Dave Essays - Jam Bands, Counterculture Of The 1960s,

Dave Matthews Band Who is the Dave Matthews Band? Five years ago that question would have gotten nothing more than a weird stare and a stupid look. But today you would get everything but that. The Dave Matthews Band is one of the most successful bands of the late 20th century. But many ask how a band so new has become so successful in such a relatively short period of time. Many come to wonder if it was their music, their look, or possibly something else that has made the Dave Matthews Band what they are today. It is my opinion that the Dave Matthews Band's success comes from their earth-toned acoustical music, their buttoned flannel shirts and their khaki pants, their heart-laced lyrics, and the need for many Jerry Garcia "Dead Head" survivors to find a new musical connection to life. Using the Official Dave Matthews Web Page (http://dmband.com) as a reference tool, I found that the life of the Dave Matthews Band saga begins early in 1991.Dave Matthews decided to put the songs he'd been writing on tape. But rather than recording just his voice and guitar, he decided to gather some other musicians to give the project a fuller sound. Carter Beauford, Leroi Moore, Stefan Lessard, and Boyd Tinsley teamed with Dave Matthews and became the Dave Matthews Band. After several rehearsals in basements, they were ready to play in public. The first gig was May 11, 1991 at a party on the roof of an apartment building in Charlottesville. About 40 people were in attendance that night. Their first open-to-the-public performance was at the 1991 Earth Day Festival on Charlottesville, Virginia's Downtown Mall. That exposure led to regular Tuesday night gigs at a small restaurant called Eastern Standard. Before long, the largest music club in town had them playing Tuesday night gigs filling the club to capacity with locals and University of Virginia students week after week. As word spread, the band was playing three- four- five- night tours around the region. As the band's success began to exfoliate, the first album named Remember Two Things was released in August of 1993, shortly followed by Recently released in February of 1994. With 1994 proving to be a big year for the Dave Matthews Band, Under the Table and Dreaming was released on September 27th. This major release is what really made the bands elegant acoustical sound known throughout the United States and Europe (26 March 1999). By this point, many wonder what is next for the Dave Matthews Band. Their audience was growing, but they still didn't have a following that rivaled bands like the Grateful Dead and Phish. But nobody could have predicted what 1995 would bring, both good and bad. Dave Matthews Band (DMB) opened two shows for the Grateful Dead at Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas. Some believe this show was priceless and "one in a million" for the Dave Matthews Band (Pepper). Many of the reasons this show was so important had to do with the attention Dave Matthews Band got from the Grateful Dead's audience. This proved to be an overwhelming significance when the Dead encountered the death of Jerry Garcia later on in the 1995 year. The Grateful Dead had an incredible amount of fans. "The band attracted a cult following in live performances by playing without set lists (lists of songs) in a free improvised format shaped in part by audience rapport" (Garcia). All the "Grateful Dead" fans, better known as "Dead Heads" loved the acoustic sound Garcia provided for the band, and with the newly created vibe of Dave Matthews Band, the transition was an easy one to make. Thus, many of the "Dead Heads" are now faithful followers of the DMB, and many now use Dave Matthews Band as a new musical connection to life. But the death of Jerry Garcia and the flock of newly dedicated fans weren't the only reasons for popularity for the Dave Matthews Band. The sound, the feeling of the music that Dave Matthews Band creates, makes for their own following, like no other before. As David E. Thigpen, author, Time magazine puts it: The DMB offers an alternative to alternative rock: music that is conspicuously eclectic but plainly rooted in the familiar bedrock of Americana, the blues and jazz. By introducing acoustic guitars and shifting tempos punctuated by violins, penny whistles and other flourishes of world music and jazz, the band has forged a cerebral yet commercially appealing sound, surpassing competitors like Phish. (Thigpen) After the release of Under the