Bill Cutler - Crossing The Line

Grateful Dead sidekick’s album 30 years in the making

Originally a New Yorker with his roots in the coffee house folk scene, Bill Cutler is known primarily as a footnote in the extended family of the San Francisco Bay Area’s psychedelic country rock scene, later moving into production and management. He’s worked with various members of The Grateful Dead (and their side projects such as Bob Weir’s Kingfish), Moby Grape and Jefferson Airplane.

This album is somewhat schizophrenic, having been begun in the 70s with the tapes dusted-off and completed only recently. Cutler’s been able to call on any number of high profile SF musicians, yet the generic modern fairy dust applied to the material renders it bland. Six tracks featuring Jerry Garcia are unassuming country-rock, with Jerry’s tasty licks turning rather pedestrian fare into something quite charming. The extended jamming of the nine-minute closer, Delta Nightingale, comes closest to the Dead’s alchemy. Unfortunately, the rest of the album consists of fairly tedious, four-to-the-floor, mid-tempo rock with much needless axe-wrangling by people who should know better, such as the Grape’s Jerry Miller and the Airplane’s Jorma Kaukonen. It’s proficient but ultimately forgettable. Only Garcia completists need bother.

2 stars 2 stars

Magnatude | PR-2316

Reviewed by Chris Jones
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