Wall of Sound (Grateful Dead)

Because each speaker carried just one instrument or vocalist, the sound was exceptionally clear and free of intermodulation distortion.

The completed Wall of Sound made its touring debut on March 23, 1974, at the Cow Palace in Daly City, California.

As Stanley described it, The Wall of Sound is the name some people gave to a super powerful, extremely accurate PA system that I designed and supervised the building of in 1973 for the Grateful Dead.

It was a massive wall of speaker arrays set behind the musicians, which they themselves controlled without a front of house mixer.

The vocalist sang into the top microphone, and the lower mic picked up whatever other sound was present in the stage environment.

Frequent guest keyboardist Ned Lagin (best known for performing experimental interludes with various permutations of Lesh, Jerry Garcia and drummer Bill Kreutzmann throughout 1974 set breaks) preferred to play through the powerful vocal subsystem (considered to be the best part of the system); however, the group's sound crew often neglected to switch between his quadrophonic input and the vocal input during long sequences, resulting in few of his contributions being recorded.

The rising cost of fuel and personnel, as well as friction among many of the newer crew members and associated hangers-on, contributed to the band's "retirement" after the 16 to 20 October 1974 shows in San Francisco's Winterland Ballroom.