The Pizza Tape, a collection of bootlegged recordings by the late Jerry Garcia, will finally be released in official form on April 25. The "album" was originally recorded by Garcia, Tony Rice and producer David Grisman in February of 1993, and became a staple among Deadhead collectors after a pizza delivery man reportedly stole a copy of the tape from Grisman and made copies for all of his friends.

According to Acoustic Disc's Rob Bleetstein, Grisman finally decided to release his own version of the recording after the songs began to show up as inferior quality MP3s. "David listened to the MP3 version and realized how bad the sound quality was, so he went into his studio and cleaned it up, put some new effects on it, and we're releasing it next month," Bleetstein said.

Garcia sings on all the tracks on the disc. He also plays some blazing guitar on the song "Summertime," along with Tony Rice. As a bonus to fans, Grisman left in all the in-between song patter on the disc.

In other Garcia news, three of his heirs are on the verge of taking the creators of NBC's God, the Devil, and Bob to court, claiming that the primetime animated series' God character looks too much like the Grateful Dead founder. Garcia family lawyer David Phillips told USA Today that not only does "God"'s hair and face resemble Garcia, but added that the cartoon figure "handles his sunglasses the way Garcia did."

Series creator Matthew Carlson insists that Garcia wasn't his model for the character (whose voice is supplied by veteran actor James Garner). Instead, he claims that artist Robert Peluce -- who created the original drawing -- used a cameraman friend as his model. The animated God has also drawn other comparisons -- Washington Post critic Tom Shales says he looks like comedian George Carlin, while Al Kooper, former Dylan sideman and Blood Sweat and Tears founder says, "Every rock star in his fifties, who has put on a little weight and grown a beard to hide a multitude of chins looks exactly like Jerry Garcia."

JAAN UHELSZKI
(March 28, 2000)