casio sounds
> Tinny Vinny

To all of this I'd add that his tone lacked depth to my ears, but as Lance noted, Vince was the least of the GD's problems in the last few years.

Awful and embarrassing. 

I got to know Vince a little when he was playing with Cubensis. Really a nice guy and he kicked ass when playing his way(B3 and all). But he was so oppressed with the Dead. Never got to play his style. Handcuffed is no way to play the keys. I never cared for any of the Brent replacement attempts.  He was just too good.