@Mshow96 said:

Does anyone have an actual time stamp they’d like to share for where this China>Rider tease is in either CDT or Piper? and a good example from the GD for comparison? Thanks in advance.

GD China Cat - Bobby cues the descending chord progression at 7:48, and Trey begins the same progression at 3:10 in the LivePhish Piper.. Trey plays it 3 times and on the 3rd time he resolves it in a way that’s different than the Dead do. After that they play it a 6 more times, now alternating the descending chords with an improvised resolution either up or down (alternating this 3 times as well).

GD Mind Left Body Jam - Jerry begins this classic MLB riff or motif at 0:24.. You can hear Trey hit the same chromatic pattern at 4:04 of the LivePhish KDF.

The China Cat jam is a walk down from the IV chord to the I in Major scale (or Mixolydian substituting the iiidim with a iii, there’s lots of ways to notate this). MLB jam is based around a 4 note descending chromatic riff, or motif, or a pattern suggested by a chord progression that’s highlighted by the chromatic motion of one or more instruments. There’s different chords that can be played over top or used to create this motion, which is why it’s more of a theme or a motif that is then improvised over - sometimes with different chords and melodies - and making it a little unique each time it rears its head.

The Dead jammed into the MLB theme particularly often 1973-74 right after Jerry and Mickey appeared on a Jefferson Airplane-adjacent album that included the track - Your Mind Has Left Your Body - which is centered around this progression (Jer’s on pedal steel). The Dead swore up and down that this wasn’t an intentional quoting of YMHLYB, and that they had no idea what fans were on about. In fact, on several official releases longtime GD archivist Dick Latvala would call it something like Mud Love Buddy for the MLB jam out of Terrapin in Dozin at the Knick, OR (and this is where it gets REALLY confusing) on Dick’s Pick’s Twelve the aforementioned progression China > Rider transition jam (that primarily appeared in the EXACT the exact same era of 73-74) was erroneously labeled Mind Left Body Jam.

Both of these things, the 4 chord IV > I descending pattern AND the 4 note chromatic descending pattern can absolutely be played without being an intentional nod, as the Dead demonstrated, because they’re both just ear catching musical ideas. No one has a monopoly on that sort of scale movement or chromatic movement, which makes identifying them a little divisive. Was Trey consciously channeling China Cat or was he just walking down the scale? Who’s to say. MLB will get labeled as such whenever that 4 note pattern appears regardless if the pattern was an intentional quoting of something that’s been done before or just something that they improvised in the moment (like the Dead claimed it was each time they played it).

Similarly, not every progression that goes up the first 4 chords of a minor scale (usually expressed in a Dorian feel, or ii > iii > IV > V because the ear really digs that) is a direct quote or jam off of Tweezer Reprise, it’s just musical, but Phish fans will find it to be familiar. So does 6/19/04 Piper have a Tweezer Reprise Jam? Does it quote Tweezer Reprise? Or is it a jam that contains elements of Tweezer Reprise?

There’s only so many patterns you can make with the twelve tones in western music, and so you’re going to retread similar territory whether you mean to or not. Still, the Jazz tradition will label these sorts of things as quotes or will consider certain chord progressions as still being somewhat rooted to an ancestral form even if they’ve been stretched completely beyond recognition by all sorts of advanced chord substitutions - see “Rhythm Changes.” The Jazz style Bebop was all about this idea.

Folk and Blues traditions too center around lyrical references (and sometimes melodic as well) such as “Fennario” or the “Candyman,” whether we’re talking about English Folk or Black traditions, that are built upon, referenced, and recombined over the course of decades or even hundreds of years.. And these sorts of things can and have been categorized, catalogued, and indexed (see the Roud Folk Index or the Annotated Dead Lyrics).

In both of these traditions (which the Dead and subsequently Phish were heavily influenced by) you don’t usually need intentionality for something to be noted as a quote or reference or motif or chord changes if it fits a previously established one. Especially because it may not be conscious or intentional, but rather the result of internalizing and being a part of these enormous songbooks and traditions.

From that standpoint I’d consider KDF from the other night to include a MLB Jam and Piper to contain a China > Rider tease (a little harder to pin down the label on this one, since it’s not technically a part of either song). But it’s clear why this kind of labeling and identification is often divisive and highly subjective. At the end of the day I’ll leave the “official” notation to the suits in Washington, and I’ll just enjoy the sweet sweet jams as I see fit