DeadbaseXI

Millionaires do come in handy when you're a struggling rock band...

I'm thinking of how bookings, management, ticket sales etc were run by friends (which became a problem later). On the sound side, they had Bear and his experiments, but they also had Alembic fiddling with equipment and instruments, they founded Round Records and Grateful Dead Records... I gather that the ABB was using "Out of Town Tours" for a while, founded by Sam Cutler when he managed the GD. Was management and PR done by independent companies, by the record company...?

The Grateful Dead maintained their fan base to some extent as a result of more-or-less sanctioned bootleg tapers; was this ever an issue with ABB, and what was their attitude towards it?

The era I had in mind was the 70s; the GD only allowed it officially in 1984, but there was a vibrant trading community beforehand. Good to know, though I heard from a New York area taper that ABB shows (Beacon Runs in the 2000s) were still pretty harsh on it. Maybe he was trying to make a big deal of getting a tape anyway!

Next question: how much of the ABB's operation was "in-house," ie run by friends and acquaintances, and how much of it was done more professionally?

(Question prompted by by a Louis CK bit) Are duck vaginas really a thing?