To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Grateful Dead, JamBase teamed with Telefunken to produce the Songs Of Their Own 50-day tribute series featuring a daily cover of a Grateful Dead original song and culminating with our grand finale 50th video premiering the day of the final Fare Thee Well show in Chicago on July 5. We started the series with a list of 100 Grateful Dead original songs (exclusively their tunes, not covers they often played) and asked many of our favorite artists to record cover versions either at the JamBase office in San Francisco, at one of the many venues around the Bay Area, at Telefunken’s Connecticut studios and beyond. No song was allowed to be covered twice, and today’s participants Lee Gallagher & The Hallelujah ticketed “I Need A Miracle.”
Eventually becoming an anthem for hopeful ticketless Deadheads, “I Need A Miracle” began Side-B of the Grateful Dead’s 1978 Lowell George-produced Shakedown Street album. The Bob Weir/John Perry Barlow composition made its live debut at Red Rocks Amphitheater on August 30, 1978. Bobby would go on to lead the band through over 250 performances of “I Need A Miracle,” culminating with the final rendition on June 30, 1995 at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh.
Borrowing power by running an extension cord from the nearby Milk Bar, San Francisco natives Lee Gallagher & The Hallelujah promptly set up for this "guerrilla" shoot and quickly started to draw a crowd. The five-piece featuring Lee Gallagher, Kirby Hammel, Jacob Landry, Joe Miller and Jimmy Dewald ended up playing “I Need A Miracle” for our cameras as well as plenty of smartphones that also captured the spirited street performance.
9 years ago
9 years ago