Warner Bros reissue specialist Rhino Records is preparing a deluxe 50th-anniversary reissue edition of Grateful Dead’s jazziest studio album From The Mars Hotel. The release date is set for June 21, 2024.
The three-disc package features remastered audio by Grammy Award-winning engineer David Glaser, with Plangent Processes tape restoration and speed correction. Produced for release by Grateful Dead Legacy Manager and Audio Archivist David Lemieux, the deluxe edition also includes demos of “China Doll” and “Wave That Flag”—the song that became “U.S. Blues”—as well as a previously unreleased live performance of the Grateful Dead at University of Nevada-Reno on 5/12/1974.
The announcement says:
“Fifty years ago, the Grateful Dead were cooking with gas. It was spring 1974, the band had successfully emerged from a series of hectic, harrowing times, and would soon follow their transformative Wake of the Flood with the second acclaimed album release on their very own Grateful Dead Records, From the Mars Hotel. During the mere eight months that had passed between those two beloved LPs, the group also played some of their most exploratory live music and largest venues to date, famously amplified by the homemade, 75-ton Wall of Sound that they debuted on March 23, 1974, at their hometown Cow Palace in Daly City, CA.”
“In addition to the 50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition, From the Mars Hotel (50th Anniversary Remaster) will be released on June 21 as a single 180-gram black vinyl LP, limited edition Neon Pink vinyl, limited edition “Ugly Rumors” custom vinyl exclusive to Dead.net and a specially-designed picture disc created in partnership with zoetrope pioneer Drew Tetz. When viewed with a camera or strobe, the zoetrope LP will appear to animate.
