With the rise in jam bands in the late eighties and the early nineties, there is no surprise that many would jump on this bandwagon to try and follow the ideas and concepts of The Grateful Dead. The Dave Mathews Band would find themselves to be the most successful, with the exception of the group Phish,

Dave Mathews Band

What I want is what I’ve not got, and what I need is all around me.

Virginia

With the rise in jam bands in the late eighties and the early nineties, there is no surprise that many would jump on this bandwagon to try and follow the ideas and concepts of The Grateful Dead. The Dave Mathews Band would find themselves to be the most successful, with the exception of the group Phish, who’s playing style and technical difficulty could be matched hardly by anyone during this time.

Dave Mathews, the founder of the band, would go on to release numerous albums and allow taping at their shows in order to gain exposure early on, also following the same style of The Grateful Dead and Phish. However, Dave Mathews Band would gain more of the mainstream pop audience and a teenage atmosphere for its audience, which were more prepared to shell out the money for albums as opposed to those others who followed other jam bands around the country.

Starting Up

Dave Mathews was a local bartender in Charlottesville, Virginia when he was told that he should begin recording some of his songs and looking for members to join his ensemble. His first works were not very powerful and it took quite a while for Dave Mathews to find the right people he needed to create the Dave Mathews Band as it would eventually be known. They released their first demo in 1991 and played their first show at the Earth Day Festival in the same year. Finally, in 1993, the Dave Mathews Band released its first album in November called Remember Two Things. The album would prove popular on college charts and eventually go platinum in 2002.

First Originals

The band would release their second studio album on September 20 in 1994, which would feature their first full album of original content. The album would gain them their first commercial hits such as Ants Marching and What Would You Say. After Under the Table, the band would go on to release its first album that would gain them national attention titled Crash. Crash would go on to with the group a Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal for their song So Much to Say.

The band received attention from a more or less college crowd as a jam band, much to the dismay of those followers of The Grateful Dead and Phish. There was a growing bridge between the different following of fans, mostly because many who followed Phish and The Grateful Dead felt that their musicians had not sold out to the mainstream media. However, no matter how much resentment was held in the music world, the Dave Mathews Band solidified their growing audiences and brought them into stardom. Following the jam band format, the group released its first live album titled Live at Red Rocks 8.15.95 (the dates being indicative of earlier bootlegs of jam band greats such as The Grateful Dead, Allman Brothers, and Phish).

Current

The band would continue to release more an more albums with great success. They would collaborate with great instrumentalist such as Bela Fleck and sometimes with bassist Victor Wooten. During the early 2000’s the group began recording another album that was never to see light of day. The album was scrapped after Dave could not come to terms with the recordings of one of the band members Lillywhite.

Some have cited Lillywhite as being the problem; however, many have said that the album was scrapped because many of the members treated the recordings like a frat party instead of a professional recording. After this time, the Dave Mathews Band changed their style and started to produce more mainstream pop style music.

While fans were unsure at first, they followed the crowd and supported the group just as they had in the past. The band can be followed on their official website where one may find free music downloads of the group’s music.

Did You Know

• Dave Mathews Band went for almost two years without officially having a name for their group.

• One of the first albums was dedicated to Mathew’s sister who had been killed earlier in his life.

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