tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-54935573134109692822024-03-17T20:02:29.786-07:00Lost Live DeadIdentifying and illuminating live Grateful Dead shows (and shows by band members) that are unknown or poorly documented.Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.comBlogger290125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-86932450378631312332023-12-22T07:42:00.000-08:002024-01-09T18:09:19.981-08:00Jerry Garcia Live on KZSU-fm, Stanford University, 1973-89 (KZSU II and FM XV)<p><br />
</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzLGahkbkEBiccNZxcGWSWqRfxpXapavV1MbaByME3XtUgwtwfy9plvNKJtEHII-MGxU0X0gQo-5Bexy4VB3xHJdb_zUIK9nW_AkZYsAJUF9d7-ZFe6nPQK6lDwP6bT_gXRiXQKWfFyxk/s607/Homers+Warehouse+19730504.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="397" data-original-width="607" height="209" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzLGahkbkEBiccNZxcGWSWqRfxpXapavV1MbaByME3XtUgwtwfy9plvNKJtEHII-MGxU0X0gQo-5Bexy4VB3xHJdb_zUIK9nW_AkZYsAJUF9d7-ZFe6nPQK6lDwP6bT_gXRiXQKWfFyxk/s320/Homers+Warehouse+19730504.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The two May '73 Garcia/Saunders shows at Homer's Warehouse were broadcast on KZSU-fm</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Jerry Garcia had a long and storied history as a performing artist, in numerous aggregations, the most famous of which was the Grateful Dead. One of the many innovations that the Dead popularized for rock music were live performance broadcasts. A few legendary radio stations, like KSAN-fm in San Francisco, KPFA-fm in Berkeley and WNEW-fm in New York, have a particularly legendary status amongst Deadheads for their historic and widely circulated broadcasts of Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia concerts. Yet the first, seminal and arguably longest broadcaster of Garcia performances has gone largely unnoticed. KZSU, the Stanford University radio station, not only broadcast Jerry Garcia as far back as late 1962, they broadcast him regularly until 1988. The only comparable station in Garcia or Dead history might be KPFA-fm in Berkeley, which has an equally storied Jerriad saga, which I will get to eventually. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/12/jerry-garcia-live-on-kzsu-am-and-fm.html">I wrote an extensive post on Jerry Garcia's performance history on KZSU in the early 60s</a>. <p></p><p>Appropriately enough, <a href="http://jerrygarcia.shop.musictoday.com/Product.aspx?cp=640_82736&pc=JYCD62">Jerry Garcia's first studio recording was broadcast on KZSU in Fall 1962, and the Garcia Estate has released that long lost recording as <i>Folk Time</i></a>. The story of KZSU and Jerry Garcia, however, went far beyond the early 1960s, so in this post I will unravel the tale of Garcia's 70s and 80s performances on KZSU.</p><p><i><b>KZSU-880 AM and 90.1 FM</b></i><br />Stanford University radio station KZSU had been founded in 1947. Initially it was only accessible on 880-AM on the Stanford campus dorms and fraternities. Throughout the 1960s, however, almost all Stanford undergraduates lived on campus. Undergraduate women were required to live in campus in the dorms, as sororities had been closed some decades earlier. Thus, while KZSU had limited range, it had an outsized importance to campus life. In 1964, KZSU added an FM frequency. 90.1 FM was accessible to all, but since the transmitter had only 10 Watts, KZSU-fm was only audible in Palo Alto and Menlo Park. In the 1960s, however, FM receivers were rare, and usually confined to the type of guy--always a guy--with an expensive "Hi-Fi" stereo receiver (for more detail about KZSU, see Appendix 1 below). </p><p>Two restless young doctors had started a Folk Club above The Tangent deli at 117 University Avenue in Palo Alto. It was near the campus, and serious folk music was usually directed at college students. Stanford student Ted Claire arranged to tape the weekend shows at the Top Of The Tangent for a weekly Tuesday night broadcast on KZSU called "Flint Hill Special." Although only audible in the dorms (and frats), the Flint Hill Special is why there were tapes of Jerry Garcia in various ensembles in 1963 and 1964 (some later released as <i>Before The Dead</i>). <a href="https://www.discogs.com/Mother-McCrees-Uptown-Jug-Champions-Live-At-The-Top-Of-The-Tangent-1964/release/4838807">KZSU broadcast live tapes of folk music from the Top Of The Tangent at least as late as the Summer of 1964</a> (for a summary of the early days of live broadcasts on KZSU, see the summary in Appendix 2, and <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/12/jerry-garcia-live-on-kzsu-am-and-fm.html">see my earlier post for more detail</a>). <br />
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</b></i></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbuQHfuixol6RLgi4hIUnzX7j7ulsociGSqE1wET7SERzTTvW0H9cUS4mZ2M1W93Wk8Mc8XnEvytB7lVrC9YP726C4AYZFU_M5OrUPnQwL_VpNpv7gYFk_ijErmcLVu5aJvivZ0geCvv0/s739/67-07-02-Palo+Alto+BeIn+Stanford+Daily+19670704.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="739" data-original-width="706" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbuQHfuixol6RLgi4hIUnzX7j7ulsociGSqE1wET7SERzTTvW0H9cUS4mZ2M1W93Wk8Mc8XnEvytB7lVrC9YP726C4AYZFU_M5OrUPnQwL_VpNpv7gYFk_ijErmcLVu5aJvivZ0geCvv0/s320/67-07-02-Palo+Alto+BeIn+Stanford+Daily+19670704.jpg" width="306" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The July 4, 1967 Stanford Daily described the Grateful Dead's appearance at a Be-In at Palo Alto's El Camino Park on Sunday, July 2</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b><br />Live Rock Music In Downtown Palo Alto</b></i><br />Folk music was popular at Stanford and in Palo Alto, but it disappeared in a cloud of funny smelling smoke. This happened in college towns and Universities all over the United States, particularly on the West Coast and the Northeast. In Palo Alto, however, unlike every other place, these strange influences weren't some mystery wind blowing in from out of town. The call, as they say, was coming from inside the house. The Top of The Tangent crowd were right in the thick of the psychedelic revolution. <a href="https://inmenlo.com/2010/05/29/paul-dicarli-hanging-out-with-ken-kesey-on-perry-lane/">Ground Zero was Ken Kesey's cottage on Perry Lane in Menlo Park</a>, within easy walking distance of the Tangent. The doors of perception were busted open a few miles South of the Tangent--but still in Palo Alto--<a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2017/07/palo-alto-psychedelic-rock-shows-1965.html">at the Palo Alto Acid Test at The Big Beat on December 18, 1965.</a><p></p><p>In 1966, Stanford University held numerous rock concerts, featuring legendary acts in their prime. Yet the Grateful Dead had played the Tresidder Student Union on October 14, 1966 and there were no more concerts in Stanford facilities. <a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2010/12/december-3-1966-658-escondido-drive.html">Big Brother and The Holding Company headlined a "Happening" at the Wilbur dorm complex on December 3, 1966, and no such events were ever held again, at least officially</a>. Good times were being had, very good times, and Stanford University was definitely not down with it.</p><p>Two things happened in downtown Palo Alto in the Spring and Summer of 1967, within a few blocks of each other. <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2017/10/the-poppycock-and-palo-alto-psychedelic.html">First, in April of 1967, a fish-n-chips joint at 135 University (at High Street), just two doors from the Tangent, added live bands and a light show</a>. In 1967, Fish-and-Chips was exotic foreign cuisine (I swear I am not making this up--<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H._Salt_Esquire">the competing shop was called H Salt</a>), so that made the Poppycock suitably exotic for must-be-cool Palo Alto. Also, there were no bars in downtown Palo Alto (nor would there be until 1981), so a place that served foreign food and beer to hippies was enough for a hip music hangout. </p><p>The second thing was that some rebellious University types started something called The MidPeninsula Free University, known locally as "Free You." Free You offered non-standard classes. All jokes about "underwater basket-weaving" for college credit can be traced back to Free You. To raise money, the MPFU had a series of free "Be-In" concerts at El Camino Park, just a few blocks from the Tangent and the Poppycock. How free concerts raised money has never been fully explained, but Palo Alto had six such events in 1967 and '68. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/06/july-2-1967-el-camino-park-palo-alto-ca.html">The most famous one was July 2, 1967, when the Grateful Dead returned to town to headline the <i>Mary Poppins Umbrella Festival</i> on a Sunday afternoon</a>. The musicians from the Tangent had returned, heavily armed with electricity.</p><p>Over at the Poppycock, the house band was The Flowers, who had changed their name to Solid State by the time of the Mary Poppins Umbrella Fest. The Flowers were mostly a jazz group, but they played electric instruments, loud, and they had the old equipment from the Merry Pranksters, so they were part of the new psychedelic rock world (<a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2020/08/the-flowerssolid-state-south-bay.html">you can read the entire saga of The Flowers in a different post</a>). Initially, the Flowers, and later Solid State, played every weekend at the Poppycock, but over time the club booked different acts every weekend. It was the Bay Area in the late 60s--there were plenty of bands, and a lot of them were really good.</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6m7GJAKnw4pYJ6nqk-UEzjLwPNfKLN-bA-R7eB6S2kgtaUIP2060vL0geoi1-Z1Gr8UkHjubIyEibFrweBqHtyBOnB5D2Zi26C6Sb8WR8ON1OJLqMuE5woWHogbXBeq7A7oIFLZEuw_w/s1600/Stanford_Daily_19680419_0001+Creedence.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="317" data-original-width="615" height="164" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6m7GJAKnw4pYJ6nqk-UEzjLwPNfKLN-bA-R7eB6S2kgtaUIP2060vL0geoi1-Z1Gr8UkHjubIyEibFrweBqHtyBOnB5D2Zi26C6Sb8WR8ON1OJLqMuE5woWHogbXBeq7A7oIFLZEuw_w/s320/Stanford_Daily_19680419_0001+Creedence.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Stanford Daily of April 19, 1968 mentions broadcasting then-unknown Creedence Clearwater Revival live (on KZSU-fm radio)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div><p><i><b>KZSU-fm Live Broadcasts</b></i><br />It's always fun to make fun of Palo Alto--I never tire of it--but the city has legs to stand on. There were lots of college radio stations in the 1960s, most of them fairly dormant until the 1970s. KZSU, however, started doing live remote broadcasts from the Poppycock as early as February 1968. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/02/grateful-dead-live-fm-broadcasts-1968.html">At this time, KMPX-fm in San Francisco was quite literally the first "underground" rock radio station in the country, and they had only started doing live rock broadcasts in the Summer of '67</a>. KZSU very well may have been the second such station. The initial broadcast (per the Stanford <i>Daily</i>) was a comedy trio called <a href="http://thecongressofwonders.com/">Congress Of Wonders</a>. Congress Of Wonders is largely forgotten now, but their hip comedy was played regularly on the radio once their albums were released (<a href="https://youtu.be/O53xUPqE4jw">"Pigeon Park" remains a classic</a>).<br /></p><p>The first real rock band broadcast from the Poppycock by KZSU was on March 22, 1968, featuring another local act: the newly-named Creedence Clearwater Revival. The band headlined the Poppycock on Friday and Saturday night, and the first set on Friday night was broadcast on the radio station. It would only be audible on the Stanford campus and nearby Palo Alto and Menlo Park, but who else was going to the Poppycock? No tape survives of this, to my knowledge, but the fact that it happened at all sets Palo Alto apart whether you like it or not.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZ7jb-SLAxE9_RIeIRztWW_4uZC4EjeDLw12wAY6V4usTDFpmTFzXm8i46tDFHhcaqoOuGnJe6ibQhwTzz4kzsbSso43VJZo6rb_DfGGBxLlNJ3_ywndU6Tdi82T5MwRGYNgS6ndLh5Hs/s1600/Stanford_Daily_19691126+KZSU.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="660" data-original-width="304" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgZ7jb-SLAxE9_RIeIRztWW_4uZC4EjeDLw12wAY6V4usTDFpmTFzXm8i46tDFHhcaqoOuGnJe6ibQhwTzz4kzsbSso43VJZo6rb_DfGGBxLlNJ3_ywndU6Tdi82T5MwRGYNgS6ndLh5Hs/s320/Stanford_Daily_19691126+KZSU.jpg" width="147" /></a></div>As to other events, a tape has circulated of the Lafayette (Contra Costa County) band Frumious Bandersnatch, from May 31, 1969. The Stanford <i>Daily</i> mentioned a few broadcasts as well: The Apple Valley Playboys on November 26, 1969, and the bluegrass team of Vern And Ray on January 22, 1970. I suspect there were a few other live broadcasts from The Poppycock in '68 and '69 that for which we have no references. The Poppycock closed in Spring 1970, squeezed because its small size (capacity probably about 250) was not substantial enough to book popular local bands. <a href="http://www.plosin.com/MilesAhead/Sessions.aspx?s=721001">I know that Miles Davis was broadcast on KZSU when they broadcast his Frost Amphitheatre show on October 1, 1972</a>, but I have no idea if jazz broadcasts were rare or common. <br /><p></p><p><a href="https://cryptdev.blogspot.com/2020/07/tales-from-in-your-ear-live-music-in.html">In May, 1971, the site of The Poppycock became the club In Your Ear, which was sort of a jazz club, but with a much more eclectic booking policy</a>. Besides jazz, In Your Ear featured blues, a little rock and some folk music, too, similar in many ways to what the Great American Music Hall would book a few years later. The intriguing club came to an abrupt halt when a pizza oven fire burned down the building on December 31, 1972. Live music pretty much disappeared from downtown Palo Alto after that. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHFLMwLCaH3_EdqbDZdtalbtAXP7EHHEwO49w6QMzBrRkDpMJdi_Ljq3ZG5pBEImqHG2qn8kl1xlF3Ys96e1Di9rW_Ehwgp-SftVhXW3JPLwkR-OoU8tGan_zGVMMY-7wG3iq7QnleCx0/s500/Homers+Warenhouse+19730418.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="375" data-original-width="500" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHFLMwLCaH3_EdqbDZdtalbtAXP7EHHEwO49w6QMzBrRkDpMJdi_Ljq3ZG5pBEImqHG2qn8kl1xlF3Ys96e1Di9rW_Ehwgp-SftVhXW3JPLwkR-OoU8tGan_zGVMMY-7wG3iq7QnleCx0/s320/Homers+Warenhouse+19730418.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>Homer's Warehouse, 79 Homer Avenue, Palo Alto, CA</b><br />Homer's Warehouse was an old quonset storage building next to the train tracks, at 79 Homer Avenue. It was in walking distance of downtown, although you had to take a pedestrian tunnel under the train tracks (for Palo Alto locals, Homer's Warehouse was behind Town And Country Village, and the site is now a parking lot for the Palo Alto Medical Center). The club was intermittently open in mid-1971, appealing to bikers and the like, and marginally tolerated by the police since it was not in downtown itself. <a href="https://cryptdev.blogspot.com/2020/07/live-music-in-palo-alto1971-73-across.html">In late 1972, the venue was taken over by local entrepreneurs Andrew Bernstein and Rollie Grogan</a>. Bernstein wrote about his adventures at Homer's Warehouse in his 2018 self-published biography <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/California-Slim-Music-Magic-Madness/dp/1525539396/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=california+slim+andrew+bernstein&qid=1629481027&s=books&sr=1-1">California Slim: The Music, The Magic and The Madness.</a> </i><br /><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXPKcWWDRuHvTN8WGx7PtJyzaOgX3mpiBVMUvc-yZWNeLwFpTXkU_EbrlFwYu1axeS-w7QusXIwasOuxMsqJPoGvkqFsZPnE8TZGQESvgE2oizyBs7U39z11tL7F96bqRw6CyFTl_Lm44/s620/Homers+Warehouse+19730724.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="465" data-original-width="620" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXPKcWWDRuHvTN8WGx7PtJyzaOgX3mpiBVMUvc-yZWNeLwFpTXkU_EbrlFwYu1axeS-w7QusXIwasOuxMsqJPoGvkqFsZPnE8TZGQESvgE2oizyBs7U39z11tL7F96bqRw6CyFTl_Lm44/s320/Homers+Warehouse+19730724.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />It is well-known that Jerry Garcia and Old And In The Way broadcast a set on KZSU on July 24, 1973. I myself heard that show. It was, quite literally, the first time I had ever heard bluegrass music. At the time, it was easier to read about new music than hear it. I had read that Garcia was playing banjo in a bluegrass group that played local clubs, but I was too young to go to any nightclub, and in any case I had no car and no money and lived in the suburbs. I knew that bluegrass was some sort of country sub-genre, but I didn't know what it sounded like. When I stumbled onto the KZSU broadcast that night--I used to listen to KZSU regularly--I knew it was Garcia playing bluegrass. It was the first time I heard "Panama Red" and "Lonesome LA Cowboy," among other things, as the New Riders of The Purple Sage versions had not yet been released. Andrew Bernstein describes booking Old And In The Way in some detail, including having Asleep At The Wheel as an opening act. <p></p><p>Bernstein was a Palo Alto native, and had taken banjo lessons from Garcia back in 1963 or so, as a high school student. He knew Kreutzmann and Pigpen as well, and while he hadn't been in touch with the Dead once they moved to San Francisco, he had more of a connection than a regular club owner might. Old And In The Way had been booked at Homer's Warehouse for one of their very first concerts back on March 8, 1973, and Garcia and Merl Saunders had played a successful weekend in May, and then Old and In The Way again later in May, so it's no surprise that Old And In The Way returned. The first set was broadcast, and people were implicitly encouraged to come down to the club for the second set. I could have walked the dog over there, I guess--it was only a few blocks away from my house--but I didn't realize that while I was listening.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaWlbzlmK8wxlP5pXeJvyMHZBF6oIqZFsJJpTQpqn8W2atA22UaauV77MA_A56NtlrLn7UJz62CDR-5dvKq9UckeIVQ0QZ-ztoOtw8pPvDVvzvczxupj8DlTSa1U8duBdseFfNC4M5VjQ/s607/Homers+Warehouse+19730504.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="397" data-original-width="607" height="209" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjaWlbzlmK8wxlP5pXeJvyMHZBF6oIqZFsJJpTQpqn8W2atA22UaauV77MA_A56NtlrLn7UJz62CDR-5dvKq9UckeIVQ0QZ-ztoOtw8pPvDVvzvczxupj8DlTSa1U8duBdseFfNC4M5VjQ/s320/Homers+Warehouse+19730504.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><i><b>Homer's Warehouse and KZSU</b></i><br />Bernstein tells an unheard story about the link between Homer's Warehouse and KZSU, and how they came to broadcast Jerry Garcia. Most intriguingly, Bernstein says that the two Garcia/Saunders shows at Homer's on May 4-5, 1973 were both broadcast on KZSU. Per Bernstein, the Old And In The Way July broadcast followed from the initial ones in May. We don't have any airchecks of the May JGMS shows, which isn't surprising, as few people had cassette decks, and fewer still would have been in the range of KZSU's 10-watt transmitters. <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2012/04/ln-jg1973-05-04jgmsallsbd.html">In any case, we have Betty Boards for both shows, so we don't need the FM broadcasts</a>. But Bernstein's descriptions of the circumstances of the KZSU broadcasts have gone unnoticed, so I am inserting them here (please note that 30 years after the fact, Bernstein's memories are not particularly sequential and some details appear questionable. Decide for yourself how much corrective analysis is needed). <a href="https://www.amazon.com/California-Slim-Music-Magic-Madness/dp/1525539396/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=california+slim+andrew+bernstein&qid=1629481027&s=books&sr=1-1">Bernstein describes the May 4 set-up in detail</a>:<blockquote>Rollie's [<i>Grogan, Bernstein's partner</i>] biggest triumph to date came on the afternoon he booked Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders for a weekend show. Joining them on May 4th and 5th, 1973 would be John Kahn on electric bass and Ron Tutt, Elvis's old drummer and famed Nashville studio percussionist...[<b><i>note:</i></b> <i>Tutt would not join the band until 1974</i>,<i> and Bill Vitt was likely the drummer</i>]<br /></blockquote><blockquote>There was yet another surprise waiting in the wings. Lobster [<i>Paul Wells</i>], one of our regulars, was part of the FM radio scene in the Bay Area at the time. He was big, loud and both a DJ at KSJO in San Jose and the musical director of KZSU, the Stanford radio station. One afternoon, he approached Rollie and me about broadcasting the Merl and Jerry shows live from Homer's on KZSU. Rollie and I both thought it was a great idea, so Lobster connected us with Mike Lopez, the student manager of the station. Lobster had told us that we would reach the whole Northern California market [<i><b>note</b>: this was completely untrue</i>], but Mike had even bigger plans than that. It seems that Stanford had access to a transatlantic phone cable that had been dormant for many years, so Mike decided that what several Iron Curtain countries needed was a heavy dose of Jerry--via pirate radio from Homer's!<br /></blockquote><blockquote>Mike's plan called for Hungary, Belarus and parts of East Germany to receive the feed. However, first we needed to get permission from Jerry, which meant going through Sam Cutler (more blow, please!). When Sam gave us the green light, it was full speed ahead. Of course, the university would know nothing of this little international broadcasting caper....<br /></blockquote><blockquote>Around 10:00am on the day of the show, our Purple Room started to take on the look of a command center, overrun by cables and wires with crazy-looking guys from Stanford hooking up 20,000 watts [<i>the Warehouse sound system</i>]. Both shows would be taped on a gigantic Memorex reel-to-reel. It was a fuck-all, balls-to-the-wall extravaganza... </blockquote><blockquote>Around 3:00pm, the sound truck arrived with the road crew, and out stepped the lead technician for the night--Owsley Stanley.</blockquote><blockquote>Because of his eccentric and unpredictable character, Owsley didn't know how to finish a project on time, so he was banned from any involvement with sound when the Dead were on tour. However, for Jerry shows, he was "the man." His first task, when he got to Homer's, was to make sure the broadcasting guys from Stanford knew who was running the show. General Patton had arrived. Sound mix, PA levels, acoustics, tape speed, the whole shebang was under his direct control. The packed Purple Room was known that night as The Command Center.<br />Sam Cutler showed up around 5:00...by this time Owsley was like an obsessed woodpecker. He was a pain in the ass, but a perfectionist, eventually, with only fifteen minutes before the doors were scheduled to open for the Friday night show, we got the sound up and working to his desired metrics.<br /></blockquote><blockquote>The music for the show started at 7:30pm sharp. Lobster was the live DJ, operating the radio control board for the broadcast out of the Purple Room. He was hyped, as we all were. I did the stage intros. </blockquote><blockquote>This is history in the making, I thought as I introduced the band. </blockquote><blockquote>Then I ran out to Rollie's car and turned on the radio...There we were coming through loud and clear. I tried to imagine some Hungarian family puzzled by what the hell they were listening to. I hope they enjoyed it.</blockquote><p>According to Bernstein, not only was there a broadcast on May 4, the entire process was repeated the next night:</p><p></p><blockquote>Once
Owsley, Sam Cutler and their wild-eyed sound crew arrived, the madness
set in once again. Unlike the day before, however, all the gear was
already in place, so all they had to was push some buttons and turn some
knobs</blockquote><p></p><p>So Garcia apparently broadcast from KZSU three times in 1973, <a href="https://jerrybase.com/events/19730724-01">even though we only have the tape for the July Old And In The Way show</a>.<br /></p><p><i><b>Jerry Garcia and KZSU: Encore</b></i><br /><a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2023/04/the-keystone-palo-alto-260-south.html">Keystone Berkeley owner Freddie Herrera had opened a sister club in Palo Alto in early 1977</a>. The Keystone in Palo Alto was at 260 South California Avenue, in a commercial district that was distinct from downtown and University Avenue. The commercial district (formerly the downtown of the town of Mayfield, which had merged with Palo Alto in 1925) was adjacent to the Stanford Campus, but not particularly near any student housing. <a href="https://www.kfat.com/">In late 1977, the Keystone in Palo Alto started having regular Monday night broadcasts with the local "alternative" country station KFAT, in nearby Gilroy</a>. The <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2023/10/keystone-palo-alto-260-south-california.html">Monday "Fat Fry" broadcast the first set at the Keystone, to publicize the band and the club</a>, and to encourage listeners to drop by for the second set. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/10/december-5-1977-keystone-palo-alto-palo.html">The second Fat Fry, in fact, on December 5, 1977, featured Robert Hunter and Comfort, with Bob Matthews and Betty Cantor mixing the sound for the radio</a>. A similar effort was tried on one occasion with KZSU with Garcia.<br /></p><p>On December 23, 1977, KZSU broadcast the first set of the Jerry Garcia Band from Keystone Palo Alto. Per an eyewitness, the dj started up the second set and then cut it off. I believe they didn't realize the concept was just to broadcast the opening set, to encourage late arrivals. While the KFAT <i>Fat Fry</i> continued to be broadcast from Keystone Palo Alto every Monday night for several more years, I'm not aware of other KZSU experiments. Of course, since KZSU was not a commercial station, their imperatives would have been different than KFAT's. In any case, we got a good tape of the first set from December 1977, at a time when quality JGB was not in circulation. How appropriate that Garcia was returning to where he had first broadcast, although I'm sure he was unaware of it at the time. <br /></p><p><i><b>Final Homage</b></i><br />The Grateful Dead had an appropriately rocky history with Stanford University. The Dead's concert at Tressider Union on October 14, 1966 was the last concert there--good times I'll bet--and the Dead did not return until February 9, 1973 (when they played the Maples Pavilion basketball arena). <a href="Final Homage The Grateful Dead had an appropriately rocky history with Stanford University. The Dead's concert at Tressider Union on October 14, 1966 was the last concert there--good times I'll bet--and the Dead did not return until February 9, 1973. When a fraternity arranged to book Robert Hunter and Roadhog in 1976, they were told the Grateful Dead were banned from campus. Of course, Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir had both played Frost Amphitheatre by that time, but there was at least some voodoo associated with the Grateful Dead name.">When the Beta Theta Pi fraternity arranged to book Robert Hunter and Roadhog in May 1976</a>, they were told the Grateful Dead were banned from campus. Of course, <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2012/01/august-9-1975-frost-amphitheater.html">Bob Weir had played Frost Amphitheatre by that time</a>, but there was at least some voodoo associated with the Grateful Dead name.</p><p>Nonetheless the Grateful Dead finally headlined Frost Amphitheatre in 1982, and played several weekends at the venue through 1989. By the time the Dead stopped playing there, the band was much too popular to play the 10,000-capacity bowl, and huge crowds congregated outside the venue. Stanford did not like the atmosphere, and unlike a commercial establishment, they did not really need the revenue. For the 1988 shows, however (Saturday and Sunday April 30 and May 1), I know that the shows were broadcast on KZSU to allow the huge parking lot crowd to hear them. [<b>update 20231226</b>: <i><a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2019/04/jerry-garcia-live-on-kzsu-am-and-fm.html?showComment=1703584252394#c3798170138678978632">Commenter and former KZSU staffer reports that:</a></i></p><p><i></i></p><blockquote><i>My KZSU friends have confirmed that we did broadcast the Grateful Dead Frost shows from 1985 to 1988 at least, with interviews of Healy in 1985, Mickey in 1986, and Jerry & Bobby in 1987 or 1988. </i></blockquote><p></p><p>I'm not sure if this was done again on May 6 and 7,1989. After that there were no more Grateful Dead or Jerry Garcia concerts at Frost, anyway.</p><p><b>Update 20240109</b>: Correspondent Geoff Reeves weighs in with the 411. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2019/04/jerry-garcia-live-on-kzsu-am-and-fm.html?showComment=1704848889423#c549239517102064366">All the Dead shows from 1985-89 were broadcast on KZSU, and there were numerous interviews too</a>:</p><p></p><blockquote><i>My name is Geoff Reeves and I was a staffer at KZSU for much of the 1980s. I kicked off the live broadcasts of the Dead at Frost in 1985 by calling up Dan Healey and convincing him we weren’t looking to score free tickets and were legitimately from KZSU. Dan helped get permission to broadcast live and figure out how to connect us to the board. A 5-year tradition began. And, yes I can confirm we broadcast live from 1985 through 1989. I’ve got board tapes of all 10 shows (with custom art on the labels :-) In addition to any broadcast recordings, we also made copies of the boards available to anyone wanting them so they should be in pretty wide circulation.<br />Around that time Dan started mixing ambient audience sounds into the board so the board tapes and broadcast had a much better live feel than the more ‘sterile’ boards from earlier times. More like audience tapes but mixed intentionally.<br />In 1986, we started recording interviews before the shows and during breaks to be broadcast after the live show ended. The ‘interviews’ with random deadheads were some of the most entertaining (when edited down) but over the years we interviewed Dan Healey, Dennis McNally, Wavy Gravy, Bill Graham, Mickey Heart, and, (eventually) Mickey, Jerry, & Bobby.<br />It may also be of interest to know that KZSU broadcast a program called Dead to the World during those years. The name poked fun at our still weak transmitters (100 W) but, hey, they could hear us as far away as Berkeley (sometimes). </i></blockquote><p></p><p>Live Jerry Garcia music was first broadcast from the May 3, 1963 show at the Top Of The Tangent (probably broadcast on Tuesday, May 7). It was last broadcast on <strike><i>May 1, 1988, (or maybe</i></strike> May 7, 1989 from the Frost Amphitheatre, about a mile away. In between, Garcia was broadcast a surprising number of times, with a variety of ensembles, covering the arc of his career from struggling folk musician to rock guitar legend.</p><p>
</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic0AWxk4XgIqthbXFdQrSAosxThBhYGbbvzLqvhUjIBm34cWBJSJgzHlkNdOHvFvqXuiiDp1D5IGn_Hnbf8g65zDqvYrUl8jmraZmg7vbyPI-xBnDQkpNTU_AtQA9ftGpIW4gQR_AW3hE/s1600/Kzsu+logo.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEic0AWxk4XgIqthbXFdQrSAosxThBhYGbbvzLqvhUjIBm34cWBJSJgzHlkNdOHvFvqXuiiDp1D5IGn_Hnbf8g65zDqvYrUl8jmraZmg7vbyPI-xBnDQkpNTU_AtQA9ftGpIW4gQR_AW3hE/s1600/Kzsu+logo.png" /></a></div>
<b><i>Appendix I: The Roots Of College Radio</i></b><br />
One byproduct of the massive expansion of American higher education
after World War 2 was the rise of radio stations associated with
colleges and universities. In the Post WW2 universe, college was seen as
more than just a degree factory where future employees were produced,
and schools had a host of activities that were meant to broaden both the
college community and the individual students themselves. <a href="http://kzsu.stanford.edu/about/">In the case of Stanford University, radio station KZSU started in 1947 as part of the Department of Communication</a>. KZSU facilities were used by the speech and drama department, although
unlike some smaller schools, Stanford was not providing a professional
program for future broadcasters. KZSU was only broadcast on 880 on the
AM dial, and the station could only be heard in campus buildings, like
dorms and fraternities.<br />
<br />
By the early 1960s, radio played a more important part in student life,
but KZSU was still a campus-only station. As far as I know, all Stanford
freshmen and all women were required to live on campus. There was not
enough housing for all undergraduates, so some Stanford men lived off
campus, but I do know that the majority of undergraduate students still
lived on campus in any case. <a href="http://www.radiosurvivor.com/2016/09/01/radio-recollections-sound-stanfords-kzsu-early-50s/">All
women students and all Freshman males lived in campus dorms. Some men
also lived in fraternities, but the sororities had been shut down some
decades earlier. KZSU broadcast to the dorms and fraternities</a>.<br />
<br />
Although KZSU was only audible on campus, it had an outsized importance
to Stanford students. FM radio was exotic, and little was broadcast on
it, and regular AM stations in San Francisco and San Jose were the only
other options. There were a few Top 40 stations (KYA-1260 and KFRC-610
in the City, and KLIV-1590 in San Jose), a country station (KEEN-1370)
and various news-talk-music stations for adults (like KSFO-560,
KNBR-680, KCBS-740 and KGO-810). So Stanford's
student-run-for-student-listeners station was a good choice for a dorm
resident.<br />
<br />
KZSU producers, announcers and disc jockeys were all students, or at least University-affiliated. The
programs were a mixture of Stanford sports, news updates,
documentary-type specials and lots of music. A wide spectrum of music
was covered, including jazz and classical. It being the early 60s, when
folk music was popular with college students, there was folk music on
KZSU as well. Certainly more folk was broadcast on KZSU than was heard
on any commercial station, and that is how the connection to The Top Of
The Tangent came about.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3OTblGMHfi2y_foXWbXwHwkJ6ZSC-wH6SVvucw8F1Gsc8rDITxbDSxF-uKAsz-xSBMRvutNHdycqWfGKycAdKZqV5eiX4KU33OptomMuzW8BLhWZlk7j92cRCsizllIxWXT4pBgSYBAg/s460/StanfordDaily+KZSU+19630514.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="460" data-original-width="255" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3OTblGMHfi2y_foXWbXwHwkJ6ZSC-wH6SVvucw8F1Gsc8rDITxbDSxF-uKAsz-xSBMRvutNHdycqWfGKycAdKZqV5eiX4KU33OptomMuzW8BLhWZlk7j92cRCsizllIxWXT4pBgSYBAg/s320/StanfordDaily+KZSU+19630514.jpg" width="177" /></a></b></i></div><i><b><br />Appendix II: "The Flint Hill Special" and The Top Of The Tangent</b></i><br />
It is a well-known piece of Garciaography that Garcia and his folk pals
really made their bones at a tiny folk club called The Top Of The
Tangent in Palo Alto. What has remained under the radar is how critical
KZSU was to the modest success of The Tangent. Without KZSU, the Top Of
The Tangent might not have thrived, and thus the whole story of Garcia,
Weir, Pigpen and Mother McRee's Uptown Jug Band Champions would have
taken some different, unknown course.<p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/07/jerry-garcia-top-of-tangent-117.html">I have discussed the history of The Top Of The Tangent at some length elsewhere</a>,
so I will only briefly recap it. Two restless young doctors, Dave
Schoenstadt and Stu Goldstein, decided to start a folk club in eary
1963. Their only guide was a Pete Seeger book called <i>How To Make A Hootenanny</i>.
There was a delicatessen at the end of University Avenue that was
nearest Stanford, with an extra room above it. The two doctors arranged
to have shows there on Friday and Saturday nights, as well as a "hoot
night" on Wednesdays. The little room held about 75 people. Sometimes
there were touring folk acts, but more often the performers were from
the Bay Area folk scene. Locals who shined at hoot night got a chance to
play on the weekends, and could build their own followings. The Tangent
deli was at 117 University, and the folk club was above it--hence "The
Top Of The Tangent." In reality, however, everyone just called the folk
club "The Tangent," so I will do that hereafter. </p><p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/12/jerry-garcia-live-on-kzsu-am-and-fm.html ">Here's the reason we have those early Garcia tapes--throughout much of
1963, every weekend Tangent show was taped, and parts of all those shows
were broadcast on KZSU</a>. I'll repeat that, just so you don't think I
mis-typed--almost every Tangent show through at least June 1963 was
taped, and parts of most of them were broadcast. So there's no mystery
why we have prehistoric Garcia tapes. Don't forget, by the way, that
everyone else who played the Tangent in '63--Pigpen, Peter Albin, Jorma
Kaukonen, Janis Joplin, Herb Petersen and many others--would have been
broadcast on KZSU as well. And yes, before we go on any further, I
assure you that the Garciaological equivalent of SEAL Team 6 has been on
the case for some time. If there's anything new to uncover, they'll get
it.<br />
<br />
The two good doctors who ran the Top Of The Tangent knew that Stanford
students would be a key component of the audience of any folk club.
Since KZSU featured weekly shows of many different types of music, The
Tangent sponsored the Tuesday night folk show. The host was either
(Stanford student) Ted Claire or (Dr. and Top Of The Tangent co-founder)
Dave Schoenstadt. The hour long show was aired at 9:00pm Tuesday
nights. A sample description, from the Tuesday May 14 edition of the
Stanford <i>Daily</i> (clipped above), says<br />
</p><blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>9:00: Flinthill Special- An hour of authentic American folk music, records, tapes, live talent (Dave Schoenstadt)</i></blockquote><p>
"Flint Hill Special" was the name of a famous Flatt & Scruggs
bluegrass standard, and in the code of the time, "authentic American
folk music" meant "serious" folk music, like bluegrass or old-time
music, not "popular" sing-alongs like the Kingston Trio.<br />
<br />
Ted Claire's deal with the doctors was that he would tape the weekend
Tangent shows, and broadcast some highlights over the air on Tuesday
nights. So the boys and girls in the Stanford dorm who liked folk music
could listen to KZSU and hear what they missed at the Tangent that
weekend. Little did they know that a few years later they'd be seeing
Jerry, Janis and Jorma at the Fillmore, playing many of the same songs
just a little bit louder.</p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-65577778246263665922023-09-22T10:09:00.002-07:002023-09-26T13:10:04.778-07:00June 15, 1973 Nippert Stadium, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH: Grateful Dead (canceled)<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjah6H8RB43G7xpxGupYhUsVbiMP_FggDG6oVmjZn2unZ--L-OvvX4S8utZ4hu-d5gd9U_A6ZpXpsE-aNh5G66oraXRGtVRuMlPiGVRrxCX8VTsqoiBkhp8BNHTUtYOVnQNdoNKzWbmQ6ceM4Pcdo90Qnoe49AigPd4aBE8Yu0U-LpdzbORA1bMBBA/s957/GD%20Nippert%2019730615%20Post%20June%208.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="957" data-original-width="819" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjah6H8RB43G7xpxGupYhUsVbiMP_FggDG6oVmjZn2unZ--L-OvvX4S8utZ4hu-d5gd9U_A6ZpXpsE-aNh5G66oraXRGtVRuMlPiGVRrxCX8VTsqoiBkhp8BNHTUtYOVnQNdoNKzWbmQ6ceM4Pcdo90Qnoe49AigPd4aBE8Yu0U-LpdzbORA1bMBBA/s320/GD%20Nippert%2019730615%20Post%20June%208.jpg" width="274" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Grateful Dead's scheduled show at Cincinnati's Nippert Stadium, planned for June 15, 1973, was canceled the day before. Nice to see Pigpen with the boys, even if he wasn't going to play with them. </i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>One of the pleasures of being a Grateful Dead fan is considering the difference between listening to the tapes of great shows versus actually attending them. Some shows have more depth every time you listen to them again, whereas others had their most magical moment in the very instant of creation. Yet some shows stand even above those comparisons, epically memorable shows for whom the tapes revealed extraordinarily powerful music that stood out on its own. During the Spring and Summer of 1973, the Grateful Dead played five huge outdoor dates in Iowa, Santa Barbara, San Francisco and Washington, DC, all of them memorable moments for everyone who attended. The tapes, too, circulated widely, and the Grateful Dead Archive released all five shows in their entirety in the Summer of 2023. <i>Here Comes Sunshine</i>, a 17-cd set box set, was released to great acclaim, and Grateful Dead fans can't get enough of the music or the memories. </p><p><a href="https://www.dead.net/deadcast-index">Season 7 of <i>Deadcast</i>, the Grateful Dead's official podcast, tells the whole story of the Spring and Summer of 1973</a>. Jesse Jarnow and Rich Mahan wrote and produced the saga of the great concerts, the great music, and all the events surrounding the Spring tour. <a href="https://www.dead.net/deadcast/here-comes-sunshine-rfk-stadium-673">Jarnow ends the final episode, however, with a tantalizing remark</a>. After the stadium tour ended at RFK in DC on June 10, 1973, there was another concert scheduled for Nippert Stadium at the University of Cincinnati, just five days later. The Dead's crew were there, the sound system was being constructed, but technical problems caused the show to be canceled the day before the planned event. </p><p>So the Grateful Dead world almost had one more June '73 stadium show, two or three sets in the summer sun, epic jamming on new material on an 80-degree Ohio afternoon. <a href="https://www.wunderground.com/history/daily/us/oh/cincinnati/KLUK/date/1973-6-15 ">At 3 pm on June 15, the Cincinnati airport reported 85 degrees and a 10 mph breeze</a>. It would have been perfect weather, right about when the boys (and one girl) would have been cranking up a second set. <br /></p><p>There have been lots of projected Grateful Dead shows that didn't happen. But once the band became headliners by 1970, there were very few where tickets were sold, the crew was in place and the show still didn't happen. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2022/03/may-27-1973-ontario-motor-speedway.html">Now, sure the Grateful Dead had canceled a huge outdoor show at Ontario Motor Speedway just the month before (originally scheduled for Sunday, May 27 with the Allman Brothers) but that was canceled on May 21, with a week to go</a>. But nobody was camped out in the parking lot, and the crew hadn't rolled any semis. Cincinnati was different. It nearly happened. This post will try and unpack how the June 15, 1973 show at Nippert Stadium in Cincinnati nearly made landfall, but didn't, and what it tells us about the history of Grateful Dead touring.<br /></p><br /><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBZNE2S4b0p_mPh8upo3PBxt7dAfUh0Y3AOoCHW8vkQR8nEg0ry-wIB5Ii5IzBge-tHYcyYBPxTs3xUcTAePmnYYOHK0sKjvTI9cC7p0gJ7Kcc8ylmhD4mlc5uj0Dnz0mZfBTYp1UuW8ipfFiETNvZnLFXxXrp1OZDf0i7hmzGtxnOmJoKXpLkAUVW/s1220/GD%20Nippert%2019730615%20article%20May%2031%20Enquirer.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1220" data-original-width="576" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBZNE2S4b0p_mPh8upo3PBxt7dAfUh0Y3AOoCHW8vkQR8nEg0ry-wIB5Ii5IzBge-tHYcyYBPxTs3xUcTAePmnYYOHK0sKjvTI9cC7p0gJ7Kcc8ylmhD4mlc5uj0Dnz0mZfBTYp1UuW8ipfFiETNvZnLFXxXrp1OZDf0i7hmzGtxnOmJoKXpLkAUVW/s320/GD%20Nippert%2019730615%20article%20May%2031%20Enquirer.jpg" width="151" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Cincinnati Enquirer, May 31, 1973</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b><i>Risk And Reward</i></b><br />Enormous amounts of talk and writing about the Grateful Dead phenomenon have been proffered to the world, and I am as culpable as anyone for contributing to the huge volume of words. One aspect of the Dead's history that that receives less attention than it should, however, is the band's appetite for risk. Jerry Garcia himself had a higher risk tolerance than anyone in the band, but all members of the Grateful Dead organization had to sign on to a career of high-risk propositions. The Grateful Dead's constantly improvisational music was a moment-to-moment risk, and the commitment to it over the repetition of formally arranged songs was another inherent layer of risk. Even when the Grateful Dead had a popular song, if not a hit, they would not always play it, nor ever play it the same. Hardly a logical approach to success in popular music. <br /></p><p>The Grateful Dead's tolerance for risk extended to their business practices. The Grateful Dead were regularly the first out-of-town band to play many of the new psychedelic ballrooms than sprung up around the country in 19l67 and '68. These new ballrooms were modeled, however vaguely, on the Fillmore and Avalon. Almost all of the proprietors of these establishments were inexperienced hippies who had little or no business experience. In most cases, they also didn't know anyone directly associated with the Dead, but just sounded persuasive over the phone. The Dead flew to these cities with no real guarantee of a payday, or a way to afford to get home if they didn't get paid. Yet the band took chances on new promoters nearly every month in the late 60s.</p><p>Other decisions by the Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia also depended on extraordinary risk tolerance, particularly in the early 1970s. Touring Europe, starting their own record company, starting a second record company (Round Records) for less popular material, spending their touring profits on a better, sound system and starting a travel agency (<a href="https://www.dead.net/deadcast/here-comes-sunshine-grateful-dead-co">all of which is explored by Jesse Jarnow in Deadcast 7:4</a>), just to name a few things, were each by themselves not a risk most bands would take. The Grateful Dead took all of them, in the space of two years. The band took chances. Sometimes they worked. Sometimes they didn't.</p><p>As Jarnow documents in <i>Deadcast</i> Season 7, the Grateful Dead's audience was expanding quickly, and in order to capture the crowds, the Dead moved their shows to places even larger than the indoor basketball arenas that had been rock music's top tier up until that time. Also, the Dead did not hesitate to work with inexperienced promoters if they felt that they "understood" the needs of the band. Most of the Spring '73 shows had a large degree of new promoters, new venues or both. </p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><a href="https://www.dead.net/deadcast/here-comes-sunshine-des-moines-51373">The Iowa State Fair Grandstand show (May 13, 1973: Des Moines, IA) was produced by some Iowa Record Store owners who had almost no concert promotion experience</a>. Yes, they were ably assisted by Bill Graham and Barry Fey (from Denver), but the show was put on by rookies. The Iowa State Fair Grandstand, mainly a stock car track, had been used for country music concerts since 1970, but never for a rock concert on the scale of the Dead show.</li><li><a href="https://www.dead.net/deadcast/here-comes-sunshine-santa-barbara-52073">The Harder Stadium show at UC Santa Barbara (May 20, 1973) was put on by college students</a>. They were supported by Sepp Donahower and the Pacific Presentations team, so there was professional involvement, but it was still a college show. Harder Stadium had been built in '67 for football, but UCSB had stopped playing football in 1971. There had been one rock show in the stadium (CSNY in '69) and it went poorly. So the Dead played an outdoor show run mostly by college students in an all-but-untried venue. </li><li>The show at San Francisco's Kezar Stadium (May 26, 1973) was put on by Bill Graham Presents, of course, so there was no lack of professionalism on hand. Kezar, however, had lost its major sports tenant when the San Francisco 49ers had moved to Candlestick Park in 1971. There had been one peace rally/rock show in April, 1967, but in reality Kezar Stadium was totally untried as a rock venue for a big crowd. After a Led Zeppelin show a week later (June 1), Bill Graham would move big rock shows to the more modern Oakland Coliseum. </li><li><a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2022/03/may-27-1973-ontario-motor-speedway.html">The canceled show with the Allman Brothers at Ontario Motor Speedway in Southern California (May 27, 1973) was proposed by Bill Graham Presents</a>. It would have been the first rock show at Ontario Motor Speedway. <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2022/05/april-6-1974-ontario-motor-speedway.html">The next year, other promoters held the California Jam at OMS, on April 6, 1974, and it had the highest paid attendance of any rock concert up to that time (168,000-plus)</a>. So the idea was sound, but the Dead/Allmans show was just a little too soon. </li><li><a href="https://www.dead.net/deadcast/here-comes-sunshine-rfk-stadium-673">The twin shows at RFK Stadium in Washington, DC (June 9-10, 1973) were put on by the Electric Factory, Philadelphia promoters who had booked the Grateful Dead since 1968</a>. The Electric Factory had used RFK before, as well, for the Rolling Stones (July 4, 1972), so there was some precedent for the event. </li></ul><p>We don't have Jesse Jarnow and a <i>Deadcast</i> episode to query the
Cincinnati event, more's the pity. But from what we know, the Nippert
Stadium presentation was another attempt by the Dead to expand their concert footprint. A venue never before used for a rock show and inexperienced promoters sounds like a risky proposition, and indeed it was. But that was how the 1973 Grateful Dead rolled. If it sounded like a good time, and might make for good music and a good day, the band was down. Mostly it worked, so why not?</p><p><i><b>Some Geography</b></i><br />The Grateful Dead had constructed a bespoke sound system for outdoor stadiums on their 1973 tour. That gargantuan PA had to be trucked across the country, so it was not a coincidence that the touring schedule had gaps of at least one week between every show. The haul from San Francisco (after May 26) to Washington, DC (by June 9) was substantial. It makes sense to have tried to book a show on the way back. Even if the Cincinnati show might have turned out to be as profitable as some of the other shows, it would still make sense to have a payday on the way home. </p><p>Also, by 1973 the Grateful Dead were catching on to the fact that their big outdoor shows were drawing a regional audience. The Washington, DC concerts, for example, drew plenty of Deadheads from New York and Philadelphia. Cincinnati was 500 miles from DC and nearly 600 from Iowa. So a huge contingent of Midwestern Grateful Dead fans were going to see themselves as within traveling range. The Cincinnati location made sense just by looking at a map. The Grateful Dead had already played Cincinnati four times (six shows, in 1968, '69, 71 and '72). They had also played Cleveland three times. Cincinnati and Ohio seemed like a logical choice.<br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglXzCoqCdtUaUk4eePbavQGxNzi59twCWmDuI9gZDJTnp-X8sZUnU1nZcQpolu3I_kUBKfpTS9E5Uvax1pQxb8dBnBI6zTR71tC5lTkOF1nGbYZvcO-cr3_hpnFYh8lojAB17OdpqTxCnkvBwhApChTp7gAZ8ROJSDaM6iYXY5eaKpUgeNOa5j1ibus6o/s1146/Nippert%20Stadium%20Soccer%20May%2020%201973%20(Enq).jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1146" data-original-width="819" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglXzCoqCdtUaUk4eePbavQGxNzi59twCWmDuI9gZDJTnp-X8sZUnU1nZcQpolu3I_kUBKfpTS9E5Uvax1pQxb8dBnBI6zTR71tC5lTkOF1nGbYZvcO-cr3_hpnFYh8lojAB17OdpqTxCnkvBwhApChTp7gAZ8ROJSDaM6iYXY5eaKpUgeNOa5j1ibus6o/s320/Nippert%20Stadium%20Soccer%20May%2020%201973%20(Enq).jpg" width="229" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Cincinnati Comets of the American Soccer League opened their 1973 season with an exhibition game on May 20 at their home field, Nippert Stadium. They played (then 2nd Division) Bristol City, who beat them pretty handily, apparently. </i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b><i>Nippert Stadium, Cincinnati, OH</i></b><br />Nippert Stadium was the home stadium for the University of Cincinnati Bearcats football team, and had been throughout the century. The Bearcats had first played on the grounds in 1915, when it was called Carson Field. The stadium seats were constructed in 1925, and expanded in 1928 and again in 1954. The football capacity was 28,000. Nippert Stadium had been home to the AFL Cincinnati Bengals in 1968 and '69, until they moved into the new Riverfront Stadium in 1970.<p></p><p>In 1973, rock concerts in stadiums was still a new concept. Stadiums that hosted major league baseball were unwilling to put their playing fields at risk, so that left football stadiums. In the early 1970s, however, the rage was publicly-owned "multi-use" stadiums, so many cities had a facility that hosted both NFL and MLB teams. Thus there were fewer stadiums willing to try on big rock concerts. In the case of the Grateful Dead's spring '73 tour, neither Harder Stadium in Santa Barbara nor Kezar had major sports tenants. RFK had lost its baseball team (the Washington Senators had become the Texas Rangers after the 1971 season). </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6bcsirGeCOS66D8qP_C_a42jyLCBAsyDm2q17OCBYoOWbZ5LfpRG7ZE8JuJP-akJBG2sUrLQJmECawpexfEVIHRbxvWK_8n2AbESa72MW58TwPHSoBYbAzRtl26F5dNlUJvxD6MdcFXO7bIoIDIfYENU3rR0i5Vc27Jq2mEoxgzOKyxwupibgBsuFKJs/s880/Cincinnati%20Pop%2019700613.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="432" data-original-width="880" height="157" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6bcsirGeCOS66D8qP_C_a42jyLCBAsyDm2q17OCBYoOWbZ5LfpRG7ZE8JuJP-akJBG2sUrLQJmECawpexfEVIHRbxvWK_8n2AbESa72MW58TwPHSoBYbAzRtl26F5dNlUJvxD6MdcFXO7bIoIDIfYENU3rR0i5Vc27Jq2mEoxgzOKyxwupibgBsuFKJs/s320/Cincinnati%20Pop%2019700613.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Cincinnati Summer Pop Festival bill, held on June 13, 1970 at Crosley Field. Promoted by Mike Quattro and Russ Gibb from Detroit. The Reds had just moved to Riverfront Stadium. <br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati hosted the baseball Reds, so it would not have made itself available. There had been one stadium concert in Cincinnati, at the old Crosley Field in Summer 1970. Crosley Field had been the home of the Reds for many years, but the Reds had moved to Riverfront mid-season. <a href="https://www.cincinnati.com/picture-gallery/entertainment/2020/06/13/50-years-ago-cincinnati-summer-pop-festival-crosley-field/3182726001/">The Cincinnati Summer Pop Festival on June 13, 1970, an all-day event with numerous acts headlined by Grand Funk Railroad was hard rock madness at its 1970 worst.</a> Iggy and The Stooges stamped their legend when Ig surf-walked into the waiting arms of the packed crowd. No one wanted a repeat. <p></p><p>Still, the University had signed up for a slate of six concerts in the Summer of 1970, of which the Grateful Dead would be the first. In 1970, the University had replaced the natural grass with astroturf. Cincinnati was not a public school, so they probably felt the revenue would help their bottom line. There was some risk, sure, but on the scale of things it wasn't much different than the UC Santa Barbara scenario. There was even a precedent in Ohio--sort of.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyIcaxS-VkwsXprx5-2kn0-vTPRgDTE_E5tzcer7AUzfD8lbJWSWQvjvOdPEdmdXZQeBkcrmxW4cmI5kbkiz0wC2z_ItFiAnN82UexLQR6qC_DCg2K5zCNk2J8nYcYExsG5TkSAN7xaZecjsuZ486be84AQwdaQNrPRbU_u9s296aDsWLlM7R2rsNubNs/s844/Akron%20Rubber%20Bowl%2019720624.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="844" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyIcaxS-VkwsXprx5-2kn0-vTPRgDTE_E5tzcer7AUzfD8lbJWSWQvjvOdPEdmdXZQeBkcrmxW4cmI5kbkiz0wC2z_ItFiAnN82UexLQR6qC_DCg2K5zCNk2J8nYcYExsG5TkSAN7xaZecjsuZ486be84AQwdaQNrPRbU_u9s296aDsWLlM7R2rsNubNs/s320/Akron%20Rubber%20Bowl%2019720624.jpg" width="227" /></a></div>Belkin Productions, Cleveland's principal rock promoters since 1966, had booked a series of concerts at the Akron Rubber Bowl for the summer of 1972. Akron is 40 miles South of Cleveland. Jules and Mike Belkin had rented the Rubber Bowl from the University Of Akron for the summer, for about $40,000. The stadium had been built as a civic facility in 1940, but the University of Akron had purchased it for $1 from the city in 1971. Belkin put on 9 concerts at the football stadium. Most of the shows drew about 20,000, but the sold-out Rolling Stones show drew as many as 50,000 (for a list of the shows, see below).<p></p><p>At the end of the Summer of '72, the University of Akron chose not to renew the contract with Belkin Productions. The shows had been profitable, but there had been tension between the city and the promoters, and rock concerts still made communities nervous. The Rubber Bowl would replace the natural grass with astroturf in 1973, too, but I don't know if that figured into the decision not to renew. In any case, the Grateful Dead had played for Belkin in Cleveland before, but there was no chance they could play for them at the Rubber Bowl in '73.</p><p></p><p><br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfUA_z_y7qkR4PEp1024mfxq-KbH3qDUHddL1HpMCUNlq8lHmvRS5lPYt_cF_Y2IU0WhnagXsHdjwqXRR1UcrJ3cSSPtv3lQHgmE0wrVq5EcMFzQYMqeJ4CfxZeYOwc-XVMRJb3mIhNwZHTthFmGwrk71CmsUj8D798DSCyhykUl1wBghRxkU66U9E/s1198/GD%20Nippert%20stage%2019730615%20June%207%20Post-1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1198" data-original-width="532" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfUA_z_y7qkR4PEp1024mfxq-KbH3qDUHddL1HpMCUNlq8lHmvRS5lPYt_cF_Y2IU0WhnagXsHdjwqXRR1UcrJ3cSSPtv3lQHgmE0wrVq5EcMFzQYMqeJ4CfxZeYOwc-XVMRJb3mIhNwZHTthFmGwrk71CmsUj8D798DSCyhykUl1wBghRxkU66U9E/s320/GD%20Nippert%20stage%2019730615%20June%207%20Post-1.jpg" width="142" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Cincinnati Post June 7, 1973<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8spvf4LiggkYBl00n6iDqtQ4vL77v4vUtl3puFLS_bW1pPbppnAq7x7WJ9ve6SA_UpigrXVUM_WTb6yzSNzV6KeiFH8uGdgQD9QfVzqqBSAWTnm3rIo5OWYauNsjqn2Fuc82ETJZfSA_za5JltRzfwDQdHXgW6OtN40CsEdeMVyVM9G5tQH6OWPQ0/s761/GD%20Nippert%2019730615%20Post%20June%207-2.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="761" data-original-width="558" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8spvf4LiggkYBl00n6iDqtQ4vL77v4vUtl3puFLS_bW1pPbppnAq7x7WJ9ve6SA_UpigrXVUM_WTb6yzSNzV6KeiFH8uGdgQD9QfVzqqBSAWTnm3rIo5OWYauNsjqn2Fuc82ETJZfSA_za5JltRzfwDQdHXgW6OtN40CsEdeMVyVM9G5tQH6OWPQ0/s320/GD%20Nippert%2019730615%20Post%20June%207-2.jpg" width="235" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Cincinnati Post, June 7, 1973 (cont)<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>The June 7, 1973 Cincinnati <i>Post</i> reported on the upcoming show:</p><p></p><blockquote><i>THE GRATEFUL DEAD, which comes to the University of Cincinnati's Nippert Stadium at 7 pm, June 15, to kickoff a series of concerts, will initiate a new method of staging quite different than anything ever seen in this area.<br /><br />Producers of the concert said that although Nippert Stadium seats approximately 30,000 persons, the stadium is being set-up for the Grateful Dead concert to handle a limited number of patrons. <br /><br />Physically, the stage will be set-up between the 35 and 50-yard lines, playing into the horseshoe configuration of seats at Nippert Stadium. The astroturf immediately in front of the stage will be covered with a special new material to enable festival seating in front of the stage. Patrons in all locations will have an excellent view of the stage and a specially adapted sound system will provide stereo-type sound reproduction.<br /><br />Although tickets to the concert are available on a general admission basis, producers of the concert said that since seating will be limited, patrons would be wise to purchase tickets in advance--once the supply of printed tickets is depleted, no more seats will be available.</i></blockquote>I don't have any details about how Sam Cutler and the Grateful Dead
made the connection to the University of Cincinnati. The show was promoted by the University itself (the UC Office Of Programs and Cultural Affairs), a similar arrangement to Santa Barbara.
Maybe there was an experienced concert promoter in the background. I don't know who had promoted the Dead's prior 1970s shows in Cincinnati, but Belkin Productions would the Dead's
next show in Cincinnati (on December 4, 1973) so I wouldn't be surprised
if they had some involvement. In Santa Barbara, although the Dead were
working with inexperienced young promoters, the (relatively) veteran
promoter Sepp Donahower was assisting them. Probably there was a comparable
arrangement in Cincinnati, with Belkin or someone. <p></p><p>The
Grateful Dead had a five-day break between RFK (ending June 10) and
Cincinnati. The band members probably flew home, anticipating a return
to Cincinnati a few days later. It was probably cheaper for the band to
fly home than pay for hotel rooms. In any case, the Dead had their own
travel agency, so they could find a bargain on tickets. In Jerry
Garcia's case, he actually had a bluegrass gig in Warrenton, VA on the
afternoon of June 11, so I assume he flew home a day later than the rest
of the band. </p>The crew, meanwhile, would have torn down the sound
system at RFK, loaded it up and driven to Ohio. Figure it took a full
day to deconstruct the sound system and load it up, and another full day
to drive there. So the crew would have arrived in Ohio on Tuesday
night, and would have begun setting up on Wednesday. That seems to be
when trouble set in. <p></p><p> </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAopFz-0fflmQc2ydJ88DjSUWrH_d8lQwUfoAvmpt0riwP10aaAhZDV1Dpf63TMxsniTGV-aR5i5XpwYXFS7iHl2ow6gQ0P1N5u9Ev5SYGXDMrB1ZSuu1uEAHtyJHt_BRIF-ofSQe0x8MAkCjHdBA7CitY24GlgYv-TIrBJiKYTY0rUWZAQ6nQ8kJU/s1474/GD%20Nippert%20cxl%2019730615%20Enquirer%20June%2014.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1474" data-original-width="512" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAopFz-0fflmQc2ydJ88DjSUWrH_d8lQwUfoAvmpt0riwP10aaAhZDV1Dpf63TMxsniTGV-aR5i5XpwYXFS7iHl2ow6gQ0P1N5u9Ev5SYGXDMrB1ZSuu1uEAHtyJHt_BRIF-ofSQe0x8MAkCjHdBA7CitY24GlgYv-TIrBJiKYTY0rUWZAQ6nQ8kJU/s320/GD%20Nippert%20cxl%2019730615%20Enquirer%20June%2014.jpg" width="111" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Cincinnati Enquirer, Thursday, June 14, 1973</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><br /> The June 14, 1973 <i>Enquirer</i> had the mournful headline "Grateful Dead Off At Nippert." </p><p></p><blockquote><p><i>The Grateful Dead concert, set for Friday at UC's Nippert Stadium, has been canceled. Reason for the cancellation, according to promoters, were "insurmuoutable problems connected with the staging of the event."<br /> <br />The technical problems were twofold. The size of the stage needed to accommodate the full Grateful Dead show posed a problem. So did the fact that the stadium is located directly behind the UC physical plant, which according to the Dead's road manager, Sam Cutler, makes entirely too much noise. He feared it would be a distraction.<br /><br />It is believed the show will be rescheduled later in the summer when there some more time to prepare fully for it.</i></p><br /></blockquote><p>In general, when road managers in the 1970s explain why concerts had to be canceled, particularly road managers named Sam Cutler, they did not usually tell the truth, or much of it. In this case, however, I think Cutler's explanation was likely mostly true.</p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The principal reason that concerts were canceled was because of poor ticket sales, and given the Grateful Dead's popularity in 1973, I don't think that was the case. </li><li>The second most likely reason for bands to cancel concerts is that they don't think they will be paid. The University of Cincinnati was not some cigar-chewing mobster, however--any check from the school was going to clear the bank.</li><li>The other reason that bands canceled concerts was that some members weren't able to play. Usually, however, the band would state it as such, and in any case we know so much about the Grateful Dead. All the band members were fine, so that wasn't the problem either. </li></ul><p>The <i>Deadcast</i> made clear how much effort went into the groundbreaking Grateful Dead sound system, fine tuned for every venue. If the stage was really in front of the "physical plant," which I take to mean the University power station, I can see how it might undermine the Dead's state-of-the-art sound. I did think that a member of the Dead's sound team (such as Bob Matthews) visited all the venues beforehand, but somehow this got missed. </p><p>In any case, since the report was in the Thursday paper, the show was effectively canceled on Wednesday, June 13. Given the putative schedule I described above, the crew would have been begun building the stage on Wednesday, and soon identified the issues. The band was still in San Francisco, presumably scheduled to fly on Thursday (June 14), so they never left home. </p><p><b><i>Aftermath</i></b><br />The Nippert Stadium show didn't happen. The <i>Here Comes Sunshine</i> box set was just 17 discs, not 20. he Grateful Dead returned to action the next week in Vancouver, on June 22, 1973. The Dead played Cincinnati, indoors, on December 4, 1973 at Cincinnati Gardens. On October 2, 1976, they would return to the city again to play the 16,000 seat Riverfront Coliseum, but they <strike>never played outdoors there </strike>did not play a stadium in Cincinnati, although they played the Rubber Bowl with Bob Dylan and Tom Petty on July 2, 1986. </p><b><i>Appendix 1:</i> Nippert Stadium, Cincinnati, OH 1973</b><br />There were two concerts in Nippert Stadium in the summer of 1973, however. Presumably the bands weren't as finicky as the Grateful Dead about the technical issues or the size of the stage.<p></p><p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWGOsDtYtTWueYkbQq_qT-jsVgF0TT7MeFOXJcNAp2UN5AHbq7th2cDrDuekeiJkixK9A-HZ0IywBa82TYF2L0TM-f8CbplhjzSng_qna_SEVDoI1M9i1fAHdIkqM5E4x504b40Jj8gqH1C4hiME-5GftK3_5toZUoF5wRHwDSbjJYRnt2y_SWf3_R/s1133/Nippert%20Edgar%20Winter%2019730722.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1133" data-original-width="819" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWGOsDtYtTWueYkbQq_qT-jsVgF0TT7MeFOXJcNAp2UN5AHbq7th2cDrDuekeiJkixK9A-HZ0IywBa82TYF2L0TM-f8CbplhjzSng_qna_SEVDoI1M9i1fAHdIkqM5E4x504b40Jj8gqH1C4hiME-5GftK3_5toZUoF5wRHwDSbjJYRnt2y_SWf3_R/s320/Nippert%20Edgar%20Winter%2019730722.jpg" width="231" /></a></div><p><b>July 22, 1973 Nippert Stadium, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH: Edgar Winter Group/James Gang/Peter Frampton's Camel </b><i>(Sunday)</i><br />Attendance was apparently between 5000 and 7000. <b>The Edgar Winter Group</b> had scored a big hit in '72 with the instrumental "Frankenstein," and would soon score an even bigger one with bassist Dan Hartman's "Free Ride." Guitarist Ronnie Montrose had been replaced by Jerry Weems. <br /></p><p><b>The James Gang</b> featured singer Roy Kenner and guitarist Dominic Troiano, as Joe Walsh had left the band. Peter Frampton had left Humble Pie at the end of 1971, and was making his first American tour with his band, <b>Frampton's Camel</b>. <br /></p><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQxrjm6u60HejjwIhLBBw-NXDd9pR15ajRlp8QTlYWUZKHeXM6BGO1omoP6CnSxVoOJd4pfeIZX0iRIqXHApnGhVDkn-_MKz_Q4KBYaLXNlFsg7bwQjRi7PiEat-2NopbqFlS4840OM1btddGEsgEE6kEwtNPhSatPNWvRvjN2aR1gaBFfGt46kw7k/s1487/Grand%20Funk%20Cincinnati%2019730729%20Enquirer%20July%2022.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1487" data-original-width="819" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQxrjm6u60HejjwIhLBBw-NXDd9pR15ajRlp8QTlYWUZKHeXM6BGO1omoP6CnSxVoOJd4pfeIZX0iRIqXHApnGhVDkn-_MKz_Q4KBYaLXNlFsg7bwQjRi7PiEat-2NopbqFlS4840OM1btddGEsgEE6kEwtNPhSatPNWvRvjN2aR1gaBFfGt46kw7k/s320/Grand%20Funk%20Cincinnati%2019730729%20Enquirer%20July%2022.jpg" width="176" /></a></div><p><b>July 29, 1973 Nippert Stadium, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH: Grand Funk Railroad/Ball'n Jack </b><i>(Sunday)</i><br /><b>Grand Funk Railroad</b>, about to have a mid-career boom with their newly-released "We're An American Band," drew about 8000. <br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS_txXM9mrnsA7E0k6_S-WTuFTaTXgayyoqCu7CwCqQfgRJzFvh5K6FEOxyaUI_nWo2-faUg7JzPKaAZp6a0E1sJX1PklocOr7kVFJltOZunkVKtcz0mfVzk0tJseQ7cYvzrFCfv-X2QxAKccUAGQrRkYZzWOnBZ7uHk3QX-v-C3PsfXgZ3oWV4VtU-Fk/s980/Nippert%20Stadium%20OH%2019750803.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="980" data-original-width="819" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgS_txXM9mrnsA7E0k6_S-WTuFTaTXgayyoqCu7CwCqQfgRJzFvh5K6FEOxyaUI_nWo2-faUg7JzPKaAZp6a0E1sJX1PklocOr7kVFJltOZunkVKtcz0mfVzk0tJseQ7cYvzrFCfv-X2QxAKccUAGQrRkYZzWOnBZ7uHk3QX-v-C3PsfXgZ3oWV4VtU-Fk/s320/Nippert%20Stadium%20OH%2019750803.jpg" width="267" /></a></div><br /><b>August 3, 1975 Nippert Stadium, Cincinnati, OH: Aerosmith/Black Oak Arkansas/Blue Oyster Cult/Styx/REO Speedwagon/Nitty Gritty Dirt Band/Foghat/Mahogany Rush/Outlaws</b> <i>(Sunday) Ross Todd Productions and U.S. Concert Board present the Ohio River Music Festival</i><br />Two years later, there was a big outdoor show at Nippert Stadium, headlined by <b>Aerosmith</b>. <br /><p><br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirbpcHJ-8jIjJ2aZMa-b5-Rbc9wkVLSNu_Ao8nC1FEcc40iTxA5qx0z3DFYi8cwDrIcOFooO6eC4egEgqCE4Eai9T2NTPekPaS8bgMCJaVhOFDqE9zWQrELbWiSCpVDar06_t8w_dm7XpuOtABL5GqopzjvVy1_r-_7DJnreaFtJaEQRzRbuDpc0xMG9A/s844/Akron%20Rubber%20Bowl%2019720624.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="844" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirbpcHJ-8jIjJ2aZMa-b5-Rbc9wkVLSNu_Ao8nC1FEcc40iTxA5qx0z3DFYi8cwDrIcOFooO6eC4egEgqCE4Eai9T2NTPekPaS8bgMCJaVhOFDqE9zWQrELbWiSCpVDar06_t8w_dm7XpuOtABL5GqopzjvVy1_r-_7DJnreaFtJaEQRzRbuDpc0xMG9A/s320/Akron%20Rubber%20Bowl%2019720624.jpg" width="227" /></a></div><b><i>Appendix 2:</i> Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron OH Summer 1972</b><br />Belkin Productions, out of Cleveland, booked nine concerts at the Akron Rubber Bowl in the Summer of 1972. <a href="https://www.beaconjournal.com/story/entertainment/2022/06/09/akron-rubber-bowl-1972-rolling-stones-stevie-wonder-black-sabbath-jefferson-airplane-osmond-brothers/9985541002/">For a complete look at the history of the shows, with pictures and all, see the Akron <i>Beacon-Journal </i>article here</a>. The shows were financially successful and fondly remembered by fans, but the University of Akron chose not to renew the contract. <br /><p></p><p><b>June 16, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Three Dog Night/James Gang</b> <i>(Friday) estimated crowd- 12,000</i><br /><br /><b>July 3, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Faces/Badfinger/Cactus</b> <i>(Monday) est: 17000<br /></i><br /><b>July 11, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Rolling Stones/Stevie Wonder</b> <i>(Tuesday) est: 50000</i><br /><br /><b>July 17, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Black Sabbath/Humble Pie/Edgar Winter/Ramatam </b><i>(Monday) est: 18000</i><br /><br /><b>July 21, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Osmonds/Bo Donaldson and The Heywoods</b> <i>(Friday) est: 20000</i><br /><br /><b>August 5, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Alice Cooper/J Geils Band/Dr. John</b> <i>(Saturday) est: 20000</i><br /><br /><b>August 11, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Yes/Mahavishnu Orchestra/The Eagles</b> <i>(Friday) est: 20000</i><br /><br /><b>August 20, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Chicago</b> <i><b>(Sunday) est: 19000</b><br /></i><br /><b>August 21, 1972 Akron Rubber Bowl, Akron, OH: Jefferson Airplane/Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen</b> <i>(Monday) est: 21000</i><br /></p><br /><p><br /></p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-54105688250751105492023-06-15T11:22:00.003-07:002023-06-15T11:23:52.187-07:00October 5, 1968 Civic Auditorium, Sacramento, CA: Turtles/Grateful Dead/Family Tree/others (Pigpen Exit?)<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNNx-w6gYHK1-TaepJXj9QiH3gUccyZCpaTU4dthax_RflXQyh6j1ZX6ROwNaDxvNsQPjK2fjt3crpmjJsixGxfkPRevoXqOBjEmgD3i0tFZdOoAHVwii-kXngKPAHjgXQwZvcuc60D_PfZf-b2bnNMPyg2SKtNmuMoU4WAmghb_nTC5g9VWmgMC06/s1247/GD%20Sacramento%2019681005%20Bee%20Oct%203.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1247" data-original-width="546" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNNx-w6gYHK1-TaepJXj9QiH3gUccyZCpaTU4dthax_RflXQyh6j1ZX6ROwNaDxvNsQPjK2fjt3crpmjJsixGxfkPRevoXqOBjEmgD3i0tFZdOoAHVwii-kXngKPAHjgXQwZvcuc60D_PfZf-b2bnNMPyg2SKtNmuMoU4WAmghb_nTC5g9VWmgMC06/s320/GD%20Sacramento%2019681005%20Bee%20Oct%203.jpg" width="140" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Sacramento Bee of October 3, 1968, announced that The Turtles had replaced Traffic as the headliner of the concert that included the Grateful Dead and others at the Civic Auditorium on October 5</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>Scholars and fans of the Grateful Dead tend to divide their music into eras. The contours of those eras may be a subject for discussion, but almost everyone would agree that the Dead's music evolved over time, often with a change in emphasis during different periods. While everyone has their own categories, the largest agents for change in the band revolve around the changes in personnel: the arrival, departure and return of Mickey Hart, and the arrival and departure of different keyboard players, too. Yet there was almost another event in 1968 that would have dramatically shaped the Grateful Dead's music: replacing Pigpen with another lead singer. </p><p>Let's be clear: it didn't happen. Stockton's Bob Segarini, formerly of the Brogues and the Family Tree,
and later of Roxy, The Wackers, The Dudes and a successful solo career
as a singer and DJ in Montreal and Toronto, described being asked by
Jerry Garcia to consider joining the Grateful Dead as their lead singer.
Segarini described this in an interview for the 2007 re-release of the
Family Tree's 1968 album. Confusingly, however, he got the date wrong, not
surprising after a 38 year gap. Once I sorted out the date issue,
however, the entire story makes sense. Segarini said "no," as it
happened, which he ruefully called "one more stupid thing I did in my
life." </p><p> </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge93kkwo1vDpa21YfiIua7lPwaPwTU-kGPXL1Tv0S6xIHktpp3ZMJl8RITgRUY7Tcvu40Kd7tmgd60t-5YzN1e8N3QMDS1IJSavFgMpRUX3BUpKoIxKPKKW_bcGszwFtIo2XexOxocSMiu-RQ71EvwE7b0gjMNB3ZdFj1Zgu3Hb0m1BJAPLi4aRn--/s600/Bob%20Segarini%2060s.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="432" data-original-width="600" height="230" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge93kkwo1vDpa21YfiIua7lPwaPwTU-kGPXL1Tv0S6xIHktpp3ZMJl8RITgRUY7Tcvu40Kd7tmgd60t-5YzN1e8N3QMDS1IJSavFgMpRUX3BUpKoIxKPKKW_bcGszwFtIo2XexOxocSMiu-RQ71EvwE7b0gjMNB3ZdFj1Zgu3Hb0m1BJAPLi4aRn--/s320/Bob%20Segarini%2060s.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bob Segarini, from Stockton, CA, lead singer of The Family Tree, around 1968</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table> <p></p><p>Bob Segarini and the Family Tree opened for the Grateful Dead at the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium on October 5, 1968. In the previous months, Garcia and the Dead had put Bob Weir and Pigpen on notice that they might be replaced. According to McNally, Weir actually believed that he had been fired. No one ever asked Pigpen about it. Over the years I have focused on the Dead's discreet auditions for other guitarists, but here I will focus on the Pigpen question. Segarini and the Family Tree were old Fillmore regulars, so Garcia knew Segarini's music and history. This post will look backwards and forwards at the possibility of Bob Segarini replacing Pigpen, and what that tells us about Garcia's thinking at the end of 1968. <br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkeVuRUWwusfNXHz_tQXUHz9WrHtjCi_GdnypFXU9nv7MhQSgPE3vmrRyhWCuE2VpNCgfVN_NOX1u4LkDQmXkPT2a_PrziHRvK1qHrKQtwWeomJAazozLcvPI2Qf-4KBvbKqPGObLPbF5mxlUA_8UBcGM8PpHvejESGn7w7TT6rtV0S1CdG1D-Z0IC/s683/GD%20Traffic%20Sacramento%2019681005%20Sep%2029%20Bee.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="683" data-original-width="546" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkeVuRUWwusfNXHz_tQXUHz9WrHtjCi_GdnypFXU9nv7MhQSgPE3vmrRyhWCuE2VpNCgfVN_NOX1u4LkDQmXkPT2a_PrziHRvK1qHrKQtwWeomJAazozLcvPI2Qf-4KBvbKqPGObLPbF5mxlUA_8UBcGM8PpHvejESGn7w7TT6rtV0S1CdG1D-Z0IC/s320/GD%20Traffic%20Sacramento%2019681005%20Sep%2029%20Bee.jpg" width="256" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Sacramento Bee promoted a picture of Traffic as the headliner for the October 5, 1968 concert with the Grateful Dead, but they were replaced by The Turtles at the last minute</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>October 5, 1968 Sacramento Memorial Auditorium, Sacramento, CA: Grateful Dead/The Turtles/Youngbloods/Sanpaku/Initial Shock/Family Tree </b><i>(Saturday)</i><br />On Saturday, October 5, 1968, the Grateful Dead played a show at the Sacramento Memorial Auditorium along with several other bands. The show was only modestly successful, with about 2000 seats filled in a 3600 capacity auditorium. We don't have a tape, but we have a brief review. The Grateful Dead probably played about an hour, since they were just one of six groups on the bill. From careful triangulation, however, we can tell that it was in Sacramento that Jerry Garcia asked Bob Segarini to consider joining the Grateful Dead. The fact that Garcia even asked suggests that the Dead were at a far more critical crossroads at the time than has usually been recognized.</p><p>In late summer 1968, probably around August, the Grateful Dead had a meeting in which Bob Weir and Pigpen were told that the band found their musicianship wanting. Even though there is a tape of the meeting, the future success of the Grateful Dead made it in everyone's interests to obscure this rocky moment in the band's history. Weir and Pigpen weren't actually fired, since they continued to perform with the band. By October, however, Weir at least (according to Dennis McNally) thought he had been fired and feared that he would soon be out of the band. The Dead were known to have jammed with <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2014/05/september-21-1968-pacific-recording-san.html">Vic Briggs of The Animals</a>, Elvin Bishop and David Nelson, among others, without Bob Weir, so you can't say the idea of replacing Weir wasn't in the air. No one ever talks about replacing Pigpen, however, since his later passing made talking about his possible failings too sad.</p><p>From late September 1968 through October 1968 we have only one sure Pigpen sighting with the Grateful Dead. The band played a few gigs during this time and had started recording <i>Aoxomoxoa</i>. Pigpen wasn't involved in recording that album at all, to my knowledge, nor does he play with Mickey and The Hartbeats, and he seems to have skipped at least some gigs. Pigpen sang at the September 20, 1968 show in Berkeley and <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/12/september-22-1968-del-mar-fairgrounds.html">the September 22 show in San Diego</a>, but he does not appear on the October 12 and 13 Avalon shows. We have no tape or setlist for October 11(Avalon), October 18 (Torrance) or October 19 (Las Vegas) but he sings at the Greek Theater on October 20. You can decide for yourself whether Pigpen thought he was being fired and skipped some gigs, or just that we are simply missing his songs. </p><p>We have to assume, by default, that Pigpen was actually at the Sacramento show. Still, the Dead probably only played an hour, as there were six bands on the bill (see below), so perhaps he wasn't. In any case, in the context, consideration of a Pigpen substitute seemed plausible in October 1968, perhaps for the only time in the 1960s.<br /></p><b><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJOYm4UaoWQ1dhQm0yBeUE93D8igyIPq_2oplUU4aI_mBpLJS9Q1VxBzrAMEaZsPZv7o7HDxGepNI7heq0IZCoSnnE4AdWf3w4quasbuzOQmcmVXSf9oQCmR-oMVajqGX9gnqQla-xRqsCZxcs2s45RSj47vnzB_e0ajyauN3dpiIPzJW_2FW90thB/s2256/Hartbeats%20Matrix%2019681008.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2256" data-original-width="1951" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJOYm4UaoWQ1dhQm0yBeUE93D8igyIPq_2oplUU4aI_mBpLJS9Q1VxBzrAMEaZsPZv7o7HDxGepNI7heq0IZCoSnnE4AdWf3w4quasbuzOQmcmVXSf9oQCmR-oMVajqGX9gnqQla-xRqsCZxcs2s45RSj47vnzB_e0ajyauN3dpiIPzJW_2FW90thB/s320/Hartbeats%20Matrix%2019681008.jpg" width="277" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Mickey and The Hartbeats (booked as "Jerry Garceaaah") on a Matrix flyer, October 8-10, 1968</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Fall 1968: Was There A Plan?</i></b><br />In Summer '68, Garcia and Phil Lesh apparently felt that Weir and Pigpen were insufficiently committed to the musical advancement that the other four members were undertaking. Songs like "China Cat Sunflower" were entering the repertoire, and the jamming was getting broader and wider, magnified by the double drummers. The Grateful Dead had lined up Tom Constanten to play organ as soon as his Air Force hitch ended in November. TC had apparently jammed with the Dead as early as Fall 1967. <br /><p>As to another guitarist, the Dead were trying out other guitarists from September through December. Although all parties say now that there were no plans to replace Weir, it rings pretty hollow if you've ever known anybody in a band. If your girlfriend is out of town, and you keep inviting other women to go out dancing with you, are you shopping for a new girlfriend? You can say "no" all you want, but why were you going dancing?</p><p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2014/05/september-21-1968-pacific-recording-san.html">On September 21, 1968, the Dead invited both David Crosby and ex-Animals guitarist Vic Briggs up to San Francisco to jam at Pacific Recording</a>. There's a tape. They took two LA guitarists and invited them up to jam, and Weir wasn't there. At the time, neither was known to have a band (Crosby was already making plans with Stephen Stills and Graham Nash, but it wasn't public). Both players were more advanced than Weir at that stage. </p><p>On October 8, 9 and 10, 1968, Garcia, Lesh, Hart and Kreutzmann had played the Matrix as Mickey and The Hartbeats. Elvin Bishop dropped by to jam. Bishop would return for another jam on October 30. Sometime around December, David Nelson was invited to jam with members of the Dead at Pacific Recorders--Bob Weir wasn't there, again--and they tried on "The Eleven." You can't say that the Dead weren't trying out guitarists, not least since they never did anything like this again. They already had a new organist lined up. </p><p>There had been an infamous meeting, around August 1968, taped by Owsley, in which the band's unhappiness with Weir and Pigpen was made known. The tape is as much legend as fact. <a href="https://www.dead.net/deadcast/adventures-pigpen-part-1">Still, in the excellent Deadcast episode about Pigpen, Jesse Jarnow found a reliable eyewitness (Mike Dolgushkin) who had heard the tape. Interestingly, there was no mention of Pigpen and Weir actually being "fired."</a> The proposal would seem to be that Weir and Pigpen would continue to write songs and record with the Dead, but not be part of the performing unit. Jarnow speculated that this inexplicable proposal only makes sense if you imagine that the Dead were concerned about their status with Warner Brothers, and felt they still needed to include Pig and Weir as signatories to the recording contract. </p><p>The Pigpen Deadcast makes another point, however. An eyewitness in Archive comments says that Garcia announced from the stage at one of the October Avalon shows that Pigpen was absent because he was home taking care of his sick girlfriend. His longtime partner, Veronica Barnard (known as Vee) had suffered an aneurysm around this time, and Pigpen was taking time to nurse her back to health. So Pigpen's absence from the Dead in this period may have had more to do with personal choice, and not his status with the band. It seems likely that Pigpen wasn't with the band in Sacramento.<br /></p><p>If a full transition was under consideration, however, the band would need another lead singer. Sure, I guess the Dead could consider just having Garcia do all the vocals, but that would not only put a huge strain on Garcia's voice, it would have greatly cut down on the range of songs they could consider. None of the guitarists they had tried out had a significant history as a vocalist. Much later in their careers, both Elvin Bishop and David Nelson would become experienced lead singers, as would David Crosby, but they did not present that way in late 1968. So it makes sense that Garcia was looking around for another lead singer.</p><p><br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOIIS6niPqisbm_ff1yDNaAT1-AtKqGtSnc5gbZdG0h3SZuo3jYX676dL43ENPxVlbonwbqiWgkFwovLBkoi3PaPQdZS2MpWtTCeRohhu_47-sX-E06DxDQ2uWmwM0FvsJ_p8QQSRirPHnikzwRztwo88f-cnCRQNgwYiCbh8S5rXVVsZjKvFQcJfm/s1080/AIrplane%20Quicksilver%20Family%20Tree%20Fillmore%2019660401.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="695" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOIIS6niPqisbm_ff1yDNaAT1-AtKqGtSnc5gbZdG0h3SZuo3jYX676dL43ENPxVlbonwbqiWgkFwovLBkoi3PaPQdZS2MpWtTCeRohhu_47-sX-E06DxDQ2uWmwM0FvsJ_p8QQSRirPHnikzwRztwo88f-cnCRQNgwYiCbh8S5rXVVsZjKvFQcJfm/s320/AIrplane%20Quicksilver%20Family%20Tree%20Fillmore%2019660401.jpg" width="206" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Family Tree opened for Jefferson Airplane at the Fillmore Auditorium on Saturday, April 2 (Quicksilver Messenger Service opened Friday April 1)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>During its existence from 1966-68, the Family Tree only released a single on an obscure label in late 1966, a single on RCA in 1967 and an RCA album around May 1968. They were a successful live band on the West Coast, particularly in Northern California and the Pacific Northwest, but since their recorded output was slim, they remain obscure. The Family Tree name is best known from their presence on Fillmore and Avalon posters from 1966, often opening for Quicksilver Messenger Service. Few people who recognize the name, however, know anything of their music. Bob Segarini had been born and raised in Stockton, in Central California, and he had been in the band Ratz, with Gary Duncan, from nearby Ceres, as early as 1965. Duncan (then known by his birth-name Gary Grubb) would wind up in Quicksilver Messenger Service by 1966. Bob Segarini was thus well-entrenched in the San Francisco music scene from its earliest days.</p><p>The Family Tree only released two singles, on in 1966 (on Mira) and one on RCA in 1967. They would release the album <i>Miss Butters </i>on RCA in May, 1968, and broke up later that year. With only two singles, an album and some demos, we only have a sketch of what Family Tree sounded like. In general, Segarini found a slot between West Coast folk-rock and Anglo rock and roll. Think of a sweet spot between Buffalo Springfield and The Kinks, and we have at least a hint of the sound of Family Tree. <br /></p><p></p><p>The Sacramento concert on October 5 was two weeks after the Dead’s jam with
Crosby and Briggs, and a few days before the first jam with Bishop at
the Matrix. If there was any time Garcia was thinking about a new
configuration of the Grateful Dead, it was during this window. The band
gets to Sacramento, and Jerry finds his old pal Bob Segarini singing in one of
the opening acts, so he hits him up. Before we address the history of
Bob Segarini, however, I want to sort out why I am certain that the
conversation took place on this date, even though Segarini's own belated
account is somewhat different. </p><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd5Xs0R3ywBdGDtGSizIwo4qhHmtNuEZZba97BsEdJ5GvS-KVJeE6q4cgt7D-1F2txQV2QCD0DcsWncNH4nUgld8pLgr27o9uprFNHgoG6XhBmA7FNcSAC7s8SMTfwSroMg47YUJoZ_aK5x8ebMwqCzNNvJkqZ4e8zRabKlhQWaRV76GB3P4WPGyTt/s254/iFamily%20Tree%20around%201967.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="198" data-original-width="254" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhd5Xs0R3ywBdGDtGSizIwo4qhHmtNuEZZba97BsEdJ5GvS-KVJeE6q4cgt7D-1F2txQV2QCD0DcsWncNH4nUgld8pLgr27o9uprFNHgoG6XhBmA7FNcSAC7s8SMTfwSroMg47YUJoZ_aK5x8ebMwqCzNNvJkqZ4e8zRabKlhQWaRV76GB3P4WPGyTt/s1600/iFamily%20Tree%20around%201967.jpg" width="254" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Family Tree around 1967, Seagrini in front</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Unpacking The Evidence</b></i><br />I was aware of Bob Segarini's assertion that he had been asked to join the Grateful Dead in 2007, when I read the great liner notes to the Rev-Ola Records cd re-release of the Family Tree's only album, <i>Miss Butters</i>. The album had originally been issued by RCA Records in 1968, and the LP had become a collector's item (I myself had never laid eyes on a vinyl copy, and even though I had been aware of it). Steve Stanley's excellent liner notes discuss the story of Segarini and the Family Tree, and they included this intriguing tale:<br /><p></p><blockquote>During this time [<i>ca 1968-70</i>], Segarani had other career opportunities.
He recalls just one example: "In 1969, we were opening the Bitter End
West on Santa Monica Boulevard. This was during the period between The
Family Tree and Roxy. It was Graham Nash, Rita Coolidge, one of the
guitarists from Iron Butterfly, Little Richard's drummer. We were
opening the show. The Grateful Dead were the headliners. I'd known Jerry
[Garcia] for years, and he said, " Do you want to join the band and be
the lead singer? And I said "no, I've already got my own thing going.'
One more stupid thing I did in my life; I coulda been in the Grateful
Dead."</blockquote><p></p><p>There were a number of confusing things about this story, which made it difficult to process. In simplest terms, although Segarini was between bands in 1969, the Bitter End West was not open until October 1970, so something was wrong with his timeline. Eventually, however, I was able to unpack the details, which I will explain. I am convinced that Segarini is conflating two very real but separate events:</p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Opening for the Grateful Dead and being asked to consider joining the band, in October 1968, and</li><li><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/10/august-28-29-1970-thee-club-los-angeles.html">Opening for the Grateful Dead in West Hollywood on August 28-29, 1970, at Thee Club, later called The Bitter End West</a>. </li></ul><p>I think both these things happened, and Segarini merged them in his mind. He has had a long complicated career, and he was asked 38 years after the fact. </p><p>To deal with the second memory first: In 1970, Segarini formed a band called Roxy, who had released a pretty good debut album on Elektra Records in 1969. On the weekend of August 28-29, 1970, Roxy had opened for the acoustic Grateful Dead at a new "showcase" venue called Thee Club. It was a real Hollywood opening, apparently, with all sorts of stars dropping by. By October '70, the venue had changed its name to the Bitter End West (after the famous Greenwich Village folk club). <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/10/august-28-29-1970-thee-club-los-angeles.html">I wrote about the Dead's appearance at Thee Club at great length in another post. </a></p><p>When I realized that Family Tree had opened for the Dead in Sacramento, I put all the pieces together. By October of 1968, Family Tree had all but fallen apart, but they had still opened for the Grateful Dead. The next time Segarini would open for the Dead was at Thee Club, and I am asserting that he just merged the two events. </p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcRNKRgqIHraYFIxu_iGp531fmqiIrgcf3oRTA04eek20G72ubEKeG7AZSRj008sMPRwP0Q8rXvWmNICQq_-s3J8mzqz4EIGJIgUYIWgVKMP_-Zx2MR20Vg3rqdrCr6IjPLsZE0VpuaVLLDsMXDmydZkfptm5d-HooCVrOter_zj8vsAUgkwDu1Im6/s247/VIc%20Briggs%20Hendrix%2068.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="247" data-original-width="204" height="247" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcRNKRgqIHraYFIxu_iGp531fmqiIrgcf3oRTA04eek20G72ubEKeG7AZSRj008sMPRwP0Q8rXvWmNICQq_-s3J8mzqz4EIGJIgUYIWgVKMP_-Zx2MR20Vg3rqdrCr6IjPLsZE0VpuaVLLDsMXDmydZkfptm5d-HooCVrOter_zj8vsAUgkwDu1Im6/s1600/VIc%20Briggs%20Hendrix%2068.jpg" width="204" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Animals guitarist Vic Briggs (right), jamming with a friend, probably May 1968</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />What Might Have Been</b></i><br />I don't want to go too far for down the counterfactual road, but let's at least think about a new-look late 1968 Grateful Dead:<ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>Garcia, Lesh, Hart</b> and <b>Kreutzmann</b></li><li>Another <b>guitarist</b> to duel with Garcia (Vic Briggs, Elvin Bishop, David Nelson or who knows?)</li><li><b>Tom Constanten</b> on organ</li><li><b>Bob Segarini</b> on lead and harmony vocals, and maybe some rhythm guitar</li></ul><p>Lots of fine 60s bands had significant personnel changes, and they had a wide variety of outcomes, many, though not all, quite favorable There's no reason that the Alterna-Grateful Dead couldn't have risen to the heights of the one in our timeline, but I'll leave that speculation to you. Now, even if Segarini had said "yes," it was no guarantee that he would have actually ended up replacing Pigpen, and we can imagine scenarios in which Weir remains but Segarini also joins, but we'll leave it to our imagination to consider what that band might have sounded like. </p><b><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgY506Rm2tAQhesGQGd_18p5mH9n7Bx-0uG8ScGPCIsYmatKLd_zhHJbL3NZHI51bPrW4akmwjKAaNBZ2Cqdu_zbjOK5qvycV_j4FpMHF9hPXIdqJmPVarnziSa61gj6QHvZTKKM4n1XZsLB47FN6IADKDfuTOBfXXVxqpbWn_a8Uy9k9E5kSVMMLAE/s480/Bob%20Segarini%20around%201979.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="480" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgY506Rm2tAQhesGQGd_18p5mH9n7Bx-0uG8ScGPCIsYmatKLd_zhHJbL3NZHI51bPrW4akmwjKAaNBZ2Cqdu_zbjOK5qvycV_j4FpMHF9hPXIdqJmPVarnziSa61gj6QHvZTKKM4n1XZsLB47FN6IADKDfuTOBfXXVxqpbWn_a8Uy9k9E5kSVMMLAE/s320/Bob%20Segarini%20around%201979.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bob Segarini, with his band The Dudes, late 1970s</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Who Is Bob Segarini?</i></b><br /><a href="https://www.recordnet.com/story/entertainment/local/2011/08/04/reliving-rocking-history-stockton/49946942007/">Bob Segarini was raised in Stockton, CA. At about age 16, he dropped out of high school to become a full-time musician</a>. In 1965, he was in a band called The Ratz with guitarist Gary Grubb, from the tiny town of Ceres, near Modesto. The Ratz opened for the Rolling Stones on December 4, 1965 in San Jose. Grubb went on to form The Brogues, and later Quicksilver Messenger Service, using the name Gary Duncan. <br /><p>Segarini, meanwhile, had formed The Family Tree in early 1966. Members included organist Micheal Olsen and ex-Brogues bassist Bill Whittington, and drummer Newman Davis. The Family Tree played many early gigs at the Fillmore and elsewhere with Quicksvilver Messenger Service. So Segarini had been a regular on the Fillmore scene since its inception. Within a few months, the Family Tree had evolved. Whittington and Mike Olsen left--Olsen becoming famous using the name Lee Michaels--and Segarini was joined by bassist Kootch Trochim, guitarist Mike Dure, organist Jimmy DeCocq and drummer Van Slatter. Initially, Family Tree had signed with tiny Mira Records.</p><p>The "Fillmore Scene," such as it was on the West Coast, also existed in parallel with a pre-existing teen circuit with its initial roots in the Pacific Northwest. Bands like the Grateful Dead and Quicksilver only dabbled in that circuit, just playing the occasional high school prom, but there was a lot of money for bands playing the typical teen dance halls. Family Tree did very well from Sacramento through Oregon. They had a regional hit in early 1967 with their only Mira single "Prince Of Dreams." Segarini recalls buying a new 1966 Jaguar XKE with cash from all the money the Family Tree made playing the Northwest. </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNH_5f25EhltLw5qcoyNxsVeZBDNyFO4tY6kkUCcqyTs2VdAyKO17c5OJpfjizJfmmu68K-sOOadtiAJEPAgppUTN2u0CwicVW2w_gUHTuuT7IcNXZtiMhHr3OvDRZxVwOYL5GQXc69uiz6baXz65tpIWn68_LXJK0sY66ngZG3xmW1wdmeyTP1FAL/s488/Segarini%20house%20in%20Stockton%2069%20cold-red.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="231" data-original-width="488" height="151" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNH_5f25EhltLw5qcoyNxsVeZBDNyFO4tY6kkUCcqyTs2VdAyKO17c5OJpfjizJfmmu68K-sOOadtiAJEPAgppUTN2u0CwicVW2w_gUHTuuT7IcNXZtiMhHr3OvDRZxVwOYL5GQXc69uiz6baXz65tpIWn68_LXJK0sY66ngZG3xmW1wdmeyTP1FAL/s320/Segarini%20house%20in%20Stockton%2069%20cold-red.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The view from the front yard of Bob Segarini and Roxy's house "Cold Red," outside of Stockton in 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p></p><p><a href="https://bobsegarini.wordpress.com/ ">Segarini has a wonderful blog called <i>Don't Believe A Word I Say</i>, which you can read for yourself</a>. It's very entertaining, and very long (Segarini says it is 1.8 million words and I believe him). I did extract this Grateful Dead story, written in 2012. The timeline seems somewhat garbled--plainly Mr Owsley's fault--but <a href="https://bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2017/01/27/segarini-the-fat-city-chronicles-2-short-stories-about-long-ago-2/#more-28405">this passage about the house his band was living in 1969, just outside of Stockton, includes a discussion of where they got their acid</a>. From the source, as it happens. Clearly, Segarini was no outsider. <br /></p><p></p><blockquote><i>I had come into possession of the acid by way of an acquaintance we had
met through The Grateful Dead, whom I had gotten to know during the
Family Tree days at the Fillmore and Avalon. Owsley, (Augustus Owsley
Stanley, who occasionally went by the name ‘Robert Owsley’ for some
strange reason), was not only a fine chemist, but one of the most
advanced sound technicians of the day. He spent time both before and
after serving time for drugs, as an investor in the Dead, as well as
their soundman. At one point, when Roxy was living in L.A, and the Dead
were in a rented house there while they were recording, we all went to
their place for Chinese food, and found the entire house full of sound
equipment and a shitload of big Voice of Theater speakers. Very cool…you
either had to sit on the floor and eat, or stand at one of the speaker
cabinets and eat. It was so…exotic! </i></blockquote><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjICfYq1s-3ZhtvvbYo6FxvkOPjdRXzE6JXtUZkrWA6QF7hPDOhKLzEEcEr75uWWlQ9IcP5H7iRB5PxFuIKLv3NUWVomIcd2xYFiwLLaSZSGtavns5bVieg0RIqapO5sM3H9MYRBSzklSUJvMvOFRDzH9t3Jk0iDOxjn-GHO32ahjC6Jzg41Hn_nfo9/s599/Miss%20Butters%20Family%20Tree%20RCA%20May%201968.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="591" data-original-width="599" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjICfYq1s-3ZhtvvbYo6FxvkOPjdRXzE6JXtUZkrWA6QF7hPDOhKLzEEcEr75uWWlQ9IcP5H7iRB5PxFuIKLv3NUWVomIcd2xYFiwLLaSZSGtavns5bVieg0RIqapO5sM3H9MYRBSzklSUJvMvOFRDzH9t3Jk0iDOxjn-GHO32ahjC6Jzg41Hn_nfo9/s320/Miss%20Butters%20Family%20Tree%20RCA%20May%201968.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Miss Butters, the only album by The Family Tree, released on RCA in May 1968<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>By 1968, an album on Mira hadn't materialized, but RCA had noticed the Family Tree's regional hit, and signed the band to a contract. RCA had been hugely successful with the Jefferson Airplane, so they must have been looking to capitalize on new young bands from the West Coast. The Family Tree recorded <i>Miss Butters</i> with RCA staff producer Rick Jarrard, who had also produced the Airplane. <i>Miss Butters</i> had Beatles-like pop overtones, probably somewhat at odds with the more rocking sound of Family Tree in concert. </p><p><i>Miss Butters </i>was released in May 1968, but it had no hit single and largely disappeared without a trace. The Family Tree ground to a halt. By October 1968 Kootch Trochim was already playing bass for another Sacramento band (<a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/07/sanpaku-performance-list-1968-69.html">Sanpaku</a>), and the Sacramento Civic show must have been one of Family Tree's last gigs under that name. By early 1969, Segarini and others played under the name Asmodeus, but they didn't play much. Segarini would go on to form Roxy with guitarist Randy Bishop (<i>for more about Segarini's later career, see below</i>). Roxy, too, opened for the Dead at Thee Experience in 1970, but as noted, Segarini seems to have merged the events in the telling.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOualJgAenA0-cc8Pg55UAZxNMlpNvOrsU_F-F4Bfm_eG9H9CbVJOts20otzenFrQvY9HeEqoaqNYxvk9eLxBpkhp2yh8jLhonVCCiDxvCYc0bGVQphy6A4tgfSAsddU5unjNUs-0Xp18ditcsnyaBsx3kLQVm8F2xlRFNmKDmbSCoGrVUA6RAPl6z/s545/GD%20Sacramento%20listing%2019681005%20Sep%2029%20Bee.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="185" data-original-width="545" height="109" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOualJgAenA0-cc8Pg55UAZxNMlpNvOrsU_F-F4Bfm_eG9H9CbVJOts20otzenFrQvY9HeEqoaqNYxvk9eLxBpkhp2yh8jLhonVCCiDxvCYc0bGVQphy6A4tgfSAsddU5unjNUs-0Xp18ditcsnyaBsx3kLQVm8F2xlRFNmKDmbSCoGrVUA6RAPl6z/s320/GD%20Sacramento%20listing%2019681005%20Sep%2029%20Bee.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The September 29 Sacramento Bee listed upcoming concerts. Traffic was the scheduled headliner for Saturday, October 5 (replaced by The Turtles)<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b><i>Concert Report:</i> October 5, 1968 Sacramento Memorial Auditorium, Sacramento, CA</b><br />The Sacramento show was promoted by Whitey Davis. <a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2010/04/some-notes-about-whitey-davis.html">Davis had been one of Chet Helms' lieutenants at the Avalon in late 66, and had moved up to Oregon</a>. Davis had been <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/crystal-ballroom-1332-w-burnside_09.html">the co-proprietor of the infamous Crystal Ballroom in Portland</a>. By Summer '68, however, the Crystal had folded, and Davis turned up in Sacramento. He started booking shows at a place called The Sound Factory, which was supposed to be Sacramento's version of the Fillmore, and working with KZAP-fm, the local underground rock radio station. He also managed the band Sanpaku. The Sacramento Memorial Auditorium was the biggest venue in town, with 3600 seats.<p></p><p>Initially, Traffic had been booked as the headliners. They had been scheduled to open for Cream at the Oakland Coliseum (October 4), and <a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2020/07/october-5-6-1968-san-francisco.html">play the ill-fated "San Francisco Pop Festival" outside of Stanford University on October 6</a>. The band had just released their great second album, <i>Traffic</i>, with "Feelin' Alright" and many other classics. Dave Mason abruptly quit the band, however, and all dates were canceled. Instead of Traffic, The Collectors opened for Cream, the San Francisco Pop Festival was moved from Stanford to Pleasanton, and The Turtles replaced Traffic in Sacramento. The Grateful Dead were bumped up to headliners. The Turtles, regardless of their bubblegum-pop hits, were actually a terrific folk-rock group. </p><p></p><p>With six bands on the bill, every band must have played short sets. I don't know what advantage Whitey Davis would have seen in booking so many bands. Only 2000 people attended, so it can't have been a huge success. <a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2017/05/march-11-1968-sacramento-ca.html ">We do have one brief review, from Mick Martin in the Sacramento underground paper </a><i><a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2017/05/march-11-1968-sacramento-ca.html ">Pony Express</a>:</i></p><p></p><blockquote><i>In
Sacramento, The GRATEFUL DEAD, TURTLES, YOUNGBLOODS, INITIAL SHOCK,
SANPAKU, and FAMILY TREE played to a surprisingly small crowd of 2,000.
[Memorial Auditorium, 10/5/68] The TURTLES were funny and entertaining.
They were a release from the intensely musically innovative atmosphere.
Mark Volmann is a comedian, in the truest sense of the word.<br />The
DEAD, INITIAL SHOCK, and SANPAKU were the musical highpoints of the
evening. SANPAKU's hornmen are so beautiful, their solos are always
different, and yet they build to a completely emotional climax. Their
original material is well arranged and worth repeated listens.<br />INITIAL
SHOCK and the DEAD were better than ever and twice as groovy. Both
groups always provide me with the feeling that I have heard something
worthwhile, and on this night I felt they did exceptional jobs.
YOUNGBLOODS were nice, and FAMILY TREE shows promise. It was an
enjoyable evening, but I can't wait for Sacramento to get it together
and support promoters like Whitey Davis, who really cares about music.</i></blockquote><p></p><p>This brief review does not indicate whether Pigpen performed. If so, it would have been the only sighting of him for 30 days. If he wasn't present, it might also have made it easier for Garcia to chat openly with Segarini about replacing him. </p><p>Segarini took a pass. Ultimately, Pigpen returned. Bob Weir never left. Bob Segarini went to LA, then Northern California, then Montreal, then Toronto and had a pretty lively career in the music business. </p><p>Coulda been different. Wasn't. So it goes. <br /></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNx19exRpR0dAaUwK8vSX8D3tbRJvznnu_owyj2AbtlOMtI9bugWNHpesCSzyiz-ylIhRMmcjU4QIuwzF6a198RccwT6YUBEaCfW7wU7a6e_mPA5mdkn6hy7khXvggEQobmfNZ-AQ0pZsHN0EFrRB9BL7xWJdf9gHVr6wRUMDZaL05vMniYMaWxvNC/s600/Wackering%20Heights%201971%20Elektra.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="590" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNx19exRpR0dAaUwK8vSX8D3tbRJvznnu_owyj2AbtlOMtI9bugWNHpesCSzyiz-ylIhRMmcjU4QIuwzF6a198RccwT6YUBEaCfW7wU7a6e_mPA5mdkn6hy7khXvggEQobmfNZ-AQ0pZsHN0EFrRB9BL7xWJdf9gHVr6wRUMDZaL05vMniYMaWxvNC/s320/Wackering%20Heights%201971%20Elektra.jpg" width="315" /></a></b></i></div><i><b><br />Appendix: Bob Segarini Career Overview</b></i><br />Bob Segarini may not be a major figure, but he's a pretty good rock and roller with a diverse career, and it's still going on. I have sketched out a few highlights here, but this list isn't anywhere near the entire story. <a href="https://bobsegarini.wordpress.com/">For more about Segarini, see his own blog <i>Don't Believe A Word</i></a>. For a starting point on his extensive catalog, I would recommend <i>Wackering Heights</i>, the 1971 debut album of The Wackers.<br /><p></p><b>The Us</b><br />Bob Segarini first surfaces on tape with The Us, recorded by Autumn Records in Fall '65. San Francisco-based Autumn had scored a hit with The Beau Brummels, and was recording emerging rock bands around the Bay Area, including The Great Society (with Grace Slick) and The Emergency Crew (later to change their names to The Warlocks, and then to something else). <br /><p>The track "How Can I Tell Her, " written by Segarini, was produced by staff producer Sylvester Stewart, later better known as Sly Stone. I'm not certain if the track was actually released as a single. Segarini was apparently credited as "Cylus Prole," possibly because he wasn't a legal adult yet. The rest of the band was bassist Varsh Hammel, guitarists Jock Ellis and Rueben Bettencourt and drummer Frank Lupica. Lupica, in another instance of convergence, created his "Cosmic Beam" which was the direct inspiration for the instrument built by Dan Healy and Mickey Hart.</p><p><a href="https://www.discogs.com/release/3374503-Various-Dance-With-Me-The-Autumn-Teen-Sound">"How Can I Tell Her" was released on the 1994 Autumn Records compilation <i>Dance With Me</i>, part of the <i>Nuggets From The Golden State</i> series</a>.<br /></p><p><b>The Ratz</b><br />The Ratz were from Stockton, and briefly featured Ceres, CA guitarist Gary Grubb along with Segarini. Grubb had left The Ratz by the time they opened for the Rolling Stones at the San Jose Civic Auditorium on December 4, 1965.</p><p><a href="http://brunoceriotti.weebly.com/the-brogues.html">Grubb would join a Merced band called The Brogues, who were popular in San Jose and the Central Valley, and released a few singles</a>. Grubb and Brogues drummer Greg Elmore had met guitarists John Cippolina and Jim Murray at a Family Dog event at Longshoreman's Hall in October '65. The Brogues ended up breaking up because some members got drafted into the military, so Grubb and Elmore formed a band with their two Marin friends. By 1966, the band was named Quicksilver Messenger Service and Grubb was using the name Gary Duncan.<br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJu5D0jJBhrN2057qxzkRdD2XyKQGkNXbGxhQHrjMUw0P4IEAj07a7No2fxSAQdKF_cJ3TgeYi4rMWyeShGtL6jMOtIB6O33owJSPXRdNuGYMe7eZaTuBrr8L-yAGCE0MM_v6iVdVPQVe0aSMs23BieoLwO1ima6LjyehACUcM7EL7mLHVntETSlUE/s320/Family%20Tree%20Hillsboro%2019680316.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="320" data-original-width="236" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJu5D0jJBhrN2057qxzkRdD2XyKQGkNXbGxhQHrjMUw0P4IEAj07a7No2fxSAQdKF_cJ3TgeYi4rMWyeShGtL6jMOtIB6O33owJSPXRdNuGYMe7eZaTuBrr8L-yAGCE0MM_v6iVdVPQVe0aSMs23BieoLwO1ima6LjyehACUcM7EL7mLHVntETSlUE/s1600/Family%20Tree%20Hillsboro%2019680316.jpg" width="236" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The
Cirque, Hillsboro, OR March 16, 1968. San Francisco's Best, The Family
Tree plus The Jefferson Davis Five (Hillsboro is West of Portland)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>Family Tree</b><br />The Family Tree was founded in early 1966 by Segarini and ex-Brogues bassist Bill Whittington. Also in the initial lineup of Family Tree were drummer Newman Davis and organist Mike Olsen (<a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/08/november-12-1965-tiger-go-go-san.html">formerly of the Joel Scott Hill Trio</a>). The Family Tree played both the early Fillmore circuit and the "teen circuit" in Northern California and the Pacific Northwest. Segarini knew Gary (Grubb) Duncan, of course, so Family Tree was in on the Fillmore from the very beginning. It's not clear how Segarini had met Jerry Garcia, but it doesn't matter: the San Francisco psychedelic music scene was tiny, with only a few dozen working musicians, and everyone knew each other.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYaNimA3g1_6D_5prtu1cCPrII1us2O001XbYUeqAntrh_EqUH8hTV2lloCMr1JGyNghmdbu_SuiXYT43PRV0L15H2R-rjRc2BaqloGysJ243uImDf8NfUzn-M5KyJMpbOay4yh9y-G0z1wjRjoTPgoghUCvBEbDYmJdYVS6L5Cd137XK_-IBIKAfZ/s215/the%20family%20tree%20prince%20of%20dreams%20mira-s.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="213" data-original-width="215" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYaNimA3g1_6D_5prtu1cCPrII1us2O001XbYUeqAntrh_EqUH8hTV2lloCMr1JGyNghmdbu_SuiXYT43PRV0L15H2R-rjRc2BaqloGysJ243uImDf8NfUzn-M5KyJMpbOay4yh9y-G0z1wjRjoTPgoghUCvBEbDYmJdYVS6L5Cd137XK_-IBIKAfZ/s1600/the%20family%20tree%20prince%20of%20dreams%20mira-s.jpg" width="215" /></a></div><br />Family Tree had started to attract attention later in 1966. By this time, Mike Olsen had left for a solo career under the name Lee Michaels (Lee's first drummer was Frank Lupica, incidentally). Jim DeCocq joined on keyboards, Vann Slater came in on drums, Danny "Kootch" Trochim replaced Whittington on bass and Mike Dure was added on lead guitar. The Family Tree was signed by Los Angeles based Mira Records, releasing the single "Prince Of Dreams" on Mira in September '66. <a href="https://youtu.be/8P5KmChhNpE">Additional tracks were recorded for a prospective album, but Mira fell apart</a>. <p></p><p>Family Tree was increasingly successful on the California/Oregon live circuit, however, and they were picked up by RCA. A single was released by RCA in 1967, and the band recorded the album <i>Miss Butters</i> under the direction of staff producer Rick Jarrard. The rocking side of Family Tree can be heard on the Mira demos from '67, but the RCA album emphasized the poppier side of Segarini's work. Now, to be clear, Segarini had written all the songs and was very much into Beatles-style pop music, so RCA wasn't undermining the band, but all the traces suggest Family Tree rocked much harder in concert than <i>Miss Butters</i> implies. </p><p><i>Miss Butters </i>was released in May 1968, but made no headway on the charts. Family Tree soldiered on, but ultimately fell apart. The October booking in Sacramento seems to be one of the last for Family Tree. By this time, Kootch Trochim was playing bass for the Sacramento band Sanpaku (also on the bill), and I don't know who else was even in Family Tree by then. <br /></p><p><i><b>Family Tree</b> discography</i><br /><b>Sep 1966 45</b>: Mira Records "Prince Of Dreams"/"Live Your Own Life"<br /><b>1967 45</b>: RCA Records "Do You Have The Time"/"Keepin A Secret"<br /><b>May 1968 LP</b>: RCA Records <i>Miss Butters</i></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrdEPJVDcxdbbjAOIJ8inl2oFFJg4_yyTZTZVikg0B5IKANqAih-11iibfRcvT70Ml_silXb7nSnLOTiBY-W9cDtmd6FOocE93ZLOKhms0bH7clydDrI1zJCLiRVIVkfmt9ymoNloO32BO_nOxyPAwqgg5fX4gNNYp9oQ-VeYtq0eZjtkGC1yMqxpk/s615/NO%20House%2019690207.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="510" data-original-width="615" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrdEPJVDcxdbbjAOIJ8inl2oFFJg4_yyTZTZVikg0B5IKANqAih-11iibfRcvT70Ml_silXb7nSnLOTiBY-W9cDtmd6FOocE93ZLOKhms0bH7clydDrI1zJCLiRVIVkfmt9ymoNloO32BO_nOxyPAwqgg5fX4gNNYp9oQ-VeYtq0eZjtkGC1yMqxpk/s320/NO%20House%2019690207.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i><a href="https://bobsegarini.wordpress.com/2017/01/27/segarini-the-fat-city-chronicles-2-short-stories-about-long-ago-2/#more-28405">A Berkeley Barb ad for Berkeley's New Orleans House, February 1969</a>. Sea Train had recently been the reformed Blues Project. The Steve Miller playing the next week is the organist from the band Linn County (and later Elvin Bishop), not the better-known guitarist. A.B. Skhy featured Howard Wales.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>Asmodeus</b><br />I don't know who was in Asmodeus save for Bob Segarini. They apparently played around in early 1969.<br /></p><p><b></b></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY3WYiFGOWtC8Rb6u8cVuCPZg_sjBx7UaGsJ7_qNH5lHQICZbhHQ0YRWkwBT3BjfJh2ToLb2S8daaHCr10mKv6niueD6CUH4nuBPEz8Gb64PC-6h-b0NSjCQiTISTlBlMqpTqxEiWf6NuQbXcotGT69ah_aB3kLeAXe6B23PtI9qG__L6saTvhNacQ/s509/Roxy%20lp%20Elektra%201969.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="507" data-original-width="509" height="319" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhY3WYiFGOWtC8Rb6u8cVuCPZg_sjBx7UaGsJ7_qNH5lHQICZbhHQ0YRWkwBT3BjfJh2ToLb2S8daaHCr10mKv6niueD6CUH4nuBPEz8Gb64PC-6h-b0NSjCQiTISTlBlMqpTqxEiWf6NuQbXcotGT69ah_aB3kLeAXe6B23PtI9qG__L6saTvhNacQ/s320/Roxy%20lp%20Elektra%201969.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Roxy's only LP, released on Elektra Records in 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br />Roxy</b><br />Roxy formed later in 1969, with Jimmy DeCocq (now lead guitar), Randy Bishop (bass, guitar, vocals), James Morris (keyboards) and John McDonald (drums). They released one album on Elektra in 1969. Roxy had a more upbeat sound than <i>Miss Butters.</i> They lasted until late 1970, and opened for the Grateful Dead at least twice. Roxy opened for the Dead in Phoenix on March 8, 1970, and then for the acoustic Grateful Dead at the Thee Club in August 1970 (Thee Club changed its name shortly afterwards to the Bitter End West). <p></p><p><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisbva9FyohZ406q5fe3c5dxZybWEi-EZHJccoQpaUZmstoZWpUMeN5WmiNVEPP3-g3Cjhinu4-wMcBf2VbnqunAC_i7bsKiwsHidZySZAIIJ3xN5NGVLtxeTcer8qDpk6fNyDPh4mqkFNva4TPzd3to-KQnHX2x8I6uWG_Drmj7CcZLdxXAnHAHIkx/s600/Hot%20Wacks%20Wackers%20Elektra%201972.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="596" data-original-width="600" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisbva9FyohZ406q5fe3c5dxZybWEi-EZHJccoQpaUZmstoZWpUMeN5WmiNVEPP3-g3Cjhinu4-wMcBf2VbnqunAC_i7bsKiwsHidZySZAIIJ3xN5NGVLtxeTcer8qDpk6fNyDPh4mqkFNva4TPzd3to-KQnHX2x8I6uWG_Drmj7CcZLdxXAnHAHIkx/s320/Hot%20Wacks%20Wackers%20Elektra%201972.jpg" width="320" /></a></b></div><b><br />The Wackers</b><br />In late 1970, Segarini and Bishop abandoned Roxy, who had ground to a halt. They moved themselves up to the far-Northern California outpost of Eureka, CA. For those not familiar with the geography, Eureka is 270 miles North of San Francisco, and though near to the Oregon border, it is still 400 miles South of Portland. It was (and remains) completely detached from the California music scene. Segarini knew the region from his success with Family Tree, but moving to Eureka wasn't an obvious career move.<p></p><p>Segarini and Bishop formed The Wackers, along with drummer Earnie Earnshaw, Michael Stull (keyboards, guitar and vocals) and returning bassist Kootch Trochim. <a href="https://www.discogs.com/release/3126706-The-Wackers-Wackering-Heights"><i>Wackering Heights</i>, the bands first album on Elektra, had great harmonies in the popular vein of Crosby, Stills and Nash, but propelled by short, catchy songs with a beat</a>. </p><p><a href="https://www.discogs.com/release/1160358-The-Wackers-Hot-Wacks">In 1972, after the band's second album <i>Hot Wacks</i></a>, The Wackers relocated to Montreal, Quebec. They drove there in an old VW bus. Elektra released their third album, <i>Shredder</i> later in 1972. The Wackers, stayed in Montreal, building up a following in Canada. </p><p><b></b></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq86ETiJM_uFAPuMDvOFhHm1Fnx71zS8TN01GBYDJgNhBUaxqecTB7nrlMx3eJCPcDBUOqyM6Nvey-BcoCrZiWigzIAZJjj1RjqJD13eMat-hhd_dUKi7k5xHR0jPSxEUp6O2kFtLi2G0Xn1srt23u5jSH4gWsDx2dGMucT7hK5s6w0Aw8-50ZyOmB/s599/The%20Dudes%20Columbia%201975.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="599" data-original-width="597" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgq86ETiJM_uFAPuMDvOFhHm1Fnx71zS8TN01GBYDJgNhBUaxqecTB7nrlMx3eJCPcDBUOqyM6Nvey-BcoCrZiWigzIAZJjj1RjqJD13eMat-hhd_dUKi7k5xHR0jPSxEUp6O2kFtLi2G0Xn1srt23u5jSH4gWsDx2dGMucT7hK5s6w0Aw8-50ZyOmB/s320/The%20Dudes%20Columbia%201975.jpg" width="319" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Dudes 1975 Columbia Records album</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br />The Dudes</b><br />The Wackers had some personnel changes after <i>Shredder</i>, including some Canadian musicians. By 1974, The Wackers were gone, and Segarini had formed The Dudes, with Kootch on bass and some Canadian players. <a href="https://www.discogs.com/master/297573-Dudes-Were-No-Angels">In 1975, Columbia released The Dudes debut <i>We're No Angels</i></a>, but the band fell apart.<p><br /></p><p><i></i></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi64IWy7KJ_Zn-LRniMQcrk7RKPTvLPMvXjCWl720h1CkLcQPNwqp6WnbmjAM12H_5ahvf4kH-I_Xr4Hu9ii0eENglBnk3Q4Bab4U4QSt3_MB6JxGz3cm_UH4W5tHaG7ttL14zdn2hTGMMMQvVdt2vS7Br8W_FmBPt04_D0bnuy86EAAadgQFrg__EN/s600/Gotta%20Have%20Pop%20Bob%20Segarini%20Bomb%20Records%20lp%201978.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="597" data-original-width="600" height="318" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi64IWy7KJ_Zn-LRniMQcrk7RKPTvLPMvXjCWl720h1CkLcQPNwqp6WnbmjAM12H_5ahvf4kH-I_Xr4Hu9ii0eENglBnk3Q4Bab4U4QSt3_MB6JxGz3cm_UH4W5tHaG7ttL14zdn2hTGMMMQvVdt2vS7Br8W_FmBPt04_D0bnuy86EAAadgQFrg__EN/s320/Gotta%20Have%20Pop%20Bob%20Segarini%20Bomb%20Records%20lp%201978.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Gotta Have Pop, Bob Segarini's first solo album, released on Bomb Records in 1978</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><i><br />Gotta Have Pop-</i><b>Bob Segarini</b><br />Since The Dudes fell apart, Segarini went solo. His first album <i>Gotta Have Pop</i> was released in 1978. He went on to have an extensive solo career in Canada, which I will not attempt to summarize here.<br /><br />In 1982, Segarini began a successful career as a dj at the Toronto fm station CHUM. As near as I can tell, he is better known as a radio personality in Canada than as a singer, though of course the two careers are merged.<p></p><p> <br /></p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-36740519017935215552023-03-23T11:27:00.001-07:002023-03-23T11:27:46.556-07:00December 4-7, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/The Flock/Humble Pie (x-Altamont)<p><br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAvWOkJSxA491hr5_9QEmsaemubV7pBAlno2vQueoETTjPNqHJMhNSmk8hngtb-l8LDso1mKAeujKGtkANC_L28N6sfZoPRShOYBOQ5n0gToHP0GTmjQHeLS0BRTZy91kR1opOgJczG2E/s1542/FW+GD+19691204.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1177" data-original-width="1542" height="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhAvWOkJSxA491hr5_9QEmsaemubV7pBAlno2vQueoETTjPNqHJMhNSmk8hngtb-l8LDso1mKAeujKGtkANC_L28N6sfZoPRShOYBOQ5n0gToHP0GTmjQHeLS0BRTZy91kR1opOgJczG2E/s320/FW+GD+19691204.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A Bill Graham Presents flyer with the poster for the December 4-7, 1969 concert at Fillmore West, headlined by the Grateful Dead. On the back was a list of upcoming concerts, including Jefferson Airplane on New Year's Eve at Winterland</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>Here's a Grateful Dead trivia question: when did Sam Cutler first speak on stage prior to a Grateful Dead concert? I'm pretty sure that it was Thursday, December 4, 1969 at Fillmore West. At the time, he was the road manager of the Rolling Stones. Cutler was in town with the Stones because they were planning a gigantic free concert in the San Francisco Bay Area. Cutler had apparently arrived the day before (December 3), and by Thursday it appeared that <a href="https://www.sonomaraceway.com/">the concert would be held at the recently-opened Sears Point Raceway, at Highway 37 and 121 in the Sonoma hills</a>. On the existing tape from December 4, an unknown announcer says "Sam Cutler told you what was going on." Presumably Cutler had come on stage earlier to talk to the crowd. It was ironic that it would shortly become part of his job description, but neither Cutler nor anyone else could have foretold that.</p><p>The Grateful Dead's four-night stand at the Fillmore West, from December 4 through 7, was their fourth weekend booking at Fillmore West in 1969. Even though Fillmore West was the Dead's home court, so to speak, any reflections on the weekend are usually swallowed up by contemplation of the ensuing debacle of a concert at Altamont Speedway on Saturday, December 6. Indeed, the Dead’s Saturday night performance at Fillmore West was canceled, since the Dead were at the racetrack and most of the fans were too. It was a strange footnote that as things fell apart, the helicopters returned the band to Fillmore West, but the Dead didn't play that Saturday night.</p><p>For all the monumental importance of Altamont, however, the December Fillmore West shows remain a cipher. We only hear about Saturday night, when the Dead helicoptered back to San Francisco and didn't perform. We hear nothing at all about Thursday, Friday or Sunday. Sure, we have the tapes. Yet the tapes tell us the music that was played--always welcome--with no other context. Were the shows well attended? How many people went to Fillmore West one of those nights, and also went to Altamont? I cannot find any trace of eyewitnesses.<br /></p><p>This post will illuminate what we can about the actual events at the Fillmore West on the weekend of December 4-7, 1969. At the very least, the limited known facts are still indicators of trends and portents in the arc of Grateful Dead concert history. This post will look at what the how the weekend at Fillmore West shows us about how Grateful Dead concerts were evolving, without addressing the <i>hapax legomenon</i> of the Altamont event.</p><p><i><b></b></i></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiRAIFpfQ03U1hM2bSoAEqr-tEsRKC4sHHeXrapaQz6Vag9etdRjSqEAmsVI3cUw0novMqTKGv4MnwmCDREBV7-3C721msSywwic8rH4Ul3RWF44fX313yfmauQUDugXJgNhmG3RNrzzpLmPFKsTrBF7lhhZqz-aCp-fy3p7EoV8ybkiYbpC8vPTdij=s1746" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1746" data-original-width="1180" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiRAIFpfQ03U1hM2bSoAEqr-tEsRKC4sHHeXrapaQz6Vag9etdRjSqEAmsVI3cUw0novMqTKGv4MnwmCDREBV7-3C721msSywwic8rH4Ul3RWF44fX313yfmauQUDugXJgNhmG3RNrzzpLmPFKsTrBF7lhhZqz-aCp-fy3p7EoV8ybkiYbpC8vPTdij=s320" width="216" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Jefferson Airplane and Grateful Dead had played May 2 and 3, 1969 (Friday and Saturday) at Winterland, supported by Mongo Santamaria. Mongo, Cold Blood and Elvin Bishop were at Fillmore Thursday and Sunday</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b><br />The Grateful Dead/Bill Graham Presents 1969</b></i><br />The Grateful Dead had been headlining concerts for Bill Graham Presents since October 1966 at the Fillmore. This status had continued when Graham moved to the Fillmore West in July 1968. These December 1969 shows were the fourth weekend in 1969 at which the Dead had headlined the Fillmore West. Grateful Dead performances for Bill Graham Presents were an evolving
process, as always, but since both the Dead and Bill Graham established
the future of the rock concert industry, any evolution in their
arrangements had implications for the profession as a whole. Up until this December weekend, Grateful Dead shows at Fillmore West had followed the same pattern as the Fillmore Auditorium shows that had preceded them. <p></p><p>At Fillmore and Fillmore West, there had always been three bands advertised ("On The Poster"), and they would both play two sets. In contrast to future years, however, the bands rotated throughout the night, so the headline band played the third and sixth set of the night. This allowed audiences to come and go. Suburban teenagers could come early, and city denizens who worked at restaurants and the like could come late, and all patrons could see all three bands. Some hardcore fans could stay throughout, but that was initially uncommon. Particularly in 1966-67, people went to the Fillmore (or the Avalon) because it was "The Fillmore," to see whoever happened to be booked. In many cases, the bands didn't even have records, or if they did, no radio station was playing them. Fans were just checking out the scene. If they were lucky, they caught the Grateful Dead or Quicksilver Messenger Service (or numerous other bands) before they were known, laying down the future of rock music.</p><p>There were times that another act would be added to the bill, usually on Friday or Saturday night. <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/08/fillmore-west-lost-concerts-tuesday.html">Often they were bands who had played the Fillmore West Tuesday "audition nights," and recently discovered by the Bill Graham organization.</a> These bands were rarely advertised, neither on "The Poster" nor even in daily newspaper listings. This peculiar practice explains bands who recall opening for famous groups at Fillmore West even though they were not "On The Poster." Such bands only played one set, so the headline act would play the 4th and 7th sets of the night.</p><p>The significance of the Grateful Dead's December, 1969 Fillmore West shows was that the venue evolved to a more conventional single set, evening-ending performance to conclude the show. The taped evidence suggests rather strongly that the Dead ended each night with a single extended set, rather than playing two shorter (45 minutes>one hour) sets at different points in the evening. Though unnoticed, this evolution brought the Grateful Dead into the mainstream of rock concert performers at the time. Due to the paucity of information about Fillmore West concerts in late 1969, I don't know whether the Dead were among the last or the first of performers who moved from two separated sets to one longer one.</p><p>Now, for every other promoter in 1969, whenever the Grateful Dead headlined a show, they came onstage and ended the show. In most cases, they played a single long set, plus an encore. It may be that in a few instances, the Grateful Dead played two sets--if they did that in 1969, the reason was likely equipment related--but the band still ended the show. The only times the Grateful Dead would turn the stage over was when they had two performances in the same evening. At Bill Graham's Fillmore East, for example, almost all shows (save for a few weeknight benefits) had an early and a late show, and the headliner and the opener played both shows. When the Grateful Dead had played Fillmore East with Country Joe and The Fish (and opener Sha-Na-Na), for example, on September 26-27, 1969 (Friday and Saturday), the Dead had played two sets separated by the other acts. From the point of view of the crowd, however, the bands would play single sets for each audience.</p><p>So when the Grateful Dead played single long sets at Fillmore West in December, 1969, they were stepping away from one of the factors that made the Fillmore West a unique rock performance venue. The configuration went from a nightclub-like booking, with multiple acts repeating their performances, to a concert setting, where each performer presented a single time.<br /></p><i><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjjT1NxSQ1CvVlJd_RL5At9tg-GG4IOmsumlLPumi_R9IRSR8n5_ERp3d0-z3UXVvowLKLjwPHlk5SsWXoiK9VlbE1vSN3T8Xw3rfGB9LBJk9k3COOIoP6RgIDfP_Frr8yPmrAbN6U5eatlXA7zhrEHuGp-uPp4K6ZLgWQ-T0dYhmCwMbEjeIjZojlO=s3028" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3028" data-original-width="1960" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjjT1NxSQ1CvVlJd_RL5At9tg-GG4IOmsumlLPumi_R9IRSR8n5_ERp3d0-z3UXVvowLKLjwPHlk5SsWXoiK9VlbE1vSN3T8Xw3rfGB9LBJk9k3COOIoP6RgIDfP_Frr8yPmrAbN6U5eatlXA7zhrEHuGp-uPp4K6ZLgWQ-T0dYhmCwMbEjeIjZojlO=s320" width="207" /></a></div><br />The Grateful Dead at Fillmore West, 1969</b></i><br /><b>January 2-5, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Blood, Sweat & Tears/Spirit </b><i>(Thursday-Sunday)</i><br /><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/12/december-31-1968-winterland-grateful.html">The Grateful Dead had co-headlined New Year's Eve with Quicksilver Messen</a>ger Service, with an all-night (9pm-9am) extravaganza that included It's A Beautiful Day and Santana, then both rising bands. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/09/january-2-5-1969-fillmore-west-san.html">They followed New Year's Eve with another weekend, supported by Blood, Sweat & Tears, who would go on to become one of the biggest bands of the year (t</a>heir album would sell 4 million copies). Little is known about the Dead's performances this weekend. <p><b>February 19, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Golden Toad </b><i>(Wednesday) "Celestial Synapse"</i><br /><a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2012/07/february-19-1969-fillmore-west-grateful.html">The Dead played a private event on February 19, 1969, but that was a Wednesday night for an invited crowd.</a> <br /></p><p><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg6TzsxP4zRDkPQjuX3c5K9npb42NKXFD9R_IzzcveVO0_MNQR8FxYSqDBy1ZMesYoc7dH5RbMlNuNDNFRyp8ehnNQDaMmNbXXN_nwlV-OQ34vmXyf8D3Vn4vKXnRNyke8Fget5R28Ug236JwlqRQDl_YhH-N050-u2brXpJwDBupeZww8xdmo686kP=s450" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="269" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg6TzsxP4zRDkPQjuX3c5K9npb42NKXFD9R_IzzcveVO0_MNQR8FxYSqDBy1ZMesYoc7dH5RbMlNuNDNFRyp8ehnNQDaMmNbXXN_nwlV-OQ34vmXyf8D3Vn4vKXnRNyke8Fget5R28Ug236JwlqRQDl_YhH-N050-u2brXpJwDBupeZww8xdmo686kP=s320" width="191" /></a></b></div><b><br />February 27-March 2, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Pentangle/Sir Douglas Quintet </b><i>(Thursday-Sunday)</i><br />This four night stand at Fillmore West was perhaps the most seminal live weekend in Grateful Dead history. The band recorded most of what would become <i>Live/Dead,</i> on state-of-the-art 16-track Ampex recorders. The band would release a memorable 10-cd set of the entire weekend in 2005. Grateful Dead music really doesn't get any better than this.<br /><p></p><p>And yet there was more. The opening act was the English group Pentangle, a unique English ensemble, with two (mostly) acoustic guitarists, a jazzy rhyhm section and a female singer. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/03/fillmore-west-february-27-march-2-1969.html">Jerry Garcia explicitly stated a decade later that hearing Pentangle made him consider the possibility of two amplified acoustic guitars over a rock rhythm section as a sonic possibility.</a> It would take almost another year before the Dead broke out their acoustic format, but hearing Pentangle was the catalyst.</p><p>The Dead were playing the 3rd and 6th sets of the night (<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/03/february-28-1969-fillmore-west-grateful.html ">and on at least one night, when Shades Of Joy opened, the 4th and 7th set</a>). One of the byproducts of this arrangement was that the headline act had to be "in the house" when the other bands where going through their second round, so musicians had little choice but to hear each other play. Thus Garcia heard Pentangle, and it had a profound influence on future Grateful Dead acoustic configurations.<br /></p><b>May 2-3, 1969 Winterland, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Mongo Santamaria </b><i>(Friday-Saturday)</i><br />In 1969, the Grateful Dead had also played two weekends for Bill Graham Presents at Winterland, twice the size of Fillmore West (officially 5400 vs 2500), both times in conjunction with the hugely popular Jefferson Airplane. These concert weekend were configured differently than the Fillmore West shows. After any opening acts, the Dead and then Jefferson Airplane would play a single extended set. None of the bands returned for a second set. <br /><p>Jefferson Airplane were hugely popular, but the rock scene had not expanded enough that they could sell out Winterland on their own. So the Airplane and the Dead played Friday and Saturday night at Winterland, with as many tickets on sale as if they had played four nights at Fillmore West. Latin jazzer Mongo Santamaria opened the show. He would have been great, but this was more a case of Graham showcasing music he wanted to be heard, as he was a Latin jazz fan.</p><b>May 28, 1969 Winterland, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Creedence Clearwater Revival/Santana/Elvin Bishop Group/Aum/Bangor Flying Circus </b><i>(Wednesday) People's Park Bail Benefit</i><br /><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/12/grateful-deadjerry-garcia-tour.html">The Dead had also played a Benefit at Winterland on May 28, 1969, with many other acts.</a> They had only played a brief set, however, and <a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2015/03/may-1969-three-days-with-dead.html"><i>Rolling Stone</i>'s Michael Lydon complained that the Dead "didn't get it going. </a><br /><p><b>June 5-8, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Junior Walker and The All-Stars/Glass Family </b><i>(Thursday-Sunday)</i><br />The
Grateful Dead headlined over Junior Walker and The All-Stars, a popular
group but not a huge draw. This weekend stands out because Garcia was
late one night (early set June 6) and Bill Graham insisted that Wayne
Ceballos of AUM stand in for him. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/04/fillmore-west-june-6-and-8-1969-guest.html">As if that weren't enough, for the
last set of Sunday night (June 8) some experimentation by Owsley left
Garcia--shall we say--"unavailable,"--so Ceballos returned with Elvin
Bishop to lead a 48-minute "Turn On Your Lovelight."</a> </p><p><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEggvrNl-PQ4eYjfnYLHq56A37jPow-AkFeV3WMv3xgq8zpbRRJBgrnCYcOk8ZXKyXnv74PEy45g6vJTXdUvjLovO3TZsjQkpQ4dVSGRXCg-I1Y7td9fn5TPYsBQXLCWB0fQ1JXGPM_TNIUDnwpdR9m80ulUp7IcAaCTp-pLLcrMQCkxiiOmfZilUkR3=s579" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="579" data-original-width="385" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEggvrNl-PQ4eYjfnYLHq56A37jPow-AkFeV3WMv3xgq8zpbRRJBgrnCYcOk8ZXKyXnv74PEy45g6vJTXdUvjLovO3TZsjQkpQ4dVSGRXCg-I1Y7td9fn5TPYsBQXLCWB0fQ1JXGPM_TNIUDnwpdR9m80ulUp7IcAaCTp-pLLcrMQCkxiiOmfZilUkR3=s320" width="213" /></a></b></div><b><br />October 24-26, 1969 Winterland, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Sons Of Champlin/Doug Kershaw</b><i> (Friday-Sunday)</i><br />Jefferson Airplane were bigger than ever. They would release their sixth album on RCA, <i>Volunteers</i>, in early November. The album was probably already getting heavy airplay on KSAN and other FM stations by the time of the concert, and copies may have even been available in record stores. The Grateful Dead would also be releasing the classic album <i>Live/Dead</i> in early November. The Jefferson Airplane closed the shows on Friday and Sunday, but the Grateful Dead were the last act on Saturday night (October 25). Also on Sayturday, Stephen Stills and Graham Nash played a guest acoustic set, and Stills jammed with the Dead on "Lovelight."<p></p><p><b></b></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjGAM1lWeee03GeJKAvkqhiMaaPCxzoqR7S8ynwEuncqn2Gxs_p4eH9dA-wYzeM5CwJ0lC6G0zhBOEPEBUzNKXz6qHpp65qfo77HD1HxDjomb2a-Hsaf7A2zkZXWy5pjDhO3tOt6Lu3-C-SMXoyb6-xShsas3QEQXxjJTc4sdYGTJ8-YBwqvte7Y4ln=s434" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="206" data-original-width="434" height="152" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjGAM1lWeee03GeJKAvkqhiMaaPCxzoqR7S8ynwEuncqn2Gxs_p4eH9dA-wYzeM5CwJ0lC6G0zhBOEPEBUzNKXz6qHpp65qfo77HD1HxDjomb2a-Hsaf7A2zkZXWy5pjDhO3tOt6Lu3-C-SMXoyb6-xShsas3QEQXxjJTc4sdYGTJ8-YBwqvte7Y4ln=s320" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The SF Examiner listing for Fillmore West on December 4, 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br />December 4-7, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/The Flock/Humble Pie </b><i>(Thursday-Sunday)</i><br />Although the Grateful Dead's December Fillmore West shows conformed with rock concert orthodoxy by concluding with a single long set, there was still some elements that were distinctive to Graham and the venue. In the 60s, every rock concert was expected to have multiple acts. In most cases, the headline act was preceded by a local band. At the Fillmore West, the openers were bands on major labels with albums to their names. Now, it's true that San Francisco bands often opened Fillmore West shows, but they too were bands with albums on major labels. <br /><p></p><p>By December, the Grateful Dead had released <i>Live/Dead </i>and had become established enough in the Bay Area that they did not need a major support act to sell tickets. There was still an assumption, however, that a proper rock concert at Fillmore West had three bands, and that the two openers were substantial bands, even if they were not yet popular. Many, many Bay Area rock fans were proud of having gone to the Fillmore or Fillmore West and heard bands on the way up, if only so they could brag a year later "yeah I saw Santana and Chicago open for Big Brother when no one knew who they were (e.g. September 12-14 '68)." The two opening acts in December hadn't sold a lot of records, but the musicians in the band had futures on tap. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEil0ua5Dq3dSHJf2X7-acsIZG-Rmkx535ILxCgFG_url4KW_DzURW-lYVDFi7vfDXVbRxQ42Zo1wcalpzMpwi892R4yzbS9FzpBjSToBygMUvB0mV4jPB8LhqThKGu7yNOK-bTdEcn6HOo/s300/The+Flock+lp+CBS+1969.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEil0ua5Dq3dSHJf2X7-acsIZG-Rmkx535ILxCgFG_url4KW_DzURW-lYVDFi7vfDXVbRxQ42Zo1wcalpzMpwi892R4yzbS9FzpBjSToBygMUvB0mV4jPB8LhqThKGu7yNOK-bTdEcn6HOo/s0/The+Flock+lp+CBS+1969.jpg" width="300" /></a></div><br /><a href="The Flock Columbia 1969 https://www.discogs.com/release/1074550-The-Flock-The-Flock">The Flock were a unique horn band from Chicago, and they had released their debut album on Columbia back in July</a>. Now, rock bands with a horn section were hardly unique, particularly on Columbia. Blood, Sweat & Tears and Chicago Transit Authority had both signed with the label back in '68, and by late '69 both bands had sold a lot of records. Other labels were signing rock bands with embedded horn sections, too, like San Francisco's own Sons Of Champlin (Capitol), The Serfs (out of Kansas, also on Capitol) and the Keef Hartley Band (on Decca, out of London).<p></p><p>The Flock played jazzy rock with a touch of soul and a lot of solos, pretty much the same model as for Chicago or The Sons. The special aspect of The Flock was that the principal soloist was electric violinist Jerry Goodman. Goodman was also one of the lead singers, and the band didn't have a keyboard player. Goodman was a great player, and The Flock had a very distinctive sound. Still, the Flock didn't really have many memorable songs, whereas bands like Chicago or BS&T had endlessly hummable material, whether you liked it or not. </p><p>A little bit of live material from the Flock floats around, and they were at the very least an interesting opening act (<a href="https://youtu.be/MsBPEORZJIA">for a live example from German TV in 1970, see her</a>e). Electric violin was still pretty exotic in 1969, particularly in the context of a horn section rather than countrified music. Jerry Goodman would go on to be well-recognized as a virtuoso when he would join the original Mahavishnu Orchestra in 1971 (Deadheads may recognize Goodman from the 90s jam-band Dixie Dregs). So The Flock would have made an impression as the Dead's opening act, even if in the end they didn't really make it big. At least alert fans could say a few years later that they had seen Goodman before Mahavishnu, and that is what a certain kind of mostly male rock fan lived for (I was exhibit A). </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4J32l0ZBuwQzaaW0nv-vZTQs8W8CyuV-qbK4njKPnD1R6oJ2ZK9YEd3lMmIQOgOIUuq5BYt_SB4uhC2fP5qa5g_0vXh7fnFSaRyajZgKZ2Iffq8AC9LpbH1l_K31GbO4Sb7DufQyImFs/s600/As+Safe+As+Yesterday+Is+Humble+Pie+Immediate+July+69.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="591" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4J32l0ZBuwQzaaW0nv-vZTQs8W8CyuV-qbK4njKPnD1R6oJ2ZK9YEd3lMmIQOgOIUuq5BYt_SB4uhC2fP5qa5g_0vXh7fnFSaRyajZgKZ2Iffq8AC9LpbH1l_K31GbO4Sb7DufQyImFs/s320/As+Safe+As+Yesterday+Is+Humble+Pie+Immediate+July+69.jpg" width="315" /></a></div><br />Humble Pie, meanwhile, was a newly-formed band touted by the English rock press as a "supergroup." At the time, the Pie were all but completely unknown. Within a few years, however, Humble Pie would be Winterland (and National) headliners in their own right. Lead guitarist Peter Frampton would leave Humble Pie in late 1971 to go solo, leading to his legendary double-live album <i>Frampton Comes Alive</i>. After it was released in Summer '76, <i>Frampton Comes Alive</i> became the best-selling live album of all time (over 3 million copies sold). While its sales record has since been eclipsed (Eric Clapton's <i>Unplugged</i> shipped an astonishing 10 million units), <i>Frampton Comes Alive</i> triggered every touring rock band to release a live "Greatest Hits" style double album sometime during the 1970s. So Humble Pie turned out to be an important band, even though they were still struggling to get heard in the States back in December '69.<p></p><p>Humble Pie's anchors were guitarists Steve Marriott and Peter Frampton. Both were excellent singers, and handsome lads who had been "Teen Idols" in England, a frustrating experience they had both shared. Marriott had led the Small Faces, a hugely successful "Mod" band in the UK who had never made much of a splash in the States (their only US hit had been "Itchykoo Park"). Frampton had been in The Herd, not as monumental as Small Faces, but still with some hits to their name. When The Herd had broken up in late 1968, Marriott had wanted Frampton to join the Small Faces as lead guitarist. Bandmates Ian McLagan and Ronnie Lane rejected this suggestion, however. So Marriott and Frampton went off and formed Humble Pie (McLagan, Lane and drummer Kenny Jones, meanwhile, teamed up with Rod Stewart and Ronnie Wood to form Faces). <br /></p><p>Marriott and Frampton added drummer Jerry Shirley and bassist Greg Ridley. Ridley had been in the underrated band Spooky Tooth, and he, too, was an excellent, soulful vocalist. With 3 strong singers and two striking guitarists, Humble Pie didn't lack for talent. <a href="https://www.discogs.com/release/4135445-Humble-Pie-As-Safe-As-Yesterday-Is">In the fashion of the times, their July '69 debut album <i>As Safe As Yesterday Is</i></a> featured music that was in a rustic style that intentionally evoked <i>Music From Big Pink</i>. Humble Pie did not emphasize hard rock until the early 70s. The Pie were signed to Immediate Records, run by former Rolling Stones' manager Andrew Loog Oldham. </p><p>At the time of the first American Humble Pie tour, Immediate was nearly bankrupt. Humble Pie's second album, the laid back <i>Town And Country</i> had been released in the UK, but not in the States. A few FM stations had the import, however, so Humble Pie was probably getting a little play on KSAN. Now, the Small Faces had not been big in the US, and no one would have known who The Herd were, and thus Humble Pie wouldn't have been seen as a "Supergroup." They were still a "New Thing" from England, however, and that was never nothing.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE_JcGPK2Y3gLBlL1i4V2vic8o1Ac5K2BHSDU5YPkglSlfuELHYq3t2zya98MZxW4K8BvLxu_GpkWVl-C81EcgE4pitWMwm_MwS-gNyHIwEz-PWkWmbqrkfj9AqgbbyynToh80_EavK4Q/s500/Live+at+Whisky+A+Go+Go+%252769+Humble+Pie+Castle+2002.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="494" data-original-width="500" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgE_JcGPK2Y3gLBlL1i4V2vic8o1Ac5K2BHSDU5YPkglSlfuELHYq3t2zya98MZxW4K8BvLxu_GpkWVl-C81EcgE4pitWMwm_MwS-gNyHIwEz-PWkWmbqrkfj9AqgbbyynToh80_EavK4Q/s320/Live+at+Whisky+A+Go+Go+%252769+Humble+Pie+Castle+2002.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Humble Pie Live At The Whisky A-Go-Go '69, released by Castle in 2002</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />We actually have a pretty good idea of what Humble Pie must have sounded like in December '69, since in 2002 a Pie show was released from <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Whisky-A-Go-Go%20History.htm">the Whisky A-Go-Go, recorded the very next week (on December 13-16, opening for Grand Funk Railroad).</a> Whatever your subsequent view of hard-rocking Humble Pie, the 1969 variation had more of an R&B orientation and more pronounced movement from quiet to loud and back. They would open with a mostly-acoustic cover of the Yardbirds hit "For Your Love," followed by a mix of covers and originals. <a href="https://www.discogs.com/release/5501831-Humble-Pie-Live-At-The-Whisky-A-Go-Go-69">The album only has 5 tracks, but it's a good look at what the band likely sounded like at Fillmore West </a>(for a great sample, see <a href="https://youtu.be/AOO7Ag4JrA4">this 1970 German TV version of "The Sad Bag Of Shakey Jake" with all three vocalists in their prime</a>). <p></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgOHaE2jUjMHxTK4eaLD5lblqGALxW-yrkP3NiwI9IlAbbs3IAzLPsY5JHEqcwdHCdWgXWK1pJABZT83JLols0TWZG8XU1Y4ric6TPKqKg_U2fKFAl1rXWxFDeg2sSNzgX_haXZwMnWT5QfpHNLt9ymn1FL9hHSdubLFowrcV2zoAu5EU9lREc8pWfF=s500" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="333" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgOHaE2jUjMHxTK4eaLD5lblqGALxW-yrkP3NiwI9IlAbbs3IAzLPsY5JHEqcwdHCdWgXWK1pJABZT83JLols0TWZG8XU1Y4ric6TPKqKg_U2fKFAl1rXWxFDeg2sSNzgX_haXZwMnWT5QfpHNLt9ymn1FL9hHSdubLFowrcV2zoAu5EU9lREc8pWfF=s320" width="213" /></a></b></i></div><i><b><br />Humble Pie Live At Fillmore West December 1969</b></i><br />For many years, decades really, we didn't have any first-hand accounts of this weekend Fillmore West. Rather unexpectedly, a detailed description turned up in the memoir of Humble Pie drummer Jerry Shirley. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Best-Seat-House-Drumming-Marriott/dp/1888408138/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=jerry+shirley+book&qid=1635036012&qsid=143-4782595-3965019&sr=8-1&sres=1888408138%2C0767920872%2C0578447266%2C1688999175%2C0692489010%2C1400098335%2CB00NMPN2C8%2C1538108275%2C0553328212%2C0451533909%2C1623498880%2C0806506954%2C0399544038%2CB083G6LGZ4%2C0802845363%2C1951035917&srpt=ABIS_BOOK"><i>Best Seat In The House: Drumming In The 70s with Marriott, Frampton and Humble Pie </i>(2011; Rebeat Books) </a>is a loving memoir of the Good Old Days when they were Bad. Of course, you have to like 60s and 70s rock in grimy detail, but that is pretty much what I live for, so I recommend it highly. <p></p><p>One interesting thing about Shirley's description of the Fillmore West was that he was no fan of the Grateful Dead. He has no grudge against them--he just dismisses them as being self-indulgent for playing too long. Shirley reports that Humble Pie came on in between The Flock and the Grateful Dead. I suspect this was a sign that Humble Pie was getting at least some airplay on KSAN. Shirley (chapter 8): </p><p></p><blockquote><p><i>The Fillmore West audiences were notoriously difficult to satisfy, and we soon found out why--they were so stoned that you could easily mistake the real culprit, barbiturates mixed with cheap red wine, for total lack of interest. The Ripples-and-reds crowd, as they were affectionately known, became our latest challenge. We were determined to leave our mark, and in this case the goal was simple: if we woke 'em up, we had scored. With this lot, the last thing in the world you wanted to do was knock 'em out!</i></p><p><i>Bill Graham ran this Fillmore with same military efficiency he was famous for at the Fillmore East...at the beginning of December, 1969, a lot was happening in America, both musically and socially. The Charles Manson murders had occurred only months earlier, and the Stones were getting ready to play a huge free concert at Altamont, that now-famous racetrack just outside San Francisco. There was talk that the size of the crowd would outdo Woodstock (although "only" about 300,000 attended, far fewer than Woodstock's "half a million strong"), and one of the main acts on the bill was to be the Grateful Dead. Nothing wrong there, except that they were also supposed to be headliners for our third show at the Fillmore West. We were set to play the middle spot after an American band called The Flock, who had started to make some headway in the charts and featured an electric violinist who was a show all of his own. Not my cup of tea, but interesting, I suppose.</i></p><p><i>The Dead ended up not playing at Altamont because of the violence there. The problem was that the security force they had hired for the show, the Hell's Angels, who saw fit to use stabbing as a form of crowd control. The Angels killed an innocent bystander while the Stones were playing, which caused more than a little set of problems...</i></p><p><i>The Grateful Dead couldn't get out of Altamont to be at the Fillmore West. So we ended up playing our third show at Fillmore West shows as headliners, as we were the only band that could get there. The same applied to the crowd: only a very few people actually made it from Altamont, and they were so exhausted that they got in, sat down in front of the stage, and went to sleep. We must have been really impressive that night, because we managed to wake them up. </i></p></blockquote><p></p><p>So there you have it, such as it is: no eyewitness accounts of the Dead performances on Thursday, Friday and Sunday, although we have some tape, but a detailed memory of the night that the Dead didn't play. </p><i><b>Aftermath</b></i><br />After December 1969, the Grateful Dead did not cede the stage once they got on it. They would take breaks, or play all night, as the case might have been, but there was no more rotating around the bill. The Dead would co-headline on occasion for another few months, but once <i>Workingman's Dead</i> got out there, the Dead were headliners in their own right. There were occasional exceptions, like giant outdoor shows or benefits, but the Grateful Dead made themselves a hard act to follow.<p>The Flock put out one more album (<i>Dinosaur Swamps</i>) and faded away. The Flock opened for the Dead again in New Orleans, when they were busted down on Bourbon Street (January 31-February 1). Jerry Goodman went on to success with Mahavishnu Orchetra, Dixie Dregs and numerous other recordings. </p><p>Humble Pie toured successfully until 1975, even after Peter Frampton left. They had moved to A&M Records in 1970, toured hard and made themselves into a great concert attraction. Frampton left in late '71, to great success, but the Pie continued to rise in popularity. It all ground to a halt, however, and there were many financial issues with management. Steve Marriott, hugely talented and much beloved by his peers, nearly had a reunion with Peter Frampton and a reformed Humble Pie in 1991. The project was put on hold, however, and Marriott died in a fire in 1991, deeply mourned by the public and his friends. <br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-7589215869499266712022-12-30T11:22:00.000-08:002022-12-30T11:22:30.525-08:00April 14-15, 17, 1967 The Banana Grove, Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Canned Heat (Might Have Been)<p> </p><div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwbFlxFbPgsEjRpKfY-tRyQ3p_TNFH80qXbIZxbI9Msgq4Qjad6jb03N2v_2tYtNDrS3ZYLPj3dkTLIhCtXfuWSb-l9pdepIaiQ8alcj6xkQt4V4QuSqFbr1hacfX1C6kTkaI8Mh_jRa8/s789/Kaleidoscope+19670414.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="789" data-original-width="753" height="410" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwbFlxFbPgsEjRpKfY-tRyQ3p_TNFH80qXbIZxbI9Msgq4Qjad6jb03N2v_2tYtNDrS3ZYLPj3dkTLIhCtXfuWSb-l9pdepIaiQ8alcj6xkQt4V4QuSqFbr1hacfX1C6kTkaI8Mh_jRa8/w391-h410/Kaleidoscope+19670414.jpeg" width="391" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The signature of The Kaleidoscope was its circular posters, eminently collectable today. The venue was supposed to debut on the weekend of April 14-15, 1967, with Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead and Canned Heat. The venue was a former movie theater on 1228 Vine Street in Hollywood.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table>Soon
after their first album was released in March, 1967 the Grateful Dead
were booked for the debut of a hip new psychedelic ballroom in Los
Angeles on the weekend of April 14-15, 1967. On April 17, the Monday following that weekend, the Dead
were also booked for what was apparently a record company sponsored
party at a ballroom in a prominent Los Angeles hotel. The show at the new venue got canceled, however, and instead the bands all played the hotel ballroom
that weekend. It went well, and the idea was floated for the hotel to have a regular psychedelic ballroom of its own, this time, in a true hotel ballroom.</div><div><br /></div><div>Los
Angeles rock history might have been different. As usual, it's not what
happened. But it's worthy of thinking about, however briefly.<br /><div><br /><b>April 14-15, 1967 The Kaleidoscope, Los Angeles, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Canned Heat Blues Band</b><br /></div></div><div>After
the Grateful Dead's first album was released on Warner Brothers in
March, 1967, the Dead made some effort to "make it" in Los Angeles.
Their first Los Angeles booking was at a nascent underground venue
called The Kaleidoscope. The obscure venue is known today mainly for its
unique, round posters (<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/6230-sunset-boulevard-hollywood-ca.html">well, and my detailed history, too</a>).
The Kaleidoscope was a venture by Canned Heat's managers (Skip Taylor
and John Hartmann) to open a Fillmore-style venue in Los Angeles. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div>With
the Fillmore and Avalon providing the template, groovy little
psychedelic venues popped up in all sorts of cities in 1967. One would
have thought that fashion-conscious LA would have been on top of that
trend. Taylor and Hartmann were both former talent agents at William
Morris, and clearly knew a good idea when they saw one. With a new band
to promote, they thought big and decided to create a venue, too. They
leased a building at 1228 Vine Street in Hollywood (at La Mirada near
Fountain), but still in the city of Los Angeles, and planned to have
Jefferson Airplane and the Dead for their debut weekend. The actual
venue had opened as the La Mirada Theatre in March 1926. <a href="http://cinematreasures.org/theaters/1419">On May 9, 1928 it was taken over by West Cloast Theatres and renamed Filmarte Theatre</a>. Later it was operated by Fox West Coast Theatres. </div><div><br /></div><div>For 1967, this was quite an inspired booking. Jefferson Airplane had just released <i>Surrealistic Pillow</i>
and "Somebody To Love" was climbing the charts, while the Grateful Dead
were underground legends who had just released their first album.
Canned Heat were unknown to all but a few Los Angeles club goers, but
they were an excellent live band. A last second injunction stopped
the event. The story in the Los Angeles <i>Times</i> was that the building was sublet without the knowledge of the owners (National General Corporation). Still, there was every reason to believe that the city of Los
Angeles was looking to keep hippies out, using any excuse.This sort of
meddling was exactly why all the cool 60s rock clubs were in
then-unincorporated West Hollywood, out of range of the Los Angeles
police. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDIxbBQ-1Z0UlAaKnaFwkbGmnY8XtMcPOsrqi83uE5eJD7va0HmhN1DdsAsp7TnEQwhBlj1pLMkBWNY6qq7lSxgqxEfkgLOpy0KEefYMKbILjyClUazWfl79umrIs-luMKFqfWinxCAF4/s424/Banana+Grove+19670414+18+Apr+1967%252C+60+-+The+Los+Angeles+Times+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="424" data-original-width="288" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDIxbBQ-1Z0UlAaKnaFwkbGmnY8XtMcPOsrqi83uE5eJD7va0HmhN1DdsAsp7TnEQwhBlj1pLMkBWNY6qq7lSxgqxEfkgLOpy0KEefYMKbILjyClUazWfl79umrIs-luMKFqfWinxCAF4/s0/Banana+Grove+19670414+18+Apr+1967%252C+60+-+The+Los+Angeles+Times+at+Newspapers+com.png" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Digby
Diehl's review of Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead and Canned Heat at
the Embassy Ballroom in Los Angeles, on April 14, 1967 (full text in
Appendix 1 below)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b>April 14-15, 1967 Embassy Ballroom, Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Canned Heat</b></div><div>For
the weekend, the show was moved to the Embassy Ballroom in the
Ambassador Hotel, at 3400 Wilshire Boulevard. The Ambassador, one of LA's pre-eminent luxury hotels, also housed the legendary
Cocoanut Grove Ballroom. Performers at the Cocoanut Grove were at the apex of the Los Angeles celebrity pyramid, so the history of performers at Cocoanut Grove is a Who's Who of 20th century American entertainment. Per the LA <i>Times</i> article, the Embassy Ballroom was nicknamed "The Banana
Grove" for the shows. </div><div> </div><div>Digby Diehl's review (see Appendix 1 below for the transcript) is somewhat patronizing, but it's notable that he has a sensible appreciation of what a live psychedelic rock show has to offer. The Embassy apparently fit in 1,300 patrons, pretty close to the capacity of San Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium. The audience at the show is young and hip, and in an entertainment town like Los Angeles, they are always on the lookout for the next big thing. Diehl, while no musical expert, compliments the singing of Marty Balin and Pigpen. He also describes the light show accurately, makes it seem like an enjoyable evening. He may have been patronizing, but like any good entertainment writer, he knows something is happening. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><div><b>April 17 1967 Embassy Ballroom, Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dead</b><br /></div><div>The
Monday night event (April 17) appears to have been a sort of LA event
for the release of the first Dead album, and that likely accounts for
the hotel picking up the weekend shows. We don't know anything about the Monday night show. The previous month, however, Warner Brothers had held a record release in tiny Fugazi Hall in San Francisco. Ralph Gleason described the March 20 event (see Appendix 3 below) in the SF <i>Chronicle</i>.</div><div><br /></div><div>Fugazi Hall, at 678 Green Street, was too small for a real Grateful Dead concert even in early 1967. More recent SF residents may recognize it as the home for many decades of the show <i>Beach Blanket Babylon</i>. Following the record company protocol at the time, the invited guests would have been record company promotional staff, some disc jockeys and radio station employees, and a few band friends and lucky hippies. The Dead had played a set, in this case cut short when the power cut out unexpectedly. There's every reason to presume that the Embassy Ballroom event was the same, a shortish set for industry people and a few lucky folks. We have no eyewitnesses, however, because in LA, those sort of events happened every week, and good or not, there wouldn't have been anything memorable about it to the local record company and radio staff.<br /></div></div><div><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-XENb8kNilFpo-mIxRS2fDC3B4r9WwmSsizUn9cldPoy-5fW0Pjhl2bKH0T_C52THWCpZqnkp02isbAzzz2TjPfgo0Uy0aGL8xo0Dyxw9BlNFmmyXV1NwYwekBBzZghw2n37xP2cZrtE/s500/embassy+ballroom+interior+current+LA.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="395" data-original-width="500" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-XENb8kNilFpo-mIxRS2fDC3B4r9WwmSsizUn9cldPoy-5fW0Pjhl2bKH0T_C52THWCpZqnkp02isbAzzz2TjPfgo0Uy0aGL8xo0Dyxw9BlNFmmyXV1NwYwekBBzZghw2n37xP2cZrtE/s0/embassy+ballroom+interior+current+LA.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The empty Embassy Ballroom, in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div><br /></div><div><i><b>What Might Have Been?</b></i></div><div>Los Angeles was one of the world entertainment capitals, and home to many record companies, both major and independent. It was a peculiar dynamic that the psychedelic rock explosion took place in San Francisco and other cities, and that Los Angeles was more of a consumer than a creator. The ultimate reason for this was that live rock bands playing original music couldn't really make a living in LA from 1966-68. Now, sure, many great bands from Southern California got signed by record companies, and many of them made great music, both live and studio. But the fact was, bands in LA were performing for record companies, hoping to get signed just so they could afford to eat. This was the opposite of the San Francisco model, where bands could make a living playing live--while living hand-to-mouth, sure--and figure out recording later.</div><div> </div><div>Jefferson Airplane would have been fine if they had been living in Los Angeles, and Buffalo Springfield would have killed it at the Avalon if they had ended up in San Francisco. But The Byrds needed LA, just as the Grateful Dead needed San Francisco. So the absence of a viable LA ballroom skewed the history of live bands in Southern California, even if we don't know how. Were there gigs, for the likes of Kaleidoscope or Canned Heat? Sure. But they couldn't just tell the record companies to come back later.</div><div> </div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT7dYKLDMORuV6qU7YPHXpq8UWl7X2_izAmyZD-V7fDPQCreGbuM18aNHcTxLqZTUmLHTqsX33kAhVpQIFi6b9Kq-VFJli5kif5KlJteTaFeRKIcaoseM5M0qFUNKJmE010V7-5R_yIhonDOXX1J2lTgzU0kLeYSqqz8jKutvtpRblEchAoVeJObmZ/s502/Magic%20Mushroom%20Kaleidoscope%2019680118.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="402" data-original-width="502" height="256" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT7dYKLDMORuV6qU7YPHXpq8UWl7X2_izAmyZD-V7fDPQCreGbuM18aNHcTxLqZTUmLHTqsX33kAhVpQIFi6b9Kq-VFJli5kif5KlJteTaFeRKIcaoseM5M0qFUNKJmE010V7-5R_yIhonDOXX1J2lTgzU0kLeYSqqz8jKutvtpRblEchAoVeJObmZ/s320/Magic%20Mushroom%20Kaleidoscope%2019680118.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Magic Mushroom, out in the Valley at 11345 Ventura Boulevard in Studio City was a "teens only" nightclub. It had replaced the Cinnamon Cinder, a teen club run by KRLA-dj Bob Eubanks (also host of The Dating Game). The club was managed by Chesley Millikin at one point. This ad is from 1968.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />There was a club called The Magic Mushroom out in Studio City, (formerly the Cinnamon Cinder) too small to make any money, and a place called The Blue Law in Torrance (<a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/08/bank-19840-south-hamilton-avenue.html">which evolved into The Bank)</a>, which was backed by an enterprising dentist and never really viable. If there had been a downtown Los Angeles Fillmore, where bands could actually make a buck playing live, the locus of 60s music might have shifted south from SF to LA.</div><div><br /></div><div>The Ambassador, thanks to the Cocoanut Grove Ballroom, was locked in to the highest levels of the Los Angeles entertainment elite. Sure, the film and TV people looked down on rock music as "kid stuff," but the fact was that all the big studios--Columbia, Warners, MGM, ABC-Paramount--each had record labels. If the Ambassador Ballroom would have been a pipeline to the Next Big Thing, the Majors would have all accommodated it with ease. Cool bands could have played "The Banana Grove," made a few dollars, and their managers could have negotiated favorable deals with anyone in town. </div><div><br /></div><div>Why didn't it happen? All these things come down to money. Canned Heat's managers, John Hartmann and Skip Taylor, were both former William Morris agents, so they knew what was what. According to the LA <i>Times</i> article (below), "Kaleidoscope owners
are considering continued use of the Embassy Room as a "total
environment" until the use of the Vine St. location is resolved."</div><div> </div><div>It's a great idea. The real issue, however, would have been who would have controlled the bar receipts. I am certain that the Ambassador would have happily hosted the Kaleidoscope, long-haired hippies and all, as long as they controlled the bar and any food income. Hartmann and Taylor would have taken the opposite position, so it was never going to happen. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHb5DxVRdpDpefo0q_0wUX9ubi9R_B9gB1H_W-tMpkYW1W8kMxZ6hoFq-7_794ucRCSb_r_7c3r7xv18067UYo_G8unzLQArai1QHqFo8LDF0Ec_I4LlAs-lQuQqlYk4JYkmqHRM_K0F54gxPszIZho7btvpUEiFS_T2I72_zSdTmU4f9ys8os29bF/s496/6230%20Sunset%20Kaleidoscope%201968.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="396" data-original-width="496" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHb5DxVRdpDpefo0q_0wUX9ubi9R_B9gB1H_W-tMpkYW1W8kMxZ6hoFq-7_794ucRCSb_r_7c3r7xv18067UYo_G8unzLQArai1QHqFo8LDF0Ec_I4LlAs-lQuQqlYk4JYkmqHRM_K0F54gxPszIZho7btvpUEiFS_T2I72_zSdTmU4f9ys8os29bF/s320/6230%20Sunset%20Kaleidoscope%201968.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Kaleidoscope Theater at 6230 Sunset Boulevard, ca. 1968 (formerly the Earl Carroll Theater, then The Hullabaloo, and later The Aquarius)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></b></i><i><b><br />Aftermath</b></i><br /></div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Taylor and Hartmann continued to work on the Kaleidoscope concept,
eventually taking over the Earl Carroll Theater at 6230 Sunset (<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/6230-sunset-boulevard-hollywood-ca.html">I have written about that venue at length</a>). The building has a remarkable history in its own right, <a href="https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/uncovering-a-secret-gem-from-the-aquarius-theatres-psychedelic-past/ ">like a metaphor for Hollywood, and of course Alison Martino and VintageLA have the complete breakdown</a>.</li><li>The Kaleidoscope, on Sunset, opened in Summer '68. It was inspired, but a year late. Canned Heat were influential, and sold a lot of records, but thanks to bad luck (and an unfortunate trip to Denver) never made the money they deserved. One of their road crew, Phil Hartmann—the younger brother of their manager--is now widely beloved for his entertainment career, and rightly so.</li><li>The Ambassador Hotel, central to the Los Angeles entertainment ecology, is now recalled as the site of Bobby Kennedy's tragic assassination on June 5, 1968. The hotel was sold in 1971, and closed to guests for safety reasons in 1989. The site was demolished in 2004. So it goes.<br /></li></ul><div><i><b> </b></i></div><div><i><b>Appendix 1</b></i></div><p><b></b></p><blockquote><p><b>Kaleidoscope Opens at Embassy Room by Digby Diehl </b><i>(Los Angeles Times, April 18, 1967)</i><br />As
the shaggy-haired boy in a checkered mod suit and his equally hirsute
miniskirted companion approached the entrance to the Ambassador last
weekend, you could almost imagine the doorman saying, 'Excuse me, I
think you're in the wrong place." But he didn't.</p><p>The couple
continued into the hotel lobby, mixing with the expensively attired
guests from the the Cocoanut Grove, strolled under the elegant
chandeliers and and turned in at the ornate doorway of the Embassy Room.
There, amidst a whirl of colored spots, strobe light, far-out films and
floor shaking rock bands, 1,300 other teeny-hippies gyrated joyously in
the celebration of International Kaleidoscope's opening.</p><p>More
than just a stipples victory in social integration, the Kaleidoscope's
presence in the Embassy Room foiled an injunction against the club's
intended residence at 1228 Vine St. by the building owner, National
General Corp. A supoena served last Thursday before the announced
opening, prevented all persons from entering Los Angeles' second
psychedelic ballroom. </p><p><b>Electronic Vibrations</b><br />By setting
up the psychedelia in the Ambassador, Kaleidoscope managers Skip Taylor,
John Hartmann, Gary Essert and Walter Williams were able to provide a
sample of the latest in the art of the freak-out dancehall. </p><p>The
Ambassador's new Banana Grove, as some dubbed the room, featured the
electronic vibrations of Jefferson Airplane, the Grateful Dead and the
Canned Heat Blues Band. All three rock groups were happily received.</p><p>Particularly
effective was Airplane leader Marty Balin's version of "This Is My
Life," which seemed to voice a popular existential stance in the
audience. Pigpen, of the Grareful Dead, who looks like Jerry Colonna in
drag, was a vocal success with his modern interpretation of screaming'
blues.</p><p><b>In, Out of Focus</b><br />Inventive use of the baroque
Embassy Room's crystal lighting fixtures and mirrored walls was made by
lighting director Bill Kerby. In back of the bandstand, a series of
multi-color pattern backgrounds flashed in and out of the focus while
the silhouette of a girl dancing was superimposed over the projection.</p><p>On
the sides of the room, film clips of the love-ins, psychedelic body
paintings, Gov. Reagan's speeches and sundry other materials were
bounced off mirrors, and mixed in bizarre juxtaposition with pattern
slides. Phosphorescent and stroboscopic lights played over the bobbing
heads on the dance floor. <br /></p></blockquote><blockquote><p>Representatives of the Ambassador claimed
to be satisfied with the behavior of the clientele. Kaleidoscope owners
are considering continued use of the Embassy Room as a "total
environment" until the use of the Vine St. location is resolved. </p></blockquote><p></p><p><b>Appendix 2</b></p><p><b>March 20, 1967 Fugazi Hall, San Francisco, CA: <i>Warner Brothers Record Release Party for The Grateful Dead Debut Album</i></b><br /></p><div><br /></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEhyphenhyphenGduJUKZti_llehFIuQVcFQBth5VSGwlqfYZpNCKwor53NoQguhTVmBOr5bTMdUruhdbtdlSWbR_KAh1U_EWNvXi3go0esZtCOsBh8cy-WgegL1VtlJphaFDLFrWTBUAuq8Eatn1Lo/s1016/SFC19670322a.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1016" data-original-width="291" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEhyphenhyphenGduJUKZti_llehFIuQVcFQBth5VSGwlqfYZpNCKwor53NoQguhTVmBOr5bTMdUruhdbtdlSWbR_KAh1U_EWNvXi3go0esZtCOsBh8cy-WgegL1VtlJphaFDLFrWTBUAuq8Eatn1Lo/s640/SFC19670322a.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Ralph Gleason's SF Chronicle column from March 22, 1967</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></div><div>I<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/march-20-1967-club-fugazi-678-green.html">t
had been established for some time that Warner Brothers Records had an
album release party for the Grateful Dead's first album at a North Beach
venue called Fugazi Hall, at 678 Green Street</a>. Up until this time, I
had been unable to uncover any other information about it. However,
Ralph Gleason of the San Francisco Chronicle attended the Monday night
party, and wrote about it in his March 22, 1967 column:<br /></div><div><blockquote><i>In
Antonioni's Blow-Up there's a wonderful moment in a rock club scene
when guitarist Jeff Beck first belts the amplifier and then wrecks his
guitar at the frustration at the problems of electronics. </i></blockquote><blockquote><i>Monday night's part [sic] for the Grateful Dead was aborted when the
power failed and the set was chopped short. So everything you see in the
movies isn't fantasy.</i></blockquote>Whatever the cultural dynamics of the 1967
Grateful Dead playing in a tiny hall for a weird mixture of record
company promotional staff and a few lucky hippies might have been, it
seems to have been cut short. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><div><b>Appendix 3</b><br /></div><div><b><i>The Cocoanut Ballroom in The Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, CA</i></b><br /></div><div><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambassador_Hotel_(Los_Angeles)"></a><blockquote><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambassador_Hotel_(Los_Angeles)">Formerly located at 3400 Wilshire Boulevard, between Catalina Street and Mariposa Avenue in present-day Koreatown, the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles was built as part of the Ambassador Hotels System.</a> At the time
the hotel opened in January 1921, the chain consisted of the Ambassador
Los Angeles, the Hotel Alexandria in Los Angeles, the Ambassador Santa
Barbara, the Ambassador Atlantic City and the Ambassador New York. The
Santa Barbara property burned down soon after on April 13, 1921, and the
Alexandria left the chain in 1925, while the Ambassador Palm Beach
joined in 1929. The Schine Family owned the Ambassador from its opening
in 1921 until 1971; it was set back from Wilshire Boulevard on 24 acres,
which included the main hotel, a garage and several detached
bungalows.<br /><br />The Ambassador Hotel was frequented by
celebrities, some of whom, such as Pola Negri, resided there. From
1930 to 1943, six Academy Awards ceremonies were hosted at the hotel.
Perhaps as many as seven U.S. presidents stayed at the Ambassador, from
Hoover to Nixon, along with chiefs of state from around the world. For
decades, the hotel's famed Cocoanut Grove nightclub hosted well-known
entertainers, such as Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Judy Garland,
Lena Horne, Nancy Wilson, Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole, Liza Minnelli,
Martin and Lewis, The Supremes, Merv Griffin, Dorothy Dandridge, Vikki
Carr, Evelyn Knight, Vivian Vance, Dick Haymes, Sergio Franchi, Perry
Como, Dizzy Gillespie, Benny Goodman, Sammy Davis Jr., Little Richard,
Liberace, Natalie Cole, Richard Pryor and Shirley Bassey. </blockquote></div><div></div><div>Sadly, the Ambassador Hotel is most famous for being the site of Robert F. Kennedy's assassination on June 5, 1968. For safety reasons, the hotel was closed to guests in 1989. The building was demolished in 2004.<br /><br /></div><div><br /></div></div>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-45009760871177349222022-09-23T11:14:00.000-07:002022-09-23T11:14:50.366-07:00March 7, 1982 The Saddle Rack, San Jose, CA: Jerry Garcia Band KFAT Fat Fry (FM XIX)<p> </p><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoz5sdO4kZB5Wys0PGvItsEmkEzHONQwLqjlv7-5HAqGleSzjx7KaHa3KPu95VCIf-FaLe5sprbnamqPHQnMYFY7u0p63XQqUohBxFACPeatIn3gY5Wfjf3r7zB3OotUI6LJHONwQY2zw/s350/saddle+rack+interior+2001.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="260" data-original-width="350" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoz5sdO4kZB5Wys0PGvItsEmkEzHONQwLqjlv7-5HAqGleSzjx7KaHa3KPu95VCIf-FaLe5sprbnamqPHQnMYFY7u0p63XQqUohBxFACPeatIn3gY5Wfjf3r7zB3OotUI6LJHONwQY2zw/s320/saddle+rack+interior+2001.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Patrons at the Saddle Rack in San Jose, ca 2001</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />March 7, 1982 The Saddle Rack, San Jose, CA: Jerry Garcia Band KFAT Fat Fry <i>(FM XIX)</i></b><br />Melvin Seals played organ in the Jerry Garcia Band from 1981 until 1995, playing with Garcia for several hundred shows. Yet Seals was only on a Garcia radio broadcast a single time, on KFAT-fm from Gilroy, CA, recorded at an Urban Cowboy bar called The Saddle Rack, in San Jose. The entire time that Seals played with Garcia, both Garcia and the Grateful Dead became a greater and greater attraction. Yet Garcia radio broadcasts became a thing of the past, so Melvin only participated in that single one. In many ways, the early '82 period showed the Jerry Garcia Band at a crossroads, on the verge of separating itself from any normal part of the 20th century music industry. This post will examine how the Jerry Garcia Band not only came to play the Saddle Rack--a Silicon Valley joint that nonetheless had live, actual bulls in a stockade--but to see how it came to be broadcast on the radio. <br /><p><i><b>Jerry Garcia Band: Status Report, 1982</b></i><br />In 1982, the Grateful Dead were not in a good financial way. Their concerts were still fairly lucrative, but they were carrying a lot of staff and had expensive gear, so profits were probably not high. Their record sales had cratered, too, so royalties were not adding to the bottom line. Songwriters would still be getting a little money, but with record sales down, their fortunes were not swelling. Also, by the early 1980s, none of the Grateful Dead or their extended family wanted to live commune style on an old ranch. They all wanted a somewhat middle class life in a house with their family members and a car that worked, so their expectations of what was a reasonable to receive as compensation would have been higher than it was a dozen years earlier. The Grateful Dead members, crew and staff were generally hurting for cash. </p><p>The Jerry Garcia Band had gigged steadily throughout 1981, ending their year with a substantial Eastern tour in November. In late December, the Jerry Garcia Band had started recording at Club Front, and they would continue recording through February, in between some Grateful Dead shows. The JGB played just a few shows in early 1982, two at the Old Waldorf, two at the Catalyst in Santa Cruz, and five at the various Keystones (Berkeley, Palo Alto and The Stone). On Wednesday, March 3, the band had played an afternoon show at a tiny (300 capacity) room at San Francisco State. </p><p>Unknown to most fans at the time (certainly unknown to me), "Jerry Garcia Band" was not just a name under which a band was booked, but a corporate partnership between Garcia, John Kahn and Ron Tutt, dating back to 1975. Originally the LLC had included pianist Nicky Hopkins, but he had been written out when he left the group at the end of '75. The Jerry Garcia Band had released one album, the poorly-received <i>Cats Under The Stars</i> on Arista. Tutt had stopped performing with the band before the album was even released, and I don't know whether this was directly related to the death of Tutt's other employer, Elvis Presley. Buzz Buchanan and then others had taken over the drum chair in the meantime.<br /></p><p>The Fall '81 Jerry Garcia Band tour had stood out not least because Ron Tutt had returned to the band on drums. I can remember calling the Grateful Dead Hotline and hearing (I think) Steve Marcus announce the tour as "The Return of Ronnie Tutt." Drummer Daoud Shaw had left the band at the end of the Summer, Bill Kreutzmann had briefly filled in, and Tutt came on board for the big East Coast tour. When Garcia had returned to the stage, however, for three Keystone shows in December, 1981, I asked someone who went and he assured me that Kreutzmann had played drums. Did this mean Billy was just the filler for local gigs, or that Tutt was out of the band? In retrospect, it looks like Kreutzmann was just intended as a fill-in drummer for local gigs, but Tutt ultimately left the group without making any more live appearances with the Jerry Garcia Band.</p><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPh8vUBdmHnsGIURE9D0TXlgVIUhMy7S6XzvzGYqiqMhm-M-vOjTse1mp-AUuGTaK5GcYJxYkppLTAz3Pqpzru-LeVytnRigiXNaqpQMHOCD9Lrf4GxYCr2rfZkZN_Gnu-o-40BirFbZY/s300/garcia+run+for+the+roses+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPh8vUBdmHnsGIURE9D0TXlgVIUhMy7S6XzvzGYqiqMhm-M-vOjTse1mp-AUuGTaK5GcYJxYkppLTAz3Pqpzru-LeVytnRigiXNaqpQMHOCD9Lrf4GxYCr2rfZkZN_Gnu-o-40BirFbZY/s0/garcia+run+for+the+roses+cover.jpg" width="300" /></a></div><br />Run For The Roses Sessions at Le Club Front</i></b><br />The Jerry Garcia Band still existed as a company, and it appears that Garcia and Kahn were bringing back Tutt in order to record. There were Club Front sessions intermittently between September 1981 and February 1982. Tutt played on the tracks that were released on <i>Run For The Roses</i>, but I don't know exactly when he was recording. Given that Bill Kreutzmann drummed for the Garcia Band in September and December 1981, its possible that Bill had some involvement in the sessions, but more likely in a rehearsal role.<p>The<i> Run For The Roses</i> album would not be released until Fall 1982, and the release was confusing to fans. We now know that while 5 of the tracks were recorded in 1981, two of them were 1974 outtakes from <i>Compliments Of Garcia</i>. That wasn't clear from the album credits, however, and to contemporary record buyers (like me) it had appeared that Merl Saunders had been invited to Garcia Band sessions, even though he hadn't played with Garcia since Reconstruction in 1979. It is difficult to explain how little information there was about the Jerry Garcia Band at the time. A few insiders may have known (or figured out) that <i>Roses</i> included two outtakes from the prior album, but it was largely unknown when the record came out.<br /></p><p>Based on a Jake Feinberg interview with Melvin Seals from just a few years ago, it appears that Ron Tutt was surprised at what bad shape Garcia was in. Now, sure, Tutt was no innocent, and he had toured with Elvis, so he wasn't naive about the pressure on rock stars. Certainly the Garcia of 1975 through 1977 hadn't adhered to any kind of clean living. But Tutt was still surprised, and did not stick around. As far as I can tell, Tutt did perform on the October tour, and recorded the basic tracks (probably in 1981), but had left the band by the beginning of 1982. I assume that the release of <i>Run For The Roses</i> as a "Jerry Garcia Band" album was the vehicle for Tutt exiting the partnership with Garcia and Kahn. </p><p>For the purposes of this post, however, it's important to remember that in the Spring of 1982, Garcia was still looking to make a viable proposition out of the Jerry Garcia Band as a recording and performing entity in line with the music industry orthodoxy of the time. The Garcia Band was recording an album for a major label, and was at least thinking about how they might present the album to the record-buying public.</p><p><i><b>Jerry Garcia FM Broadcasts</b></i><br />Live FM broadcasts were an essential part of the Grateful Dead's history, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/03/grateful-dead-live-fm-broadcasts-1971.html">and their Fall 1971 tour was an integral component in making the band a long-lasting phenomenon</a>. Most early 70s bands (or their management, anyway), wrung their hands in anxiety that any FM broadcast might create a bootleg LP. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/03/bootleg-grateful-dead-lps-east-and-west.html">The Dead, while no fans of bootlegs, nonetheless benefited hugely from the bootleg phenomenon.</a> For major market FM broadcasts, however, the critical component was a record company willing to compensate the radio station for lost advertising time. Warner Brothers had shown themselves willing to do that in 1971, and the Dead--and Deadheads--had been the beneficiaries.</p><p>The Jerry Garcia ensembles of the early 1970s did not have the backing of any major record company. Yet Garcia managed to play on the radio anyway, due to a combination of the unique conventions of Bay Area rock radio, and Garcia's own willingness to appear live on the air. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2014/10/february-6-1972-pacific-high-recorders.html">KSAN-fm regularly broadcast live shows, mostly from local studios,</a> and some other stations followed suit. So the Garcia-Saunders ensemble and <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/04/old-and-in-way-fm-broadcasts-1973-fm-vi.html">Old And In The Way had appeared live somewhat regularly around the Bay Area,</a> thanks to these practices.</p><p>Another Bay Area practice, probably somewhat related to KSAN's habits, was that local college stations also broadcast shows live. Stanford's station KZSU, for example, just had a 10-watt signal that could only be heard on campus and in Palo Alto, but Garcia was willing to allow broadcasts on the station (<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/12/jerry-garcia-live-on-kzsu-am-and-fm.html">not surprising, when you find out that Garcia had been broadcast live on KZSU since 1963</a>). Old And In The Way also had some broadcasts on other local college stations, in a nod to the post-WW2 tradition of bluegrass bands. So even without record company backing, live Garcia was not without a presence of FM radio.</p><p>Once Garcia became a solo artist on Arista Records, the Jerry Garcia Band had a live FM broadcast in Washington DC on March 18, 1978. I assume that Arista supported this, even though the 1978 show was prior to the release of <i>Cats Under The Stars</i>. I think Clive Davis had a long enough view to see that Garcia's appeal was over a long period of time, so he made sure there was a broadcast.<br /></p><p><b><i></i></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgM2B3CYqMVM3Ex6Ta8ZCbh_hODyEBhiO2ELqDMwUc-0SXAhxmjGYR_Gp0_8qJxV0NpcV1lGHyO5SHFuioz8GGanxncvXs9PsxOrfGzUpG_Wr3nGgtyzBOIaHov0MKQTI4VPCLYENNT1M/s232/KFAT+logo.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="232" data-original-width="217" height="232" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgM2B3CYqMVM3Ex6Ta8ZCbh_hODyEBhiO2ELqDMwUc-0SXAhxmjGYR_Gp0_8qJxV0NpcV1lGHyO5SHFuioz8GGanxncvXs9PsxOrfGzUpG_Wr3nGgtyzBOIaHov0MKQTI4VPCLYENNT1M/s0/KFAT+logo.jpg" width="217" /></a></i></b></div><b><i><br />KFAT-fm, 94.5 Gilroy, CA</i></b><br />The Jerry Garcia Band show from the Saddle Rack in San Jose was recorded on March 7, 1982, and broadcast on KFAT-fm, out of Gilroy, CA, as part of an ongoing series called The Fat Fry. The tale of KFAT is hard to imagine these days, and I can only sketch it out. Suffice to say, the KFAT Fat Fry appealed to fans in the range of KSAN and the Bay Area tradition of live rock broadcasts, and it was largely self-supporting. Thus a band did not require support from their record company. My guess is that the Garcia Band was offered a lucrative gig at the Saddle Rack, in return for allowing the show to be broadcast throughout San Jose and the South Bay. Unlike many acts, FM broadcasts were always fine with Garcia. It would have been a good paying show and broadcasting was normal for him. Who knew that it would be the last live broadcast of a Jerry Garcia Band show?<p></p><p>The Keystone Palo Alto broadcast a live show on KFAT every Monday night back in
the late 70s and early 80s, as part of The Fat
Fry. KFAT was a legendary psychedelic country station in
then-tiny Gilroy, CA (pre-Cisco Systems), whose story is too bizarre to
believe (<a href="http://www.kfat.com/kfat.html">read it and weep--radio was like this once, but only once</a>).
Every Monday night a local live attraction would play the Keystone Palo
Alto and their first set would be broadcast on KFAT, audible all over
the South Bay, and even in South Berkeley if you were lucky. To some extent,
this was to advertise the bands themselves, and to some extent this was
to promote the Keystone Palo Alto. <br /></p><p>KFAT broadcast <a href="https://archive.org/details/KFAT94.5">a quirky mix of country, blues, old-timey music, raunchy comedy, bluegrass, Hawaiian, and whatever struck the fancy of the disc jockey</a>. It was on the air from mid-1975 to January 1983
at 94.5 FM. From high atop Mt. Loma Prieta (site of the famous 1989
earthquake) near San Jose, its signal reached to the edge San
Francisco to south of Monterey and east to the Sierra Nevada mountains.
Some of the original KFAT staff carries on the tradition (updated for
the 21st Century) at KPIG in Freedom, CA (107-oink-5 fm). KFAT wasn't really audible in San Francisco, and reception was sketchy in South Berkeley (and non-existent further North). So the real audience was the greater San Jose, Santa Cruz and Monterey areas, back before the area was dominated by well-off Silicon Valley suburbs. It wasn't exactly rural--although there were some farms and ranches--but it wasn't really suburban either. </p><p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/10/december-5-1977-keystone-palo-alto-palo.html">On December 5, 1977, the headliner for the second-ever Monday Fat Fry had been Robert Hunter and Comfort.</a> They brought along Bob Matthews and Betty Cantor (Hunter name-checked them from the stage) to ensure a great sound. They performed a complete version of Hunter's "Alligator Moon" suite. Since Hunter never allowed the Comfort version of the suite to be released, the live Fat Fry version remains the definitive recording. As at any Fat Fry from that era, the first set was broadcast, and Hunter encourages the listening audience to come down to Keystone Palo Alto for the second set. So the Dead family, if not actually Garcia, was familiar with the Fat Fry, and must have been positively disposed.<br /></p><b><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB3k6MKP5i3TWWwKOvQQkqM4FgmZ8FxX2ULDkXCMHTrlpDyw8eEKagOsGFMoveCde9H4R8-MMI5pY0JEE-4b5QODg1M1RPqU3wvr22NH2bYSHAN98gqmZRHbTX-LqvuK8vQM8LAVLAyBI/s252/KEEN+1370+Belt+Buckle.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="252" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB3k6MKP5i3TWWwKOvQQkqM4FgmZ8FxX2ULDkXCMHTrlpDyw8eEKagOsGFMoveCde9H4R8-MMI5pY0JEE-4b5QODg1M1RPqU3wvr22NH2bYSHAN98gqmZRHbTX-LqvuK8vQM8LAVLAyBI/s0/KEEN+1370+Belt+Buckle.jpg" width="252" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>A promotional belt buckle for KEEN, San Jose (1370am). "Country Music 24 Hours A Day"</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />San Jose and The San Jose Country Music Scene</i></b><br />San Jose had initially been a medium-sized California city, but in the 1960s it underwent explosive growth. At a time when San Francisco's population growth was capped by geographic limitations, the flat plain of the Santa Clara Valley was custom-made for suburbs. San Jose boomed, and the suburban cities around it (Santa Clara, Cupertino, Sunnyvale, Campbell and others) expanded as well. Given that the city was full of teenagers, its no surprise that San Jose had a thriving rock scene in the 1960s, even if much of it was somewhat self-contained. <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/09/san-jose-ca-outdoor-rock-festivals-1967.html">Certainly the Grateful Dead and all the other San Francisco bands regularly played outdoor and indoor shows in San Jose, because it was too lucrative not to</a>. <br /><p></p><blockquote><i><b>Comparative Population (Census Data)</b></i><br /><b>Census San Francisco San Jose</b><br />1960 740,316 204,196<br />1970 715,674 459,913<br />1980 678,974 629,400<br />1990 723,959 782,248<br />2019 881,547 1,019,995</blockquote>Come the 1970s, however, while San Jose was bigger than ever, the rock market had regionalized. Rock promotions were focused on San Francisco and Berkeley, mostly at shows promoted by Bill Graham Presents. Rock fans from San Jose or the nearby suburbs had to expect to get in their cars (or their parents' cars) and drive to Winterland, Berkeley Community Theater or Oakland Coliseum to see big rock shows. There were a few venues in San Jose, but there weren't that many memorable rock shows. <p></p><p>As far as the 1970s went, Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead had each played a show at the <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/02/san-jose-civic-auditorium-135-w-san.html">San Jose Civic Auditorium in 1972</a>, the Jerry Garcia Band had played Cupertino in 1975 and the Grateful Dead had played the San Jose State football stadium in 1979, but that was about it. Jerry Garcia and The Grateful Dead had played Palo Alto and Stanford in the 70s, so San Jose Deadheads had some opportunities, but Palo Alto wasn't San Jose, and everybody knew it.</p><p>By 1982, San Jose was not only booming, it was getting wealthy. The early harvests of microprocessors had made Silicon Valley increasingly prosperous. It is a long-forgotten fact that the original coinage of "Silicon Valley" was a play on the Santa Clara Valley. The Santa Clara Valley had been a prosperous agricultural area since the mid-19th century, and up through the 1960s, San Jose had basically been a farm town. All of the farms and ranches throughout the greater South Bay bought their feed and tractors in San Jose. The Bay Area's biggest country radio station was KEEN-1370-AM, out of San Jose. When Bob Weir and Jerry Garcia talk about hearing country music on the radio growing up, they were talking about KEEN. As far as the Bay Area was concerned, San Jose was a farm town, and a big city like San Francisco or a college town like Palo Alto was always going to look down on San Jose. San Jose got no cultural respect from anywhere else in the Bay Area, and once rock music became "Art," that was true of rock as well. </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKPcVfkNpKiFqwjDIrgJCKyLHH7XyOQi-Rq-5dD2q-NhFf_baBE-DwBXvEbu43xghM-9IPlVj9sf2zYllsGHHFWS21_XCT0Wv4eh2UmpReCpBmjdtg_3NtipE6nOkkRqKKo-rpKh5YzhQ/s604/Don+Cox+Crazy+Gringo+lp+1976.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="604" data-original-width="599" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKPcVfkNpKiFqwjDIrgJCKyLHH7XyOQi-Rq-5dD2q-NhFf_baBE-DwBXvEbu43xghM-9IPlVj9sf2zYllsGHHFWS21_XCT0Wv4eh2UmpReCpBmjdtg_3NtipE6nOkkRqKKo-rpKh5YzhQ/s320/Don+Cox+Crazy+Gringo+lp+1976.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Don Cox, owner of Cowtown in San Jose, had a local hit with "Crazy Gringo" in 1976</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />As it happened, however, and not surprisingly, San Jose was the heartbeat of a thriving country music scene since at least World War 2. Not only was there KEEN, but there were numerous venues and bars for country and honky tonk music. This was true well into the 1970s. Among the biggest country music venues in San Jose was Cowtown, at 1584 Almaden, opened in the late 1950s by local country singer Don Cox. Cowtown had a house band, playing music for dancing and sometimes backing visiting country stars. Cowtown was open on Almaden up through the early 80s, and when it closed Cox re-branded his other joint, Sam's Club (over on Monterey Road), as Cowtown, and the successor stayed open until 1988.<p></p><p>In fact, there were a few Grateful Dead connections to Cowtown. In the early 1970s, one of the regular pedal steel guitarists in the house band was Bobby Black. The story goes that Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen heard Black--they may have been booked at Cowtown--and were so impressed that they ended up hiring him in 1972. In 1978, Black would spend a year in the New Riders of The Purple Sage, after Buddy Cage quit (and before Cage returned). Black was a fine steel player, with a more pronounced Western Swing style than Cage. It was Black on pedal steel with the Riders when they opened for the Grateful Dead on the night Winterland closed, New Year's Eve 1978.</p><p>A more intriguing Cowtown connection, however, involved Garcia's old pal Peter Grant. According to Grant, back in '64 or so, when Grant and Garcia were in the Black Mountain Boys together (Grant on dobro, Garcia on banjo), they were driving around in Garcia's Corvair when they hear Buck Owens' new hit "Together Again," with the great pedal steel ride by the Buckaroos' Tom Brumley. Both Grant and Garcia agreed on the spot that they each had to learn pedal steel. Although Garcia had bought a Fender pedal steel in 1967, he sold it because he couldn't keep it in tune, so Grant had learned the instrument first. It was Grant that played pedal steel on "Rosemary" on <i>Aoxomoxoa</i>. </p><p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/jerry-garcia-sneaky-pete-kleinow-and.html">By April 1969, however, Garcia had bought a Zane Beck Double-Ten (ZB10) pedal steel at Guitar City in Lakewood, CO</a>. He had started to play it with John Dawson, then the Grateful Dead and then the New Riders. He also played some sessions on some rock albums, including the Jefferson Airplane's <i>Volunteers</i> and "Teach Your Children" by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. By 1970, the New Riders were turning into a serious enterprise, and for his own Garcia-reasons, Jerry bought a new Emmons DB 10. So--being Jerry--he called up Grant and asked him if he wanted his earlier one. Grant owned a pedal steel guitar, but it wasn't nearly as good as the ZB10 that Garcia was moving on from, so he gladly said yes.</p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Q91LfCKp_LFs4kFmMrD7wHM0sAp7q7P1gWsMZ0nfLDS_ctRa0dr4BMG6jv8jMX2WA7RS1ytS-_dL5W4ldrFal3rE0Aafpa4THnYQevm9pQSwKVHPYZAnnUANtnyVGe5iiy_cTznbobg/s1538/pete-w-ZB-at-Cowtown-74-v2-sm.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1082" data-original-width="1538" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Q91LfCKp_LFs4kFmMrD7wHM0sAp7q7P1gWsMZ0nfLDS_ctRa0dr4BMG6jv8jMX2WA7RS1ytS-_dL5W4ldrFal3rE0Aafpa4THnYQevm9pQSwKVHPYZAnnUANtnyVGe5iiy_cTznbobg/s320/pete-w-ZB-at-Cowtown-74-v2-sm.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Peter Grant and Jerry Garcia's old ZB10 Pedal Steel Guitar at Cowtown in San Jose, ca 1974</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />By the mid-70s, Peter Grant was a regular member of the house band at Cowtown. Grant was a full-time musician, and though he went on tour once in a while (with Hoyt Axton, for example), he lived in San Jose and his main gig was Cowtown. And so it came to pass that Jerry Garcia's legendary ZB10 was live at 1584 Almaden Avenue in San Jose at a honky tonk bar many nights of the week in the mid-70s, just as it was intended. Garcia never played Cowtown, but his steel guitar was regularly in the house. <p></p><p>The Saddle Rack opened on August 13, 1976, at Lincoln and Auzerais Avenues, near downtown. Unexpected as it may have seemed, in the heart of early Silicon Valley, it was a savvy move to open a Cowboy bar in urban San Jose. True, San Jose had not really been a Feed And Seed hub for some years, and many of the former orchards in San Jose were now housing developments. Thanks to San Jose's inferiority complex towards Palo Alto and San Francisco, however, the city was an attractive place to live for the kind of guy who worked in a factory and liked Merle Haggard. </p><p>It's largely forgotten now that the first wave of Silicon Valley, from the early 60s onward, was oriented towards manufacturing. There were a lot of factories, and the men and women who worked there didn't have advanced degrees from Stanford. When that bell rang at 5:00pm, they wanted a cold one, dim lights, thick smoke and loud, loud music. The Saddle Rack hit the mark, and was an instant hit. The 1980 <i>Urban Cowboy</i> movie, with John Travolta, captured this dynamic in Texas a few years later, but it was already in full force at the Saddle Rack.</p><p><a href="http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/07.19.01/saddlerack-0129.html ">According to a 2001 Fare-Thee-Well retrospective of the Saddle Rack in the San Jose <i>Metro</i></a>, Travolta's <i>Urban Cowboy</i> movie supercharged the atmosphere at the Rack. The club's manager said "At the time the movie came out, it moved from a little country bar into a massive, and I mean massive, country bar." The Saddle Rack had a mechanical bull, and for a year or two, they even had some real ones. Yes--it's possible that the Jerry Garcia Band played a live concert <a href="http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/07.19.01/saddlerack-0129.html ">in a room with real actual bulls</a>:</p><p></p><blockquote><i>[owner Hank] Guenther turned up the cowboy mystique when he incorporated a bull pen--yes, live bulls--in the back corner, where the dance floor closest to the bathroom now stands, around 1982. The story sounds familiar. On a busy Thursday night [in 2001], Patty Gergel, 22 and a recent graduate of San Jose State University, tells her group of friends that she heard a rumor about the bulls.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>"They got loose and started running on 280," she tells her sorority sisters.<br />"Shut up!" one of them screams.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>"It ran on Meridian [Avenue], not 280," says [manager Andy] Buchanan, clarifying the rumor later that night.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>Was it all the bulls?<br />"Just one. It jumped over a 10-foot fence. That was amazing to see. An 1,800-pound bull jumping the fence."</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>An automobile traveling on Meridian hit the bull and ended its spree of freedom. The bull arena didn't last much longer and in 1984, after their insurance company said they wouldn't cover it, Guenther shut it down. These days, the mechanical bull is one of the largest draws, with many just-turned-21, it's-my-birthday gonzos tanked on liquid courage lining up for a crack at it. (Wednesday bull riders pay $1; Thursday is free and Fridays and Saturdays is $2.)</i></blockquote><p></p><p>More importantly for our story, however, was that the Saddle Rack became a live venue. San Jose had no nightclubs booking original music at the time (notwithstanding The Bodega in the nearby suburb of Campbell), at least not on any level beyond local bands. Somewhere around 1981, the Saddle Rack took over from the Keystone Palo Alto as the sponsor of the Fat Fry. In 1981, the Saddle Rack was a big, booming operation and the financial arrangement was probably better for the bands. In any case, San Jose was right in the center of KFAT's audience, even if Palo Alto had a bigger irony quotient. More from the <i>Metro</i>:</p><p></p><blockquote><i>Beginning in 1981, the Saddle Rack hosted live shows and concerts
featuring singers and rockers--heavy metal and country--on the way up
and on the way down, Buchanan says. Over the years, they've booked such
acts as James Brown, B.B. King, Garth Brooks, Huey Lewis, Roy Orbison,
the Charlie Daniels Band, Johnny Cash, Tammy Wynette, Loretta Lynn,
Martina McBride and an all-star roster of other bands and singers. And
it's not all Texas-style bragging. Inside Guenther's office, just like
in the movie where Wes attempts to rob Gilley's (which inspired
Guenther's Rack), wood-framed photos of celebrity singers line the faux
wood-paneled walls.</i></blockquote><p></p><b>Recap: The Jerry Garcia Band at The Saddle Rack, San Jose, CA March 7, 1982</b><br />The Jerry Garcia Band played an Urban Cowboy bar, perhaps for the only time. There was a mechanical bull in the house, and just maybe a couple of real ones. It was perhaps Garcia's only direct nod to the country tradition in San Jose, even if Jerry himself hardly thought about it. Garcia had played a fair amount in San Jose in the 60s, but despite the increasing size and importance of the city in subsequent decades, it remained outside the Garcia and Grateful Dead orbit (save for<a href="https://jerrybase.com/events/19920425-01 "> a Jerry Garcia Band show at the Events Center in San Jose State University on April 25, 1992, capacity 7400</a>).<p>The Saddle Rack show was the last Jerry Garcia Band live broadcast, and I believe his last non-Grateful Dead live broadcast of any kind. I taped it myself, in my Berkeley apartment. I was thrilled to get some current Garcia on my cassette deck, of course, but it never occurred to me that it would be the very last one. No doubt, Garcia rocked the house, and everyone was dancing--I wonder if there was any line dancing? It is a latterday Garcia irony that in contrast to most touring bands at the time, Garcia's manager would have been more concerned about the payday for the show--no doubt pretty darn good--and unconcerned about the virtues or defects of performing live on the radio. Garcia, with and without the Dead, had appeared so many times on air by 1982 that he would have had no reservations, and rightly so.</p><p>One indeterminate question is whether the show was broadcast live or tape-delayed. KFAT Fat Frys were always on Monday, and March 7, 1982 was a Sunday night. I do know that while the Keystone Palo Alto Fat Fry was always live--artists always encouraged listeners to come on down for the late set--at least some Saddle Rack shows were taped. According to one internet posting, at least once the Saddle Rack had multiple bands that were then broadcast on successive Monday nights over the next few weeks. I myself taped the Garcia Band show, but I no longer recall if it was broadcast or tape-delayed to the next night. I also no longer recall if they only broadcast one set. My guess is that they probably just blasted out one set, since I think I would have recalled an all-night Fat Fry (I long since gave up my original cassette to the four winds). <br /></p><p>And as for the Jerry Garcia Band in 1982, its future arcs were unexpected in any number of ways. <i>Run For The Roses</i> was released by Arista in November, 1982, to very little fanfare. Only the title track passed into the regular JGB repertoire, with the rest of the new material fading into obscurity. The covers were unmemorable, including a needless "Knocking On Heaven's Door." Presumably Ron Tutt opted out (or was bought out) of any partnership, and the Jerry Garcia Band would not release any material until a live double cd in 1991. The Jerry Garcia Band retreated into the silo of Grateful Dead fandom, and disassociated itself from the rest of the music industry in almost every way. </p><p>Yet, remarkably, the Jerry Garcia Band thrived against all odds. It wasn't just that the Grateful Dead became huge, massively huge, far beyond the dreams of even the most devoted Deadhead. It was also that, in some strange way, the Jerry Garcia Band was a contrast of sorts to the Dead themselves. Given, of course, the inevitable effect of "The Garcia," the Jerry Garcia Band strove to minimize the trappings of a Grateful Dead concert. The pacing and song choices at JGB shows minimized the raucous drama of Dead shows, and Garcia's own choices de-emphasized his most famous songs. For many years, the Garcia Band never did an encore (before caving in to the inevitable). As a result, many aging Deadheads, myself included, stuck with the Garcia Band long after going emeritus on the full circus of the Grateful Dead themselves. Thus, the Jerry Garcia Band developed into a massive concert attraction, outside the scope of the music industry at the time.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo11P1o9BT5XOHjI3dsnBHhSUs4z_5wZDCt9w8ck5BvSeKoFTe2AwbmbC-tuyTHS9QyV1cul7WavwvsmnGo5LsturkuZ1SecH7apHOAPg9sJW1qIKgRWsaB8brP0ej2C1uB8bmwHOb2eQ/s1440/1390+Saddle+Rack+St%252C+San+Jose.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="959" data-original-width="1440" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjo11P1o9BT5XOHjI3dsnBHhSUs4z_5wZDCt9w8ck5BvSeKoFTe2AwbmbC-tuyTHS9QyV1cul7WavwvsmnGo5LsturkuZ1SecH7apHOAPg9sJW1qIKgRWsaB8brP0ej2C1uB8bmwHOb2eQ/s320/1390+Saddle+Rack+St%252C+San+Jose.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The condominium development at the former site of The Saddle Rack uses the old club as its street name (above: 1390 Saddle Rack St, San Jose, CA)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />The Saddle Rack in San Jose closed on August 5, 2001. The site is now a high-density condominium unit. The condo is now located on Saddle Rack Street, which did not exist when the club was there. The club moved to 42011 Boscell Road in Fremont, across the Bay. It continued to thrive for many years, but finally went out to pasture amidst many other closures in May, 2020. <p></p><p>Two big questions remain about the Jerry Garcia Band's last live broadcast on March 7, 1982 at the Saddle Rack:</p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><i>Was the show broadcast live on Sunday night, or delayed until March 8 (Monday)?, and</i></li><li><b><i>Were there live bulls in the house while Garcia played!</i></b></li></ul><p>Anyone who knows, or thinks they know someone who knows, or has something interesting to say anyway, please suggest it in the Comments<br /></p><a href=" https://jerrybase.com/events/19820307-01"><i><b>Appendix: Setlist from The Saddle Rack, San Jose, March 7, 1982</b></i></a><br />I: Sugaree, Catfish John, Valerie, Second That Emotion, Tangled Up In Blue<br />II: The Harder They Come, Mystery Train, Knockin' On Heaven's Door, Tore Up Over You, Midnight Moonlight<p><i>Note: while it is suggested in JerryBase that Dave Torbert played bass this night, no evidence seems to support this claim (unfortunately). Torbert did sit in for the first set in Chico just 10 days later, as John Khan was delayed by fog. <br /></i></p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-19609952460265112642022-06-24T09:20:00.001-07:002022-06-24T19:40:27.396-07:00February 3, 1970 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead (Lost and Found) [FDGH VII]<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3_hzRJ0UwSLwTYELWtoLlaGVawNUDf9ixlSq-DXLZAjr8he7yfdGtedTEdTbmz23y2C6mrUPTd0OBODSgw7dPeOcnZ_iLRm_0TTx23M_ht57rdOr_URPhd5v146kuRhGmzqIOlFpxM4I/s500/A+Night+At+The+Family+Dog+dvd.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="350" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3_hzRJ0UwSLwTYELWtoLlaGVawNUDf9ixlSq-DXLZAjr8he7yfdGtedTEdTbmz23y2C6mrUPTd0OBODSgw7dPeOcnZ_iLRm_0TTx23M_ht57rdOr_URPhd5v146kuRhGmzqIOlFpxM4I/s320/A+Night+At+The+Family+Dog+dvd.jpg" width="224" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The KQED-tv Special A Night At The Family Dog, recorded in February 1970, was released in 2007</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b> </b><p></p><p><b>February 4, 1970 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Santana/Kimberly </b><i>"A Night At The Family Dog" (Wednesday)</i><br />Most
of the concrete information we have about the Family Dog on The Great
Highway comes from Grateful Dead scholarship. Almost all of the
surviving live tapes from the Dog are from the Grateful Dead, or
are associated with the band. Of the non-Dead, non-Garcia tapes that exist, many were recorded by either Owsley or Alembic (Bob Matthews <i>et al</i>), each
affiliated with the Dead. On top of that, what press coverage there was
on the Family Dog was often anchored by reporting about the Dead or
Jerry Garcia. </p><p>For the wider audience of rock fans, and even of
Deadheads, the most prominent knowledge of the Family Dog on The Great
Highway was the Public Television special <i>A Night At The Family Dog</i>,
recorded at a special concert for an invited audience on Wednesday,
February 4, 1970. The show was initially broadcast on PBS-tv affiliate
stations nationwide on April 27, 1970, and re-broadcast various times.
With only three commercial networks and the occasional independent
station, Public Television shows were widely watched in a way that would
be unfathomable today. I assure you that the PBS <i>Night At The Family
Dog</i> special was watched by young people nationwide in large numbers,
and
was probably influential in suggesting that events like this went on in
San Francisco all the time. Certainly, if you were in cold Des Moines
or windy El Paso and saw Jefferson Airplane, The Grateful Dead and
Santana sharing the stage, everybody dancing and a big jam afterwards,
it would make you believe that San Francisco was the promised land
indeed.</p><p>I have looked into this event at some length, starting a decade ago when I<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/02/february-4-1970-family-dog-on-great.html"> discovered a contemporary San Francisco <i>Chronicle</i> article about the Wednesday night filming of the KQED special by Ralph Gleason. Although Gleason was disingenuous about his role--he was co-producer of the TV special--it was a striking description, and our only source of information up until that time</a>. It seems, however, that there was a lot more to the story. At least some of the music from the special was likely recorded the night before. Now, that may mean that there was a dress rehearsal the night before, with professional video and audio, some of it seems to have been used in the TV special. Alternately, it may mean the date of February 4 was incorrect.<br /></p><p>So: while we might have the date wrong, we might actually be missing a show. There could be audio, and there could even be video. Let's look at what we know today.<br /><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGjYicWBeRCZUocJYR0NCDQnknRAUM5xenKYUCLs_Za4gky-OTHj1L1416uiNELGhyH4yX2RKooUgWPszwdq5mW6rNM2dVoNFErTwsQ-YsPyfgpGP9kEdQmsMJ44JXAW8p5MGTpBQV2GzZ/s455/SFC19700206a-1.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="455" data-original-width="355" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGjYicWBeRCZUocJYR0NCDQnknRAUM5xenKYUCLs_Za4gky-OTHj1L1416uiNELGhyH4yX2RKooUgWPszwdq5mW6rNM2dVoNFErTwsQ-YsPyfgpGP9kEdQmsMJ44JXAW8p5MGTpBQV2GzZ/s320/SFC19700206a-1.jpg" /></a></div><p>The Grateful Dead's performance at Chet Helms' Family Dog on The Great
Highway on February 4, 1970 is fairly well known today. The hour-long
video of concert highlights, originally broadcast on Public Television,
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Jefferson-Airplane-Grateful-Dead-Santana/dp/B0071IBXH8/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3OX0I3GFL46MB&dchild=1&keywords=a+night+at+the+family+dog&qid=1628368710&sprefix=a+night+at+the+family+do%2Caps%2C190&sr=8-1">has since been released in 2007 on DVD as <i>A Night At The Family Dog</i></a>. In 2005,
the Grateful Dead released the recording of their entire set from that
night. Thus both the audio and some video are available from the show, a
rare and potent combination. However, while the music is well-covered,
and video is available, very little has been recalled about the
circumstances of the actual event itself. Even the Dead's cd release is
scarce on details. Still, you can watch the video,
play the cd, light one up--legally, in most states--and get a feel for
what it might have been like Back In The Day.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibWn3R0WQkJ_6Gp4T19WJ4mFdtJ-3Qd6kNwj-qO0sKQdXsdW_n_Gwn4An5yqW6zOX1eFA2lPWqXdY5IAVPVp7UmpL8WVCylEtdbVMRcTz2u-nCZ4GL1pSpHqdCq2oISmZhgI-h1l7Jq6a5/s500/The+Band%2527s+With+Me+Sally+Mann+Romano.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="500" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEibWn3R0WQkJ_6Gp4T19WJ4mFdtJ-3Qd6kNwj-qO0sKQdXsdW_n_Gwn4An5yqW6zOX1eFA2lPWqXdY5IAVPVp7UmpL8WVCylEtdbVMRcTz2u-nCZ4GL1pSpHqdCq2oISmZhgI-h1l7Jq6a5/s320/The+Band%2527s+With+Me+Sally+Mann+Romano.jpg" /></a></div><br />Grateful
Dead scholarship never rests, however, and it seems that the video and
cd may have been somewhat more of a pastiche than we originally thought.
One of the best sources of the era has been Sally Mann Romano, the
ex-wife of the late Jefferson Airplane drummer Spencer Dryden. <a href="https://www.blurb.com/b/9043957-the-band-s-with-me">Her 2018 book <i>The Band's With Me</i> is a must-read for anyone interested in California rock history in the late 60s and early 70s</a>.
In a Twitter exchange, Romano recalled that the filming of the TV
special was actually two nights at the Family Dog, on Tuesday and
Wednesday (February 3 and February 4). The first was probably conceived
as a rehearsal and sound check, prudent considering that filming live
rock concerts was still in its infancy. Some very good evidence,
however, suggests that at least some--and perhaps all?--of the TV special and the subsequent Archival cd
release was actually from February 3.<br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCEyBMvMJKv6w5MU1VP23fcG5MYtEvNkImnYFLRFu9anARSW61RU6ZpbcmYCjoyhGLhNZdQXpe3sAZZgPqPzXVLcz-T1jEKCXvwH92MQK5ohxL6gJOFbRj7BhlNznMWL_pCOC5ZrSWSlbw/s960/19700203+FDGH+Owsley+Tape+Box.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="942" data-original-width="960" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCEyBMvMJKv6w5MU1VP23fcG5MYtEvNkImnYFLRFu9anARSW61RU6ZpbcmYCjoyhGLhNZdQXpe3sAZZgPqPzXVLcz-T1jEKCXvwH92MQK5ohxL6gJOFbRj7BhlNznMWL_pCOC5ZrSWSlbw/s320/19700203+FDGH+Owsley+Tape+Box.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Owsley
Stanley's tape box for the recording at the Family Dog on February 3,
1970. The sticker says "Probably really 2/4/70"--I disagree.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><i><b>What About Tuesday, February 3?</b></i><br />The <a href="https://owsleystanleyfoundation.org/">Owsley Stanley Foundation</a>
has a long-term project of preserving Owsley's live recordings, even
when the tapes themselves may not yet be released. Recently the
Foundation announced that an Owsley 2-track recording of the February
Family Dog had been preserved. The tape box itself says "See 16-track,"
an indicator that Owsley's recording was different than the Bob
Matthews/Alembic recording that would have been the basis of the PBS
video special. Owsley, always scrupulous about dates, has marked the box
"Dead #2/Airplane #1, 3 Feb 70 Family Dog." A sticker on the box, in
different handwriting, says "Probably really 2/4/70," since February 4
was the known date of the live recording of the special. <p><a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2022/05/january-30-31-1970-grateful-deadfamily.html">As I have documented in the previous post in this series, the Family Dog on The Great Highway had re-opened the previous weekend with a comparatively stealthy appearance by the Jefferson Airplane on Friday and Saturday, January 30 and 31</a>. When I asked Sally Mann Romano about this on Twitter, however,
she specifically did not recall that weekend's shows, and her recollections are
uniformly precise. She plainly recalled going to the Family Dog for two
days, presumably February 3 and 4 (Tuesday and Wednesday), and she
understandably said that she surely would have remembered spending 4 out
of 6 nights at the Dog. Mann Romano's recollection was the first
indication of a rehearsal filming on the night before the official
event. </p><p>Now, the most-likely explanation for Mann and Dryden not going to the
Dog on the prior weekend is in the only-the-Jefferson-Ariplane category. The most
likely reason was that the Airplane were thinking about firing Dryden,
and were trying out drummer Joey Covington, all without telling Spencer
or his wife. Indeed, Dryden would be pushed out of the band a month
later, and Covington took over the drum chair in March. The actual
dating of Covington's arrival is confusing, and not a rabbit hole I will
go down here, but suffice to say inviting Covington to a secret gig and
not telling the current drummer was just another day in Jefferson
Airplaneville. </p><p>What we are left with, however, is the knowledge
that there may have been a rehearsal at the Family Dog the night before the official PBS taping. Today,
even small venues are set up for live video with synchronized sound--we
can all do it ourselves on our phones now anyway--but this was new stuff in
1970. Video cameras were giant at the time, and needed their own
locations. Separate trucks were needed for the video feed and the sound
recording, and cable snakes would have been laid everywhere. It's not
surprising that a full tech rehearsal was in order. And it's also likely
that the entire rehearsal was filmed and the music recorded, if only to
ensure that there was backup material in case the "official" event on
Wednesday (Feb 4) had technical problems.</p><p>If there was a full rehearsal the night before, it would not be at all surprising to find out that the official video may have been a
pastiche of both nights. At the time, the entire industry considered
live recording another way to create product, not an historic record of
an event. One track on the <i>Woodstock</i> movie soundtrack album, for
example, was actually recorded at Fillmore East (CSNY's "Wooden Ships").
The Grateful Dead released the Family Dog show as part of their
Download Series in 2005, but that series was poorly curated and had
almost no recording information. The date was listed as February 4, but
that was probably based on an assumption. The cd has 9 tracks. The final
six are the same as the ones on Owsley's tape (above). I don't think
the Dead repeated six songs--either there was only one show, or I think the Dead played better the first
night rather than the second, and three of those tracks were used for
the PBS video{see the Appendix below for track listings].<br /></p><p><b><i>What About The Grateful Dead on February 4, 1970? First Hypothesis</i></b><br />If
in fact, the existing audio and video recordings of the Grateful Dead
were from February 3, not February 4, what did the Grateful Dead play on
February 4? It raises the tantalizing possibility that there would have
been existing professional recordings of the Dead from the "official"
night that were never used. Since there was an invited crowd on
Wednesday night, probably there were plenty of crowd shots, but the
Dead's actual performance would have been different. My guess is that
the Santana and Airplane sets were used from the 4th, as was the jam. </p><p>According to the Owsley Stanley Foundation, the tape with the Grateful Dead from February 3 includes two Jefferson Airplane tracks, "The Other Side Of This Life" and "Somebody To Love." Neither of those are on the Family Dog video. There's also some implications from the numbering--since there is a "Grateful Dead #2" and a "Jefferson Airplane #1" it follows there are additional tapes with the Dead and the Airplane. As far as a soundcheck goes, my assumption is that the Dead and the Airplane showed up for the soundcheck, and the Dead are famous for using soundchecks as an opportunity to play as long as they felt like it. Now, granted, we can hear some audience after "Hard To Handle," but it's not unlikely a few friends and family were around. </p><p>Santana was a hotter band than the Dead or the Airplane at the time, and less likely to show up for the soundcheck the previous night. It's just an assumption on my part, but it's plausible. Kimberly, I should add, who opened the show, appear not to have been recorded. Kimberly were associated with Santana management, which suggests the privileged part accorded to Santana's presence.<br /></p><p>Unfortunately, however, video tape and
16-track recording tape were expensive. If it was determined that the
Dead's February 3 set was superior, then the Dead tapes for the 4th
would simply have been erased. Owsley seems to have taped the rehearsal
night, but it seems less likely he would have been allowed to tape the
"official" performance, if only because space at the mixing board would have been at a
premium. There remains the remote hope that some fragments exist,
somewhere, or perhaps some production notes. It's a little more complicated since Bob Matthews recorded 16-track tape
for Alembic, but it's entirely plausible that the existing recording was
either from February 3 or an edit of the two nights.</p><p>Since no one had asked Sally
Mann Romano, the existing Owsley tape was casually indicated (by the
sticker) as incorrectly dated, when in fact I suspect it was accurate.
Any missing Dead tape from the 4th has likely disappeared. <i>Sic Transit Gloria Psychedelia. </i>But<i> </i>here's to hoping some undated audio and video fragments of the Dead's
performances on February 3 and 4 1970 can be identified and resurrected.
I trust Owsley to have gotten the date right. </p><i><b>An Alternative Hypothesis: Maybe The Date Was Wrong?</b></i><br />Of course, there's another possible explanation for the dating confusion. Maybe the date of the concert really was February 3, not February 4. February 4 has been accepted as the proper date for decades, but it's not supported by an advertisement or announcement, because there weren't any. Ralph Gleason's article was Friday, February 6, which suggests that he saw the bands on Wednesday, February 4. But the <i>Chronicle</i> was a morning paper, so if he went on Tuesday (February 3) he still could not have published until Friday.<p>It's true that Sally Mann Romano, my most reliable witness, remembers two nights, which is why that is my preferred hypothesis. But there are other possible explanations for her memory (the Airplane were not coming in off the road, unlike the Dead, for example). In any case, the context of her memory was that she and her husband were definitely not there four nights out of six (January 30-31, February 3-4). I'm still inclined to thinking that the Dead played two nights, but I am at least acknowledging another possibility.</p><p>[<i><b>update</b></i>: <i>legendary scholar David Kramer-Smyth found a link (<a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2022/06/february-3-1970-family-dog-on-great.html?showComment=1656121897999#c7824757363499236714">see the Comments</a>) to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/community.28044010?searchText=%22family+dog%22&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3D%2522family%2Bdog%2522%26so%3Dold%26efqs%3DeyJjdHkiOlsiWTI5dWRISnBZblYwWldSZmMyVnlhV0ZzY3c9PSJdLCJjb2xsZWN0aW9uX2lkcyI6W119%26groupefq%3DWyJjb250cmlidXRlZF90ZXh0IiwiY29udHJpYnV0ZWRfY29udGFpbmVyIiwic2VhcmNoX2FydGljbGUiLCJjb250cmlidXRlZF9pbWFnZXMiXQ%253D%253D%26pagemark%3DeyJwYWdlIjo5LCJzdGFydHMiOnsiSlNUT1JCYXNpYyI6MjAwfX0%253D&ab_segments=0%2Fbasic_phrase_search%2Fcontrol&refreqid=fastly-default%3Afc5d58e251cad7c5e8dbda0cea7d77dc&seq=18">a Good Times review of the event. It isn't very informative, but it does indicate the event was on Wednesday (February 4)</a>, so that points toward performances on Feb 3 and Feb 4</i>]<br /></p><p><b><i>"Hard To Handle"</i></b><br />Even casual poking around will lead you to online comments from people who recall seeing the public tv special in April of 1970 and being absolutely floored by the Dead. We did not have direct access to the video until it was released in the 21st century (I don't know if it floated around in collector's circles previously). The Dead performed three songs on the video: "Hard To Handle," "China Cat Sunflower" and "I Know You Rider." Only one of those songs was on a previously released album ("China Cat" was on <i>Aoxomoxoa</i>). "Hard To Handle" would not be officially available until <i>Bear's Choice</i> in early 1973, and the "China Cat>Rider" medley did not come out until October '72 (on <i>Europe '72</i>). So numerous teenagers got on the bus hearing songs that would not circulate officially for a few more years. Now, it turns out we didn't even have the date correct. </p><p><b>Appendix 1<i>: A Night At The Family Dog</i></b> <b><i>TV show</i></b><br />
Broadcast on Public Television stations on or about April 27, 1970<br />
Produced by Ralph J. Gleason and Bob Zagone for National Educational Television (NET) <br />
<br />
<b><i>A Night At The Family Dog</i></b> DVD<br />
with Grateful Dead/Jefferson Airplane/Santana<br />
Eagle Vision: released 2007<br />
</p><ul><li> Incident At Neshabur - Santana
</li><li> Soul Sacrifice - Santana
</li><li> Hard To Handle - Grateful Dead
</li><li> China Cat Sunflower - Grateful Dead
</li><li> I Know You Rider - Grateful Dead
</li><li> The Ballad of You And Me And Pooneil - Jefferson Airplane
</li><li> Eskimo Blue Day - Jefferson Airplane
</li><li> Super jam featuring members of Santana, Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane
</li></ul><p> <b><i>A Night At The Family Dog</i></b> audio<br />
Grateful Dead Download Series<br />
Grateful Dead Records: released 2005</p><ul><li> Hard To Handle </li><li> Black Peter
</li><li> Me and My Uncle
</li><li> China Cat Sunflower >
</li><li> I Know You Rider
</li><li> St. Stephen >
</li><li> Not Fade Away >
</li><li> St. Stephen >
</li><li> In The Midnight Hour <br /></li></ul><p> (plus bonus tracks from other 1970 shows)</p><p><br /></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s400/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="315" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, ca. 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: left;"><i><b>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></i><br />The
Family Dog was a foundation stone in the rise of San Francisco rock,
and it was in operation in various forms from Fall 1965 through the
Summer of 1970. For sound historical reasons, most of the focus on the
Family Dog has been on the original 4-person collective who organized
the first San Francisco Dance Concerts in late 1965, and on their
successor Chet Helms. Helms took over the Family Dog in early 1966, and
after a brief partnership with Bill Graham at the Fillmore, promoted
memorable concerts at the Avalon Ballroom from Spring 1966 through
December 1968. The posters, music and foggy memories of the Avalon are
what made the Family Dog a legendary 60s rock icon.</p><p>In the Summer
of 1969, however, with San Francisco as one of the fulcrums of the rock
music explosion, Chet Helms opened another venue. The Family Dog on The
Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, on the Western edge of San
Francisco, was only open for 14 months and was not a success. <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/FD%20Shows.htm">Yet numerous interesting bands played there, and remarkable events took place, and they are only documented in a scattered form.</a></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidK9c9Ob32yfR-TNEfFVE1zdhfuIdVl_vhbeQi0_wH3BACeZJ3YexFKOhN-eK3TyvbK0vufiZhzkFT-1QFM1siG3-QSOWbfiUZm43RbgnVbUuRxRlTQTVS2J2lQysCvBFdBjWLYNgyVvy-/s501/660+Great+Highway+modelcarraceways1967.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="501" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidK9c9Ob32yfR-TNEfFVE1zdhfuIdVl_vhbeQi0_wH3BACeZJ3YexFKOhN-eK3TyvbK0vufiZhzkFT-1QFM1siG3-QSOWbfiUZm43RbgnVbUuRxRlTQTVS2J2lQysCvBFdBjWLYNgyVvy-/s320/660+Great+Highway+modelcarraceways1967.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>660 Great Highway in San Francisco in 1967, when it was the ModelCar Raceway, a slot car track</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b><br />The Edgewater Ballroom, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></i><br />As
early as 1913, there were rides and concessions at Ocean Beach in San
Francisco, near the Richmond District. By 1926, they had been
consolidated as Playland-At-The-Beach. The Ocean Beach area included
attractions such as the Sutro Baths and the Cliff House. The San
Francisco Zoo was just south of Playland, having opened in the 1930s.<a href="http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2011/10/family-dog-at-great-highway-660-great.html ">
One of the attractions at Playland was a restaurant called Topsy's
Roost. The restaurant had closed in 1930, and the room became the
Edgewater Ballroom. The Ballroom eventually closed, and Playland went
into decline when its owner died in 1958.</a> By the 1960s, the former Edgewater was a slot car raceway. In early 1969, Chet Helms took over the lease of the old Edgewater. <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s768/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="768" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr style="text-align: left;"><td class="tr-caption"><i>One
of the only photos of the interior of the Family Dog on The Great
Highway (from a Stephen Gaskin "Monday Night Class" ca. October 1969)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b><br />The Family Dog On The Great Highway</b><br />The
Great Highway was a four-lane road that ran along the Western edge of
San Francisco, right next to Ocean Beach. Downtown San Francisco faced
the Bay, but beyond Golden Gate Park was the Pacific Ocean. The aptly
named Ocean Beach is dramatic and beautiful, but it is mostly windy and
foggy. Much of the West Coast of San Francisco is not even a beach, but
rocky cliffs. There are no roads in San Francisco West of the Great
Highway, so "660 Great Highway" was ample for directions (for reference,
it is near the intersection of Balboa Street and 48th Avenue). The
tag-line "Edge Of The Western World" was not an exaggeration, at least
in American terms.<br /><br />The Family Dog on The Great Highway was
smaller than the Bill Graham's old Fillmore Auditorium. It could hold up
to 1500, but the official capacity was probably closer to 1000. Unlike
the comparatively centrally located Fillmore West, the FDGH was far from
downtown, far from the Peninsula suburbs, and not particularly easy to
get to from the freeway. For East Bay or Marin residents, the Great
Highway was a formidable trip. The little ballroom was very appealing,
but if you didn't live way out in the Avenues, you had to drive. As a
result, FDGH didn't get a huge number of casual drop-ins, and that
didn't help its fortunes. Most of the locals referred to the venue as
"Playland."</p><a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2022/01/june-13-15-1969-family-dog-on-great.html"><i><b>The Family Dog In 1969</b></i><br />Chet Helms had
opened the Family Dog at 660 Great Highway to much fanfare on June 13,
1969, with a packed house seeing the Jefferson Airplane and The
Charlatans</a>. One of the goals was that the Dog would feature mostly San
Francisco bands and a variety of smaller community events and groups.
Since so many San Francisco bands were successful, and had record
contracts, this didn't confine the venue to obscurity. A lot of great
bands played the Family Dog in 1969, but the distant location and the
gravitational pull of major rock events hosted elsewhere in the Bay Area
kept the Family Dog isolated. We know only the most fragmentary bits
about music played, events and audiences throughout the year. Despite
the half-year of struggle, Helms had kept the Family Dog on The Great
Highway afloat. He had entered the new year of 1970 with a new plan.He had new backers, and he would merge his operations with the Grateful Dead's. It didn't happen, however, and the Family Dog on The Great Highway ws closed by the end of the Summer of 1970.<br /><p>
</p><p><b>Appendix 2: <i>Excerpts from Ralph Gleason's San Francisco Chronicle column, February 6, 1970</i></b><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF2jiYO0BYNfJ9khWpnicVUZ6vrqhSGGYpzAa05Vr_LBZfnDrM2LDCher-UyrdYQRb-3rvs0KrEbsMXcxHxZmJ4Y_queOr0Zvc9LtEn85xHx65BrKfZcP1KINlM3oFSGMv4ano0v5BosuZ/s455/SFC19700206a-1.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="455" data-original-width="355" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF2jiYO0BYNfJ9khWpnicVUZ6vrqhSGGYpzAa05Vr_LBZfnDrM2LDCher-UyrdYQRb-3rvs0KrEbsMXcxHxZmJ4Y_queOr0Zvc9LtEn85xHx65BrKfZcP1KINlM3oFSGMv4ano0v5BosuZ/s320/SFC19700206a-1.jpg" /></a></div><br /><blockquote><i>"Do you have a set schedule for what's going to happen?" the technician
asked Bob Zagone of KQED. "We don't have a set schedule for anything,
Zagone said. 'We have a loose schedule."<br /></i>
<i><br />
They were in the KQED mobile video tape recording truck outside the
Family Dog. Several other trucks and a generator, roaring away like a
power drill, were set up in the parking lot. Zagone and the KQED crew
were getting ready to videotape a Jefferson Airplane party at the Family
Dog for National Educational Television.<br /></i>
<i><br />
There's a young band called 'Kimberly' going on stage starting in a few
minutes," Zagone said. "The it will be Santana. After that I don't know
what's going to happen."</i></blockquote><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaOvnq2mOqTdJNogGGkoOlfThPTizLhTrVMfRkswDCs9LBeVSKOjSyFx7UzUNtpoNt8nsUAFSfizKaj8qjJJmz-p1_LIpHILJgKL4NqnP9JDKi70livrMoFX216g-3UxQyE3Mh_kuYIHv0/s374/SFC19700206a-2.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="374" data-original-width="360" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaOvnq2mOqTdJNogGGkoOlfThPTizLhTrVMfRkswDCs9LBeVSKOjSyFx7UzUNtpoNt8nsUAFSfizKaj8qjJJmz-p1_LIpHILJgKL4NqnP9JDKi70livrMoFX216g-3UxQyE3Mh_kuYIHv0/s320/SFC19700206a-2.jpg" /></a></div><br /><blockquote><i>The cables were strung all along the sidewalk and into the hall and the
huge TV cameras on dollies were rolling back and forth through the place
in the wild assembly of San Francisco hip society.<br />
<br />
On stage the musicians were plugging in their guitars and tuning. In a
little while Kimberly, a neat, melodic band, began. Light men
experimented with different combinations. Rock critics wandered through
the hall. "It has the right feeling tonight," Mike Goodwin of Rolling
Stone said. And poet Lew Welch pointed out that it was one of the few
times in recent memories that you could actually get close to a band and
not be jammed by the press of a crowd.<br />
<br />
After Kimberly, Santana took over and the rhythms of the drums and the
bass melded with the guitar and conga drum and rose to an incredible [something].
It ended with Santana almost leaning over backwards, hitting the guitar
strings and bassist David Brown, his eyes squeezed shut, flailing away
at the guitar. The crowd screamed. Out in the truck, Bob Zagone
complained "we're not getting that audience noise" and Bob Matthews, who
was doing the sound, whipped out a mike and set it up taping the
audience. </i></blockquote><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDt_BD2ddIKSHGPVMwUX-EV5fkPelI8cPJFlNIOArN5TCPl99IqXLRr0K2DkLgAzWUdQpHTodUSIE_hd3_XA5Y6jVNmJpnGwIYJOswQQMWVXqnfIN3CuJnh9N4xgVaOjZc2BWbJiD4oAgb/s364/SFC19700206a-3.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="361" data-original-width="364" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDt_BD2ddIKSHGPVMwUX-EV5fkPelI8cPJFlNIOArN5TCPl99IqXLRr0K2DkLgAzWUdQpHTodUSIE_hd3_XA5Y6jVNmJpnGwIYJOswQQMWVXqnfIN3CuJnh9N4xgVaOjZc2BWbJiD4oAgb/s320/SFC19700206a-3.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p><br /></p><blockquote><p><i>"We'll go dark as they start their set and bring the light up
gradually," Zagone said and the Grateful Dead began. In the truck the
multiple images on the little screens made a fascinating montage. Jerry
Garcia's face silhouetted but still clear, approached the mike on the
screen and he began to sing. The little screens that showed the pictures
[of] the various cameras were registering, flicked from one to another.
"Gimme a two shot," Zagone said, "Let's see both those guitars."<br />
<br />
Out in the crowd, which was dancing or sitting on the floor and around
the sides of the stage, John Carpenter of the L.A. Free Press said "when
is it going to be aired?" and hoped a definite date could be set. The
man from N.E.T said probably in April. "It's a good night," Carpenter
said. "I had forgotten what San Francisco was really like. I've seen
people I haven't seen in years."</i></p><p><i>On stage the sound was
into those rhythmic phrases that make the Dead such groovy dance music
and several guests were dancing behind the band and on the stage. Still
photographers leaped up from the audience and shot pictures like the
paparazzi in "Z." </i></p></blockquote><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUjnqm9c3b59T5hYYigJehTEKfc-kQsWWjV4LqQR9VfUvCv9qzfWqxwlt0HT-g9b3pgHSJTKOcH5c7Q62gZdfMygbpbQgTdAEKtpKBe2h7fNNMPWmW5oPfrSO6VOP0DUnXOpbLW8na378/s1600/SFC19700206a-4.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUjnqm9c3b59T5hYYigJehTEKfc-kQsWWjV4LqQR9VfUvCv9qzfWqxwlt0HT-g9b3pgHSJTKOcH5c7Q62gZdfMygbpbQgTdAEKtpKBe2h7fNNMPWmW5oPfrSO6VOP0DUnXOpbLW8na378/s320/SFC19700206a-4.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><i><blockquote>Then the Airplane came on and Grace smiled and Marty sang "Do you want
to know a secret, just between you and me," and the lights flickered off
the sweat on his forehead as he sang and Spencer drove into the drums
with a fierce concentration and Jorma sang "Good Shepherd" and the crowd
gyrated and the cameras rolled back and forth.<br />
<br />
It was a great evening. San Francisco within a week had two TV specials
shot here. Both on rock. There will be more and if they end up on the
screen as good as they are in person, the rest of the country will see
something unique.</blockquote></i><br />
<br /><br /><p> </p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-15129569150679940932022-03-25T11:44:00.007-07:002024-02-01T18:57:48.477-08:00May 27, 1973 Ontario Motor Speedway, Ontario, CA: Allman Brothers Band/Grateful Dead/Waylon Jennings (What Might Have Been)<div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEioM3i8nFfdPskD87xo156PQeeusf92VzGaTtRsD8bnK7AwicGdGFjw_XRL1Fl_O89qwrO7DJS__xnsQqH4KPxqCBWjbEkFEYCYiKoFsBz06ODhIU1CIZZdhNiU5i_8PvkTxSWKAdyuBvwdDPP-RoyNoJbbhNg-QaeJakpk9mRN170VkNn-_om6IKUD=s335" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="335" data-original-width="235" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEioM3i8nFfdPskD87xo156PQeeusf92VzGaTtRsD8bnK7AwicGdGFjw_XRL1Fl_O89qwrO7DJS__xnsQqH4KPxqCBWjbEkFEYCYiKoFsBz06ODhIU1CIZZdhNiU5i_8PvkTxSWKAdyuBvwdDPP-RoyNoJbbhNg-QaeJakpk9mRN170VkNn-_om6IKUD=s320" width="224" /></a></div><br /><b>May 27, 1973 Ontario Motor Speedway, Ontario, CA: Allman Brothers Band/Grateful Dead/Waylon Jennings/Jerry Jeff Walker (Sunday) </b><i>Bill Graham Presents--canceled</i><br />The biggest rock concert in American History was the "Summer Jam" at Watkins Glen Grand Prix Racecourse in Watkins Glen, NY, where 600,000 fans saw the Allman Brothers Band, the Grateful Dead and The Band perform on July 28, 1973. Three-quarters of those fans got in for free, however, as the crowd overwhelmed the fences. <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2022/05/april-6-1974-ontario-motor-speedway.html">The highest paid attendance at any concert was the next Spring, at Ontario Motor Speedway in Ontario, CA, 35 miles East of Los Angeles on April 6, 1974. 200,000 or more fans fans, at least 168,000 of whom paid, saw Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Deep Purple and The Eagles headline over a slew of other popular bands</a>.<p>Yet on
Memorial Day weekend in 1973, on Sunday May 27, Bill Graham Presents had
booked the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers at the Ontario Motor
Speedway. It would have been the first show at the Speedway, and the
first time the Dead and the Allmans had been booked together since the
Fillmore East in 1970. The show was abruptly canceled, almost certainly due to tepid
ticket sales. Yet the paired booking and the venue would prove to be the
biggest winners in the history of rock. What happened? </p><p>This post will review what we can determine about Bill Graham's grand
plans for the Ontario Motor Speedway on May 27, 1973, and why he was too
early. </p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjB9fNxo79sBZu8Be3SHadAEAChuy_YsJOdprgcZLTa0e2eorGCtU4HdwGb7a4cTnORSnFum1Mc5P9lqyvznAorI7CtOm9pPl5e0Y7Y-oe2QH3bNcRbkYA5dlxLz1t4Eny3ytBCqp6snUP6c2kczBmQrd7kr2IJMEIv60UOY7nlgspKmvWDSAMpNdAv=s832" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="832" height="173" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjB9fNxo79sBZu8Be3SHadAEAChuy_YsJOdprgcZLTa0e2eorGCtU4HdwGb7a4cTnORSnFum1Mc5P9lqyvznAorI7CtOm9pPl5e0Y7Y-oe2QH3bNcRbkYA5dlxLz1t4Eny3ytBCqp6snUP6c2kczBmQrd7kr2IJMEIv60UOY7nlgspKmvWDSAMpNdAv=s320" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Winston Churchill ca. 1946</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Winston Churchill was famously reputed to have said of his decisions in World War 2 that "History will be kind to me, as I intend to write it." It is largely forgotten now that the perpetually-broke Churchill made his living as a best-selling author of history books, so this was no casual assertion. [For the record, Churchill's actual quote was <i>"For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all
Parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write
that history"</i>]. Giant figures in rock music, notably Bill Graham, implicitly took Churchill's adage to heart. Graham is widely viewed as the greatest rock concert promoter in the 20th century, a view widely promulgated by Bill Graham. It isn't untrue, by the way--it's just that Bill made sure that the entire rock world heard his version of events first and loudest. <br /><p></p><p>Bill Graham's modern twist on Churchill, however, was not as an author but as an interview subject. Graham gave more interviews than perhaps all rock promoters put together, always had a great story, told them well, and never told a provable lie. Sure, sometimes he favored his own interpretation of events. Every journalist and rock star biographer told Bill Graham's version of the story, and the very best of Graham's practices and innovations--and there were many, to be sure--took front and center, cementing Graham's legacy forever. Rock History was indeed kind to Bill Graham, but he was instrumental in the composition of that history. <br /></p><p>In the Spring of 1973, Bill Graham took a big swing in the Southern California rock market, planning to put on the biggest concert in regional history. He struck out, massively. He never mentioned the event again, not in a meaningful way, and the story disappeared. In retrospect, Bill actually looks pretty good: he was absolutely right about everything, but he was just a little bit early. But that wasn't the story he wanted to tell, so he didn't tell it. Only the bare outlines remain. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgZ6ZUhZ2Bie-Idwvcj4tZ7wd1oibgnNso477VhLTOmv_3Gx9cMThXurZAmZWuNZo9l0rASCU39jQ7_tNnOmRi1e-9eBspWtqVqrPlho33igWIYlNtUh-geOqtQKB4uBM_C_SuKkiAJYE_YpdjJYlioklItaHKmki-OpTucWu0hT1BSXMUpO0xaVbBg=s500" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="333" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgZ6ZUhZ2Bie-Idwvcj4tZ7wd1oibgnNso477VhLTOmv_3Gx9cMThXurZAmZWuNZo9l0rASCU39jQ7_tNnOmRi1e-9eBspWtqVqrPlho33igWIYlNtUh-geOqtQKB4uBM_C_SuKkiAJYE_YpdjJYlioklItaHKmki-OpTucWu0hT1BSXMUpO0xaVbBg=s320" width="213" /></a></div><i><b><br />Rock Festivals and Major Rock Venues: Status Report early 1974</b></i><br />Rock
Festivals were a product of the 1960s. <a href="https://www.uipress.uiowa.edu/books/9781609386085/half-a-million-strong">Gina Arnold's excellent 2018 book
<i>Half A Million Strong</i> (University of Iowa Press)</a> tracks how "free shows in the park" evolved into
"giant multi-day events in some farmer's muddy field" over the course of
a few years (yes, she's my sister but you should still read it). By the
time of the biggest festivals of 1969 and 1970, most famously
Woodstock, hundreds of thousands of people would come to some outlying
area and camp out for several days, while live rock music blasted 24/7.
Legendary as these events were, most fans did not attend more than one
giant event, and most communities that endured a huge rock festival did
not tolerate a second one. <br /><p></p><p>The live rock music business got bigger every
year, and various efforts were tried to find a way to have "festival"
events on a large scale. Multi-act events were appealing to promoters
because they inherently hedged risk in a volatile music market. Since
shows had to be planned many months in advance, it was hard to
anticipate how one band might have a breakout hit, and how another may
have become over the hill, or even broken up, in the few short months
between booking the show and playing it. In early 1969, for example, <a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/12/convocation-center-ohio-university.html">Led Zeppelin found themselves playing tiny auditoriums, sometimes as the opening act, with their debut album roaring up the charts</a>, while at the same time Vanilla
Fudge found themselves no longer the draw they had been the year
before. A rock festival, with dozens of acts over a few days, could more
easily absorb the hits and misses. Promoters continued to search for a
way to book multiple acts profitably. </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgcQ7Jpt_HwhhJhvJCI6tkwFxw8mUvcxFWWbXgPSKfG1MFVyfUPzAoiVZVoRVO08oM4p4g1Bkw3_eAn4sjrDnQtCcWGzJVGRdTUhRP6ZV8LKB7x0fm2vTmtUeukPu_vuzt0rJKbfTD9ibM64f0gL3Evqs3wxxpDeO_cVlKM3MT7AhZF6uhc1kKl0jjn=s450" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="272" data-original-width="450" height="193" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgcQ7Jpt_HwhhJhvJCI6tkwFxw8mUvcxFWWbXgPSKfG1MFVyfUPzAoiVZVoRVO08oM4p4g1Bkw3_eAn4sjrDnQtCcWGzJVGRdTUhRP6ZV8LKB7x0fm2vTmtUeukPu_vuzt0rJKbfTD9ibM64f0gL3Evqs3wxxpDeO_cVlKM3MT7AhZF6uhc1kKl0jjn=s320" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>An aerial shot of the Watkins Glen Grand Prix Course on July 28, 1973, with some of the 600,000 fans in attendance at the Allman Brothers/Grateful Dead/Band rock concert</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b><i>Rock Concerts at Auto Racing Tracks</i></b><br />The
immediate and vast popularity of rock festivals posed a very specific
land-use problem. Places like Indian Reservations and farms were not
really viable for major, multi-day events, since too many things could
go wrong. Equally importantly, despite or because of the increasing
crowds, it was all but inevitable that rock festivals would become "free
concerts." Liberating as this may have seemed at the time, it ensured
that the events could not make enough money to provide a safe,
repeatable event for bands, patrons and host communities. The financial
opportunities of rock festivals were huge, however, and since nothing
says "rock and roll" like "land use," over the years there was a
concerted effort in the concert industry to find spaces that could
successfully and profitably host occasional, loud outdoor events with
giant crowds.<p>One of the intriguing solutions for hosting giant rock
festivals was to use facilities designed for auto racing. Race tracks
were usually somewhat removed from urban areas while still being near
enough to civilization to attract a crowd. Auto races themselves were
noisy, and major race events tended to occur just a few times a year and
last an entire weekend, just like a rock festival. Since race tracks
were permanent facilities, they generally had fences, bathrooms, water,
power and parking, so in many ways they would seem like ideal venues for
huge rock events. Indeed, some of the major rock events of the 1969 and
the 1970s were held at race tracks. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgsPEeKtJBjXnV4jB7Ega2C8wxlMi1z50US-NwjCMRGn80eDMDXaKLCL8m3NSKxAN0C7qLquxhrcpvv_oxh5Xl0sTTWIbMeObQwtit2M5jiBRHmUNKdRUAFZjeyvgllMNUZYiLw-9ho4lD13U0D4N6DCe5ZP4ZFUob2dEGzn7uVzPMZA3zmj9E6PNlE=s400" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="186" data-original-width="400" height="149" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgsPEeKtJBjXnV4jB7Ega2C8wxlMi1z50US-NwjCMRGn80eDMDXaKLCL8m3NSKxAN0C7qLquxhrcpvv_oxh5Xl0sTTWIbMeObQwtit2M5jiBRHmUNKdRUAFZjeyvgllMNUZYiLw-9ho4lD13U0D4N6DCe5ZP4ZFUob2dEGzn7uVzPMZA3zmj9E6PNlE=s320" width="320" /></a></div><br />Two of the most successful
rock festivals were held at Dallas International Speedway and Atlanta International Raceway, both
organized in 1969 by promoter Alex Cooley. Both tracks were giant NASCAR
"super-speedway" ovals. The Rolling Stones' debacle at tiny Altamont Speedway might not
have happened had it been held at its original site, <a href="https://www.racing-reference.info/tracks/Sonoma_Raceway/">the newly-opened Sonoma Raceway, then a newly opened Road Course in rural Sonoma County</a>,
near the San Francisco Bay. <p></p><p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/07/grateful-dead-performances-at-race.html">I looked at some of the history and economic dynamics of Auto Racing tracks as Rock Concert sites in another post, although for purposes of scale I focused on the Grateful Dead. </a>
Generally speaking, while auto racing had been popular since the
invention of the automobile, horse racing had been hugely popular in
cities and county fairs throughout the United States, long before cars
were invented. However, after WW2, when the GIs returned and economy
boomed, America moved from its rural roots to a more urban and suburban
universe, and the automobile became a more important part of everyone's
life. A national boom in the popularity of auto racing corresponded with
a slow decline in the popularity of horse racing. </p><p>By the early
1960s, numerous custom-built facilities served the hugely popular auto
racing industry, with oval tracks (for NASCAR and "Indianapolis" cars in
the South and Midwest), road courses (for sports cars on both coasts)
and dragstrips (nationwide). These facilities were actually ready-made for rock
concerts, but there were some huge cultural divides. With a middle-class
family audience for auto races, and their Dow Industrial sponsorship
from major companies, racetrack promoters were neither tuned into nor
inclined to sponsor long-haired outlaw rock concert events flaunting
nudity and drugs. </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEit4xvQfQuNLsh75e9iNaTuagnXbYCeWz99iof47zUqKBsvhOKSYKpvcZ6O7h7uZ_FmXHRtr2Drwmfjlk-BozXQO758a-0KvAyuGwgEkdtFquedIhzPmw6QbzRZxdDSEqiFLmkA0JGd-OdlR6L_tLVM9YPwmcaPKas9ik4YnJho-PpLGV7mODs4GJQw=s515" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="515" data-original-width="458" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEit4xvQfQuNLsh75e9iNaTuagnXbYCeWz99iof47zUqKBsvhOKSYKpvcZ6O7h7uZ_FmXHRtr2Drwmfjlk-BozXQO758a-0KvAyuGwgEkdtFquedIhzPmw6QbzRZxdDSEqiFLmkA0JGd-OdlR6L_tLVM9YPwmcaPKas9ik4YnJho-PpLGV7mODs4GJQw=s320" width="285" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>On July 8, 1972, Concert 10 presented a multi-act rock show at Pocono International Raceway in Long Pond, PA. Due to a huge rainstorm, the headliners did not appear until the dawn hours of July 9. The fine print says "the natives are friendly and the security, hassle-free"</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><i><br />Rock Concert Economics: 1973</i></b><br />In 1973, there was a huge audience for
live rock music, but that audience was young, and without much ready
cash. Also, since rock music stood for "rebellion," the most popular of
rock music attractions were vulnerable to the complaint that they were
charging "too much" for tickets. The inevitable result of these
pressures was that popular rock bands put on concerts in larger and
larger venues, instead of charging more at smaller places. By 1973, the most popular bands were selling out
basketball arenas with capacities of 12,000 or more, even in so-called
"secondary" markets. Ticket prices were reasonable, around 4 or 5
dollars usually, but the total number of tickets sold was larger than
ever. <br /><p></p><p>By the early 70s, multi-act "Festival" shows had mostly
been financial debacles and public relations disaster, and it wasn't
just Altamont: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erie_Canal_Soda_Pop_Festival">check out the saga of the "Erie Canal Soda Pop Festival"
in Griffin, Indiana on Labor Day weekend of 1972</a>. Smart promoters were looking
for other workable venues, and race tracks re-appeared on the horizon.
An interesting thing to consider about auto racing was that--because of
the noise--they had to generally be well outside any populated areas,
but still within driving distance of a lot of potential fans. At the
same time, since fans had to drive a fair amount, a race track generally
offered a whole slew of races during a weekend at the track, not just a headline race.
These economics pretty much defined multi-act rock concerts, just for a
different, younger fan base.</p><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concert_10">On July 8, 1972 there had been a huge multi-act rock festival at Pocono Raceway in Pennsylvania. Pocono Speedway, in rural Long Pond, was nonetheless in driving distance for a huge population of teenagers in greater Pennsylvania and parts of Northern New Jersey</a>. Pocono Raceway was less than an hour from
Scranton, Allentown and Nazareth, and about 90 minutes from the suburbs
of Philadelphia and Newark. There was a huge population of suburban rock
fans with access to their parent's cars. 120,000 fans showed up to see
Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Faces, Humble Pie, Three Dog Night and and
numerous other bands, completely overwhelming the facility. The interest
was there.</p><p>The parallel development at this time was rock concerts at football or baseball stadiums, full-size major league ones. There had been experiments with stadiums going back to the Beatles, but they had been unsatisfactory. The live rock music audience had gotten bigger, however, and sound systems had improved as well. The first "modern" rock concerts at football stadiums were on May 4 and 5, 1973, when Concerts West hsd produced Led Zeppelin shows at Tampa Stadium and also at Fulton County Stadium in Atlanta. Upwards of 40,000 fans attended each concert. All fans bought tickets, too, setting paid attendance records at the time for such venues. Uniquely, Led Zeppelin were the only act for both shows, with no opening bands. </p><p>The rock market was finding new mega-venues, and Bill Graham wasn't going to be left out. Graham was a self-promoter, yes, but he thought big--he was going to break in two mega-venues of his own, one at home in the Bay Area and the other down in Southern California.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEie1v_0DMO7-8xvScqEpuMqAi7Re7PizlUi7xcwWghsdnr0eaF16v_p2hG54-uvBC4dLMGd1hzq1U94MOVsKaWsG1rImFd9i7K_r0Mr-LpYY2xenWMQsUTa-pfBMAXoowaVH4ZRTTQKvVLT8NhhvWbSJ1aOXFy63IpWPQanFwDB18zCdY6dzgbUFPZN=s480" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="314" data-original-width="480" height="209" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEie1v_0DMO7-8xvScqEpuMqAi7Re7PizlUi7xcwWghsdnr0eaF16v_p2hG54-uvBC4dLMGd1hzq1U94MOVsKaWsG1rImFd9i7K_r0Mr-LpYY2xenWMQsUTa-pfBMAXoowaVH4ZRTTQKvVLT8NhhvWbSJ1aOXFy63IpWPQanFwDB18zCdY6dzgbUFPZN=s320" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><p>Bill Graham was the king of concert production in San Francisco, but he had only occasionally put on shows in Los Angeles. Southern California did not have a dominant promoter, however, so there was still room for Bill to operate. To do that, however, he needed to make a splash, and to make a splash he needed a place. It looked like that place was the Ontario Motor Speedway, an innovative and newly constructed auto racing track that had only opened for full-time racing in Summer 1970. </p><p>The city of Ontario, CA, had been founded in 1891, and named by transplanted Canadians. Ontario is 35 miles East of Los Angeles, and 23 miles South of San Bernardino. Part of San Bernardino County, it is on the Western Edge of the proverbial Inland Empire. Ontario had been the site of a World War 2 Army Air Force Base, which remained an Air National Guard base after the war (and would remain so through 1995). The airport had also been established for civilian use in 1946 as Ontario International Airport. The Airport was joined to LAX in 1967, and jet flights had begun at the airport in 1968. Although Ontario only had a population of 64,118 in the 1970 census, as a result of the airport and the airbase it was at the nexus of a substantial freeway network. I-10 and I-15 met at Ontario Airport, so all of Southern California could get there easily.<br /></p><p>Auto racing was booming in the 1960s, yet Los Angeles was underserved by facilities. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riverside_International_Raceway">Yes, there was the epic Riverside Raceway, another 25 miles East</a>, but that made it even farther from LA proper. More importantly, Riverside was just a road racing facility--albeit a great one--and that limited the types of major events that could be held there. Ontario Motor Speedway was conceived as a full-service answer to every auto racing sector in the Los Angeles area, in a location near the city. The airport location was crucial, too, since major auto racing teams barnstormed around the country like touring rock bands, and drivers and even their race cars were often flying directly from track to track. </p><p>Ontario Motor Speedway was custom built to provide first class facilities for all the major types of racing: an oval for NASCAR and Indianapolis cars, a road course (that included part of the oval) for road racing and a dragstrip. Besides advanced pit facilities, OMS also pioneered what we now call "clubhouses" and "luxury suites" for sponsors. It was a well-conceived endeavor. The plan was to have not only top level NASCAR and USAC (Indy Car) 500-mile races, but Formula 1 and NHRA Drag racing. The inaugural race was the (Indy Car) California 500 on September 6, 1970, with paid attendance of 178,000, a huge crowd even by auto racing standards. <a href="http://www.champcarstats.com/races/197012.htm ">Jim McElreath beat out an All-Star field of drivers that included Mario Andretti, A. J. Foyt, Dan Gurney and the Unser brothers</a>.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg3QbbNmlaPaRCMlrPmLOaAqMGLLFSocvLq0EUyUQP-MTm279btL0NyiwxbbGzj4dM8R2IdR3cyOBVYaXt-PrafcL5fD6Q6wWEqaJ0kGFOUs_PFW2P1SF-LIk_O6ezrZ6fQkkjZrxIrfThQiu4sv1sLHue-RbFPqbkDCcbHJo6hFsOZv_18FxcKmDr_=s275" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg3QbbNmlaPaRCMlrPmLOaAqMGLLFSocvLq0EUyUQP-MTm279btL0NyiwxbbGzj4dM8R2IdR3cyOBVYaXt-PrafcL5fD6Q6wWEqaJ0kGFOUs_PFW2P1SF-LIk_O6ezrZ6fQkkjZrxIrfThQiu4sv1sLHue-RbFPqbkDCcbHJo6hFsOZv_18FxcKmDr_" width="275" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Mario Andretti (5) in a Ferrari 312B F1 car, about to lap Mark Donohue (26) in a Lola-T192 Chevy F5000 car. Andretti would win the Questor Grand Prix, the only F1 race at Ontario Motor Speedway, on March 28, 1971</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />After a hugely successful opening, however, Ontario Motor Speedway had a number of events in 1971 and '72 that did not live up to financial expectations. The racing was great--it was the early 70s--but after the September '70 opening, the Speedway didn't catch LA like it should. The big plan was that Ontario would host a 2nd United States Grand Prix, which hitherto had been the exclusive province of Watkins Glen in New York. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1971_Questor_Grand_Prix">As a prelude, Ontario Motor Speedway held a non-Championship Formula 1 race, the Questor Grand Prix, on March 28, 1971, won by Mario Andretti in a Ferrari 312B</a>. The event was a financial bust, however, and Formula 1 cars never ran at Ontario again (ultimately <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Grand_Prix_West">Long Beach, CA, would get the second US Grand Prix</a>). Although 1971 went alright, the 1972 Ontario attendance, despite great racing, were a financial letdown. Thus by 1973, Ontario Motor Speedway would have been open to the possibility of different promotions. <p></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjKSJb8cbTv0pticxj_l9Whz81cAdg9hE_jxwIvZb_RIISewBWKSzTb_h6pk0Bvelhj_SP2QcF3SYOWbnlN3JsM8KV9wTSNVpYtmQCkxQexX-WT5NKy8tueqzCuqyOc5ByBROAV_7PI3dZpuqDcVZfNfhlkKEcleKNeVv5_4_uKkKrKOThsz1S9IKal=s267" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="189" data-original-width="267" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjKSJb8cbTv0pticxj_l9Whz81cAdg9hE_jxwIvZb_RIISewBWKSzTb_h6pk0Bvelhj_SP2QcF3SYOWbnlN3JsM8KV9wTSNVpYtmQCkxQexX-WT5NKy8tueqzCuqyOc5ByBROAV_7PI3dZpuqDcVZfNfhlkKEcleKNeVv5_4_uKkKrKOThsz1S9IKal" width="267" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Anaheim Stadium, Anaheim, CA July 10, 1973</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><i><b>Southern California Stadiums</b></i><br />There were plenty of stadiums in Southern California, but none of them were particularly ripe for rock concert promoters. Dodger Stadium was under the full control of the Dodgers, and they didn't share it. The Los Angeles Coliseum was old (opened 1921) and in and was near "undesirable" (read: "too African-American") neighborhoods. The Rose Bowl, in Pasadena, had access and parking issues. That left Anaheim Stadium, in Orange County. But it was just across the road from Disneyland, and The Mouse would not want weekend parking disrupted by hordes of young rock fans. In fact, starting around 1976, Anaheim Stadium would become the primary home of stadium rock concerts in Southern California, with the full cooperation of Disneyland, but that was a few years away. In any case, Bill Graham was from out-of-town, not well-placed to talk local stadium operators into cooperating.<p></p><p>Ontario Motor Speedway was a different matter. It had been well-conceived and well-built, but after initial excitement, the attention had died down--same as it ever was for LA--and it was going to need additional sources of revenue. May 27, 1973 was the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend, and the biggest day for auto racing in America. Since all American race fans would be glued to their Televisions watching the 57th running of the Indianapolis 500, it was a perfect day for Ontario Motor Speedway to try something else. Bill Graham had figured out that he had a perfect venue in Southern California, and more importantly, a venue that needed him and his rock-concert expertise. </p>What did the Ontario Motor Speedway offer as a rock concert venue?<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Its location (35 miles E of LA, 23 miles Southwest of San Bernardino) put in close proximity to tens of thousands of potential rock fans.</li><li>The convergence of the I-10 and I-15 freeways meant that an even larger pool of rock fans could drive to the Speedway fairly easily, from either San Diego (on I-15) or nearer the Pacific Coast (I-10). Ontario was just outside of Central LA, so the majority of potential fans could circumnavigate the often brutal traffic jams that the region was infamous for.</li><li>In Southern California, it's always sunny and it never rains, so weather wasn't a consideration.</li><li>The racing facility had parking for 50,000 cars, and apparently there were satellite lots as well. No need to worry about cars abandoned by the side of the road on some farm road.</li><li>The grandstands featured 95,000 seats, with 40,000 "bleacher" seats in temporary grandstands, and a substantial crowd could fit on the infield. It was plausible to imagine 200,000 or more fans at an Ontario Speedway rock concert (178,000 had attended the inaugural California 500 race). This was double the capacity of even the enormous LA Coliseum.</li><li>Ontario Motor Speedway had debt to service and was looking for other sources of revenue, so they would be eager to work with a partner like Bill Graham.</li><li>Most importantly, the huge grandstands around the track, and hence around the facility, ensured that the facility was cordoned off. That meant it was plausible to ensure that only those with tickets would get into the show. At giant rock festivals, the economic issue was always gate-crashing, but that was usually in some giant, muddy field. The Speedway acted as fence, and entry was through controlled tunnels under the grandstands. </li></ul><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhKHNIFO814a6Dp5BUJItMQ0dd5hUonI79ZvlfrT_QK03GzawgmGrhw1yBYAvDxtwK4uU0L8LQ109PfhWaXA_UeL9QGbnMS__NGKYpJFv9Gm058G1gxn6Qr1fdoPeo4jR9A-KGLUXC_Ywf29MiQCEc7sB8AshQLD25UpRbR2PbsBTR3UA4WI3NjfYCF=s1160" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1160" data-original-width="1054" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhKHNIFO814a6Dp5BUJItMQ0dd5hUonI79ZvlfrT_QK03GzawgmGrhw1yBYAvDxtwK4uU0L8LQ109PfhWaXA_UeL9QGbnMS__NGKYpJFv9Gm058G1gxn6Qr1fdoPeo4jR9A-KGLUXC_Ywf29MiQCEc7sB8AshQLD25UpRbR2PbsBTR3UA4WI3NjfYCF=s320" width="291" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Robert Hilburn's column in the LA Times May 5, 1973</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>A feature in the Los Angeles <i>Times</i> mapped out the strategy I described above. Robert Hilburn was the <i>Times</i>' principal rock critic, and he had a "Saturday Roundup." On May 5, the Ontario Speedway concert was the primary topic, with a photo of Gregg Allman and quotes from a high-powered public relations executive (remember, in Los Angeles, PR equaled prestige). <br /></p><p></p><blockquote><i><b>Bill Graham Going All Out For Rock </b>(Robert Hilburn, LA Times May 5 '73)<br />Bill Graham, rock's most creative--and often controversial--concert producer, is staging an all-day (8am to 5:30pm) rock show May 27 at the Ontario Speedway featuring the Grateful Dead, Allman Brothers Band and Waylon Jennings. Upwards of 150,000 persons are expected.<br /><br />It's ironic, of course, that Graham, once so critical of outdoor festivals and other big-money events that lured rock stars away from more intimate ballrooms such as his Fillmores East and West, should be the man behind the Ontario spectacular, but there is no one better equipped to make the event a success. Graham, even his severest critics will conceded, puts together the best concerts in rock.<br /><br />Though most of his energy is spent in San Francisco (he produces concerts regularly at Winterland and the Berkeley Community Theater), Graham does produce occasional shows in Los Angeles, most notably The Rolling Stones' benefit concert last January at the Inglewood Forum.<br /><br />Gary Stromberg, a partner in the Gibson & Stromberg public relations firm, said special security measures will be taken for the concert. "California Highway Patrol, Sheriff's Department officers and local police will have road checks within five miles of the Speedway to insure that only cars with special stickers and concert tickets will be allowed in the vicinity."<br /><br />Stromberg also said the Speedway has high fences and special tunnel entrances that were built specifically to deter would-be gate-crashers. There is parking at the Speedway, he added, for approximately 50,000 cars. <br /><br />The event is titled "A Happening on the Green," and special non-musical treats are reportedly being arranged by Graham. </i></blockquote><p></p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4ZmG0cLR-IZ7zacAQSyQUlW8y8Zl-5e4a0jNKe0EJo7ANo4Rdc36pJE7EVfIFNFirOvP1b-0Hua2Xaai5sISxyyeP9pN9pdrxij1rMYw5UnA3UbXoRexVLNyTWm9xq1ZAhu49Ix0yUo1UWs8Jakkamit_G95s7ZmZmSACJv-MeH891-b39WbdDrPY/s720/Kezar%20Stadium%20aerial.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="540" data-original-width="720" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4ZmG0cLR-IZ7zacAQSyQUlW8y8Zl-5e4a0jNKe0EJo7ANo4Rdc36pJE7EVfIFNFirOvP1b-0Hua2Xaai5sISxyyeP9pN9pdrxij1rMYw5UnA3UbXoRexVLNyTWm9xq1ZAhu49Ix0yUo1UWs8Jakkamit_G95s7ZmZmSACJv-MeH891-b39WbdDrPY/s320/Kezar%20Stadium%20aerial.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />This aerial shot of Kezar Stadium (exact date uncertain) </i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></b></i><i><b><br />Meanwhile, Back In San Francisco</b></i><br />Whatever your modern-day view of Bill Graham might be, he didn't think small. In May 1973, Graham was planning to expand his empire with a dramatic entrance into the Southern California market. But he had big plans for Northern California as well. On May 4, information was quietly leaked (through the Hayward <i>Daily Review</i> rock column "KG") that the Grateful Dead would headline two concerts at the Cow Palace on Tuesday and Wednesday, May 21-22. Also on the bill would be Willie Nelson and the New Riders of The Purple Sage. This was a surprising booking on a number of levels.<br /><br />The Grateful Dead had an extraordinarily loyal audience in San Francisco, but the band wasn't really that big. The Dead had headlined three weeknight concerts at the (officially) 5400-capacity Winterland back in December (Sunday-Tuesday December 10-12), followed by New Year's Eve. Those four shows had sold out without meaningful advertising. Yet the Cow Palace was a 16,000-capacity barn in Daly City, on the outskirts of San Francisco. Were there really enough Dead fans to fill it up for two weeknights? Willie Nelson was a rising star at this time, but he was no proven commodity in the Bay Area. Tickets went on sale, but it almost seemed to be a stealth show. <br /><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhyVXTLXiPgPPsr9t6heYbZn6g0JOGrlB-2HT7YQLLAYdamp1DD_7pDfNkCpnfRLgxq45vaKCROukl_yvgPKiw_FuMs9zud5_eM0XjTVpwWU3_wAoboqgoWZEQscT3cCLT5KZFnBXiis6iCO16kHvTSyyFe7znFzl4kVxnvqigjPu5hcUOgwWTEx4zK=s738" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="738" data-original-width="294" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhyVXTLXiPgPPsr9t6heYbZn6g0JOGrlB-2HT7YQLLAYdamp1DD_7pDfNkCpnfRLgxq45vaKCROukl_yvgPKiw_FuMs9zud5_eM0XjTVpwWU3_wAoboqgoWZEQscT3cCLT5KZFnBXiis6iCO16kHvTSyyFe7znFzl4kVxnvqigjPu5hcUOgwWTEx4zK=s320" width="127" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The San Francisco Examiner, May 14, 1973</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>On Monday, May 14, Graham showed his hand. The two Cow Palace Grateful Dead concerts were rescheduled for Saturday, May 26 at Kezar Stadium in Golden Gate Park. Kezar Stadium, opened in 1925, had been the home of the San Francisco 49ers until the 1971 NFL season. Kezar was now largely unused, but it was in the center of the city and relatively easy to get to by freeway from surrounding counties. On top of that, most Bay Area residents knew how to get to Golden Gate Park, so it was a workable destination. Kezar was small for an NFL stadium (about 60,000), but huge for a concert facility. With no competing sports dates, Kezar would be easier to schedule than an active stadium.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgItIZqPnxcZdmQk6yR2nZlAX3SkZwX42akTwIai-oaH7V0-1tBZ4YEH3naxLWsatrCSiXRJcEeXm_V53ermr5_FlF_gchBh3zuMrQhHNo_6pwHJ_UrLraWqaof3e4LwEXFI-l-nWn5ypBUHkPpdyIKtFFbZPYgH_fLIISH8C801Jc3f3R2SPjOmJgR=s480" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="365" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgItIZqPnxcZdmQk6yR2nZlAX3SkZwX42akTwIai-oaH7V0-1tBZ4YEH3naxLWsatrCSiXRJcEeXm_V53ermr5_FlF_gchBh3zuMrQhHNo_6pwHJ_UrLraWqaof3e4LwEXFI-l-nWn5ypBUHkPpdyIKtFFbZPYgH_fLIISH8C801Jc3f3R2SPjOmJgR=s320" width="243" /></a></div>More importantly, the weekend after the Grateful Dead, Graham announced that Led Zeppelin was going to headline Kezar Stadium. As noted, Zeppelin had begun their tour by headlining stadiums in Tampa and Atlanta. Now Graham was going to book Zep's biggest concert on the West Coast. Over the course of just eight days, Graham was planning to put on the Grateful Dead at Kezar (Saturday May 26, with Waylon replacing Willie), the Allman Brothers and the Dead at Ontario (Sunday May 27) and Led Zeppelin back at Kezar (Saturday June 2). <br /><p></p><p></p><blockquote><i><b>Grateful Dead, Led Zeppelin To Play Kezar</b> (SF Examiner, May 14 '73)<br />The Grateful Dead-Waylon Jennings concerts scheduled for May 22-23, have been canceled and the entire event, called a "Boogie on the Green," has been moved to Kezar Stadium, starting at noon, on Saturday, May 26.<br /><br />Tickets sold for the Cow Palace shows will be honored at Kezar, or can be refunded through the Bill Graham organization. More tickets will go on sale at Ticketron Wednesday. <br /><br />The New Riders of the Purple Sage will open the show, which will utilize the Kezar turf as well as stadium seats. <br /><br />Led Zeppelin is scheduled for a Kezar Stadium concert Saturday, June 2. Tickets at Ticketron beginning Thursday. </i></blockquote>The Grateful Dead/Waylon Jennings show at Kezar drew about 30,000 fans, and was a huge success. The Led Zeppelin show on the next weekend was sold out, drawing twice as many fans. The noise bothered the local neighborhood--the sound system was in a different location than it had been for the Dead--, and Led Zeppelin's fans were not as welcome in the Haight-Ashbury as Deadheads. Bill Graham had proof-of-concept for his "Day On The Green" all-day stadium concerts, but he moved them to the more accessible Oakland Coliseum. They would thrive there for many decades.<br /><p></p><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh1pCXwSf0yN3ft5q2KGCKXmcml470AD3UnApmHLHPOSTsVLtKMKbDQeTWBLwDWGoUlU9uy1fgbHSdshRfqrcwypg4KcBxCOymlxALk-Y2oCIYlxKZO4_Ifij-04B6_XqxKaJbNTQXzekSt3KVh3N2lApFtCMZ5zp8v8cpREGqep9oN4NXKI9eJulIg=s358" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="188" data-original-width="358" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh1pCXwSf0yN3ft5q2KGCKXmcml470AD3UnApmHLHPOSTsVLtKMKbDQeTWBLwDWGoUlU9uy1fgbHSdshRfqrcwypg4KcBxCOymlxALk-Y2oCIYlxKZO4_Ifij-04B6_XqxKaJbNTQXzekSt3KVh3N2lApFtCMZ5zp8v8cpREGqep9oN4NXKI9eJulIg=s320" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>May 12, 1973 Pomona Progress-Bulletin listing</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><i><b> May 1973 Status Report: Allman Brothers, Grateful Dead, Waylon Jennings, New Riders</b></i><br />The Allman Brothers Band would be the premier attraction at the Watkins Glen Summer Jam concert on July 28, 1973, attracting around 600,000 fans. 150,000 of them even paid. From the Summer of 1973 through the Fall of 1975 the Allman Brothers were one of the premier concert attractions in the country. You can make a good case that Led Zeppelin and Emerson, Lake & Palmer were equally as popular as the Allmans, but they weren't bigger. Now, granted, the Rolling Stones didn't tour and Bob Dylan only played indoor arenas, but the Allmans were a massive outdoor draw all over the country. Watkins Glen was the biggest, by far, but it wasn't a fluke. <br /></p><p>Most rock fans from the era recall that Summer '73 was when the Allmans broke through with their mega-hit "Ramblin' Man," a catchy country tune that was not particularly typical of the bluesy jamming on which the Brothers had made their bones. "Ramblin' Man" was reminiscent of "Blue Sky," sure, and maybe "Revival," both of them Dickey Betts songs as well, but it wasn't at all like "Statesboro Blues" or "Whipping Post." So the idea that the Allmans began to dominate the US concert market when they got their big hit single is compelling. But it's wrong. </p><p>The Allman Brothers had a massive successful US tour in the Summer of 1973. The first highlight was an epic double-bill with the Grateful Dead at Washington, DC's RFK Stadium, on the weekend of June 9-10. Yet that event was eclipsed by the triple-bill at Watkins Glen on July 28. Nonetheless, the Allmans' follow-up release to <i>Eat A Peach</i>, which had come out back in February '72, would not even be released until August of '73, after the Watkins Glen show. "Ramblin' Man" was the first single, released at the same time, and it would go on to reach #2 on the <i>Billboard</i> charts. Now, sure, advance copies of <i>Brothers And Sisters</i> and the "Ramblin' Man" 45 were probably on FM radio (or even AM) in late July, but the huge successes of RFK and Watkins Glen were before the album and single had even been released. The Allman Brothers Band were huge because they were huge. FM radio listeners had caught up to them, and FM radio played them constantly throughout 1972 and '73.</p><p>The Allman Brothers Band's third album <i>At Fillmore East </i>had been released in July 1971. As America was slowly catching up to their stunning sound, Duane Allman was killed in a motorcycle accident on October 29, 1971. As a result, the band's followup, <i>Eat A Peach</i>, a double-lp that was half studio and half live, received extraordinary (if well-deserved) attention. And if that wasn't enough, Derek And The Dominos had a hit in Summer '72 with the by-now18 month-old "Layla," and Duane's interplay with Eric Clapton drew even more attention to him. The Allmans were in the process of recording the sequel when bassist Berry Oakley died in a motorcycle accident almost exactly a year after Duane (on November 11, 1972). Interest in the Allmans inevitably redoubled. In 1973, Capricorn Records released a double album of their first two records (<i>Allman Brothers Band</i> and <i>Idlewild South</i>) as <i>Beginnings</i>, so the Allmans were all over the radio throughout the Summer, even though they did not yet have a new album. </p><p>The Grateful Dead, meanwhile, had risen above the level of cult status, even if they were only somewhat of a "major attraction." The band had released four gold albums in a row (<i>Workingman's Dead, American Beauty, Grateful Dead </i>['Skull & Roses']<i> </i>and<i> Europe '72</i>), and they, too, got their share of play on FM radio. In the case of the Dead, the songs played on FM were likely the more rocking songs in their repertoire (like "Bertha" or "Sugar Magnolia"), rather than big jams like "Dark Star," but they were Dead songs nonetheless. The Dead would leave Warner Brothers to go independent at the end of 72, but <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2015/11/album-economics-bears-choice-history-of.html">they would not release their final record on the label (<i>Bear's Choice</i>) until July of '73</a>.</p><p>The New Riders of The Purple Sage no longer featured any members of the Grateful Dead, but they still shared booking and other services with them. By May 1973, the Riders had released three albums on Columbia. The Dead tried to book the Riders as openers when it fit. Clearly, they fit in at Kezar but not Ontario. <br /></p><p>Waylon Jennings (1937-2002) was an established country singer, but
he had roots in rock and roll. Jennings had been the bass player for
Buddy Holly and The Crickets, and had graciously offered to give up his
seat on the airplane to The Big Bopper, on the fateful flight on
February 3, 1959 that crashed, killing Holly, the Bopper, and Ritchie
Valens. Jennings had gone on to success as a Nashville singer, but he
had never been happy with how his records were made. By '73, country rock was starting to become a commercially viable enterprise, with the Eagles as the most prominent band, along with a slew of other groups like Poco, the New Riders and Pure Prarie League. The unhappy Jennings, however, tapped into something much more potent than hippies playing rock and roll with a twang. <br /></p><p>The more potent and lasting merger of country music and the 60s would be the music coming out of Austin, TX. Genuine country musicians, with proper Nashville pedigrees, would move to Austin, grow their hair, light one up and pretty much play the same music they had been playing before. OK--maybe there was a bit more attitude, but that wasn't incompatible with older roughneck country, anyway. One of the earliest converts was Jennings. </p><p>In 1972, Jennings had had a pretty good hit with the song "Ladies Love Outlaws," and RCA still wanted him to be a typical Nashville artist. By 1973, however, Jennings had moved to Austin, TX, to join fellow outcast Willie Nelson, and RCA finally saw the light. Jennings kept the beard he had grown, and "Outlaw Country" followed, with Willie and Waylon in the forefront. Sharing bills with the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers in California was a huge break from country practice. Jennings was consciously and enthusiastically aligning his music with long hair, weed and loud, loud music. <br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiGCMy2JFiyIxkJ2GC3wpUkEuSlPy3dhwe_Xy0oES0lbNqe7s08irSNwKxe4rMfHvQW-pSVwLsYkFjCOpdqNyaAKIVWg3FOfKbyn5BOpvUVFricpIdA9AY0EK8Xp5DuFuH4H6waNf9SA-xClMF70ekphXLH2JD0zt6D7S5GCTQPIn_vSltmGNuvPJzk=s1296" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="506" data-original-width="1296" height="125" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiGCMy2JFiyIxkJ2GC3wpUkEuSlPy3dhwe_Xy0oES0lbNqe7s08irSNwKxe4rMfHvQW-pSVwLsYkFjCOpdqNyaAKIVWg3FOfKbyn5BOpvUVFricpIdA9AY0EK8Xp5DuFuH4H6waNf9SA-xClMF70ekphXLH2JD0zt6D7S5GCTQPIn_vSltmGNuvPJzk=s320" width="320" /></a></div><b>What Happened: Ontario Motor Speedway</b><br />On Monday, May 22, Robert Hilburn explained in the Los Angeles <i>Times</i> that the Dead/Allmans/Waylon concert would be canceled. The reason given was that the police were going to insist that the concert end by nightfall, because of some incident at a concert in Stockton. <br /><p></p><blockquote><i><b>Ontario Rock Concert Canceled by Graham </b>(Hilburn LA Times May 22 '73)<br />The all-day Grateful Dead-Allman Brothers-Waylon Jennings rock concert Sunday at the Ontario Motor Speedway--which had been expected to draw upwards of 150,000 persons--has been canceled, producer Bill Graham has announced.<br /><br />"Trouble with several youngsters at an April 29 outdoor concert in Stockton caused Ontario civic official to take a hard, long look at the May date," Graham, who was not involved in the Stockton event, said. Specifically, police said the concert--the first of its kind at the huge speedway--would have to end three hours before dark, or approximately 5:54pm, he added.<br /><br />Since the Allmans and the Grateful Dead were scheduled to play several hours each, Graham said he doubted he could honestly end the show by that time." He pointed out the Dead played six hours recently at an outdoor concert in Des Moines, Iowa. Though normally outspoken, Graham made it clear he was not blaming anyone. "All the Ontario officials and police were extremely cooperative. Under the time limits imposed however, I didn't feel we could have given the kids the show we promised.<br /><br />Graham said he is proceeding with plans to present Leon Russell Aug. 5 at the Ontario facility. Ticket sales for the Sunday event were described as "healthy" by a spokesman for the San Francisco-based producer. </i></blockquote><p></p><p>You can buy this story if you like. Maybe there were some elements of truth to it, I don't know. Here's what I think--the concert didn't sell enough advance tickets, and it no longer made economic sense. Remember, Graham's team would have had to construct a huge stage and a ginormous sound system, and fly the Allman Brothers, the Dead and Waylon Jennings in from out of town. The Times article says that the concert was "expected to draw upwards of 150,000 patrons." If Graham had those kind of ticket sales, he would have found a way around any police objections (if those objections were real), by paying for better lighting, more security or whatever it took. But I don't think the ticket sales were there. Given that we know that the Allmans and the Dead would pack Watkins Glen just two months later, why could that have been?</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgeCiHUYC1zHjHvU5TUghjB8Vw-u53XAvXEGnAlHnXOmEjsyhzUfa6usHKilAESkEPUhVDLlH9xK62dPA6voCrBvsgpIzEftNwofTYASbdYSZh0xUfRlRWFeGGo2w1VKJFADdhluJKnQiSqD24jD5OHbtHwbrvCjvn3e9p6zJAwHfyc-4OndoLsYY-N=s614" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="614" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgeCiHUYC1zHjHvU5TUghjB8Vw-u53XAvXEGnAlHnXOmEjsyhzUfa6usHKilAESkEPUhVDLlH9xK62dPA6voCrBvsgpIzEftNwofTYASbdYSZh0xUfRlRWFeGGo2w1VKJFADdhluJKnQiSqD24jD5OHbtHwbrvCjvn3e9p6zJAwHfyc-4OndoLsYY-N=s320" width="313" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Although this fine album was a massive hit, it doesn't shout "Los Angeles Summer of '73" to me</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br />The West and The East</b><br />The West Coast and the the East Coast were very different concert markets in the 1970s. The Midwest and the South probably were different, too, but I have done less research into them, so I won't generalize. A characteristic of East Coast events from 1969 onwards was the willingness of large numbers of young people to get in their cars and travel for rock concerts. An event like Woodstock drew not just from New York state but all of New England, Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Population was much more distributed in the East. There were a lot of medium-sized cities full of young people anxious to see major rock bands, and they would travel. The phenomenon of Deadheads driving hundreds of miles to every show originated as an East Coast phenomenon. <p></p><p>The West, even in California, was considerably less populated in the 1970s. The vast suburbs of Los Angeles, the Bay Area, Fresno and Vegas were far smaller then. It wasn't that young people didn't love rock and roll as much, they surely did, but once you got outside the major metro suburbs, there just weren't that many people. Fresno, to name just one outlying city, had 165,655 residents in the 1970 census, while it would have 542,107 in 2020. There were just fewer young people ready to hop in their parents' cars and see a big rock show. Few Deadheads from San Francisco would have been planning to travel down to Ontario, since the Dead were playing the afternoon before. As for LA, t<a href="https://jerrybase.com/events/19730629-01">he Dead had already booked three shows at the Universal Amphitheatre on June 29-July 1</a>, so it's not like Deadheads would lose out. <br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh4XBrDru0oLt0N1ByumP991KfRIe2gi2c3KxFUcAOV4hcOs69O-dYoQN9we5y0SJPJW4dGWS6P7efgE4NUdEIpTg7963D5Ozb7ai1LM4UvBhyBNdppxqk5AN0EyLAoGkxY_IiXrXje-UTOyE-M2VY_2BAKf_8LCFeqgbtQWNlrlET4oVq3mdFSD2K2=s300" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh4XBrDru0oLt0N1ByumP991KfRIe2gi2c3KxFUcAOV4hcOs69O-dYoQN9we5y0SJPJW4dGWS6P7efgE4NUdEIpTg7963D5Ozb7ai1LM4UvBhyBNdppxqk5AN0EyLAoGkxY_IiXrXje-UTOyE-M2VY_2BAKf_8LCFeqgbtQWNlrlET4oVq3mdFSD2K2" width="300" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Los Angeles and San Francisco aren't the same, which is what makes California great</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Also, while both the Grateful Dead and the Allman Brothers were popular bands, I don't think they were particularly popular in 1973 Los Angeles. Now, sure, there were plenty of fans who liked each band, or both bands. But LA was huge, so any band could sell tickets--Jethro Tull, Black Oak Arkansas, The Yes, you name it. But the Allmans and the Dead were hippie guitar hero bands--was that what was happening and what was going to impress everybody in LA on Monday morning when you got back to school? I don't think so. <br /><p></p><p>Did the Allmans or the Dead have a hit single on the radio? Definitely not. Did this matter in Los Angeles? Well, you decide, but it was the biggest record industry town in the history of the record industry, so I think you had to be super-cool or on the charts, and the Dead and the Allmans were neither. I think ticket sales were tepid, and Graham canceled the show. </p><p>Some months later, in the East it was different. The tens of thousands who bought tickets for Watkins Glen weren't downtown Greenwich Village hipsters, they were kids in Syracuse or Allentown or Parsippany who wanted to see some big time rock bands. None of those bands were coming to their town, and their parents weren't necessarily OK with them driving to Manhattan, but some racetrack out in the countryside? Yeah, why not? The kids could have got permission to go the US Grand Prix, so why not a concert?</p><p>Graham's assessment of the Allman Brothers and the Dead as a booking pair was correct, but his location was off by 3000 miles. He was also right about the Ontario Motor Speedway, although he picked the wrong bands. The following Spring, Ontario Motor Speedway would hold the "California Jam" on April 6, 1974, an all-day affair headlined by Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Deep Purple and the Eagles. Actual attendance was well North of 200,000, but more importantly paid attendance was around 168,000, breaking every record known for a paying concert. That record would hold until "Cal Jam 2," also at Ontario Motor Speedway, on March 18, 1978. Cal Jam 2 had at least 175,000 paid.</p><p>So the planned May 27, 1973 concert at Ontario Motor Speedway had all the right pieces for an epic success of unimagined proportions, but in the wrong combination. We are left with only a poster. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj7IsjH_iwxrjI3zTL6gavoLG4D37uZywg_1s57RVLaaUN3pvsEpoIPdqyAL3vJoxDp4Pg0jdQs1mIzkdhQcGvlV5YzvVp5LvZ1IM8XaV3asPzkTQqeO3OurXMy57PVVLjKJPGYVpCR3E-_br2N1EFDmPKaKQAp5z_gsKzhKhmsq_Kzda5a4k6YdpXK=s288" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="288" data-original-width="190" height="288" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj7IsjH_iwxrjI3zTL6gavoLG4D37uZywg_1s57RVLaaUN3pvsEpoIPdqyAL3vJoxDp4Pg0jdQs1mIzkdhQcGvlV5YzvVp5LvZ1IM8XaV3asPzkTQqeO3OurXMy57PVVLjKJPGYVpCR3E-_br2N1EFDmPKaKQAp5z_gsKzhKhmsq_Kzda5a4k6YdpXK" width="190" /></a></div> <br /> <br /></div><b><i>Postscripts</i></b><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The August 5 Leon Russell concert booked for Ontario alluded to above seems to have been moved by Bill Graham to Oakland Coliseum, the first in what was a decades-long success in outdoor stadium concerts at that venue. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/05/june-8-1974-oakland-coliseum-stadium.html">The Grateful Dead show at Kezar (on May 26) was a huge success, but the sold-out Led Zeppelin show did not go over well with the neighborhood, leading to the shift to Oakland Coliseum</a>.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm0pw_RQaMonhISpnLaK_WRkiG9HQzLtsThNWvUrPDPu-vWEgmHUQAilxQOdTylkCXqTXXGSVS4TIZWw0gdGzL3sLRF143wQexuXJ7pEWc9ZPxLareyahBEWKdrvwnerx07WBCQ1xeaTuVMMHzJ-AKS0h47jCbM_ZUOu_A46nIX5i7XT-0bJBQ2UMeb7s/s552/Leon%20Russell%2019730728%20Long%20Beach%20Jul%2026.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="226" data-original-width="552" height="131" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjm0pw_RQaMonhISpnLaK_WRkiG9HQzLtsThNWvUrPDPu-vWEgmHUQAilxQOdTylkCXqTXXGSVS4TIZWw0gdGzL3sLRF143wQexuXJ7pEWc9ZPxLareyahBEWKdrvwnerx07WBCQ1xeaTuVMMHzJ-AKS0h47jCbM_ZUOu_A46nIX5i7XT-0bJBQ2UMeb7s/s320/Leon%20Russell%2019730728%20Long%20Beach%20Jul%2026.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></li><li><i><b>update 20240201</b></i>: <i>it turns out the Leon Russell concert was indeed held at Ontario Motor Speedway, on Sunday, July 29, 1973. This was the first rock concert at the Speedway. Leon had just released his monster hit triple album Leon Live. Per the July 31 Times, around 30,000 showed up, but Bill Graham was expecting 80,000. In a strange bit of symmetry, this was the same weekend as the Dead/Allmans blowout at the Glen, and Leon had originally been booked there. The Dead and the Allmans had preferred The Band, and Leon was bought out of the gig</i>. <br /></li><li>The <strike>first</strike> second concert at Ontario Motor Speedway has been entirely forgotten. On November 24, 1973, Three Dog Night and the Guess Who headlined a rainy Saturday at the Speedway. There were several opening acts, something like 25,000 people and per a Dennis Hunt <i>Times</i> review, a miserable time was had by all. It must have served as proof of concept, however, since Cal Jam was held five months later.</li><li>Bill Graham and the promoters of the Watkins Glen attempted another event at Ontario on August 3,1974, headlined by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. <a href="http://www.insidesocal.com/davidallen/2014/04/page/3/">Tickets were even sold, but the event was canceled</a>. </li><li>Ontario Motor Speedway was a well-designed and forward looking auto racing facility, but it did not succeed financially. The Speedway was open from August 1970 to December 17, 1980. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario_Motor_Speedway">Per Wikipedia</a>, by 1980, the Ontario Motor Speedway bonds were selling at approximately $0.30 on the dollar. Generally unknown and unrealized by the bond-holding public, the 800 acres (3.2 km2) of land originally purchased at an average price of $7,500 per acre, had now risen to a value of $150,000 per acre. Chevron Land Company, a division of Chevron Corporation recognized the opportunity to acquire the bonds and effectively foreclosed on the real estate. For approximately $10 million, Chevron acquired land which had a commercial real estate development value of $120 million, without regard to the historic significance or future potential of the speedway. </li><li><a href="https://www.google.com/maps/place/Ontario,+CA/@34.075839,-117.573956,439m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x80c334dbeadd627b:0x703e35af9583190!8m2!3d34.0633443!4d-117.6508876?hl=en ">From above, you can still see traces of Turn 3.</a></li></ul><p><br /><b><i>Appendix:</i> <a href="https://www.insidetheie.com/where-was-ontario-motor-speedway">Where Was Ontario Motor Speedway?</a></b><br /></p><blockquote><p>The speedway was bordered on the north by 4th Avenue (then referred to
as San Bernardino Avenue), on the south by Interstate 10, the west by
Haven Avenue, and the east by Milliken Avenue, which still has the
eastward curve needed to make room for turn 1 and turn 2 of the
racetrack. Milliken Avenue is one of (maybe the only) street with
curves like this in the entire city. <br /></p><p>Contrary to those news reports
about the Ontario Mills Mall being built inside the old racetrack, this
is not the case. Ontario Mills Mall lies across the street, due-east of
what was the racetrack, on the east side of Milliken Avenue. When the
Speedway was still in existence, the future home of Ontario Mills Mall
was either empty fields, or parking areas, depending on the year. <br /></p><p>Even
though virtually nothing remains of the race track, other than some of
the raised-berms that made turn number 3 at the corner of 4th and Haven
Avenues, The City Of Ontario has retained some of the history and
heritage of the racetrack by building Ontario Motor Speedway Park a few
blocks west of the racetrack site and by using auto racing inspired
street names in and around the old speedway. Let’s give Ontario some
credit for these street names! (Jaguar Way, Corvette Dr, etc)</p></blockquote><p></p><i>Appendix 2</i>: <b>Population of Ontario, CA</b><br />1960 46,617 103.8%<br />1970 64,118 37.5%<br />1980 88,820 38.5%<br />1990 133,179 49.9%<br />2000 158,007 18.6%<p><br /></p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-63973687962279520162022-01-28T09:23:00.000-08:002022-01-28T09:24:00.909-08:00Halloween Weekend 1969: Loma Prieta Room, San Jose State and Family Dog on The Great Highway (Oct 31-Nov 2 '69) [FDGH V]<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3H65tQTTMLdxUOivSNF52y2xGuxNLgC10Ax68wHbc7KlCIiaCBy4OG5RSmymczh6xjRy-2piyrf7nUR6RABXwMtLbd7oxdqoRzi81cgN_Qt7fqf0KWq1zbDLeOt4opSd8k2Gr49g45mw/s2048/Grateful+Dead+SJSC+19691031.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1586" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3H65tQTTMLdxUOivSNF52y2xGuxNLgC10Ax68wHbc7KlCIiaCBy4OG5RSmymczh6xjRy-2piyrf7nUR6RABXwMtLbd7oxdqoRzi81cgN_Qt7fqf0KWq1zbDLeOt4opSd8k2Gr49g45mw/s320/Grateful+Dead+SJSC+19691031.jpg" /></a></div><p><b>The Grateful Dead: Halloween Weekend, October 31-November 2, 1969 </b><br />Over the years, it seemed like a Law Of Nature (or a Federal statute) that the Grateful Dead had to play on Halloween. Skeleton iconography attracts skeleton iconography, and a Dead concert on Halloween always seemed like a good idea. </p><p>A close look at Halloween 1969 poses a paradox for the band. They were booked for the weekend at the Family Dog on The Great Highway, where they could draw 1500 or 2000 fans each night at $3.50 a head. Yet they only played the Dog on Saturday and Sunday, leaving the actual Friday night of Halloween for a campus event at San Jose State College. The newly-opened Student Union Ballroom held, at most, 700 people. Even if it was oversold, since student admission was only $2.00, the payday wasn't going to be the same as at the Dog. <br /></p><p>What were the Grateful Dead and their management thinking? This post will take a look at the different threads in play for the Grateful Dead over the weekend of October 31-November 2, 1969.</p><i><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEixgfnep77-uzZdyXqJ-aIvz_bH14tVWPE-RNTlnEEb7uiZyvyyD4GEr-7W0xjiOzuPqvRBEM_85I-8JtS-F_8ib6vLKYs-9NB9DQgJHHxHHyFjzGQDloUA9CSEHPRkAGCKTpQ9DaeVoKaYz8JLPwOw40J7CfvI5yzINRlJUUszbXBea2-IU-Qo8qnz=s1738" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1736" data-original-width="1738" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEixgfnep77-uzZdyXqJ-aIvz_bH14tVWPE-RNTlnEEb7uiZyvyyD4GEr-7W0xjiOzuPqvRBEM_85I-8JtS-F_8ib6vLKYs-9NB9DQgJHHxHHyFjzGQDloUA9CSEHPRkAGCKTpQ9DaeVoKaYz8JLPwOw40J7CfvI5yzINRlJUUszbXBea2-IU-Qo8qnz=s320" width="320" /></a></div><br />Grateful Dead Economic Status Report, Fall 1969</b></i><br />In late 1969, the Grateful Dead were hurting for cash. They had spent so much money on <i>Aoxomoxoa</i> that they weren't earning anything back on royalties. <i>Live/Dead</i> would be a kind of success, but it wouldn't be released until November, so royalties wouldn't show up until later. The Dead, being the Dead, of course, were always spending too much money on equipment, and keeping a lot of friends and girlfriends on the payroll. This took cash, and the Dead didn't make that much.<p>Of course, the Dead's cash flow problem was greatly aggravated by the fact that manager Lenny Hart was absconding with a significant amount of the band's money. Hart's management "strategy" was dubious, at best, and in hindsight some of it may have been oriented towards bookings that facilitated Hart's greedy fingers, rather than the band's best interests.</p><p>The Family Dog on The Great Highway had a capacity of something around 1500 (the Fire Department capacity may have been a bit lower). Some contemporary comments in the <i>Examiner</i> suggest that a full house at the Dog approached 2000. Whether that meant they oversold the house, or people came and went throughout the night, it gives us an idea that the gate was about $6500 per night (assuming paid attendance of about 1850). Assuming costs for expenses, opening acts and profits, figure that the Dead could clear $4000 on a great night. </p><p>The Student Union Ballroom at San Jose State held, at most, 700 patrons. Students would only pay $2.00, and they would have been the bulk of the audience. So even assuming a little bit of overselling and a few non-student admissions (at $3.00), and the possibility that a lot of students might come and go throughout the evening (allowing for more ticket sales), the realistic gate would be around $2000. The catch here was that San Jose State would have had an entertainment budget, and that ticket sales were meant to only defray the cost, not cover it. It's reasonable to assume that the Dead would have cleared $2500 or even $3000 for the Friday night show, which was still less than the Dog.</p><p>The difference in the two bookings was that San Jose State, though likely cheaper, was a sure thing. San Jose State was not going to go out of business. The Family Dog on the Great Highway, conversely, was always in a precarious financial situation. A band who booked a future show at the Dog had no guarantee the venue would be in business by that time. On top of that, rock concerts, like any live entertainment venture, were inherently risky ventures. The Grateful Dead, by what little evidence we have, had drawn well when they had played at the Family Dog for two weekends in August, and there was every reason to think they would do so again. </p><p>There was one hangup, however: the Family Dog wouldn't be able to advertise the Dead show until that very week. Bill Graham Presents had booked the Dead with Jefferson Airplane for the prior weekend, and the contract would have required that the Dead could not advertise a show within 50 miles until their booking was complete. Now, it wasn't that Dead fans wouldn't want to see the band again--that was never a problem. It's just that concert attendance takes planning, and if you don't know there's a Dead concert on Halloween weekend, what if you've got something else going on? What if your sister already got the family car and you've got no way to get there? <br /></p><p>Also, on any given night, anything could happen--rainstorm, earthquake, fire in the venue, riots in the neighborhood--that would lead to a financial debacle at the Dog. This risk was magnified by the prohibition on advertising until the previous Monday. Now, sure, the same things could happen at San Jose State. My guess, however, was that some part of the San Jose State concert booking was guaranteed, and that would be paid regardless, and very possibly paid in advance. The Dead were hurting for cash, and Lenny Hart was hungry for it, so a smaller, ensured payday on Halloween took precedence over a potentially larger one at the more uncertain Family Dog. So the Dog had a ghost of a show on Halloween without the Dead, and the Dead turned up for the balance of the weekend. Although non-musical details are scant, it seems that the Dead did well both nights at the Dog, so it was a financially sound weekend in the end.<br /></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-YJeUAByljLnvskrA8HYTV86-R1iCx0qIJETUPiJR-5n4k3lAnn7xTCdHaZPQYYa6YRI7dXFenJMiH5Zt420ry2Ft2sorgAXTlgvTuS-xvOKHqF8bMYQ61F7Qt_LlzRX8n1jQ-Ztdo0w/s452/NRPS+SJ+Spartan+19691017+ad.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="375" data-original-width="452" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-YJeUAByljLnvskrA8HYTV86-R1iCx0qIJETUPiJR-5n4k3lAnn7xTCdHaZPQYYa6YRI7dXFenJMiH5Zt420ry2Ft2sorgAXTlgvTuS-xvOKHqF8bMYQ61F7Qt_LlzRX8n1jQ-Ztdo0w/s320/NRPS+SJ+Spartan+19691017+ad.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p><i><b>Loma Prieta Room, Student Union, San Jose State University, 211 S 9th St San Jose, CA 95112</b></i><br />San Jose State College (now Cal State San Jose University) was the oldest college in California, first established as a Teacher's College in 1857. After various name changes, it became San Jose State College in 1935. After World War 2, thanks to the GI Bill and the Baby Boom, San Jose State expanded enormously. By 1969, it probably had 15,000 students or more (currently it has over 33,000, with 3/4 of them as undergraduates). The school is right at the center of downtown San Jose, which itself was expanding in the 1960s. The Student Union building at 211 9th Street had just been built in 1969. The main ballroom was on the third floor, and depending on the configuration, was either called the Ron Barrett Ballroom (capacity 588) or the Loma Prieta Room (capacity 700). The new ballroom had only opened on Tuesday, October 13, 1969. The very first rock concert at the Student Union Ballroom was held on the first Friday it was open. On October 17th, the New Riders of The Purple Sage played with a jazz-rock band called The Fourth Way.<br /></p><p> </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTJZbebVzvEyrNU1cuZVw-VA4i-fNi5sGgQ6aa3AwZtBu1aqXVicmWNnVA4oITSqQxZx9BZnSbuME0DC-TTjCGHDy4AReBgguLroP643rWzNdf_R6a3mwcnzN8bi1XDkdHn4aAv6MkdC0/s445/NRPS+Spartan+article+19691017+.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="445" data-original-width="214" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTJZbebVzvEyrNU1cuZVw-VA4i-fNi5sGgQ6aa3AwZtBu1aqXVicmWNnVA4oITSqQxZx9BZnSbuME0DC-TTjCGHDy4AReBgguLroP643rWzNdf_R6a3mwcnzN8bi1XDkdHn4aAv6MkdC0/s320/NRPS+Spartan+article+19691017+.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Daily Spartan of Thursday, October 16 reported on the upcoming dance the next night at the Student Union Ballroom </i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><i></i></p><blockquote><i><b>Two Bands To Appear For Dance </b><br />"Riders of the Purple Sage with special guest appearances by Jerry Garcia and Mickey Hart of the "Grateful Dead" will be one of the two bands playing tomorrow night in the new College Union on Ninth Street</i></blockquote><i><blockquote>A dance sponsored by the College Union Program Board will feature "Sage" and "The Fourth Way," with guest appearances by members of the Charles Lloyd Quartet and John Handy's group. </blockquote></i><i><blockquote>The dance will be held from 9 pm to 1 am in The BALLROOM on the third level of the College Union. Admission will be $1.50 for students and $2 for the general public. There will be no pre-sale; all tickets will be sold at the door. </blockquote></i>By October 17th, the Grateful Dead would have already booked their Halloween show at the same venue. In this instance, besides booking a paying gig for the New Riders, it seems like the Dead were checking out the venue in advance. It was a very odd feature for the New Riders to headline a venue on a Friday night, and then for the Dead the same venue two weeks later. This suggests to me that the Dead booked the Halloween show, and then realized they could book another show two weeks earlier. <p></p><p>The Fourth Way was an interesting electric jazz-rock band. There were a lot of bands in the Bay Area fusing rock, jazz and electricity, but Fourth Way did it in a less frantic style than Miles Davis or the Tony Williams Lifetime. Fourth Way did release three albums on Capitol, now long out-of-print. Bandleader Mike Nock, formerly pianist with Yusef Lateer, Steve Marcus and many others played electric keyboards. The lead soloist was electric violinist Mike White, best known for playing with the John Handy Quintet. Bassist Ron McClure had played with Handy, and then with a Charles Lloyd Quartet lineup when it was based in San Francisco (along with Keith Jarrett and Jack DeJohnette). Drummer Eddie Marshall rounded out the quartet.</p><p>We don't know what happened at this show. Was it well attended? Who knows? In the peculiar way of Dead history, however, while we don't have an eyewitness account, we have a tape. The Owsley Foundation was kind enough to transcribe the setlist for us. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/04/riders-of-purple-sage-old-new-and.html">We can see that Bob Weir showed up for a few numbers, so there was a taste of Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck</a>.<br /> <i>Crossover<br /> Hello Trouble<br /> Long Black Limousine<br /> Six Days on the Road<br /> Next In Line<br /> Games People Play<br /> To Have the Hurting End<br /> Whatcha Gonna Do<br /> The Race Is On (w/Bob Weir)<br /> Cathy's Clown (w/Bob Weir)<br /> Saw Mill (w/Bob Weir)<br /> Mama Tried (w/Bob Weir)<br /> Me & My Uncle (w/Bob Weir)<br /> Fair Chance to Know</i><br /></p><p>In any case, Owsley and the crew probably had a chance to figure a few things out about the room setup, and that had to help for Halloween.<b><br /></b></p><b>October 31, 1969 Loma Prieta Room, San Jose State College, San Jose, CA: Grateful Dead/South Bay Experimental Flash</b><i> (Friday) </i><br />We know the Grateful Dead played the Student Union Ballroom on Halloween, because we have a tape. It's around 90 minutes, and my guess is that it's the entire Grateful Dead performance. We don't really know anything about the show itself. <br /><p><a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2019/01/halloween-1969-san-jose-state-college.html">There were two articles previewing the event in <i>The Spartan Daily</i></a></p><p></p><blockquote><i><b>GRATEFUL DEAD BRING LIVE MUSIC TO LIVELY SJS HALLOWEEN FLING</b><br /><br />This Friday evening SJS is having its own “trick-or-treat,” when it brings out The Grateful Dead to play in the College Union Ballroom.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>The Grateful Dead, pioneers of the San Francisco sound, will be making their first appearance at SJS Halloween night.<br /></i></blockquote><blockquote><i>“The Dead” have added a little country to their blues and psychedelic elements, and the blend works well, according to people who saw them last weekend at Winterland.</i> <br /></blockquote><blockquote><i>“The Dead,” whose music has what many people term a euphoric effect, will play two sets, a total of one and a half to two hours. It is hoped that they will play some of their more famous sets which range from straight country, as in “Mama Tried,” to the blues encore, “Good Morning Little School Girl.” In the former, bass guitarist Phil Lesch produces a good country vocal sound, and in the latter, Ron (Pig Pen) McKernan is at his vocal best.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>Lead guitarist Jerry Garcia also has a good set as does organist Tom Constante and rhythm guitarist Bob Weir. The dependable work of drummers William Kreutzman and Mickey Hart is ideal in the country tunes.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>Accompanying “The Dead” will be the far out sounds of the “Experimental Flash.” In addition, two color horror films will be shown, “Billy the Kid vs. Dracula” and “Godzilla vs. The Thing.” Both films will be shown silently behind the bands.</i> </blockquote><blockquote><i>The dance will be held from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. and admission is $2 for students and $3 for the public. Tickets are on sale in [the] Student Affairs Business Office, located on the second level of the College Union.</i><br /><br />(by Marty Pastula, from the <i>Spartan Daily</i>, San Jose State College, 29 October 1969)</blockquote><blockquote><i><b>BANDS TO PLAY AT MASKED BALL IN COLLEGE UNION</b><br /><br />The Grateful Dead and Southbay Experimental Flash will perform at 9 p.m. tonight in the College Union to a masked audience.<br /></i></blockquote><blockquote><i>In keeping with the theme of Halloween, the College Union Program Board (which is sponsoring the dance) has asked that all those attending tonight’s dance wear masks.</i> <br /></blockquote><blockquote><i>It is hoped that the debut of The Grateful Dead at SJS will be a pace-setter for future “name groups,” according to [the] CUPB student director.</i> <br /></blockquote><blockquote><i>The CUPB will provide masks for those who “forget their disguises.”</i> <br /></blockquote><blockquote><i>Tickets are still available in the Student Affairs Business office. [...]</i> <br /></blockquote><blockquote><i>[The] CUPB director added that in case it gets too warm, there will be “bobbing for apples” as refreshing but perhaps “ghostly” fun.</i><br /><br />(from the <i>Spartan Daily,</i> 31 October 1969)</blockquote><p></p><b>Setlist</b><br />Casey Jones, Dire Wolf, It Hurts Me Too, Cryptical Envelopment-> Drums-> The Other One-> Cryptical Envelopment, China Cat Sunflower-> I Know You Rider, Mama Tried, High Time, Sitting On Top Of The World, Next Time You See Me-> Easy Wind, Turn On Your Love Light <br /><p><b>South Bay Experimental Flash</b><br />The South Bay Experimental Flash were a jazz-rock quintet from San Jose, although by 1969 they actually lived in Richmond. <a href="https://www.svvoice.com/david-ladd-anderson-a-lifetime-of-music-making-magic/">The main soloist was flautist David Ladd, well known over later decades in the South Bay as a session man and music teacher</a>, along with organist Harry Critchfield and drummer Kirk Harwood.</p><b><i>The Poster</i></b><br />There is a relatively well-known poster associated with the San Jose Halloween concert (at the top of the post). I am no poster expert, by any means, but it does raise a few questions:<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Why was there a poster? This was a student show, subsidized by the college, and not intended to turn a profit. Why authorize a color poster, since it's a needless expense?</li><li>I can understand some hippies on the "Entertainment Committee" who wanted to commission a poster because it was cool. But why print it? Why print hundreds of copies at real cost? For one thing, even by 1969, any Fillmore or Fillmore-type poster accessible on a telephone pole was immediately removed and put up in someone's dorm room. So posters were not only a cost, they didn't help sell tickets.</li><li>I can see one poster for display outside the Student Union ticket office. But why print more? Do they circulate? Some part of this doesn't add up, although it may be that the posters were reprinted later because they were appealing.</li></ul><p><i><b>Loma Prieta Room: Aftermath</b></i><br />The brave comment in the <i>Spartan Daily</i> about the Grateful Dead being the "pace-setter" for future name groups at the Loma Prieta Room turned out to be outrun by events. There were some more rock concerts at the Loma Prieta Room in Fall '69, the biggest name of which was Lee Michaels. Rapidly, however, the rock business got way bigger than any tiny 700-seat room on a campus, so while I'm sure there were occasional events, the Grateful Dead were far and away the biggest band ever to play the Student Union Ballroom. <br /></p><p>The Loma Prieta Room was remodeled, and thus while the building is still in use, the Ballroom is not the same as when the Dead played there. During November 5-8, 2014, Cal State San Jose University held <i><a href="https://www.sjsu.edu/somanyroads/">So Many Roads : The World in the Grateful Dead, A
Conference & Symposium</a></i> in the Student Union building (though not the Loma Prieta Room, then under re-construction).<br /></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s400/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="315" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, ca. 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: left;"><i><b>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></i><br />The
Family Dog was a foundation stone in the rise of San Francisco rock,
and it was in operation in various forms from Fall 1965 through the
Summer of 1970. For sound historical reasons, most of the focus on the
Family Dog has been on the original 4-person collective who organized
the first San Francisco Dance Concerts in late 1965, and on their
successor Chet Helms. Helms took over the Family Dog in early 1966, and
after a brief partnership with Bill Graham at the Fillmore, promoted
memorable concerts at the Avalon Ballroom from Spring 1966 through
December 1968. The posters, music and foggy memories of the Avalon are
what made the Family Dog a legendary 60s rock icon.</p><p>In the Summer
of 1969, however, with San Francisco as one of the fulcrums of the rock
music explosion, Chet Helms opened another venue. The Family Dog on The
Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, on the Western edge of San
Francisco, was only open for 14 months and was not a success.</p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s768/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="768" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr style="text-align: left;"><td class="tr-caption"><i>One
of the only photos of the interior of the Family Dog on The Great
Highway (from a Stephen Gaskin "Monday Night Class" ca. October 1969)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>The
Great Highway was a four-lane road that ran along the Western edge of
San Francisco, right next to Ocean Beach. Downtown San Francisco faced
the Bay, but beyond Golden Gate Park was the Pacific Ocean. The aptly
named Ocean Beach is dramatic and beautiful, but it is mostly windy and
foggy. Much of the West Coast of San Francisco is not even a beach, but
rocky cliffs. There are no roads in San Francisco West of the Great
Highway, so "660 Great Highway" was ample for directions (for reference,
it is near the intersection of Balboa Street and 48th Avenue). The
tag-line "Edge Of The Western World" was not an exaggeration, at least
in American terms.<br /><br />The Family Dog on The Great Highway was
smaller than the Bill Graham's old Fillmore Auditorium. It could hold up
to 1500, but the official capacity was probably closer to 1000. Unlike
the comparatively centrally located Fillmore West, the FDGH was far from
downtown, far from the Peninsula suburbs, and not particularly easy to
get to from the freeway. For East Bay or Marin residents, the Great
Highway was a formidable trip. The little ballroom was very appealing,
but if you didn't live way out in the Avenues, you had to drive. As a
result, FDGH didn't get a huge number of casual drop-ins, and that
didn't help its fortunes. Most of the locals referred to the venue as
"Playland." <br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzOwa_mjEXn6GRTNdu-1Dxt0hnDv5qTrq2dwju-YE9GyGy3NMqmHKNtCy7J10G3LWmgrjz_5Lr_K_bRpgGKEcsnAbL1oHoX4WNFHVXNG9E_qSVoGaVEiGVPohj2JgvzKB7ik5XADjLcAZ5/s1857/FDGH+GD+19691101.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="631" data-original-width="1857" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzOwa_mjEXn6GRTNdu-1Dxt0hnDv5qTrq2dwju-YE9GyGy3NMqmHKNtCy7J10G3LWmgrjz_5Lr_K_bRpgGKEcsnAbL1oHoX4WNFHVXNG9E_qSVoGaVEiGVPohj2JgvzKB7ik5XADjLcAZ5/s320/FDGH+GD+19691101.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p><b>October 31, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Danny Cox/Alan Watts/Golden Toad/Hells Angels Own Band </b><i>(Friday)</i><br /><a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2022/01/june-13-15-1969-family-dog-on-great.html">The Family Dog had opened to great fanfare on June 13, 1969</a>, but since then it had lurched through October with little to show for it. The
venue had been open almost every night of the month, mostly with a
variety of community-oriented events that only charged $1.00 admission
on weeknights. While in retrospect we can see that some of the weekend
acts would have been playing some good music (Kaleidoscope or Brewer And
Shipley, for example), they weren't really good draws. The Dead were taking the sure payday in San Jose on Halloween, but they would be back at the Family Dog on Saturday and Sunday
(November 1 and 2). </p><p>So for Halloween at the Family Dog, the
putative headliner was the Golden Toad and folksinger Danny Cox, both of
whom would be opening for the Dead on the subsequent nights. The
unexplained billing was "<b>Hells Angels Own Band</b>." Who were they?
What did it mean? We kind of know it wasn't the Dead, since they were
playing in San Jose. I guess you could claim they were going to show up
late, but geography doesn't favor that, and in any case, why invoke the
Hells Angels? I wouldn't go to any public event today that advertised
anything to do with the Hells Angels, and this was Halloween 1969. Also,
the Hells Angels never took kindly to anyone using their name
satirically, so the usage must have had some kind of informal approval. </p><p>Was
this a biker party? Maybe--but why advertise it to the public? Also,
bikers are bikers--were they going to look forward to a Renaissance Fair
quintet playing 15th century melodies on hand-built replicas of
medieval pipes (<a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2012/07/february-19-1969-fillmore-west-grateful.html">which is what Golden Toad did</a>)?
Sure, Golden Toad founder Bob Thomas was a personal friend (and
sometime roommate) of Owsley, but would a bunch of cranked-up bikers
care? Danny Cox was an enjoyable folksinger, but he was a big
African-American guy, and the Hells Angels were never an advertisement
for diverse inclusion. </p><p>Nothing about the Friday night booking
made any sense. I have one tiny clue: <a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2021/10/danny-cox-live-at-family-dog-november.html">I had a clever, but inaccurate, theory that Owsley Stanley had made a tape of Danny Cox that would become the album <i>Danny Cox Live At The Family Dog</i></a>. The Owsley Stanley Foundation looked into it, and it turned out that Cox's manager would not let Owsley tape his act. Family Dog soundman Lee Brenkman thinks that Cox was recorded on Halloween. Brenkman referred to the event as the "Hell's Angels Halloween party", and added that "it was the last calm thing that occurred that night." Intriguing. Anyone with insight, rumors or clever speculation,
please post in the Comments.<br /></p><b>November 1-2, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Danny Cox/Golden Toad </b><i>(Saturday-Sunday)</i><br />The <b>Grateful Dead</b>
headlined the Family Dog on The Great Highway on Saturday and Sunday
night. Thanks to Owsley Stanley, we have tapes of both nights. The
playing on both nights is magical. The existing tapes are both two
hours, and seem to be complete shows with a few minor snips. So Golden
Toad and Danny Cox must have each done sets, capped by a two-hour blast
by the Grateful Dead in their early prime. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00PWX7RIS/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1">David
Browne, in his great Dead reflection, <i>So Many Roads</i>, reviews the November 2
(Sunday) tape, with its 30-minute "Dark Star" in its larger context, and
it is well worth reading</a> (as is the rest of the book). Whatever the
commercial flaws of the Family Dog on The Great Highway, and they
seemed to be many, the Dead played fabulously there. In early 1970,
manager Lenny Hart would make plans to merge the Grateful Dead's
operations with Chet Helms and the Dog, and it had to be at least in
part because the band played so well in the room.<p>The <b>Golden Toad</b> had
nothing to do with rock, of course. But they resolutely followed their
own musical course, in a manner clearly aligned with the Grateful Dead's
own single-minded mission. The Toad mostly played outdoors in at
Renaissance Fairs (in Los Angeles and Marin) or in Berkeley, and usually
only played indoors at Berkeley's Freight and Salvage or with the
Grateful Dead. The Golden Toad were known to have a rather flexible
membership, so they may have had numerous people on stage augmenting the
root quintet (supposedly they had performed with up to 23 members) <a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2012/07/february-19-1969-fillmore-west-grateful.html"><i>[see here for more about the Golden Toad].</i></a><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW9UXRpbwGUAaGtp-WF7rcDIKa63zqKSP-_O3xYUiNDU0ASg0iT4rhWjXICE2DfW68RNFrO4Da7Xusvp0A7uofS8eiN7rRFaJ1xER4VqJmY-wZ_TcFtZYnCrBjRpQoYQKW0fxNGrxls5Zy/s608/Danny+Cox+Birth+Announcement+69+2lp+Together.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="608" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW9UXRpbwGUAaGtp-WF7rcDIKa63zqKSP-_O3xYUiNDU0ASg0iT4rhWjXICE2DfW68RNFrO4Da7Xusvp0A7uofS8eiN7rRFaJ1xER4VqJmY-wZ_TcFtZYnCrBjRpQoYQKW0fxNGrxls5Zy/s320/Danny+Cox+Birth+Announcement+69+2lp+Together.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Danny Cox's 3rd album was Birth Announcement, a double-LP released on Together Records in 1969 and produced by Gary Usher</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danny_Cox_(musician)"><b>Danny Cox</b> was from Cincinnati, but he had relocated to Kansas City in 1967</a>. Cox, a large African-American man, defied rather shallow 60s expectations by singing folk music instead of blues. <a href="https://www.discogs.com/Danny-Cox-Birth-Announcement/release/2944791">His current album was his 3rd, <i>Birth Announcement</i>, a double-lp on Together Records produced by Gary Usher</a>. Cox sang folk classics along with Beatles and Dylan songs, lightly backed.</p><p>Cox shared management with Brewer And Shipley, and like them <a href="https://www.discogs.com/Danny-Cox-Danny-Cox/release/2112800">he
would record an album for ABC/Dunhill in San Francisco with producer
Nick Gravenites. Recorded at Wally Heider Studios, it was released in
1971</a>. Both John Kahn and Merl Saunders played on that album. During
demo sessions for the record in 1970, Kahn introduced Merl Saunders to
Jerry Garcia, who was recording in another room. Some weeks later, when
Howard Wales didn't want to come jam at the Matrix, Kahn recommended
Merl and the Garcia/Saunders partnership began.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUo3-RznyOKWArR-nPz0TczBjFF-g-znWRKIv6js9uw46qfUjbk-1ZI32SRpxBbl8cD1kyyelPO2ja5ac60FzoFLqCPh96OeN03AfJFrfJpPOzAnU8czwjAw09DRgk7EezGyYzjGOQoxBM/s600/Danny+Cox+Live+At+The+Family+Dog+Sunflower+1970.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="599" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUo3-RznyOKWArR-nPz0TczBjFF-g-znWRKIv6js9uw46qfUjbk-1ZI32SRpxBbl8cD1kyyelPO2ja5ac60FzoFLqCPh96OeN03AfJFrfJpPOzAnU8czwjAw09DRgk7EezGyYzjGOQoxBM/s320/Danny+Cox+Live+At+The+Family+Dog+Sunflower+1970.jpg" /></a></div><p><br />In between 1969 <i>Birth Announcement</i> and his 1971 ABC/Dunhill albums, <a href="https://www.discogs.com/Danny-Cox-Live-At-The-Family-Dog/release/2588844">Sunflower Records released a 1970 Danny Cox album called <i>Live At The Family Dog</i></a>. Sunflower, associated with MGM, was a fringe label that had released the legal-but-unauthorized <i>Vintage Dead</i> and <i>Historic Dead</i>
albums in 1971. Danny Cox only played the Family Dog this weekend and
the next weekend in 1969, so assuming that the material was really
recorded at the Family Dog--that's no sure thing--they could very well
have been recorded this weekend. <a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2021/10/danny-cox-live-at-family-dog-november.html">I speculated that Owsley might have recorded the tape, but it turned out not to be the case</a>. Cox's manager, Howard Wolf, wouldn't allow Owsley to tape his act. As mentioned, soundman Lee Brenkman thinks that Cox was recorded on Halloween. <i>(Scholarly
readers will be interested to know that on the Family Dog lp, Cox
records "Me And My Uncle," and it is credited to "Trad.--arranged Danny
Cox.")</i> </p><p><i><b>Summary</b></i><br /></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><i>The Grateful Dead played a tiny ballroom for 700 or so people on a college campus on Halloween Friday in 1969. </i></li><li><i>What went down on Halloween '69 at the Family Dog? Why book a Renaissance Fair pipe band and a folksinger and advertise Hells Angels Own Band? What was that?</i></li><li><i>The Grateful Dead played Saturday and Sunday night at the Family Dog. They played great music, and ticket sales were probably pretty good, because they usually were.</i></li><li><i>Opening act Danny Cox may have had his Halloween show recorded and released on Sunflower Records as <u>Live At The Family Dog</u></i><br /></li></ul>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-57244582626708939222021-11-26T06:42:00.003-08:002023-08-17T14:11:05.159-07:00September 6, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead (What Do We Know?) [FDGH IV]<p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx0NJCEBOO9MJ7DLBiyYrkVNQOC9b4037qs4qthsOOJ13cq6Q6zlg3nbvf4cXcLp15VOY-wJfHkazpkpHfQN8tNTdbsh4dP-MHo1X_qRsJz1ECjRq0qWKhMJ3b_Jc3h42hUE0ypeGHdp4/s364/SF+Good+Times+FDGH+19690905.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="67" data-original-width="364" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjx0NJCEBOO9MJ7DLBiyYrkVNQOC9b4037qs4qthsOOJ13cq6Q6zlg3nbvf4cXcLp15VOY-wJfHkazpkpHfQN8tNTdbsh4dP-MHo1X_qRsJz1ECjRq0qWKhMJ3b_Jc3h42hUE0ypeGHdp4/s320/SF+Good+Times+FDGH+19690905.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>This cryptical listing in the underground paper San Francisco Good Times, from Thursday, September 5, 1969, was the only published hint that the Grateful Dead and the Jefferson Airplane would play the Family Dog on The Great Highway during the weekend. It was probably announced on FM radio</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>On Saturday, September 6, 1969 the Family Dog had what must have been
its biggest show in its history. We know it was good, too, because we have the
tapes. It was very likely packed. The Jefferson Airplane, one of the
biggest drawing acts in rock music at the time, played the Great Highway, supported
by no less than their old pals the Grateful Dead. Yet there was only the
faintest hint of pre-show publicity, and not a word about it
afterwards. If the Airplane and the Dead had played an unscheduled show
at the Fillmore West, you can bet that Bill Graham would have made sure
everyone heard about it, so every rock fan knew that the Fillmore was
Where It Was At. The Family Dog let this event slip by without a
trace--if Owsley Stanley had not taped both acts, we would never have
any idea that the show had even happened.</p><p><a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2022/01/june-13-15-1969-family-dog-on-great.html">After a packed opening night with the Jefferson Airplane, back on June 13, the Family Dog had since found itself in difficult financial straits</a>. The
venue itself was very appealing. The bands that had played the Family
Dog each weekend, by and large, had been really good bands. The groups
weren't quite as high profile as the Fillmore West, and Bill Graham
always got the first bite of any band on tour. But the quality of music
at the Dog was high. The location, far from the center of the city and
not near an easy freeway exit, made the venue difficult to find for
suburban teens. In the era before MapQuest, simple directions made a big
difference. The problem seems to have been that not enough Bay Area
rock fans had made it a habit to check out who might be playing at the
Family Dog, and consider it as an option. For rock fans, checking to see
who was at Fillmore West was automatic, whether or not you ended up
going. But the Family Dog hadn't yet gotten into the minds of Bay Area
rock concert fans.</p><p>August 1969 had a run of really good bands at
the Family Dog, including the Dead on two separate weekends (August 2-3
and 28-30), Country Joe and The Fish (August 8-10), Mike Bloomfield
(August 15-16) and <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/02/august-22-23-24-1969-fillmore.html">a slew of bands on the Wild West "makeup" shows
(August 22-24)</a>. If there was any time that rock fans were noticing the
Dog, it would have been this month. In retrospect, however, we can see
August 1969 as a high water mark for the Family Dog. Come September,
things would fall apart for the balance of the year. Probably no week in
the Family Dog's 14-month history sums up its contrarian history so
well as the first week of September. </p><p>Let's review the week of September 1-7, 1969 at the Family Dog on The Great Highway.</p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s400/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="315" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, ca. 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: left;"><i><b>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></i><br />The
Family Dog was a foundation stone in the rise of San Francisco rock,
and it was in operation in various forms from Fall 1965 through the
Summer of 1970. For sound historical reasons, most of the focus on the
Family Dog has been on the original 4-person collective who organized
the first San Francisco Dance Concerts in late 1965, and on their
successor Chet Helms. Helms took over the Family Dog in early 1966, and
after a brief partnership with Bill Graham at the Fillmore, promoted
memorable concerts at the Avalon Ballroom from Spring 1966 through
December 1968. The posters, music and foggy memories of the Avalon are
what made the Family Dog a legendary 60s rock icon.</p><p style="text-align: left;">In the Summer
of 1969, however, with San Francisco as one of the fulcrums of the rock
music explosion, Chet Helms opened another venue. The Family Dog on The
Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, on the Western edge of San
Francisco, was only open for 14 months and was not a success. <a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2021/12/family-dog-on-great-highway-navigation.html">Yet numerous interesting bands played there, and remarkable events took place, and they are only documented in a scattered form.</a> </p><i><b></b></i><br /><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s768/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="768" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr style="text-align: left;"><td class="tr-caption"><i>One
of the only photos of the interior of the Family Dog on The Great
Highway (from a Stephen Gaskin "Monday Night Class" ca. October 1969)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>The Family Dog On The Great Highway</b><br />The
Great Highway was a four-lane road that ran along the Western edge of
San Francisco, right next to Ocean Beach. Downtown San Francisco faced
the Bay, but beyond Golden Gate Park was the Pacific Ocean. The aptly
named Ocean Beach is dramatic and beautiful, but it is mostly windy and
foggy. Much of the West Coast of San Francisco is not even a beach, but
rocky cliffs. There are no roads in San Francisco West of the Great
Highway, so "660 Great Highway" was ample for directions (for reference,
it is near the intersection of Balboa Street and 48th Avenue). The
tag-line "Edge Of The Western World" was not an exaggeration, at least
in American terms.<br /><br />The Family Dog on The Great Highway was
smaller than the Bill Graham's old Fillmore Auditorium. It could hold up
to 1500, but the official capacity was probably closer to 1000. Unlike
the comparatively centrally located Fillmore West, the FDGH was far from
downtown, far from the Peninsula suburbs, and not particularly easy to
get to from the freeway. For East Bay or Marin residents, the Great
Highway was a formidable trip. The little ballroom was very appealing,
but if you didn't live way out in the Avenues, you had to drive. As a
result, FDGH didn't get a huge number of casual drop-ins, and that
didn't help its fortunes. Most of the locals referred to the venue as
"Playland."</p><p>The Grateful Dead were one of the few bands to consistently draw an audience to the Great Highway. While the Dead were not yet the irresistible attraction they would become in future decades, they had their own audience. The Dead's Bay Area audience--not yet even called Dead Heads--would make an effort to see them wherever they were. In contrast to most other bands, the more the Dead played the more fans wanted to see them, so there wasn't a concern about oversaturating their market with too many gigs. The distance and difficulty of getting to the Great Highway was not an impossible barrier, and the Dead shows seem to have drawn pretty well.</p><p>The Dead had played <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/04/august-3-1969-family-dog-on-great.html">the weekend of August 2-3</a>, and <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2021/08/august-28-30-1969-family-dog-at-great.html">then returned on the weekend of August 29-30</a>. On Thursday, August 28, the Dead had played an unannounced show that included a jam set with members of the Dead and Howard Wales. We only know of that show because Owsley taped it. Presumably it was mentioned on the radio on the day of the show, but if not for Owsley, the event would have slipped entirely under history's radar. The Dead would return the next weekend, sharing the room with the Jefferson Airplane. Save for Owsley, there seems to be no markers of this event. Rock venues, like all entertainment venues, depend as much on their reputation as a happening place as much as the events themselves. The Family Dog somehow failed to capitalize on their own underground cool.<br /></p><p><b></b></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKgsn2ggwhoeN5muwiZMqEwcyjBK4E8bBN4eVcEP3zHZjRI3FB_73Qsf0L31ckKWo_JyqXYP__mp7wu651aRLgz48kNUdNWCf6uYwitizgy70zgEr49cmdwTe_F66yeRTbeeO410CtY2o/s375/FDGH+19690829+Playland+forthcoming.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="66" data-original-width="375" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKgsn2ggwhoeN5muwiZMqEwcyjBK4E8bBN4eVcEP3zHZjRI3FB_73Qsf0L31ckKWo_JyqXYP__mp7wu651aRLgz48kNUdNWCf6uYwitizgy70zgEr49cmdwTe_F66yeRTbeeO410CtY2o/s320/FDGH+19690829+Playland+forthcoming.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The August 28 ad for the Family Dog on The Great Highway, promoting the Grateful Dead on the weekend of August 29-30, also included coming attractions for the week<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br />September 1, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: <i>Monday Night class</i></b><br />Like
any venue, the Family Dog was willing to rent the hall out during the
week when there wasn't a booking. Bill Graham did the same at Fillmore
West. Besides clearing a little cash, and providing workdays for a few
staff members, these sort of events could remind patrons that the Family
Dog was a happening concern, worth checking out. The Family Dog had an additional goal, which was making itself into a community nexus, rather than being exclusively a venue for high-profile rock bands. Yet the Dog was seemingly unable to convert their community efforts into enticing a paying audience on weekends.<br /><p></p><p>Stephen Gaskin was a
popular literature instructor at San Francisco State, whose campus was
not too far down the road (at 19th Avenue and Holloway). Gaskin spoke
about what we would now be called "Human Consciousness" or "Self-Help,"
but at the time he was called a "Hip Guru." I am no expert in this area,
but I will say that Gaskin was neither a con artist nor interested in
turning a profit, rare for those sort. His "Monday Night" class had been
running since at least July. I don't know whether it was every Monday
night or just some, but it was popular (the interior picture of the Dog, just above, is from one of his Monday night events). Admission was free, and
Gaskin just lectured, although I think they took donations. </p><p>You
would think that Chet Helms would have found a way to entice San
Francisco State students that were interested in Self-Actualization on
Labor Day Monday to consider checking out rock shows on the weekend. On
this weekend, however, the upcoming show was a secret, so the crowd would not
have seen a poster at the door encouraging them to check out the weekend
rock show. An opportunity lost.<br /></p><p><b>September 2, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: <i>Theatre of The Absurd Costume Ball </i></b><i>(Tuesday)</i><br />Other
than the listing (above) on the Family Dog flyer, I have no idea about
this event. It does seem clear that various theater and dance groups
took advantage of the Family Dog space for various events, but I don't
have any sense that the Dog was able to capitalize on it in any way.</p><p><b>September 3, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: <i>Latin Night </i></b><i>(Wednesday</i><i>)</i><br />There
had been a substantial Latin Jazz scene in San Francisco in the 1950s
and '60s. Indeed, San Mateo's Cal Tjader had been an essential founder
in the genre. Once Broadway in North Beach went topless, however, Latin
Jazz went into decline in the city. Still, there was an existing scene,
probably focused on "older" (although still under 40) fans. I doubt
there would have been much synergy between the Latin Jazz crowd and the
weekend psychedelic Dog shows, although renting out the venue for a night was
still a good thing for the bottom line.<br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5T0UGp3rKNQeeqkV_3Zql32Dlb0iERxJKrCgZG9lFXLk6iVHOku-82NJXxWZkSIobFmYruxy7at71B90kwqrsdvG-Vaq4wpA7LYcITtCRxhQbunmYr7KgWTruvmNt5rwtCdA6irPjDWtv/s1110/FDGH+Miss+Playland+19690904+4+Sep+1969%252C+27+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1110" data-original-width="440" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj5T0UGp3rKNQeeqkV_3Zql32Dlb0iERxJKrCgZG9lFXLk6iVHOku-82NJXxWZkSIobFmYruxy7at71B90kwqrsdvG-Vaq4wpA7LYcITtCRxhQbunmYr7KgWTruvmNt5rwtCdA6irPjDWtv/s320/FDGH+Miss+Playland+19690904+4+Sep+1969%252C+27+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>An ad from the Thursday, September 4 SF Examiner promotes the Carnival Ball and coronation of "Playland Girl '69"</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p><b>September 4, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: <i>Carnival Coronation Ball for Miss Playland 1969</i> w/Devil's Kitchen/Flying Circus </b><i>(Thursday)</i><br />Playland-At-The-Beach
was an amusement park, if an out-of-date one, and the Sunset District
in those days was basically a suburb. So it's no surprise to find out
that Playland apparently had an annual Beauty Pageant. It had probably
run throughout the Summer. <a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2010/02/660-great-highway-san-francisco.html">It
is a telling irony that I am able to discern far more information about
a weeknight local Beauty Pageant at Playland than any of the rock
concerts by bands who remain popular decades after they were performing</a>.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXz7rlrOS1OrBLS8DaZtjVKWJtfBPcJRX-k2QtNFU14Np5Fa9ptPXBNXtcLGLYIZKO53-dc1XU8ug3gOtsYAyTQIPKDpxm1UQyBjIMLPkeK5gXwxmzM63HmmsHGiaNH4p2UhdeHSOa78bv/s693/Playland+tick+19690904.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="365" data-original-width="693" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXz7rlrOS1OrBLS8DaZtjVKWJtfBPcJRX-k2QtNFU14Np5Fa9ptPXBNXtcLGLYIZKO53-dc1XU8ug3gOtsYAyTQIPKDpxm1UQyBjIMLPkeK5gXwxmzM63HmmsHGiaNH4p2UhdeHSOa78bv/s320/Playland+tick+19690904.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p>Devil's Kitchen were a band from Carbondale, IL, that had relocated to the Bay Area and became a sort of "house band" at the Family Dog. Brett Champlin (a distant cousin of Bill) played keyboards and sang, Robbie Stokes played guitar, Bob Laughton was on bass and Steve Sweigart was on drums. They played bluesy rock and roll. According to Brett Champlin, Devil's Kitchen were just another dance
band at this show, providing music after the pageant was complete. The
Metropolitan Sound Company was a soul band from Oakland, playing
original soul music with a Hendrix touch, and the bands probably
would have alternated. While the ticket rather enticingly says "Dress Optional," I
take that to mean that guests were not obligated to dress formally,
rather than at all. </p><p>Based on the <i>Examiner</i> ad (above), it seems
that Metropolitan Sound Co was replaced by the Mill Valley band Flying
Circus. Flying Circus had existed since 1966, albeit with many personnel
changes, and currently featured lead guitarist Bob McFee. He was the
brother of Clover lead guitarist John McFee (many years later in the
Doobie Brothers and Southern Pacific), and the two bands shared
equipment and a rehearsal hall. As far as I can tell, Flying Circus
played the kind of funky country rock typical of future Marin County
bands. Brett Champlin only vaguely recalled the event, since he still had
the
complimentary ticket, so it was probably just another night for a
working band. </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjspflXo93DNl4U21fqm4Z8guMbYAHhtVEdBq_zbCs2kD7-scwTl7R3KpCo-GzMDaF_tY-pzxFx4j_2Z2yPfS_gMyj7GiDPPgtJHQ39j-SQFdQ9Fl7NceJ0-eJNp5ASoKKBR2-UVv4ZVfN-/s657/SFC19690906b1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="657" data-original-width="229" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjspflXo93DNl4U21fqm4Z8guMbYAHhtVEdBq_zbCs2kD7-scwTl7R3KpCo-GzMDaF_tY-pzxFx4j_2Z2yPfS_gMyj7GiDPPgtJHQ39j-SQFdQ9Fl7NceJ0-eJNp5ASoKKBR2-UVv4ZVfN-/s320/SFC19690906b1.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The SF Chronicle of Friday, September 6, 1969 reported Judith Vacek's election as Miss Playland '69</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Given
the paucity of information about rock shows at the Family Dog, it's
notable that not only was there an ad in the <i>Examiner</i> for the Coronation
Ball, we even know who won. The Friday SF <i>Chronicle</i> reported:<blockquote><i>Judith Vacek shoots a good game of pool, measures a classic 36-26-36 and is "Playland Girl '69."</i><br /></blockquote><blockquote><i>The 20-year old Tiburon girl was officially crowned as the Queen Of
Playland At The Beach Thursday. The contest was conducted all summer and
decided by popular vote of the public.</i><br />
<i>Miss Vacek, who aspires to be an airline stewardess, received a 1970 Ford Maverick that went along with her new title.</i></blockquote><p>So,
Judith Vacek won a Ford Maverick, was a babe, and shot a good game of
pool. Wherever she is today, I hope that the Maverick served her well,
that she had a nice life, and that she kept her pool game sharp. Yet the
Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead played the Family Dog over the
weekend, and we only know about Judith. </p>Let's set our modern
hats aside and think about the Miss Playland Coronation Ball from 1969.
It was some sort of "election." Apparently the different contestants
invited their family and friends to submit votes and then come and cheer
and vote for them. Now, let's be real here--what was rock and roll
about in 1969 (and probably every other year)? Did all of the Miss
Playland contestants get free tickets to the Family Dog? If not, why
not? If you were a teenage boy rock and roller in 1969--long haired or
not--and knew that beauty pageant contestants might be showing up at the
venue on Friday night, wouldn't you be there? More importantly,
wouldn't the venue want to shout to the newspapers that all the
contestants (and their sisters!) were given free tickets all weekend?
Now, maybe they did get free tickets--Judith Vacek could have driven her
friends in her new Maverick--but the whole point would have been to
publicize it. Yet somehow the Family Dog missed this equation.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpM8qkkDWaVmIe-vFPhzI__p3aLKrXnnVSezX8nDavQ6dzM_2dRWQYXUyn3YMNvfEy1Qg33PophrS7hGkYK-LNREmd5CHpQquLCh50pLjARZNeX1gOSfTvekmCr07YOdYmF7H4nrUSjmZW/s364/SF+Good+Times+FDGH+19690905.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="67" data-original-width="364" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpM8qkkDWaVmIe-vFPhzI__p3aLKrXnnVSezX8nDavQ6dzM_2dRWQYXUyn3YMNvfEy1Qg33PophrS7hGkYK-LNREmd5CHpQquLCh50pLjARZNeX1gOSfTvekmCr07YOdYmF7H4nrUSjmZW/s320/SF+Good+Times+FDGH+19690905.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p><b>September 5, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Malachi/Rubber Duck <i>(mime) and a jam with members of 3 groups we're not allowed to name</i></b><br />We only have the faintest hint of what might have happened on Friday night. <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2015/06/the-common-september-5-6-7-ish-1969.html">The San Francisco <i>Good Times</i> had a cryptical ad (above)</a>.
Malachi was a sort of moody guitarist, and Rubber Duck was a mime (Joe
McCord) working with a rock band playing improvised music. But that
wasn't the appealing part (well, unless you thought Beauty Pageant
contestants would be there). The ad said, temptingly, "a jam with
members of 3 groups that we're not allowed to name." </p><p>Literally, we know nothing else about Friday night--not even if it happened.<br /></p><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifIprn1qKLC8cWiR2CzfX4lqUESmDcdpdT4rEU_UAJVWuRqahi7D0HwxiExkkmLDOXK-xVKfMZyioVzRSeCtj1rUblDIib6ZMWqi01K3U9kaEVFc_vWiQ2UwMKSkpb_PCJZIa9Txi_F6v4/s605/Bless+Its+Pointed+Little+Head+RCA+69.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="605" data-original-width="599" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifIprn1qKLC8cWiR2CzfX4lqUESmDcdpdT4rEU_UAJVWuRqahi7D0HwxiExkkmLDOXK-xVKfMZyioVzRSeCtj1rUblDIib6ZMWqi01K3U9kaEVFc_vWiQ2UwMKSkpb_PCJZIa9Txi_F6v4/s320/Bless+Its+Pointed+Little+Head+RCA+69.jpg" /></a></div><br />September 6, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead </b><i>(Saturday)</i><br />We
have two great tapes from Saturday, September 6: one by the Jefferson
Airplane, and one by the Grateful Dead. Notwithstanding that they were
both recorded by Owsley Stanley himself, famous for (among many other
things) accurate dating on tape boxes, internal evidence fits as well.
At the end of the Grateful Dead tape, Jerry Garcia says "coming up next,
Jefferson Airplane." At the end of the Airplane tape, Garcia jams with
the Airplane. So it looks pretty definitive: whatever else happened on
the weekend, the Grateful Dead and the Jefferson Airplane played the
Family Dog on the Great Highway on Saturday night.<p>So why do we know
nothing? It's understandable that contracts or other issues may have
prevented some advance publicity. In any case, it wouldn't have affected
attendance. Jefferson Airplane were one of the most popular live rock
bands in the country, much less in San Francisco. Their most recent
album, <i>Bless Its Pointed Little Head</i>, recorded at Fillmores East
and West, and released in February 1969, had been a huge hit. The
Grateful Dead were a popular local band, by any standard. The place was
going to be packed. But why didn't Chet Helms make sure the world knew?
Bill Graham would have, and that's why the Fillmores are legendary
today,--because Bill constantly reminded us. Chet could have done the
same, and yet he didn't.</p><p>When I speculated about this show many years later, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/september-6-7-1969-family-dog-at-great.html?showComment=1423161877326#c2624714064958918034">I did get one tantalizing clue from an unknown Commenter:</a></p><blockquote><i>Yes,
I was there that night, working for the light show company that did the
show. Both bands were there and traded sets, then both bands took to
the stages at either end of the ballroom and jammed together until 2
a.m.</i></blockquote><p>The syntax is a bit confusing here, but
the eyewitness suggests the Dead and the Airplane were on separate
stages at opposite ends of the venue. Uniquely, the Family Dog had two
stages, and they were known to use both to enable quick set changes.
It's fascinating to think of the Dead and the Airplane sharing a venue,
but on different stages. Yet we only have the barest of clues, memories
almost slipped beyond the horizon.</p><p><i>[<b>update 17 Aug 2023</b>] New information has come to light, and the New Riders of The Purple Sage opened the September 6 show. This explains the "3 groups" that can't be named. </i><br /></p><p><br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEs-qvK7spnpw22R6iJAk4_VV-_heNEq2unYsEvs1h7HENEs7mI8zwVb-Z4d_0FXWzGJ31_4TtTNiMTS61s9xqfnDXJO6tYvMq1BLx-5GRK5lV5e97GqszsjHc0Bgr3no14RlFuJK9ibaq/s511/SFC19690827a+Hyde+Park+crop.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="511" data-original-width="456" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEs-qvK7spnpw22R6iJAk4_VV-_heNEq2unYsEvs1h7HENEs7mI8zwVb-Z4d_0FXWzGJ31_4TtTNiMTS61s9xqfnDXJO6tYvMq1BLx-5GRK5lV5e97GqszsjHc0Bgr3no14RlFuJK9ibaq/s320/SFC19690827a+Hyde+Park+crop.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Ralph Gleason's column from the August 27, 1969 SF Chronicle</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b></b></div><b><br />September 7, 1969 Hyde Park, London, England Crosby, Stills and Nash/Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Joni Mitchell </b><i>(canceled)</i><br />
As if San Francisco's <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/02/august-22-23-24-1969-fillmore.html">Wild West Festival</a>
fiasco wasn't enough, just a few days later (August 27) Ralph Gleason had
announced (above) plans for the Grateful Dead to join Crosby Stills and
Nash, The Jefferson Airplane and Joni Mitchell to play a free concert in
London for a Granada TV Special. Gleason:<blockquote><p><i>The
Jefferson Airplane, The Grateful Dead, Crosby Stills and Nash (now a
Bay Area band: they're moving here) and Joni Mitchell will be presented
in a free concert in London's Hyde Park on September 7. </i></p><p><i>The
groups, with some additions to be announced, will be flying over
directly from San Francisco. The show is being put on for filming for a
Granada TV program and there's a possibility that there will be other
concerts in Europe later.</i></p></blockquote><p>Of course, none
of this happened. Various major bands had played free concerts in Hyde
Park during this summer (including Blind Faith and the Rolling Stones),
so this idea wasn't as far-fetched as it sounds. Among many other
byproducts of this plan, Grateful Dead manager Rock Scully flew to
London and made contact with the Rolling Stones, which indirectly lead
to the unfortunate Altamont debacle. Scully describes the whole story in
his autobiography. Whatever the reality quotient might have been, the
unfulfilled plan left the Airplane and the Dead free on this weekend, so
they seem to have chosen to play the Family Dog instead. I assume the
show was announced on KSAN. Once the word was out, any Airplane show was
going to be packed, much less one shared with the Dead.<br /></p><p><b>September 7, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA:<i>? </i></b><i>(Sunday)</i><br />Who
else performed at the Family Dog this weekend? Honestly, we don't know.
<a href="https://www.discogs.com/artist/1557419-Malachi-8">Malachi (John Morgan Newbern) a sort of troubadour guitarist</a>, and "Rubber Duck" (Joe
McCord), a mime backed by improvising musicians, were listed as
performing Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Did they? Who knows? Thanks to
Mr Owsley, however, we have yet another intriguing detail. It's worth
remembering that Owsley was particularly scrupulous about noting the
date correctly on the boxes of his tape reels (earning the undying
appreciation of rock prosopographers everywhere). </p><p>There is a
28-minute board tape from the Family Dog, dated September 7, 1969. The
performers seem to consist of Jerry Garcia, Jorma Kaukonen, Jack Casady,
drummer Joey Covington and another drummer (presumably Hart or Kreutzmann, but we don't know). They perform some rock and
roll oldies (see the setlist below), and Joey Covington (future drummer for
the Jefferson Airplane) sings a few. A crowd member calls for the old
surf tune "Wipeout" and the players respond with the drum solo. A note
on the box implies that Jerry Garcia may have joined the two drummers,
briefly, on some drums. </p><p>So there appears to have been a jam on
Sunday. Probably some band equipment was left there from the night
before, on purpose. Did Malachi or Rubber Duck play? Did the
Dead/Airplane players do any other music? It seems likely that Jorma,
Jack and Joey would have done their full electric thing, as that was
what they were doing around the Bay Area. But we don't know. There was
some kind of crowd--someone called for "Wipe Out"--but no eyewitnesses
have surfaced. Once again, with their most famous performers in
residence, the Family Dog made sure that no one found out what happened
on Sunday night. For the Family Dog on The Great Highway, it was all a long, slow ride downhill from here.</p><p><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwXwogixZ1B1vHc0gxVrKlFCWDnFu5CpSIdZsgFrBTjkreodQ1mMSvHpDb6B-mn8fvq4eVziopLNzHPq5Z5B6Y66z2fd6P9oUO_OzTp5SZrie2saiTBXPADjmatU1HNL9aazU7Pr1FEB9SyKpxb_oBBJfovCxSTfGEflwRkT598ysTegVQET5r0zjyYNU/s2048/Bear%20tape%20reel%20FDGH%2019690907.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="2038" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwXwogixZ1B1vHc0gxVrKlFCWDnFu5CpSIdZsgFrBTjkreodQ1mMSvHpDb6B-mn8fvq4eVziopLNzHPq5Z5B6Y66z2fd6P9oUO_OzTp5SZrie2saiTBXPADjmatU1HNL9aazU7Pr1FEB9SyKpxb_oBBJfovCxSTfGEflwRkT598ysTegVQET5r0zjyYNU/s320/Bear%20tape%20reel%20FDGH%2019690907.jpg" width="318" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Owsley apparently did not like the drum mix on Sep 7 79</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />[<b>update 17 Aug 2023</b>] The Owsley Stanley Foundation figured out
that there is an additional reel from September 7. The Grateful Dead
played at least one set on September 7 (setlist below), following a set
by Jorma Kaukonen, Jack Casady and Joey Covington, with Will Scarlett on
harmonica and Jerry Garcia on pedal steel guitar.</i></p><p><i><b>Appendix: Setlists</b></i></p><b>Grateful Dead, September 6, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b><br /><blockquote><b>Good Morning Little Schoolgirl</b> [11:48];[0:13] ;<br /><b>Doin' That Rag</b> [6:28];[0:09] ;<br /><b>He Was A Friend Of Mine</b> [12:24];[0:06]%[0:16] ;<br /><b>Big Boy Pete</b> [3:09] ><br /><b>Good Lovin' </b>[3:55];[0:53] ;<br /><b>It's All Over Now</b> [4:04] [Total Time 47:00]<br /></blockquote><p><b>Jefferson Airplane, September 6, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b><br /></p><blockquote><p><b>Grace Slick</b>-vocals<br /><b>Marty Balin</b>-vocals<br /><b>Jorma Kaukonen</b>-lead guitar, vocals<br /><b>Paul Kantner</b>-rhythm guitar, vocals<br /><b>Jack Casady</b>-bass<br /><b>Spencer Dryden</b>-drums<br />#<i>plus</i>-<i>Jerry Garcia</i>-guitar, <i>Mickey Hart</i>-drums, {<i>unknown</i>}-congas <br /></p><p>[0:10] ; <b>Ballad of You, Me & Pooneil > Starship</b> [15:13] ; [0:20] ; <br /><b>Good Shepherd</b> [6:30] ; [0:12] ; <br /><b>We Can Be Together</b> [6:46] <br /><b>% Somebody To Love</b> [3:55] ; [0:05] ; <br /><b>The Farm</b> [2:53] ; [0:17] ; <br /><b>Crown Of Creation </b>[3:05] ; [0:08] ; <br /><b>Come Back Baby </b>[5:34] ; [0:12] % <br /><b>Wooden Ships</b> [5:38] > <b>Go Ride The Music</b> [0:35] <br />% <b>Volunteers</b> [#2:22] > <br /> <b>Drums</b> [1:54] > <br /> #<b>Jam</b> [25:27] [Total time 1:20:12]<br /><br />Garcia
and Hart participate in the Jam following <i>Volunteers</i>, as well as an
unidentified conga player. This Jam passes includes a <i>Darkness Darkness</i>
Jam.</p></blockquote><p><b>Grateful Dead, September 7, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></p><b><blockquote>Me & My Uncle<br />China Cat Sunflower<br />High Time<br />Mama Tried<br />Big Boy Pete<br />New Orleans<br />Not Fade Away<br />Easy Wind<br />Sitting On Top Of the World </blockquote></b><p> </p><p><b><i>Jam</i>, September 7, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b><br /></p><blockquote><b>Peggy Sue</b> [3:26] %<br /><b>That'll Be The Day</b> [3:20] %<br /><b>Johnny B. Goode</b> [3:44] %<br /><b>Baby What You Want Me To Do</b> [4:54]%[0:46] ;<br /><b>Wipe Out Drums</b> [0:16] ><br /><b>Wipe Out Jam </b>[3:54] ><br /><b>Big Railroad Blues</b> [1:16] %<br /><b>Louie Louie</b> [3:02] ><br /><b>Twist & Shout</b> [1:36] ><br /><b>Blue Moon </b>[1:29] [Total Time 28:49]</blockquote><p><span> </span><span> </span>Jerry Garcia, Jorma Kaukonen, Jack Casady, Joey Covington, {additional drummer} </p><p><br /></p><p> </p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-40532477065684907662021-10-22T08:53:00.000-07:002021-10-22T08:53:26.419-07:00June 4-7, 1970 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage/Southern Comfort (San Francisco Evening)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIypsuC8Edd0u2r7SKf_wPzvQi_ityGB91uCF_fufQDpqWc0N6uHyv1ay7ffKJQXOul3HCtdPp5xMF4X0HQjLtOEG8i_3fcxPzKdDrtgPxXHSMmTXbRVg7b_AJ7kRLzIIfsnK8EVUuNxI/s1102/GD+FW+19700604.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1102" data-original-width="752" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIypsuC8Edd0u2r7SKf_wPzvQi_ityGB91uCF_fufQDpqWc0N6uHyv1ay7ffKJQXOul3HCtdPp5xMF4X0HQjLtOEG8i_3fcxPzKdDrtgPxXHSMmTXbRVg7b_AJ7kRLzIIfsnK8EVUuNxI/s320/GD+FW+19700604.jpg" /></a></div>In this century, fans reflect upon Grateful Dead shows as a function of the surviving recordings. Thinly attended shows in out-of-the-way places have become legendary thanks to an amazing recording, while powerful sold-out live events might have little resonance without a good tape. The Grateful Dead's four-night performance at the Fillmore West on the weekend of June 4-7, 1970 falls somewhere in the middle of this spectrum. There are decent recordings of fairly complete shows, so the performances haven't been forgotten. On the other hand, based on what came before and after, the tapes do not mark themselves as exceptional. As a result, while I'm sure these shows get some listens, no one really thinks about the events themselves. This post will consider what was interesting and important about the Fillmore West June weekend shows at the time.<p></p><b>June 4-7, 1970 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Southern Comfort </b><i>(Thursday-Sunday)</i><br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>These June shows were the San Francisco introduction to the "Evening Of The Grateful Dead" concept. In May, the Dead had toured the East Coast and provided all the music, with an acoustic Grateful Dead set, then the New Riders of The Purple Sage and then the full electric Grateful Dead. San Francisco had seen bits and pieces of all these ensembles in various places and configurations, but not all in one show.</li><li>The New Riders of The Purple Sage had not played at a Bill Graham show in San Francisco up until this time, strange as it may seem. This was the Riders first time opening for the Grateful Dead at a BGP concert in the Bay Area.<br /></li><li><i>Workingman's Dead</i> had not formally been released, but it was already being played on KSAN. It may have also been available in a few hip record stores. So these shows were the first time that regular concert-goers may have come to the show with the expectation that the Dead were evolving from psychedelic adventurers to cosmic cowboys. </li><li>The group Southern Comfort opened the show. Their new album had been co-produced by one John Kahn. Kahn had been jamming with Jerry Garcia, Howard Wales and Bill Vitt on Monday nights over at the Matrix. He had probably jammed with Garcia about six times prior to this weekend. While its reasonable to suspect that Kahn had seen the Grateful Dead before, it's all but certain that this would have been the first time Kahn had seen the Dead since he had started jamming with Garcia. </li></ul><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn75dd-6bxyieD9FGNze4oitbepN2_m9wP6lZ-e-ZB3xM7HLW4s94dBvgrgen7dx9FauVAvo1PqXzX4y6h3OytGlQYV0zhFf63r-ggElKvZS8JTopiYFhszSt1iMINlRpvNpQ-E1cB5K4/s1186/GD+NRPS+19700604+31+May+1970%252C+108+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="762" data-original-width="1186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgn75dd-6bxyieD9FGNze4oitbepN2_m9wP6lZ-e-ZB3xM7HLW4s94dBvgrgen7dx9FauVAvo1PqXzX4y6h3OytGlQYV0zhFf63r-ggElKvZS8JTopiYFhszSt1iMINlRpvNpQ-E1cB5K4/s320/GD+NRPS+19700604+31+May+1970%252C+108+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />An Evening With The Grateful Dead</i></b><br />It is little remarked that in the early years of the Fillmore and Fillmore West, the Grateful Dead followed the performance patterns of every other band at the Fillmore. They played two sets, yes, but so did every other act listed on the poster. More distinctly, bands played in order, so the headliner would do the third and sixth set of the evening. Commercially, this meant that high schoolers and suburbanites could come early and leave early, and still see all three bands. Late arrivers, such as those who might work at a restaurant, could check in by 11:00pm and also see all the bands. So while some patrons stayed through six sets, most fans came, saw all three bands once, and went home, essentially allowing Graham to sell tickets all night. <br /><p>The most famous Grateful Dead performances at the Fillmore West, possibly the best, and certainly the best-recorded, was four nights from February 27 through March 2, 1969. All eight sets were recorded in 16 tracks, and not only formed the core of <i>Live/Dead</i>, but were all released on the 2005 10 cd <i>Fillmore West 1969: The Complete Recordings</i> box. All eight Dead sets are fantastic, but listening to them in sequence is misleading. Two other bands played sets in between each Dead sets, so the audience experience of a Grateful Dead concert was not at all the immersive experience it would be from the 1970s onwards.</p><p>The last time the Grateful Dead played the Fillmore West with a round-robin configuration was June 6-8, 1969, with the Glass Family and Junior Walker and The All-Stars. At some point in the Summer of 1969, the Fillmore West changed its rotation. Opening acts opened, and the headliner came on last, and no one came on after them. When the Grateful Dead had played Winterland with the Jefferson Airplane on the weekend of October 24-26, 1969, while they alternated closing duties, each band only played one set. Opening act the Sons Of Champlin played a set and did not re-appear later, as they would have in previous years. From what I can discern, this pattern was being followed by Graham at other Fillmore West concerts as well. The Dead returned to the Fillmore West in December of 1969 (December 4-7), supported by Humble Pie and The Flock, but due to the Altamont debacle, no one remembers those shows at all.<br /></p><p>Prior to the June '70 shows, the Grateful Dead had played two weekend stands that year at Fillmore West. From February 5 through 8, 1970, the Dead had headlined Fillmore West over two Southern California acts, Taj Mahal and Big Foot. Taj Mahal doesn't seem like a major act now, but at the time he seemed to be a rising star. He had released three albums on Columbia, a major label, and he got regular airplay on KSAN. Mahal fronted a killer band, too, with Jesse Ed Davis on lead guitar. So from the point of view of a rock fan in February 1970, Taj Mahal was worthy of attention. The Dead came on after Taj and did their thing until the hall closed each night.</p><p>From April 9-12, 1970, the Grateful Dead headlined over Miles Davis and Stone The Crows. Once again, the Dead played one long set after Miles. While Miles Davis was already a legend by 1970, and the Grateful Dead certainly thought of him that way, from a rock concert point of view he didn't sell as many tickets as the headliners. Still, the event was treated as a sort of double bill of equals, even if the Dead were bringing more of the crowd. Throughout late 1969 and first half 1970, the Dead had played numerous other shows around San Francisco and the Bay Area, at various venues for various promoters. At pretty much all of the venues, the band had shared the bill with different acts, and played a single extended set, usually closing out the evening. </p><p>The June Fillmore West shows would turn out to be different in another way, although the fans would not have known that until afterwards. Major Bay Area shows, at Fillmore West and elsewhere, typically had three acts on the bill. The June shows had Southern Comfort and The New Riders billed under the Grateful Dead. While Southern Comfort was a typical opening act--more on them below--after their no-doubt brief set beginning at 8:30 it was all Grateful Dead. There was a New Riders set, an acoustic set and an electric set. Garcia and Hart were part of the New Riders, and Dawson and Nelson periodically joined in for the acoustic set, so from about 9:30 pm onwards, the same 9 musicians were providing the music until about 2:00am. An evening indeed with the Grateful Dead.</p><p>Following the June shows, this became the pattern for the Grateful Dead in San Francisco, and ultimately elsewhere. Other than big outdoor shows, benefits or special events, if you went to see the Grateful Dead, the evening's entertainment was provided by the Grateful Dead. Sometimes, particularly in the early 70s, there might be an opening act for some reason, but once the Grateful Dead came on stage, they didn't leave. Initially, the Grateful Dead aura was expanded to include not only the New Riders but James and The Good Brothers or the Rowan Brothers, but those too faded away. The Dead themselves expanded from one electric set to two, or even three, and the need for any additional acts was remaindered. Like most Deadheads, once the Dead came on stage, I didn't want the spell broken by some other band, even if they were a band I liked. <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2011/05/ln-jg1970-05-01gdall-126minssbd.html">The "Evening With The Grateful Dead" concept had been tried in May out on the road</a>, but at home it began in earnest in June 1970 at Fillmore West.<br /></p><b><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDeK0ZTcSYQ4JxtoZybJO2nKgQKz6Jo7Jho92JAjvlhrrYAYJTfixjZbbnU4M_5MD7eiRvHRNk_841AEgPzhbkR9EMJXvonHsnJy9GeADkhwiuySXEMp3OO1XbrczsfZuoH8dkW19DpBY/s600/Dawn+Of+The+New+Riders+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDeK0ZTcSYQ4JxtoZybJO2nKgQKz6Jo7Jho92JAjvlhrrYAYJTfixjZbbnU4M_5MD7eiRvHRNk_841AEgPzhbkR9EMJXvonHsnJy9GeADkhwiuySXEMp3OO1XbrczsfZuoH8dkW19DpBY/s320/Dawn+Of+The+New+Riders+cover.jpg" /></a></div><br />The New Riders Of The Purple Sage</i></b><br />Jerry Garcia, John Dawson and David Nelson had started the New Riders of The Purple Sage in the Summer of 1969. The New Riders had played the few little rock clubs around the Bay Area, and the Dead had experimented with having the Riders as their opening act. Yet for whatever reasons, the New Riders of The Purple Sage did not play a San Francisco Bill Graham show until June 1970. The Dead had gone on the road with the New Riders in May. Mostly they had played colleges. The New Riders of The Purple Sage were listed in a few local newspapers and the like, although no one in New York or Massachusetts would have had any idea who they were. <p>Yet the New Riders had never played a Bill Graham show in San Francisco. I don't think this represented any complicated conspiracy, rather just a matter of timing. Still, it's an oddity I hadn't considered until now. When the Grateful Dead had played the Fillmore East, however, on Friday, May 15, 1970, Graham listed the bill as "The Grateful Dead featuring the New Riders of The Purple Sage." There were early and late shows at Fillmore East, and the band did their three sets--acoustic, Riders and electric--two times over. It must have been OK with Bill, because he booked that lineup at Fillmore West. The New Riders, even without Garcia, would go on to play for Bill Graham many, many times. But it all started here in June, 1970. </p><p>(<i><b>Note</b>: Some songs from the June 4 and June 5, 1970 New Riders' performances were released by the Owsley Stanley Foundation on the excellent 5-disc <a href="https://owsleystanleyfoundation.org/bears-sonic-journals/dawn-of-the-new-riders-of-the-purple-sage/">Dawn Of The New Riders of The Purple Sage</a> box set</i>)<br /></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgate_a8GUDejYqCwNhq-dkbvdDrpgP_SPEWqeCdfh5sMvu0sAs1FHXvobOvAu01GHTlxApqo_dGaf2vddGc004nLHv5YZ_2Nn2q1Ja8f9KrC3HwCIv-tGV7YkMeqdlT4_r5i7sH873jTE/s800/WORKINGMANS_Cover_.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="713" data-original-width="800" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgate_a8GUDejYqCwNhq-dkbvdDrpgP_SPEWqeCdfh5sMvu0sAs1FHXvobOvAu01GHTlxApqo_dGaf2vddGc004nLHv5YZ_2Nn2q1Ja8f9KrC3HwCIv-tGV7YkMeqdlT4_r5i7sH873jTE/s320/WORKINGMANS_Cover_.jpg" width="320" /></a></b></i></div><i><b><br />Workingman's Dead</b></i><br />We tend to view the arc of the Grateful Dead's music through their live tapes, and that's an appropriate way to evaluate them. Very few Grateful Dead fans back in the 60s, however, would have been able to have any such perspective. Even those few people in San Francisco lucky enough to have gotten to go to multiple concerts would have had only a few whiffs of how the Grateful Dead were evolving at any given moment. Even that would have depended on which shows they had happened to attend. <p></p><p>From today's perspective, we know that the Grateful Dead's psychedelic adventuring in late '68 and early '69 was starting to be refined by some jangly country sounds. In late '69, going to a Grateful Dead concert and expecting "The Other One" must have led to some cognitive dissonance when you heard "Dire Wolf" or "Green Green Grass Of Home." The countrified <i>Workingman's Dead</i> material had started to appear in mid-69, and the band recorded the album in February and March 1970. From that point of view, the shift to acoustic or semi-acoustic music, the New Riders and the twanging guitars make a lot of sense. It still would have been a surprise to contemporary listeners. </p><p>The official Warner Brothers release date of <i>Workingman's Dead</i> is generally marked as June 14, 1970. In those days, record release dates were generally more casual. Lots of stores probably already had <i>Workingman's Dead </i>by June 4, and would have been selling them to interested patrons. It's known that the Dead had shared a tape of an early mix of <i>Workingman</i>'s with KSAN, so the album had been played on the radio. By June 1, KSAN would have probably had an advance promotional copy anyway. So hip rock fans listening to KSAN, at home or in their car, would have gotten a taste of <i>Workingman's Dead</i> already. Thus, kicking off an acoustic set with "Dire Wolf" or an electric one with "Casey Jones" wouldn't have been quite as unexpected as it might have been, even if the songs themselves weren't that familiar yet. <br /></p><p>It is a truism of Grateful Dead culture that the definitive recording of the Summer of 1970 is the Pacifica Radio broadcast from SUNY Binghamton, recorded on May 2, 1970. It was widely bootlegged for decades, and the Grateful Dead portion was released in its entirety on the epic 1997 3-cd set <i>Dick's Picks Vol. 8.</i> It's one of the greatest nights of the Grateful Dead, and well deserving of the reverence in which it's held. In this context, however, it's critical to remember that the May 2 show was not broadcast on Pacifica affiliates--KPFA in Berkeley, WBAI in New York, and so on--until later in June. As near as I can tell, the broadcast date was June 21, 1970. The important point here is that from June 4-7, even the most devoted of Deadheads would have had no awareness of the band's performance on May 2. Anything they heard in June would not have been compared to Binghamton until later.<br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCxR7FiY6sArKU-Odr-thQIKgyEC93MvtvHEFVGhOylYz_Uuph59cu6hm9BwfJSxDs4y_VSQ-MeQv01-VXMoY5JQqUeU44zY2nkS4NbELPC-GWQRIpBVe_7ysDP6tla9y2MUnw_9XnnSY/s383/Howard+and+Jerry+Hooterollin+back+cover+1971.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="270" data-original-width="383" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCxR7FiY6sArKU-Odr-thQIKgyEC93MvtvHEFVGhOylYz_Uuph59cu6hm9BwfJSxDs4y_VSQ-MeQv01-VXMoY5JQqUeU44zY2nkS4NbELPC-GWQRIpBVe_7ysDP6tla9y2MUnw_9XnnSY/s320/Howard+and+Jerry+Hooterollin+back+cover+1971.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Howard Wales and Jerry Garcia preparing for Hooteroll (from the back cover of the 1971 LP)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Southern Comfort and John Kahn</b><br />John Kahn was not just Jerry Garcia's bass player from 1970-1995, he was also his partner and musical Straw Boss, putting together bands and keeping them rolling. Garcia made it clear that the Jerry Garcia Band was really the Jerry Garcia and John Kahn Band. Without Kahn, Garcia could not have made the JGB the nearly full-time aggregation that it turned out to be, given Garcia's commitment to the Grateful Dead. Kahn, however, articulate and charming as he was, was rarely interviewed. When he was, it was almost always about his work with Garcia and the Garcia Band. As a result, many topics were never pursued, and are left to speculation.<p></p><p>One question that, to my knowledge, was never asked of Kahn was "when did you first see the Grateful Dead?" Now, Kahn had moved to San Francisco in Fall '66 to attend San Francisco Conservatory. He had known musicians ever since, and had been working professionally since mid-67. Musicians get around, so I figured he had at least seen the Dead somewhere, since they played so much. The really interesting question, also never asked of Kahn, was "after you had started jamming with Jerry Garcia, when did you next see the Grateful Dead?" </p><p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/03/john-kahn-live-performance-history-1970.html">I have looked into the chronology of Kahn's introduction to Garcia, and the best triangulation suggests that they jammed together for the first time at The Matrix on Monday, April 13, 1970</a>. It looks like Kahn, Garcia, organist Howard Wales and drummer Bill Vitt had played the Matrix together six times by June 1, 1970. It's true that the June Fillmore West shows would have been the Dead's first local performances since the jamming had started, and Garcia would surely have invited Kahn. That's not the interesting part, though. </p><p>Opening act Southern Comfort was a San Francisco band, who had just released their debut album on Columbia. The album had been assigned to veteran producer Nick Gravenites, but Gravenites had turned the project over to John Kahn. So for the June Fillmore West shows, not only had Kahn been jamming with Garcia, Kahn was co-producer of the band opening the concert. Although Southern Comfort had been around for a year, they too were debuting at Fillmore West, so you know their co-producer would have been there.</p><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEdB3yWAcSQYu63Yw1htRRBpEE_AzcxfwEO8TYPf-_U1R70TqmfkzpNRSWPzAtQf_Q43xUO-6-L9MGwanyp-lPWYSi89lQKvop1GeST3hB9zP0pbtYnXCeoyNodgHWiDVt5ywUeI977AY/s640/bobjonesmemorialpics.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEdB3yWAcSQYu63Yw1htRRBpEE_AzcxfwEO8TYPf-_U1R70TqmfkzpNRSWPzAtQf_Q43xUO-6-L9MGwanyp-lPWYSi89lQKvop1GeST3hB9zP0pbtYnXCeoyNodgHWiDVt5ywUeI977AY/s320/bobjonesmemorialpics.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Pictures of Bob Jones, from his time as a guitarist in the We Five, to the 70s as a drummer with Mike Bloomfield, and finally in 2010 in retirement in Hawaii</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Bob Jones, John Kahn and Southern Comfort</b><br />How Kahn became the producer of Southern Comfort and also Jerry Garcia's bass player are in fact two strands of the same story. I have dealt with both at some length, so I won't repeat every detail (follow the links for true journeys down those rabbit holes), but the June Fillmore West concerts turn out to be a convergence of different threads, so it's worth a brief re-visit. <br /><p><a href="https://www.officialwefive.com/splashbobjones.html">Bob Jones (1947-2013)</a> had played 12-string guitar and sang harmony vocals in a 60s group called The We Five. They had a huge, worldwide hit in 1965 with Ian and Sylvia Tyson's "You Were On My Mind," which sold millions of copies. Still, the We Five broke up, and Jones formed bands in San Francisco with John Kahn and a few others, f<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/11/john-kahn-live-performance-1967-68-t-r.html">irst the R&B styled T and A Blues Band in 1967 and then the more bluesy Memory Pain in 1968</a>. In the meantime, Kahn and Jones would go around to local jam sessions. Although Jones was a guitar player, Kahn would always ask him to bring a drum set (they shared a house with drummer John Chambers) and play it. Jones would complain that "he wasn't a drummer," but, as he told interviewer Jake Feinberg in the 21st century, he was "Kahned into drumming." </p><p>At a jam session in Novato around late 1968, famous guitarist Mike Bloomfield stuck his head into the room, and enquired who was drumming and who was singing. When he found out that it was the same guy, Bob Jones had a new job. Jones considered himself a guitarist, but Bloomfield liked his drumming, and wanted to use him as a singer as well. Bloomfield had recently left the high-profile Electric Flag,just as he had left the high-profile Paul Butterfield Blues Band before that. Bloomfield was the first SF rock star to play regularly in smaller nightclubs, a practice later picked up by Jerry Garcia, Jorma and Jack, Van Morrison and others.</p><p>Bloomfield wouldn't rehearse. If a club date was booked, singer Nick Gravenites would call up a few players and they would back him up. The "first call" lineup for Mike Bloomfield would generally include Gravenites on vocals and rhythm guitar, Bob Jones on drums and vocals, and Kahn on bass. Sometimes keyboard players (such as organist Ira Kamin or pianist Mark Naftalin) might be included, or a horn player as well. If one of the regulars couldn't make it, a substitute was called in. No one was rehearsing anyway, so subs were no problem. Thus the original connection to Kahn and Bloomfield was through Bob Jones, because he had been "Kahned" into drumming at a jam session.</p><p>In 1969, San Francisco was the hottest place in the record industry, and a lot of records were being recorded at studios in town. Gravenites was a key producer, since he was well-known from having been in Electric Flag. Gravenites regularly called on Kahn and Jones, among others, for recordings (which incidentally is how they both ended up on the Brewer And Shipley's hit single "One Toke Over The Line," produced by Gravenites). It is a testament to Bob Jones' musical talent that he took so readily to professional drumming without any real background.</p><p></p><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt6E0sIsvG0E9WEkirqCgT3qi0YQHvf6gQvr0PaBbRNCrTQzkFR8z7IOswb7XjgWDXKEcx5vPaeEIX9WGXITLRNP-pw15TTOsaa61-tyioKuJpyKtqEl0xp1iMzBwaMqN3Wi_bNoErzh0/s1838/Southern+Comfort+19700604+31+May+1970%252C+108+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="966" data-original-width="1838" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt6E0sIsvG0E9WEkirqCgT3qi0YQHvf6gQvr0PaBbRNCrTQzkFR8z7IOswb7XjgWDXKEcx5vPaeEIX9WGXITLRNP-pw15TTOsaa61-tyioKuJpyKtqEl0xp1iMzBwaMqN3Wi_bNoErzh0/s320/Southern+Comfort+19700604+31+May+1970%252C+108+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />Around May, 1969, Jones and some other local musicians formed a band modeled on Booker T and The MGs. The idea was that they would be a complete studio ensemble, and also record and perform their own music. The name of the band was Southern Comfort. The band members were:<p></p><blockquote><b>Fred Burton</b>-lead guitar [<i>aka Fred Olson, his given name</i>]<br /><b>Ron Stallings</b>-tenor sax, vocals<br /><b>John Wilmeth</b>-trumpet<br /><b>Steve Funk</b>-keyboards<br /><b>Art Stavro</b>-bass<br /><b>Bob Jones</b>-drums, vocals</blockquote><p>Ron Stallings had been in the T&A Blues Band with Kahn and Jones. He would turn up later with Kahn in Reconstruction in 1979. Southern Comfort was signed to an advance by Columbia Records, and Gravenites was signed up as the producer. At this period of time, Gravenites was also working with Mike Bloomfield, Brewer And Shipley and later <a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2021/10/danny-cox-live-at-family-dog-november.html">Danny Cox (who shared management with Brewer And Shipley)</a>.</p><p>The Southern Comfort band members received modest advances (probably in the high 4 figures). Bob Jones told me in a private email that his parents persuaded him not to spend his advance on a car or new gear--typical musician choices--but instead to buy a house. As a result, Jones bought a two-story house in Fairfax. Jones and his family lived upstairs, and he rented out the downstairs flat to another musician. </p><p>Bob Jones' tenant was drummer Bill Vitt, who had recently returned to the Bay Area after time on the road and as a Los Angeles session musician. Good drummers are always in demand, so Vitt was immediately popular. Not only did Vitt get studio calls from Gravenites, when there was a conflict between a local Southern Comfort booking and a Mike Bloomfield gig, Vitt was the "second call" drummer. As Southern Comfort played around more in 1969 and '70, Vitt got more calls for the Bloomfield band. </p><p>In March 1970, when Bill Vitt and organist Howard Wales were running the Monday night jam sessions at the Matrix, Jerry Garcia--who had already jammed with Howard Wales--found he enjoyed dropping in. Vitt had invited a symphonically trained bassist (Richard Favis), but it hadn't worked out. So the next weekend--probably April 13--he invited John Kahn. It worked out. If Jones hadn't been in Southern Comfort, if his parents hadn't persuaded him to buy a house, if he hadn't rented it to Vitt, it's not likely that the Vitt/Kahn connection would have been made. But it was.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyTnMq2YnRovapsAt1L-MQ8RRtB1Cvog5ywLAUyaiujygFhucFjMspBEjyQ_SYbwmYqagoAnZXCYewqxIPc-LWxAME3uVph9zsN42qA_cc9fvoEqaWrEOjp5VilNhdwB9QsHKhS7Be5lY/s527/Southern+Comfort+lp+CBS+1970.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="527" data-original-width="525" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyTnMq2YnRovapsAt1L-MQ8RRtB1Cvog5ywLAUyaiujygFhucFjMspBEjyQ_SYbwmYqagoAnZXCYewqxIPc-LWxAME3uVph9zsN42qA_cc9fvoEqaWrEOjp5VilNhdwB9QsHKhS7Be5lY/s320/Southern+Comfort+lp+CBS+1970.jpg" /></a></div><br />According to Jones, Nick Gravenites found himself over-committed in the studio, and turned the production of the Southern Comfort album over to John Kahn. Kahn and Jones were close friends, so this was fine with the band. Gravenites had been using the musically trained Kahn as an arranger and orchestrator anyway, so this was more like a promotion rather than a new assignment. Kahn was listed as co-producer on the <i>Southern Comfort</i> album, and he filled in a few gaps--co-writing songs, helping with arrangements, playing piano--but not playing bass. Columbia released the <i>Southern Comfort</i> album in mid-1970. Opening for a major band at Fillmore West was exactly how big labels liked to promote their bands. I'm sure Kahn was there, probably multiple nights. It would have been a pretty interesting evening for him, hearing the band he had just produced, and then hearing the band with the guy he was jamming with.<p></p><p>You don't need me to listen to old Grateful Dead tapes. The Dead sets for June 4-7, 1970 are fairly intact, and seem pretty good, though not epic. When you're listening to them, however, imagine Garcia wailing away, and a guy on the side of a stage, with a mustache, nodding his head and looking on, thinking about how he might be able to work together with Garcia, if things played out right.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p> </p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-56130223281489206202021-09-23T15:41:00.001-07:002021-10-05T13:29:12.839-07:00August 2-3, 1968, The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA; Grateful Dead (Next Phase)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2iOQUXtt45U6rgruQLHDqEwdrAn4dEWyPx52ucczfAjtZPd8yjK2gqMtytfC8GDg62SjLT4wsJXshEdmE0Ljd6N5M6vcmVxpn0SkZvAKMWYCFUqeHLvTRto0LuCqt472S-SJ9npjCdsc/s1024/Hippodrome+SD+19680802.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="785" data-original-width="1024" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2iOQUXtt45U6rgruQLHDqEwdrAn4dEWyPx52ucczfAjtZPd8yjK2gqMtytfC8GDg62SjLT4wsJXshEdmE0Ljd6N5M6vcmVxpn0SkZvAKMWYCFUqeHLvTRto0LuCqt472S-SJ9npjCdsc/s320/Hippodrome+SD+19680802.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p></p><i><b>The Grateful Dead in San Diego </b></i><br />In July of 1968, the Grateful Dead released their second album for Warner Brothers, <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i>. The album was released 13 months after their debut album, which for the era was a long stretch between records. The first album had not had a hit single, either, so the Grateful Dead were mostly an unheard legend outside of the few places where they had performed regularly. If a record company was going to pay attention to a band, it was going to be when there was a new release and something to sell. So even hippie bands tried to organize tours and high-profile gigs around any new album. Yet the Grateful Dead did no such thing.<p>In July of 1968, the Grateful Dead only played two shows. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/11/august-19-25-26-1967-grateful-dead-lake.html">Both were in North Lake Tahoe, a vacation resort 200 miles from San Francisco</a>. There were a few other posters for events that were spurious or canceled, in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Honolulu, but otherwise the band played no shows. How was there going to be any record sales if the Dead weren't going to even make an effort?</p><p>August was a little better. The Grateful Dead were booked at a rock festival in Orange County on Sunday, August 4. So the band decided to break in some new territory, and play a weekend in San Diego at a newly-opened psychedelic ballroom called The Hippodrome. The Hippodrome was a former roller skating rink, run by a bunch of inexperienced hippies, and had only been open since June. The Dead probably agreed to the date before the Hippodrome had even opened (less than 60 days earlier), a risky proposition. Risk? What's the risk? Just as big a question: what's the Reward?<br /></p><i><b>The Grateful Dead in July 1968: Status Report</b></i><br /><b>July 12-13, 1968 Kings Beach Bowl, North Lake Tahoe, CA: Grateful Dead/The Working Class</b><br /><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/11/august-19-25-26-1967-grateful-dead-lake.html">The Dead had played a weekend at Kings Beach Bowl in the previous Summer (August 25-26, 1967)</a>, and followed it up with a weekend during ski season (February 22-24, 1968). The operators of Kings Beach Bowl put the Dead up in some sort of Tahoe vacation home, so everybody must have had a lot of fun. One of the operators of the venue worked for the Sheriff's Department, so the cops weren't in the picture. The Summer '68 booking was probably long-standing, and much like a vacation. Working Class, the opening band, was from Sacramento. <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/07/sanpaku-performance-list-1968-69.html">By 1969, they would evolve into San Paku, and ended up opening for the Dead a number of times</a>. Members of the Working Class recall the weekend--vaguely--as a giant party. <br /><p><b>July 18, 1968: Release of <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i></b><br />The official release date of <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i> was July 18, 1968. Without getting too wonky, it's worth noting that 60s album release dates were not nearly so precise as 70s release dates. By the mid-1970s, records were officially released on a certain day, usually a Tuesday. All the record stores would get the boxes of albums at the same time, and could not sell copies until the designated day. At the same time, FM radio stations had advance copies, and airplay, promotions and tours were structured around the release date.</p><p>The sixties weren't like that. It's possible that detailed coordination took place for Beatles records, or a few other high profile acts. Generally, though, most records were sold in department stores and drug stores, and albums were just a commodity like socks or shaving cream. The actual distribution of albums was largely farmed out to independent intermediaries (usually called "Rack Jobbers"). The boxes of manufactured albums were shipped weeks in advance, and would arrive at stores over a period of time. Sometimes albums arrived in stores after their "official" release date, and sometimes before. Many stores, particularly big chains, would want to limit what was in their precious shelf space to those albums being promoted by their companies. But there weren't prohibitions against selling an album before it's "official" release date.</p><p>If a teenager went into a store and asked if they had a new album, a friendly clerk could look in the waiting boxes and sell him one. If enough kids asked, the store would put the albums out on the rack. Once FM radio came along, and random cool album tracks started getting played, this happened more and more. If you read accounts of 60s rock tours, by the likes of Led Zeppelin for example, you'll read plenty of stories of people who bought an album before it's official release date. But the flip side also happened. Just because Warners declared July 18 the official release date, it didn't all mean that <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i> was in a given store at that time.<br /></p><p><b>July 23, 1968: <i>A New Soundman Gets Hired</i></b><br />The Grateful Dead's former soundman, Owsley Stanley, had been arrested in Orinda, CA in late 1967. The case had wound through the courts, and Owsley's bail conditions in Summer '68 required that he get a job. Owsley, honestly, didn't have much work experience. Other than a stint in the Air Force, his previous, perhaps only, job had been as soundman for the Grateful Dead. On July 23, 1968, the Dead re-hired Owsley Stanley as their soundman. Owsley was a quick study, of course, which was good, since the first show upon his return was just 10 days later at the Hippodrome.</p><p><i><b>San Diego, CA</b></i><br />San Diego, with its deepwater natural harbor and balmy weather, has been a city since the state of California was founded in 1850. Always an important base for the US Navy, the population of San Diego doubled between 1930 (147,995) and 1950 (333,865). Some of this was due to military expansion during World War 2, but of course many Navy veterans went through San Diego and realized what a nice place it was. Numerous defense contractors also moved permanently to San Diego during this period.</p><p>San Diego has perfect weather, all year around. It's warm in the Summer, but never scorching, it's never humid--I believe humidity is forbidden by County ordnance--and there is usually a cool ocean breeze. The temperature on Christmas Day is usually about 72 degrees, and often you can go to the beach. If you go to San Diego, everybody is friendly and in a good mood, and why wouldn't they be? When a professional conference is held in San Diego, everybody wants to stay there when it's over.</p><p>San Diego is about 110 miles South of Downtown Los Angeles, however, so the cultural life of San Diego is swallowed up by that proximity. Think of rock music, for example. Plenty of musicians grew up in the San Diego area. But if they had musical dreams, they went to Los Angeles, and so we think of players like former Byrd Chris Hillman and former Eagle Bernie Leadon as "LA musicians" even though they both grew up in San Diego. The most successful 60s rock band from San Diego was Iron Butterfly, but they had to go to the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood to make it big.</p><p>San Diego's WW2 expansion was built on defense spending, and postwar cutbacks hurt the economy. The City and County of San Diego diversified into science, research and tourism. The suburbs around San Diego expanded significantly. San Diego State University, founded in 1897 as a teacher's college, had expanded to an enrollment of over 10,000 students by 1959, and had joined the State College system (by 1960 it was San Diego State College). In 1964, the University of California had opened its UC San Diego campus in suburban La Jolla, with an emphasis on mathematics, engineering and scientific research. The population in San Diego continued to expand between 1960 (573,224) and 1970 (696,769), with corresponding increases in the smaller suburban towns around the city.</p><i><b>Downtown San Diego and Concert Promotion</b></i><br />For much of the 1960s, the San Diego concert market was just a satellite of the Los Angeles concert market. Artists doing a national tour would slip in an extra day in San Diego, before or after any other Southern California bookings. The principal local concert promoter was James C. Pagni, who had gone from throwing fraternity dances in the early 60s to booking name acts. In 1964, the Exposition Hall at the Community Concourse had opened downtown. It was an auditorium that could be used for sports events, trade shows or concerts. Usually advertised as the "Community Concourse" (now the Civic Concourse), it was at 202 West C Street, at 2nd Avenue (sometime in the early 1970s, the Community Concourse was remodeled and re-named Golden Hall).<p>Most major touring acts played the Community Concourse, regardless of genre, and that included 60s rock bands. <a href="https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/1972/oct/19/cover-rock-in-san-diego/">Pagni had an established record with booking agents, so he had a firm grip on the local concert business. </a>In 1969, the much larger San Diego Sports Arena opened (at 3500 Sports Arena Boulevard). It could hold between 8,000 and 14,000 for concerts, so Pagni could book big acts as well, like James Brown. </p><p>Pagni was an established concert promoter, but he wasn't popular with the local hippies. In 1968, Pagni had booked the big touring acts like Big Brother (February 9) and Cream (May 19) at the Community Concourse. But the local hippies didn't like Pagni shows. It's hard to tell what the issues were, but Pagni's professional productions probably ensured that the Concourse wasn't much like the Fillmore. It does appear that rock shows at the Community Concourse had reserved seats, so that alone meant that there wasn't any kind of loose Fillmore scene. Although San Diego is a benign town, by and large, culturally it has always been dominated by ex-military folks (for obvious reasons), and the free-thinkers always decamped to LA. Downtown San Diego was somewhat in decline by 1968, but it wasn't being replaced by a bohemian underground.</p><b><i>Something Stirring In The Suburbs?</i></b><br />Downtown San Diego might not have been thriving, but something was going on in the outskirts of town, as the suburbs were booming. Suburbs were booming all over California, of course, and it's no surprise that in a beautiful place like San Diego, once-small towns in driving distance of the city were getting bigger and bigger.<p>The town of La Jolla, on the ocean and just 12 miles North of downtown, had been the home of the esteemed Scripps Oceanography Institute since 1903, and also a Marine base (Camp Matthews). During and after World War 2, the civilian population of La Jolla had expanded, making Camp Matthews less suitable for firing practice. Ultimately, Camp Matthews was closed and "declared surplus" in 1962, and the land was used for the new University of California at San Diego. The first class of undergraduates enrolled at UCSD in 1964. </p><p>The big attraction of La Jolla was the beach, of course, and that meant surfers. In early 60s Southern California, surfing was a weird, rebellious subculture. Middle-class young men (and their girlfriends) who organized their days around the tides, looking for the good waves, were not buying into the post-WW2 expectation that they should be a junior executive, join the Rotary Club, and raise 2.2 children. Tom Wolfe, a staff writer for the <i>New York Herald Tribune Sunday Magazine</i>, wrote a 2-part article about a bunch of teenagers he had stumbled across in La Jolla, published in February 1966.<br /></p><p>Wolfe wrote an article called "The Pump House Gang," later the title and first chapter of a 1968 book of his collected articles. <i>The Pump House Gang</i> book was released at the same time as his more famous <i>Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test</i>. Though less dramatic, the "Pump House Gang" was just a less radical, but no less pronounced, rebellion by La Jolla teenagers against the conformist expectations of the world, just like Kesey and his Merry Pranksters up in Palo Alto.</p><p><a href="https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1990-11-25-me-7245-story.html">Wolfe wrote about about some young surfers who hung out at the sewage pump house at La Jolla's Windansea Beach. Some were in High School, some were a little older</a>. They considered the beach their own. What they didn't like was outsiders, from other suburbs, often older adults (probably about 35 years old), that the Gang considered interlopers. The teenagers would stare at the Moms in their station wagons, spit on the sidewalk and stage <i>ad hoc</i> sit-ins to prevent them from parking. Neighbors would call the police, and trouble would ensue. The Pump House Gang were mostly middle class, and the incidents were minor and passed by, but it was surfer rebellion nonetheless.<br /></p><p>UC San Diego, which had just opened, was more of a science school, but it was still the 60s. There were some "Be-Ins" at the beach in La Jolla, and a local band called Maya played at them. A few locals, George Driver and Ron "Anchovy" Barca helped put them on. San Diego was San Diego, though, not Greenwich Village. There weren't that many rebels. It was inevitable that they would meet and join forces. </p><b><i>KPRI-fm, 106.5 FM, San Diego, CA</i></b><br />In 1967 and '68. the tipping point for rock music in most cities was the arrival of FM radio. FM radio broke the hegemony of Top 40, letting hippies hear cool album tracks from San Francisco and London. In San Diego, like most cities, rock radio on FM got its start in the middle of the night, but if you were tripping balls on LSD, what could be more appropriate?<p>Steve Brown (USN), stationed in San Diego, approached the owner of KPRI-fm in late 1967. At the time, FM radio was new, and not many people had FM receivers. Many new "Hi-Fi" stereos had FM receivers built-in, however. Young hippies were buying stereos to get the full effect of Beatles albums and the like, so there was an implicit audience. At the time, KPRI played typical MOR fare, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and so on. The (quite amazing) KPRI timeline picks up the story:</p><p><a href="http://www.kpri1065.com/ "></a></p><blockquote><i><a href="http://www.kpri1065.com/ ">In December of 1967, all of that changed forever. Steve Brown approached Larry Shushan, owner and manager of KPRI and offered to keep the station on the air after their customary midnight sign-off time, as long as he could play any kind of music that he wanted.</a></i></blockquote>There were no dollars offered for this service. Steve hit the airwaves of San Diego as O.B. Jetty, playing the Grateful Dead, Big Brother and The Holding Company, blues of all kinds and many bands that had never yet been heard on San Diego mainstream radio. Before long, Steve began gathering other like-minded people to to collaborate on those nightly journeys into the unknown, and the show "Electric Music For The Mind And Body" was born. The rest, as they say, is history.<p></p><p>Throughout early 1968, Brown and a co-conspirator hold down the midnight-to-3am shift at KPRI. By May, Brown and his fellows were broadcasting rock music 24/7. The underground had come to San Diego, unexpected as that might have seemed.<br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_Umwn_YeTXBKXNJjOETf709yNbygOgoZ4XUjDnA2ZR7LYXy-3RXf8yoKvLiGcrYD9_DU56xD-f5IxVD807cmMBHdmXc0AFLlF5dDawVfGG6wLCYBTAZVoBZbigzIjQBqq47iUlfbPUh0/s800/Hippodrome+Staff+1968.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="552" data-original-width="800" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_Umwn_YeTXBKXNJjOETf709yNbygOgoZ4XUjDnA2ZR7LYXy-3RXf8yoKvLiGcrYD9_DU56xD-f5IxVD807cmMBHdmXc0AFLlF5dDawVfGG6wLCYBTAZVoBZbigzIjQBqq47iUlfbPUh0/s320/Hippodrome+Staff+1968.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Translove Airways crew at the Hippodrome, Summer '68. Jerilyn Brandelius: "I’m the one with the big smile on the left side next to the girl with
long hair (Suzanne Spackman) and below Ramon Rashover and above the guy
with the white shirt"</i></td></tr></tbody></table><b><i><br />The Threads Come Together</i></b><br />Once a city had FM radio playing album tracks, young people wanted to see the bands. And they weren't the bands playing on the top 40 teenage circuit. San Diego needed its own Fillmore. Ron "Anchovy" Barca and George Driver, who had put on the Be-Ins in La Jolla in '67 were the primary organizers. Somehow, they found an old roller skating rink downtown at Front and G Street, once known as Skateland. They formed a production company called Translove Airways, after the lyrics from a Donovan song (from "Fat Angel:" it went "Fly Translove Airways, get you there on time/...Fly Jefferson Airplane, get you there on time"). They dressed up the Roller Rink, and opened it in June as The Hippodrome.<br /><p>Among the Pump House Gang was one Jerilyn Brandelius
(1948-2020), who would go on to play a big role in the Grateful Dead
universe in the 70s and beyond. In her memoir, she wrote:<br /></p><p></p><blockquote><i>Translove Airways was our production company we created when we got the
Hippodrome Ballroom in 1968. A group of us from La Jolla lived in San
Francisco from 1965 until 1967. San Diego county was getting too hard
for longhairs due to it being a military town during the Vietnam war, so
we split to the freedom of San Francisco. We met many of the bands and
decided to bring them to San Diego and open our own place like the
Avalon & Fillmore.</i></blockquote><p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTf2OeBiZwse287I7wFeVM7uHFBclJ5UVKRwbUF8Kea-kRapph0iSbsXszqnfxY2kr5IOoeu7KKhoGx4ydJU4zEvkCAI8xsIHWMO6p0BqXLBf6NqQ4DYaOp08RIiIyFaLjyhyphenhyphen6jyfwZYE/s600/Steve+Miller+Hippodrome+SD+19680607.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="447" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTf2OeBiZwse287I7wFeVM7uHFBclJ5UVKRwbUF8Kea-kRapph0iSbsXszqnfxY2kr5IOoeu7KKhoGx4ydJU4zEvkCAI8xsIHWMO6p0BqXLBf6NqQ4DYaOp08RIiIyFaLjyhyphenhyphen6jyfwZYE/s320/Steve+Miller+Hippodrome+SD+19680607.jpeg" /></a></div><i><b>Hippodrome Shows</b></i><br />The headliners at the Hippodrome were almost exclusively San Francisco bands. The opening acts were local San Diego bands, but there weren't that many of them. The first booking at The Hippodrome was for the weekend of June 7 and 8, with the Steve Miller Band headlining both nights. At the time, the Miller Band had just released their great debut album on Capitol, <i>Children Of The Future.</i> Side One was a continuous suite of music, not eligible for play on Top 40, but no doubt getting plenty on KPRI.<p></p><p>The Hippodrome only booked shows on Friday and Saturday nights, a sign that the underground market was both young and still just forming. The second weekend featured the Velvet Underground, which must have been pretty strange--San Diego doesn't do darkness. The next weekend (June 21-22) featured Mike Bloomfield and the Electric Flag, and the following one (June 28-29) was headlined by David Lindley and Kaleidoscope, one of (if not the) best underground bands in Los Angeles. Great as all these shows sound now, however, none of those groups would have been particularly well-known at the time.</p><p>During the same month of June, however, James Pagni was putting on rock shows at the nearby Community Concourse. The Mothers Of Invention played June 1, Eric Burdon and The Animals played June 18 and Canned Heat on June 25. Now, today, we care much more about the likes of the Velvet Underground and Kaleidoscope. In 1968, however, songs like "Sky Pilot" (Eric Burdon) and "Going Up The Country" (Canned Heat) were big on the radio, and they were both more popular bands (and I should add, both terrific live). Now, granted, the Burdon and Heat shows were on Wednesdays, since the prime bookings were saved for Los Angeles. So the weekend shows at Hippodrome would have been more accessible to suburban teenagers, but the acts were not as prominent as the ones at Community Concourse.</p><i><b>The Hippodrome, July 1968</b></i><br />Hippodrome bookings for July were even more shaky. Around July 4, which was on a Thursday, Dr. John The Night Tripper was supposed to headline, supported by two Bay Area bands. According to Sons Of Champlin road manager Charlie Kelly, however, Dr. John canceled. This left the largely unknown Sons and Boogie, another Bay Area band. The Sons had not yet released their debut album, and the group had barely played outside of the Bay Area. <br /><p>For that weekend (July 5-6), there was a legendary show with the Quicksilver Messenger Service headlining over the returning Velvet Underground. Quicksilver, besides being hip, had just released their debut album on Capitol, and no doubt it was getting heavy airplay on KPRI. There are some descriptions of this show in Ritchie Unterburger's Velvet Underground chronology (<i>White Light White Heat</i>), and it sounds like a truly special event.</p><p>Dr John finally turned up on the weekend of July 12-13. His debut album, <i>Gris Gris</i>, had been released fairly recently. Once again, Dr John is widely revered today, and rightly so, but he was pretty obscure at the time. I doubt he drew much of a crowd. Bo Diddley headlined the next weekend (July 19-20), enjoyable no doubt, but hardly a must-see event for suburban teen hippies.</p><p>Throughout July, James Pagni was promoting rock shows at the Community Concourse on Tuesdays. While Tuesday is a weeknight, the rock audience was mostly school-age, and thus in the Summer it wasn't a school night. The Tuesday night shows had much more prominent bands--Iron Butterfly, Paul Butterfield and Steppenwolf. As noted above, today we dream of time-traveling back to see the Velvet Underground or Kaleidoscope, but at the time, "Magic Carpet Ride" or "Inna-Gadda-Da-Vida" was a much bigger draw. Those bands were available on Tuesdays because they had better bookings on weekends.<br /></p><p>The Paul Butterfield Blues Band played Thursday, July 25. This suggests that they had a better booking on the weekend, probably in LA, and that it wasn't worth it to them to play a whole weekend in San Diego. It also means that the Hippodrome didn't have the cash to book them all weekend, either. I can find no trace of a Hippodrome show on the weekend of July 26-27, another ominous sign for its financial well-being.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQ7yHPvcTcQQG1FZtpwOthVBZgyRC3ibay6teykqYxFSo6rxjrWe5KWxjv1K7vH5mS3lrkAIze6dL-K1uxnDQZ6W9a22J5cEdwW_zwdsVBOWQEguiGvExs043gNrhCDKDBIS8rM9iWglM/s512/JG+Owsley+SD+Airport+19690802.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="512" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQ7yHPvcTcQQG1FZtpwOthVBZgyRC3ibay6teykqYxFSo6rxjrWe5KWxjv1K7vH5mS3lrkAIze6dL-K1uxnDQZ6W9a22J5cEdwW_zwdsVBOWQEguiGvExs043gNrhCDKDBIS8rM9iWglM/s320/JG+Owsley+SD+Airport+19690802.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Owsley Stanley and Jerry Garcia at the San Diego Airport, August 1968</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b>August 2-3, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Grateful Dead/Curly Cooke's Hurdy Gurdy Band/Maya</b><i> (Friday-Saturday)</i><br />The Grateful Dead played the first weekend in August at the Hippodrome. It was the band's first shows after the formal release of <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i>. The truth is, we know almost nothing about the show except that it was booked. If the poster had not been published in Paul Grushkin's book <i>Art Of Rock</i>, we might not have even known that. I'm not aware of an eyewitness account. Since Jerilyn Brandelius never mentioned that it was canceled, we can assume it happened, but beyond that I can only draw a blank (if anyone can find any accounts or references, please cite them in the Comments). <br /><p></p><p>The Hippodrome was Owsley's first show as the returning soundman. Knowing Owsley's penchance for perfectionism, it's unlikely the technical set up was to his liking, so I'll bet the Dead didn't hustle right on to the stage. We don't have a tape. I'm no expert in this area, but I don't believe Owsley began taping until somewhat later.</p><p>Owsley was already an underground legend. There was a photo Owsley and Jerry, taken at the San Diego Airport (above). For many years, it was just about the only circulating photo of Owsley. Given that it was Owsley's first weekend, my guess is that when someone took a photo, Owsley realized it was going to get around, and took enormous pains not to be photographed again. There are a few backstage and private photos that eventually surfaced, mostly after his death, but my guess is that Owsley rapidly realized that Garcia was a magnet, and did not go near him in public after that.</p><i><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDoSfWJu0svQM5ouFgAdo-VglSfCr08M8S2bKQxJWR3PRS8nwr69VtzTjkq8pKwH7wAVqtnC53QmalfQyzvXNQsLSE6vlXLx3xwE698i7TNt_-cdyAHEgxc3HB2Ax-MT4XGxV98HhV7ms/s987/Del+Mar+19680922.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="987" data-original-width="672" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDoSfWJu0svQM5ouFgAdo-VglSfCr08M8S2bKQxJWR3PRS8nwr69VtzTjkq8pKwH7wAVqtnC53QmalfQyzvXNQsLSE6vlXLx3xwE698i7TNt_-cdyAHEgxc3HB2Ax-MT4XGxV98HhV7ms/s320/Del+Mar+19680922.jpg" /></a></div><br />Last Dance: Autumn Equinox Festival</b></i><br /><b>September 22, 1968: Del Mar Fairgrounds, Del Mar, CA: Quicksilver Messenger Service/Grateful Dead/Buddy Miles Express (formerly The Electric Flag)/Youngbloods/Taj Mahal/Mother Earth/Sons Of Champlin/Ace Of Cups/Phoenix/Curly Cooke's Hurdy Gurdy Band </b><i>(Saturday)</i><br />After the Grateful Dead shows on August 2-3, I can find no trace of any more bookings at the Hippodrome, so it must have closed. Still, the hippies who ran it had one more event in them. Somehow they found the financing to put on an all-day rock festival at a former Ostrich Racing track in the suburbs. Yes, a former Ostrich Racing track, you read that correctly. It was actually the County Fairgrounds, established in 1937 as a horse racing track by Bing Crosby and his associates, but Ostriches apparently raced there (<strike>in the 1980s, Del Mar Fairgrounds became an auto racing track, but it's now houses I believe</strike> <b><i>update</i></b>: <i>I had this wrong. The Fairgrounds and the horse racing track is still thriving. The auto track was a temporary facility in the parking lot, used for IMSA racing from 1987-92</i>). <br /><p>Eyewitnesses reported that it was a nice afternoon--hey, it was San Diego, right?--and a nice time, although the event was not well-attended. The underpinning to the booking seems to be that most of the bands were tied to the same booking agency, San Francisco's West-Pole. <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/12/september-22-1968-del-mar-fairgrounds.html">West-Pole was run by Quicksilver manager Ron Polte, and they had ties to many other bands in San Francisco, including the Dead.</a> From looking at the list of bands at the Equinox Festival, we see a number of bands that played the Hippodrome, so we can see that West-Pole was tied in to booking for the Hippodrome. Curly Cooke's Hurdy Gurdy Band, featuring ex-Steve Miller Band guitarist Cooke, was booked by West-Pole, which explains why they had opened the Grateful Dead weekend.</p><p>Ron Polte also regularly promoted shows, through another wing of his company, so I suspect Polte financed the show, booked the bands and hired the Hippodrome crowd to actually put it on. After that, as far as I know, the Hippodrome crowd went their own ways, leaving San Diego concert booking to others.</p><i><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoUxvN_dlifLZ31IDtOdt-mi9V7Og-CzXecN6cWH1y_t37ccZU050bfuF-JxQFEX3VAKzPefdeN_OZQqXhox5nvTZKkbnGDma7BEYPnSO6GZ0sAbsQjbFOSr8BaS0wQonhX6p_gX8xinA/s1309/Aztec+bowl+SD+19690511.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1309" data-original-width="1024" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgoUxvN_dlifLZ31IDtOdt-mi9V7Og-CzXecN6cWH1y_t37ccZU050bfuF-JxQFEX3VAKzPefdeN_OZQqXhox5nvTZKkbnGDma7BEYPnSO6GZ0sAbsQjbFOSr8BaS0wQonhX6p_gX8xinA/s320/Aztec+bowl+SD+19690511.jpg" /></a></div><br />Postscripts</b></i><br /><b>The Grateful Dead </b>returned to San Diego, albeit intermittently. In 1969 (on May 11), the Dead played a concert at the Aztec Bowl (the San Diego State football stadium), along with Canned Heat, Lee Michaels and Santana. The promoter was the new hippie competitor to the Pagni kingdom, a former assistant named Roger Hedgecock. Hedgecock had some success promoting concerts, but ultimately left the field. Later, he became Mayor of San Diego.<p>The band played the Community Concourse in 1970 (on January 10), but I'm not sure who the promoter was (Magna Productions is on the poster). In subsequent years they played for Pacific Presentations (1971 and '73), <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2019/06/the-grateful-dead-at-shrine-exposition.html">old friends from the Shrine in LA,</a> and in 1978 for Bill Graham. The band almost played a show for James Pagni, in 1972 or so, but it was canceled (probably due to lack of ticket sales). San Diego was not really a big market for the Dead until their last several years, and by then everywhere was a big market. So the efforts to plant the seed in San Diego in 1968 were well-intentioned, but didn't add up to anything significant, really, other than a great Fall '73 show (on November 14). <br /></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjskwCN5RfsZ0rzAyxkVum1Bo3h1U7UQzyu6e8Y8QIDpd6465c1ecPLi0oKTAJKyCDDDEf8Yz1UMgupjKmf0Jml4Cn2VWDrdhuILFSJGsiwFZxbnDisQnmk_GwUgfBM3mC8diewpnyV9GQ/s1500/captain+milkshake+movie+1970.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1500" data-original-width="983" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjskwCN5RfsZ0rzAyxkVum1Bo3h1U7UQzyu6e8Y8QIDpd6465c1ecPLi0oKTAJKyCDDDEf8Yz1UMgupjKmf0Jml4Cn2VWDrdhuILFSJGsiwFZxbnDisQnmk_GwUgfBM3mC8diewpnyV9GQ/s320/captain+milkshake+movie+1970.jpg" /></a></b></i></div><i><b><br />Captain Milkshake</b></i> was one of the first "Anti-Vietnam" hippie movies, financed in the wake of the unexpected success of Easy Rider, and released in 1970. <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0143164/. ">The IMDB blurb says "A Marine on leave from Vietnam becomes involved with hippies, communes and drug-running."</a> It was filmed in and around La Jolla, and includes scenes from inside the Hippodrome. <a href="https://www.lajollalight.com/lifestyle/sd-cm-ljl-captain-milkshake-20190329-htmlstory.html">The Translove Airways crowd appears in the movie, mostly as themselves. Ron Barca plays "Anchovy</a>." <br /><p></p><p><b>Jerilyn Brandelius</b> decamped North, and helped run the show for Chet Helms at his Family Dog on the Great Highway enterprise in 1969 and '70. Ultimately, Jerilyn and Mickey Hart had two kids, and she became a regular part of the Grateful Dead family. <a href="https://thegdwheel.com/gdfa/">Her Grateful Dead scrapbook (now online) is a fascinating chronicle of life from the inside</a>. She died in 2020. <br /></p><p><b>Steve Brown</b> (OB Jetty), who had been the key to starting KPRI and the underground rock explosion in San Diego, missed out on the San Diego Summer of '68. Brown was in the US Navy, and the Navy decided to send him to Vietnam from June to December. He returned intact. But never fear--ultimately he came up to San Francisco and helped found Round Records with Jerry Garcia. <br /></p><p><b>KPRI-fm </b>(106.5) was hugely successful, so much that the station had been sold to Southwestern Broadcasting in mid-1968. By early 1969, KPRI was the #4 station in San Diego, in all formats (AM, FM, news, music etc). Southwestern Broadcasting decided to switch to a Top-40 format during the daytime in Spring '69. <a href="http://www.kpri1065.com/ ">The change was a catastrophe, and KPRI reverted to all album rock by the Summer</a>. KPRI remained a top rock station in San Diego for many years. <br /></p><p><b>James Pagni</b> <a href="https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/sandiegouniontribune/obituary.aspx?n=james-c-pagni&pid=14399618 ">(1943-2005) remained the king of the San Diego concert business until about 1974, when he stepped aside and into a successful career in the restuarant business</a>. <br /></p><b><i>Appendix</i>: San Diego Rock Concerts, June-September 1968</b><br />J<b>une 1, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Mothers of Invention</b><i> (Saturday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i><br />The Community Concourse was at 202 West C Street (at 2nd Avenue). Shows were presented in the Exhibition Hall (which was later remodeled and re-named Golden Hall).<p><b>June 7-8, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Steve Miller Band/Alexander’s Timeless Blooze Band/Baptized By Fire</b> <i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i><br />The Hippodrome was downtown at Front and G Streets. <br /></p><p><b>June 14-15, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Velvet Underground/Clover/Maya </b><i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents </i></p><p><b>June 18, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Eric Burdon & The Animals/Brain Police </b><i>(Wednesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>June 21-22, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Electric Flag/Clover/Pacific Flash </b><i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i></p><p><b>June 25, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Canned Heat </b><i>(Wednesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>June 28-29, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Kaleidoscope/Baptized By Fire/Maya </b><i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i></p><b>June 29, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: The Doors/Chambers Brothers </b><i>(Saturday) Scenic Sounds Presents</i><br /><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2019/06/the-grateful-dead-at-shrine-exposition.html">Scenic Sounds were Los Angeles promoters, who had evolved from the team that promoted shows at Los Angeles' Shrine Exposition Hall</a>. Later, Scenic Sounds management formed Pacific Presentations.<p><b>July 2, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Iron Butterfly </b><i>(Tuesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>July 2-3, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: (Dr. John)/Sons of Champlin/Boogie </b><i>(Tuesday-Wednesday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i><br />Date approximated from a memoir on the website of Sons roadie Charlie
Kelly. Dr. John The Night Tripper was the headliner, but he canceled.
Boogie was a Bay Area power trio. <br /></p><b>July 4, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Velvet Underground (Thursday)<br />July 5-6, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Quicksilver Messenger Service/Velvet Underground </b><i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i><br />Velvet Underground played by themselves on Thursday night. This week is the only (known) week where the Hippodrome was open most nights of the week. The weekend shows were reviewed, with both bands getting impressive notices. VU must have been getting some airplay on KPRI, because fans seem to have known who they were.<p><b>July 9, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Paul Butterfield Blues Band (Tuesday) </b><i>Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>July 12-13, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Dr. John The Night Tripper and His Louisiana Voodoo Show </b><i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i></p><p><b>July 16, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Paul Butterfield Blues Band/Framework </b><i>(Tuesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>July 19-20, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Bo Diddley/Maya/Frumious Bandersnatch </b><i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i></p><p><b>July 23, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Steppenwolf/Brain Police </b><i>(Tuesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>July 25, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Butterfield Blues Band/Maya/Early Morning Blues Band </b><i>(Thursday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i></p><p><b>July 30, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Moby Grape </b><i>(Tuesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>August 2-3, 1968 The Hippodrome, San Diego, CA: Grateful Dead/Curly Cooke’s Hurdy Gurdy Band/Maya </b><i>(Friday-Saturday) Trans-Love Airways Presents</i></p><p><b>August 10, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Jefferson Airplane </b><i>(Saturday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>August 13, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Spirit/Jello’s Gas Band </b><i>(Tuesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>August 20, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: James Cotton Blues Band </b><i>(Tuesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>August 27 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: The Who/Brain Police </b><i>(Tuesday) Presented by James C. Pagni</i></p><p><b>September 3, 1968 Balboa Stadium, San Diego Jimi Hendrix Experience/Vanilla Fudge/Eire Apparent/Soft Machine </b><i>(Tuesday) James C Pagni Presents</i><br /></p><p><b>September 22, 1968 Del Mar Fairgrounds, Del Mar, CA Grateful Dead/Buddy Miles Express/Taj
Mahal/Quicksilver Messenger Service/Sons of Champlin/Mother Earth/Curly
Cooke’s Hurdy-Gurdy Band/Youngbloods/Ace of Cups/Phoenix </b><i>(Saturday)</i><br /></p><p><b>September 28, 1968 Community Concourse, San Diego, CA: Big Brother and The Holding Company</b><i> (Friday) James C Pagni Presents</i></p><p></p><p><br /></p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-91635928663751744342021-08-26T15:17:00.003-07:002021-08-28T12:50:47.348-07:00August 28-30, 1969, Family Dog at The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Hartbeats/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen/Rubber Duck (Archaeology) [FDGH II]<p> </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUSLBgPL5Qa893UZ11Hcwb9UkMJ6kkaukNaXXkR9L1BsjRBZn5feVFf_EpOpitM02DzEMwZy6XsI68kNVP2MAYtPkgB7qjKAxSnoSwoqBG1wJhEGz3WYMrMknjTBDRFmInYUiJcIp7Go8/s915/FDGH+19690829.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="915" data-original-width="415" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUSLBgPL5Qa893UZ11Hcwb9UkMJ6kkaukNaXXkR9L1BsjRBZn5feVFf_EpOpitM02DzEMwZy6XsI68kNVP2MAYtPkgB7qjKAxSnoSwoqBG1wJhEGz3WYMrMknjTBDRFmInYUiJcIp7Go8/s320/FDGH+19690829.jpg" /></a></div><br />The historical record of the Grateful Dead is a profound contrast with other legendary, high profile 60s bands. When The Doors, Jimi Hendrix Experience or Led Zeppelin hit a town, we can find posters, newspaper reviews, fond reflections and sometimes some police reports. We get a good picture of what happened at those concerts, but with only a vague feel for the music that was played. If Jimi killed it on "Red House," or Robert Plant inserted a Buffalo Springfield song into a medley, we usually don't know, or at least not for sure.<p></p><p>The Grateful Dead's 60s history is the opposite. Thanks to Owsley, and a few other fellow travelers, we have a surprisingly good tape record of the band's history. Sure--it isn't anywhere close to complete, but we have tapes of far more Grateful Dead concerts than just about any other 60s rock band that toured heavily--only Frank Zappa's archive is anywhere close. But this leads to the odd scenario where we have complete, or almost complete, tapes of Dead shows, and almost no information about the shows themselves. Were they sold out? Did the play any sets before or after they were taped? Who opened? Did the crowd like it, or did they leave early? We often have no idea. </p><p>On the weekend of August 28-30, 1969, the Grateful Dead played from Thursday to Saturday at the Family Dog on The Great Highway in San Francisco. The Family Dog was Chet Helms' successor to his Avalon Ballroom, where the Dead had played many times from 1966 through 1968. The Family Dog on The Great Highway was far from downtown. The Great Highway is the westernmost road in San Francisco, running right along Ocean Beach. The venue was at an aging amusement park called Playland-At-The_Beach. Helms had taken over the former Edgewater Ballroom (previously Topsy's Roost) and turned it into a rock ballroom. The Dog was a bit smaller than the old Fillmore, and perhaps 60% of the capacity of the Fillmore West. So Helms was competing with Bill Graham again, farther from downtown and not as big. Helms was an underrated entrepreneur, but he wasn't in a great competitive position.</p><p>The Grateful Dead played a remarkable weekend at the Family Dog on The Great Highway from August 28-30, 1969. Thanks to Owsley, we have a pretty good idea of the music played. We know almost nothing else.</p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s400/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="315" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghr5uLz52w4ddIHp3EUajFRmabT3v3X4tlqG_ME5B4CGkqAQ996vp4E1urKa6SC3pNAtIalWqVuaYTs7l82XC0oueRALxpFAxgiZio5eyXI0Txj93_TEMCZ0O6MzVp6FaAEdaMdxZcsnvB/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, ca. 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: left;"><i><b>The Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></i><br />The
Family Dog was a foundation stone in the rise of San Francisco rock,
and it was in operation in various forms from Fall 1965 through the
Summer of 1970. For sound historical reasons, most of the focus on the
Family Dog has been on the original 4-person collective who organized
the first San Francisco Dance Concerts in late 1965, and on their
successor Chet Helms. Helms took over the Family Dog in early 1966, and
after a brief partnership with Bill Graham at the Fillmore, promoted
memorable concerts at the Avalon Ballroom from Spring 1966 through
December 1968. The posters, music and foggy memories of the Avalon are
what made the Family Dog a legendary icon of 60s rock.</p><p style="text-align: left;">In the Summer
of 1969, however, with San Francisco as one of the fulcrums of the rock
music explosion, Chet Helms opened another venue. The Family Dog on The
Great Highway, at 660 Great Highway, on the Western edge of San
Francisco, was only open for 14 months and was not a success. <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/FD%20Shows.htm">Yet numerous interesting bands played there, and remarkable events took place, and they are only documented in a scattered form.</a> </p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidK9c9Ob32yfR-TNEfFVE1zdhfuIdVl_vhbeQi0_wH3BACeZJ3YexFKOhN-eK3TyvbK0vufiZhzkFT-1QFM1siG3-QSOWbfiUZm43RbgnVbUuRxRlTQTVS2J2lQysCvBFdBjWLYNgyVvy-/s501/660+Great+Highway+modelcarraceways1967.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="501" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidK9c9Ob32yfR-TNEfFVE1zdhfuIdVl_vhbeQi0_wH3BACeZJ3YexFKOhN-eK3TyvbK0vufiZhzkFT-1QFM1siG3-QSOWbfiUZm43RbgnVbUuRxRlTQTVS2J2lQysCvBFdBjWLYNgyVvy-/s320/660+Great+Highway+modelcarraceways1967.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>660 Great Highway in San Francisco in 1967, when it was the ModelCar Raceway, a slot car track</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b><br />The Edgewater Ballroom, 660 Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></i><br />As
early as 1913, there were rides and concessions at Ocean Beach in San
Francisco, near the Richmond District. By 1926, they had been
consolidated as Playland-At-The-Beach. The Ocean Beach area included
attractions such as the Sutro Baths and the Cliff House. The San
Francisco Zoo was just south of Playland, having opened in the 1930s.<a href="http://jerrygarciasbrokendownpalaces.blogspot.com/2011/10/family-dog-at-great-highway-660-great.html ">
One of the attractions at Playland was a restaurant called Topsy's
Roost. The restaurant had closed in 1930, and the room became the
Edgewater Ballroom. The Ballroom eventually closed, and Playland went
into decline when its owner died in 1958.</a> By the 1960s, the former Edgewater was a slot car raceway. In early 1969, Chet Helms took over the lease of the old Edgewater. <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s768/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="768" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1H1GxDXyUEmyEsUpr6PjiYhNXECazLP5g1t2Gwfm9a4DqT3bMveNIsODPLa9Af5nb1g4nSUccahNxAdLVGni6KTAM2JpA9VB_uE5wiM8dQRvMK3SwYA-7du-ONjJZcsk98cyamQcJ8-Cg/s320/FDGH+660+Great+Highway+inside.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr style="text-align: left;"><td class="tr-caption"><i>One
of the only photos of the interior of the Family Dog on The Great
Highway (from a Stephen Gaskin "Monday Night Class" ca. October 1969)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br />The Family Dog On The Great Highway</b><br />The
Great Highway is a four-lane road that runs along the Western edge of
San Francisco, right next to Ocean Beach. Downtown San Francisco faces
the Bay, but beyond Golden Gate Park was the Pacific Ocean. The aptly
named Ocean Beach is dramatic and beautiful, but it is mostly windy and
foggy. Much of the West Coast of San Francisco is not even a beach, but
rocky cliffs. There are no roads in San Francisco West of the Great
Highway, so "660 Great Highway" was ample for directions (for reference,
it is near the intersection of Balboa Street and 48th Avenue). The
tag-line "Edge Of The Western World" was not an exaggeration, at least
in North American terms.<br /><br />The Family Dog on The Great Highway was
smaller than the Bill Graham's old Fillmore Auditorium. It could hold up
to 1500, but the official capacity was probably closer to 1000. Unlike
the comparatively centrally located Fillmore West, the FDGH was far from
downtown, far from the Peninsula suburbs, and not particularly easy to
get to from the freeway. For East Bay or Marin residents, the Great
Highway was a formidable trip. The little ballroom was very appealing,
but if you didn't live way out in the Avenues, you had to drive. As a
result, FDGH didn't get a huge number of casual drop-ins from around the Bay Area, and that
didn't help its fortunes. Most of the locals referred to the venue as
"Playland."<p> </p><p style="text-align: left;"><b></b></p><b><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7rNEvKQIxn-U1ewUglMGkZzUttKCgJbBiZzxsH3Kw205NjB0qBCpCrgg06YeaW56313Q_d8zQKLQkZ009ZIrU-HaJl2R_FZSIIdZMK78m6olcFcjDFiCRUvjo-HOqFqWXFC4Fg5ZbcaM/s708/GD+FDGH+19690828+San+Francisco+Good+Times+-+community+28043987+pdf.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="708" data-original-width="622" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7rNEvKQIxn-U1ewUglMGkZzUttKCgJbBiZzxsH3Kw205NjB0qBCpCrgg06YeaW56313Q_d8zQKLQkZ009ZIrU-HaJl2R_FZSIIdZMK78m6olcFcjDFiCRUvjo-HOqFqWXFC4Fg5ZbcaM/s320/GD+FDGH+19690828+San+Francisco+Good+Times+-+community+28043987+pdf.png" width="281" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Thursday (August 28, 1969) SF Good Times shows the added Grateful Dead night on that evening<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />August
28, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, 660 Great Highway, San
Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Mickey Hart and The Hartbeats/New Riders of
The Purple Sage </b><i>(Thursday)</i><br />Prosopographical research on
rock shows at the Family Dog on The Great Highway is closer to
Archeology. We often have very limited information about what shows were
even scheduled, and almost never have information about the bands that
actually played or anything that happened. Since the shows were
generally--apparently--thinly attended, eyewitness accounts on blogs and
message boards are few and far between. For 60s research, Grateful Dead
performances are usually our best hope of getting some information,
since Deadheads and the Grateful Dead cosmos have made a half-century
long effort to document everything.<p></p><p style="text-align: left;">Thursday,
August 28, 1969 <strike>has</strike> had no provenance save for the Grateful Dead. The
Family Dog had advertised the Grateful Dead for Friday and Saturday
(August 29 and 30), supported by the then unknown New Riders of The
Purple Sage, Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen and Rubber Duck.
The Dog pretty much never had shows on Thursday night as part of a
weekend run. Yet the Grateful Dead vault had a tape labeled "Hartbeats"
from the Family Dog, recorded by Owsley Stanley himself, and dated
August 28. It should be noted that Owsley's tape labeling was
known to be scrupulously accurate.</p><p style="text-align: left;"><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/04/hartbeats-family-dog-on-great-highway.html">I speculated about the tape and the mysterious performance in a blog post many years ago</a>.
My speculation at the time, reasonable but in the end incorrect, was
that the Dead had set up their equipment in advance of their weekend
show, and had taken the opportunity to jam a little bit. My blog
Commenters and I generally speculated that this may have been a response
to Jerry Garcia's request at a meeting of The Commons (on Tuesday,
August 12) for the Dog to host jam sessions during the day. There was no
flyer, no advertising, no trace of the event, so the general assumption
was that the hour long tape was members of the Dead having some fun
with some friends.</p><p style="text-align: left;"><i><u><b>Update</b></u>: once I posted this, <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2021/08/august-28-30-1969-family-dog-at-great.html?showComment=1630122778145#c1475453944856434172">fellow scholar David found a contemporary ad for the show from the SF Good Times (above).</a> It seems the Dead added a Thursday night show. <br /></i></p><p style="text-align: left;">The
lineup for the tape was Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann,
Mickey Hart, organist Howard Wales and a brief appearance by a flute
player. Starting back in 1968, Garcia, Lesh, Hart and Kreutzmann had
played some gigs at the Matrix as Mickey Hart and The Hartbeats,
sometimes joined by some guests. They typically played some instrumental
Dead jams and a few blues numbers, which is exactly what transpired on
the tape. It all seemed to fit--a weeknight jam for Garcia, for a few
random hippies, when the Dead's equipment was already set up.</p><p style="text-align: left;"><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/04/hartbeats-family-dog-on-great-highway.html?showComment=1293212962754#c9011734165111993276">Yet one anonymous Commenter said:</a></p><blockquote><i>I was there for the concert on the 28th and remember all the bands
playing, the Dead, New Riders, and Commander Cody. There was also a
short set from Mickey and the Heartbeats which played either during or
after the normal Dead set. The hartbeats did High Heeled Sneakers and
maybe even Schoolgirl. It was a fantastic night.</i></blockquote><p style="text-align: left;">Memories
are a tricky thing, and it was always possible that the Commenter was
remembering Friday or Saturday, or combining Thursday and Friday. But
guess what? It's looking like he remembered pretty well, whoever he (or
she) was.</p><i><b>Update</b>: a correspondent writes</i><br /><blockquote><i>I attended these shows. I have no memory of Commander Cody or Rubber Duck playing at all. Rather, there was a group called Phoenix. The line up was Phoenix as the opener, then New Riders, then the Dead with the bonus Hartbeats one night. There were stages at either end of the hall and while Phoenix was playing at one end, the Riders were setting up at the other and then the Dead while the Riders played. God showed up as well in the form of Pig and Jerry tearing it up and leaving we poor mortals smoking wrecks. When it was over, we stumbled out and across the Great Highway to collapse on the sand and let the crashing surf bring us back to earth.</i></blockquote><p><br /><a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Phoenix.htm">Phoenix was a San Francisco band with roots going back to the Acid Test days (when they were known as Universal Parking Lot)</a>. Is the Internet great or what? It's also fascinating to see that two stages were in use, in a complete break from rock concert orthodoxy.<br /></p><p><br /></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt2GkjggbamzxcKiS7qg_ydK3QzJgF9OYX9qZ7R2Tqa_eWGDsLSKupcrTatS5McavLguEqUrgcN8eptp9TEFSfb3PfXDI9MrEEdxmmnygpKmBugARlkmsxNRzM2gUMhiaTN-YehlN9znaf/s600/Dawn+Of+The+New+Riders+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjt2GkjggbamzxcKiS7qg_ydK3QzJgF9OYX9qZ7R2Tqa_eWGDsLSKupcrTatS5McavLguEqUrgcN8eptp9TEFSfb3PfXDI9MrEEdxmmnygpKmBugARlkmsxNRzM2gUMhiaTN-YehlN9znaf/s320/Dawn+Of+The+New+Riders+cover.jpg" /></a></b></i></div><i><b><br />Dawn Of The New Riders</b></i><br />In early 2020, <a href="https://www.merchmountain.com/products/dawn-of-the-new-riders-of-the-purple-sage">the Owsley Stanley Foundation released a great 5-disc set called <i>Dawn Of The New Riders of The Purple Sage</i></a>.
One of the discs had a complete New Riders set from Thursday, August 28
(see below for the list). As if that wasn't enough, Bob Weir joined the
New Riders for several numbers, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/04/riders-of-purple-sage-old-new-and.html">previewing a never-fulfilled concept called Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck</a>.
So that means Weir was at the Family Dog that night, so a Grateful Dead
set suddenly seems very likely. It remains to be seen whether the Dead
set was recorded by Owsley, and whether it can surface, but given the
paucity of evidence we typically deal with for the Family Dog, I'm going
with the likelihood that the Dead played a set, along with the
"Hartbeats" jam and the New Riders. <br /><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdRdrgKLgCa1luzBSHLVSvuaigJYT2WB3RAdVK1rc-LfJ39mGTcqOI9A-Md4YcrurHVI9F2H8fpyraeap7hntmtYM798CP8zKJ7foTdZXwSNTH5OsOyEHyB6SS3jzDnzlCvYOGyyTk6L_f/s1280/hooteroll+back+cover+1971.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="1280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgdRdrgKLgCa1luzBSHLVSvuaigJYT2WB3RAdVK1rc-LfJ39mGTcqOI9A-Md4YcrurHVI9F2H8fpyraeap7hntmtYM798CP8zKJ7foTdZXwSNTH5OsOyEHyB6SS3jzDnzlCvYOGyyTk6L_f/s320/hooteroll+back+cover+1971.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr style="text-align: left;"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Howard
Wales and Jerry Garcia, from the back cover of their 1971 Hooteroll?
album. Tame as it may seem now, passing a joint on the back cover of
your album was A Statement at the time.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p style="text-align: left;"><i><b>Howard Wales</b></i><br />Over
the years, the most intriguing part about the Family Dog "Hartbeats"
tape was the presence of organist Howard Wales. In a much later
interview, Tom Constanten complained that Wales had "a bigger stack" (of
Leslie Amplifiers, presumably) than him, a whiff that there was some
competition involved. I had always assumed that Wales was sitting in
when TC wasn't there, but now it seems more likely that the whole band
was there, and the Hartbeats jam was something extra. <br /></p><p style="text-align: left;">Now, Howard Wales was an experienced musician and a brilliant player. Wales was from the Cincinnati area, where he had
backed guitarist Lonnie Mack in the mid-60s. Wales then ended up in El
Paso, TX, working in a jazz trio with tenor saxophonist Martin Fierro,
and after that in Seattle. By 1968, Wales had made landfall in San
Francisco. He joined a blues trio that had just moved from Milwaukee,
The New Blues. They became a quartet called the AB Skhy Blues Band. The
band's debut album had been released on MGM in 1969, and they performed
regularly around the Bay Area. </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQTBHWO9ZUVXZGsvanBrTNRgKuJOhMMlB8dPZtwmv2wwLDpE2-pJHnveFRppFZM9GinAYZCcLSuwR5eOFHVH26iSHyZG899TmhwbBdQt1WO-CK-0lxzfpX_Z35EYGAC3OzxZLhxWcVwQI4/s600/AB+Skhy+MGM+lp+1969.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="598" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQTBHWO9ZUVXZGsvanBrTNRgKuJOhMMlB8dPZtwmv2wwLDpE2-pJHnveFRppFZM9GinAYZCcLSuwR5eOFHVH26iSHyZG899TmhwbBdQt1WO-CK-0lxzfpX_Z35EYGAC3OzxZLhxWcVwQI4/s320/AB+Skhy+MGM+lp+1969.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Howard Wales was part of A.B. Skhy when they released their 1969 debut on MGM Records</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Wales
must have met Garcia somewhere. I'm not aware of AB Skhy opening for
the Dead prior to this, and Garcia in general did not "hang out" at the
Avalon or in bars, so it's mysterious how they connected. The geography
of the Family Dog isn't irrelevant here. I don't know where Wales lived,
but it's a safe bet it wasn't out in the essentially suburban Sunset
district. Wales wouldn't have come to the Family Dog at all, and even
less likely if he brought his own organ, without the guarantee of
jamming. The Great Highway was a long way from anywhere, and nobody
jammed with the Dead in '69 unless they were invited, which means they
had received the Garcia seal of approval. So how Wales ended up at the
Family Dog this night is not just a mystery, but part of a larger puzzle
that may never be solved.<p style="text-align: left;">Of course, we now know the story <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-matrix-3138-fillmore-st-san.html">that
Wales and drummer Bill Vitt were managing the Monday night jams at the
Matrix in the Spring of 1970, and Jerry Garcia started showing up</a>.
Garcia showed up because he wanted to jam with Wales. Vitt, in turn,
would invite bassist John Kahn, and Garcia and Kahn's partnership would
begin there. But the roots of it seem to trace back to the Family Dog.
Somehow, Wales was invited to jam with the Hartbeats configuration, and
we even have a tape. A few years later, we had the Howard Wales/Jerry
Garcia album <i>Hooteroll</i>? (released on Douglas/CBS in 1971, but
recorded in October 1970, yet it all seems to have started for
undetermined reasons at an unpublicized Thursday night at the Family
Dog. It's distinctly possible that Garcia had somehow previously jammed
with Wales at the Matrix, a regular jamming site, and invited him out to
the Dog for a more serious go at it. No wonder TC had some anxiety even
years after the fact.<br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b>Known Facts</b><br />
</p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Knowledge of the show comes from a Bear cassette master of the show
labeled "Hartbeats," with the date of the show and the
location. </li><li>Although there are some tape flips and some resulting missing snippets of music, <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/gd69-08-28.sbd.lepley.4234.sbeok.shnf">the tape seems to be 81 minutes and sounds like a complete set.</a></li><li>The band lineup appears to be Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart and organist Howard Wales.</li><li>A flute player joins in at the beginning of "Dark Star," just shy of
the 10-minute mark, but he is hard to hear and seems to drop away </li><li>The Grateful Dead were playing on Friday and Saturday night (August
29-30), so it seems plausible that they might set up their equipment a
day early to have some kind of jam session.</li><li>This is the first time I am aware of Howard Wales playing with Jerry Garcia</li></ul><b>Unknowns</b><br />
<ul style="text-align: left;"><li>I know of no advertisement, notice, flyer or review of this show, and I have looked at just about all of the SF <i>Chronicle </i>and<i> Examiner</i> dates as well as the relevant listings for the Berkeley <i>Barb</i> (and <i>Tribe</i>), and there is no listing or mention for even a "jam session" at the Dog</li><li>Did anyone other than Owsley use the name "Hartbeats" for this show?
Was that just convenient shorthand for a jam, or were they introduced that way? It wasn't actually used in 1968, and
although I'm aware that it appeared on a 1969 bill at the Matrix and
1970 at the Dog and the Matrix, we don't have have tapes of any "Hartbeats" sets at those shows</li><li>It seems logical that the Grateful Dead proper would play a set, and our sole (anonymous) eyewitness recalls that</li><li>It's plausible but uncertain that Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen would play a set. <a href=" https://berkeleyfolk.blogspot.com/2010/09/commander-cody-and-his-lost-planet.html">They were new in town, and would not have been socially connected to the Dead at this point</a>,
so an invitation to a stealth event isn't as likely. In any case, they likely appeared on the next two nights, but we don't positively know
that either (see below for a more thorough discussion
of Cody and the Airmen)<br /></li><li>Who played flute? <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/04/hartbeats-family-dog-on-great-highway.html">I discuss that a little bit here</a>--one possibility is Steve Schuster, another is Andy Kulberg of Blues Project, both socially connected enough to be invited</li></ul><p><b>August 29-30, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco,
CA: Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Commander Cody and His
Lost Planet Airmen/Rubber Duck </b><i>(Friday-Saturday)</i><br />By the
end of August, 1969, the Family Dog on The Great Highway was widely
known to be in poor financial straits. Although some excellent bands had
played the Dog since it had opened in June, save for the opening night
attendance had not apparently been exceptional. There was so little
coverage of Family Dog concerts that we can only infer things like ticket sales, but all the evidence points to underwhelming crowds. Chet
Helms and the Family Dog had significant tax problems stemming from
1967, which had been the Family Dog's most successful year. Helms'
public acknowledgement of his tax problems (in the <i>Examiner</i> and elsewhere) was a clear indicator that the Great Highway shows were not selling well enough to resolve his issues.</p><p>The
Grateful Dead had played the Family Dog at the beginning of the month.
The opening Friday night had been undermined by the brief "strike" of
the Light Show Guild. The Dead had played the next two shows (on
Saturday and Sunday, August 2-3), and the <i>Examiner</i> reported that
Saturday, at least, was a "packed house." We have no idea about Sunday's
crowd. Still, the Grateful Dead were one of the few bands that returned
to the Family Dog over and over, so they must have done alright.
Although the Dead did not yet have a traveling circus of Deadheads
following them around--which was initially an East Coast phenomenon in
any case--the band had a solid core of local fans. Unlike other groups,
when the Dead played all around the Bay Area, they increased their
demand rather than reduced it. So whoever might have been seeing the
Grateful Dead at the Great Highway, returning less than a month after
their last appearance was an attraction, not a detriment.</p><b><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8a3q9xI6Gz8nTLGW3x0iTjvUP5lw_a6K5BpOhmxViN22C5AqStk1gBZKu5hf3aivrks9erIvhcGk9Zui9rVsU5OWD6aNqY9D-OncAF5H6c1PBGIkNYrb0a0GfdmU6NQs0Ia43piZBgno/s788/Wild+West+19690822.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="788" data-original-width="550" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8a3q9xI6Gz8nTLGW3x0iTjvUP5lw_a6K5BpOhmxViN22C5AqStk1gBZKu5hf3aivrks9erIvhcGk9Zui9rVsU5OWD6aNqY9D-OncAF5H6c1PBGIkNYrb0a0GfdmU6NQs0Ia43piZBgno/s320/Wild+West+19690822.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The poster for the canceled Wild West Festival at Kezar Stadium. The Grateful Dead were booked for Friday, August 22, 1969.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table></i></b><b><i><br />Grateful Dead Touring Plans, August 1969</i></b><br />The
Grateful Dead had begun the month of August at the Family Dog, but they
were mostly booked at rock festivals for the month. The Grateful Dead's
bookings were:<br /><blockquote><b>August 1-3, 1969</b> Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA<br /><b>August 16, 1969</b> Woodstock Festival, Bethel, NY<br /><b>August 20, 1969</b> Aqua Theater, Seattle, WA<br /><b>August 22, 1969</b> Wild West Festival, Kezar Stadium, San Francisco, CA<br /><b>August 23, 1969</b> Bullfrog 2 Festival, Mt St Helens, OR<br /><b>August 24, 1969</b> Vancouver Pop Festival, Paradise Valley Resort, Squamish, BC<br /><b>August 29-30, 1969</b> Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA<br /><b>September 1, 1969</b> New Orleans Pop Festival, Baton Rouge Speedway, Prairieville, LA</blockquote><p>Of
course, the Dead's actual performance schedule was quite different.
They didn't play the first night at the Family Dog (August 1), they were
rained out at Aqua Theater and played a bar (<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/august-20-1969-roach-seattle-wa-updated.html">El Roach, Ballard, WA August 20</a>),
and then the Aqua next night (August 21), the Wild West was canceled
(<a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2020/05/new-riders-of-purple-sage-tour-history.html">so NRPS got to play Bullfrog 2 on Friday August 22</a>), they added an extra date at the Family
Dog (August 28) and the band canceled out in British Columbia. Rock
concerts were turning into big money, but the market was far from
stable.</p><p>Still, it's only possible to discern the Dead's touring
schedule without knowing what they had planned, even if it didn't work
out. The Dead's weekend at the Dog at the end of August did not appear
on any schedules or press releases, and wasn't even mentioned in the
newspaper. Indeed, the flyer up top is the only trace of any
advertisement. Now, the Dead were booked as the headliner at the opening
night (Friday August 22) of the canceled Wild West Festival. Since Bill
Graham was booking the Festival, you can take as a guarantee that no
Bay Area Grateful Dead show within 3 weeks of the Festival could be
advertised until after the Festival show. So the Dead may have planned
to play the Dog all along, but they couldn't have announced it in
advance. The fact that there was no mention in the newspapers during the
weekend, either, can be blamed on weak operations by the Dog. The way
the footer of the flyer is written (with days of the week), it's clear
the flyer was made for circulation the next week (August 29-September
4). </p><p>The Dead apparently played on Thursday night, even though we
only have tapes for the New Riders of The Purple Sage and "The
Hartbeats" (the jam with Garcia, Lesh, Kreutzmann, Hart and Howard Wales). Given the precarious financial circumstances of the
Family Dog, my suspicion is that the Dead did not have a guarantee, like
they would have gotten from Bill Graham at the Fillmore West. Rather,
they were getting a percentage of the door, and taking the risk or
reward of the result. That makes sense of the Thursday night show--if
the Dead thought they could get a few more admissions from a casual
Thursday night show, they would take it. Since the band and crew could
sleep at home, there were no travel costs. Publicity probably came from
announcements on KSAN and other fm radio stations. By 1969, newspapers and
posters actually played only a small role in concert promotion,
particularly right around the day of a show.</p><i><b>The New Riders of The Purple Sage</b></i><br />One
significant historical note was that this weekend's booking at the Dog
was the first time in the Bay Area that the New Riders of The Purple
Sage were booked to open for the Grateful Dead, as they would so many
times in the forthcoming years. The band had opened for the Dead at
Longshoreman's Hall back on July 16, but they hadn't been advertised and
the bad didn't have a name. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/02/august-6-9-1969-matrix-san-francisco.html">The New Riders name debuted at the Matrix on August 6</a>, and the Riders had been booked to open at the Aqua Theater in Seattle on August 20 (since it was rained out, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/august-21-1969-aqua-theatre-seattle-wa.html">they actually opened on August 21</a>).
The New Riders had played two gigs on Tuesday nights at the Family Dog
(August 12 and August 19), but the band was still largely unknown to
even the local followers of the Dead. These nights at the Family Dog
were the first of dozens, if not hundreds, of times that the New Riders
would open for the Grateful Dead.<br /><p>At this early stage, the New Riders were</p><blockquote><b>John Dawson</b>-acoustic guitar, vocals<br /><b>Jerry Garcia</b>-pedal steel guitar<br /><b>David Nelson</b>-electric guitar<br /><b>Bob Matthews</b>-bass<br /><b>Mickey Hart</b>-drums </blockquote><p>Bob Matthews was an old Palo Alto friend of the band, and was one of the Grateful Dead's "staff engineers." He had mixed <i>Live/Dead</i> with his girlfriend and partner, Betty Cantor, and the pair would go on to produce <i>Workingman's Dead,</i>
among many other albums. Matthews would give up his career as a
musician at the end of 1969 to focus full time on being a recording
engineer and producer. </p><p>During this period, <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/04/riders-of-purple-sage-old-new-and.html">the Grateful Dead were experimenting with a configuration they called "Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck."</a>
Bob Weir would duet on a few country covers with John Dawson, backed by
the Garcia and the New Riders. Thanks to Owsley, we have a few hints
about this idea, even though it was dropped by 1970 ( a few of the
tracks from the August 29 and 30 show were released on the Owsley
Stanley Foundation 5-disc box <a href="https://www.merchmountain.com/products/dawn-of-the-new-riders-of-the-purple-sage"><i>Dawn Of The New Riders of The Purple Sage</i></a>). <br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSdLdOO27VaDSHbBkq1gaSAJPXD1iIl5T-M-yXEDz4Qumr2mzxhmAw_UxlBrNibH3K54XIpdnfx1PaHn2aHdO2GXY24YYx2NFf0UPwa50kYBUQKxTN6xtj5jDj4iyaWHoyANoq1_1In7l6/s1842/Cody+Michigan+69+%2528Barb+19690811%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1456" data-original-width="1842" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSdLdOO27VaDSHbBkq1gaSAJPXD1iIl5T-M-yXEDz4Qumr2mzxhmAw_UxlBrNibH3K54XIpdnfx1PaHn2aHdO2GXY24YYx2NFf0UPwa50kYBUQKxTN6xtj5jDj4iyaWHoyANoq1_1In7l6/s320/Cody+Michigan+69+%2528Barb+19690811%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A
photo of Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, ca 1969, published
in the August 11, 1969 Berkeley Barb. The photo was probably taken a few
months earlier in Ann Arbor, MI<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b><br />Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, Ann Arbor, MI 1967-69</b></i><br />
University of Michigan graduate students George Frayne (Fine Arts,
piano) and John Tichy (Physics, guitar) had formed the group in Ann
Arbor in 1967 as Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, as an homage
to an obscure movie serial (actually called Kommando Kody). The group
was a loose aggregation of local musicians, and was a continuation of a
band that Frayne and Tichy had begun as undergraduates. Although the
story got changed and embellished with each telling, it does seem that
the band chose the name and then had to “decide” who was “Commander
Cody,” since people kept asking. For obscure reasons, George Frayne was designated as Commander Cody.<br />
<br />
George Frayne had received his MFA in Spring 1968 and got a position
teaching Art at the University of Wisconsin at Oshkosh (the main campus
was at Madison—Oshkosh was a satellite). The Commander Cody band
continued on with various members throughout the 1968-69 school year.
Frayne did come home to play with Commander Cody on weekends, but
ultimately the band “fired” him in order to be able to play more gigs.
The Commander Cody band was particularly interested in playing “honky
tonk” country music, in a Bakersfield style that was distinct from the
fashion popular in Nashville, as well as rocked up versions of Texas
Swing music, all of which was largely lost on the R&B-oriented fans
in Michigan. The band finally ground to a halt in the Spring of 1969
when guitarist Bill Kirchen headed out West to California. <ul><li><b>Billy C Farlow</b>-vocals, harmonica, acoustic guitar<br /></li><li><b>Bill Kirchen</b>-lead guitar, trombone, vocals</li><li><b>Steve “West Virginia Creeper” Davis</b>-pedal steel guitar</li><li><b>Andy Stein</b>-fiddle, tenor sax</li><li><b>George “Commander Cody” Frayne</b>-piano</li><li><b>Lance Dickerson-</b>drums</li><li><b>Gene Tortora</b>-bass </li></ul><p>When some of the Ann Arbor crowd found a gig in San Francisco, the call went out to the rest of the band. <a href="https://berkeleyfolk.blogspot.com/2010/09/commander-cody-and-his-lost-planet.html ">The story is somewhat complicated, but fortunately I wrote it all out elsewhere</a>.
By July 1969, the Lost Planet Airmen had assembled in Berkeley. They
"debuted" on Telegraph Avenue, playing acoustic (Frayne on accordian) in
front of Cody's Books, although--in perfect Berkeley fashion--they were
soon interrupted by a riot. The band found a house in Emeryville, and
started to book gigs. <br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj4S5koooZwq-UZeV7Oxggo4bH24ZflnG1v1VWMBjzXkpP2fhceLiJzuwG2K_KpWrgYiWO-H5tPEasr6bXNWk5PvXkwDGEWkn0iuINt27X4M7AS_CLM8T43odIWVefduCeRNQlSl66L21l/s1044/Commander+Cody+Band+House%252C+Emeryville.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="730" data-original-width="1044" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgj4S5koooZwq-UZeV7Oxggo4bH24ZflnG1v1VWMBjzXkpP2fhceLiJzuwG2K_KpWrgYiWO-H5tPEasr6bXNWk5PvXkwDGEWkn0iuINt27X4M7AS_CLM8T43odIWVefduCeRNQlSl66L21l/s320/Commander+Cody+Band+House%252C+Emeryville.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Emeryville, CA house on the left was reputedly the "band house" for Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, ca 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />According to an article by <i>Rolling Stone</i> writer Ed Ward (RIP), Cody and The Airmen debuted at audition night at <a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/08/1048-university-avenue-berkeley.html?showComment=1289243032365#c1499614575025640249">a Berkeley club called Mandrake’s, at 1048 University (near San Pablo Avenue).</a>
Mandrake’s was a little beer joint that generally featured blues and
danceable rock. The Cody crew had so many friends from Ann Arbor that
they managed to pack the place on a weeknight, so they were immediately
booked. While the Cody band was a terrific outfit, it was a fact that
Ann Arborites moved to Berkeley with their social life intact, so Cody
already had a built in fanbase in Berkeley.<br />
<br />
The Airmen's integration into Berkeley was so seamless that their
audition show at Mandrake's was reviewed in the next week's Berkeley <i>Barb</i> (August 11, 1969).
Clearly written by a friend of the band, the article included a photo
of the group (above) and the headline "Real Country Rock." <a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/08/1048-university-avenue-berkeley.html?showComment=1292830200179#c3759951002218021648">However,
a waitress who worked at Madrake's at the time thinks that the photo
was not from the club, although she recognizes Cody and the Airmen circa
1969</a>. We have assumed the photo was taken in Michigan, and given to the <i>Barb</i> writer for publication, but I would love to know exactly where it was taken.<p>Since
their appearance at Mandrake's, the Airmen had hustled their way onto
the bill at one of the Wild West Benefit shows at the Family Dog
(Saturday, August 23), and then played some sort of "Golf Festival" at
the San Francisco Jewish Community Center. Thus their weekend booking
with the Dead at the Family Dog was only the second time the band had
been advertised in the Bay Area. An eyewitness (above) recalled Cody and the
Airmen playing Thursday (August 28) as well, but we have no way of
determining that yet.</p><p><b>Rubber Duck</b> featured mime Joe McCord,
backed by musicians who
improvised behind him. McCord's backing band fluctuated, and on occasion
even included Jerry Garcia and Tom Constanten, but it's unlikely
(though not impossible) that they performed with him this night.
Typically McCord was backed by Berkeley musicians, who often included
drummer Chicken Hirsh, bassist Tom Glass (aka poster artist Ned Lamont)
and keyboard player Toni Brown (<a href="https://jgmf.blogspot.com/2011/03/nrps-june-2-3-1970-mandrakes-berkeley.html">for more on the McCord/Garcia connection, see the Comment Thread here</a>). In 1971, Constanten would perform in the group Touchstone, who released the album <i>Tarot</i>, apparently the music used to back McCord.<br /></p><p><i><b>What Happened?</b></i><br />As
always with the Family Dog on The Great Highway, we don't really know.
Thanks to Mr Owsley, we know the shows occurred, because we have tapes
for the Grateful Dead and the New Riders. The extant Dead tapes are
about 90 minutes, so it seems pretty likely that the Dead played one
long set each night. Maybe we are missing an encore or a fragment or
something, but the sets seem pretty complete. We have one eyewitness
comment, from Saturday night. <a href="https://archive.org/details/gd69-08-30.sbd.barbella.8594.sbeok.shnf">On the archive, Commenter @cvdoregon says</a></p><blockquote><i>I was with the Poppycock Light Show company and we did this show. It was
fantastic! I spent time with Jerry Garcia backstage and the rest of the
band. Loved every minute of it. Great memory...although we were all
pretty stoned =)</i></blockquote><p><a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2020/07/palo-alto-psychedelic-rock-shows-1969.html">The Poppycock was a rock club in Palo Alto</a>.
Other than his comment, however, we don't really know anything. Were
the shows packed? Empty? Since the Dead came back regularly to the Dog, they must
have done pretty well, but we can't tell much beyond that. Some fine music
got played, but we are left to wonder what it was really like. </p><p><i><b>Appendix: Setlists</b></i><b> </b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><i>Setlist</i>: New Riders of The Purple Sage, August 28, 1969, Family Dog</b> <b>on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA</b></p><blockquote style="text-align: left;"><b>John Dawson</b>-acoustic guitar, vocals<br /><b>Jerry Garcia</b>-pedal steel guitar<br /><b>David Nelson</b>-electric guitar<br /><b>Bob Matthews</b>-bass<br /><b>Mickey Hart</b>-drums </blockquote><blockquote><b>Six Days On The Road</b> (<i>Dave Dudley-1963</i>)<br /><b>I Am Your Man</b> (<i>John Dawson original</i>)<br /><b>Last Lonely Eagle</b> (<i>John Dawson original</i>)<br /><b>Whatcha Gonna Do</b> (<i>John Dawson original</i>)<br /><i>[introducing the famous Bobby Ace]</i><br /><b>Mama Tried </b>[w/Bob Weir] (<i>Merle Haggard-1968</i>)<br /><b>Cathy's Clown</b> [w/Bob Weir] (<i>Everly Brother-1960</i>)<br /><b>Old, Old House</b> [w/Bob Weir] (<i>George Jones-1965</i>)<br /><b>Me And My Uncle</b> [w/Bob Weir] (<i>Judy Collins-1964</i>) <br /><b>Seasons Of The Heart </b>[w/Bob Weir] (<i>George Jones-1965</i>)<br /><b>Slewfoot</b> [w/Bob Weir] (<i>Porter Wagoner-1966</i>)</blockquote><p><i>note: save for the Dawson songs, I have listed the best known cover versions, not the songwriters</i><b><br /></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b><i>Setlist</i>: Hartbeats, August 28, 1969, Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, C</b><br /></p><blockquote><b>Jerry Garcia</b>-guitar, vocals<br /><b>Howard Wales</b>-organ<br /><b>Phil Lesh</b>-bass<br /><b>Bill Kreutzmann</b>-drums<br /><b>Mickey Hart</b>-drums<br /><i>#unknown</i>-flute (<i>"Dark Star Jam"</i>)</blockquote><b>It's A Sin<br />High Heeled Sneakers<br />Dark Star Jam#><br /> The Eleven Jam><br /> Dark Star Jam</b><p><b><u>New Riders of The Purple Sage, August 29, 1969, Family Dog on The Great Highway</u><i><br /></i>To Have the Hurting End</b><i> </i><b><i>(John Dawson original)</i></b><br /><b>Games People Play</b> <i>(Joe South-1968)</i><br /><b>All I Ever Wanted</b> <i>(John Dawson original)</i><br /><b>Connection</b> <i>(Rolling Stones, from Between The Buttons-1967)</i><br /><b>Mama Tried </b>[w/Bob Weir] <i>(Merle Haggard-1968)</i><br /><b>Cathy's Clown</b> [w/Bob Weir] <i>(Everly Brothers-1960)</i><br /><b>Fair Chance to Know</b> <i>(John Dawson original)</i><br /><b>Seasons of My Heart</b> [w/Bob Weir)] <i>(George Jones-1965)</i> <br /></p><div><u><b>Grateful Dead, August 29, 1969, Family Dog on The Great Highway [[1:19:54]</b></u><br /><b>Casey Jones</b> [5:08] ; [0:10] ; </div><div><b>Easy Wind</b> [7:55] ; [0:18] ;</div><div><b>Me And My Uncle</b> [3:07] > </div><div> <b>High Time</b> [7:03] ; [1:03] ; </div><div><b>New Orleans</b> [3:24] > </div><div> <b>Searchin</b>' [3:21] > </div><div> <b>Good Lovin' Jam </b>[0:26] > </div><div> <b>Good Lovin'</b> [4:#00] ; [0:30] ; </div><div><b>Dire Wolf</b> [4:28] > </div><div> <b>King Bee</b> [7:38] ; [0:15] ; </div><div><b>Turn On Your Love Light </b>[30:07] ; [0:43]<br />
<div> </div><u><b>New Riders of The Purple Sage, August 30, 1969, Family Dog on The Great Highway</b></u><br /><b>Superman</b> <i>(John Dawson original)</i><br /><b>Henry</b> <i>(John Dawson original)</i><br /><b>All I Ever Wanted</b> <i>(John Dawson original)</i><br /><b>Last Lonely Eagle</b> <i>(John Dawson original)</i><br /><b>Saw Mill</b> [w/ Bob Weir] <i>(Buck Owens-1963)</i><br /><b>Whatcha Gonna Do</b> <i>(John Dawson original)</i><br /><b>Cathy's Clown</b> [w/Bob Weir] <i>(Everly Brothers-1960)</i><br /><b>Mama Tried </b>[w/Bob Weir] <i>(Merle Haggard-1968)</i><br /><b>Six Days On The Road</b> <i>(Dave Dudley-1963)</i> </div><div> </div><u><b>Grateful Dead, August 30, 1969 Family Dog on the Great Highway [1:27:42]</b></u><br /><b>China Cat Sunflower</b> [2:55] > <br /> <b>Jam</b> [2:43] > <br /> <b>Doin' That Rag</b> [7:42] ; [0:47] ; <br /><b>Morning Dew</b> [10:47] ; [0:25] ; <br /><b>Easy Wind</b> [8:20] ; [0:10] % [0:04] ; <br /><b>Dark Star</b> [28:52] > <br /> <b>St. Stephen</b> [6:26] > <br /> <b>The Eleven</b> [6:35] > <br /> <b>Drums</b> [5:14] > <br /> <b>High Time</b> [5:38] ; [1:04]<p> </p><br />Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-78328507905602415942021-05-14T07:51:00.004-07:002022-04-15T16:48:06.798-07:00December 31, 1969 Boston Tea Party, Boston, MA: Grateful Dead/Livingston Taylor/The Proposition<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtk_ZRxJqwZSbVc6PO6lN8Xr_zNcPrda_x_p1hFc9Y3H44DKS7qkl4L0RkE3uwjBe5rNYCRR7j72lR7zAmpMtsQnaifdfTGxS9sSzJ3CXOeUMU4UeMralnMpWvfYUuVCXZXTcopYMfzW8/s640/GD+19691229+Boston.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="418" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtk_ZRxJqwZSbVc6PO6lN8Xr_zNcPrda_x_p1hFc9Y3H44DKS7qkl4L0RkE3uwjBe5rNYCRR7j72lR7zAmpMtsQnaifdfTGxS9sSzJ3CXOeUMU4UeMralnMpWvfYUuVCXZXTcopYMfzW8/s320/GD+19691229+Boston.jpg" /></a></div><p><br />The Grateful Dead rose to prominence from the 1970s with financial anchors in certain strongholds that allowed them to tour in the points in between. The strongholds ensured their survival while the newly-conquered territory was subdued. In the early 1970s, for example, Grateful Dead concerts were a guaranteed success in Northern New Jersey, Philadelphia and Boston. From there, they extended their reach into New England, Upstate New York and the New South. It was a logical strategy, whether for a military empire or a touring rock band.</p><p>The Grateful Dead had mostly laid the groundwork for their 70s success in the 60s. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/12/roosevelt-stadium-danforth-ave-and-nj.html">They had played many New York Metro gigs before they solidified New Jersey</a>. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/12/the-grateful-dead-electric-factory-and.html">The band had played some famous shows in Philadelphia in the 60s, too, even if it took a little longer to conquer the state</a>. But what about Boston? From about 1972 onwards, the Dead could count on Boston as a solid gig, with loyal fans and good ticket sales. In Deadhead lore, the fact that Boston was the site of the Dead's only New Year's Eve show outside of San Francisco or Oakland ensures Boston's status. </p><p>Yet the Grateful Dead's New Year's Eve 69/70 show at the Boston Tea Party stands in stark contrast to the Dead's history in Boston. Boston was a hugely important rock city in the 1960s, yet the Dead had little to do with it until that New Year's Eve. Still--being late to the party doesn't mean you can't have a good time. This post will analyze how little is actually known about the Dead's New Year's Eve weekend in Boston, and how intermittent their previous efforts had been in Boston Metro. The Grateful Dead played three nights (December 29-31 '69) at the Tea Party, culminating in New Year's Eve. When the Dead played New Year's Eve '69, they played for promoter Don Law. Law was the Bill Graham of Boston, although he he had a much lower profile. But the Dead hadn't played for Law until just three months earlier. The Dead came to Boston late, but strong.<br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzVNHnicOGnl2-Hl4hfvJ13V1kPnNXdfPNDPMJyn0QQ6fip5KttliEaFyCBMP5Icr4_0ijTAeErMwW0Rs1Y4bV96Bf12tCkVEsYwf7ZqGSoZjOCx_cE_q2heQ-vicak3YKl_yxoL5_CmE/s1738/live%253Adead+album.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1736" data-original-width="1738" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzVNHnicOGnl2-Hl4hfvJ13V1kPnNXdfPNDPMJyn0QQ6fip5KttliEaFyCBMP5Icr4_0ijTAeErMwW0Rs1Y4bV96Bf12tCkVEsYwf7ZqGSoZjOCx_cE_q2heQ-vicak3YKl_yxoL5_CmE/s320/live%253Adead+album.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Warner Brothers released Live/Dead in November 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>December 31, 1969 Boston Tea Party, Boston, MA: Grateful Dead/Livingston Taylor/The Proposition</b><br />Let me start by dismissing the main point. It's true that we have quality soundboard tapes of all three nights of the December '69 stand in Boston. In that sense, all of these shows are "known," in that many Deadheads have listened to those sets many times. But the shows are largely devoid of context. There aren't pictures of the band on stage at the Tea Party--if there is, please send them or link them--and save for brief reviews of the opening set on December 29, the only eyewitness accounts are mainly of the "I was tripping" variety. Because of the Dead's limited Boston 60s footprint, there is only a vague hint of how the Dead were perceived as similar or distinct from other contemporaries. Boston 60s rock music history is rich and well-documented, befitting a University town, but the Dead have little to do with it.<p></p><p>Because of the tape, and a general familiarity with Grateful Dead posters, plenty of 'Heads recognize the Boston Tea Party as a venue. When the Dead played New Years Eve '69, the Tea Party was at 15 Landsdowne Street, across the street from the outfield of Fenway Park. The Tea Party was Boston's foundational psychedelic venue, opening on January 20, 1967 at 53 Berkeley Street (at Appleton), in the South End neighborhood. Yet the Dead never played the original Tea Party. By the time the band played there, the Tea Party had moved a mile and half away to 15 Landsdowne Street, in the Kenmore Square district. Lots of music had happened in Boston in the 60s, but the Dead weren't the ones playing it.</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRXNWBR3HZ8a18GgD53Fv8FVaUwvHP-T6Anyn8dJLZFIyem_pjwsvEGxc9gruSEORGmFE5LRVALyiE7dsfyge4Vkr9254-nlm2QcKLhSTKvz-UXvsgNiJ6PXCyMPZbL6kohz2OOki20wI/s606/The+Proposition+ad+6+Mar+1969%252C+20+-+The+Boston+Globe+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="430" data-original-width="606" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRXNWBR3HZ8a18GgD53Fv8FVaUwvHP-T6Anyn8dJLZFIyem_pjwsvEGxc9gruSEORGmFE5LRVALyiE7dsfyge4Vkr9254-nlm2QcKLhSTKvz-UXvsgNiJ6PXCyMPZbL6kohz2OOki20wI/s320/The+Proposition+ad+6+Mar+1969%252C+20+-+The+Boston+Globe+at+Newspapers+com.png" width="320" /></a></div><br />The Grateful Dead New Year's show at Boston Tea Party were opened by an improvisational comedy troupe called The Proposition, itself a unique event. The Proposition, like Second City in Chicago or The Committee in San Francisco, had a little theater (at Inman Square, across the Charles River in Cambridge) and created improvised routines for every audience. The Proposition's claim, apparently, was that rather than doing unscripted but previously performed sketches, each Proposition performance was newly improvised based on suggestions by that night's audience. In that sense, The Proposition were an appropriate opener for the Dead, committing every night's chance to their skill at inventing art out of thin air.<p></p><p>The Proposition had about a half-dozen members, apparently, possibly on a somewhat rotating basis. I know of no tapes of their performances, even when they moved to New York in 1971. One of the cast regulars, however, was future <i>Saturday Night Live</i> player Jane Curtin. Curtin had dropped out of her junior year at Northeastern University to make a full-time go at the theater. Given the long, complicated history of <i>SNL</i> with the Grateful Dead, it is largely unremarked that Curtin opened for the Dead before the Blues Brothers ever did, and that the likes of Al Franken and Tom Davis would have been in awe when they found out. Did they find out? Curtin has never mentioned it, and I only figured it out by searching out the few archive postings from eyewitnesses. It's possible that the <i>SNL</i> crew didn't realize that Jane Curtin had out-Jerry'd them all.<br /></p><p>In another break from Fillmore West orthodoxy, local folkie Livingston Taylor played between Dead sets. Now, even the Fillmore West and the Avalon occasionally had acoustic sets between acts, but not between Grateful Dead sets. Livingston Taylor was two years younger than his brother James. At this time, James Taylor had just released one obscure album on Apple Records in 1968. Livingston had been playing in the Boston area since 1966 and had at least a local name. He played in a bluesier style than his older brother. Livingston, managed by Don Law, would be signed to Capricorn Records, the Allman Brothers Band's label, and release his first (self-titled) album sometime in 1970. I'm not aware of any published recollections by Livingston Taylor of his time opening for the Dead (please Comment or link if you know one).</p><p>So: we can confirm three nights of fantastic music by the Grateful Dead. A future Television comic idol opened the New Year's show. Another opening act was not a complete unknown. Yet, the taped music appears seemingly from behind a closed door. This post will look at what little can be discerned from the Dead's strangely ineffective efforts to make it in Boston in the 60s, belying the fact that they hit the New England jackpot in the 70s.<br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDad2auDoEDTfkqaXKU2ZJivP6511mP3VFDNjFs9zwr6uurfT2f8QmClDNYwrfchf-WOW4eneYw32BovGG65ZRL-mpNW9_RvTp_41DSEUx2RynE_0c2IHMKVsJ7nvPPYDwcHddiDol0IM/s1024/Boston+Tea+Party+debut+19670120.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="732" data-original-width="1024" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDad2auDoEDTfkqaXKU2ZJivP6511mP3VFDNjFs9zwr6uurfT2f8QmClDNYwrfchf-WOW4eneYw32BovGG65ZRL-mpNW9_RvTp_41DSEUx2RynE_0c2IHMKVsJ7nvPPYDwcHddiDol0IM/s320/Boston+Tea+Party+debut+19670120.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><i><b>The Boston Tea Party and Psychedelic Rock Music in Boston and Cambridge</b></i><br />Boston, MA is a huge city, and it has numerous important colleges and universities. Some of the most famous schools--Harvard and MIT, for example--are actually in the city of Cambridge, just across the Charles River from Boston, but broadly speaking they are all part of the Boston Metropolitan Area. The "Great Folk Scare" of the late 1950s started in Cambridge and Greenwich Village. Former Palo Alto High School student Joan Baez, a recent arrival (her Professor father had transferred from Stanford to MIT in her Senior year) came to notice in Cambridge around 1960. Folk music is outside the scope of this blog (for a great eyewitness account, see the book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Baby-Let-Follow-You-Down/dp/0870239252"><i>Baby Let Me Follow You Down</i> by Eric Von Schmidt and Jim Rooney</a>), but the early folk music explosion was essential to the rock music that would follow, and Cambridge was a wellspring.<p>The British Invasion landed hard on Boston and New England. The Boston and Cambridge area had numerous colleges--Harvard, MIT, Boston University, Northeastern, Brandeis, Tufts, and many others--and of course the surrounding suburbs had an infinite number of high school students. There were plenty of rock bands throughout New England inspired by or just emulating the Beatles and Stones, but that also is too gigantic a subject to even consider here. By early 1967, word had spread from San Francisco of another model, bands playing there own music in a big room where everyone could just dance, with a total immersion of lights and sounds. Boston was no backwater--they were going to have their own psychedelic ballroom, and the Boston Tea Party opened on January 20, 1967.</p><p>Initially, the bands that played at Boston Tea Party were just regional bands. The first headliners, for example, The Lost, were from Plainfield, VT. They had released a few singles on Capitol, and played various places, but they hadn't been out of New England. <a href="https://www.mmone.org/the-lost/ willie alexander">Their leader was Willie Alexander, mildly familiar to anyone who had too many records in the 1970s</a>. For the second weekend, The Lost were joined by The Hallucinations, from Boston. Lead singer Peter Wolf and drummer Stephen Jo Bladd would end up in the J Geils Band a few years later. </p><p>The Tea Party's initial profile was similar to the early Fillmore, with a predominance of hip bands from within driving distance. At first, the Tea Party was only open on weekends, a sign of a club finding its footing. Since it didn't sell beer, teenagers were welcome, a significant commercial point. Out-of-town bands only started to appear in late Spring, with David Blue and the American Patrol (April 28-29) and the Velvet Underground (May 26-27) from Manhattan. Still, the Tea Party was tiny. The official capacity of the Berkeley Street venue was 550. While that was no doubt periodically exceeded, for comparison, the official capacity of Keystone Berkeley was 476, and the original Fillmore about 1500. In 1968, the Tea Party added another fire escape and the official capacity was raided to 720, but even so it was just half the size of the Fillmore.<br /></p><p>By the Summer of 1967, there were plenty of visiting bands: Peanut Butter Conspiracy (July 14-15, from LA), Larry Coryell and the Free Spirits (July 21-22, Greenwich Village) and The Paupers (July 28-29, from Toronto). The first Fillmore visitation was by Country Joe and The Fish on August 25-26 (<a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20150408223912/http://wbcnthefilm.weebly.com/boston-tea-party-schedule-1967---1970.html">for a complete listing of known Boston Tea Party shows, see here</a>).</p><i><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghfx1HQJ_gZWQUGDRBRjEXfs2AxyrSBYzvSWVIFI97Irt1CsjK1k_TKP72jxbskdWc0V_6yZ_kMUtnauYrvfs1EQQDjp8IR8co02-lY_eX7GwYxvAjnzuGx5ESzrwCMA3Is2EbCRfQ4ms/s626/GD+Supermarket+19671208.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="626" data-original-width="477" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghfx1HQJ_gZWQUGDRBRjEXfs2AxyrSBYzvSWVIFI97Irt1CsjK1k_TKP72jxbskdWc0V_6yZ_kMUtnauYrvfs1EQQDjp8IR8co02-lY_eX7GwYxvAjnzuGx5ESzrwCMA3Is2EbCRfQ4ms/s320/GD+Supermarket+19671208.jpg" /></a></div><br />The Psychedelic Supermarket</b></i><br />Not surprisingly, a competitor to the Boston Tea Party soon arose. T<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/11/psychedelic-supermarket-boston-ma-1967.html">he Psychedelic Supermarket was a converted parking garage, with grim acoustics to match. The official address was 590 Commonwealth Avenue, near Kenmore Square, but the actual location was in an alley backing on to Boston University</a>. Owner George Papadopolis had run a coffee house called The Unicorn that had booked folk acts, and later electric bands, so he was a more experienced operator than the hippie-ish Tea Party team. <br /><p>Initially, there had been a new psychedelic ballroom called The Crosstown Bus, in suburban Brighton, but it folded after a few dates. The Bus, however, had booked Cream for a week, and <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/05/august-19-september-5-1967-axis.html">since their epic appearance at the Fillmore in August</a>, the deal was too good to waste. Papadopolis apparently had been planning to convert the parking garage into a venue anyway, but he did so earlier to accommodate the Cream booking. The Psychedelic Supermarket had great bookings, but it's not remembered fondly by fans or patrons: the sound was lousy, the room uninviting, and Papadopolis had no reputation for generosity.</p><p>Lawrence Azrin, a former Boston disc jockey, <a href="http://punkblowfish.com/BostonClubsSixties.html ">has some biting reflections on the Psychedelic Supermarket</a></p><p></p><blockquote><i>The Psychedelic Supermarket (located where Kix and the Nickelodeon Cinema in Kenmore Square are now) was a blatant attempt by George Popadopolis to cash in on a trend. He had run the Unicorn, a Boston folk club, for some years before deciding to expand in early 1968. Seating of 300 was in the lower tier of a garage that was completely concrete, except for the stage. Cream played a memorable gig there in February '68 [sic] not to mention Janis Joplin and the Holding Company. Stories of Popadopolis' financial finagling are a legend.. . groups would cancel contracts and leave because they would be paid less for long stands. The exposure was supposed to make up for the lesser pay!! One out of two bands would leave a gig after one set for various reasons and regular club-goers remember him raising ticket prices from $4.50 to $5.50 when he knew that a show was going to sell out. </i></blockquote><p></p><p>The exceptional economic dynamic of late 60s Boston rock concerts was the multiple promoters. There was no Bill Graham figure dominating the landscape. Ironically, the Boston rock market was very robust, with college students and suburban high schoolers, and plenty of venues. Big touring bands could play lucrative college gigs or a variety of sports arenas and theaters. There were plenty of great rock concerts in Boston in the late 60s, but they were at numerous different places. <br /></p><p><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/03/atwood-hall-clark-university-worcester.html">The Grateful Dead introduced themselves to Boston by playing the Psychedelic Supermarket on the weekend of December 8-9, 1967. The band also fit in a Saturday afternoon show (December 9) at Clark University in Worcester, about an hour away</a>. I'm pretty sure the band played another weekend at the Supermarket on December 29-30, but I have been unable to confirm that. We know they played Manhattan before and after Christmas, and we know they did not play the Fillmore New Year's Eve, as they were out of town. All signs point to Boston, but I can't find a firm trace.</p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpjXsq_74K7fIFYy57Qi_dV3tPawKa3giX0uNaS6V6ZamSUDbyDqUT3LLkzVWYk5ySpPb_zzjaxok8foHbUQHuX4eOM6cBy02iMhSGmuptSXRIbavw7U5dfOes4YGLaQnwZXJaT4EK46E/s274/Van+Morrison+Tea+Party+19680531.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="274" data-original-width="184" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpjXsq_74K7fIFYy57Qi_dV3tPawKa3giX0uNaS6V6ZamSUDbyDqUT3LLkzVWYk5ySpPb_zzjaxok8foHbUQHuX4eOM6cBy02iMhSGmuptSXRIbavw7U5dfOes4YGLaQnwZXJaT4EK46E/s0/Van+Morrison+Tea+Party+19680531.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Van Morrison Controversy and Ill Wind were booked at the Boston Tea Party (at 53 Berkeley Street) for the weekend of May 31-June 1, 1968. The Ill Wind released a 1968 album on ABC called Flashes. Lead guitarist Ken Frankel had played in bluegrass bands with Jerry Garcia in 1962-63.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></b></i><i><b><br />Boston Rock 1968</b></i><br />Rock music exploded in Boston 1968. Unlike many cities, the Grateful Dead played no part. The story is too long to tell here, but here are a few highlights:<ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The original Boston Tea Party partners (Ray Riepen and David Hahn) added another one, Boston University student Don Law Jr. Don Law's father had been a staff producer for Columbia Records. Law Sr had produced Robert Johnson's only recording session in San Antonio, and he had run Columbia's country music division in Nashville since 1952, working with major Columbia stars like Johnny Cash. Law Sr had even produced Marty Robbins' "El Paso." Although Law Sr had taken mandatory retirement in 1967, he was still an independent producer. His son was just a student, but he had been born into the popular music business.</li><li>The Boston Tea Party bet heavily on touring bands, particularly English ones. Throughout 1968, plenty of English rock legends came through; Procol Harum, the Yardbirds, Traffic, Jeff Beck Group, Ten Years After and more. Many of those bands would play Fillmore East as well as the Tea Party, as did some San Francisco bands like Steve Miller or Quicksilver. The Psychedelic Supermarket still booked shows, but the Tea Party was the place that everyone remembers.</li><li>On March 15, 1968, WBCN-fm was the first underground rock music station in the Boston area. Don Law and Ray Riepen were the owners. Initially they broadcast out of a dressing room at the Tea Party. The most popular all-night dj was a jive talker called The Woofuh Goofuh. A true Boston legend--apocryphally, many came down from a long acid trip listening to Woofuh Goofuh jiving and playing blues and R&B records far into the night--his rein ended around December 1968. The Woofuh Goofuh was Peter Wolf, lead singer of the Hallucinations. When that band broke up, and Wolf joined the J Geils Band, he had to give up the dj gig. WBCN went on to become the dominant rock station in the region.<br /></li><li>MGM Records signed a bunch of up-and-coming Boston bands, like Ultimate Spinach, Beacon Street Union and Orpheus. MGM staff producer Alan Lorber, declared that Boston was the next San Francisco. Lorber coined the catch-phrase "The Bosstown Sound." <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosstown_Sound">The bands were actually pretty good, but there wasn't a "Boss-Town sound." The ad campaign backfired. Hippies were suspicious of anything promoted by "The Man." </a>So some good Boston bands got overlooked because the rest of the country's hippies thought they were just hype. The Bosstown Sound debacle was a cautionary tale for record industry promotions of underground bands for the balance of the 20th century.<br /></li></ul><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9lAAohot0-CaePrFtnnLKxmqs3Jcosls34bm702w8rHODGBWpx27u2maYXmyWpe6qWK_pkEu1h_IL_GiSinFEzHq-hM179jWbGZv8AkzQgsDyr8HvEdtmGgGCpM9sjg3JfyfTUReyyvw/s614/The+Ark+Theater+Boston+Globe+19690314.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="614" data-original-width="580" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9lAAohot0-CaePrFtnnLKxmqs3Jcosls34bm702w8rHODGBWpx27u2maYXmyWpe6qWK_pkEu1h_IL_GiSinFEzHq-hM179jWbGZv8AkzQgsDyr8HvEdtmGgGCpM9sjg3JfyfTUReyyvw/s320/The+Ark+Theater+Boston+Globe+19690314.png" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>An ad in the March 14, 1969 Boston Globe for Theater events at The Ark on 15 Landsdowne Street. A rock show was held on the weekend (in this case Charlie Musselwhite and Elephant's Memory, Friday and Saturday, March 21-22)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>The Ark, 15 Landsdowne Street, Boston, MA Winter and Spring 1969</b><br />For whatever reasons, the Grateful Dead were never booked at the Boston Tea Party. I myself don't think there was any complicated reason. I think the Dead shows in Boston in 1967 had been poorly attended, so there wasn't any impetus to book them. The band's two albums weren't exactly radio-friendly, even when WBCN-fm's underground sound came on the air. So the Dead never got booked. This would finally change in April 1969 when The Ark opened.<p></p><p>By early 1969, the Boston Tea Party was the flagship of Boston's underground rock scene. The Psychedelic Supermarket hadn't exactly closed, but it was only booking shows intermittently (by this time using the name The Unicorn, which had been the name of Papadopolis' folk club). A<a href="https://www.mmone.org/15-lansdowne-street/ ">bout a mile and half from the Tea Party, neophyte promoter Charlie Thibeaux built a rock club over at 15 Landsdowne Street. The club didn't do well, actually, but it marked the beginning of making the Kenmore Square neighborhood into a leading music and entertainment district for Boston</a>.</p><p>Although it is easy to google the Boston Tea Party, the Psychedelic Supermarket and The Ark with reference to the 60s, there is almost no systematic information about the period. Lots of people refer to the glory of 60s Boston, but the views are largely impressionistic, or based on somewhat vague websites focusing rather narrowly on posters. One of these days, not today, I will post my Boston chronology, but that is a mammoth project even by my standards. Certainly, there is no useful information about The Ark, so I will try and summarize that here. </p><p>The Ark had opened on Friday, January 24, 1969. The model of The Ark
seemed to be a Boston variation on New York's Electric Circus. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/10/may-7-9-1968-electric-circus-23-st.html">I went
into the peculiar history of the Electric Circus when I discussed the
Dead's appearance there in 1968,</a> so I won't recap it all here. Suffice
to say the Circus had multiple stories, and was more of an
"environment." Any performing rock band was just one element of the
evening.</p><p>The Ark had three stories, and it is generally referred
to in the Boston <i>Globe</i> as a "disco." There must have been a stage on one of
the stories, but I assume the other two were for hanging out or dancing. In
general, it seems that the Ark had a live band on Thursday, Friday and
Saturday, and for the rest of the week they presented theater events on
the stage. I know little about theater, but the performances seemed to
have been pretty forward looking stuff: Bread And Puppet Theater, The SF
Mime Troupe and so on. For music, there was usually a more modest act
on Thursday, joined by a higher profile headliner for Friday and
Saturday.</p><p>The two original owners of the Boston Tea Party had capitalized the club with just $850 in early 1967, and the venue was heavily dependent on volunteer labor. The Ark, in contrast, besides founder Charlie Thibeau, had 17 stockholders. Per the Boston <i>Globe</i>, they were "local doctors, university people and businessmen." The Globe said that 10 of the 26 employees of The Ark were full-time. <br /></p><p>On The Ark's opening night, January 24, the headliners
were the Los Angeles band Spirit, joined by The Bar-Kays, Otis Redding's
backing band. No one in Boston seems to have noticed Spirit, however, since over at the
Tea Party that weekend was the debut of Led Zeppelin (Thursday through
Sunday, January 23-26), whose debut album had just been released. Those
with too many records will note the irony of Randy California and Led
Zeppelin debuting the same weekend in Boston. I have
compiled a list of every booked music act at The Ark (forthcoming), and they included
the Flying Burrito Brothers (March 6-7) and Taj Mahal (April 4-6) from
the West Coast. <br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhn9qrV0EFyz0PIKIZYs3POJu7ejBq_LiSkqRdGK1OIMsGWCnVcmFgj5IltiOX0QksRvw9BZPXNE_U__W7-4Fts0zZPfpJwsg7I9uyyfR4PsB5ihCCqreAR9XAZOeXnf64lSPMrWztJT0I/s425/GD+The+Ark+19690421.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="425" data-original-width="347" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhn9qrV0EFyz0PIKIZYs3POJu7ejBq_LiSkqRdGK1OIMsGWCnVcmFgj5IltiOX0QksRvw9BZPXNE_U__W7-4Fts0zZPfpJwsg7I9uyyfR4PsB5ihCCqreAR9XAZOeXnf64lSPMrWztJT0I/s320/GD+The+Ark+19690421.jpg" /></a></div><br />The Grateful Dead were booked April 21 through 23, a Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. This in itself was a strange booking. Most "psychedelic" ballrooms weren't open except on weekends, although even the Tea Party had started to add such dates. When bands were on the road, and had a few days off between weekends, why not play a few weeknight gigs, and take the door? Otherwise, they would be making no money. This was particularly true with English bands on the road, which is why you see weekday bookings at the Tea Party for UK bands in 1969.<br /><p></p><p>The Dead were playing Clark University in Worcester again on Saturday (ultimately rescheduled to Sunday, April 20), and they had a big weekend booking at the Electric Theater in Chicago (on April 25-26). So they had nothing else to do, and of course no money--so why not take a flyer on an unknown, brand new psychedelic ballroom with an inexperienced promoter?</p><p>It is remarkable, and generally unremarked, how many chances the Grateful Dead took on the road with rookie promoters in strange cities. Whether Charlie Thibeau called the Dead, or the Dead called The Ark, the Tea Party didn't have a pre-existing connection to the band. In any case, even if the Dead weren't popular in Boston, they were still infamous, and for a new club, that mattered. So the band played three April weeknights in Boston.</p><p>The weekend before the Grateful Dead, the headliners at The Ark had been the Greenwich Village band Cat Mother and The All-Night Newsboys. They had just released their debut album on Elektra, <i>The Street Giveth...And The Street Taketh Away</i>, produced by no less than Jimi Hendrix. Both Cat Mother and Hendrix shared manager Mike Jeffery. Cat Mother was booked for Thursday through Saturday, April 17-19. The Grateful Dead's Monday-through-Wednesday
booking at The Ark seems to have been the first weeknight music booking at the venue.</p><p>Since all three nights of the Grateful Dead performances at The Ark were taped and preserved, more or less in their entirety, Deadheads feel that they "know" these shows. And they do, up to a point. But an abstract listening to a live recording is just a single window. Were the shows crowded? Did the audience like the Grateful Dead, or were they just there for a party? Did people wander over from the disco, or did concertgoers wander out? It was a weeknight--when did the Dead start playing and when did they finish? Was there any opening act? We have the tapes--it's the Dead--but we really have no sense of what the shows were like. <br /></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_5qHdfBMCt6V0sI1jBJLspxaoB0NUTfq_zt4SvMoGPdvKQ5s8-shHRTPrKUeGPWKw9_kwVi-91TzccpV6NbIe-p-yANgZUEYYvRT8_l73cNo0c2HIoT83ALhoXCkL6m0qMWiIhiRzlCo/s1098/Kaleidoscope+The+Ark+19690620+20+Jun+1969%252C+15+-+The+Boston+Globe+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="822" data-original-width="1098" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_5qHdfBMCt6V0sI1jBJLspxaoB0NUTfq_zt4SvMoGPdvKQ5s8-shHRTPrKUeGPWKw9_kwVi-91TzccpV6NbIe-p-yANgZUEYYvRT8_l73cNo0c2HIoT83ALhoXCkL6m0qMWiIhiRzlCo/s320/Kaleidoscope+The+Ark+19690620+20+Jun+1969%252C+15+-+The+Boston+Globe+at+Newspapers+com.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>David Lindley and Kaleidoscope played The Ark on June 20-21, 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b><br />What Do We Know About The Ark?</b></i><br />As is typical of late 60s Boston rock history, there is far less information circulating than you would expect. This effect is magnified by the fact that the Tea Party moved to the site of The Ark in July 1969. Many old Boston hippies referred to the Landsdowne Street Tea Party as "The Ark," whether because they forgot, or liked to show off that they knew the difference (in San Francisco, the comparison was referring to the Fillmore West as the Carousel long after Bill Graham took it over and renamed it). When Ned Lagin, for example, refers to having first seen the Grateful Dead at The Ark in 1969, we don't know if it was at the actual Ark (April 21-23 '69) or the Tea Party (Oct 2-4 and Dec 29-31 '69). This confusion riddles what few memoirs there are about Boston rock history.<p></p><p>An article in The Harvard <i>Crimson</i> student newspaper (published February 28 1969) by regular <i>Crimson</i> rock writer Salahuddin I. Imam entitled “Boston’s
White Rock Palaces” described the original Berkeley Street Tea Party as </p><p></p><blockquote><i>a large
square hall with a low stage. When it is full of people, as it often is,
the performers seem very close to the crowd nearly submerged by
it—which makes it all very warm and intimate—not intimidating as is the
case in some circus-like arenas. The simplicity of the setup does mean
that acoustics are virtually non-existent, but that is made up for by
the immediacy and directness of the sound, which comes out quite
powerfully amplified over the speaker system.” </i></blockquote>The article ads “the crowds are hip, or perhaps too hip, because there is almost no dancing at the Tea Party. But then its probably just as well that people listen attentively to good music.<p></p><p>About The Ark, Imam said</p><p></p><blockquote><p><i>The building and the whole of the main dance hall of the Ark, a newly
opened club, is much more interesting than the Tea Party's box-like
shape. Not surprisingly, the major emphasis at the Ark is on creating an
elaborate and stylized fantasy environment, with the music as more a
contributing than dominating factor. This effort at atmosphere is
sometimes pursued a little too relentlessly but the overall result is
nevertheless an interesting, sometimes fascinating, blend of modern
multi-media techniques. The walls curve and sway, the floor winds
round and round in ramps that dip and rise. Most of the ground is
covered in thick blue carpeting expect for the main dance floor, which
is to be painted in bright colors. </i></p><p><i>With all this structural complexity
there is much acoustic modulation. The sound has definite variations in
texture (depending on where you are in the building) though the volume
is never weak anywhere, owing to the incredibly expensive and
sophisticated sound system that the club uses. Surprisingly the system
sounds best when records are being played between sets. One area of
the floor is ringed by tent-like walls and you feel like walls and you
feel like you're in the middle of a growing plant. Another, a raised
section, is entirely strobe lit, great waterfalls of light white light,
and people dance as if bathing. EVERY INCH of wall space is covered
with light shows of various kinds indifferent themes, with pictures
ranging from ten foot high shots of Janis Joplin's singing face to
Egyptian hieroglyphics. Fascinating things happen in isolated corners
with the slides, but these shows are in fact all pre-programmed by
computer; there is not the spontaneity and musical relevance of the Tea
Party's light show, but rather a static grace. </i></p><p><i>The groups that play at
the Ark are not established rock groups, which is in line with the
club's intent of emphasizing the whole experience--light and colors and
sound rather than solely the musical. Occasionally one is able to catch a
really fine group that has not yet made its name. One such was a group
called Man, who did a remarkable, aggressive gig recently at the Ark.
Dancing is not frowned upon at the Ark as it is at the Tea Party and
most people do take to the floor at some tome or other, though one is
slightly dwarfted by the cavernous height of the ceiling. The Ark
caters to a different set of interests than the Tea Party and does it's
thing pretty well.</i></p></blockquote><p></p><p><i><b>July 1969: The Ark Merges with The Boston Tea Party</b></i><br />The July 10, 1969 Boston <i>Globe</i> reported that Boston's two major rock venues would be merging over the weekend. The Tea Party would produce their final show at the Berkeley Street location on Friday, July 11. Appropriately enough, the Velvet Underground were the headliners. Starting Saturday, July 12, all the scheduled Tea Party shows would move to 15 Lansdowne Street. The first headliner was Larry Coryell.<br /><br />The Globe article makes it seem like a merger of equals, but I doubt that was the case. The Tea Party team was in control of the new venue. Ray Riepen was chairman of the operating entity (Environmental Arts Inc), while Ark founder Charles Thibeau was Chairman of the Board. Donald Law Jr was the actual General Manager of the new club. The implication of the article is that the 17 stockholders of The Ark have an ownership in the merged Tea Party organization. The <i>Globe</i> also points out that Riepen is President and a major stockholder of WBCN-fm, ultimately a far more valuable proposition than a rock club.</p><p>The article makes clear that Boston does not have room for two rock-only venues. In sum, the Tea Party had the underground credibility and the connections to booking touring English rock bands, but the club was too small. The larger Ark had not really been a success, even though some good bands passed through. The final concert at The Ark had been The Mothers Of Invention on Tuesday, July 8 (<a href="https://www.discogs.com/Franks-Mothers-Of-Invention-The-Ark/master/81067">bootlegged and later officially released by Zappa</a>). </p><p>Once the Boston Tea Party took over the 15 Landsdowne site, I am unaware if any of the other features of The Ark were in use. Were there still 3 floors, multiple environments, a discoteque and weeknight theater performances? I am unaware of any such things, but reflections on the Boston Tea Party are fairly narrow, so it's hard to say. </p><p><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuuhT5C-fT_6nHK6k6plmxOGiJWaAmqshTmN0KzzTd0U2dmL7RkeFVGHiJjpQlVtRxDRoCG80QNTZLH-lQ4BTB6sSuMXpuUHGCWJDb1gkrgaECHP11yhjuvQlx9HCj-2GrzPb35r35BII/s640/GD+Boston+19691002.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="424" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuuhT5C-fT_6nHK6k6plmxOGiJWaAmqshTmN0KzzTd0U2dmL7RkeFVGHiJjpQlVtRxDRoCG80QNTZLH-lQ4BTB6sSuMXpuUHGCWJDb1gkrgaECHP11yhjuvQlx9HCj-2GrzPb35r35BII/s320/GD+Boston+19691002.jpg" /></a></b></div><b><br />October 2-4, 1969 Boston Tea Party, Boston, MA: Grateful Dead/Doc and Merle Watson </b><i>(Thursday-Saturday)</i><br />The Grateful Dead returned to 15 Landsdowne Street for three nights in early October. We have no tapes, so the concerts have disappeared in collective Deadhead memory, as if they didn't occur. A commenter on Dead.net recalls attending one of the shows, and that Doc and Merle Watson opened. Doc Watson was a huge influence on Jerry Garcia, particularly as an acoustic performer (just listen to Doc, and you'll see). The poster had the immortal Bonzo Dog Band as the opening act. Awesome as it would have been for the Bonzos to confront Garcia and Pigpen with the age-old question "Can blue men sing the whites?," it wasn't to be. The second US tour by the Bonzos was apparently a mess, and they only played a few gigs, not including Boston. So Don Law would have had to find another opener, and he couldn't have done better than Doc Watson.<p></p><p>The October shows must have gone well, because Don Law invited the Dead back for New Years Eve. He must have offered them good money, too. Now, granted, a place like The Tea Party, in a town like Boston, depended on hip prestige, so even in 1969, snagging San Francisco homeboys for a Boston celebration was going to stand out. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQJ0MAQvs7lont6JfFuA0-gc9F3JsueUvUfIudobWIKzO_evz5vmhl9AVSaos7Qv2SjvIe7iog3uFJFt2AR_-CBhPkclTyNmsvPax_JozDpWIuYNJz89B6pCecGmt3MIehicu9sPmsm9w/s563/Boston+GD+19691123.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="563" data-original-width="354" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQJ0MAQvs7lont6JfFuA0-gc9F3JsueUvUfIudobWIKzO_evz5vmhl9AVSaos7Qv2SjvIe7iog3uFJFt2AR_-CBhPkclTyNmsvPax_JozDpWIuYNJz89B6pCecGmt3MIehicu9sPmsm9w/s320/Boston+GD+19691123.jpg" /></a></div><b>November 23, 1969 Boston Music Hall, Boston, MA: Grateful Dead/Country Joe and The Fish/Pacific Gas and Electric </b><i>(Sunday) 6:15 and 9:30 pm</i><br />Rather inexplicably, in between the October and December Tea Party weekends, the Grateful Dead were booked for a Sunday night show at the Boston Music Hall. They were scheduled for two shows, sharing with Country Joe and The Fish as headliners. The Dead (nor Country Joe) were not touring the East, so they would have had to fly out for the shows, and then fly home again. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/04/november-23-1969-boston-music-hall.htm ">I had seen the ad for years, and had always assumed the show was canceled</a>.<p></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghNmfy86I0SiT6jKVMxndDX4lUCeZtA_nkGfCGBlwyUwgiW4OsmzmqtDY3H2HOwuDLbEdgUY0DYP6kmdgCF5mKYae9I17IfM_AB62DaQNSroBWlwT1UtVestfT7gRpM8KyA6eBW2hHFZ8/s745/GD+Boston+ticket+19691123+copy.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="527" data-original-width="745" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghNmfy86I0SiT6jKVMxndDX4lUCeZtA_nkGfCGBlwyUwgiW4OsmzmqtDY3H2HOwuDLbEdgUY0DYP6kmdgCF5mKYae9I17IfM_AB62DaQNSroBWlwT1UtVestfT7gRpM8KyA6eBW2hHFZ8/s320/GD+Boston+ticket+19691123+copy.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Grateful Dead were on the ticket for the November 23, 1969 Boston Music Hall show, but they were replaced by The Youngbloods</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />I have since found out the show was not canceled, but the November 21 (Friday) <i>Globe</i> reported that the Dead were replaced on the bill by The Youngbloods. Given that the Dead would have been booked into the Tea Party for New Year's Eve by this time, Don Law could not have let this booking stand. My suspicion is that this was Lenny Hart's work. Booking a one-off show out of town, in contravention to another booking, only makes sense if proper management--as in "profitable" and "not-crooked"--were not part of the equation. <p></p><p>Nonetheless, even though the Dead canceled out of the November '69 Music Hall show, it's still informative about the Boston rock market. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wang_Theatre">The Boston Music Hall at 268 Tremont Street</a>, in which the Dead would play epic shows a few years later, was much larger than the Tea Party, with a capacity of 4225. A promoter was bringing in two big San Francisco bands to compete directly for the concert dollar with Law's Tea Party. It was essential for Law to ensure that the Tea Party at least had the lock on being the coolest place in town, since it couldn't be the most profitable.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiinZIwDJSEWrkdCib-Hz5RmtSzjeTs_RahI_qlb_gK0-hLf5owYGRCu-GiDBg2GRISwTzOlhIWE3ACljUypn3noU1929pCwM3PN2Byo0xhRahGeSeX6fIVB1iLdgripR8tQTNbb_k15eg/s640/Boston+Herald+article+19691230.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="259" data-original-width="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiinZIwDJSEWrkdCib-Hz5RmtSzjeTs_RahI_qlb_gK0-hLf5owYGRCu-GiDBg2GRISwTzOlhIWE3ACljUypn3noU1929pCwM3PN2Byo0xhRahGeSeX6fIVB1iLdgripR8tQTNbb_k15eg/s320/Boston+Herald+article+19691230.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Tim Crouse's article in the Boston Herald, December 3, 1969</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>December 29-30, 1969 Boston Tea Party, Boston, MA: Grateful Dead</b><br /><a href="http://www.gratefulseconds.com/2017/12/jerry-says-it-looks-like-70s-are-gonna.html">Fellow scholar Grateful Seconds</a> found two brief reviews of the Grateful Dead's opening night in December. Tim Crouse of the Boston <i>Herald</i> describes what apparently was the writing of "Mason's Children," and mentions that it ended the first set. He also mentions that the band opened with "Mama Tried", and praises the fact of no opener.<p></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcp_3Q0gcHj9BZbzAESAd3jlfUmv_BIoBErxb0yNpOie8NTcYHO-P4objsar94nSLjMDhMtrFkdtZXpJqWf8BZT00Iq25rZO1y32O4GmEB0M3fuBzKRDufFpLXbdHC_q9i9cEdaIlDy4o/s493/19691230+The+Boston+Globe+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="440" data-original-width="493" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcp_3Q0gcHj9BZbzAESAd3jlfUmv_BIoBErxb0yNpOie8NTcYHO-P4objsar94nSLjMDhMtrFkdtZXpJqWf8BZT00Iq25rZO1y32O4GmEB0M3fuBzKRDufFpLXbdHC_q9i9cEdaIlDy4o/s320/19691230+The+Boston+Globe+at+Newspapers+com.png" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Charles Martin's review of the Grateful Dead's opening set from the December 30, 1969 Boston Globe</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Similarly, Charles Martin of the Boston Globe mentions that the concert began at 9:10pm with "a moving song" and the first set ended "The Mason Song." For those of you not familiar with the ways of 20th century rock critics, it is clear that neither writer stayed past the first set. It's possible that either of the writers likely had a deadline to meet and could not stay late in any case, but it's also possible that one or both may not have wanted to stay through the whole thing. So we know a little about the first set of the first night, but not much else.<br /><p></p><p><b>New Year's Eve 1969-70, 15 Landsdowne Street, Boston, MA</b><br />We would like to say that the Grateful Dead's New Year's Eve show at the Boston Tea Party was the stuff of legends. But we don't really know that. Sure, the tape is great, but the Dead were killing it at the end of '69, so that in itself was to be expected. We don't really know if the weekend was sold out, if the sound was good, or what the crowd thought. There are a few hints from the Archive, typical of almost every Grateful Dead New Year's Eve show:</p><p><a href="https://archive.org/details/gd69-12-31.sbd.gardner.7373.sbeok.shnf"></a></p><blockquote><i><a href="https://archive.org/details/gd69-12-31.sbd.gardner.7373.sbeok.shnf">Howdy - Yes, I was there when this was played that very night</a>. Good dear
friend Marshall Goldberg was the sound engineer/designer for the Ark and
the Tea Pary (when it was absorbed later on at the Landsdowne Street
venue). The Ark was designed and built by Intermedia Systems
Corporation, which, in 1969, did the logistics for Woodstock. I worked
for them during this phase. Hi to Gerd Stern and Stuart Vidockler and
George Litvin! Google those names for a ride through the acid-drenched
'60s.<br />Livingston Taylor was on this bill, as was an improv group,
Cambridge Light and Power, which oddly enough, was the previous tenant
in what became Intermedia's new home base in 1969 - 711 Mass. Ave.
Intermedia bought the only recording studio in Boston at that time -
Petrucci and Atwell - and they are the name on some of the Timothy Leary
recordings.<br /><br />Great show. Went 'til sun-up. Everyone was dosed.
EVERYONE. This includes Don Law, the manager of the Ark, who tried in
vane to NOT get conditioned (someone got to his corked/sealed bottle of
Mateus). The memory of him being escorted off of the stage as he asked
the balloon-screeching audience "Have you all lost your minds?" Good
entertainment there!</i></blockquote><p></p><p><i><a href="https://archive.org/details/gd69-12-30.sbd.miller.28469.sbeok.shnf"></a></i></p><blockquote><p><i><a href="https://archive.org/details/gd69-12-30.sbd.miller.28469.sbeok.shnf">I just got a call from a friend wishing me a Happy New year and he reminded me about us going to this show 40 years ago! </a>I did a search for
it and found this sirte.... freakin amazing!<br /><br />The show opened
with Jane Curtin of Saturday Night Live fame way before she broke onto
the scene nationally doing some wicked funny stand up comedy and
Livingston Taylor (James's little bro) doing some bits of stand up
between sets... I was tripping my brains out on Blue Barrel acid and he
kept inhaling helium from a balloon and speaking which was way freakish
and annoying at the time but funny in retrospect haha...<br /><br />They
played one of the most amazing moving rocking life changing shows till
4AM and I can remember everything from the exploding tie-dye paint
splatter pulsating walls light show to the amazing vibe that only the
Dead can create like it was yesterday! This is the Dead at their finest!</i></p></blockquote><b><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGpezlFLsLjTyft2bPqBTUii86OarqzkUUR2xrbvJZeNL-5dxiDmEEbq2gfiKZwXLQythIOwhxOhxeHG78CzqxwYuQEOioatBeCyOYnszjDZYQ2vHPHD2un6npx-Alf3J8qmRRrVYGrvI/s800/MIT+Free+Concert+19700506.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="709" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGpezlFLsLjTyft2bPqBTUii86OarqzkUUR2xrbvJZeNL-5dxiDmEEbq2gfiKZwXLQythIOwhxOhxeHG78CzqxwYuQEOioatBeCyOYnszjDZYQ2vHPHD2un6npx-Alf3J8qmRRrVYGrvI/s320/MIT+Free+Concert+19700506.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The MIT student paper (The Tech) from May 6, 1970, carefully noting that there will <u>not</u> be a free concert by the Grateful Dead<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table></i></b><b><i><br />Aftermath: The Grateful Dead in Boston 1970-94</i></b><br />It took the Grateful Dead a little while to get established in Boston. After New Year's Eve, they only returned in the summer for a show at MIT. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/first-free-grateful-dead-concert-in.html">Being the Dead, however, they played a free concert at the school in Kresge Plaza, cementing their legend in Boston</a>. The Kresge Plaza show took place during an anti-war demonstration following the Kent State disaster, so it memorialized the Dead in Boston consciousness. Any band could have played for free the afternoon of May 6, 1970, but it was the Dead who did it (as a footnote, <a href="https://jerrybase.com/events/19700509-01">the New Riders played a free concert in downtown Boston a few days later, but no one remembers that one</a>).<p>The Grateful Dead returned to Boston regularly for the next few years, playing a variety of places for different promoters. The biggest show was in Boston Gardens on April 2, 1973, where the show was promoted by Buffalo promoter (and now convicted rapist) Harvey Weinstein. Weinstein's firm also promoted the December 1973 Music Hall shows. I can't tell who promoted the June 28 1974 show at the Garden.</p><p>The Boston Tea Party had closed at the end of 1970, too small to compete in the growing rock market. Don Law went on to become a successful concert promoter in the Boston and New England area. Whatever exactly had happened on New Years Eve '69--which everyone seems vague about--it all paid off in a big way. Starting in 1975, Don Law began promoting shows by Jerry Garcia (April 6 by Legion Of Mary, for one) and Kingfish as well. When the Grateful Dead returned to the road in Summer '76, it was Don Law putting on the Boston shows at the Music Hall. To my knowledge, it was Don Law's company that promoted the Dead at every Boston show until their final stand there on October 3, 1994.</p>In 2009, <a href="http://www.boston.com/ae/music/articles/2009/05/22/live_music_czar_law_returns_to_roots_of_his_success/?page=1">the Boston <i>Globe</i> summarized Law's career</a>:<br /><blockquote><i>After managing small acts in college and running the legendary Back Bay nightclub Boston Tea Party, he went on to either build, manage, book, or own everything from Great Woods and The Orpheum to the Worcester Centrum and the Providence Civic Center to the Cape Cod Coliseum, the old Harborlights, the Paradise, Avalon, and Axis. But in 1998, in a surprising move, he sold the Don Law Company for a reported $80 million to SFX Entertainment and signed a five-year management contract. Two years later, Clear Channel Communications bought SFX and named Law president of its New England division. In 2005, Clear Channel spun off its concert arm into a new company, Live Nation. </i></blockquote><p>Just like the Bill Graham organization, however, the Grateful Dead were far and away the most profitable act on the live concert circuit. When BGP was sold, the news reported that while the Dead only represented 5% of the company's revenue, it was 25% of the profits. Don Law was hugely successful, and he had earned the trust of Garcia and Dead back when it mattered, but with the big guy gone, Law hit the bid and stepped aside. Whatever happened on New Year's Eve 1969, it established the Grateful Dead in Boston for the coming decades, and anchored the business of the promoter who took the chance on them.
<br /> </p><br />Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-33739779589614172742021-03-24T17:47:00.003-07:002021-04-07T13:32:43.726-07:00August 19-September 4, 1967 (Forces Tear Loose From The Axis)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYhF2lTiP9y7jdCefSgdgXbBbAwNjY-xKLGh0sJgaaAGYcdlfoFLnpBpkL6wnWCS75i_igU0xj9bekRdBaxjQTPMxmr2fv7Lo8fPfRc4AcNlDMymMP0tKFR6-qas4xvFEVhgmrb5g8iFM/s705/the-grateful-dead+dark+star+45+warner-bros.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="705" data-original-width="687" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiYhF2lTiP9y7jdCefSgdgXbBbAwNjY-xKLGh0sJgaaAGYcdlfoFLnpBpkL6wnWCS75i_igU0xj9bekRdBaxjQTPMxmr2fv7Lo8fPfRc4AcNlDMymMP0tKFR6-qas4xvFEVhgmrb5g8iFM/s320/the-grateful-dead+dark+star+45+warner-bros.jpg" /></a></div><br />Grateful Dead history is so full of events that most historians deal with it serially. Each stream of the band's history tends to be reviewed in isolation, in order to keep the myriad details from flooding the zone and eradicating any chance for coherence. This was particularly true in the 1960s, when much was happening in the world, and Grateful Dead World itself was a vortex of events that often threatened to drown the band members at the center of The Singularity.<br />
<br />
Once in a while, however, it's a valuable effort to consider Time in its own terms, just to see how much was happening. One such sliver of time was the 18 days in 1967 from Saturday, August 19 through Monday, September 4. So many things happened in Grateful Dead history during this brief period, most of them fairly well documented, but usually only discussed in isolation. For today, let's consider them in order, as they happened.<p></p><i><b>Summary</b></i><br />Between August 19 and September 4, 1967, quite a lot happened in the world of the Grateful Dead:<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The band played five shows, in four venues</li><li>Jerry Garcia and Mountain Girl went camping [<i><b>update</b>: <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/05/august-19-september-5-1967-axis.html?showComment=1616732863174#c4616540007081357025">fellow scholar LIA sorted out some timeline details,</a> so I updated the post accordingly</i>]<br /></li><li>Cream played two weeks at the Fillmore, and reshaped the possibilities of electric music in ways that would greatly favor the Grateful Dead</li><li>Jerry Garcia saw at least two and likely more of those Cream shows</li><li>Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann met</li><li>After hitchhiking throughout the Southwest, Robert Hunter returned to San Francisco at Jerry Garcia's request, and joined the Grateful Dead as house songwriter</li><li>Hunter wrote the lyrics to "Dark Star."</li></ul><p>
<i><b></b></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUPhUrJUGGbJLHf1T0X6hFAJvKkT1NpwLSHE9QjnOh1cBwocaakiT8OmqGMGCM9duNXZGOxoOoWtv89ctAwUM5Oda6zCFeFPDVUnhQ6ISCxS-SLEi3514HPoo_F54DfrulxJRjNsRGXig/s600/Grateful+Dead+debut+1967.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="598" data-original-width="600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUPhUrJUGGbJLHf1T0X6hFAJvKkT1NpwLSHE9QjnOh1cBwocaakiT8OmqGMGCM9duNXZGOxoOoWtv89ctAwUM5Oda6zCFeFPDVUnhQ6ISCxS-SLEi3514HPoo_F54DfrulxJRjNsRGXig/s320/Grateful+Dead+debut+1967.jpg" width="320" /></a></b></i></div><i><b><br />The Players</b></i><br /><b>The Grateful Dead</b><br />The Grateful Dead had released their debut album back on Warner Brothers back in March. It hadn't done particularly well, but releasing an album made a local band into a "real" band. The group was gigging steadily, and actually making a living. The band lived together at 710 Ashbury (except for Phil Lesh and Bill Kreutzmann, who lived on Belvedere street, nearby). The entire country was now aware of San Francisco bands, and 1967 was "The Summer Of Love." The Grateful Dead were San Francisco's official ambassadors of hippiedom, playing for free in Golden Gate Park and elsewhere. The five band members had been in the group together since June, 1965.<p></p><p></p><p>During our two-weeks-plus stretch, the Grateful Dead would play five shows<br /></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>August 19, 1967 American Legion Hall, South Lake Tahoe, CA: Grateful Dead</li><li>August 25-26, 1967 Kings Beach Bowl, North Lake Tahoe, CA: Grateful Dead/The Creators</li><li>August 28, 1967 Lindley Meadows, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA: Big Brother and The Holding Company/Grateful Dead "Party for Chocolate George"</li><li>September 3, 1967 Dance Hall, Rio Nido, CA: Grateful Dead</li></ul><b>Robert Hunter</b><br />In the mid-60s, Robert Hunter had been focused on making a living as a writer. He had played in a bluegrass trio with his best friends Jerry Garcia and David Nelson, but had been bumped aside for better musicians. In late 1966, Jerry Garcia had encouraged Hunter to come to Los Angeles to help the Grateful Dead record their album in a Hollywood studio. Hunter had declined. Although the details have always been a bit murky, At some point in the Spring, Hunter had sent Garcia a letter with some proposed song lyrics. Also, by Spring 1967, Hunter was concerned about his own excesses with methedrine, and had departed to New Mexico, probably around June. <div> <br /></div><div>Around July, after having spent a month or so in New Mexico, recovering from various past excess, Hunter received a letter from Jerry Garcia, telling him that the band was rehearsing the song "Alligator," using lyrics that Hunter had sent him. Jerry encouraged him to join the band (McNally p. 219). Hunter considered his options, which were probably few, and decided to head back to San Francisco and join Garcia and the Dead.<br /></div><p>
</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_pIj3towaOG6t7WAkV0DkCaUVnTnNnBNmTWWHBt6_9lkT253vRTY5zJ2vHfhmh33OMap9qr7u33cQonxd4FHRW5jRmLt0h_bpD8GQ6KbFZvDI0zl7IEyilgkaFDlFQ3zcY4Iv7LuWIg4/s1237/Hart+Music+Ad.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="872" data-original-width="1237" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_pIj3towaOG6t7WAkV0DkCaUVnTnNnBNmTWWHBt6_9lkT253vRTY5zJ2vHfhmh33OMap9qr7u33cQonxd4FHRW5jRmLt0h_bpD8GQ6KbFZvDI0zl7IEyilgkaFDlFQ3zcY4Iv7LuWIg4/s320/Hart+Music+Ad.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>Mickey Hart</b><br />In the Summer of 1967, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/08/hart-music-894-laurel-avenue-san-carlos.html">Mickey Hart was mainly a drum instructor and instrument salesman at his father's drum shop, Hart Music in San Carlos</a>. He lived with one of his students (probably in a suburban garage apartment). He played a little bit in bands, and also spent time riding horses and practicing martial arts. Hart had played about in a few groups, and he knew a lot of drummers, but he wasn't really part of the local rock music scene.<p></p><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLXgTfvBqsY8qYH75O-KibQ7fFyYosw8aKgW2LnVK1VWWwM3P3IvfJfYL8SlrCyeGn-UaEG3pE5dgPpFaroHGiyOmAV7z8SAfJJxSWT-ApH51-a61P01JMmTGwMHXhjgV8DU3mXinL96M/s400/Fresh+Cream+lp+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="393" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLXgTfvBqsY8qYH75O-KibQ7fFyYosw8aKgW2LnVK1VWWwM3P3IvfJfYL8SlrCyeGn-UaEG3pE5dgPpFaroHGiyOmAV7z8SAfJJxSWT-ApH51-a61P01JMmTGwMHXhjgV8DU3mXinL96M/s320/Fresh+Cream+lp+cover.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><b>Cream</b></div><div>Cream had formed in London in 1966. Guitarist Eric Clapton had become a star, having success with the Yardbirds and "For Your Love" and then with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers. Bassist Jack Bruce and drummer Ginger Baker had been in the popular Graham Bond Organization, as well some other bands. When they formed, music papers like <i>Melody Maker</i> had them pegged as an All-Star organisation from their inception. Cream's debut album <i>Fresh Cream</i> had been released on Atco in December, 1966.</div><div><br /></div><div>In March, 1967, the Cream had played a corny radio event in Manhattan at the RKO Theater (nine shows from March 25-April 2, where they played one or two songs with a plethora of other groups). The band had returned to New York in May, 1967 to record their forthcoming album, but it would not be released until later in the year (the staggering <i>Disraeli Gears</i> was released in November 1967). Cream would begin their American tour with ten nights at the Fillmore Auditorium from August 22 through September 3, 1967.<br /></div><p><i><b>Day-By-Day: August 19-September 4, 1967</b></i><br />To illustrate these remarkable weeks, I have constructed a day-by-day timeline. With the exception of the known concerts, most of the events could have taken place on more than one day in a given week, so I have simply made plausible guesses. Still, these events happened pretty much in the order in which I list them, even if individual actions may be off by a night or two. </p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV8cFUtEjaLjJ4fmDUHkWXqIBdqCPT8hZYYcY-JWMfMlKRUzpKbdruYn3oJWMyD44tKpI81WnoeAXoCzIE0ZCdjgzT2vp2HfgpDiG21RlbisGRIkHCfnOKvXxPbUSMwsUHNgRXFWUzI08/s300/American+Legion+Hall+SL+Tahoe.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV8cFUtEjaLjJ4fmDUHkWXqIBdqCPT8hZYYcY-JWMfMlKRUzpKbdruYn3oJWMyD44tKpI81WnoeAXoCzIE0ZCdjgzT2vp2HfgpDiG21RlbisGRIkHCfnOKvXxPbUSMwsUHNgRXFWUzI08/s0/American+Legion+Hall+SL+Tahoe.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The American Legion Hall in South Lake Tahoe, CA, at 2748 Lake Tahoe Blvd [US-50]</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Saturday, August 19, 1967 American Legion Hall, South Lake Tahoe, CA: Grateful Dead</b><br />On Saturday, August 19, 1967, the Grateful Dead were booked at the American Legion Hall in South Lake Tahoe. Lake Tahoe was a deep lake in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Just 200 miles Northeast of San Francisco, it had been the City's playground since the end of the 19th century. A significant feature of Lake Tahoe, however, was that there was gambling on the Nevada side of the lake (usually referred to as 'North Lake Tahoe'), so the casinos focused on the high-end trade there. The California side (usually referred to as 'South Lake Tahoe,' although the geography doesn't quite fit that) was more of the family side. After Lake Tahoe boomed following the 1960 Winter Olympics, the California side of the lake was left for "the kids," because the adults wanted to go to Nevada and gamble. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/11/august-19-25-26-1967-grateful-dead-lake.html ">As a result, for a resort area, the California side of Lake Tahoe in the 1960s had a peculiar focus on rock and roll that is largely undocumented, except by me</a>.<div> </div><div>The first person to catch on to the vast quantity of teenagers in Lake
Tahoe was a guitarist named Jim Burgett. He started putting on dances at
the South Lake Tahoe American Legion Hall (at 2748 Lake Tahoe Blvd [US
50], South Lake Tahoe, CA) in 1958. The story is complicated, but by the
mid-60s Burgett was holding dances at the Legion Hall seven days a week
from Memorial Day to Labor Day. For any teenagers spending a week, a
month or a Summer in Lake Tahoe, every night was Friday night, and with
the parents often away in Nevada anyway, the Legion Hall dances were the
only show in town. Burgett's own band played most nights, but on
occasion he hired out of town acts as well. When the Fillmore bands
became popular, he would often hire them to give his own band a night
off (Burgett's band also played six days a week in the afternoon at Harrah's Tahoe, believe it
or not). </div><div><br /></div><div>The Grateful Dead were booked at the Legion Hall for Saturday night, giving Burgett's band a rest. Old Lake Tahoe comment threads say that the Dead played until well after 2 AM. For many teenagers in Lake Tahoe, the Fillmore was too far away from their suburb, or simply off limits. So the Grateful Dead coming to Lake Tahoe was like having the Fillmore at your high school, all while your parents were probably off gambling in North Lake Tahoe. </div><div> </div><div>Robert Hunter was still on the road, hitchhiking somewhere between Taos, NM and Las Vegas. He had left New Mexico in early August with 20 dollars, and took various wrong turns that included a ride to Denver. The journey took a few weeks. Hunter, per McNally (pp. 219-220) was not in a good way. In Denver, Hunter saw the new Grateful Dead album in a supermarket, and it was a reminder of where he was trying to go.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sunday, August 20</b></div><div>The Grateful Dead had played South Lake Tahoe on Saturday night. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/05/august-19-september-5-1967-axis.html?showComment=1616732863174#c4616540007081357025">Esteemed scholar LightIntoAshes picks up the story here</a>:</div><div><blockquote>we do know the Dead were back in San Francisco by the evening of August 20. McNally writes, "The Dead were to play on August 20 at a gathering on Mount Tamalpais, but when they got to the mountaintop, they discovered that there was no power, and the event turned into what Rifkin called 'a bongofest.'" (p.212) </blockquote><blockquote>An article from the Berkeley <i>Barb</i> confirms this event:<br />"The Festival of Om on Mount Tamalpais Sunday began with beautiful vibrations and ended in a mess of mishaps and non-communication. Although the fire marshall was notified of the would-be gathering, no official permit was obtained. The fire marshall, probably expecting a nice group, was confronted with about 2,500 happy hippies. </blockquote><blockquote>The Grateful Dead was to play for the gathering, but ended up with a burnt-out generator. At which point some people took up the entertainment by banging on garbage cans. Richard Webster of The Flame arrived on the scene about 9:30 p.m. He said, "By 10:30 there were some 250 people on the side of the hill and about two or three people with candles."<br />Forest rangers, alarmed by the flickering lights, heard the garbage can din and thought the hippies were throwing firecrackers. They called in re-enforcements. (The area has been very dry and dangerous fires are easily set.) <br /></blockquote><blockquote>Word was given to Webster that the cops were on the way to bust for being in the park illegally. After some waiting, the crowd dispersed quietly.<br />There were no busts reported." <i>("Hip-Hash" column, Berkeley Barb 8/25/67, p.6)</i></blockquote>There had been a few rock shows at the mountain theater on Mt. Tamalpais. Rock shows had gotten too popular for the venue, however, particularly with respect to the parking at the foot of the mountain and the difficult, windy access road. After the widely attended two-day Magic Mountain Festival on June 10-11, 1967 (the week before Monterey Pop), the County had declared that there would be no more rock concerts at the theater. One more weekend show went off as scheduled, the Festival Of Growing Things on June 30-July 1, but there were no more rock concerts on Mt Tamalpais until the 21st century, as far as I know. The August event was an attempt to bypass the ban, but clearly it didn't work.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div>On Sunday night in England, Cream played the Redcar Jazz Club at the Coatham Hotel, in Cleveland, England. Cleveland is in Yorkshire. This was Cream's last UK show before coming to the United States.</div><div><br /></div><div>Robert Hunter was still hitchhiking.</div><div> </div><div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgu3JA3KqNa7iQZ2q_129m9LOYYxOfGS34c-nL8v9Q5_y2dRX8pTOhU7rscgLy5VYWQgbJUGAlrRwxBPDGV3PjKbUWwowuUrbWjjUv5W-Oawu4xMHZdD8pokI395yg3D-NvVXavsHIb2Y/s700/BGP+Fillmore+Basie+19670820.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="700" data-original-width="487" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgu3JA3KqNa7iQZ2q_129m9LOYYxOfGS34c-nL8v9Q5_y2dRX8pTOhU7rscgLy5VYWQgbJUGAlrRwxBPDGV3PjKbUWwowuUrbWjjUv5W-Oawu4xMHZdD8pokI395yg3D-NvVXavsHIb2Y/s320/BGP+Fillmore+Basie+19670820.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A BGP poster for Fillmore shows during August 15-21, 1967. Count Basie, Chuck Berry, Charles Lloyd and the Young Rascals are highlighted</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Sunday and Monday, August 20-21, 1967 Fillmore Auditorium, San Francisco, CA: Count Basie Orchestra/Charles Lloyd Quartet</b></div><div><br /></div></div><div><b>Monday, August 21</b></div>Logic tells us that Cream must have flown from London to San Francisco on August 21. I assume they flew BOAC from Heathrow to SFO. <div><br /></div><div>At this juncture, Mickey Hart met Bill Kreutzmann. Kreutzmann and Hart saw Count Basie at the Fillmore on either Sunday (August 20) or Monday (August 21), but it's impossible to be certain which without more information, which may never be forthcoming. Given that the Dead were apparently expecting to play Mt. Tam on Sunday, Monday (the 21st) seems more likely. For our purposes, it doesn't matter so much which day it happened, just that it happened this week, so I will assign the story to Monday.</div><div><br /></div><div>The story of the meeting of Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart has been told by many writers. The primary source of the story always seems to be Mickey Hart, except of course in Bill Kreutzmann's autobiography. All the versions of the story vary somewhat, and they make it difficult to determine the exact facts of the matter. Now, the story was old when people started asking Mickey about it, and nobody ran down the details when they could have been more easily recovered, so there are a number of contradictions. </div><div><br /></div><div>Still--the essence of the story remains the same: Mickey Hart was with former Count Basie drummer Sonny Payne, whom Hart had befriended two years earlier. They were at the Fillmore, and an unknown stranger told Hart that he ought to meet another stranger, Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann. The mysterious stranger introduced them. Later, Payne, Hart and Kreuzmann went to see Janis Joplin and Big Brother and The Holding Company, but Payne found them too loud. Payne left, and later Hart and Kreutzmann went around the city playing drums on garbage cans and car hoods, talking rhythm. Kreutzmann got Hart's phone number and invited him to a Grateful Dead rehearsal. It's a great story, and it lead to the famous two-headed drum chair partnership of Mickey and Billy.</div><div><br /></div><div>It's a great story, indeed. There are so many contradictions in the story, however, that it's hard to encompass them all. It doesn't change the essential transmission--Hart was hanging with Sonny Payne, a stranger introduced him to Billy K, and Mickey ended up in the Grateful Dead. Still, there are many confusing angles to this story. Let's review them:</div><div><br /></div><div><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNWWxnEBdtheoPrKJhrZb1xJk5mjblz9QLezsyZJ1jCZsz_lhyphenhyphenTOo1kT-yXh2x7QRURnrHCb6hicQU2g6x6DUV-_pr6cbEGhG8WW9oOiYnjhyF3Na9h1wDWedP7Wxc7vWmIxO4_lOOJiI/s355/Best+Of+Count+Basie+lp.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="355" data-original-width="344" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNWWxnEBdtheoPrKJhrZb1xJk5mjblz9QLezsyZJ1jCZsz_lhyphenhyphenTOo1kT-yXh2x7QRURnrHCb6hicQU2g6x6DUV-_pr6cbEGhG8WW9oOiYnjhyF3Na9h1wDWedP7Wxc7vWmIxO4_lOOJiI/s320/Best+Of+Count+Basie+lp.jpg" /></a></div><br />Sonny Payne and Count Basie</b></div><div>Count Basie and His Orchestra, supported by Charles Lloyd (with Keith Jarrett, drummer Jack DeJohnette and bassist Ron McClure), were playing the Fillmore Auditorium on Sunday and Monday, August 20 and 21. Charles Lloyd's Quartet had played the whole week, supporting Chuck Berry and Steve Miller Band (August 15-17) and then the Young Rascals on Friday and Saturday (August 18-19). The Count Basie booking, however, wasn't really directed at Bay Area hippies. Instead, Count Basie's audience was his mostly African-American fans, many of whom lived right there in the Fillmore district. Basie had played the Fillmore many times for promoter Charles Sullivan (Graham's predecessor). Graham was no fool--if there was a profitable booking, he was going to be all for it. Basie, perpetually on the road, has a gig in Mt. Tamalpais Theater on Sunday afternoon--the same day and the same place where the Dead had their power-less "bongo fest" later that evening--, and was starting a booking at The Showcase on Telegraph Avenue in Oakland on Tuesday (August 22). According to Philip Elwood's review in the <i>Examiner</i>, the crowd was evenly split between older African-Americans and hippies, but the light show was running.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhzYATt2RQzK_rH904NEL_osM5KbfH2V0yaYFNssxeItwrFXaqCj24oADLxnYNlPLUt7YB_1_Qn9i9FcpqEP1CSKlnh9IZIEjPndbVQP67FbiPvgOi0js-bSDyqYW1Rc0U4Aq0omSvrm8/s550/sonny+payne.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="550" data-original-width="550" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhzYATt2RQzK_rH904NEL_osM5KbfH2V0yaYFNssxeItwrFXaqCj24oADLxnYNlPLUt7YB_1_Qn9i9FcpqEP1CSKlnh9IZIEjPndbVQP67FbiPvgOi0js-bSDyqYW1Rc0U4Aq0omSvrm8/s320/sonny+payne.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Drummer Sonny Payne in action</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Sonny Payne and Mickey Hart had become friends when Hart had been in the US Air Force, back in 1965, per Dennis McNally. Hart, other than being a judo instructor, mainly played music in the very high-class Air Force big band. The band had played some gigs in Germany, where there were plenty of US Servicemen, and groups like the Count Basie Orchestra had been booked as well. Hart jammed with all sorts of musicians, and Payne and he became friends. <a href="Sonny Payne https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonny_Payne">At the time, Payne was Count Basie's drummer, and had been so for many years</a>. Payne left Count Basie's Orchestra at the end of 1965, and mostly played with Harry James' band. Payne continued to play with the Count Basie Orchestra, however, whenever Frank Sinatra was singing with them. According to Elwood's review (below), Sonny Payne was temporarily filling in for regular drummer Rufus Jones. Big bands didn't run like rock groups, and substitutes were common. </div><div><br /></div><div><b><i>Big Brother And The Holding Company</i></b></div><div>Most versions of the saga have the newly-introduced pair going over to The Matrix to see Janis Joplin and Big Brother and The Holding Company. In the Hart version, Sonny Payne thinks that Big Brother was too loud, and leaves. Kreutzmann's version has him inviting Mickey over to see Janis at the Matrix--Kreutzmann would have been allowed in regardless of ticket sales--and doesn't mention Sonny Payne. In any case, since Sonny Payne was Basie's drummer, he might have had to return for a late set anyway.</div><div><br /></div><div><a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Matrix%20Shows.htm">The difficulty with this delicious story is that the Matrix had no one booked on this Monday night, much less Big Brother.</a> Also, Big Brother was headlining the Avalon for the entire weekend (Thursday-Sunday, August 24-27)--why would they be playing the 100-seat Matrix three days before? Now, sure, it's possible that Big Brother was working on new material or had some other reason for an unpublicized private show (and indeed, Chet Helms would have insisted on no publicity for a club show prior to the Avalon booking). It's also true that if Big Brother were playing an unannounced show, a member of The Grateful Dead would have known about it. Still, it's another thing about the Hart-Kreutzmann meeting that doesn't quite sync up with known facts.</div><div> </div><div><i><b>Phil Lesh</b></i></div><div>Phil Lesh also attended the show with Bill Kreuzmann. It's not surprising, since Phil and Bill were roommates (they lived on Belvedere Street, near 710, in a house owned by attorney Brian Rohan). When we were in our 20s, what did we do on an off night?--why, go check out some bands with your roommate. So Phil and Bill hit the Fillmore. In his autobiography, Lesh has a detailed description of the power and precision of the Basie band, so it clearly had a musical impact. He also mentions the meeting of Hart and Kreutzmann, but Lesh's description comes right out of the McNally book. So Phil was there, but doesn't really seem to have been witness to the meeting. </div><div> </div><div>A historiographical problem with well-studied subjects is that someone like Phil Lesh (and his editors) would have reviewed all the material that came before them, so repeating it only means it doesn't contradict what Phil recalls, without it really being a memory. For example, Phil recalls Count Basie playing with Chuck Berry, when it was actually Charles Lloyd. That means Phil didn't look closely enough at the poster (Berry had played earlier in the week, but he is displayed side-by-side with the Count). It doesn't materially change his story, but we have to be cautious about his description of the initial meeting, since he didn't see it.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b><i>Yet Another Eyewitness</i></b></div><div>Bill Kreutzmann's story in <i>Deal</i> adds another generally unknown facet to the famous Hart-Kreutzmann meeting: Mickey Hart's student/landlord Mike Hinton was there with Hart. So it wasn't just Hart and Kreutzmann who left the Matrix and drummed on random objects throughout the city, but Mike Hinton as well. Hinton isn't nobody, by any means. <a href="https://musicschoolnj.com/meet-michael-hinton/">Among many other things, he was a Broadway professional, leading Liza Minelli's band for many years, and working on many Broadway productions</a>. He was also in the legendary Diga Rhythm Band, both live and in the studio, and <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/05/may-30-1975-speedway-meadows-golden.html">played with them in Golden Gate Park when Jerry Garcia dropped by for a little "Fire On The Mountain" action</a>.</div><div><br /></div><div>No one has actually interviewed Hinton about this famous meeting (<a href="http://www.jessejarnow.com/about/">journalists do interviews, you know who you are</a>--I'm a blogger and do no such thing). From what I can piece together, Hinton, a few years younger than Hart, was one of his students. Hart also lived with him, but by triangulation I think the deal was something like Hart living in Hinton's family house (I have always presumed a garage apartment or something similar). So Hart and Hinton were close both as drummers and as friends. Hinton is worthy of a post on his own, but that is a topic for another day. Since Hinton appears to have been Hart's roommate, that means Phil Lesh and Bill Kreutzmann both went to the Fillmore with their roommates.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div>Just to answer a few other questions that may arise:</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2011/12/unknown-percussionist-3rd-set-december.html">I think Mike Hinton was the unnamed drummer who sat in with the Grateful Dead, Etta James, Matt Kelly and the Tower of Power horn section on New Year's Eve 1982</a>.</li><li>The drummer Mike Hinton is different than the guitarist Michael D. Hinton, a fine player who passed away a few years ago. Micheal D. Hinton was in High Noon, apparently ghosted for Jerry Garcia on some "Twilight Zone" soundtracks (with Jer's cheerful assent) and was part of Merl Saunders' Rainforest Band for many years. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/07/1981-high-noon-with-mickey-hart.html?showComment=1270442252237#c4687556451564001947">Plus he commented once on one of my blog posts (!)</a>. Rest In Power, Michael D. Hinton.</li><li><a href="https://privatelessons.com/member/michael-hinton-ma-juilliard">The drummer Michael Hinton is still out there keeping the beat on The One</a> (unless you are skipping the one, of course). </li></ul><br /><div><br /></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNHDHKzBXn3T0a_Sl9ukvTh5gK898LEmpwlH2NNixqX3zbuiuSTYN89psH6jQB6jjyBt531KYeIC29HNcDdP51bepXNrEadWjz4vQ1FQ516p0AFzmI7C63LrgD3gSwCEpYfDGaaKIh9gc/s1200/cream-poster-19670822+aug-27-1967.webp" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="805" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNHDHKzBXn3T0a_Sl9ukvTh5gK898LEmpwlH2NNixqX3zbuiuSTYN89psH6jQB6jjyBt531KYeIC29HNcDdP51bepXNrEadWjz4vQ1FQ516p0AFzmI7C63LrgD3gSwCEpYfDGaaKIh9gc/s320/cream-poster-19670822+aug-27-1967.webp" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The BGP poster for the Butterfield Blues Band, Cream and Southside Sound System at the Fillmore during the week of August 22-27, 1967</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Tuesday, August 22</b></div><div>Cream debuted at the Fillmore on Tuesday night. if you look at the original poster, while Cream's name is the biggest, the more established Butterfield Blues Band are actually "above" Cream, probably fulfilling any agreements with Butterfield's booking agent and manager. Southside Sound System, with harmonica man Charlie Musselwhite and guitarist Harvey Mandel, were third on the bill.</div><div><br /></div><div>At this great remove, it's easy to either to take Bill Graham for granted, or else to complain about some decision or other that doesn't look so right in retrospect. Put all that aside for now. Bill Graham took a huge chance on Cream, made a huge bet, and not only won that bet, but he made the career of Eric Clapton and changed the arc of rock music, all in the space of two weeks at the Fillmore. The Grateful Dead were but one of many beneficiaries, and--indeed--by extension so was I and perhaps most of the readers of this blog.</div><div><br /></div><div>Although Cream had been flagged at its formation as a collection of great musicians, Americans didn't read <i>Melody Maker</i> or <i>New Musical Express</i>. Cream's debut album, <i>Fresh Cream,</i> had been released by Atco in December 1966. It had no AM radio hits. The difference in San Francisco was KMPX-fm, the first major market free-form "underground" FM radio station. KMPX had debuted in April, 1967. KMPX djs played album tracks they liked, 24/7, instead of hit singles. Tracks from <i>Fresh Cream</i> were played all the time. Now, there were some pretty cool songs on <i>Fresh Cream</i>, like "Spoonful," but none of them were the epic, extended live versions that Cream fans would associate with the band. No matter. "Spoonful," "Cat's Squirrel," "Four Until Late," "Sleepy Time Time," "Rollin' And Tumblin:" the future of rock music hadn't arrived yet, but you could see it from here. The longest track was 6 minutes, 30 seconds ("Spoonful"), which by mid-68 would be nothing, but was really unheard of in late 1966.</div><div><br /></div><div>Cream were a popular live band in England, and touring hard. For rock shows in England at that time, however, headliners typically played 25-30 minutes. 40 minutes was a long show. There were often multiple acts on the bill, each doing a short set. Some clubs had an early and late show, turning the house over, so the headliner would play two sets to different audiences. When Cream got to San Francisco, they were surprised to find out from Bill Graham that they were expected to play sets of 45 minutes to an hour. On top of that, although they would be doing an early and late set, the house would not "turn over," so bands were expected not to repeat themselves. Cream were in a panic--they didn't have 90 minutes of material, much less two hours.</div><div><br /></div><div>Cream weren't even the first English headliners to panic at the Fillmore's expectation. The Who had started their US Summer Tour at the Fillmore in June (June 16-17), and were shocked to find out that as headliners, they would have to play 2 hours of material without repeating. The Who sent their manager out to the record store, and he bought the first two Who albums (<i>The Who Sings My Generation</i> and <i>Happy Jack</i>), got a record player from the hotel, and the Who spent the first afternoon of their tour frantically re-learning their old songs, most of which they had never played live.</div><div><br /></div><div>Cream didn't have two albums, and they didn't have years together of playing R&B covers, either, so they couldn't take the path The Who took. They took a different one. They decided to just jam out on every song, and extend their set that way. Jack Bruce and Eric Clapton played through giant Marshall amps, and Ginger Baker was as loud a drummer as you can imagine. So Cream was going to do the Coltrane thing, but they were going to do it loud.</div><div><br /></div><div>Rock music was never the same. Everything had changed, first for the fans, then for the musicians and ultimately for the music industry. Word got around the city, fast. The Cream were blasting it out all night long, and as one old hippie said once, "I couldn't believe anybody could be that good and that loud for that long." The Fillmore was wall-to-wall, for two weeks. Supposedly there were 3500 people some nights, when the Fillmore "officially" only held about 1500. Fans came, told their friends, and came back with them.</div><div> <br /></div><div><b>Wednesday, August 23</b><br />I can't be certain of the exact day, but Garcia must have heard I think he heard that Cream was killing it at the Fillmore. I think he went both Wednesday and Thursday, but he definitely went one of these nights. He also went the next week. <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2013/08/jerry-garcia-concert-attendance-1961-90.html?showComment=1376115573759#c5359244242181668491">Here's what he said later that month: </a></div><div><div><blockquote><i>"I would say the Cream are damn near the best group there is... Their
music is really strong. I mean, really strong... They're much better
musicians than Jimi Hendrix... You should have seen them at the
Fillmore...cause they played with a lot of very heavy bands. They played
with Gary Burton's band. They played with the Electric Flag. They
played with Paul Butterfield's band and with Charlie Musselwhite's band.
And they made them all sound pretty old-fashioned..." </i></blockquote></div></div><div>Butterfield and Musselwhite were playing the first week, so we know Garcia went one of these nights. I'll bet Garcia went on Wednesday, and went back on Thursday night. I mean--I would have, and you would have, and we're not even Jerry.</div><div><br /></div><div>Now, think about it: Cream were loud, really loud. Cream were playing long songs with a lot of soloing and very few vocals. Although I like Jack Bruce's and Eric Clapton's singing, they weren't renowned as singers. They were packing the Fillmore and people were going nuts, and they were doing it by jamming as long as they wanted, playing difficult stuff at full volume. Suddenly, the quixotic enterprise of the Grateful Dead seemed--dare we say it--financially viable. The Dead could play the long, loud crazy music that appealed to them, and people would like it. They wouldn't have to damp it down for consumption. Garcia saw Cream--I'll bet the rest of the band did, too--and whole new worlds of music went from imagined to actual.<br /></div><div> </div><div><b>Thursday, August 24</b></div><div>I'm confident Garcia saw Cream this night. My only question would be whether it was his first time or his second. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwtHew-9_FTYQux2mNKx6WTkandvkiEKS8qqFoYGfcjpcuwlv4W20LK44m50x4pwuczPXzlPefVAs7tYQYIEofAsUQef8pHfanb19FIEDmxVwJF7OtzdOgmLiUaPXppWvJM1h77eG-rRU/s400/Kings+Beach+Bowl+Springfield+1967.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="329" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwtHew-9_FTYQux2mNKx6WTkandvkiEKS8qqFoYGfcjpcuwlv4W20LK44m50x4pwuczPXzlPefVAs7tYQYIEofAsUQef8pHfanb19FIEDmxVwJF7OtzdOgmLiUaPXppWvJM1h77eG-rRU/s320/Kings+Beach+Bowl+Springfield+1967.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The only known photo from inside the Kings Beach Bowl in North Lake Tahoe. Neil Young, Richie Furay and Stephen Stills of Buffalo Springfield, on either August 18 or 19, 1967 (<a href="http://mizshelyspast.blogspot.com/2006/11/welcome-to-my-blasts-from-past-blog.html">photo: Michelle McFee</a>)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Friday and Saturday, August 25-26, 1967 Kings Beach Bowl, North Lake Tahoe, CA: Grateful Dead/The Creators</b></div><div><div>North Lake Tahoe, about 20 miles away from South Shore, was less crowded and hence
had less activity. The North Shore had a Nevada side and a California side, and of course the Nevada side had gambling and was the preferred destination for adults. Thus the California side of North Shore was left to their teenage children. The North Lake Tahoe set considered
themselves cooler than the South, and a rock venue had opened in North Lake Tahoe
as well. </div><div> </div><div>Kings Beach Bowl, a converted bowling alley on North Lake
Avenue, was opened in the Summer of 1967, but it was mostly only open on
weekends. The sons of the owners had a band, and their dads created a
place for them to play. Although the teenagers were not the bookers,
they advised the booking agents on what was cool in Sacramento (where
they were from) and San Francisco, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/11/august-19-25-26-1967-grateful-dead-lake.html ">so some very cool Fillmore bands played Kings Beach Bowl in 1967 and 1968, including Jimi Hendrix, The Grateful Dead and Buffalo Springfield.</a></div><div> <br /></div><div>Kings
Beach Bowl was just a converted bowling alley, and hardly a special
building. Nonetheless, eyewitnesses recall it fondly. <a href="http://mizshelyspast.blogspot.com/2006/11/welcome-to-my-blasts-from-past-blog.html">I only know of one photo of the inside, from when the Buffalo Springfield played on August 18-19, 1967</a>. Most of the attendees
were based in North Tahoe, but largely came from the Bay Area and
Northern California, so they had heard of all the Fillmore groups. For
many, it was the first chance to see these groups. The commercial area
of North Lake Tahoe was so quiet and safe that parents had no problem
allowing teenagers and their friends to go to shows on their own.<br /> </div>Kings
Beach Bowl only presented shows on weekends, unlike the American Legion
Hall, which was open 7 days a week from Memorial Day to Labor Day. In
1967, when it opened, Kings Beach only even began on June 15. The Grateful
Dead would have been the last or next to last event presented that season (I
still have not been able to determine if Kings Beach was open Labor Day).
I believe that bands were housed in a nearby vacation home for the
weekend. Lake Tahoe houses at the time were not opulent, but they were
usually spacious and secluded, just the thing for a band who liked to
travel with all their crew, girlfriends and families and engage in
various extracurricular activities. Since one of the backers of Kings Beach Bowl worked for the
Sheriff's department (Allen Goodall), there were not problems with the cops. </div><div><br /></div><div>The Grateful Dead would return to Kings Beach Bowl twice more. One of those weekends was held during Ski season, and the poster said "Trip Or Ski." That weekend (February 22-24, 1968) was recorded for <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i>, and the tapes were released as <i>Dick's Picks Vol. 22</i>.</div></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sunday, August 27</b></div><div>The Grateful Dead probably made a leisurely caravan back to San Francisco on Sunday. According to Mountain Girl, however, she, Jerry and her daughter had been staying in a little hotel. It makes sense that a "family unit" was given their own accomodations, even if the rest of the gang was having a mass slumber party in some vacation house. According to Mountain Girl, they were expecting to
have a nice weekend in Tahoe. I should add--as a Californian--that the Lake
Tahoe area is so beautiful that just being there is relaxing, even if
you don't actually do anything. No doubt Garcia figured he'd get a lot
of guitar practice in, so he wouldn't lack for music.<div> </div><div>Mountain Girl spoke about this week in Robert Greenfield's underrated Garcia oral history, <i>Dark Star</i>.
According to her, the hotel was tacky and awful and she couldn't stand
it. So, amazingly, Garcia, MG and her daughter simply went camping. In
those days in California, you could find a quiet wilderness area and
camp out, because the state was less crowded and there weren't many
rules (for good or ill). Garcia had apparently camped out regularly
through his childhood and early Palo Alto days, because it was something
he could afford. I have to think that this week was the last time
Garcia slept under the stars. Thus, it seems that by Saturday night,
Garcia and his family were in the forest in South Tahoe.<br /></div><div> </div><div>I like to think
of them relaxing in the forest, Garcia practicing away for hours.
Perhaps some hikers walked by, and thought "hey, that guy's a pretty
good picker." Of course, Jerry might likely have been playing an
unamplified electric guitar, but maybe he bought his acoustic, too. At
the time, Lake Tahoe wasn't really built up, but it wasn't rural,
either. The Garcias could have gone easily to a gas station or a
restaurant when they needed to wash or get food, but they still would
have spent most of their time in a pleasant outdoor forest. On Monday, however, Garcia (per MG) tossed everything in the car and they drove back to the Bay Area (<a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/05/august-19-september-5-1967-axis.html?showComment=1616732863174#c4616540007081357025"><i>thanks to LIA for sorting out the timeline here</i></a>). <br /></div> </div><div>Cream finished their first week at the Fillmore as a huge sensation. </div><div><br /></div><div>Robert Hunter was probably in Denver. Somehow he had gotten pointed the wrong way, and spent a few days there.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Monday, August 28, 1967 Lindley Meadows, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA:
Big Brother and The Holding Company/Grateful Dead </b><i>"Party for Chocolate
George"</i></div><div>After their return from Lake Tahoe, the Dead reappeared in San Francisco for the Monday afternoon funeral of a popular Hell's Angel known as Chocolate George. Big Brother and The Dead played a free concert at Lindley Meadows in Golden Gate Park, and a ceremonial funeral was held with George's casket (I do not know where he was actually buried).</div><div> </div><div>The Grateful Dead had been booked at a rock festival on the Cabrillo
College football field. The poster (published in the <i>Art Of Rock</i>)
advertises a festival for Saturday and Sunday, September 2nd and 3rd,
headlined by the Grateful Dead and Canned Heat, and supported by many
local bands. The implication is that the Dead would play both days,
although that is not certain. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/06/september-2-1967-cabrillo-college.html">While there had been regular dances at the Cabrillo football field in the past</a>, apparently the county got cold feet about a
multi-act rock festival at a junior college. <a href="http://www.45worlds.com/memorabilia/item/nc490994us ">On August 29, the cancellation was announced in the paper</a>, so the Dead must have found out Monday afternoon. For a working band, losing a weekend is Not Good, so I assume that Rock Scully and Danny Rifkin started working the phones.</div><div><div> </div></div><div><br /></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPdpuN4RK5VM-yeuBuqNF6dJubHzNuSz2vrBcXjWBqb3ubJttvCK-aMRvtQ4gj9Sq1jhzgwcrsPlKBHaAoiUKhhOLUlbCbwoqt4VdwNSPW4BoaAAR6jb564tlh_bQ96L29EA1wKLJwbkA/s1200/cream-poster-+19670829-sep-3-1967.webp" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="791" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPdpuN4RK5VM-yeuBuqNF6dJubHzNuSz2vrBcXjWBqb3ubJttvCK-aMRvtQ4gj9Sq1jhzgwcrsPlKBHaAoiUKhhOLUlbCbwoqt4VdwNSPW4BoaAAR6jb564tlh_bQ96L29EA1wKLJwbkA/s320/cream-poster-+19670829-sep-3-1967.webp" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The BGP poster for Cream, Electric Flag and Gary Burton at the Fillmore, August 29-September 3, 1967</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Tuesday August 29</b></div><div>Cream began their second week at the Fillmore. Nominally, the headliners were Mike Bloomfield's new band, the Electric Flag. Bloomfield was already a star, and the Flag had debuted as Fillmore headliners just two weeks earlier (Aug 15-20). Nick Gravenites was the principal songwriter and lead singer. Drummer Buddy Miles also sang, and there was a big horn section. The Electric Flag had a lot of "hype" associated with them, and they were promoted as being a mixture of all kinds of American music--rock, jazz, blues and country. For all the promise, the Flag had an unsteady career, and their debut album would not be released until March 1968.<br /></div><div> </div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBvaDWrxXuFLglkewLPULttwhijfeEVazqnsvvaE2uUGuxJbacSJd_FLehay5d3Nlhb-v-e4lcPNuJK3Pf7VLa-LoicygvIunFc_pnEFnRTBN9dZ40DO-wgu93kkkBUb5AXlWYd7mYMzs/s316/Duster+Gary+Burton+%2528album%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="316" data-original-width="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBvaDWrxXuFLglkewLPULttwhijfeEVazqnsvvaE2uUGuxJbacSJd_FLehay5d3Nlhb-v-e4lcPNuJK3Pf7VLa-LoicygvIunFc_pnEFnRTBN9dZ40DO-wgu93kkkBUb5AXlWYd7mYMzs/s0/Duster+Gary+Burton+%2528album%2529.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Duster, the 1967 debut album on RCA for the Gary Burton Quartet, including Larry Coryell and Steve Swallow (Bob Moses would replace Roy Haynes on drums for touring)<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Also on the bill was the Gary Burton Quartet. Burton's band played jazz, but they did it on electric instruments, so it was called "jazz-rock." Burton played vibes, and the band didn't have a piano player. The amazing Larry Coryell was the guitarist, while the rhythm section had Steve Swallow on bass and Bob Moses on drums. The Quartet played quiet music, although they were amplified, so while they anticipated the Fusion music genre, they didn't sound like <i>Bitches Brew</i>. The band's current album was <i>Duster</i>, the first by the Quartet (although it was the 8th album for Burton himself). Playing places like the Fillmore was part of RCA's plan to expose the Burton Quartet to a younger, wider audience than just regular jazz listeners.<br /></div><div> </div><div>Robert Hunter was still hitchhiking, and I think this is the day he made
it to Las Vegas with just a dime in his pocket (which, indeed, sounds
like the lyrics to a Robert Hunter song). The story goes that he only had a dime, so he chose to play the slots. He won, and had enough money to get back to San Francisco. Hunter called the band--presumably the House phone at 710 Ashbury--and told them he was on his way. I assume he continued to hitchhike, but maybe he had won enough for a bus ticket. </div><div><br /></div><div><b>Wednesday August 30</b></div><div>Some day during this week, Mickey Hart tried to go to a Grateful Dead rehearsal. He couldn't find the rehearsal hall, and he didn't (apparently) have a phone number for Kreutzmann. It is easy to forget that without cell phones and Google maps, directions and appointments were not at all a sure thing. <br /></div><div> </div><div><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/01/grateful-dead-rehearsal-spaces-1965-1995.html">The subject of Grateful Dead rehearsal halls is murky (not that I haven't dived deeply into those waters</a>), but I believe that the band was rehearsing at an empty synagogue at 1839 Geary Boulevard. 1839 Geary was right between two famous San Francisco buildings: the Fillmore Auditorium at 1805 Geary, and <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/11/1859-geary-blvd-san-francisco-geary.html">the Masonic Temple at 1859 that would become Jim Jones' People's Temple</a>. In the 1970s, <a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/11/1839-geary-blvd-san-francisco-ca-july.html">1839 Geary became a concert venue, known at various times as House Of Good (1972), Theatre 1839 (1977) and Temple Beautiful (1979).</a></div><div><br /></div><div>Garcia definitely saw Cream this week, although we don't know which nights. His comments above, about making Electric Flag and Gary Burton looking "old-fashioned" indicate that he went to at least one from the second run. Consider that Electric Flag was supposed to be the proverbial Next Big Thing, and that, comparatively speaking, the Gary Burton Quartet was extremely forward-looking. Yet when Garcia compared them to Cream, he dismissed them both. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Thursday, August 31</b></div><div>Somewhere near the end of this week, Robert Hunter turns up at the house of his friend Carl Moore. Back in 1965-66, Moore had lived on Channing Avenue, just up the street from Jerry Garcia, Rick Shubb and others. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/02/david-nelson-and-new-delhi-river-band.html">David Nelson and the New Delhi River Band had gotten together at the Channing house in the Summer of 1966</a>. By Summer '67, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/08/david-nelson-and-new-delhi-river-band.html">the NDRB were popular in the South Bay, if not exactly successful. Moore, Nelson and Dave Torbert lived in a house on Euclid Avenue in East Palo Alto,</a> which was also where the band rehearsed. The geography of East Palo Alto has changed dramatically, but old-time Palo Altans will know what I mean when I say that Euclid Avenue was near Whisky Gulch.</div><div><br /></div><div>Also living in the Euclid Avenue house was Russell (Rusty) Towle, a few years younger than his housemates. Towle was one of my best sources on early Palo Alto days, <a href="http://www.tommangan.net/twoheeldrive/index.php/2008/08/17/tragic-loss-to-californias-hiking-community/">and it was sad that he passed away too soon</a>. Towle recalled Hunter arriving at the house and spending a few days there, looking very thin and not well, which fits Hunter's saga of hitchhiking for weeks with little to his name. So I have inferred that he probably arrived around Thursday, and that Phil Lesh picked him up and drove him to Rio Nido on Saturday or Sunday. </div><div><br /></div><div>There is an interesting dynamic here that has never really been commented on. Hunter was explicitly returning to the Bay Area to be the house songwriter for his best friend's psychedelic blues band, who needed help coming up with good original material. He spent a few days at the house of his other best friend, who also had a psychedelic blues band without any original material. Why didn't Hunter and Nelson agree to collaborate? Songwriters aren't like drummers--you can work for more than one band at a time. If the New Delhi River Band had accumulated some Robert Hunter songs at the end of 1967, they, too might have found a way to bring their bluesy sound to a wider audience. Yet neither Hunter or Nelson ever mentioned such a thing, although it is also true that no one asked.</div><div> </div><div>In another context, however, Nelson has said he had no interest in actually writing songs until the mid-80s. <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2013/01/boston-april-2-1973-robert-hunter-and.html">Nelson did write the fine song "Crooked Judge" with Hunter in 1973</a>, and the New Riders would have certainly benefited from new Hunter/Nelson songs. Ironically, the reconstituted 21st century New Riders were energized by some fine songs by that pair. How different would things have been if they had started in 1967? But it seems that Nelson saw himself as a performer, not a writer, and didn't sign up Hunter for any New Delhi River Band lyrics in the few days that he was at the NDRB house.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Friday, September 1</b></div><div>It's surprising that the Grateful Dead were not booked anywhere on the Friday of Labor Day weekend. It does mean another night when Garcia could have seen Cream, another reason I think he saw them more than once in the second week.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIuF1bAigg1Xf2V48pOVPJAnJ8gN1S6ZAcEvYn-Sqfm957RXZ_Sl5K-eA2RXLkgRA4CYO9e6ebrOtYCm4Y1Fyyzb2aihqYeQmXO1WU84uArznfakNXwJYd1irV9fSsrYOKrA5QCDahvDQ/s843/Cabrillo+19670902.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="843" data-original-width="526" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIuF1bAigg1Xf2V48pOVPJAnJ8gN1S6ZAcEvYn-Sqfm957RXZ_Sl5K-eA2RXLkgRA4CYO9e6ebrOtYCm4Y1Fyyzb2aihqYeQmXO1WU84uArznfakNXwJYd1irV9fSsrYOKrA5QCDahvDQ/s320/Cabrillo+19670902.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The poster for the canceled rock festival at the Cabrillo College JC football field in Santa Cruz County, scheduled for September 2-3, 1967</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>Saturday September 2</b></div><div><a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/06/september-2-1967-cabrillo-college.html">The Grateful Dead had been booked for the rock festival in Santa Cruz County on this weekend</a>, possibly expecting to play both days. <a href="http://www.45worlds.com/memorabilia/item/nc490994us ">By the prior Tuesday, the festival had been canceled</a>. That left the Dead with a hole in their schedule on Labor Day weekend, a time of the year when there are three nights without school, rather than two. We do know that the Dead played the Rio Nido Dance Hall, in Sonoma County, because we have an Owsley tape of some of the show. Owsley has been proven to be historically accurate on his dating, so we can have some confidence.</div><div> </div><div>But what about Saturday night? It's very likely that every club or venue was booked. Cream was still headlining the Fillmore, so Graham didn't need any help with ticket sales there. The Steve Miller Band was at the Avalon all weekend, so Chet Helms didn't need the Dead either. I think Scully and Rifkin managed to drum up the Rio Nido gig at the last minute because it was the only venue not in use. It's also possible that the Dead got to Rio Nido Saturday night, maybe to play an undocumented gig, maybe just to jam in front of a few friends. Both of these scenarios would have had the same people there, frankly.</div><div> </div><div>The story goes that Phil Lesh was sent to Palo Alto (in reality East Palo Alto) to retrieve Hunter. Why it was Phil and not Jerry has never been explained, either, but I am more curious about what Jerry might have been busy with than wondering why Phil went. Lesh drove Hunter to Rio Nido. I am thinking that all this took place on Saturday, and that the Dead were already set up there. Also, even today, it is a 2-hour journey from East Palo Alto to Rio Nido, so I am thinking Phil went from San Francisco to Euclid Avenue, and then took Hunter to Rio Nido. This saga doesn't change if it all actually happened on Sunday. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sunday, September 3, 1967 Dance Hall, Rio Nido, CA: Grateful Dead</b><br /></div><div>Rio Nido, CA, a tiny unincorporated community in Sonoma County. There
was a tiny dance hall, with room for a few hundred patrons, that dated
back until at least the 1940s. It was an ideal spot for out-of-the-way
activities where little scrutiny was desired, and the Grateful Dead had
some good times there, before they simply outgrew the place.</div><div> </div><div>There is a brief tape recorded by Owsley. Apparently, this was the only 1967 tape recorded by Mr Owsley, who was more focused on other activities that year. Phil Lesh used one song, "Midnight Hour" on his archival compilation album <i>Fallout From The Phil Zone.</i> In the liner notes, he says "This was recorded at a Russian River resort ballroom on Sunday night of
Labor Day Weekend - I don't think there were more than 25 people there,
but we played our little hearts out for them anyway." On a subsequent CD re-release of the band's debut album, "Viola Lee Blues" was added as filler. <br /></div><div> </div><div>Robert Hunter was present. We know from the tape that the band played "Alligator." So Hunter got to hear one of his lyrics made flesh by the Grateful Dead for the first time. <br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Monday, September 4</b></div><div>There is a fragment of a tape dated September 4. Since there was no advertising, no flyer, no publicity and apparently very few people at the Sunday night show, we really have no idea if there were multiple shows planned. But it probably doesn't matter. The Rio Nido Dance Hall wasn't widely used--that's why it would have been free at the last moment on Labor Day weekend--so the Dead probably just jammed, because their equipment was already set up. A few people, probably friends, were also likely dancing and hanging out.</div><div><br /></div><div>I think this day was the day that Hunter, the Grateful Dead's newly-onboarded songwriter, was listening to the band jam in the afternoon. He wasn't in the room with the band, but he could hear them outside. Garcia, and probably other band members, had spent the last two weeks hearing Eric Clapton and Cream upend rock music as it was known, playing challenging music to enthusiastic crowds. Bill Kreutzmann had met some guy who seemed to have something new to show him about rhythm. </div><div><br /></div><div>Hunter heard the first expansive, exploratory riffs of what would become a deeply familiar melody. Right there at Rio Nido, while the Grateful Dead jammed, he wrote the first verse to what would become "Dark Star."</div><div><br /></div><div>Not a bad couple of weeks, really.</div><div><br /></div><div><i><b>Aftermath</b></i></div><div><a href="http://www.ectours.de/ "><b>Cream</b> continued their American tour. </a></div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Cream played <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Whisky-A-Go-Go%20History.htm">three weeknights at West Hollywood's Whisky-A-Go-Go</a> (September 4-6).</li><li>Cream had been booked at the Crosstown Bus in a Boston suburb, but it had been shut down due to non-payment of bills (the J. Geils Band got their amps out just in time). A local coffee house proprietor converted a parking garage to open a venue he called the Psychedelic Supermarket just to book Cream for nine night (September 8-16). <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/11/psychedelic-supermarket-boston-ma-1967.html">The supermarket was a notoriously unappealing joint, but it had great bands.</a> The Dead would play there a few months later</li><li>Cream played two weeks at the <a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/01/cafe-au-go-go-new-york-city-152_07.html">Cafe Au Go Go in Greenwich Village (September 22-October 8)</a>, packing the place out, and everyone knew them by then. I don't think Cream learned new songs, but rather just jammed like they had at the Fillmore.</li><li>The American tour ended with five nights in Michigan (October 11-12 at the Fifth Dimension in Ann Arbor, and then October 13-15 at the Grande in Detroit). <i>Disraeli Gears </i>would come out in November, and when Cream returned to America in February 1968, they were huge.</li></ul><div><b>Robert Hunter</b> wrote the second verse of "Dark Star" in Golden Gate Park after a mysterious stranger gave him a joint. The stranger recommended the song title. Since we don't know who the stranger was, here's to hoping that it was the same guy who introduced Mickey and Billy. </div><div> </div><div>Hunter went on to write additional songs for the Grateful Dead and others, as well as for himself.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>Mickey Hart</b> joined the Grateful Dead. Phil Lesh mentions in his book that Kreutzmann went over to Hart Music in San Carlos, and made sure that Hart could come see the Dead play at the Straight Theater in San Francisco on September 30, and he did. Hart sat in that night, and joined the Grateful Dead a few weeks later.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b>The Grateful Dead </b>continued to perform and record the songs of Robert Hunter and others until Jerry Garcia's death in 1995.<br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b><i>Appendix 1</i>: Cream Audience Tape, September 3, 1967, Fillmore Auditorium</b><br /></div><div><div>There is a Cream setlist from the Fillmore for Sunday, September 3,
1967. This must be based on the circulating audience tape. I do not know if this was
the early set or the late set. There may have been some different songs
throughout the booking, but Cream did not have that many songs at the
time, so most nights were probably pretty similar to this.</div><div></div></div><blockquote><div><div>Spoonful</div><div>Tales of Brave Ulysses<br />Sunshine of Your Love<br />Sweet Wine<br />N.S.U.<br />Lawdy Mama<br />Sleepy Time Time<br />Steppin' Out</div></div><div></div><div></div></blockquote><div><br /><b><i>Appendix 2: </i>Phil Elwood's San Francisco <i>Examiner</i> Review of the Count Basie Orchestra at the Fillmore Auditorium, August 21, 1967</b></div><div><i>Examiner</i> music critic saw the Count Basie Orchestra and the Charles Lloyd Quartet at the Fillmore on Sunday, August 20, 1967. His review appeared in the <i>Examiner</i> on Monday, August 21. I have theorized above that Hart and Kreutzmann met on the next night (August 21), but it could have been this night. It is a thoughtful, interesting review in any case.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZioFoYeZQddZ_q2GW5L208NAh4PvRWXXjaTR7QWUoL9hYQPNfdRuI998wqY9niu4Y5PheAtHRZsJpHtpmJx0U1D3opUQ4zYvT2nMcLfwPPAS08f6cZVUHhJMGCM27k-1R4GqglyIp4LI/s1426/Count+Basie+Review+19670820+21+Aug+1967%252C+22+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1072" data-original-width="1426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZioFoYeZQddZ_q2GW5L208NAh4PvRWXXjaTR7QWUoL9hYQPNfdRuI998wqY9niu4Y5PheAtHRZsJpHtpmJx0U1D3opUQ4zYvT2nMcLfwPPAS08f6cZVUHhJMGCM27k-1R4GqglyIp4LI/s320/Count+Basie+Review+19670820+21+Aug+1967%252C+22+-+The+San+Francisco+Examiner+at+Newspapers+com.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><br /><div><br /></div><br /><div><div> <br /></div><br /></div><p> </p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com20tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-8828194682935232012020-12-17T13:20:00.006-08:002022-05-02T17:31:54.740-07:00The Grateful Dead in Oregon 1966-76 (Country Home)<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7q_-eyPM6rgHAY0SUIAEEo3eEAfrB_pUu_uemmv7SnLgma5ptW74KqyhuoM_SDEhgDcqGc2UTckXhG4uBHEfbencBR7aLl5sIVLx1oEEv-prnxauivd1Uv0NnqMy_V-cu_SB4u1lZ6bU/s600/Sunshine+Daydream+cd.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="545" data-original-width="600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7q_-eyPM6rgHAY0SUIAEEo3eEAfrB_pUu_uemmv7SnLgma5ptW74KqyhuoM_SDEhgDcqGc2UTckXhG4uBHEfbencBR7aLl5sIVLx1oEEv-prnxauivd1Uv0NnqMy_V-cu_SB4u1lZ6bU/s320/Sunshine+Daydream+cd.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Sunshine Daydream, the cd from the Grateful Dead's legendary performance on August 27, 1972 at the Renaissance Fairgrounds in Veneta, OR</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />The Grateful Dead began in San Francisco, and staked out their first beachhead in Manhattan. Over the decades, the band was popular in some places, like New Jersey and the Southeast, and weaker in others, like Texas or Los Angeles. I would suspect, however, that on a population-adjusted basis, the Dead's greatest success was in the state of Oregon. Until relatively recently, Oregon was thinly-populated and not a major economic engine. It was a pretty place between Northern California and Seattle, with laid back people and lousy weather.<p></p>Yet the Dead's connections to Oregon go far beyond a reliable concert booking no matter the day of the week, or the time of the year:<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Ken Kesey, whose LSD evangelism was a big part of the initial Grateful Dead ethos, was from Springfield, OR. The Dead's only out-of-state Acid Test was in Portland, OR.</li><li>Thanks to Kesey, and fellow prankster Mike Hagen, the anchors for the Grateful Dead road crew came from modest cattle towns in Eastern Oregon. Ramrod (Larry Shurtliff), John Hagen (Mike's brother) and Rex Jackson were from Pendleton (Rex) and Hermiston (Ramrod and Hagen). The "Workingman's Dead" Marin County Ranchero look of boots, ponchos and big hats came directly from the Oregon crew.</li><li>Since Portland and Eugene were in between Seattle and San Francisco, the Dead played regular gigs there whenever the band played Seattle or Vancouver. These gigs both kept the band afloat while boosting the nascent rock scene in Oregon.</li><li>Not only did Oregon's location ensure some good bookings, something about Oregon lead to some truly epic performances there. The most legendary such show was the Springfield Creamery Benefit for the Kesey family dairy on August 27, 1972, but there were plenty of other great shows.</li><li>When the Grateful Dead undid their "hiatus" and returned to live touring in 1976, they needed a stealth warmup, and could have played anywhere. They chose Portland. The Dead played lucrative shows in Oregon ever since, and played great music, too.</li></ul><p>This post will review the arc of the unique relationship between the Grateful Dead and the state of Oregon.<br /></p><i><b>Oregon and San Francisco</b></i><br />In the early19th century, Oregon was vaguely and jointly administered by the English and American governments. It was mainly a source of furs and other resources. While Native Americans had lived in Oregon for centuries, the first permanent settlement by Europeans was Fort Astoria, at the mouth of the Columbia River, established in 1811. There were a few other settlements, such as Fort Vancouver, established in 1825 on the border of what is now Washington State and Oregon (on the Washington side). <br /><p>There was not even a government in Oregon until 1842, when meetings were
held to form provisional government that began in that year. The Oregon territory was annexed by the United States in 1848. The Oregon Territory included all of the present-day states of Washington, Oregon and Idaho, plus parts of Montana and Wyoming. The Southwestern part of the Oregon Territory became the state of Oregon in 1859.<br /></p><p>Oregon has always been intimately connected to California, and particularly San Francisco. The Oregon Trail was initially the principal route for California-bound settlers, going back to 1842. Legend has it that when gold was discovered in California in 1849, most of the Oregon population headed South, and the town of Portland was left with only three people. Generally speaking, Californians have been returning to Oregon ever since.<br /></p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB35vhKihkyT8MLiF9iN_h_SDe7oym_CYA32OogvwK036tWQaCjV4MLY3kP7iHF00zZlSaPs4XLMZrNjhM0sLP2hLriLBKqGMpa40ddvLZwCGENy5gU-sjV21FDSfQ2jiHbJ1G-TwTZNE/s500/washingtonterritory1860.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="417" data-original-width="500" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiB35vhKihkyT8MLiF9iN_h_SDe7oym_CYA32OogvwK036tWQaCjV4MLY3kP7iHF00zZlSaPs4XLMZrNjhM0sLP2hLriLBKqGMpa40ddvLZwCGENy5gU-sjV21FDSfQ2jiHbJ1G-TwTZNE/s320/washingtonterritory1860.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A map showing the state of Oregon ca. 1859 (lower left). The balance of the Oregon Territory became the Washington Territory, which included the modern-day states of Washington and Idaho, as well as parts of Montana and Wyoming. Washington became a state in 1889, and Idaho in 1890.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></b></i><i><b><br />Seattle and Portland</b></i><br />Portland has always been the biggest city in Oregon, and though it is 120 miles inland, it is largely a seaport town. The Columbia River is navigable all the way to Portland, so lumber and other resources were easily shipped out to the Pacific and down the coast. The Columbia divides the states of Oregon and Washington. Californians, and others, often treat Seattle and Portland as a single unit, but historically that has not really been true. Although both cities were principally seaports, they were economically linked to different regions.<p>Seattle, WA was the Western Terminus of James Hill's Great Northern Railroad line--Deadheads will recall the Hunter line from "Jack Straw," "Great Northern, out of Cheyenne, from sea to shining sea"-running from Seattle to St. Paul. Seattle was the link to Asia, and St. Paul was the link to the Midwest and the Great Lakes, so commodities and manufactured goods could indeed be shipped all over the world.</p><p>Oregon, however, was linked by rail to California, via the Southern Pacific. The Transcontinental Railroad, following the path of today's Interstate 80, went from Oakland to the Sierras via Sacramento. Right before Sacramento, there was a junction at Davisville (now Davis, CA), and trains could head North to Oregon. Thus, in the 19th and 20th centuries, Oregon's crops and commodities were shipped South to California and from there to the middle of the country via Southern Pacific.</p><p>The Columbia River kept Seattle and Portland in separate economies throughout the 20th century, initially because of railroads, which in turn created separate economies. Eastern Oregon and Eastern Washington, beyond the reach of the Columbia, had a more integrated economy (the Great Northern reached California through Eastern Oregon, but the Grateful Dead story is more about Portland than the more rugged Eastern part of the state). Oregon, and particularly Portland, had been economically tied to California since the mid-19th century, in a way that Seattle would never be. So in that sense, some of the seemingly random synergy between the Grateful Dead and Oregon was not random at all.<br /></p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKWwxuDXQmfBfUWWoPiPsCjv-EADsFnrfwh76X_9MVECQre4RqPBDpEeqVVncD6TGmK8Gdsdwr_In7S82nUd_TlD1985YoSbKI2W5qvz-YA3kTttkDbEkdgHU3aV9G2hkPsRhRmbrkeRg/s1000/Vanport_Flood_aerial.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="781" data-original-width="1000" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKWwxuDXQmfBfUWWoPiPsCjv-EADsFnrfwh76X_9MVECQre4RqPBDpEeqVVncD6TGmK8Gdsdwr_In7S82nUd_TlD1985YoSbKI2W5qvz-YA3kTttkDbEkdgHU3aV9G2hkPsRhRmbrkeRg/s320/Vanport_Flood_aerial.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>An aerial view of the Vanport, OR flood in 1948. Young Robert Burns could be in the photo, maybe.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />VanPort</b></i><br />During World War 2, coastal cities all over the country became industrial boomtowns, building merchant ships. East Coast shipyards were working flat out building Navy warships, so other places were built up to build much simpler transport ships that were needed in greater numbers. On the East Coast, places like Mobile, AL and Wilmington, NC became big shipyards. On the West, transport ships were mainly built in the San Francisco Bay Area and in greater Portland, OR. Workers moved from the Midwest and Southeast to the West, many of them African Americans. The Bay Area shipyards (in Oakland, Richmond, Hunters Point, Vallejo and Marin City) caused a huge music explosion as a byproduct. <br /><p>Less well-known, but nonetheless prominent were the shipyards just West of Portland. The Kaiser company, prominent shipbuilders in Oakland, set up a shipyard in the Columbia River. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vanport,_Oregon">The workers, mostly newly-arrived, many of them African American, mostly lived in shoddy new housing at a place called Vanport</a>. Vanport was so named because it was between Portland, OR and Vancouver, WA, which was just across the river. Vanport boomed with well paid workers during the war, and Portland did too.</p><p>After the war, however, when the shipbuilding went away, Vanport declined. The already weak housing stock was not improved. During the war, Vanport had a population of 40,000 (40% African-American), making it Oregon's second largest city. By 1947, the shipyards had closed but there were many returning WW2 veterans, so the population was still 18,500. Vanport had been used as emergency housing for the war effort, so everybody had ignored the fact that it was built on a flood plain. In May 1948, heavy rains caused the entire community to flood, and many already poor families lost pretty much everything. The family of young Robert Burns, for example, then just 7 years old, was abandoned by his father. Young Robert lived with foster families for a few years, but returned to live with his mother when he was 11. He took his mother's new husband's name as his own. </p><p>Robert Hunter didn't forget the trauma of the Vanport flood. He wrote "Here Comes Sunshine" as an homage to the relief he felt when the floods finally subsided.<br /></p><b><i><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsx6lXo_0Er6ORWM6FxJ8AoPfAiNCdcyeqK2Q4qOOK_kRv2jkzYDrHPzsGOV3aYJatLp7LVpuUrmZQdtyEaCq_rrutE3f_Rm7Qc_R9TPOA8ElEweAHCaw9wmWsp5cf9K1XexCYhNqUzQk/s500/Hermiston+OR+downtown.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="318" data-original-width="500" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsx6lXo_0Er6ORWM6FxJ8AoPfAiNCdcyeqK2Q4qOOK_kRv2jkzYDrHPzsGOV3aYJatLp7LVpuUrmZQdtyEaCq_rrutE3f_Rm7Qc_R9TPOA8ElEweAHCaw9wmWsp5cf9K1XexCYhNqUzQk/s320/Hermiston+OR+downtown.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Many of the Grateful Dead road crew came from Eastern Oregon cattle towns like Hermiston (pictured above, from a vintage postcard). It wasn't Berkeley.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></i></b><b><i><br />Ken Kesey and Pendleton</i></b><br />Oregon is a larger state than most people realize, but there aren't many people in most of it. Coastal Oregon is rugged and beautiful, but there isn't really any economy and few people live there. Eastern Oregon, by contrast, is flatter but not really that hospitable, either. Resource extraction, usually in the form of logging, has always been a big part of Oregon's economy. Even before the railroads, the various rivers allowed Oregon lumber to get to the Pacific Ocean for export. Cattle ranching came later to Eastern Oregon, when railroads allowed the otherwise inhospitable land to be used for profitable ranching.<p>The Oregon that everyone is familiar with is a comparatively thin strip in the middle of the state. Portland, the largest city, was at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia Rivers. It wasn't huge, though, having a population of around 370,000 throughout the 1960s. Eugene, the site of the University of Oregon, is 100 miles South of Portland, and while not really the center of the state. it was accessible from all directions. In the 1960s, Eugene had a population of just about 60,000, hardly even a city. In between the two was the state Capital at Salem, with about the population of Eugene. Aside from these three cities, there weren't any other major population centers in Oregon.</p><p>Ken Kesey's family came from Springfield, just outside of Eugene. Kesey had graduated from the U. of O in 1957, followed by going to Stanford University on a writing fellowship. His debut novel, <i>One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest</i>, was published in 1962 and was an instant success. With Kesey already in Palo Alto, and participating in LSD experiments, the Merry Pranksters and Acid Tests weren't far behind.</p><p>Kesey was a University graduate and a writer, but his family were Dairy farmers, so Kesey was on the cusp of both the intellectual world and an agricultural one. While many of the Pranksters were wayward intellectuals, at least one of them, Mike Hagen, was from a ranching family in Hermiston, OR, near Pendleton (from where we get the checkered Pendleton work shirts). Through Hagen, one Larry Shurtliff came down from Oregon to join the Pranksters in Mexico in late 1966. In 1967, Kesey recommended Shurtliff, whom he had christened "Ramrod" (for Pranksterish reasons). Shurtliff (b.1945-2006) would anchor the Grateful Dead crew until the very end of the line. </p><p>The Kesey/Ramrod connection extended the Eastern Oregon population to include John Hagen, Joe Winslow and Rex Jackson, along with several others. The Oregon crew members mostly came from either Pendleton (Rex Jackson and Joe Winslow) or the nearby cattle ranching town of Hermiston (Ramrod, Hagen and Sonny Heard). When the band members moved out of San Francisco to more rural addresses in Marin County, it was the crew members, that had grown up ranching, who knew how to fix fences and ride horses. Now, sure, not much ranching probably took place, but the crew members were comfortable out in the country, building fires and shooting off guns.<br /></p><p>With the frame of Oregon's history in mind, let's review all the times the Grateful Dead and its members played Oregon in the band's first decade of existence.<br /></p><p><i><b></b></i></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj969CAgiAlWk40IynRFcU4imJ_F-t35HmF4vi1q44Wyoe-R16muDbWa9Mtv4bHIrg_YHLBiG-cs9cpcNDy7l4T08Q0ZlMj-XOxB0vbNnZc5iV_R7P4B_1oEv3GNGoGkstZIMll1UDTY4g/s2048/JG+Camp+Meeker+19630801.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1264" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj969CAgiAlWk40IynRFcU4imJ_F-t35HmF4vi1q44Wyoe-R16muDbWa9Mtv4bHIrg_YHLBiG-cs9cpcNDy7l4T08Q0ZlMj-XOxB0vbNnZc5iV_R7P4B_1oEv3GNGoGkstZIMll1UDTY4g/s320/JG+Camp+Meeker+19630801.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Although this photo from August 1963 is from Camp Meeker, CA (near Yosemite), it was probably typical of the mass folk ensembles like The Bay City Minstrels (JG 2-r, David Nelson far right)<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b><br />Prehistory: The Bay City Minstrels in Oregon, 1963</b></i><br />It is symbolic, if not really significant, that Jerry Garcia's first performances outside of California were in Oregon. At the time, folk music was popular among college students, although not the type of old-timey and bluegrass music favored by purists like Jerry Garcia. One compromise was to form fairly large ensembles to perform easy-to-digest folk songs, while allowing sub-groups to perform some more specialized numbers. Groups like The New Christy Minstrels and the AuGoGo Singers were popular acts, touring around, recording and appearing on TV. <p></p><p>One such little known ensemble was "The Bay City Minstrels." It appeared to be about 10 performers who did a few numbers together, probably at the beginning and end of shows. In between, it seems that the performers did numbers in smaller groups, and possibly solo as well. One such sub-group was The Black Mountain Boys, with Jerry Garcia, David Nelson and Eric Thompson. Presumably, the trio provided the musical backing for the ensemble numbers, and did their own bluegrass set (or sets) somewhere in the middle. <br /></p><p>The ensemble toured the Pacific Northwest in Fall 1963. Fellow scholar Brian Miksis has tracked down two of the dates.<br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh10h3BFycFRzUi7KhrPjA8Qenfn3S5wRfwne2f5dNYEOnbhWKyXa30M_56PP2IMuAwMlXB8j3m7L_xjygZqV-Jky55Q3BKfWWyhyUMigw0Fb7HJQlUYSw21KBPSECH0PTnp8j97r63RzI/s879/Bay+City+Minstrels+19631102+a.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="879" data-original-width="671" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh10h3BFycFRzUi7KhrPjA8Qenfn3S5wRfwne2f5dNYEOnbhWKyXa30M_56PP2IMuAwMlXB8j3m7L_xjygZqV-Jky55Q3BKfWWyhyUMigw0Fb7HJQlUYSw21KBPSECH0PTnp8j97r63RzI/s320/Bay+City+Minstrels+19631102+a.jpg" /></a></div><br /><b>November 2, 1963 Eugene Hotel, Eugene, OR: Black Mountain Boys </b><i>(Saturday)</i><br />(Garcia, Nelson, Thompson; Bay City Minstrels evening hootenanny performance following SJSU vs. U. of Orgeon football game; also Sherry Snow and Songdivers)<p></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhljTLkeF6Jx9Ig2g6Owd1hQaJDemGNHsL4yg01H9nHZi0zn32dqhyg_FUrSwJVBAhFnkpezYR2jgtIgiTtu_CsdHJF1iqMGPANXdxn-QouRrDB7AoM4g2CSjt5__PE3OKHOl3BrkHZXtI/s2048/Bay+City+Minstrels+19631103.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1205" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhljTLkeF6Jx9Ig2g6Owd1hQaJDemGNHsL4yg01H9nHZi0zn32dqhyg_FUrSwJVBAhFnkpezYR2jgtIgiTtu_CsdHJF1iqMGPANXdxn-QouRrDB7AoM4g2CSjt5__PE3OKHOl3BrkHZXtI/s320/Bay+City+Minstrels+19631103.jpg" /></a></div><br /><b>November 3, 1963 Auditorium, Medford High School, Medford, OR: Black Mountain Boys </b><i>(Sunday)</i><br />(Garcia, Nelson, Thompson; Bay City Minstrels afternoon hootenanny performance; also Sherry Snow and Songdivers; Medford <i>Times</i> article) <p></p><p><b>January 1 (?), 1966 Beaver Hall, Portland, OR: <i>Portland Acid Test</i></b><br /><a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2016/02/grateful-dead-performance-list-december.html">The Portland Acid Test definitely happened, but when it happened is another issue</a>. Following Prankster logic, it would seem that it would have been on a Saturday night, but that would make it either Christmas 1965 or New Years Day 1966. It could even have been as late as January 7 or 14, but then you have to make sense of the Matrix dates around that time. Everyone seems to agree that there were snowy conditions in Portland, and that points towards New Year's Day. Keep in mind that all of the Grateful Dead/Pranksters crowd had no real family connections, so being out of town for the holidays was no big deal. The exception may have been Ken Kesey, but of course his family actually was in Oregon.<br /><br />Beaver Hall was a small room at 425 NW Glisan Street that could be rented fairly easily. It was used occasionally for local Oregon rock shows in the later 60s and into the 70s. <a href="https://www.facebook.com/PortlandInThe1960sStoriesFromTheCounterculture/posts/340409342719692">I did find a reference, however, that said the Portland Acid Test was at a different Beaver Hall on the other side of town</a>: </p><p></p><blockquote>Many of you will fondly remember Beaver Hall on NW Glisan. But, did you know there was once another place named Beaver Hall near SE Hawthorne around 1510 SE 9th Ave? And, it was at this Beaver Hall that Ken Kesey's Portland acid test took place. City directory listings back up several memories of the event. I love research projects: </blockquote><blockquote><i>From George Walker</i>: "Well, for starters, there was only one Portland Acid Test, in December '65. I don't know the exact date, but I don't believe it was on Christmas." </blockquote><blockquote><i>From Joe Uris:</i> "I was at the famous Acid Test. In fact, I hold the original acid test poster. It was at an upstairs hall, I think off of Hawthorne in a place I’d never been before or since. In those days, in order to have a dance with underage people, you had to have a matron. And they had this black woman who was a very nice lady but she had absolutely no idea what the hell was going on. And they had spiked various things with LSD which I thought was not responsible. The Warlocks which later became the Grateful Dead were there and the movies were playing endlessly."</blockquote><p></p><p>Once 1965 turned into 1966, the Warlocks turned into the Grateful Dead, and Acid Tests aside, they started looking for paying bookings. Initially, like any band they started out locally. The group moved their headquarters to Los Angeles in February and March of 1966, but they did not take a true road trip until July, 1966. The Grateful Dead went to Vancouver, British Columbia and played a three-day weekend Trips Festival (July 29-31), followed by a Friday night concert (August 5). In between, they played their first free show in the park (in Stanley Park on August 3), inaugurating an important Grateful Dead tradition. The band flew to Vancouver, however, so they did not stop anywhere on the way home.</p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh00gfBMZV9af1goIaGFwWvTPjZQ_jrsif6XwCVAhq_ylfqG_gtqUKtMbuNS7HHfHrFGFX4RWFLdcxpChzZzeYtkeQSoRz-kmohHX3IaxEJdEhU_XZ_qjnmxne5x2xQipaDjudEw8YV6sk/s625/GD+Eagles+19670716.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="625" data-original-width="427" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh00gfBMZV9af1goIaGFwWvTPjZQ_jrsif6XwCVAhq_ylfqG_gtqUKtMbuNS7HHfHrFGFX4RWFLdcxpChzZzeYtkeQSoRz-kmohHX3IaxEJdEhU_XZ_qjnmxne5x2xQipaDjudEw8YV6sk/s320/GD+Eagles+19670716.jpg" /></a></b></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />July 13, 1967 Pacific National Exhibition Agrodome, Vancouver, BC: Grateful Dead/Daily Flash<br />July 14-15, 1967 Dante's Inferno, Vancouver, BC: Grateful Dead/Collectors/Painted Ship<br />July 16, 1967 Golden Gardens Beach, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead </b><i>(afternoon free show)</i><b><br />July 16, 1967 Eagle's Auditorium, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead/Daily Flash/Magic Fern</b><br />By mid-1967, the Dead had released their debut album on Warner Brothers, and were nationally infamous. Relatively few people outside of San Francisco had heard the band's music, but they were known. The band had already played Manhattan, and now they had a chance to play the Pacific Northwest. The group has Thursday, Friday and Saturday night bookings in Vancouver, and a Sunday night show in Seattle. The band shared some dates with the Daily Flash, Seattle's leading psychedelic guitar band. Being the Dead, they also played a Sunday. afternoon free concert on Puget Sound. I'll just say--the Dead have ruled Seattle ever since.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">A word about the structure of this post--in order to understand the dynamics of Grateful Dead shows in Oregon, I have to list many other Pacific Northwest shows for context. To keep this post manageable, however, I won't talk much about the economics of shows in Seattle and Vancouver.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMPmyYKUZgP0TvU9FCpklG9fOvXqyPnoX4h0_CAYwG1HYzYe5EFt0AHpBwnXkZTSLSEmXaVk789GY6U5PE21dpgWlTMSBCSW91ZqW8hYgYPlZkdq7BUx5vtOSP0TkyFQajsn8jcON3VMM/s2034/19670718+GD+Portland+Masonic.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2034" data-original-width="2025" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMPmyYKUZgP0TvU9FCpklG9fOvXqyPnoX4h0_CAYwG1HYzYe5EFt0AHpBwnXkZTSLSEmXaVk789GY6U5PE21dpgWlTMSBCSW91ZqW8hYgYPlZkdq7BUx5vtOSP0TkyFQajsn8jcON3VMM/s320/19670718+GD+Portland+Masonic.jpg" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b>July 18, 1967 Masonic Temple, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead/Poverty's People/US Cadenza/Nigells </b><i>(Tuesday)</i><br />Portland had a thriving music scene in the 1960s, of a sort, but the economics were very much at odds with anywhere else on the West Coast. For one thing, music was not allowed anywhere that alcohol was served. So--no bar bands in Portland (apparently this was a legacy of the rather wild years of WW2). This also meant, however, that it was tough for bands to make a living in Oregon. Throughout the Pacific Northwest in the 60s, there had been a teenage rock and roll dance scene, generally centered around Tacoma, WA. Groups like Paul Revere and The Raiders and The Wailers were very popular nationwide. But Portland was just a satellite of the Tacoma scene.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Original music in 60s Portland mostly folk music, played in coffee shops. When bands started to form, they played in coffee shops, because they were not allowed to play in bars. Thus, on one hand the Portland scene wasn't driven by the need to play Top 40 hits for drinkers, but on the other hand there was no upside to being an electric band in Portland with no steady paying gigs. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Paradoxically, by 1967 Portland had a thriving, if tiny, psychedelic ballroom scene. If you wanted to play or hear live, electric rock and roll, you couldn't go to a bar. In one way, that was fine since most rock fans back then weren't even of drinking age. But coffee shops were simply too small to sustain the economics of a rock band requiring even minimal equipment and transport. A folk singer can hitchhike with his guitar, but a four piece band needs at least a station wagon to transport some amplifiers, trap drums and electric guitars.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Back in '67, numerous tiny venues in Portland put on rock shows, with weird posters and bands playing "folk-rock." Once in a while, a traveling band from California or Washington would play one of these gigs, since CA-to-WA was a multiple day drive, and they would spend a night in Portland anyway. Why not try and pick up a meal, some weed and a few bucks when there was a chance? <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/oregon-rock-concerts-1967-oregon-v.html">Thus Oregon's rock history in 1967 is largely insular, with the unexpected insertion of some well known rock bands</a>. Almost always, the Portland shows were in conjunction with another booking in Seattle or Vancouver.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Masonic Temple was built in 1925, at 1119 SW Park Avenue at SW Jefferson Street. The Masonic Temple building is now part of the <a href="https://portlandartmuseum.org/">Portland Art Museum</a> (the address is 1219 SW Park). The 4-story building still includes the Grand Ballroom, which is probably a remodeled version of the Ballroom used for rock concerts in the 1960s. The current capacity is about 1000 (per the site), so perhaps up to twice that many could have been squeezed in.The Masonic Temple was a regular, if intermittent venue for Portland rock concerts in the 60s. I do not know if a specific promoter controlled the lease; more likely, the hall was simply for rent. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2010/04/1119-sw-park-avenue-portland-or-masonic.html ">In particular, the Masonic Temple had a number of high profile Fillmore-type bands in the Summer of 1967</a>, exactly when the Crystal Ballroom was at a low ebb since its founding partners (Mike Magaurn and Whitey Davis) were in <i>absentia</i> that Summer. There seems to have been intermittent concerts throughout the end of the 1960s, but our information is spotty. In this case, the Grateful Dead made their formal Portland debut on a Tuesday night, partway back from the Vancouver and Seattle shows.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size: small;"><b>January 26-27, 1968 Eagles Auditorium, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead/Quicksilver Messenger Service</b><br />The Grateful Dead's true invasion of Oregon began in early 1968. The Grateful Dead and Quicksilver Messenger Service were booked for 7 dates in the Northwest, two in Seattle and five in Oregon. The weekend of shows at Seattle's Eagles Auditorium was in fact the big booking. Eagles Auditorium, at 1416 7th Avenue (at Union St) in downtown Seattle, had been built in 1925. Remarkably, apartments surrounded the ballroom. Eagles was Seattle's Fillmore-equivalent, and the Dead had played there the previous summer (see July 16 above). Now they were back, with Quicksilver in tow. This would have been a lucrative gig, but they needed to get home, so paying shows in Oregon made good sense.</span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><br /><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi962tutkTfiHC4Jzx1eZ7uRSDJ7jgf94WE8ouJLkGYPsWKBRr_VQm2k7jZgQjEP2J6QlNqDpY6fzlWzAs_CCmTz3GYCeO8rnz4CnhhmNIrceXlb7r3uKSPB8vS-iUIPyXEm532WZaZkgM/s704/GD+Oregon+19680129+hb.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="704" data-original-width="456" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi962tutkTfiHC4Jzx1eZ7uRSDJ7jgf94WE8ouJLkGYPsWKBRr_VQm2k7jZgQjEP2J6QlNqDpY6fzlWzAs_CCmTz3GYCeO8rnz4CnhhmNIrceXlb7r3uKSPB8vS-iUIPyXEm532WZaZkgM/s320/GD+Oregon+19680129+hb.jpg" /></a></b></span></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />January 29, 1968 College Center Ballroom, Portland State College, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead/Quicksilver Messenger Service/PH Phactor Jug Band </b><i> (Monday)</i><br />With a week between relatively big weekend bookings in Seattle and Portland, the Quick and the Dead played some smaller college venues in Oregon. However small some of those college gigs may have been, the bands would have had the same expenses in any case. The Crystal Ballroom in Portland was the major venue, but it was too casually run to have (or to enforce) non-compete clauses at nearby places. <a href="http://pnwbands.com/phphactor.html">The PH Phactor Jug Band, though not a major musical group, was a crucial fulcrum in the social network of </a></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfPfd9OFy8kS6jfXKN5JhnfAC26FMLhbRtpf9d5oky9CXlhI-b_T2QRpiCde3MRukv76qQ1uf6sfZVbuNT2TOttYzz6211yTPaV-YDIwMWuiiu_sbO_eQSKREJq7q8Et1Q8Th5nXg_4fs/s716/19680130+GD+Eugene.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="716" data-original-width="573" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfPfd9OFy8kS6jfXKN5JhnfAC26FMLhbRtpf9d5oky9CXlhI-b_T2QRpiCde3MRukv76qQ1uf6sfZVbuNT2TOttYzz6211yTPaV-YDIwMWuiiu_sbO_eQSKREJq7q8Et1Q8Th5nXg_4fs/s320/19680130+GD+Eugene.jpg" /></a></b></span></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />January 30, 1968 EMU Ballroom, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR: Grateful Dead/Quicksilver Messenger Service/PH Phactor Jug Band/Palace Meat Market </b><i>(Tuesday)</i><br />Eugene was about 112 miles South of Portland, a quick two hours by freeway. Now, of course, we all think nothing of driving two hours to see rock bands we like, but that wasn't a likely scenario back then. Thus Eugene was a separate concert market than Portland. This show was the band's Eugene debut, a city where the band would go on to play many legendary shows. Palace Meat Market was a Portland folk-rock band. There were rock shows at the University of Oregon, of course, but by and large there wasn't really a "rock scene" in Eugene, just in Portland.<br /></span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;">The various breaks in the schedule (after Seattle, and then after Eugene) mean that the bands had to stay somewhere. By this time, Ramrod and John Hagen were part of the crew, so they had plenty of Oregon connections. Did any of the band stay with Ken Kesey? Did they all go to Pendleton? <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/03/grateful-dead-tour-itinerary-january.html?showComment=1342196667895#c8052448627654205981">Some remarks by John Cipollina in an old <i>Golden Road</i> suggest that they did</a>. That would have been pretty severe culture shock for suburban beatniks like Garcia, Lesh and Weir. Few people inquire what the Dead members did between shows, but in those days they would have had no money for hotels. <br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-Ks_XldKiiOgMmwTxNOd6tEqSQTVCCB0x3z_1ZAyK2L7xvQJdsRHePliZX9-LzT11P8o_afAd3-yVcIxFs8t5GaDUTLghLWyBPqGegep0xEOfy2c54z0ox6iUNHm6M9Qfiyd6bP7pV9Y/s480/19680202+Oregon.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="305" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-Ks_XldKiiOgMmwTxNOd6tEqSQTVCCB0x3z_1ZAyK2L7xvQJdsRHePliZX9-LzT11P8o_afAd3-yVcIxFs8t5GaDUTLghLWyBPqGegep0xEOfy2c54z0ox6iUNHm6M9Qfiyd6bP7pV9Y/s320/19680202+Oregon.jpg" /></a></b></span></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />February 2-3, 1968 Crystal Ballroom, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead/Quicksilver Messenger Service/PH Phactor Jug Band</b><i> (Friday-Saturday)</i><br /><a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/crystal-ballroom-1332-w-burnside_09.html ">The Crystal Ballroom, at 1332 W. Burnside (at NW 14th), played a peculiar role in Portland rock history, as it was the highest profile venue in the city, but it was run on a shoestring basis</a>. When the Crystal was functioning well, however, it provided some of the great memories of 60s Portland rock. When the Grateful Dead and Quicksilver tour hit the Crystal on a Friday and Saturday night, all the stars were aligned. After a few smaller shows at Portland State and U of O, hip Portland was primed for the shows at the Crystal.</span></span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br />
<br />
According to Toody Conner, who was one of the volunteers who helped run
the Crystal (per Tim Hills' book), there were lines around the block,
and there was so much money in gate receipts that they had to borrow an
equipment case to stuff it into, which she sat on during most of the
show. The Crystal had had financial struggles throughout its entire
existence as a psychedelic venue, but for this weekend, with the
audience ready and the Dead firing on all cylinders--not to mention the
formidable Quicksilver Messenger Service--everything happened the way it
was supposed to, if only for a weekend.<br />
<br />
We know how well the Grateful Dead played, too, because they taped it.
Partial tapes of Dead sets from both nights circulate —the only live
tapes I know of from The Crystal—and one track was released on a
Grateful Dead vault cd in 2009 (“Dark Star” from 2/2/68, as a bonus
track on <i>Road Trips Vol. 2 No. 2: Carousel 2/14/68</i>)</span></span><p></p><span style="font-size: small;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFO8Rw7e0jptKZ9JwsjbBXFBImx_lttT2o6DV3mCRu0Svus9bhSViu7AmQDSn0S5Blcw-6nkkNmlYMcA2_DAigYe92Xj9eJpN3hzSD5cJN8TJJ9fi838TYnMRP4CW4ZdRdLghW8U05EBc/s640/19680204.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="414" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFO8Rw7e0jptKZ9JwsjbBXFBImx_lttT2o6DV3mCRu0Svus9bhSViu7AmQDSn0S5Blcw-6nkkNmlYMcA2_DAigYe92Xj9eJpN3hzSD5cJN8TJJ9fi838TYnMRP4CW4ZdRdLghW8U05EBc/s320/19680204.jpg" /></a></div><br />February 4, 1968 Gym, South Oregon College, Ashland, OR: Grateful Dead/Quicksilver Messenger Service </b><i>(Sunday)</i><br />The "Quick and The Dead" Northwest tour concluded with a Sunday night show in Ashland, OR at the Gymnasium of South Oregon College, 290 miles South of Portland. South Oregon College (today Southern Oregon University) had been founded in 1926. This was the Dead's only appearance in Southern Oregon, as their increasingly popularity in Oregon ensured that they played the larger population centers around Portland the two largest State Universities for the rest of their career.</span><br /><span style="font-size: small;"></span><p><span style="font-size: small;">
<strike>I assume the Dead and Quicksilver played McNeal Pavilion at 1250
Siskiyou Boulevard, since it was opened in 1957. The Pavilion was
renovated in 1990, doubling its capacity to 1,400. Thus the Dead and
Quicksilver played a tiny gym with 700 seats--and no doubt some people
on the floor. Did they get to dance? No information or tape has ever
surfaced about this interesting event, to my knowledge. </strike></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><i>[<b>update</b>] <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/12/the-grateful-dead-in-oregon-1966-76.html?showComment=1614109377122#c4559558019210124105">Commenter IM tells us that the concert was actually in Britt Hall</a>, not McNeal Pavilion. There are some further details about the show </i><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">As the Grateful Dead got bigger and bigger in Oregon, they had less need to play outlying areas. This Sunday night show was the only time the band played Ashland. Ashland is very far South, not too far from the California border. Once the Dead became big in Eugene, which would happen in about 18 months, there was no thought of playing a small place South of it.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTEb2X4LeK8qtij5BGoEm3zlSp1MfqxfGGvof_ihzgJFWYg6FjpVdWCrNxQPGGuKjVR3tfbV99cm_0qD2AVBxyMhAyzA1lH8TspnV4LhIV4PYAL-R_7uZJnvX3eij4tY1fpCdXUmEYG4A/s800/Sky+River+photo+19680901.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="551" data-original-width="800" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTEb2X4LeK8qtij5BGoEm3zlSp1MfqxfGGvof_ihzgJFWYg6FjpVdWCrNxQPGGuKjVR3tfbV99cm_0qD2AVBxyMhAyzA1lH8TspnV4LhIV4PYAL-R_7uZJnvX3eij4tY1fpCdXUmEYG4A/s320/Sky+River+photo+19680901.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The first Sky River Rock Festival, on a farm in Sultan, WA (August 31-September 2 1968) created the blueprint for all the huge outdoor rock festivals in 1969<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />August 31-September 2, 1968 Sky River Rock Festival and Lighter Than Air Fare, Betty Nelson's Organic Raspberry Farm, Sultan, WA: Country Joe and The Fish/Pink Floyd/Muddy Waters/Peanut Butter Conspiracy/Santana/ Kaleidoscope/ John Fahey/ HP Lovecraft/ Steppenwolf/ Youngbloods/ (Grateful Dead </b><i>unbilled</i><b>) </b><br />The 1968 Sky River Rock Festival was held at a farm East of Seattle. From this distance, while Sky River seems like the typical story of hippies in the mud listening to noisy rock with few clothes on--which is accurate--the Festival was still a profoundly important event in rock history. I don't know how many hippies from Oregon went to Sky River, probably a fair number, but the important thing was that every Oregon hippie must have heard about it, from friends or the news or the grapevine. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Grateful Dead played at Sky River, but burnishing their legend, they were not billed, and simply flew in and played on the last day. To the people there, the appearance probably seemed like a magical benediction, as at the time the Dead were bigger than almost all the bands booked at the festival. That, too, would have gotten down to Oregon and the underground telegraph.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">In 1967 and '68, there were numerous multi-act "Rock Festivals" all over the country, modeled on the June 1967 Monterey Pop Festival, at the Monterey County Fairgrounds. The Monterey Pop Festival had been modeled on the Monterey Jazz Festival, held annually at the same venue since 1959. 60s County Fairground Pope Festivals are largely fondly remembered by fans, and lots of great music was played.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Unfortunately, it was an unprofitable business model. Usually these shows took a big arena (like the Philadelphia Spectrum) or an outdoor pavilion (like any County Fairgrounds) and booked numerous bands. The idea was to spread out the risk of who was hot and who was not. The problem was that if a lot of people came, the venue would be overrun and the municipality--and the cops--would be very upset. If the crowd was manageable, that often meant that there weren't enough paid admission. In any case, long-haired rock fans wanted to smoke weed, carry on and dance to loud music, and County Fairgrounds weren't really the place for that.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Sky River was different. It was held on private property--the organic raspberry farm of one Betty Nelson--so the music could be loud and long, and the cops really had no jurisdiction. A smaller, predecessor event had been held on April 28, 1968 at Duvall, WA (just East of Seattle), featuring Country Joe and The Fish (it was known as "The Piano Drop," since the featured highlight had been dropping a piano from a helicopter). A few thousand attended, and the decision was to go all-in for Labor Day weekend. The chosen site was the farm in Sultan, WA, an hour Northeast of Duvall. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Sky River Rock Festival was an epic event, well-covered on the Internet if you Google. The festival was booked by the former organizer of the Berkeley Folk Festival (John Chambless), so the event was heavy on Berkeley and San Francisco performers. But there were some touring acts, too, including then-unknown Pink Floyd, a rising band from LA called Steppenwolf, a hip comedian named Richard Pryor, legendary bluesman Muddy Waters and numerous others. On the same weekend, there was a "typical" three-day rock festival at the Palace Of Fine Arts in San Francisco. The event was held, and the Grateful Dead were supposed to headline the last day (Monday, September 2).</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Even without modern technology, word had come down from the Northwest--it was happening at a farm a few hours East of Seattle. The Dead abandoned the Palace of Fine Arts gig and flew to Seattle, then headed East. At the show, Fender had a tent full of equipment, and each band could choose what they wanted to use. The band was asked "which amps do you want to use?" Famously, the Dead--I suspect soundman Owsley Stanley here-- said "all of them." They were the last act, so why not?</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Something like 20,000 people had showed up at the raspberry farm. It had rained, and there was mud everywhere. Also lots of hippies, many of them girls, not wearing clothes. Somehow, however, everyone got fed, there was no significant violence and everyone had a great time. The last set on Labor Day, apparently, was the unexpected Grateful Dead, playing through every available Fender amplifier. </span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The rock world took notice. Rock festivals at the County Fairgrounds were <i>passe</i> from then on. For the Summer of '69, there was a new model: private property, unlimited attendance and a massive tower of amplifiers that could be heard for miles. No cops. Let it rock. This was the model for the Seminole Pop Festival in Florida in May, the Atlanta Pop Festival in July and finally Woodstock in August. Regardless of how many Oregonians went to '68 Sky River--it was probably a fair number--the word was out. This was how it was done, and it wasn't a real festival without the Grateful Dead.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size: small;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN4vR572fvfD66xduOTiquP79GgW7XJLkzzFNv45pR88_kd5lW-dQOmniHaSWDvKH-spoNUAdiDtv4toGClfwIt2eGtod3rckNQaafx536E5GTV8Kiq3VoMzGroR6_vqnJPoORChaeYpQ/s564/GD+Corvallis+19681115.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="564" data-original-width="274" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN4vR572fvfD66xduOTiquP79GgW7XJLkzzFNv45pR88_kd5lW-dQOmniHaSWDvKH-spoNUAdiDtv4toGClfwIt2eGtod3rckNQaafx536E5GTV8Kiq3VoMzGroR6_vqnJPoORChaeYpQ/s320/GD+Corvallis+19681115.jpg" /></a></div><br />November 15, 1968 Gill Coliseum, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR: Grateful Dead/Mint Tattoo/City Blue</b><i> (Friday)</i><br />In November of 1968, the Grateful Dead had booked a Saturday night show in Vancouver (November 16) and two shows at Eagles in Seattle on Sunday (Nov 17). It made perfect sense to book a show in Oregon, on the way North. Oregon State University, the Agricultural School counterpart to the University of Oregon in Eugene, was in Corvallis. Corvallis was midway between Eugene and Portland, both of which were about an hour away.</span><p><span style="font-size: small;">Gill Coliseum was the basketball arena. The Grateful Dead were not nearly a big enough draw to come close to filling the arena (capacity 9,600), but that wouldn't have been the economic driver. Universities in those days had entertainment budgets, so some hippies probably got on the appropriate committee and got the booking agent to sign up the Grateful Dead. The basketball arena was the venue that would be used, and I assume only the floor was open, not the upper decks. It also meant that even with a good crowd, there would have been room to dance and hang out. Also, I think Corvallis on a Friday night back in '68 wasn't that exciting, so a lot of undergraduates probably just showed up for the hell of it. Think about it, seeing a band you'd barely or never heard of in your college gym--many of us did that, right?--and stumbling on to the 1968 Grateful Dead, burning it up with "The Eleven" or something.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Opening Mint Tattoo was a Bay Area based band featuring Sacramento musicians, guitarist Bruce Stephens and organist/bassist Burns Kellogg (plus drummer Gregg Thomas). Mint Tattoo released an album on Dot in 1968, and then Stephens and Kellogg joined Blue Cheer in 1969. As for City Blue, they were a local band, and guitar player Marshall Adams recalls the event: <br /></span></p><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/09/november-15-1968-coliseum-oregon-state.html?showComment=1304781790493#c8818008424727806428">This definitely took place. Marshall Adams, guitar player for Big City Blue had this to say: </a><br /><blockquote>"Big City Blue came together for the Grateful Dead Concert at OSU Gill Coliseum in Fall Term 1968. We were to open and Mint Tattoo was to also be featured. We had one set of material with Jimmy Hibbs doing most of the vocals and rhythm guitar, Jim Knight on Bass, Ron Leach on drums, and Marshall Adams on lead guitar and folk flute. Well we opened and it went quite well.........35 minutes later we went back on and did our set again. Seems that Mint Tattoo was busy out in the parking lot doing whatever bands would do in a parking lot."</blockquote></span><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b>November 16, 1968 Erb Memorial Union Ballroom, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR: Grateful Dead</b><i> (Saturday)</i><br /><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/09/november-15-1968-coliseum-oregon-state.html ">I wrote about the Friday night Corvallis show over a decade ago.</a> At the time, the poster circulated, but the Corvallis date didn't appear on most databases of Grateful Dead performances (<i>Deadlists, Deadbase</i>, <i>etc</i>). My post helped rectify that oversight. In the post, and in the Comment Thread, I speculated about the open date on Saturday night (November 16). If the Dead were playing Friday night in Corvallis, Sunday night in Seattle and Vancouver Saturday night had been canceled, where were they. I speculated about the idea that maybe there was a stealth show we didn't know about, and the most likely location was Eugene.</span></p><span style="font-size: small;">It took a few years ago, but Internet did its thing. You can follow the discussion on the Comment Thread, but the best summary is by the stellar scholar LightIntoAshes, who cracked the egg. <a href="https://deadessays.blogspot.com/2017/11/lost-shows-come-to-light.html">His summary of the "lost" show in Eugene can be found in his blog post here.</a> The show appears to have been pitched to the University as a "student dance" without naming the band. So the word "Grateful Dead" didn't appear in advance. Thanks to LIA's great research, and a search of <a href="https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=4pF9x-cDGsoC&dat=19681118&printsec=frontpage&hl=en ">the Eugene Register-Guard on the Monday after,</a> we get a whiff of the event:<br /><blockquote>FAKE BOMB ENDS UO ROCK DANCE<br />A fake bomb planted near some amplifiers brought an early end Saturday night to a University of Oregon concert and dance by a rock group known as the Grateful Dead.<br />Eugene police said someone attending the dance noticed the "bomb" - consisting of seven wooden sticks, painted red to resemble dynamite, an alarm clock, battery, and wires - and reported it to Anthony Evans, night manager at the Erb Memorial Union, where the concert and dance were being held.</blockquote></span><span style="font-size: small;"><blockquote>Even though one of the band member[s] held up the "bomb" and indicated it was a fake, Evans decided to clear the Erb ballroom at about 11:40 p.m., police said. Police were called, took possession of the "bomb," and were still investigating Monday.</blockquote></span><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b>November 17, 1968 Eagles Auditorium, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead/Byron Pope/Easy Chair </b><i>(two shows 3pm and 9pm)</i><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpuHcaRsSEHTNveHYWUK9Ebg-UxFsZvFdmjKw0c2IkEI0kkO2Pi7RBXR9qVoOVytwQmvet4vCyxk_mSkHzyKTOh5PBIyRh7rKgGwjjXLVjZAyz4AwZkFX8MkC6WFPYbRhYL8-SOPBjVxE/s640/19690530-7x10-100.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="434" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpuHcaRsSEHTNveHYWUK9Ebg-UxFsZvFdmjKw0c2IkEI0kkO2Pi7RBXR9qVoOVytwQmvet4vCyxk_mSkHzyKTOh5PBIyRh7rKgGwjjXLVjZAyz4AwZkFX8MkC6WFPYbRhYL8-SOPBjVxE/s320/19690530-7x10-100.jpg" /></a></b></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />May 30, 1969 Springer's Hall, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead/Palace Meat Market </b><i>(Friday)</i><b><br />May 31, 1969 McArthur Court, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR: Grateful Dead/Palace Meat Market</b><i> (Saturday)</i><br />The band returned to Oregon in the early Summer of 1969. This trip was the only one for many years that did not include a swing to other parts of the Pacific Northwest. The Dead also began a pattern of alternating between Portland and Eugene. In this case, they played Friday in Portland and Saturday in Eugene, which in fact was a very rare combination. <a href="http://pnwbands.com/palacemeatmarket.html">Palace Meat Market was a Eugene band with a horn section, and they opened both shows</a>.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Springer's Hall, usually called Springer's Ballroom on posters, had an interesting history. It is in what is now Gresham, OR, a suburb about 12 miles East of downtown Portland. In the early 20th century, Springer's seems to have been the terminus of the Portland Traction Company (Springwater Division Line Railroad). It appears the Inn, with the associated ballroom, was a destination for Portland residents. The line closed in 1958, but the old Inn and ballroom seems to have been run-down but intact. For many years Springer's Ballroom was apparently a popular venue for big band swing and country music, so opening it up for rock groups made good sense.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">Although Gresham is part of the suburbs now, at the time it was just countryside. The various posters don't even have an address: they just say "take Powell Street to 190th, turn right," and that was apparently sufficient (scholarly commenters have determined that the actual address is now 18300 SE Richey, Gresham, OR 97080). The Dead had been playing at the Crystal Ballroom, but the Crystal had closed in mid-68. <a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2010/04/w-powell-blvdus-26-at-se-190th-avenue.html">In Portland, like most places, live rock music first became popular in bohemian underground neighborhood, but the audiences were out in the suburbs. So an old ballroom in the quiet countryside had fewer neighbors to bother. Apparently Springer's was a pretty fun joint.</a><br /></span></p><p>In Eugene, the Grateful Dead were playing at MacArthur Court, the basketball arena. McArthur Court, built in 1926 with a capacity of nearly 10,000, remained the home of the Oregon Ducks until it was replaced in 2011 by the Matthew Knight Arena. In any case, when the Dead headlined McArthur Court on May 31, it was one of the biggest rooms that they had headlined up until that time. The show appears to have been scheduled for the track stadium (Hayward Field) and moved indoors, but in any case it was a sign of the Dead's status in Oregon. I don't know how many tickets were sold--it probably wasn't nearly sold out--but it was still a big booking for Oregon. <br /><br />Ken Kesey and his Prankster pals were having some sort of Prankster reunion this weekend, and Kesey, Ken Babbs and others were in attendance at these shows, and may have appeared on stage in some capacity or other. Apparently it was a wild time, just another in a long list of memorable Oregon shows for the Grateful Dead.<br /></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnP4xW_HB9yh3AVhpZWhcC7mw-XIh0o-E_Io8g48q7Pv0yd1mM9d79L5M4GHaNQ7zBYhGOJG6GOenA8amsN2r70FMVRPB-REmVNnBb-kunPyIfevNrw0rROPM8oYC6-yVMWT-7lRdVMr8/s1024/aqua-theatre-green-lake-1961.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="803" data-original-width="1024" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnP4xW_HB9yh3AVhpZWhcC7mw-XIh0o-E_Io8g48q7Pv0yd1mM9d79L5M4GHaNQ7zBYhGOJG6GOenA8amsN2r70FMVRPB-REmVNnBb-kunPyIfevNrw0rROPM8oYC6-yVMWT-7lRdVMr8/s320/aqua-theatre-green-lake-1961.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Aqua Theater in Seattle, at Green Lake, 1961. Does this seem like a good idea?</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />August 20, 1969 El Roach Tavern, Ballard, WA: Grateful Dead </b><i>(Wednesday)</i><b><br />August 21, 1969 Aqua Theatre, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Sanpaku </b><i>(Thursday)</i><br />The Grateful Dead's next trip to the Pacific Northwest had a bizarre schedule, made even stranger by what ended up occurring. There were huge rock festivals in every part of the country--Woodstock was the weekend of August 15-17--and the West was no exception. The big event planned for San Francisco was The Wild West Festival. All the San Francisco bands were going to play a three day festival at Golden Gate Park. There were three big nights scheduled at Kezar Stadium, in the Park, the football home of the San Francisco 49ers, on the weekend of August 22-24. At the same time, there would be free concerts in the park throughout the whole weekend. The Grateful Dead were booked at Kezar for Friday, August 22, along with Janis Joplin and Quicksilver. <br /><br />The Wild West Festival did not happen. Indeed, it was a famous debacle, and its cancellation ended up leading to the ill-fated Altamont concert, which was even worse (f<a href="https://www.michaeljkramer.net/the-republic-of-rock-music-and-citizenship-in-the-sixties-counterculture/">or a great evaluation of the Wild West saga, see Michael J Kramer's fine 2017 Oxford Press book <i>The Republic Of Rock</i></a>) . But the Dead's strange, tortured travel plans only make sense if we consider that they were planning to fly into and out of San Francisco for a big Friday night show at the 49ers football stadium. As a result, the Dead were booked to headline a show in Seattle on Wednesday (August 20), would then return for a Friday night show at Kezar (August 22), followed by headlining festivals on Saturday (August 23 outside of Portland) and Sunday (August 24, in British Columbia).</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio2xuin_a4MpZ7e6OpHbrWIYFFZ-uLf_XSs8YdhIElPgVt8sevOc55Gl30b-I3Kpn5O6_xoLVCATdAAfq2Q07WLCukHS7wqPokJTbacE-4f8oSRb-Rw4VbdDXhNzMExfrmBC6DubJpVSA/s1434/El+Roach+from+Helix+1969.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1434" data-original-width="952" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEio2xuin_a4MpZ7e6OpHbrWIYFFZ-uLf_XSs8YdhIElPgVt8sevOc55Gl30b-I3Kpn5O6_xoLVCATdAAfq2Q07WLCukHS7wqPokJTbacE-4f8oSRb-Rw4VbdDXhNzMExfrmBC6DubJpVSA/s320/El+Roach+from+Helix+1969.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>An ad for El Roach, at 5419 Ballard Avenue, from a 1969 edition of the Seattle underground paper The Helix. The New Loiter Blues Band is playing during the week, and on the weekend is Peece. It says "come boogie with the freaks."<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: small;"><br />The week began with a Wednesday night booking at an outdoor theater on a lake, outside of Seattle. It got rained out. I mean, never mind the lake--what's the idea of having an outdoor theater in the Pacific Northwest? <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/august-20-1969-roach-seattle-wa-updated.html">Incredibly, the Dead addressed the rain-out by going to a biker bar called the El Roach Tavern a few miles away and jamming the night away</a>. The Dead, with the New Riders and Sanpaku in tow, returned to the Aqua Theater the next night (Thursday August 21), playing the last ever show at the venue. It would take numerous posts to explain the strangeness of the Aqua Theater and the quixotic trip to the El Roach. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/august-21-1969-aqua-theatre-seattle-wa.html">Fortunately, I have written the posts, with pictures and links</a>. Either of the gigs would count as among the strangest ever in Dead history.<br /></span><p></p><b><span style="font-size: small;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGqem3K0Pu3Zg1Jad-eN0fTJ4w8I1nr8Ay7GeP5e2UAWqxhyphenhyphenQjms8m7YXQ8-awfxu7YEyT6pLPlP3AoTGKtyyOSWcoBNLTjR0LSJ-wSdVcVWEhVM1bxwfnORcglx8OAax0zL1IO3ea15E/s803/19690823+Oregon.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="803" data-original-width="494" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGqem3K0Pu3Zg1Jad-eN0fTJ4w8I1nr8Ay7GeP5e2UAWqxhyphenhyphenQjms8m7YXQ8-awfxu7YEyT6pLPlP3AoTGKtyyOSWcoBNLTjR0LSJ-wSdVcVWEhVM1bxwfnORcglx8OAax0zL1IO3ea15E/s320/19690823+Oregon.jpg" /></a></div><br />August 21-23, 1969 Bullfrog 2 Festival, Pelletier Farm, St. Helens, OR: Grateful Dead/Portland Zoo/Notary Sojac/Chapter Five/Sabbatic Goat/Searchin Soul/Trilogy/River/The Weeds/Bill Feldman/Sand/New Colony/Don Rose/Mixed Blood/Ron Bruce</span></b><br /><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b>August 22, 1969 Pelletier Farm, St. Helens, OR: New Riders of The Purple Sage/others Bullfrog 2 Festival </b><i>(Friday)</i><b><br />August 23, 1969 Pelletier Farm, St. Helens, OR poster: Grateful Dead/others Bullfrog 2 Festival </b><i>(Saturday)</i><b><br /></b>Because the Friday night Wild West Festival booking was canceled, the Dead could go straight to the Portland area for the "Bullfrog 2" Festival. One sub-plot of the weekend was that the Festival booked for a "regular" venue, the Wild West event at a football stadium, got canceled. Meanwhile, the two Festivals booked for empty fields on private property (Bullfrog and Vancouver Pop) actually happened. This was the result from the success of the Sky River festival. Events on private properties didn't really need permits, and if they were in unincorporated areas, as most farms are, then there weren't likely ordnances that could be invoked to stop them. This didn't always mean that events were safe, or well-run, or that the sound was good. But they happened, and the cops couldn't interfere, which was a far bigger issue with a rock festival in the 1960s. <br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Bullfrog 2 Festival--even I don't know anything about the first Bullfrog Festival--was a three day event on a farm outside of Portland, headlined by the Grateful Dead but otherwise exclusively featuring Oregon bands (<a href="http://pnwbands.com/">you can look any of them up on the great Pacific Northwest bands site</a>). The Dead showed up Friday night, however, so the New Riders actually played that evening. <a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2020/05/new-riders-of-purple-sage-tour-history.html">Apparently the Riders played on the back of a flatbed truck, illuminated by a few spotlights</a>. The Dead played their scheduled show on Saturday. I don't know what the crowd was like. There wasn't a Bullfrog 3, but by 1970 the "Rock Festival In A Muddy Field" model was no longer viable, anyway, since fans rarely wanted to go to more than one of these events in their life.<br /><br /><b></b></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRKxN1D4Lp4namGz2E2oy-7uLWA1K-Ykc-RyYJ0h3mHNLR1DN58gvJ7TBEyKSrLy9rwbGzYGPtYF9S9RnIAaWUnxkUvfA51bfV6Ezdi7vpZQZSVzI18RUuWs56lnHJIUTAkdZ2bcJya6A/s504/Vancouver+Pop+19690824+hb-8.5x11.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="504" data-original-width="389" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRKxN1D4Lp4namGz2E2oy-7uLWA1K-Ykc-RyYJ0h3mHNLR1DN58gvJ7TBEyKSrLy9rwbGzYGPtYF9S9RnIAaWUnxkUvfA51bfV6Ezdi7vpZQZSVzI18RUuWs56lnHJIUTAkdZ2bcJya6A/s320/Vancouver+Pop+19690824+hb-8.5x11.jpg" /></a></b></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />August 24, 1969 Vancouver Pop Festival, Paradise Valley Resort, Squamish, BC: <i>Grateful Dead canceled</i></b><br />The Vancouver Pop Festival saga is too long to tell here. The Festival was actually at the Paradise Valley Resort, near Squamish, about 60 miles (90 minutes) north of Vancouver. I believe the land was somewhat under the control of the Squamish First Nation, so it was insulated from police pressure. The multi-day festival actually happened, but the Grateful Dead did not appear. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Byrds-My-Way-Burritos-ebook/dp/B00S1YUO76">Byrds and Flying Burrito Brothers manager Jimmi Seiter has an extensive description of the festival</a> (the Burritos played there), and he mentions how the crowd kept expecting the Dead to show up, but they never did. I assume the band's non-appearance had to do with money, but in fact it was a chaotic weekend, and the exact details are unknown to me.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih3T8apMNgUxQmCJ-z4rkpQCxa1H8UFgdphfASM_FYMXKWpTnddbdUPoTXyvUuR9UAXQ8RNtztKa4Znx2h7UjTrGjtiPGJxVvBQFxUn7XfnS-MfPk6Y2N9cTRNzdIpJj8Gj_bLRa9NKpg/s450/GD+Springers+19700116.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="284" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih3T8apMNgUxQmCJ-z4rkpQCxa1H8UFgdphfASM_FYMXKWpTnddbdUPoTXyvUuR9UAXQ8RNtztKa4Znx2h7UjTrGjtiPGJxVvBQFxUn7XfnS-MfPk6Y2N9cTRNzdIpJj8Gj_bLRa9NKpg/s320/GD+Springers+19700116.jpg" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><br /><b>January 16, 1970 Springer's, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead/River </b><i>(Friday)</i><b><br />January 17, 1970 Gill Coliseum, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR: Grateful Dead</b><i> (Saturday)</i><b><br />January 18, 1970 Springer's, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead </b><i>(Sunday)</i><br />T<a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2010/04/w-powell-blvdus-26-at-se-190th-avenue.html">he Grateful Dead returned to Springer's.</a> The flyer just says "Springers," while other lists say "Springer's Inn" or "Springer's Ballroom." All are true names, more or less. The tape circulated widely many years ago, so--as obscure venues go--the place is now kind of known to Deadheads. The band returned to Springers on Sunday night, after a trip to Corvallis. Based on stage announcements from Sunday (parts of January 18 were released on the <i>Download Series Vol.2</i>), the crowd was very thin. Ticket sales for Friday must have been good enough to justify trying again on Sunday night, but it may have been a poor choice. As rock moved to the suburbs, one byproduct was that the younger, often teenage, audience was simply not able to attend rock shows on school nights. So weekend shows would draw well, but any other night was often unviable.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Dead continued their two-part strategy for Oregon with a show in Portland and a show further South. In this case--and for the last time--the Dead played Corvallis (Oregon State) instead of Eugene (U. of O), but the concept was the same. I don't know if the Corvallis show was well attended. The Dead never played Corvallis again, so that might be a hint. <br /></span></p><span style="font-size: small;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv0lrOonu-rBmZBjwMBuWx6NAbZkmwuo2CXu1G3_GNbVWGdEcJXcL2zxGVwtsr-qv7JRLSu3o3laPWPGzS-3aEIkPdsHmhpEl1BoWlT5B5PWpHMJm0gJDhaTF8VyX3HtuLvuBmh4vdyiw/s720/GD+Eugene+19710122.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="708" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv0lrOonu-rBmZBjwMBuWx6NAbZkmwuo2CXu1G3_GNbVWGdEcJXcL2zxGVwtsr-qv7JRLSu3o3laPWPGzS-3aEIkPdsHmhpEl1BoWlT5B5PWpHMJm0gJDhaTF8VyX3HtuLvuBmh4vdyiw/s320/GD+Eugene+19710122.jpg" /></a></div><br />January 22, 1971 Main Gym, Lane Community College, Eugene, OR: Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Notary Sojac</b><i> (Friday)</i><b><br />January 24, 1971 Seattle Center Arena, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Ian and Sylvia</b><br />The Dead had a big show at Seattle Center Arena, so it made sense to book a show at Oregon. This time they played a junior college in the same county as the University of Oregon. I assume there must have been a conflict with an athletic event at U. of O. Whatever the reason, I think this show was significant for the Grateful Dead's history in Oregon.</span><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Dead were playing Sunday night in Seattle, so they booked a Friday night show at a junior college in Oregon. <a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2013/01/january-22-1971-lane-community-college.html">Some interesting articles tell a surprising tale: not only did the show sell out, it ended up being oversold.</a> Whether this was by accident, incompetence or crafty plan, the band got an idea of how many tickets they could sell. Apparently, there were 7000 people packed into the junior college gym.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOdLBLL2nlLtm1IAJ-6o_dPxGr_nlVcRGdKE51WZfB_YrFt1uEminAEUk6fL-qHb4RdSTrV2kd-jKbIusemoc3EevftxFH75WkVkoUPBFro1-dycF2tFTaxDGyQLZ6KQaXuvqFplAR498/s295/GD+Portland+19720725.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="216" data-original-width="295" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOdLBLL2nlLtm1IAJ-6o_dPxGr_nlVcRGdKE51WZfB_YrFt1uEminAEUk6fL-qHb4RdSTrV2kd-jKbIusemoc3EevftxFH75WkVkoUPBFro1-dycF2tFTaxDGyQLZ6KQaXuvqFplAR498/s0/GD+Portland+19720725.jpg" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b>July 21-22, 1972 Paramount Northwest Theatre, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead<br />July 25-26, 1972 Paramount Theatre, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead </b><i>(Tuesday-Wednesday)</i><br />The Grateful Dead returned to the Pacific Northwest in the Summer of '72. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2019/06/the-grateful-dead-at-shrine-exposition.html">Pacific Presentations, old friends from the Los Angeles days at the Shrine, promoted the shows</a>. I have no doubt that Sam Cutler had told Pacific about all the ticket sales in Eugene. A group in the Northwest had started putting on shows in old movie theaters in both Seattle (Paramount Northwest) and Portland (Paramount). Seattle, the big market had the weekends, and Portland had the weekday shows.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Paramount Portland Theater (now <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arlene_Schnitzer_Concert_Hall 1037 SW Broadway">the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall</a>) had been built as a movie theater in 1928. Located at 1037 SW Broadway, tt seated about 3,000. It had shown its last movie in 1972, when it was converted to a concert hall. I don't know exactly how many tickets the Portland Paramount shows sold. But guess what--I don't have to. The Grateful Dead returned the next year with the same promoters for the biggest venue in Portland (the Coliseum), so they must have done great on those school nights.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr2WXRnc4lX7U4sc64_ND2bk1N24PzwTYat6T0iOGJMxliAmaRvXq7YT4RDcAK1ohVPGLamU4zCCItmAbLMk4R83wKJyCp29AegqfB0ShLo-GKFhSKWKlvkfXmRdE6RWFIc50My-YuZE4/s588/GD+Veneta+on+stage+19720827.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="440" data-original-width="588" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr2WXRnc4lX7U4sc64_ND2bk1N24PzwTYat6T0iOGJMxliAmaRvXq7YT4RDcAK1ohVPGLamU4zCCItmAbLMk4R83wKJyCp29AegqfB0ShLo-GKFhSKWKlvkfXmRdE6RWFIc50My-YuZE4/s320/GD+Veneta+on+stage+19720827.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Grateful Dead on stage at the Renaissance Fair Grounds in Veneta, OR, on August 27, 1972</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />August 27, 1972 Old Renaissance Faire Grounds, Veneta, OR: Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage </b><i>(Sunday)</i><br />Ken Kesey had returned to Oregon after his 1960s adventures. His family still had their Dairy. By 1972, there were some financial difficulties. The Grateful Dead agreed to do what was in effect a benefit for the dairy (the Springfield Creamery). For unrelated reasons, an old friend of Garcia's pitched a plan to make a movie about the Grateful Dead in concert, so the event was professionally filmed and recorded. The Dead, being the Dead, were comfortable in Oregon and played an epic show for the ages, captured on video and on tape. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Kesey family dairy was in Springfield, several miles East of Eugene. The concert was held in Veneta, about 10 miles West of Eugene, on the opposite side of the city and University, but still in the same county, The venue was the site of the Oregon Renaissance Fair. Renaissance Fairs were a sixties artifact, somewhat outside of the scope of this blog (for a discussion of Renaissance Fairs, see Rachel Rubin's excellent book <i><a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00A2TEE0G/ref=rdr_kindle_ext_tmb">Well Met: Renaissance Faires and The American Counterculture</a></i>). </span><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;">The
first Oregon Renaissance fair was held in Eugene over the weekend of November 1–2, 1969.
It was promoted with the tagline, "come in costume." The fair began
as a craft fair to raise funds for an alternative school, the Children's
Community School. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oregon_Country_Fair">The event moved to its current location in Veneta, about 13 miles west of Eugene, for the fall fair in October, 1970</a>,
after having had a May Fair the same year on Crow Road about halfway
between Eugene and Veneta. Renaissance Fairs, to put them in a modern context, were a chance for hippies to "cosplay," jousting (literally) over the favors of fair maidens or flagons of mead.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;">August 27 was a rare, 100-degree hot day in Eugene. The Grateful Dead drew a huge crowd, over 10,000 and maybe 20,000, to the Fair site. The show had to be the band's biggest attendance in Oregon at the time, and the University of Oregon wasn't even in session. The band had played two nights in a 3,000 seat theater in Portland the month before, but it didn't affect attendance in Eugene. Now, of course, we take that metric for granted, that fans went to as many Grateful Dead shows as they could manage. Back in '72, however, particularly outside San Francisco and New York City, that was a new concept. Oregon was not a rich, populous state in 1972, and here were the Dead putting on a huge concert just after playing twice in a nearby city.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;">In certain ways, the Renaissance Fair show was a hybrid of previous models. On one hand, the Fair Grounds were an existing facility, so there was water, power, restrooms, food and parking. On the other hand, it was private property in a rural area, so the police had little influence and no ordnances could block the concert. So the band had the benefit of a relaxed event with no threat of fans getting busted, yet with all the functions of a working facility.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;">The music was for the ages, and was captured on tape, cd and video, so I needn't discuss it. <a href="https://stores.portmerch.com/newridersofthepurplesage/music.html">Even the New Riders fine set was released</a>. Yet the Springfield Creamery Benefit had a much larger part in Grateful Dead legend than just being a successful concert. It was also a reunion of the Dead and the Pranksters, and it made Oregon seem like the perfect place to see a Dead concert. Word filtered out to both California and points East that there was something special about the Grateful Dead in Oregon. <br /></span></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwC7j3T-tnBUQyGv2k_Z1Nlkc5TEW3ONwBdBpEVBX8UBVXFKvN9HaY5AWujR8CezMFkzDexX8kR9DIReLAnu0bvalTPqLHX44hzznllxz_OoMckzwaghO3EM5KjOEXZZexH4E7m6OrLto/s300/NRPS_Panama_Red.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwC7j3T-tnBUQyGv2k_Z1Nlkc5TEW3ONwBdBpEVBX8UBVXFKvN9HaY5AWujR8CezMFkzDexX8kR9DIReLAnu0bvalTPqLHX44hzznllxz_OoMckzwaghO3EM5KjOEXZZexH4E7m6OrLto/s0/NRPS_Panama_Red.jpg" /></a></b></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />May 3, 1973 Portland Memorial Coliseum, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead </b><i>(Thursday) (rescheduled to June 24)</i><b><br />May 5, 1973 Pacific National Exhibition Coliseum, Vancouver, BC: Grateful Dead </b><i>(rescheduled to June 22)</i><b><br />May 7, 1973 Seattle Center Arena, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead </b><i>(rescheduled to June 26)</i><b><br />May 8, 1973 Churchill High School, Eugene, OR: New Riders of The Purple Sage/Old And In The Way </b><i>(Tuesday)</i><b><br />May 9, 1973 Paramount Theatre, Portland, OR: New Riders of The Purple Sage/Old and In The Way </b><i>(Wednesday)</i><br />Pacific Presentations booked the Grateful Dead for three shows in the Pacific Northwest in May of 1973, in the biggest arenas available. For some reason, the shows were rescheduled for June. The interesting detail was that the New Riders were booked for two shows in Oregon, with Old And In The Way as the opening act, right after the scheduled May shows. Since Sam Cutler booked the Dead, the New Riders and Jerry Garcia, this was no coincidence. <br /><br />The Grateful Dead shows were rescheduled, but Garcia kept the Old And In The Way dates. Cutler replicated the Dead's strategy from before, booking one show in Eugene and one in Portland. He also booked the Riders into the Paramount in Portland, where the Dead had played the Summer before. Cutler regularly booked the New Riders into smaller theaters around the country where the Dead had played previously, taking advantage of relationships with promoters and fans that had already been established. </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Oregon Riders/OAITW sounded like a lot of fun. There are tapes of the Riders' sets, and they were joined by OAITW fiddler Richard Greene, an old friend of David Nelson's (as well as singer Darlene DiDomenico, another old pal). Old And In The Way played very few dates outside of Northern California, and it's yet another marker for Garcia and the Dead's affinity for Oregon that it was one of those places.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj86SL7gU1fa5w8hOfbe7WiOdHMqmg4EjlNZpFoMLZfpb0Cbelaf7Og_Scvqmx-gwTfOq6azN1VNoDTjhtSpRJEXEJ_XGiP4DOEfbe5k26yGIhNhxHQVirkeddkCTzWse3xGJ-5KM7W-iQ/s720/GD+Portland+19730624.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="474" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj86SL7gU1fa5w8hOfbe7WiOdHMqmg4EjlNZpFoMLZfpb0Cbelaf7Og_Scvqmx-gwTfOq6azN1VNoDTjhtSpRJEXEJ_XGiP4DOEfbe5k26yGIhNhxHQVirkeddkCTzWse3xGJ-5KM7W-iQ/s320/GD+Portland+19730624.jpg" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b>June 22, 1973 Pacific National Exhibition Coliseum, Vancouver, BC: Grateful Dead <br />June 24, 1973 Portland Memorial Coliseum, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead </b><i>(Sunday)(rescheduled from May 3)</i><b><br />June 26, 1973 Seattle Center Arena, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead</b><br />Pacific Presentations had booked the Grateful Dead for two Summer weeknights in 1972, and for the return engagement to Oregon the band played the Portland Memorial Coliseum, the biggest indoor arena in the state. Portland Coliseum (at 300 N. Ramsay Way) had been built in 1960, and was a typical multi-purpose concrete block of an arena. The Coliseum was the home arena for the NBA expansion Portland Trailblazers. The Coliseum had a capacity of 12,666 for sports, but it apparently could hold slightly more in a concert configuration. Elvis Presley had apparently drawn 13,000. Now the Grateful Dead were playing there.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Portland Coliseum booking was a big step up for the Dead, but Pacific Presentations could read all the signs. By mid-'73, the Grateful Dead had released four gold albums in a row, and the band's songs regularly got played on FM radio. The Dead had done well in a smaller Portland venue, and then packed the Renaissance Fair Grounds in Eugene. Despite the modest population of Oregon, it was clear that Portland could draw Grateful Dead fans just as well as the larger cities of Seattle and Vancouver. I don't know if the '73 Coliseum show was sold out, but it obviously met the promoter's expectations, since the Dead were booked in the same venue the very next Summer.<br /></span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv3kSYwQwWbrE2TzM0TfefSG5syPX2mrXb9LItV-2pnoU4PsUDt-Gijl9oSQYwTKDqwd06yzxcHtjreneYzrWIDZiBbgXUNcn0jz5Tnsqx03DtFiFMU1J9739HiOIaxINQnhJDzEe0B_A/s640/GD+Portland+19740519.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="437" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv3kSYwQwWbrE2TzM0TfefSG5syPX2mrXb9LItV-2pnoU4PsUDt-Gijl9oSQYwTKDqwd06yzxcHtjreneYzrWIDZiBbgXUNcn0jz5Tnsqx03DtFiFMU1J9739HiOIaxINQnhJDzEe0B_A/s320/GD+Portland+19740519.jpg" /></a></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b>May 17, 1974 Pacific National Exhibition Coliseum, Vancouver, BC: Grateful Dead/Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen <br />May 19, 1974 Portland Memorial Coliseum, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead </b><i>(Sunday)</i><b><br />May 21, 1974 Hec Edmundson Pavilion, University of Washington, Seattle, WA: Grateful Dead </b><br />Pacific Presentations bought the Grateful Dead back for the Vancouver>Portland>Seattle trifecta in the Summer of 74. By this time, the Dead's "Wall Of Sound" required concrete floors, so only sufficiently large venues could be booked. Also, the load-in/load-out took two days, so they could not play both weekend nights in separate arenas. Vancouver seems to have been the softest market, getting the weekend date and adding an opening act. The band then went to Portland, counter-intuitively, followed by Seattle. In Seattle, the Dead played the University of Washington basketball arena instead of Seattle Center, presumably because of a sports conflict (Seattle Center was the home of the NBA Seattle Supersonics). </span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The music in Portland for both the 1973 and '74 was, of course, massive. <a href="https://store.dead.net/pacific-northwest-73-74-the-complete-recordings-19-cd-boxed-set-1.html ">So much so that the Grateful Dead released a 19-cd set of all six Pacific Northwest shows from 1973 and '74, a must-have.</a> Thus, I don't any need to recap any of the music. It was clear that the Grateful Dead could play a weeknight in Portland's biggest arena any time they liked, with or without a new album.</span></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Grateful Dead went on hiatus in October, 1974, much to the dismay of their fans, so they didn't play Portland Memorial Coliseum any time soon after. Symbolically, however, on May 28, 1974, 9 days after the Dead show, the Portland Trailblazers drafted Bill Walton out of UCLA. Walton was the chief attraction at the Blazers home arena, leading the team to a title in 1976-77, so the Deadhead flag flew high in Portland, even if Bill was carrying it temporarily for Jerry.<br /></span></p><span style="font-size: small;"><b>December 13, 1974 Paramount Northwest Theatre, Seattle, WA: Legion Of Mary<br />December 14, 1974 Paramount Theater, Portland, OR: Legion Of Mary </b><i>(Saturday)</i><b><br />December 15, 1974 EMU Ballroom, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR: Legion Of Mary </b><i>(Sunday)</i><b><br /></b>When the Dead went on hiatus, Jerry Garcia stepped up touring with his own band. His touring schedule was generally directed by John Scher, and Scher usually focused on lucrative markets in the Midwest and Northeast. This was no accident--Garcia and the Grateful Dead organization were hemorrhaging cash, so they had to maximize returns. Still, when Garcia played Oregon, you could see the proven patterns playing out again. For the late '74 Legion Of Mary tour, Garcia played a weekend in Seattle and Portland in the same theaters that the Dead had played a few years earlier. Scher slipped in a Sunday night in Eugene, too, also at a ballroom the Dead had played many years before.</span><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b>Oct ?, 1975 <i>Klamath Basin Potato Festival</i>, Merrill, OR: Barry Melton with Peter Albin and David LaFlamme/Roadhog</b><br />Another minor but fascinating curiosity about the Grateful Dead in Oregon was that Robert Hunter seems to have revealed himself as a performer in rural Oregon before he ever did so in San Francisco. Starting around 1974, Hunter appeared with the band Roadhog, using the stage name "Lefty Banks." He was not billed as Robert Hunter until early 1976.<br /><br /><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/11/robert-hunter-and-roadhog-performance.html">Nonetheless, a Commenter looked at the English magazine <i>Dark Star, </i>written in the October/November 1975 period (h/t JGMF):</a><br /></span></p><blockquote><span style="font-size: small;">The "Weather Report" column, p. 5, has this: "Barry [Melton]'s most recent appearance was at the Klamath potato festival ... also at the destival [sic] was the bluegrass unit Road Hog, featuring Bob Hunter on mandolin."<span style="font-size: small;"><p>I am guessing this is the Klamath Basin Potato Festival around Merrill, OR. This is a harvest season event, it seems, usually mid-October by what I have seen.<br /></p></span></span></blockquote><p><span style="font-size: small;"></span></p><blockquote><span style="font-size: small;">So, if this is right, for now it might be a 10/??/75 Klamath Basin Potato Festival entry.<br />At the top of the bill was Barry Melton's band featuring Peter Albin and David LaFlamme.</span></blockquote><p>Merrill, OR is a tiny town in the Klamath Basin in deepest Eastern Oregon. Even now, news wouldn't get out from there very quickly. Hunter and the band obviously had little concern about letting the mask slip.</p><p><b>May 14, 1975 Lane County Fairgrounds, Eugene, OR Kingfish</b><br />Kingfish began a tour of the Pacific Northwest, playing some familiar places (<a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/10/bob-weir-and-kingfish-tour-history.html?showComment=1614202765063#c1896845133910764689">thanks to scholar David for figuring out the OR/WA dates</a>). The tour commenced on a Wednesday</p><p><b>May 15, 1975 [unknown venue], Seattle, WA Kingfish</b><br />Possibly Friday, May 16 (which would change the Portland date at Reed, below)</p><p><b>May 16, 1975 [</b><i>venue</i><b>], Reed College, Portland, OR Kingfish</b></p><b>May 17, 1975 Quad, U. of Oregon, Eugene, OR Kingfish </b><i>daytime free concert</i><br />The band played a free concert to "make up for the bad sound at the Fairgounds" [on the 14th]. Date confirmed by eyewitness.<p><b>May 17, 1975 Gill Coliseum, Oregon State U., Corvallis, OR: Kingfish</b><br /><a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/10/bob-weir-and-kingfish-tour-history.html?showComment=1613667650392#c5216686748016143923">Intrepid scholar David found this one</a>. He can't pin down the date precisely, but this one seems the most likely. The remarkable thing was that <a href="https://oregondigital.org/sets/osu-yearbooks/oregondigital:5712m676q#page/41/mode/1up">he found a picture in the OSU Yearbook, which complained about excessive smoking. </a></p><b>May 18, 1975 [venue], Pendleton, OR Kingfish</b><br />Kingfish road manager Rex Jackson was from Pendleton. <p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/10/bob-weir-and-kingfish-tour-history_07.html?showComment=1604120768663#c7729912353653195735">[A Commenter on a Kingfish thread mentioned Bob Weir and Kingfish playing a few dates in Oregon colleges around 1975</a>. He specifically recalls Reed College in Portland, but no other details have surfaced yet [<i>they have now--see above</i>]]<br /></span></span></p><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiy_VQOkCk_TADGovxlCC6gYAon2o6PwO_a_o2VMBiTj_EcBX28uRYeOh5zjFXYOcs0yhI-PhB_5KAJbXWPaPEEP8wKwJtH5bmFTR_pPDE1-gUS7Qps68GgcUwRSZjcCr9UfuNp61q36fo/s690/JGB+Eugene+19760303.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="690" data-original-width="443" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiy_VQOkCk_TADGovxlCC6gYAon2o6PwO_a_o2VMBiTj_EcBX28uRYeOh5zjFXYOcs0yhI-PhB_5KAJbXWPaPEEP8wKwJtH5bmFTR_pPDE1-gUS7Qps68GgcUwRSZjcCr9UfuNp61q36fo/s320/JGB+Eugene+19760303.jpg" /></a></b></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />March 3, 1976 Auditorium Building, Lane County Fairgrounds, Eugene, OR: Jerry Garcia Band </b><i>(Wednesday)</i><b><br />March 5, 1976 Paramount Theatre, Portland, OR: Jerry Garcia Band </b><i>(Friday)</i><b><br />March 6, 1976 Moore's Egyptian Theatre, Seattle, WA: Jerry Garcia Band</b><br />The Jerry Garcia Band returned to the Pacific Northwest in Spring 1976. John Scher once again followed the proven path for Oregon, one show in Eugene and one in Portland. The Wednesday night show at Lane County Fairgrounds was (per the poster) co-produced by Springfield Creamery, so effectively the show was another sort of benefit for the Kesey family dairy. In Portland, the Garcia Band returned once again to the Paramount Theater.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;"><b></b></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhClu7007Tl4Qrwyx9DjkEHLaEfcIzvl_8FsIqu2w2INF2aYyoBHpkAifKfOuDo28MghE0FZ_APQuXmCw1VGuuzBTLlDlJ0Meryd_cXeoZOP195r_NTxyyChdRUMSh7qdOv81QVSyX8Ht4/s600/GD+Portland+ticket+19760303.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="374" data-original-width="600" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhClu7007Tl4Qrwyx9DjkEHLaEfcIzvl_8FsIqu2w2INF2aYyoBHpkAifKfOuDo28MghE0FZ_APQuXmCw1VGuuzBTLlDlJ0Meryd_cXeoZOP195r_NTxyyChdRUMSh7qdOv81QVSyX8Ht4/s320/GD+Portland+ticket+19760303.jpg" width="320" /></a></b></span></div><span style="font-size: small;"><b><br />June 3-4, 1976 Paramount Theater, Portland, OR: Grateful Dead</b><br />The Grateful Dead returned to the road in 1976, never to leave it voluntarily again. The chose to return by only playing small theaters, and only selling tickets by mail to those on the Deadheads mailing list. This may have been out of concern that there wouldn't otherwise be interest in the band, but quite the opposite occurred. The Dead booked 17 shows in four metro areas (later booking six shows in San Francisco), with radio broadcasts in each region. The shows were instant sellouts, and created a huge buzz, as if the band had carefully planned it instead of just being lucky.</span><p></p><p><span style="font-size: small;">The Grateful Dead, being the Dead, of course had barely rehearsed, plus they had to rent a brand new sound system. The mini-tour would open June 9 in the Boston Music Hall, but after 17 months off the road, the band needed some warmup shows. After the mass response to the mail order, the Dead knew they could play anywhere there was a 3000 seat theater, and there were plenty of those. Of course, they wanted it to be where they were comfortable, and where the fans would like it no matter what. They could have played anywhere, and they chose Portland's Paramount Theater for a Thursday and a Friday night. Nothing more clearly marked the Grateful Dead's intimate connection to Oregon than choosing Portland as a re-entry site.</span></p><span style="font-size: small;"><i><b>Aftermath</b></i><br />The Grateful Dead played Oregon many times after 1976, and in larger and larger places. Jerry Garcia played many shows in the state as well. Oregon was a guaranteed financial winner for the band, and a guaranteed good time for anyone who went to the shows. By the 1990s, Oregon was no longer some rural backwater, but a thriving economic and cultural center. But the Dead had gotten to Oregon before the rise of Portland, and maintained their unique connection to the state throughout the life of the band.</span><br /><p><span style="font-size: small;"><i><b>Appendix: Pacific Northwest Demographic Comparison </b></i><br /></span></p><span style="font-size: small;">OREGON Population WASHINGTON Population<br />1960 1,768,687 <span> </span>1960 2,853,214<br />1970 2,091,533 <span> </span>1970 3,409,169<br />1980 2,633,156 <span> </span>1980 4,132,156<br />Est. 2019: 4,217,737 Est 2019: 7,694,813 <br /><br />PORTLAND Population SEATTLE Population<br />1960 372,676 <span> </span>1960 557,087<br />1970 382,619 <span> </span>1970 530,831<br />1980 366,383 <span> </span>1980 493,846<br />Est. 2019: 654,741 Est. 2019: 753,675</span>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-80891202946343863302020-09-24T11:36:00.002-07:002020-11-12T15:35:52.191-08:00The Grateful Dead At The Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA 1967-68 (Vintage LA)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL82WQzcSZgiCY54r8TK7omfn-Ome3d_zC_dYUTNxtCfTvT6rsUs9NDBdftfxikjbkRE5nm5AdDf1spOkQseKO3uSjnNcTT0uyZgkZDRIlKCcVlyeQhYDFOVHxQY3IL-ZsvzthlAt8nv0/s1600/+GD+19671110.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="616" data-original-width="428" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL82WQzcSZgiCY54r8TK7omfn-Ome3d_zC_dYUTNxtCfTvT6rsUs9NDBdftfxikjbkRE5nm5AdDf1spOkQseKO3uSjnNcTT0uyZgkZDRIlKCcVlyeQhYDFOVHxQY3IL-ZsvzthlAt8nv0/s320/+GD+19671110.jpg" width="221" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The color poster for the first Pinnacle concerts at the Shrine Exposition Hall, on November 10-11, 1967. Buffalo Springfield, the Grateful Dead and Blue Cheer played both nights.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
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The Shrine Exposition Hall: The Grateful Dead in Los Angeles 1967-68</b></i><br />
The rise of the Grateful Dead is a tale of two cities. The first is San Francisco, where the Dead rose to underground infamy, and the second is New York, where the Dead became economically viable. Dead fans in Manhattan and Brooklyn made playing the city perenially profitable for the band, and that was the platform for expanding their audience to New Jersey, Philadelphia, Long Island, Boston and the rest of the East Coast.<br />
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Los Angeles is America's other great entertainment capital, however, and the Dead had an opposite experience when they played Los Angeles. Sure, they sold a few concert tickets, but so did every other band, ever. On the whole, Los Angeles was pretty indifferent to the Grateful Dead in the 60s, and so the story of the Dead in LA is never even addressed.<br />
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Los Angeles, more than any other American city, traffics in the glorification of its own history, particularly when it comes to entertainment. LA always celebrates old theaters or nightclubs from brighter days, so often historical sites are better known now than they were back in the day. Looking at the best retro-LA sites, <a href="http://alisonmartino.com/">like VintageLA</a>, is like reading about American popular culture history from the inside, and 60s rock history has its place in that world. VintageLA, for example--which I can't recommend enough--has features on the <a href="http://alisonmartino.blog/2017/05/15/the-aquarius-theatre/">Aquarius Theater</a> and <a href="http://alisonmartino.blog/2014/01/13/how-go-go-dancing-took-off-at-the-whisky/">The Whisky-A-Go-Go</a>. Yet it has nothing about the Shrine Exposition Hall, which tried to be the Fillmore scene for Los Angeles. The Grateful Dead were essential to the rock history of the Shrine, as they were for many 60s rock venues, yet the tale of the Dead at the Shrine Expo Hall remains obscured. This post will illuminate the essential role of the Shrine, and the Dead's part in that, and point to why both the Shrine Expo and the Grateful Dead never lived up to Los Angeles expectations (<a href="https://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2020/09/700-west-32nd-avenue-los-angeles-ca.html"><i>see here for a broader, less Dead-centric rock history of the Shrine Exposition Hall in the late 60s</i></a>).<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOeQbW38xxlE4QYcWD5SmMCvhM6wotJXhI0MiWBpEa_p4LNrhT5hj2AIV1LPOHXR_ExKJIGb7dyHitspgFKsyTCYrCgr_j-Jb-r1qKQCXGLt5ANJqLaFrfOwZUpF5rl9rFOsDijAK2FaU/s1600/Shrine+expo+hall.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="682" data-original-width="1200" height="181" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOeQbW38xxlE4QYcWD5SmMCvhM6wotJXhI0MiWBpEa_p4LNrhT5hj2AIV1LPOHXR_ExKJIGb7dyHitspgFKsyTCYrCgr_j-Jb-r1qKQCXGLt5ANJqLaFrfOwZUpF5rl9rFOsDijAK2FaU/s320/Shrine+expo+hall.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Shrine Auditorium and Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, at 665 West Jefferson Street</i></td></tr>
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<i><b>The Grateful Dead in Los Angeles, 1966-67</b></i><br />
The music industry played a huge role in Los Angeles, since so many record companies were based there. However, live performances by rock bands in the mid-60s were focused more on "personal appearances," to keep bands' names and faces in front of current and prospective fans, rather than aimed at persuading listeners to buy records based on the music heard at the show. There were a lot of nightclubs for teenagers, and shows at high schools, that featured brief sets on minimal sound systems. There was a substantial nightclub industry, too, but that was oriented towards selling drinks. Danceable music, l<a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Whisky-A-Go-Go%20History.htm">ike at the Whisky-A-Go-Go</a>, was designed to get patrons hot and sweaty so that they would purchase plenty of liquor to cool themselves down.<br />
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None of the existing performance models had any room for the early Grateful Dead. They were a dance band, of sorts, but their audience didn't drink, and in any case was mostly too young. Playing short sets missed the point of the Grateful Dead, and without a good (for the time) sound system, their music didn't make much sense, either. In any case, the long-haired Dead were scary barbarians back in the day, and not necessarily welcomed with open arms at a High School. What the Dead needed were underground gigs, but there weren't initially many of those in an industry town like LA.<br />
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When the Grateful Dead made their first assault on Los Angeles, in February of 1966, they attempted to create their own underground scene. The buzz of the Acid Tests had worked its magic in San Francisco, and Bill Graham and Chet Helms had teamed up at the Fillmore to start presenting similar events weekly. This formula failed in Los Angeles, however. <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2015/12/grateful-dead-performance-list-july.html">The Dead had found some friends and put on some Acid Tests and "regular" shows in February and March 1966</a>. The events, while fun, were thinly attended and made no money. The Dead's trip to LA had been intended to make the band more successful. It failed. Like many out-of-towners before them, the Dead returned home to where they were popular, and re-invested themselves in their previous incarnation. They would not return until the next year, when the band had been signed by an LA record company.<br />
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<b>January 20, 1967 Santa Monica Civic Auditorium, Santa Monica, CA Timothy Leary/Grateful Dead</b><br />
The Grateful Dead were booked by Warner Brothers Records to record their debut album the week of January 30. 10 days earlier, the band had a relatively high profile Friday night show appearing with LSD promoter Timothy Leary. The Dead (and certainly not Owsley) weren't that sympathetic to Leary, but they were linked in the public mind. Santa Monica, while not technically LA, was right next to it and was generally seen by everyone as part of Greater Los Angeles, so this show would have counted as a return to the city. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2014/06/january-20-1967-santa-monica-civic.html">The show was well-attended, Leary gave a speech, and the Dead played a set</a>. A good time generally seems to have been had, and the band got paid and got some attention. Warner Brothers can not have been sorry that their underground band was doing something "hip" like this.<br />
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<a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/05/mystery-shows-1965-70-really-lost-live.html">There is a plausible rumor that the Dead played a show at the Aragon Ballroom in Venice Beach on Sunday night, January 22</a> (later The Cheetah, see April 30 below). That is someone else's research, however, so I won't elaborate. The only point to make here is that if they did indeed play it--and they might have--it remains awfully obscure, so it may not have done too much to increase underground buzz.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdL_SIHperAw2ZiInCWuvKvuGDstYVLt7FCs965vgbA6EWBi61m9OvEC071b5MV5F-67DlNLd9nGG4hdqR1MSj7Z6io5LB7Bb3-rq-YnqmlO1NlOdnVBkJgwMVaXxoBGritPuJyEG23DM/s1600/Kaleidoscope+19670414.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="789" data-original-width="753" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdL_SIHperAw2ZiInCWuvKvuGDstYVLt7FCs965vgbA6EWBi61m9OvEC071b5MV5F-67DlNLd9nGG4hdqR1MSj7Z6io5LB7Bb3-rq-YnqmlO1NlOdnVBkJgwMVaXxoBGritPuJyEG23DM/s320/Kaleidoscope+19670414.jpeg" width="305" /></a></td></tr>
<tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A poster for the first shows at the Kaleidoscope (1228 Vine St), which were blocked by an injunction. The shows may have moved to the Ambassador Hotel in LA for the weekend of April 14-15, 1967</i></td></tr>
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<b>April 14-15, 17, 1967 The Banana Grove (Embassy Ballroom), Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Canned Heat</b><br />
After the Grateful Dead's first album was released on Warner Brothers in March, 1967, the Dead made some effort to "make it" in Los Angeles. Their first booking was at a nascent underground venue called The Kaleidoscope. The obscure venue is known today mainly for its unique, round posters (<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/6230-sunset-boulevard-hollywood-ca.html">well, and my detailed history, too</a>).<br />
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The Kaleidoscope was a venture by Canned Heat's managers (Skip Taylor and John Hartmann) to open a Fillmore-style venue in Los Angeles. For 1967, this was quite an inspired booking. Jefferson Airplane had just released <i>Surrealistic Pillow</i> and "Somebody To Love" was climbing the charts, while the Grateful Dead were underground legends who had just released their first album. Canned Heat were unknown to all but a few Los Angeles club goers, but they were an excellent live band. Taylor and Hartmann continued to work on the Kaleidoscope concept, eventually taking over the Earl Carroll Theater at 6230 Sunset (<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/6230-sunset-boulevard-hollywood-ca.html">I have written about that venue at length</a>, and <a href="http://alisonmartino.blog/2017/05/15/the-aquarius-theatre/">VintageLA has the history of the theater itself</a>).<br />
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This original weekend was supposed to be at a building on 1228 Vine Street (at La Mirada near Fountain), but a last second injunction stopped the event. For the weekend, the show was moved to the Embassy Ballroom in the Ambassador Hotel, at 3400 Wilshire, which also housed the legendary Coconut Grove Ballroom (I am planning to write about the weekend at the Ambassador in some detail). The ballroom was nicknamed "The Banana Grove" for the weekend. All three bands played Friday and Saturday, but the Monday night event (April 17) appears to have been a sort of LA event for the release of the first Dead album, Taylor and Hartmann at least briefly considered keeping the Kaleidoscope at the Ambassador, but that's not what happened.<br />
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<b>April 30, 1967 The Cheetah, Venice, CA: Grateful Dead/Yellow Balloon/New Generation <i>(early and late shows)</i></b></div>
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With no real underground venue in Los Angeles like the Kaleidoscope, <a href=" http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2015/07/grateful-dead-performance-list-january.html">the Dead took conventional rock bookings instead. The Cheetah was at 1 Navy Pier on Venice Beach, right next to Santa Monica</a>. It too was part of Greater Los Angeles, and not a suburb. However, the Cheetah was mostly a teen club at the time. Teenagers would come to meet people, dance, and return to the suburbs. A 45-minute set from the strange looking San Francisco band with no hit single, nor potential hit single, wasn't going to win over the type of kids who were going to the Cheetah at the time.</div>
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<b>June 16, 1967 The Hullabaloo, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dead/Yellow Payges/The Power </b><i>(early and late shows)</i><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/11/june-16-1967-hullabaloo-los-angeles-ca.html">The Friday night before their appearance at the Monterey Pop Festival, the Dead were booked at the Hullabaloo.</a> The Hullabaloo was promoted by a popular Los Angeles top 40 dj (Dave Hull), and was designed as another teen hotspot. It had a rotating stage, so as one band played, the next band set up. It was LA, and all, and sometimes good bands played the Hullabaloo, but that wasn't why people went. Once again, the sort of stylish teen scene represented by the Hullabaloo was the complete opposite of anything that made the Grateful Dead tick.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/january-april-1967-grateful-dead.html?showComment=1369261787783#c2558921137860231082">In a September '67 interview, Frank Kofsky asked Garcia if he had played in LA</a>.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
GARCIA: Yeah, but we've never *really* played LA. We've played in the Cheetah down there.<br />
KOFSKY: Yeah, which is a drag.<br />
GARCIA: We played at all the shit places. And we can never get it on because it always brought us down so much. I mean, the people and promoters down there are all horrible, graspy... The whole LA snap, the whole hype, you know: bread, dollars and cents, and that's it. We've never gotten it on in LA. We've played there but we've never *done* it. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Kofsky mentions the upcoming 9/15 Hollywood Bowl show & Garcia says, "We want to do that just for the flash of playing in the Hollywood Bowl...[but] nothing's gonna happen."</blockquote>
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<b>September 15, 1967 Hollywood Bowl, Los Angeles, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead [<i>Big Brother canceled</i>] </b><i>Bill Graham Presents The San Francisco Scene</i><br /><b>
September 16, 1967 Elysian Park, Los Angeles, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead </b><i>(free concert)</i><br />
The Hollywood Bowl, at 2301 North Highland Avenue, is one of Los Angeles' most famous performing venues. The amphitheater is carved into the hillside, and a distinctive bandshell covers the stage. Hollywood Bowl is owned by Los Angeles County (the town of Hollywood was merged into LA in the 1930s), and even in a town of fabled entertainment venues, Hollywood Bowl stands out. Capacity is around 17,000, so events at Hollywood Bowl are major indeed.<br />
<br />
In the Fall of 1967, since San Francisco was the hottest city in the rock business, Bill Graham took to booking Fillmore bands elsewhere. Jefferson Airplane, Big Brother and The Holding Company and the Dead had very few albums, and almost no hits, but they were legendarily infamous even by this early date. So you might expect that the confluence of them in an outdoor Hollywood venue would make for a major 1967 event. But it didn't. No one seems to recall the show. The only fact I know for sure is that Big Brother canceled and did not play. I have seen a picture of Bob Weir on the empty stage, so I know the Dead made it to the venue. <br />
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A useful source explains the shortcomings of the Hollywood Bowl as a rock venue, though not specifically for the Dead. Jimmi Seiter, the road manager for The Byrds, discussed the Bowl in <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Byrds-My-Way-3-ebook/dp/B00BIUAS9O">Volume 3 of his voluminous memoirs (The Byrds My Way</a>). Sieter explains why there weren't very many good rock concerts at Hollywood Bowl:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The union in those days hat the long haired hippies so of course the Byrds were put into that category...Another bad thing about the Bowl was that there was a very strict curfew since there were many homes that were affected by the sound of the shows so they had a strict 10:30pm curfew and if there was a problem they would turn off the power to the stage. This made for some very short performances when a band would play too long, but this was one of the drawbacks to a show at the Bowl.</blockquote>
So it's no surprise Big Brother dropped out, as there probably wasn't even time for three sets, and if the Dead and the Airplane couldn't play loud, what was the point? So it's no surprise that we have no fond psychedelic eyewitness reports from Hollywood Bowl.<br />
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The next day, the Dead and the Airplane played a free concert in nearby Elysian Park. I gather this was fairly well attended, though not a huge event. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/first-free-grateful-dead-concert-in.html">In many cities, however, any free concert by the Grateful Dead was the first time a major rock band (with a record) had ever played for free, and was also a local hippie clarion call</a>. Ever-hip Los Angeles was different. <a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/10/reedy-creek-park-raleigh-nc-raleigh-be.html">The Human Be-In set off a wave of similar events around the country</a>, and Los Angeles had had it's first "Love-In" at Griffith Park in March of 1967. So there had already been a fair number of free rock concerts in LA before the Dead and the Airplane played Elysian Park. So the Dead didn't make a big splash with what in most towns would be the stuff of legends.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieUNAo9IroE0mLC8poFtCNKLtxI7ebMe1oq-fRK-nivFGqMt5OwjmSk_n0eMnfDo7KAue-IREYVtXs0x0DyCDC3H4txhkYqrvXVIoXydW6-xSSDQkqTo4_VP4iWHr7H9ZZzXKxJ9FaRP4/s1600/The_Los_Angeles_Times_Fri__Apr_7__1967_.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="461" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieUNAo9IroE0mLC8poFtCNKLtxI7ebMe1oq-fRK-nivFGqMt5OwjmSk_n0eMnfDo7KAue-IREYVtXs0x0DyCDC3H4txhkYqrvXVIoXydW6-xSSDQkqTo4_VP4iWHr7H9ZZzXKxJ9FaRP4/s320/The_Los_Angeles_Times_Fri__Apr_7__1967_.jpg" width="92" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The April 7, 1967 LA Times advertised a week-long Sport Cycle (bicycle) show at the Shrine Expo Hall</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<i><b>Meanwhile, Back At The Shrine</b></i><br />
The Shrine Auditorium and Exposition Hall was built in 1925 by the Al Malikah Temple of the Masonic Order. The building is in a Spanish Colonial Style with a Moorish flair. The main entrance to the Auditorium was at 665 West Jefferson Street. The stage is huge (186 by 72 feet) and it is a popular home for the Academy Awards. The Auditorium has 6,489 seats on three levels. The Exposition Hall, part of the same complex but around the corner at 700 West 32nd (at Figueroa) is a 56,000 square foot open area that was (and is) used for trade shows and conventions as well as rock concerts. The Expo Hall had a capacity of about 5,000. In the late 1960s, most rock concert listings that say “Shrine” are typically at the Exposition Hall rather than the Auditorium. From the 1970s onward, however, almost all rock concerts listed as "The Shrine" were at the Auditorium (including the Dead's return in the latter 70s).<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyWiM8QCF9ygbqv-cARoQ4AdYtMigw8Eu1DBr_Opp3Cj7t47BZeU-cOQ1-Vs23YkRsPNeWKUw3ZYd3rioSsV9HBKorAWerU_T_2O6W5VW4sf1X5kaGSh0VeCouRAII5uYKPYe_qfsGDXU/s1600/FZ+Freak+Out+Map.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="485" data-original-width="600" height="258" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyWiM8QCF9ygbqv-cARoQ4AdYtMigw8Eu1DBr_Opp3Cj7t47BZeU-cOQ1-Vs23YkRsPNeWKUw3ZYd3rioSsV9HBKorAWerU_T_2O6W5VW4sf1X5kaGSh0VeCouRAII5uYKPYe_qfsGDXU/s320/FZ+Freak+Out+Map.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>FREAK OUT Hot Spots! Insert to the first Mothers of Invention album, with a map of underground sites in 1966 Los Angeles (Freak Out album released June 1966)</i></td></tr>
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August 13, 1966 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA:<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span> Mothers of Invention/<i>others</i><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></b><br />
Los Angeles is an Entertainment industry town, and proud of it. Thus any cultural progression--new contrarian, regressive, progressive, even revolutionary--gets assimilated into modern entertainment. Any performer who can be accused of "selling out" is also buying in, because it's the nature of the beast. In the Summer of '66, with the Vietnam War expanding, the Watts Riots still haunting the city and hair getting longer everywhere, Los Angeles had an underground rock scene, just like the Fillmore and Avalon. We like to think of Frank Zappa as an iconcoclast, or should I say, Frank wanted us to think that, but the very first Mothers Of Invention album included a map to LA's nascent 1966 underground.<br />
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One of the founding events of the Los Angeles underground was a show at the Shrine Exposition Hall on August 13, 1966, featuring the Mothers of Invention and several other (then unknown) acts. Just like the Family Dog events in San Francisco, Southern California "Freaks" suddenly realized there were a lot more people like them than they realized. The Shrine was apparently simply rented, probably because it was centrally located and available.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmIyUuP9OLH8ENL6O-05RB0Er-zEPInzrl2ITCJV_mkezoxB2miA4JGxqXoM3G17KVJupdi_LCNut57yrgPqJgNpLHTdU1GCBDyLAm-2cTWNSlyyTuZ_3hyL4Xx5d_9VD_KAMxD7NPgSg/s1600/Shrine+Zappa+19660917.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1171" data-original-width="799" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmIyUuP9OLH8ENL6O-05RB0Er-zEPInzrl2ITCJV_mkezoxB2miA4JGxqXoM3G17KVJupdi_LCNut57yrgPqJgNpLHTdU1GCBDyLAm-2cTWNSlyyTuZ_3hyL4Xx5d_9VD_KAMxD7NPgSg/s320/Shrine+Zappa+19660917.jpg" width="218" /></a></div>
<b>September 17, 1966 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Mothers of
Invention/Little Gary Ferguson/Factory/Count 5/West Coast Pop Art
Experimental Band<br />
October 15, 1966 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Little Gary
Ferguson/Davie Allan & The Arrows/Kenny Dino/The Mugwumps/Dolores
Johnson/The Way Out/The Fabs/Vito “Freak-In” Presented By Pat Morgan</b><br />
<br />
In September and October there were sequels at The Shrine Expo Hall. The Mothers headlined in September, with some other undergroundish bands, and there was a light show as well. The October event didn't advertise the Mothers, and there were none after that. I have no idea what happened at the third one--was it a financial debacle, or did the cops hassle everyone? In any case, there were no more Freak Outs, but the Shrine Expo Hall had been proven as a possible venue for Fillmore style "Dance Concerts."<br />
<b><br />
December 18, 1966<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span> Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Big Brother and The Holding Company/Quicksilver <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Messenger Service/Loving Impulse</b><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>(<i>possibly canceled</i>)<br />
Big Brother and Quicksilver booked a show at Shrine Expo Hall, and a poster circulates. I'm not convinced the concert actually took place. The importance of the poster, however, is it means that word had gotten around that the Shrine Expo Hall might make a Southern California Fillmore stand in.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUJBAdtH4kNwWQkxWURAfd4-HondUKe2MHPIjlKN_0wJGVYZMH5UM-k8sX4XXh3G1NFTaH1AV4jlOGJPUR2ZlZijCv7XDgP4TaSTxupZs54KFCHTFKbxRmsm5naSRP6jAGk9J9UY_rt3s/s1600/19671110-11bf.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="549" data-original-width="397" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUJBAdtH4kNwWQkxWURAfd4-HondUKe2MHPIjlKN_0wJGVYZMH5UM-k8sX4XXh3G1NFTaH1AV4jlOGJPUR2ZlZijCv7XDgP4TaSTxupZs54KFCHTFKbxRmsm5naSRP6jAGk9J9UY_rt3s/s320/19671110-11bf.jpg" width="231" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>An alternate poster for the Dead's November 10-11 '67 debut at Shrine Expo</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<b>November 10-11, 1967 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Buffalo Springfield/Grateful Dead/Blue Cheer<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></b><i>Pinnacle Concerts Present</i><b>s </b><br />
By the fall of 1967, almost every psychedelic rock band had played Los Angeles, at a wide variety of venues, but there was no venue that played the role of the Fillmore. At the Fillmore, the mere fact of playing there meant you were a hip band, and fans came just to see what was hip. All over the West Coast, there were comparable places--<a href="https://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/04/crystal-ballroom-1332-w-burnside.html">the Crystal Ballroom in Portland</a>, Eagles Auditorium in Seattle and The Retinal Circus in Vancouver, for example--but none in Southern California. The Kaleidoscope had been conceived to fill the void, but the City Council (and perhaps the cops) had throttled it pre-birth. There may have been a few hip little nightclubs, like the Magic Mushroom, but no venue where the rising underground bands played on a regular basis.<br />
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To tell this story properly, I should tell the entire story of the Shrine Exposition Hall as a Southern California Fillmore. That story is too long to tell here, even for me, so I will limit the narrative to the general outlines of concert promotion at the Shrine Expo Hall, and the critical role played by the Grateful Dead as part of the story.<br />
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The first regular promoter of rock shows at the Shrine was Pinnacle Dance Concerts, the partnership of Sepp Donahower, Marc Chase and John Van Hamersveld. Supposedly some of the money was supplied by the heir to a cereal fortune, but that may be apocryphal. Pinnacle promoted concerts at the Shrine, both the Expo Hall and the Auditorium, on many weekends between November 1967 and August 1968. As far as I know, during the week the Shrine presented the usual run of corporate or civic events, but I don't know that for certain.<br />
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<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Van_Hamersveld">Van Hamersveld was a poster artist, at the time most famous for the promotional poster for the legendary surf film <i>Endless Summer</i></a>. By 1967, he was the the head of design for Capitol Records. Over the course of his career, Van Hamersheld did the covers for over 300 albums. Among his many, many classic album covers were the Beatles' <i>Magical Mystery Tour</i>, the Rolling Stones' <i>Exile On Main Street</i> and <a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2017/03/album-economics-skeletons-from-closet.html">the Grateful Dead's </a><i><a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2017/03/album-economics-skeletons-from-closet.html">Skeletons From The Closet</a>.</i> Van Hamesveld did the posters for Pinnacle Productions, and many of the posters were so good that we remain familiar with them today.<br />
<br />After Pinnacle's debut with Buffalo Springfield and The Dead, they put on a series of shows at Shrine Exposition Hall. Pinnacle only used the Shrine on weekends, and not even all of them, and the Exposition Hall seems to have had the usual trade events and the like throughout the whole period. There weren't as many rock concerts at the Shrine as at the Fillmore, but Van Hammersveld's posters are fairly recognizable today. Pinnacle must have made at least some money, since they kept putting on shows.</p><p>When I started researching the rock history of the Shrine Exposition Hall, I was very surprised to find that there was no accessible on-line list of the Pinnacle rock shows. As a result--and being me--I made my own list, and posted it elsewhere (I will add, as a Grateful Dead footnote, that the band did not play the Shrine on December 13, 1967, nor did anyone else--it was a Wednesday, so they didn't debut "Dark Star" there). <br /></p><b>March 9, 1968 Melodyland Theater, Anaheim, CA: Jefferson Airplane and Friends</b> (<i>early and late show</i>)<br />By early 1968, Jefferson Airplane were selling a lot of records, and they were genuine rock stars. Los Angeles, however, was still about "entertainment." The Airplane played a weekend, with two shows each night, at the Melodyland Theater, just across the road from Disneyland. On Saturday night, the Grateful Dead were billed as "Friends," for whatever reason. It seems both bands played two short sets twice a night. The Airplane had Grace Slick, a genuine star, but the Dead were never going to win over a crowd in that kind of format.<br /><p>
<b>May 17, 1968 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dead/Steve Miller Band/Taj Mahal<br />May 18, 1968 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dead/Steve Miller Band/Taj Mahal<i>/</i></b><i>[with Jefferson Airplane as unbilled guests] Pinnacle Presents</i><br />By May of '68, Pinnacle had put on a steady run of hip shows at the Shrine Expo Hall. For the weekend of May 18-19, the Grateful Dead returned, along with another rising San Francisco group, the Steve Miller Band. The Miller Band had just released their debut album on Capitol, the great Children Of The Future. Taj Mahal was a well-known local act, whose debut album had just been (or was about to be) released on Columbia. </p><p>In line with being cool, the Airplane "showed up" at the Grateful Dead concert on Saturday night. This was probably announced on FM radio. Pinnacle would not have had the Airplane drop in if ticket sales had been more robust. It's worth noting that the Dead, Airplane and Steve Miller were all playing the Northern California Folk-Rock Festival in Santa Clara this weekend. The Dead would have played the Shrine on Friday night, flown up to San Jose, played the Fairgrounds on Saturday afternoon, and then returned to the Shrine for the Saturday night show.</p><p><i>llumaniti</i> Alert: in an interview, poster artist and Pinnacle partner John Van Hammerseld, interviewed in Paul Grushkin's <i>Art Of Rock </i>book (p.255), says that George Lucas was part of the light show crew at some point in 67-68. So for those of you who feel that there was a secret connection between the Grateful Dead and <i>Star Wars</i>...<br /><br />
</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPf5fhAeMFCtWBXBfqrW0iLapDU351wkkS2U04txPrWYXYV9ikvxqYY3xEa4jyMeTn3TbPS_CdOwLt1zSw8sFnUC_uWp-la4GZ8bpIHiPhjA8LfpHrp3tJLmdRWz-TE-dZxV01cWRoc_U/s480/19680711+Shrine+Expo.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="315" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPf5fhAeMFCtWBXBfqrW0iLapDU351wkkS2U04txPrWYXYV9ikvxqYY3xEa4jyMeTn3TbPS_CdOwLt1zSw8sFnUC_uWp-la4GZ8bpIHiPhjA8LfpHrp3tJLmdRWz-TE-dZxV01cWRoc_U/s0/19680711+Shrine+Expo.jpg" /></a></div><p></p><p><b>July 11, 1968 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dead/Blue Cheer</b><br />The Grateful Dead returned in 1968 to headline a rare Thursday show at Shrine Expo Hall. It's hare to read the poster, but I'm not sure if it was a Pinnacle show. Certainly Pinnacle produced the weekend show, with a triple bill of Butterfield Blues Band, Sly and The Family Stone and the Velvet Underground. Presumably, the fact the Dead could play on a Thursday suggested they had an audience, but they weren't a big enough draw for a weekend show. The Dead's weekend booking was at a tiny place on Lake Tahoe's North Shore, so it wasn't like Shrine promoters were being outbid by a high-powered gunslinger from another city. <br /></p><p></p><p>There is one interesting detail about the July Shrine Expo show: future Jerry Garcia Band drummer David Kemper, then a teenage high
school graduate, had just moved to Los Angeles. In a great Jake Feinberg
interview, Kemper described seeing the Dead at the Shrine, but not
remembering much, "thanks to Mr. Owsley." The timeline strongly suggests
that it was this show.</p><p><i>[<b>update</b>: <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2019/06/the-grateful-dead-at-shrine-exposition.html?showComment=1605219989319#c6309337766149947037">Commenter Brad makes a good case for July 11 as a spurious date</a>. The poster was apparently completed in 1972, and Brad and LIA report that there is no supporting publicity. So we still don't know which show Kemper saw...maybe in May?]</i><br /> </p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHEceESViqzJ129uKMRhnHHq56veEqae_zR3cCLV2kXOW5kuABTe6DchBkAm78HHVbMRsS04bxh_W89BNdjlBzjtjFhmq_V92ZWD8-Dc7v7986iTw_tKAhSCc2IH7e-0CS6ZUCR90kLYA/s480/19680804+Newport+Pop.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="308" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHEceESViqzJ129uKMRhnHHq56veEqae_zR3cCLV2kXOW5kuABTe6DchBkAm78HHVbMRsS04bxh_W89BNdjlBzjtjFhmq_V92ZWD8-Dc7v7986iTw_tKAhSCc2IH7e-0CS6ZUCR90kLYA/s0/19680804+Newport+Pop.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Headliners for the Newport Pop Festival in Orange County were Tiny Tim (Sat Aug 3) and Jefferson Airplane (Sun Aug 4). The Dead played Sunday.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b>August 4, 1968 Orange County Fairgrounds, Costa Mesa, CA: Newport Pop Festival, with Jefferson Airplane/Eric Burdon and The Animals/The Byrds/Grateful Dead/Quicksilver Messenger Service/Iron Butterfly/Things To Come/Illinois Speed Press/Blue Cheer</b><br />The Newport Pop Festival, a two-day outdoor event at the Orange County Fairgrounds, was just one of many events trying to capitalize on the Monterey Pop vibe. When these kinds of concerts were a success, they generally overwhelmed the venue or the community, but if they weren't as crowded, they lost money. Still, the Newport Pop Festival is somewhat fondly remembered. The Dead played with their San Francisco friends, and got to check in with some other pals. Garcia's old bluegrass <i>compadre</i> Clarence White was playing one of his first shows as the lead guitarist for the Byrds, and <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/10/march-26-1967-avalon-ballroom-san.html">the Dead went back a ways with Eric Burdon and The Animals as well</a>.<br /><p></p><p>Still, putting on a good show at a big outdoor event probably didn't do that much for the band. There were a lot of groups, and the Dead probably played about an hour, like everyone else. Some fans probaly liked them, but I doubt that all the high school and college students were still raving about them when school started the next month. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih-SexMRZtB-Imnb4-NUwlaps-4ngI7afgP0qrRcIp6wFFK6wPcTnmqoihjVfG4_ecfbNRGSj7Q8ZfvsBpO5nEDEW4NdnT_YQgQAheBYiq6YFCMwlQRSs_-1aOVbLwc7jzRI7eGKxQMsg/s1600/19680823.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="250" data-original-width="148" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEih-SexMRZtB-Imnb4-NUwlaps-4ngI7afgP0qrRcIp6wFFK6wPcTnmqoihjVfG4_ecfbNRGSj7Q8ZfvsBpO5nEDEW4NdnT_YQgQAheBYiq6YFCMwlQRSs_-1aOVbLwc7jzRI7eGKxQMsg/s1600/19680823.jpg" /></a></div><p><b>August 23-24, 1968 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dea/Taj Mahal/others </b><i>Pinnacle Dance </i><br />Everyone seems to have had fond memories of psychedelic rock concerts at Shrine Expo in 1967 and '68, but they don't seem to have been that profitable. Pinnacle's next-to-last stand was on the weekend of August 23-24, with a weekend of concerts by the Grateful Dead. There was one more weekend of Pinnacle concerts, two weeks later (Sep 6-7, with John Mayall/Junior Wells/Taj Mahal), and Pinnacle stood down.<br /></p><p>The Shrine concerts were recorded by the Dead, and released by the band on the 1992 album <i>Two From The Vault</i>. The release, although brilliantly restored, has some very misleading liner notes. All of the pictures on the archival cd are from the Auditorium rather than the Exposition Hall. The liner notes, full of details about frequency response, seem oblivious to the fact that there were different venues in the same building.<br />
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</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY1z3rnlrore5ZraRx1d2zWc0O3RAxjJB255DRGHB-gsIgC1qRe24jP_i4jwg3DP1vU7aXP_NBDKO5lcE9oIbbkqzcVO8Crtr-tN_P966LDafyZrcJuaGzVCzQXGtgy_KOwTqcMDtjvZE/s1600/Shrine+19680927.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1185" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY1z3rnlrore5ZraRx1d2zWc0O3RAxjJB255DRGHB-gsIgC1qRe24jP_i4jwg3DP1vU7aXP_NBDKO5lcE9oIbbkqzcVO8Crtr-tN_P966LDafyZrcJuaGzVCzQXGtgy_KOwTqcMDtjvZE/s320/Shrine+19680927.jpg" width="237" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>An ad for a canceled concert at the Shrine Expo Hall on September 27-28, 1968, presented by "Zenith Sunrise," and featuring the Grateful Dead and Buddy Miles Express</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div><b>September 27-28, 1968 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dead/Buddy Miles Express/Black Pearl/Little John Farm </b><i>[canceled] Zenith Sunrise presents</i><br />The Pinnacle company fell apart after August. An intriguing artifact is this poster for scheduled Grateful Dead concerts at Shrine Expo on the weekend of September 27-28. The poster says the shows will be presented by Zenith Sunrise. The concerts never happened. Presumably, Zenith Sunrise was a reformed version of Pinnacle, but it didn't happen. Much of the Pinnacle team reconvened as Scenic Sounds, and started putting on shows around Southern California. The Dead were very loyal to promoters, so I assume that if they took the September booking, it would have been with the same principals as Pinnacle. <br /><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><b>October 18, 1968 The Bank, Torrance, CA: Grateful Dead/Cleveland Wrecking Company<br />December 13-14, 1968 The Bank, Torrance, CA: Grateful Dead/Magic Sam/Turnquist Remedy </b><br /><a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2010/08/bank-19840-south-hamilton-avenue.html">Over in suburban Torrance, what was formerly the Blue Law had been reconfigured as The Bank</a>. A group of hippies, one of whom had inherited some money, put together the Fillmore-like operation. On one hand, Torrance was more or less the suburbs, which was where young rock fans lived. Places like Torrance were also where the local police absolutely, positively did not want some hippie establishment.<br /><p>The Bank had opened in July. A lot of cool rock bands played there in the Summer and Fall, even more so once the Shrine was no longer booking shows. Pink Floyd and Ten Years After both played there, as did a number of San Francisco bands. The Grateful Dead played The Bank in October, and then again at the very end of the line, in December. By the end of '68, so many people were getting busted at The Bank that crowds had dramatically thinned out. This was exactly what the cops wanted, and spelled the end of the venue. The window for a Fillmore-style ballroom in Southern California was closing.<br />
</p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRYtDU6Crrj5eS4x59X-Cvw95I7d_YwHueKPcdR-TDYoIV8d2LqMqkxw4OzXWYtRU962UDnQY4_pzgmAJ-UMRpe4bfD6KwL_2onmGQhzgALqq0V4M2fX27TP2z6FeAJPKZQMTl6fHKRs4/s1600/GD+and+CJF+19681220.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="363" data-original-width="454" height="255" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRYtDU6Crrj5eS4x59X-Cvw95I7d_YwHueKPcdR-TDYoIV8d2LqMqkxw4OzXWYtRU962UDnQY4_pzgmAJ-UMRpe4bfD6KwL_2onmGQhzgALqq0V4M2fX27TP2z6FeAJPKZQMTl6fHKRs4/s320/GD+and+CJF+19681220.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption">S<i>cenic Sounds presented Country Joe and The Fish and the Grateful Dead at the Shrine Exposition Hall on December 20-21, 1968. The Dead never played Shrine Expo Hall again.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div><b>December 20-21, 1968 Shrine Exposition Hall, Los Angeles, CA: Grateful Dead/Country Joe and The Fish/Spirit/Pulse/Sir Douglas Quintet/Mint Tattoo </b><i>Scenic Sounds Presents</i><br />The Pinnacle group reconstituted itself as Scenic Sounds. I know that John Van Hammersveld was the Art Director for Capitol Records by this time, and the cereal heir was gone (if he was ever really there). Scenic Sounds rented Shrine Expo Hall again for a few more shows in the Fall. Near Christmas, Scenic booked the Dead again, this time with Country Joe and The Fish as headliners. It is largely forgotten that outside of San Francisco, Country Joe and The Fish had a higher profile than the Grateful Dead. <br /><p>Apparently there were two stages, so there could be more bands. Pulse was.a peculiar act, a conga player with a light show, and the drums apparently triggered the lights. Sir Douglas Quintet and Mint Tattoo were Bay Area bands, so it must have been a long evening. Country Joe and The Fish didn't really have a bass player at this point, so Spirit's Mark Andes filled in for the weekend, according to witnesses. <br /></p><p>Yet with that, the Grateful Dead never played the Shrine Exposition Hall again. Pretty much, that was the end of Shrine Expo as a meaningful rock venue. Sure, promoters rented it once in a while, and there were occasional rock shows. In fact, there still are. Not often, but sometimes. <a href="https://www.shrineauditorium.com/">The Shrine Exposition Hall is still a going concern, and now and again there is a concert there</a>.<br /></p><p>Still, the narrative for the Grateful Dead in the 60s in Los Angeles is the opposite of practically everywhere else. In New York, in Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest, in Miami, in Philadelphia--the Dead rolled into town and stuck a flag in the ground. Buoying every new psychedelic ballroom, playing the first free concert in town, playing longer and louder than anyone else. It was the stuff dreams were made of. Los Angeles isn't like other towns, however, and is proud of it. The Shrine Exposition Hall was just another venue. Sure, there were some great shows, because great bands were on tour, but Shrine Expo didn't have a big impact on Los Angeles culture or music, even though it's bona fides were as great as any other contemporary venue. </p><b>Aftermath: Pacific Presentations</b><br />The significant impact of Pinnacle concerts at Shrine Expo was the genesis of subsequent concert promotion companies. The Pinnacle team became Scenic Sounds. In early '69, Scenic Sounds started booking regular concerts on weekends at the Rose Palace in Pasadena. The ever-loyal Grateful Dead played for Scenic twice more at the <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/10/august-28-29-1970-thee-club-los-angeles.html ">Rose Palace, on March 21-22, 1969</a> and then again <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/10/may-10-1969-rose-palace-pasadena-ca.html">on May 10.</a> <br /><div>
Scenic Sounds in turn became Pacific Presentations. Pacific put on concerts all over the country, particularly in secondary markets like San Antonio or Rochester, where there weren't major promoters. A band like the Dead was willing to play the hinterlands, but they wanted to work with promoters they already knew, so Pacific Presentations promoted a lot of Dead shows all over the country.</div><div><br /></div><div><a href=" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Presentations">The Wikipedia entry summarizes the history of Pacific, which itself is a capsule history of concert promotion in the United States:</a></div><div></div><blockquote><div>Pacific grew into one of the largest concert companies in the United
States, promoting thousands of concerts all over the US and Canada. The
company established and popularized venues such as the Hollywood
Palladium, and the Santa Barbara County Bowl. Pacific put together
California Jam in 1974, which set the record for paid attendance. The
company also promoted entire tours of Rod Stewart & The Faces all
through the 1970s, helping make the artist one of the biggest
attractions in the world. In the late 1970s, Gary Perkins, Brian Murphy,
and Bob Bogdanovich split from Pacific and formed Avalon Attractions.
Danny Kresky was also with Pacific. After around four years, Danny left
to start his own company, DKE in Pittsburgh. Donahower stayed with
Pacific and promoted tours with Bob Marley & The Wailers and other
attractions. </div><div> </div><div>Sepp Donahower is currently the sole owner of Pacific
Presentations. After Perkins left Avalon a few years later, Irving Azoff
and Bob Getties bought into Avalon and it was sold to SFX a few years
later. SFX was then sold to Clear Channel, and Clear Channel spun off
their concert company into Live Nation, which now has merged with
Ticketmaster. </div></blockquote><div><br /></div><div><br /></div>
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</style>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com15tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-22039404294258768732020-09-07T16:58:00.006-07:002022-12-31T15:24:59.017-08:00January 2-5, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Blood Sweat & Tears/Spirit<p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMxb4JDqus8lPzRT7YNvQvp4kP9k6gWzYm19fbRn3Nu-fSBCot6CaAEzXrPBCktFP2BapBRTi5unJpe5Fa4T9wJk7gMeAxvY6vOZ9wKlalwK_LYJvQGMn18ZjCQYuAEZoosThT09HBssQ/s2048/GD+Fillmore+West+19690102.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1326" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgMxb4JDqus8lPzRT7YNvQvp4kP9k6gWzYm19fbRn3Nu-fSBCot6CaAEzXrPBCktFP2BapBRTi5unJpe5Fa4T9wJk7gMeAxvY6vOZ9wKlalwK_LYJvQGMn18ZjCQYuAEZoosThT09HBssQ/s320/GD+Fillmore+West+19690102.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Randy Tuten poster for the Bill Graham Presents show at Fillmore West on January 2-3-4, 1969, with the Grateful Dead, Blood, Sweat & Tears and Spirit (a Sunday January 5 show was added)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><p></p><p>The Grateful Dead and their fans, in a collective enterprise, have attempted to preserve all the music they ever made. The Dead's archive of live tapes is unprecedented in the 20th century rock industry for its vastness. Dead fans themselves have taped shows, going back to the 60s, with audience tapes often filling in gaps left in the archive of board tapes. Grateful Dead fans have also made an extraordinary effort to determine every show and catalog the setlist for all of them. For the 2,400 or so live shows by the Grateful Dead, surprisingly little is unknown.</p><p>There are gaps, of course, here and there, usually back in the 60s. Inevitably, if the band played <a href="https://www.dead.net/show/november-23-1968">an unscheduled show in Ohio</a> or <a href="https://www.dead.net/show/february-9-1969-0">a Wednesday night in Baltimore,</a> it's not totally surprising that we don't have any record. Indeed, the remarkable thing is the number of out-of-the-way 60s shows where we at least have some kind of tape or good eyewitness account, so we at least have a feel for what happened. The near-completeness of the historical record adds to the depth and color of the Grateful Dead's long journey.</p><p>On the weekend of January 2-4, 1969, the Grateful Dead were booked to headline the Fillmore West from Thursday to Saturday. Although neither of the Dead's two albums had been successful, really, the Dead were genuine rock stars in San Francisco, and had been since 1966. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/12/december-31-1968-winterland-grateful.html">The Dead had co-headlined an epic party at Fillmore West on New Year's Eve</a>, and they were back for more a few days later. We know the weekend was a success, because Graham appears to have added a Sunday afternoon show. In general, Graham only did this when the rest of the weekend's ticket sales had been robust. So it had to have been a pretty good weekend.</p>1969. San Francisco. The Fillmore West. Four Grateful Dead shows. <br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>I know of no tape of any of the four nights</li><li>I know of no setlists for any night</li><li>I don't even know of an eyewitness accounts of any of the shows.</li></ul><p>Why? Four nights, likely good crowds, probably eight sets, on their home court, and we know nothing about what the Grateful Dead performed? This isn't Athens, OH or Baltimore, on some weeknight on the road, it's San Francisco, Fillmore West and a weekend. I don't know the reasons--maybe my post will resurrect some long buried sources or memories--but I think I can figure it out.</p><p><span style="color: red;"><b><i>Update 28 December 2022! </i></b></span>Correspondent Alex Golden reported that his father, <a href="https://obituaries.neptune-society.com/obituaries/novato-ca/stephen-golden-10597139">the late Stephen L Golden, a music fan from way back</a>, attended the Grateful Dead show on Sunday, January 5 at Fillmore West. And--<span style="color: red;"><b>!!!!-</b></span>-he took some great color slides. Thus we have a great photo of Jerry and one of Phil and Bob. Garcia in a poncho, everyone in long sleeves--must have been a cold night. Thank you Alex, and thank you and Rest in Power Stephen L Golden.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3L6k-PrSggDIfab7PXqkVqYTqjyw9m1FeaGCFJ5f7804B3yLQLZQzYTtCluPW_FrI4nV2lamHe2NzCCgnDCnPnKDz9CVJVQaAkHZk0HNMNSLIhT9TY8WdDXj-bYnnzF8lYuocQHtNJh2Y9PjMxlitTylb8FQIvQKAoSXh5nOODoT8vDRSE72xWT0Z/s1979/JG%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1979" data-original-width="1285" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3L6k-PrSggDIfab7PXqkVqYTqjyw9m1FeaGCFJ5f7804B3yLQLZQzYTtCluPW_FrI4nV2lamHe2NzCCgnDCnPnKDz9CVJVQaAkHZk0HNMNSLIhT9TY8WdDXj-bYnnzF8lYuocQHtNJh2Y9PjMxlitTylb8FQIvQKAoSXh5nOODoT8vDRSE72xWT0Z/s320/JG%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" width="208" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Jerry Garcia on stage at Fillmore West, Sunday, January 5, 1969 (photo Stephen L Golden, courtesy Alex Golden)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9AbFPqgbZ-yJGRv6ur2Do3KyRcS9iZyzXFGQeXUGXkV0i8TDxco86pvOWK-Pu4QKT5d9sCO0njXVPF0yJrhzf2VxtpDbLuYQSPxhnfSvtl96dWDH_ZuqRNk3dQOk0f8OdAM2KxI9vh1BT2WqD6Ju4YoanOpbZQyHoEPJ7AX0W0zjCB8DYG20Cl5Mh/s2021/BW%20PL%20GD%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1285" data-original-width="2021" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9AbFPqgbZ-yJGRv6ur2Do3KyRcS9iZyzXFGQeXUGXkV0i8TDxco86pvOWK-Pu4QKT5d9sCO0njXVPF0yJrhzf2VxtpDbLuYQSPxhnfSvtl96dWDH_ZuqRNk3dQOk0f8OdAM2KxI9vh1BT2WqD6Ju4YoanOpbZQyHoEPJ7AX0W0zjCB8DYG20Cl5Mh/s320/BW%20PL%20GD%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Phil Lesh and Bob Weir (and probably Mickey Hart) on stage at Fillmore West, Sunday, January 5, 1969 (photo Stephen L Golden, courtesy Alex Golden)</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br />For the Blood, Sweat & Tears photos, see below.<br /><p></p><p><b><i></i></b></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMaqshEokegPf9gvb91uKXv6BNFg03u3WjoJOYr-T2b7faae6RKhhLrTmgOSXK2CugmmOaxkGRAnNhSoRNDWTKS20b19OqGVQK-4JnOUtE495EKWUFtdl8UmIjMg_r18datw2nM3jcRqs/s1738/live%253Adead+album.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1736" data-original-width="1738" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMaqshEokegPf9gvb91uKXv6BNFg03u3WjoJOYr-T2b7faae6RKhhLrTmgOSXK2CugmmOaxkGRAnNhSoRNDWTKS20b19OqGVQK-4JnOUtE495EKWUFtdl8UmIjMg_r18datw2nM3jcRqs/s320/live%253Adead+album.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The Grateful Dead's immortal Live/Dead album was recorded in San Francisco in January, February and March 1969, at the Avalon and Fillmore West</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><i><br />Why No Tapes?</i></b><br />The absence of any Grateful Dead tapes from the January run at Fillmore West is easier to explain, although I can't be definitive. Paradoxically, I think the absence of any tapes has to do directly with attempts to record <i>Live/Dead.</i> As you will recall, the Dead were attempting to record a live album using a brand-new Ampex 16-track tape recorder. Since the Dead were playing New Year's Eve at Winterland, Ampex engineer Ron Wickersham helped the band lug the recorder they were using at Pacific Recorders in San Mateo to the Fillmore West in order to record the show.<p></p><p>Apparently the attempt to record the New Year's Eve show was a disaster. One track remains, a messy version of "Midnight Hour." The rest of the tape was recorded over a few weeks later, since 16-track tape was expensive. I do not know what the technical problems might have been on New Year's Eve, nor would I likely understand if they were spelled out. It does appear, however, that Wickersham and the band lugged the Ampex 16-track back to San Mateo, probably mid-day on January 1. A review of the tape showed dismal results, and apparently modifications were in order.</p><p>It does make sense, however, to consider that the Dead had set up their sound board and sound system to record on December 31, and returned without their gear on January 2, since Wickersham was resolving the problems. Now, of course, with hindsight, we say "didn't Owsley have his regular deck--what happened?" Honestly, who knows? But it does make a certain sort of sense that the Dead had a certain plan, to record New Year's Eve and the subsequent shows, and it all went South. The Dead did not return to 16-track recording until January 24 at the Avalon, and in between Owsley taped a show the old way (January 17 in Santa Barbara). Still, the band had a plan for Fillmore West, and it went wrong. So the lack of tapes, while still mysterious, is at least somewhat explicable to me.<br /></p><i><b>Why No Reviews?</b></i><br />We think of the Grateful Dead as big rock stars, and that was true in San Francisco in 1969. Nonetheless, the Grateful Dead were also a hometown band who played quite regularly. So while there was plenty of coverage of the Dead in the local newspapers, there were rarely actual reviews of them. A touring band who might show up once a year was worthy of some column inches, but the Dead were a constant, like the cycles of the moon. So they weren't reviewed, not the way that Cream or even The Doors got reviewed.<p>Also, the regular beat writers for the local papers were a lot less likely to go out and about on the weekend after New Year's Eve. This was just human nature. <i>Chronicle</i> writer Ralph Gleason, as well as <i>Examiner</i> music writer Phil Elwood, often went to Grateful Dead shows, and commented on the goings on. But since neither of them appear to have gone out that weekend, we have no reports. To my knowledge, no other Bay Area paper, nor the Berkeley <i>Barb</i> or any other underground paper commented on these Dead shows, either. So we have no information at all from the press.<br /></p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjybWxNXUFy9SGmh-g72yfSyzQ8a87qJ43xxjWzadQmRruPZE-NknJwfJfhqNbbf4fwWH-pTKOrrBaSobdB3Kq_Twcwmu3jT87G36dZrLXZg9Ond0ZXrKH3WCCvyGyBAdeT-QWDvcSyyn4/s600/GD+Ticket+FW+19690105.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="331" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjybWxNXUFy9SGmh-g72yfSyzQ8a87qJ43xxjWzadQmRruPZE-NknJwfJfhqNbbf4fwWH-pTKOrrBaSobdB3Kq_Twcwmu3jT87G36dZrLXZg9Ond0ZXrKH3WCCvyGyBAdeT-QWDvcSyyn4/s320/GD+Ticket+FW+19690105.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A printed ticket for Thursday, January 2, 1969 at Fillmore West. The same run of printed tickets was used for Sunday January 5 (the tickets had a printed reproduction of the poster to prevent counterfeits).</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><i><b>Who Went To The Show?</b></i><br />The weekend of shows was originally announced as Thursday through Saturday, January 2-3-4. From some surviving ticket stubs, it appears that a Sunday night show was added. This was common practice for Bill Graham Presents. It made sense to sell tickets for three shows, and if the demand was there, to add an additional show. This was particularly true for the kind of acts which might cause people to see a show and say, "wow, that was great, I'd love to go again." Of course, the Sunday night scheduling was agreed to in advance by the bands, their agents and managements. <br /><p></p><p>The Grateful Dead had just co-headlined four nights at Fillmore West on November 7-10 with Quicksilver Messenger Service. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/12/december-31-1968-winterland-grateful.html">The Dead and Quicksilver had also hosted New Year's Eve, along with the rising groups Santana and It's A Beautiful Day</a>. Quicksilver's debut album, released in May of 1968, was hugely popular on FM radio. It was also far more accessible than <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i>. So while the Dead were local legends, they were more likely to draw people who had already seen them. The Dead were rock stars, sure, but they couldn't really sell out a weekend at Fillmore West on their own dime.</p><p>The two other bands booked with the Dead on this January weekend, as it happened, were perfect examples of bands who were hot. Blood Sweat & Tears and Spirit had both had successful debut albums, and now they were following them up. It appears to have been Blood Sweat & Tears and Spirit who drew the crowds, more than the Dead. Now, to be clear, the Dead were popular, and many of the people drawn to the shows would have looked forward to seeing the Grateful Dead as well. But another reason we know so little about the January shows may be that the Dead were overshadowed by their openers.</p><p>I don't mean to suggest that the Dead were "blown off the stage," or anything so dramatic. I just think the what hardcore Deadheads there were in those days were wiped out by New Year's Eve, and other local rock fans were the ones attending on the weekend. Neither Blood, Sweat & Tears nor Spirit have the kinds of fans who document everything they saw 50 years later, which is a shame, because I think that is who were really excited about this show.<br /></p><p><b></b></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKL-wxI9rmuuBS1PcbUDXnmANvWx_3_tNJMEKQ4URQAPtlhgpaExhcR_RQKmQiFVAXycJacX83f3ADKEHRmfeZ8qoqOAKZAhXKEzWssz3vOWLs0jk96hFV_cckXejgcCdwvxKDxVqx7uI/s300/Blood%252CSweat%2526Tears+ChildIsFathertotheMan.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKL-wxI9rmuuBS1PcbUDXnmANvWx_3_tNJMEKQ4URQAPtlhgpaExhcR_RQKmQiFVAXycJacX83f3ADKEHRmfeZ8qoqOAKZAhXKEzWssz3vOWLs0jk96hFV_cckXejgcCdwvxKDxVqx7uI/s0/Blood%252CSweat%2526Tears+ChildIsFathertotheMan.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Blood, Sweat & Tears debut album Child Is Father To The Man was released by Columbia in April 1968. Al Kooper was the principal writer, arranger and lead singer.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b><br />Blood, Sweat & Tears</b><br />If we set the Wayback Machine to January 1969, the top group playing this weekend wasn't the Grateful Dead, it was Blood, Sweat & Tears. Blood, Sweat & Tears had been formed by Al Kooper and Steve Katz in Fall, 1967, out of the remains of the Blues Project. Kooper's idea was to have a rock band modeled on the big band sound of Maynard Ferguson. B,S&T's debut album <i>Child Is The Father To The Man</i>, released in April, 1968 was a sophisticated homage to the likes of Ferguson while still retaining a rock beat and a soulful groove. The album sold pretty well, and it got good reviews. B,S&T was an eight-piece band, with the horns actually part of the group, instead of added on later. With players like Randy Brecker (trumpet) and Fred Lipsius (alto sax), the horns were big-band quality too.<p></p><p><i>Child Is The Father To The Man</i> was a great album, and it still sounds pretty good today. Kooper was the primary songwriter and arranger. Really, the only weakness of the album was Kooper's lead vocals, which were only barely adequate to the power of the arrangements. Steve Katz and other members wanted to add a "real" lead singer. Notwithstanding other disputes in the band, Kooper did not take kindly to the idea of a new lead singer, and he left the group. Thanks to a recommendation from Judy Collins, Blood, Sweat & Tears signed up Canadian singer David Clayton-Thomas. After a few other personnel changes, they had returned to the studio in October 1968. </p><p>Columbia Records was very interested in merging rock bands with horn sections. At the time, Columbia not only had B, S&T, but Chicago Transit Authority and The Flock, who also merged horns with the rhythm section. Columbia assigned producer Jim Guercio, who had been in the Buckinghams, whose hit "Kind Of A Drag" seemed to imply the kind of soul-rock mix that the company was looking for. In late 1968, Guercio was working with both Blood, Sweat & Tears and Chicago Transit Authority, and those two groups were perhaps the biggest ever sellers on the rock-band-plus-horns model.</p><p></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNuxRnLFLe1uB2kGO_3WHdum4B6zRF7Mx2s_8luYhIJaqIrdmerDZEXcLoxv4HDV91Q9YI1tff9HT_CGS7z3f-l_qkS5F-XUbxIQhVgqxeZ4V3A6AsfgNUoWomqPeZ-I9PTWpadiCACTM/s240/BS%2526T_cover.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="240" data-original-width="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiNuxRnLFLe1uB2kGO_3WHdum4B6zRF7Mx2s_8luYhIJaqIrdmerDZEXcLoxv4HDV91Q9YI1tff9HT_CGS7z3f-l_qkS5F-XUbxIQhVgqxeZ4V3A6AsfgNUoWomqPeZ-I9PTWpadiCACTM/s0/BS%2526T_cover.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Blood, Sweat & Tears self-titled second album, released in December 1968. There were three huge AM hits on the album, and the lp sold over 4 million copies.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><b>"You've Made Me So Very Happy"-Blood, Sweat & Tears</b><br />Blood, Sweat & Tears second album, named just <i>Blood, Sweat & Tears</i>, was released in December, 1968. It was huge. Really huge. It sold 4 million copies, a staggering number for the time. There were three gigantic singles that came off the album. If you were sentient in America in 1969, you heard a Blood, Sweat & Tears single from that album all year long. The three big hits were:<br /><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><b>"You've Made Me So Very Happy" </b>(single released Jan '69, remake of a '67 Brenda Holloway hit)</li><li><b>"Spinning Wheel"</b> (single released May '69)</li><li><b>"And When I Die"</b> (single released Sept '69)</li></ul><p>Blood, Sweat & Tears was so big that they were the second highest paid band at Woodstock (Jimi Hendrix got $20,000, and BS&T got $15K). For various contractual reasons, they were not in the movie, but Blood, Sweat & Tears was one of the break-out bands of 1969. Even before the singles hit, BS&T would have been getting play on KSAN. To 60s hippies, "jazz" was sophisticated music, but parents still didn't like it, so liking jazz or "jazz-rock" meant you were sophisticated. At least initially, BS&T came into 1969 as a cool band. So I think the Fillmore West shows did really well because of Blood, Sweat & Tears, not the Grateful Dead.</p><p>Now, to be clear, unlike in later decades, there was no inherent dismissal at the time of the Dead as "an old hippie band"--hippies weren't even old yet. I think the sort of fan who wanted to see B,S&T thought, "oh yeah, the Grateful Dead are supposed to be good, it'll be fun." But I also think that a fan seeing B,S&T would sit through the first Dead set, and the second B,S&T set, but not stick around for Grateful Dead late night. So any killer "Dark Star" at 2am--there had to be at least one, right?--was probably to a pretty thin crowd.<br /></p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1trplUPq9LhlkgctVj3r3Xz7WZuHUA8Y94ay4HMD6ovYwBV7Uhgn6-BmiFDYR-VEVfK6E5fw5yWiDmqrwkRZYGmmlidhFRYqsAUjvv93vB_5vmJFDrwJul1cFQ4Up6D9ba_vsHEBDJcg/s300/The_Family_That_Plays_Together_%2528Spirit_album_-_cover_art%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1trplUPq9LhlkgctVj3r3Xz7WZuHUA8Y94ay4HMD6ovYwBV7Uhgn6-BmiFDYR-VEVfK6E5fw5yWiDmqrwkRZYGmmlidhFRYqsAUjvv93vB_5vmJFDrwJul1cFQ4Up6D9ba_vsHEBDJcg/s0/The_Family_That_Plays_Together_%2528Spirit_album_-_cover_art%2529.jpg" /></a></div><p><b>"I've Got A Line On You"-Spirit</b><br />Spirit was a band from Los Angeles. Their situation was somewhat of the reverse of Blood, Sweat & Tears. The band had an underground following, and they got airplay on the few FM rock stations that existed. But the band did not sell many records until after they broke up. Today, many Spirit songs are recognizable from television commercials (like "Mr. Skin" and "Nature's Way"), and the group is widely revered by people who own too many records as one of the most original bands in the 1960s. In January, 1969, however, Spirit wasn't very well known. In December '68, the band had just released their second album on Ode Records, <i>The Family That Plays Together</i>.<br /></p><p>Still, Spirit only had one kind-of-hit in the 60s, and it was the single "I Got A Line On You." The single was released in October 1968. It was a great song, and ultimately it got as high as #25 nationally. <i>The Family That Plays Together </i>was a great followup to Spirit's 1968 debut album, and it would have gotten some good airplay on KSAN. Now, to be clear, Spirit would have been a cult item, whereas Blood, Sweat & Tears would have been mass-market. But for the kind of hipster who would only go to a show if there was something super-cool to brag about, Spirit would have been it. The Grateful Dead were still reasonably cool, as these things went, but it was Spirit that would have been the draw for the <i>hipoisie.</i> Once again, this kind of fan would have cheerily caught two sets by Spirit, and enjoyed the Dead's first set, but they weren't hanging out for the late night "Dark Star."<b><i> </i></b></p><p><b><i>A Call For Archaeologists</i></b><br /></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>The Grateful Dead, in their prime, make no tapes of the early January weekend shows at Fillmore West, presumably because of tape equipment issues related to recording what would become <i>Live/Dead</i></li><li>Blood, Sweat & Tears has just released one of the biggest albums of the 1960s, and probably helped pack the house.</li><li>Spirit, not well known but well regarded, seemed to be a band on the rise to stardom, a far more intriguing band to see than the Dead, who had headlined Fillmore West five times in the previous eight weeks</li></ul><p>No tapes, no setlists, no reviews, no memories: can someone prove me wrong? Please? Find a review, a lost comment thread on a Blood, Sweat & Tears chat board? January 1969, at home, and we got nothing?</p><p>The internet is a remarkable instrument. I'm counting on the audience to find something.</p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip9R8LUnYQNAEL0NV2OgN-YcgBHyjIdeixGDFnsrA_UDsXuHHPkoWl3sA-fjDW2sEv0E4VgcZ-q6gxHuns3eyPzn7oF_A3H8-UhrtFKbB-fGi1suCbr0QgFQqODCUKxVZKo14fM0oGx7w/s300/Spirit_-_Twelve_Dreams_of_Dr._Sardonicus.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEip9R8LUnYQNAEL0NV2OgN-YcgBHyjIdeixGDFnsrA_UDsXuHHPkoWl3sA-fjDW2sEv0E4VgcZ-q6gxHuns3eyPzn7oF_A3H8-UhrtFKbB-fGi1suCbr0QgFQqODCUKxVZKo14fM0oGx7w/s0/Spirit_-_Twelve_Dreams_of_Dr._Sardonicus.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>Spirit released their fourth album, Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus in late 1970. The band broke up in January 1971, but the album went on to become a huge hit afterwards.<br /></i></td></tr></tbody></table></b></i><i><b><br />Aftermath</b></i><br />The <i>Blood, Sweat & Tears</i> album was a monster, 4 million sold and three giant hit singles. The next album, 1970's <i>Blood, Sweat & Tears 3</i>, was also huge. It too had a giant hit single, "Lucretia MacEvil." B,S&T, however, for all their success, was rapidly shoved down the hipness ladder, seen as a bunch of poseurs. By 1970 standards, B,S&T mostly played covers, and the band played charts and didn't improvise. Clayton-Thomas, though an excellent singer, was a trained vocalist, like a Las Vegas singer, rather than gravel-voiced like Rod Stewart. BS&T had to answer the claim that they were "inauthentic," a fatal criticism in those days. Since the band toured on behalf of the US State Department and then appeared regularly in Las Vegas, the group lost all the jazz credibility that had been established with their debut. <br /><p>By about 1973, although Blood, Sweat & Tears were still very popular, no one was going around bragging about the time they saw them opening for the Dead. BS&T has toured for many decades--they may still--but they don't have the kind of fans who document every show back until the dawn of time. So any memories of the time that the band opened for the Grateful Dead at Fillmore West remain uncaptured. Indeed, some of the SF rock fans who went to check out Blood, Sweat & Tears may have been embarrassed about it after they heard "Spinning Wheel" for the millionth time, so they blocked it out.</p><p>Spirit, in contrast, has remained the height of cool since 1968, and deservedly so. Unfortunately, despite the initial success of "I've Got A Line On You," <i>The Family That Plays Together </i>wasn't a big hit. It's followup, 1969's <i>Clear Spirit</i>, another great album, went nowhere. Spirit broke up in early 1971, shortly after their album <i>Twelve Dreams Of Dr. Sardonicus</i> was released. <i>Twelve Dreams</i> was a huge hit, a staple of FM radio, and much beloved by rock fans everywhere. Various versions of Spirit performed into the 1990s, and there were some spinoffs (like JoJo Gunne), but nothing could recapture the magic of the original band. Spirit's brilliant lead guitarist Randy California drowned in a tragic accident in 1997, and that ended any chance of the heroic recognition they richly deserved.</p><p>The Grateful Dead toured continuously until 1995, when lead guitarist Jerry Garcia died. Members of the band have continued to tour and record, and archival releases of the band's material continue to sell in great numbers into the present day.<br /></p><p><i><b>Appendix: Lineups, January 1969</b></i><br /><b>Spirit</b><br /><b>Randy California</b>-lead guitar, vocals<br /><b>Jay Ferguson</b>-vocals, piano<br /><b>John Locke</b>-organ, electric piano, piano<br /><b>Mark Andes</b>-bass, vocals<br /><b>Ed Cassidy</b>-drums </p><p><b>Blood, Sweat & Tears</b><br /><b>David Clayton-Thomas</b>-lead vocals<br /><b>Steve Katz</b>-guitar, harmonica, vocals<br /><b>Fred Lipsius</b>-alto sax<br /><b>Lew Soloff</b>-trumpet<br /><b>Chuck Winfield</b>-trumpet<br /><b>Jerry Hyman</b>-trombone<br /><b>Dick Halligan</b>-organ, piano<br /><b>Jim Fielder</b>-bass<br /><b>Bobby Colomby</b>-drums </p><p>Alex Golden was kind enough to send along photos of Blood Sweat & Tears taken by his father Stephen L Golden on Sunday, January 5, 1969<br /></p><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzdRTWHvc-w4xttRlemsCQ-irrqvIDpNhcdi0QTUYYsi4hg_Fq8bMeB7DnPbOa9qAj8hCMg2n-8uXNKk5yEp6l8c6Q-hk8ZcssiFap0QpdeB8E_t6RmzW-GxQH0aRqYY0grMspF7XZNyju4yRJkBwnMzXUsptwY8qqlu6W8flgr93zNkrWjNh6Uo4V/s2021/BST%201%20%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1381" data-original-width="2021" height="219" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzdRTWHvc-w4xttRlemsCQ-irrqvIDpNhcdi0QTUYYsi4hg_Fq8bMeB7DnPbOa9qAj8hCMg2n-8uXNKk5yEp6l8c6Q-hk8ZcssiFap0QpdeB8E_t6RmzW-GxQH0aRqYY0grMspF7XZNyju4yRJkBwnMzXUsptwY8qqlu6W8flgr93zNkrWjNh6Uo4V/s320/BST%201%20%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9hw22Sb5VUuIBo-ULfz1NnW4rPgSqXlSDxveUo79qZAPBSYA9C_KiRwOPNs-bvvbqhMJW1cQugbSE8XqlutsgzbXx8wNBFlyrBO8Kw-Zg3O8gLOgRjrVloMby8pp95t4A1T4KYBAFWBPwqUEQkJK7c0bvX-teOjVA_KnC9333UMrQfAhAZLT7bce9/s2021/BST%202%20%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1285" data-original-width="2021" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9hw22Sb5VUuIBo-ULfz1NnW4rPgSqXlSDxveUo79qZAPBSYA9C_KiRwOPNs-bvvbqhMJW1cQugbSE8XqlutsgzbXx8wNBFlyrBO8Kw-Zg3O8gLOgRjrVloMby8pp95t4A1T4KYBAFWBPwqUEQkJK7c0bvX-teOjVA_KnC9333UMrQfAhAZLT7bce9/s320/BST%202%20%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWgmVRxa-kLVj1XWy8uKN6PXM4zJwrJ9IvBu8J1eWub-F9sbFKcYXv5SjS6F80NLXfzZg03MpLoBNf265Yp8A0vanOJKmIe6Fw4gInvPwrPDWUJKARgWUzWn6zNFLwhw7OGMG5658bbUnqwl7ehPkfEfezCbUKvRNj8oXEZJho1XzxAaPybVCLCzD7/s2021/BST%203%20%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1285" data-original-width="2021" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWgmVRxa-kLVj1XWy8uKN6PXM4zJwrJ9IvBu8J1eWub-F9sbFKcYXv5SjS6F80NLXfzZg03MpLoBNf265Yp8A0vanOJKmIe6Fw4gInvPwrPDWUJKARgWUzWn6zNFLwhw7OGMG5658bbUnqwl7ehPkfEfezCbUKvRNj8oXEZJho1XzxAaPybVCLCzD7/s320/BST%203%20%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p></p><p><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; 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margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1285" data-original-width="2080" height="198" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuv-_-yRFQX5WT6lbr9ZIlqT7kYQyXivwzXNLv0rzKZ81Fn5acG_ejB9HcQN3tf3A8OGMr1KaTmAc9NZ2kXvB1_UK5nwK1lQKrITebopW_YVui_PKNDuOzKhQnSq3oertEk__yoBm1yK-yzxxBHvxnnmA0A_zfbBsMO0hYfT8MSwd5qLuGPgKL8Oda/s320/BST%205%20%20FW%2019690105%20Stephen%20L%20Golden.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-44995040990694928422020-08-28T14:03:00.001-07:002020-08-29T10:35:57.359-07:00February 6, 1979 The Pavilion, Tulsa, OK: Grateful Dead (Last Lost Live Tape)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9yq6aHChW-M62UeHcanxPHwsSdvTHKsS3DOUwtTy9oD7zwZKUJPmqH6l3XCvnfPTbSNjmVBsJToMbuOkG3NTi-F6Udkv8nAvfrqD6OKuskEOeBy53ROslzzBcPwFFLbs6wVmmaQRjf-w/s1200/GD+board+tape+box+19780122.jpg" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1165" data-original-width="1200" height="398" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9yq6aHChW-M62UeHcanxPHwsSdvTHKsS3DOUwtTy9oD7zwZKUJPmqH6l3XCvnfPTbSNjmVBsJToMbuOkG3NTi-F6Udkv8nAvfrqD6OKuskEOeBy53ROslzzBcPwFFLbs6wVmmaQRjf-w/w410-h398/GD+board+tape+box+19780122.jpg" width="410" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The board tape for January 22, 1978, in Oregon</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table>The
Grateful Dead were the first band to not only allow audience taping,
but the first to openly encourage it. Inadvertent or not, the Dead's
strategy to allow the free circulation of live tapes was essential for
the group to build their loyal audience, who returned to see the band
again and again, indifferent to whether the band current record release,
if they even had one. The Dead succeeded financially running directly
against late 20th century music business orthodoxy.<p>Deadheads
know, of course, that not every Dead show was taped, or preserved on
tape. Many shows in the 60s were missing, and even into the early 70s
there were scattered shows with limited or missing tapes. By the early
70s, however, the Dead were popular enough in an underground way that
even the "untaped" shows had newspaper reviews, eyewitness accounts and
other ephemera, so we had some idea what happened those nights. </p><p>There's
an outlier, though. And it's late, much later than anyone realizes. On
February 6, 1979 the Grateful Dead played the Tulsa Pavilion in Tulsa,
OK. No board tape survives in the vault. No one seems to have made an
audience tape, not even of terrible quality. There was no newspaper
review. No one has appeared online as an eyewitness. Maybe it was just a
Tuesday night in Tulsa--maybe they played "Dark Star" for 40 minutes.
We don't know.</p><p>How did this happen?<br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhye3409pcoAcFzkgVnNWG4dIA9wG2Lx9jA6YsBn9HYVErs-MUHHLTmPZBQVR_zAyYdkIseyodjQvyKZYjETCc_RfGk51S1i9nC31QB24rtOYxn725wTaO1BS3DboBX9OL0zIMXhJY0j-k/s250/Deep+Ellum+DART+Station.jpg" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="250" data-original-width="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhye3409pcoAcFzkgVnNWG4dIA9wG2Lx9jA6YsBn9HYVErs-MUHHLTmPZBQVR_zAyYdkIseyodjQvyKZYjETCc_RfGk51S1i9nC31QB24rtOYxn725wTaO1BS3DboBX9OL0zIMXhJY0j-k/s0/Deep+Ellum+DART+Station.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>If
you go down to the Deep Ellum DART (Dallas Area Rapid Transit) station,
you probably don't have to keep your money in your shoes.</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b>The Grateful Dead in Texas and The Southwest </b><p>The
Grateful Dead first established themselves as a money making act on the
two coasts, followed by the Upper Midwest. If you define a traveling
circus by roadways, the Dead's initial main lines were US101 in the
West, Interstate 95 in the East, and I-80 linking the two across the
country. This is hardly a metaphor, as an analysis of their first
touring schedules will tell you. Throughout the 70s, initially under the
guidance of Sam Cutler, the Dead worked on building audiences in
different places, along different roads. Financial success for the Dead
meant profitable touring, and building audiences in new territory
required returning to a region again and again, maybe not in the same
cities but near enough for a road trip.</p><p>The Cutler road map played
huge dividends over time, even if the paydays didn't come until after
Cutler was long gone. Over the decades, <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/05/the-grateful-dead-in-upstate-and.html">the Dead extended their touring schedule to include upstate New York</a> and <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/02/the-grateful-dead-in-north-carolina-and.html">the "New South" of North Carolina and Virginia</a>.
When the band finally hit it big in 1987, with "Touch Of Grey," the
willing audiences in those places allowed the Dead to tour from city to
city without excessive travel. This favored both the road crew and the
road-tripping Deadheads. Put another way, the band took their three main
highways, and added two more: I-90 (in New York State) and I-85 (in
Virginia and North Carolina). </p><p>But the Cutler plan wasn't
foolproof. Throughout the 70s and early 80s, the Dead played
relentlessly in Texas and some surrounding states. They played some
great music, per the tapes, but the Dead never really took hold in
Texas. It seems strange, given the generally strong economy and Texans
love of love music. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/04/the-grateful-dead-in-texas-1968-88.html">I
wrote about this at some length, but I can't say why Texas wasn't prime
Deadhead territory. By the time '87 rolled around, the Dead had pretty
much given up on the state, and after 1988, they never played there
again.</a> The Grateful Dead's failure to add I-10 as a major thoroughfare was the the backdrop for that Tuesday night in Tulsa.<br /></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0nnw-PX6sDWZlWNR5MqDpnr3P06ztqsDdh8flvO9a3qo95lRFDeDcyTd8-3jbTZ6F1GZNxC8uhgHJwH43vWmB1jm6soH37ea2NmChqIvE0a0lhNLTAOouZkAo4-5JlyFd-sMmlSH79Xc/s1037/Tulsa+Pavilion.jpg" style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; padding: 1em 0px;"><img border="0" data-original-height="351" data-original-width="1037" height="139" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0nnw-PX6sDWZlWNR5MqDpnr3P06ztqsDdh8flvO9a3qo95lRFDeDcyTd8-3jbTZ6F1GZNxC8uhgHJwH43vWmB1jm6soH37ea2NmChqIvE0a0lhNLTAOouZkAo4-5JlyFd-sMmlSH79Xc/w410-h139/Tulsa+Pavilion.jpg" width="410" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The
Pavilion in Tulsa, OK, built in 1932 with a capacity of 6,311. Located
on the State Fairgounds at 1701 S. Louisville Avenue, the Grateful Dead
played here on February 6, 1979</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><b>February 6, 1979 Tulsa Pavilion, Tulsa, OK</b> <p>After
December 1978, it's hard not to draw the conclusion that the Grateful
Dead somewhat gave up on Texas and the Southwest. They only played the
region intermittently throughout the 80s. As the 80s rolled on, when the
Dead played their strongholds in Florida and Atlanta, they took the
North/South route through Virginia and North Carolina rather than
East/West through New Orleans and Texas. This was not necessarily a
planned decision, but it was a rational one. As the Dead's ticket sales
became more focused on fans who saw the band over and over again, the
booking policy led to a touring schedule that featured relatively short
drives on a nightly basis. The vast distances of the Southwest were far
less attractive for any fans who were thinking of catching three or four
shows in six nights.<br /><br />Another factor in the Dead's declining
presence in the Southwest was the absence of any longstanding
relationships with local promoters. Sam Cutler was an old comrade, and
he had run Manor Downs in Austin, but for mysterious reasons he dropped
out of managing the facility in the late 1970s. The Dead would indeed
return to Manor Downs but Cutler's departure meant that the band focused
on established beachheads elsewhere. We will have to wait for Cutler's
new book (hurry up, Sam!) to unravel the details, but it seems that his
departure combined with the vast plains of Texas to keep the Dead
touring in the more humid climes of the Southeast, rather than the
Southwest.<br /><br />The Grateful Dead's only appearance in Tulsa on
February 6, 1979 indicates how small a part the Southwest played in the
band's plans. Everything about the Tulsa show is an outlier, and indeed
the entire section of the tour is an outlier. The Dead had never played
Tulsa before, which is 107 miles Northeast of Oklahoma City, and the
second largest city in the State (behind OKC). <a href=" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expo_Square_Pavilion">The
Pavilion, at 1701 S. Louisville Avenue, had a capacity of 6,311, and
had opened in 1932. It was originally called The Fairgounds Pavilion.</a>
The Pavilion was only the second-largest venue in Tulsa (the 8,900 seat
Convention Center had opened in 1964), so it wasn't a glamorous booking
even for Tulsa.<br /></p><p> It was also a Tuesday night. Even weirder,
it was in between a Sunday night show (Feb 4) in Madison, WI and a
Wednesday show (Feb 7) in Carbondale, IL. Both of those shows were
effectively university gigs.<br /><br />Any band that would go 750 miles for
a Tuesday night gig in a city they had never played, just to go 500
more miles for a Wednesday night show in another city they had never
played was hurting for money. The Dead had two weekend nights in Kansas
City, KS (Feb 9-10), so they had to fill the week with any paying
booking. If Texas had been a good gig, they might have gone there, but
Tulsa and Carbondale seem to have been better choices. Draw your own
conclusion.</p><p>When I mentioned the Tulsa show in an earlier post, <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/04/the-grateful-dead-in-texas-1968-88.html?showComment=1491550414396#c8115017540247068260">commenter Brad K mentioned</a> that someone who put up posters for the show had said that it snowed. <a href="https://www.wunderground.com/history/daily/us/ok/tulsa/KTUL/date/1979-2-6">I checked this out, and it's correct--temperatures were under thirty and there was snow, albeit not a lot</a>.
Now, sure New England 'Heads will say, "c'mon 25 degrees and snow
flurries, I'd do that!" But the Southwest isn't the Northeast. The roads
and the people aren't equipped for any snow, so anyone making a last
minute decision would have just stayed home. Daunting weather would have
discouraged any non-roadie from driving to Tulsa from any distance.</p><p></p><p>There's yet another observation derived from Brad's comment. In the late 70s, promoters only hung posters around town if a show was way undersold, and they were desperate to sell tickets. How many Grateful Dead shows were there in the 70s where anxious promoters put up signs around town? Not anywhere I lived. And another thing--not only is there no tape for the Tulsa show, nor a setlist, but there's a missing poster, too. Sure, it's probably a standard "boxing -style" poster that says "Tuesday Night, The Pavilion, from San Francisco: The Grateful Dead." But right now, it's rarer than any Avalon poster.<br /><br />As
far as I know, the February 6 Tulsa show is the last, latest Grateful
Dead show for which we have no audience tape whatsoever. That tells me
that for whatever little community there may have been of "tourheads,"
none of them were going to Tulsa on a Tuesday night in February. Legend
also has it that when Brent Mydland joined the band, in late March,
Garcia grabbed a few tapes of recent shows off the shelf and handed them
over. While unprovable, it would explain why Tulsa and a few other
shows from that run have no board tapes in the vault. Thus February 6,
1979 in Tulsa, OK, is the latest Dead show for which we have not a
single recorded note from any source, listenable or not. </p><p>If you
meet a guy, and he tells you "I saw them do "Dark Star" during a
snowstorm in Tulsa," well, maybe he's deluded. But maybe.... </p><b>Update</b>:<br />Thanks to the miracle of the Internet, a few distant fragments have been threaded into one place. Thanks to everyone who contributed, <a href="http://www.jessejarnow.com/about/">but particularly fellow scholar Jesse Jarnow</a>:<br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW2l9E7ArkzyXSJDrgKDIgT2tKKWFVwxBnLpTShaAuWhnrGU3fBofNMaNIdvkgaFov4B-4emYVTkXLQ5OgxJBFEu7PS0zJrRL8uFwx5ddDTHDTGVPSODvsS20pCBapFv302pqGYgGA7JA/s400/19790206b+GD+Tulsa.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="259" data-original-width="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW2l9E7ArkzyXSJDrgKDIgT2tKKWFVwxBnLpTShaAuWhnrGU3fBofNMaNIdvkgaFov4B-4emYVTkXLQ5OgxJBFEu7PS0zJrRL8uFwx5ddDTHDTGVPSODvsS20pCBapFv302pqGYgGA7JA/s0/19790206b+GD+Tulsa.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Grateful Dead at Tulsa Fairgrounds Pavilion, February 6, 1979</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p>First of all, not one but two posters exist (it turned out both were on Deadlists). They aren't great, but they exist.</p><i><b>Eyewitness Accounts</b></i><br /><a href="https://www.dead.net/show/february-6-1979">It turns out there are a number of comments on Dead.net recalling the show</a>. It appears that the show was kind of undersold anyway, and then a snowstorm encouraged people to stay home. And it was several inches of snow, which is a lot for the Southeast. Here's some good samples:<br /><p>"Tulsa Steve" recalls:<br /><i><b>That snowy show.....</b></i><br /></p><blockquote><p>Yup, I was there too. It was a weather disaster. There was a blizzard raging in the hours prior to the show. The band made it to Tulsa. I'd always heard that the TU Student Association posed as a "real" promtion company and brought the Dead to Tulsa. having been a fan for many years, this was my 3rd show with the Dead and I was happy to attend. I bought our tickets early on and had great seats right in front of the stage. As I recall, the band had played Saturday Night Live about a week before and they were touring hard. Jerry's voice was in lousy shape (you could hear it when he sang I Need A Miracle...lots of crackling in those pipes. I chalked it up to working so hard and being on the road for weeks. The unfortunate thing is that many of the fans couldn't make it in due to the snow - seriously, it was a foot deep. Even people from Oklahoma City backed out and consequently, the Fairgrounds Pavillion was really about 2/3rds empty. <br /></p><p>For me, not the best show, maybe the worst - but by God I was there and its sorta like fishing - my worst day fishing is better than my best day working....my worst Dead show was DEFINITELY better than most other days in my 55 yrs! Thanks to Patrick Dead Head for confirming my thoughts. I too went on to earn my degree from TU and happy I stuck it out. This made that fateful year even more interesting. By the way, I'd also heard rumors after the show that the Dead would NEVER play Tulsa again and you know what? They never did! I'm going to run some traps cause if the Lafortunes have a tape of that show, it needs to be liberated!!!!!</p></blockquote><p>"Patrick Deadhead" has an illuminating story<br /><i><b></b></i></p><blockquote><i><b>Tulsa show</b></i><br />At the age of 19 I produced the show on behalf of the Tulsa univ student assn, changed my life . due to the weather we lost $15k, a valuable lesson ( with someone elses money) about business. Experience of a lifetime. They felt sorry for us and invited me on the bus. I stayed and got my degree instead . Asked Dicks Picks about it , tapes were damaged .There was someone with a good rig close to the stage, but i never got the tape. They were a bit shocked at my age when we met at the airport. Jerry was real friendly and we hung out and had a long converstaion at intermission. My girlfriend and I had a steak dinner cooked by the crew backstage second set. The experience was crazy , the Babtists threatened to protest ( Oral Roberts country ) , the stage union tried to shut us down for using student labor , one of the cars with band members wrecked on the slick ice. Mickey threatened to toss the TV out the window when they would not let the band in the hotel bar with jeans on. That experience prepared me for a great job that included working with global promotions , beauty pageants , TV shows and all kinds of good stuff. Thanks Greatful Dead. Learned a lot of lifes lessons that unforgetable night. I still have the coffee cup from the band commisary</blockquote><p></p><p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3RbbcVqQmifekEAhkFWppM-qdDV-nlJwGWqp27g5U2PxyQRrIpNrlk5b_c6e3_P3a4ox8T6TKxgjJniOkrR2KZcWSZ9XUGs2gjx5SsgwCts4kFltoAH15UlpHYOXRZcblkJFAAz5HefE/s360/19790206a+GD+Tulsa.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="244" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3RbbcVqQmifekEAhkFWppM-qdDV-nlJwGWqp27g5U2PxyQRrIpNrlk5b_c6e3_P3a4ox8T6TKxgjJniOkrR2KZcWSZ9XUGs2gjx5SsgwCts4kFltoAH15UlpHYOXRZcblkJFAAz5HefE/s0/19790206a+GD+Tulsa.gif" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>An alternate poster for the Grateful Dead at the Tulsa Fairgrounds Pavilion on February 6, 1979</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />There seems to be enough information to construct a setlist, <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/08/february-6-1979-pavilion-tulsa-ok.html?showComment=1598695803025#c7646937627636082957">as some Commenters pointed out</a><br /><i><b>Set 1:</b></i><br />Jack Straw, Loser, Beat It On Down The Line, Peggy-O, It's All Over Now, China Cat Sunflower>I Know You Rider, From The Heart Of Me, New Minglewood Blues, Deal <br /><i><b>Set 2:</b></i><br />I Need A Miracle,>Bertha>Good Lovin', Ship Of Fools, Estimated Prophet>Eyes Of The World>Drums>Not Fade Away>Black Peter, Around And Around<br />Encore:<br />Johnny B. Goode</p><p>"China Cat Sunflower" had returned a few days earlier, in Indianapolis (Feb 3), so if there were any actual tourheads, it would have been heartening to find out that the return wasn't just a one-off (like in '77).</p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl56qPUkJ8vFFC1SbsKq6pAZBRdOodvPOPpbMLh8J1kob42-j9trM43BBegUrdTwsLBcA7EqXJ05MmXUWQYYgstxx6UhEw3tRKiy-X-TAyQi2IVd-wc3p2pcPJaGJIHxyz-majBUl4AxM/s1214/Tulsa+U+Yearbook+2+19790206.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1214" data-original-width="932" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjl56qPUkJ8vFFC1SbsKq6pAZBRdOodvPOPpbMLh8J1kob42-j9trM43BBegUrdTwsLBcA7EqXJ05MmXUWQYYgstxx6UhEw3tRKiy-X-TAyQi2IVd-wc3p2pcPJaGJIHxyz-majBUl4AxM/s640/Tulsa+U+Yearbook+2+19790206.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A writeup of the Tulsa Grateful Dead show from the 1979 University of Tulsa yearbook, with pictures of Phil and Bob</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></b></i><i><b><br />Pictures</b></i><br />The Tulsa College yearbook has pictures from the show. No review, but pictures. <br /><p><i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjidZ0ITkrdZHtxOlETcebzUD6bYw_7__fjdjUgmpEak19WjyNabISQZUbEc_uGv6k-5z682-KOXa24SyEZg3FztFCv77q2IuuOib2kMY4GTh-cbzBV_9zVFOhczdDIRBJrsHgvjoqpsIs/s1212/Tulsa+U+Yearbook+1+19790206.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1212" data-original-width="930" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjidZ0ITkrdZHtxOlETcebzUD6bYw_7__fjdjUgmpEak19WjyNabISQZUbEc_uGv6k-5z682-KOXa24SyEZg3FztFCv77q2IuuOib2kMY4GTh-cbzBV_9zVFOhczdDIRBJrsHgvjoqpsIs/s640/Tulsa+U+Yearbook+1+19790206.jpg" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>A photo of Jerry Garcia and The Wolf, onstage at the Fairgounds Pavilion in Tulsa, OK, on February 6, 1979. Photo from the 1979 University of Tulsa yearbook</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table></b></i><i><b><br />The Tape</b></i><br />And of course, the tape. Someone taped it. We even know who taped it. William LaFortune is currently a judge in Tulsa, and he used to be the mayor of the city. And he taped it. <a href="https://issuu.com/tulsacountybarassoication/docs/tulsa_lawyer_april_2015">He recalls it in an interview. But he doesn't know what happened to the tape.</a></p><p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2FnZdrjnLOCNB7R14ZkrjKylSm76nZa-Hn6mCKgfm6lrHImijIyLLMBUmfpSaUjD_NxeyW24F8jDUpODMX8tb5CnHAVRF3iMbAqw0WuylfbEpn1zxYAfNiV5hV_xRijDJewWJcmNFKss/s664/LaFortune+interview+re+Tulsa+19790206.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="664" data-original-width="624" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2FnZdrjnLOCNB7R14ZkrjKylSm76nZa-Hn6mCKgfm6lrHImijIyLLMBUmfpSaUjD_NxeyW24F8jDUpODMX8tb5CnHAVRF3iMbAqw0WuylfbEpn1zxYAfNiV5hV_xRijDJewWJcmNFKss/s640/LaFortune+interview+re+Tulsa+19790206.png" /></a></td></tr><tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>An interview with Judge (formerly Mayor) William LaFortune in the April 2015 edition of Tulsa Lawyer Magazine (great research from @bourgwick)</i><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br />Somewhere out there, someone has a box of dusty old cassettes they were given back in the 80s. Maybe Tulsa Feb 6 '79 is there. If you see it, pass it on.<br /></p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com28tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-77266599701615933632020-05-30T14:01:00.005-07:002020-06-04T17:41:30.952-07:00Formation of The Bob Weir Band-Fall 1977 (Enter Brent)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV6dhMpF1BB5__SDhLZtkZghWfyjWXv9wKGgItjOh6gqod_oO-QDefhzNGcEfBr6BbaqmKaXxrsMsmAqav9wueVEYoruXZu8wLpnV2_lWKJjWkEvAuUvaLLBqBRE1K0Y2rHIxGefqwOiU/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1000" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV6dhMpF1BB5__SDhLZtkZghWfyjWXv9wKGgItjOh6gqod_oO-QDefhzNGcEfBr6BbaqmKaXxrsMsmAqav9wueVEYoruXZu8wLpnV2_lWKJjWkEvAuUvaLLBqBRE1K0Y2rHIxGefqwOiU/s320/Brent+Mydland+1984.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Brent Mydland in 1984</i><br />
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The World Historical Nature of the Grateful Dead has led to a slow explosion of scholarship in the previous few decades. One powerful strain of Dead research looks into the formative experiences and early musical careers of the band members, in order to better understand the music they made in the Dead. I myself have made great efforts to contribute to these studies. Strangely, however, very little effort has been made to contemplate the pre-Dead history of Brent Mydland. Brent had the longest run of any Grateful Dead keyboard player, probably played the most shows--at least on keyboards--and is fondly remembered by any fans who were lucky enough to see him with the group. Yet his pre-history is generally shrugged off in a few sentences.<br />
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Unlike every prior member of the Grateful Dead, when Brent Mydland joined the band in 1979, he had been a working rock musician for at least 5 years. He had played on albums with a major label, and wrote songs on one as well. As for the prior members, only Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart had any kind of performing experience on the instrument they actually played with the band, and Hart had mostly played rock music as a sideshow in the Air Force. Hart had recorded a few singles (in Spain in 1964), but the rest of the players made their studio debuts with the Warlocks or The Grateful Dead. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/01/donna-jean-thatcher-godchaux-vocals.html">Sure, Donna Jean Godchaux (nee Thatcher) was a professional studio singer in the 1960s, but ironically she had never performed live as a professional singer</a>. Brent, younger than the rest of the band, had already been doing that thing for several years.<br />
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OK, sure, interviews with Brent were few and limited. Tragically, Brent made the final load-out before anyone expected, and there was no time to ask him about some missing pieces. Even so, a fair amount is known about his career prior to the Grateful Dead. So on one hand, this post is a summary of the known touch points of Brent Mydland's professional career. At a higher level, however, this story is a meditation about how a shy, talented guy from a very out-of-the-way town ended up in the Grateful Dead, through no fault of his own save for talent and luck. Brent's talent isn't in dispute. You can decide for yourself if his luck was good or bad.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGKdBMypfqIIcNmfIAo8ggGKs8P_n5Ofz-NAcqFUg73Exj-NQ13BM0M3QpUB2rMuUbyx2uVHPCgwsxP2hju2NlufMTRhyOth4PwILdca2XkqT9BU1QXeMD_bkRW-A0IUF7_UVUpbiEbNY/s1600/Heaven+Help+The+Fool+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGKdBMypfqIIcNmfIAo8ggGKs8P_n5Ofz-NAcqFUg73Exj-NQ13BM0M3QpUB2rMuUbyx2uVHPCgwsxP2hju2NlufMTRhyOth4PwILdca2XkqT9BU1QXeMD_bkRW-A0IUF7_UVUpbiEbNY/s1600/Heaven+Help+The+Fool+cover.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Bob Weir's second solo album, Heaven Help The Fool, released on Arista Records in January 1978</i></td></tr>
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<b><i>Heaven Help The Fool</i></b></div>
In order to traverse the circuitous path that led Brent Mydland to the Grateful Dead, it's easier to start at the key moment, namely October 26, 1978. Bob Weir had formed a band to tour in support of his Arista solo album <i>Heaven Help The Fool</i>. The album had been released in January 1978, and per record company orthodoxy, Weir had then played a few dozen dates across the country in February and March. Live, the Bob Weir Band played the entire album, plus a few choice covers and a couple of songs that Deadheads recognized as "Weir songs." Brent Mydland was the keyboard player, mainly playing Hammond organ, and shared harmony vocal duties with lead guitarist Bobby Cochran.<br />
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In October 1978, Weir reconvened the Bob Weir Band, albeit with a different bass player. They played a few local shows, and then a three-day weekend of shows with the Jerry Garcia Band in the Pacific Northwest. Weir, Garcia and the rest of the Dead had apparently been contemplating the idea of replacing Kieth and Donna Godchaux. Although Garcia had definitely met Brent (documented by David Browne in <i>So Many Roads</i> p.277), he had almost certainly had not seen him play live. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/02/october-26-1978-paramount-theater.html">The apocryphal story was that after seeing Brent play with the Weir Band in Portland, Garcia told Bob "this guy might work."</a> Brent started rehearsing with the Grateful Dead in late March of 1979.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRaJHSlmIwkNW_-B7PJsMKBmYwf8F0reTURbvr3wg2B_BYPxqm3s1VuQwSRSZvYUVeVt4DKHofZhCW5Do2BcAS2JK_ZN5PmVaTxOt6s1wuNunw-mh3GNGx83cf5IQpbXV_kEcfUs4yT6Q/s1600/Bob+Weir+Band+NH+19780304.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1253" data-original-width="807" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRaJHSlmIwkNW_-B7PJsMKBmYwf8F0reTURbvr3wg2B_BYPxqm3s1VuQwSRSZvYUVeVt4DKHofZhCW5Do2BcAS2JK_ZN5PmVaTxOt6s1wuNunw-mh3GNGx83cf5IQpbXV_kEcfUs4yT6Q/s320/Bob+Weir+Band+NH+19780304.jpg" width="205" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>A poster for the Bob Weir Band, including Brent Mydland, performance at the Franklin Pierce College Fieldhouse in Rindge, NH on March 4, 1978</i></td></tr>
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<b>The Bob Weir Band: February>June 1978</b></div>
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<blockquote>
<b>Bobby Cochran</b>-lead guitar, vocals<br />
<b>Bob Weir</b>-rhythm guitar, vocals<br />
<b>Brent Mydland</b>-organ, keyboards, harmony vocals<br />
<b>Rick Carlos</b>-bass<br />
<b>John Mauceri</b>-drums</blockquote>
I believe that <i>Heaven Help The Fool</i> was recorded in the Summer of 1977. Mickey Hart had injured himself in an auto accident, and a lot of Dead shows were canceled, so Weir would have been available. The album was produced by Keith Olsen, who had recorded the Fleetwood Mac hit album Rumors and also Terrapin Station. It's important to remember that in mid-1977 many of the best-selling album acts were old Fillmore stalwarts who had simplified their traditional approach with a healthy dose of radio-friendly production. Prominent examples were not only the Mac, but Steve Miller Band, Boz Scaggs and Jefferson Starship. The idea that photogenic rock and roller Bob Weir had serious commercial potential was a pretty sound one.<br />
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Some interviews with lead guitarist Bobby Cochran suggest that the band was being put together in November/December 1977. The Dead, and thus Weir, had no gigs between November 6 and December 27. One-off touring bands cost money to put together, so this suggests a timeline of a December '77 tour. That only makes sense if the album was going to come out before Christmas (it actually came out in January of '78). Nonetheless it seems that the Bob Weir Band was put together in November 1977, but did not tour until February of 1978.<br />
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Lead guitarist Bobby Cochran was introduced to Bob Weir by I<a href="https://www.vintageguitar.com/11743/vintage-visionary/">banez executive Jeff Hasselberger, who had been working on guitar ideas with Weir</a>. Per Cochran, from a Jake Feinberg interview, the band already existed when Cochran joined. The band leader was drummer John Mauceri. Mauceri had brought in bassist Rick Carlos and Brent on keyboards. For whatever reasons, the tour and album were delayed until the first of the year. So John Mauceri had brought Brent to the Weir Band, and set the wheels in motion for him to end up joining the Grateful Dead.<br />
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<b><i>John Mauceri-Drums</i></b> <br />
John Mauceri was an excellent drummer, and probably still is, but his understated style made him an excellent hired gun who never took the spotlight. If you had no life in the 1970s, and spent a lot of time in record stores memorizing the backs of albums (reflecting on no one in particular), his name turned up here and there, but for the most part he was a well-regarded but semi-anonymous professional. For this story, Mauceri turns out to be the key link between Grateful Dead and Brent Mydland, but for no other reason than the fact that Mauceri grew up in Las Vegas.<br />
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In late Summer 1977, Mauceri got a call saying that he had been recommended by David Lindley for the drum chair in the Jerry Garcia Band. Much as I love the idea of Jer calling up Mr. Dave and asking for a scouting report, I don't think that's what happened. John Kahn was the JGB straw boss, and he would have asked a producer, very likely his old pal Michael Stewart. Stewart, who had produced Billy Joel ("Piano Man") and Tom Jones, among others, was probably the one who checked in with Lindley.<br />
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As it happened, David Lindley was effectively Jackson Browne's band leader, and Mauceri had been Browne's drummer since 1976. Browne toured relentlessly, so Lindley had plenty to go on. While I don't think Lindley was personally close to the Grateful Dead, Kaleidoscope has shared bills with the Dead many times in the 60s, so surely Garcia was aware of him. Anyway, Lindley had been the banjo champion five years running at the Ash Grove folk club (after which he was made a judge), so that had to count for something.<br />
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<a href="http://www.jakefeinbergshow.com/2014/11/the-john-mauceri-interview/">According to Mauceri, in a remarkable 2014 interview with Jake Feinberg (excerpted below)</a>, Mauceri said he got to the point of starting to learn Garcia Band songs, only to find out that he was not going to be the JGB drummer. Although Buzz Buchanan got the Garcia chair, Mauceri's <i>bona fides</i> were in turn passed on to Weir, and he was Bob's first hire. In turn, Mauceri hired two old band mates, both from the the distant East Bay town of--I kid you not--Brentwood. Rick Carlos joined the Bob Weir Band as bass player, and Brent Mydland joined on organ. Mydland and Carlos had been playing together since Liberty Union High School in Brentwood, where Brent had graduated from in 1971. Mydland, Carlos and Mauceri had all played together in a group called Batdorf & Rodney, and after that in a band called Silver.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBef72GStQ7RR5T5btFdkQUqxbgrSSzvsJAdRUANfmrP6XhIcnhzTFxBfD8stMA0pAYkjb_KtWDx35Mix6A6ddFgImTCqKoMuCz-jHH2-F53TDKiTn7hHeeIZ-EMt47GfOp_k6jXzOEng/s1600/Silver+album+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="280" data-original-width="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBef72GStQ7RR5T5btFdkQUqxbgrSSzvsJAdRUANfmrP6XhIcnhzTFxBfD8stMA0pAYkjb_KtWDx35Mix6A6ddFgImTCqKoMuCz-jHH2-F53TDKiTn7hHeeIZ-EMt47GfOp_k6jXzOEng/s1600/Silver+album+cover.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Silver lp cover, released on Arista Rcords in 1976. The cover design was by future SNL player Phil Hartmann, whose brother John co-managed Silver</i></td></tr>
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<i><b>Silver</b></i></div>
It was strange coincidence that prior to joining the Grateful Dead, Brent Mydland had recorded one album with a group, and that group was on Arista Records. I don't think Arista had any contractual hold on Brent, it's just one of those strange coincidences. Silver released their lone album on Arista sometime in 1976.<br />
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Silver played "AOR" (album oriented radio) rock, kind of like Kansas or REO Speedwagon. They were a little less rockin' than those two, however, and were probably aimed more in a sensitive vein, like Fleetwood Mac. The front line trio of Brent and guitarists John Batdorf and Greg Collier all sang and wrote, and the harmonies were well done. Brent wrote and sang two songs on the album. It was OK, fairly typical of the many carefully sculpted albums promoted by record companies at the time, but nothing special. Certainly nothing that hinted at Brent's future contribution to the Grateful Dead.<br />
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Originally, Silver was supposed to include Rick Carlos and John Mauceri on bass and drums, but they were somehow forced out, according to Mauceri (replaced with Tom Leadon-bass and Harry Stinson-drums). I don't know how much touring Silver did, but they did play on some big national dates supporting the group America (<a href="https://gdsets.com/mydland.htm">you can see the dates listed here, on the great GDSets site</a>). The connection seems to have been the management team of Hartmann and Goodman, who appear to have managed both America and Silver. In any case, the pairing tells you who their management thought would buy the Silver album.<br />
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Of the known dates listed for America and Silver, it's interesting to see that Brent had already played at some of the venues that he would play with the Dead in the future. Some examples include War Memorial Auditorium in Syracuse, SPAC in Saratoga Springs, McNicols in Denver and the San Diego Sports Arena. Silver seems to have ground to a halt in mid-1977, once they were dropped by Arista.<br />
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The only real research about Brent's life during the Silver period was done by <a href="https://www.amazon.com/So-Many-Roads-David-Browne-audiobook/dp/B00V3WSO5W/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2SIHLAJ7VMC56&dchild=1&keywords=so+many+roads+grateful+dead&qid=1590615892&s=books&sprefix=so+many+roads+%2Caps%2C165&sr=1-1">David Browne, for his indispensable book <i>So Many Roads</i> (pp.276-280)</a>. It appears that after Silver disintegrated, Brent went home to stay in a house in Concord owned by his father. He was living with his girlfriend, and apparently not doing much of anything, when he got a call out of the blue from John Mauceri, inviting him to play for the Bob Weir Band. It was the Las Vegas connection of Mauceri that had made it happen.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADYAA5ek-jheitW4Was0CAYeEpcSogeCFZ5Z7LH8AQLZ4VUz_pWPf9Mb9P9yoGZUfNMJZlgvfXQlaOPNPIcxmFvoM2X9zsnKMjmAoMsk4lwOUGlb4xioYDPlqot28XOvYoDlNlz6Oc90/s1600/Off+The+Shelf+Batdorf+%2526+Rodney+Atlantic+71.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="602" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgADYAA5ek-jheitW4Was0CAYeEpcSogeCFZ5Z7LH8AQLZ4VUz_pWPf9Mb9P9yoGZUfNMJZlgvfXQlaOPNPIcxmFvoM2X9zsnKMjmAoMsk4lwOUGlb4xioYDPlqot28XOvYoDlNlz6Oc90/s320/Off+The+Shelf+Batdorf+%2526+Rodney+Atlantic+71.jpg" width="318" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The 1971 debut album on Atlantic by Batdorf and Rodney, Off The Shelf. John Batdorf wrote the songs, he and Mark Rodney both sang and picked guitar, session guys filled out the sound.</i></td></tr>
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<div>
<b>Batdorf & Rodney</b></div>
In the early 70s, one popular format favored by record companies was two long-haired dudes playing acoustic guitars and singing in harmony. Seals and Croft, Loggins and Messina, Zager and Evans, Crosby and Nash, the list goes on and on. More broadly, you can see this as a variation on groups like Crosby, Stills and Nash and America, only with fewer members. There were a lot of these groups, mostly forgotten, a few just partially remembered. If you spent a lot of the 70s in your local record store, flipping through albums, you will sort of remember Batdorf & Rodney. They weren't big, but they weren't obscure, either. As it happened, they put out an album on Atlantic, one on Asylum and another one on Arista. They turn out to be essential to the Brent Mydland saga.<br />
<br />
Drummer John Mauceri had grown up in Las Vegas, in a "showbiz" family. His father was a classically trained percussionist, so when young John discovered rock 'n' roll, falling into playing drums was easy. After a brief sojourn to Los Angeles, soon after graduating high school in 1970, Mauceri had to return home to his family in Las Vegas. He reconnected with Mark Rodney, whom he had known earlier. Mark was the son of trumpeter Red Rodney, a jazz legend who had been the only white member of Charlie Parker's groundbreaking bebop quintet from 1949-51. After various difficulties, Red had moved to Las Vegas.<br />
<br />
Mark Rodney had been playing in Las Vegas venues with <a href="https://johnbatdorfmusic.com/">John Batdorf</a>, playing their guitars and singing Batdorf's original songs. In 1970, this is what was happening. Batdorf and Rodney were playing in Las Vegas venues--I'm not quite sure exactly where--and got signed by Atlantic. They put out their debut album, Off The Shelf, in 1971 and were set to go on the road. So they needed a band. Mauceri got the call, because he knew Mark Rodney and he was a drummer. Mauceri in turn called bassist Rick Carlos, whom he had known from earlier. The live band was then:<br />
<b></b><br />
<blockquote>
<b>John Batdorf</b>-guitar and vocals<br />
<b>Mark Rodney</b>-guitar and vocals<br />
<div>
<b>Rick Carlos</b>-bass</div>
<div>
<b>John Mauceri</b>-drums</div>
</blockquote>
<div>
<br /></div>
The first big tour for Batdorf and Rodney was opening for the band Bread, who were huge at the time. No one recalls Bread now, but they had huge "soft rock" hits with songs like "If," "Make It With You" and "Baby I'm A Want You," to name a few. The Batdorf & Rodney live quartet was steered right at the Bread demographic.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjffavqAqMFI_awBTypaeRLXomtgtk8JcAvmJWRvI5mMYrD6uPBSkLUcsYPd5SwiRudD-HHYkJiQ2mB7WWi90NJq8bAEPx0tgygYYj7N2EYyvMN8dLZFySkg0xc9BaGzjLy_NC-Rmfay1Q/s1600/Batdorf+and+Rodney+Asylum+1972.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjffavqAqMFI_awBTypaeRLXomtgtk8JcAvmJWRvI5mMYrD6uPBSkLUcsYPd5SwiRudD-HHYkJiQ2mB7WWi90NJq8bAEPx0tgygYYj7N2EYyvMN8dLZFySkg0xc9BaGzjLy_NC-Rmfay1Q/s320/Batdorf+and+Rodney+Asylum+1972.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Batdorf & Rodney, the second album by the duo, was released in 1972 on Asylum Records</i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Come 1972, Batdorf & Rodney had moved from Atlantic to Asylum. The album was recorded at the Record Plant in Los Angeles, with John Mauceri and Rick Carlos on the tracks. So even though Batdorf & Rodney were pitched as a duo by their record company, they were acting like a band in the studio.</div>
<br />
In the 1970s, the record business made a lot of money, so much so that record companies could justify keeping promising bands going, even if they weren't actually playing anywhere. In 1973, Batdorf & Rodney seemed to ground to a halt. So much so, that their rhythm section went on tour with David Blue, another Asylum artist. On August 11, 1973, at Winterland, I saw Mauceri and Carlos as part of Blue's band (along with future Eagles guitarist Don Felder). They were supporting Blue's album <i>Nice Baby and The Angel</i>, produced by Graham Nash. Nash himself joined Blue for a few numbers at Winterland that night (Blue was fourth on the bill below Poco, Mark-Almond and Robin Trower--a really great show, by the way).<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhexwhqPrHCO8dEFhEzU9cFrJyqNoJo4AAjU0nj4ZuriXfDkK8aPt-HfhP1tgREtcseSzyfMr2ZE7SVD9a1JkAMkfM7GbgDkY7HD6AZ_jGKpyz3qIIXm0CoZ7CzUKSd1jyJbwiPo7nz-eE/s1600/Life+Is+You+Batdorf+and+Rodney+1975.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="501" data-original-width="500" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhexwhqPrHCO8dEFhEzU9cFrJyqNoJo4AAjU0nj4ZuriXfDkK8aPt-HfhP1tgREtcseSzyfMr2ZE7SVD9a1JkAMkfM7GbgDkY7HD6AZ_jGKpyz3qIIXm0CoZ7CzUKSd1jyJbwiPo7nz-eE/s320/Life+Is+You+Batdorf+and+Rodney+1975.jpg" width="319" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Life Is You, Batdorf & Rodney's third album, was released on Arista Records in 1975. Brent Mydland plays some uncredited parts on the album</i></td></tr>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<div>
By 1974, Batdorf and Rodney were reactivated again, this time signed to Clive Davis' Arista Records. For the new live configuration, the band needed a keyboard player. Rick Carlos called his old high school pal Brent Mydland, and Brent got the gig. What music was Brent playing between graduating high school in 1971, and joining Batdorf & Rodney in 1974? For that matter, when did he get a Hammond organ? You don't learn that instrument overnight, however good a piano player you might be. Was he in a band? Did he jam with anyone or hang out? No one seems to have any information until 1974.</div>
<br />
Most people who remember Batdorf & Rodney recall them as a sort of Seals & Crofts type duo, with a soft rock vibe. Apparently, however, the duo saw their music as more like the Doobie Brothers, with twin guitars and a jumping rhythm section. Brent Mydland's contribution on organ sound a lot more interesting in that context, but I know of no live recordings of Batdorf & Rodney from the 1974-75 Brent era. It was Arista boss Clive Davis who wanted the duo to sound like Seals & Crofts, and insured that every guitar solo was cut out, and the rocking minimized.<br />
<br />
Batdorf & Rodney weren't huge, but they had a following, and they toured a far amount. Mauceri (in the Feinberg interview) speaks highly of Brent's playing, as does John Batdorf (when interviewed by Browne). Both of them, however, say that Brent did not compromise well, and did not really have the "take-it-as-it-comes" vibe of most traveling musicians. According to Browne, Brent had a lot of anxiety, and sometimes disappeared for a few days at a time. Batdorf & Rodney was just five guys in a van, plus maybe a roadie or two. The Grateful Dead circus was several magnitudes of The Crazy more than that, so it must have been hard on Brent. That being said, he never missed a Dead gig that I know of.<br />
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The 1975 Batdorf & Rodney album on Arista, <i>Life Is You</i>, was recorded with session players. Rick Carlos does play on it, but I think most of the record was recorded before the duo put the touring band back together. In late 1974, when they decided they needed a keyboard player, Rick Carlos recommended Brent, with whom he had played back in bands back in High School.<br />
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According to John Mauceri, Brent did a little uncredited work on the album. Batdorf & Rodney did released a single in 1975, however, that had not been on the record. Apparently the touring band played on it, so if you come across the single "Somewhere In The Night" (Arista 1975 b/w "Ain't It Like Home" album track), it could be a lost Brent artifact.<br />
<br />
Soon after he joined Batdorf & Rodney, Brent got together with Cherie Barsin, who was John Batdorf's sister-in-law. The two of them lived in a trailer in Thousand Oaks, between Oxnard and Los Angeles. At home, Brent liked playing board games and listening to jazz and classical music. Per Cherie Barsin (via Browne) "his preferences were Chick Corea, Jeff Beck. Nothing with lyrics." When Batdorf & Rodney ground to a halt, Brent joined Batdorf's next venture, which was Silver. Mauceri and Carlos got pushed out of Silver, for whatever reasons, but they did not forget Brent's playing.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIolPkF2YCh8KCYTqzd9a2rPZlnFsSLamvfmuxCwaQ7U36sT1n66Yj_LOxQ9roUdEDVUTQohEpGxCDpVEeP7Sm3bkGAx0SR4UQ82VW3tR5MON8M2z97OYeOTlgCdfRB7IwYNDsmlPZD-E/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="220" data-original-width="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIolPkF2YCh8KCYTqzd9a2rPZlnFsSLamvfmuxCwaQ7U36sT1n66Yj_LOxQ9roUdEDVUTQohEpGxCDpVEeP7Sm3bkGAx0SR4UQ82VW3tR5MON8M2z97OYeOTlgCdfRB7IwYNDsmlPZD-E/" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Jethro Tull's great album Benefit was released in April, 1970. In May, John Mauceri and Rick Carlos' band Terracotta opened for them in Las Vegas</i></td></tr>
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Terracotta</b></div>
<div>
John Mauceri had grown up in Las Vegas as part of a showbiz family. His mother was a dancer and ice skater, and his father was a singer/dj/comedian. His stepfather was a classical percussionist, and while he wasn't really a drummer, there were drums around the house. Once Mauceri heard The Beatles, all he wanted to do was drum. He took some vibraphone lessons, but he wanted to be a drummer. His family lived near the great Buddy Rich, and Mauceri used to hear him practice, but he just wanted to rock. This would have been around 1967, and there was no FM radio.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
A band called Terracotta, from the East Bay, turned up in Las Vegas. They were mostly "emancipated" (legal adults), but they were Mauceri's age. Their drummer split on them, and they had heard about Mauceri some how, so he joined Terracotta. They played around a lot, and even opened for Jethro Tull and Spirit, so this must have been 1970 (<a href="http://www.ministry-of-information.co.uk/setlist/70.htm">per Ministry Of Truth, Jethro Tull played Las Vegas on May 9, 1970</a>). The day Mauceri graduated high school, Terracotta moved to Los Angeles. They broke up a month later. Mauceri was crestfallen and returned home to Las Vegas.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
When Mauceri returned home, he reconnected (in his words) with his birth father. So he also connected, or re-connected, with guitarist Mark Rodney. As noted, Mark Rodney was the son of famous jazz trumpeter Red Rodney, so he too was from a "showbiz" family. In any case, Rodney played guitar and had teamed up with another singing guitarist John Batdorf. They had been playing around as a duo, and they had gotten signed to Atlantic, so they needed a band. Mauceri was in as a drummer--did he know a bass player? Yes he did.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Mauceri called the former bassist for Terracotta, Rick Carlos. Carlos didn't have a gig, mainly because Terracotta had broken up. It's not entirely certain to me whether Carlos came to Las Vegas, or met Batdorf, Rodney and Mauceri in Los Angeles. For our story, however, it doesn't matter. A long forgotten East Bay band called Terracotta, featuring a bunch of legal-adult-teenagers, was how Rick Carlos ended up playing bass for a Las Vegas group with an Atlantic Records contract. Brent Mydland, a senior from Liberty Union High School in Brentwood, now had his unlikely path to join the Grateful Dead. If Mauceri had called someone else, it wouldn't have been Brent, because Rick Carlos had played with Brent in high school.</div>
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<i><b><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiblJYMQo23Go267v50YPKhRUGb2FlKQetUs2dD6AEWVTM2Wu5zqz3XM1H6Ovag6urxMgSMJhHd2awrKcgk-1OtGurrZzmFCZCZOye5nfGUZnEm22e7PD9XPbI03A-1YswSFgsiug4Gdvc/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="143" data-original-width="352" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiblJYMQo23Go267v50YPKhRUGb2FlKQetUs2dD6AEWVTM2Wu5zqz3XM1H6Ovag6urxMgSMJhHd2awrKcgk-1OtGurrZzmFCZCZOye5nfGUZnEm22e7PD9XPbI03A-1YswSFgsiug4Gdvc/s320/Liberty+Union+HS+Brentwood.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Liberty Union High School, in Brentwood, CA, sometime in the 20th century</i></td></tr>
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</b></i></div>
<div>
<i><b>Liberty Union High School, Brentwood, CA</b></i></div>
<div>
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty_High_School_(Brentwood,_California)">You can look up Liberty Union High School, now Liberty High School.</a> The most famous alumni from that school is Brent Mydland. There's no need to name the school after him, though--Liberty Union High School was in the then-tiny Contra Costa County town of Brentwood, so the town is already named after him.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
In the conventional thumbnail biographies of Brent Mydland, it's always mentioned that he grew up in Concord, CA, an East Bay town just North of Walnut Creek. It's reasonable to assume that when Brent's family first came to the Bay Area, they lived in Concord. Since Brent went to Liberty Union HS, however, we know he had to live near Brentwood, and not Concord. Concord was two high schools away.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Back in the 20th century, people who grew up, lived or worked in San Francisco, Oakland or Berkeley largely ignored anything in Contra Costa County beyond Walnut Creek, and sometimes the Concord Pavilion. Anything North of Walnut Creek was often vaguely referred to as "Concord," even if it was 10 or 20 miles East of Concord proper (the comparison is Brooklynites who say "anything above Columbus Circle is Upstate New York"). I was as guilty of this as anyone. I heard that Brent was from Concord, or maybe Antioch, and couldn't have cared less at the time.</div>
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The only reliable detail we have about Brent's adolescence comes from David Browne, who reported that Brent's 70s girlfriend (John Batdorf's sister-in-law) said that teenage Brent felt isolated from his family, living on a houseboat on the San Joaquin River Delta while his sisters and parents lived in the main house. For that geography to work, the Mydland compound would have had to be somewhere around present-day Oakley (we will leave aside the synergy of two consecutive Dead keyboard players living on houseboats).</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
For Brent to have gone to Liberty Union, he would have had to be nearer to it than Antioch High School. Today, Antioch (pop. 111,000) and Brentwood (pop. 64,700), just East of it, are bedroom communities for families who work in Walnut Creek, Oakland or San Francisco. Antioch has a BART station, and Brentwood may have light rail to the Antioch BART soon. But when Brent was there, it wasn't like that at all.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
Antioch is one of the oldest towns in California, founded in 1849. It was primarily a boat landing for grain shipped in from the Delta and out to San Francisco Bay. The land that Brentwood was built on was acquired in 1837 from the original Mexican land grant. Brentwood was a rural agricultural area, but it had a post office in 1878, although the town only incorporated in 1948 (the name came from the original landowner's home town in County Essex). Old as they were, Brentwood and Antioch were tiny in Brent Mydland's day. In 1970, when Brent would have been a junior at Liberty Union, the town of Brentwood only had a population of 2,649, and Antioch (25 miles West, nearer Concord), only had 28,600. Since then, the population has exploded by nearly 600%. </div>
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But back in the day, Brent probably went to school with farm kids from the surrounding area. <a href="https://www.blogger.com/#">An unsourced Wikipedia entry</a> says that Brent played trumpet in the marching band, but was kicked out for having long hair. It's likely true [<i><b>update</b>: confirmed</i>]. Brentwood wasn't Berkeley in1970, even if it was just an hour away. Who were Brent's friends? What were the names of his bands? Did he sing with them, or just play keyboards? And when did he get a Hammond organ? Now sure, his father was (or had been) a minister, so maybe there was a church connection, but that's interesting too--did Brent play organ in his father's church? No one seems to have found out, or even asked the questions.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizbOEFO3WWCsBlMlGDj-DZ0TBazn4gsHki0RX05nZcj58jLbCSce6r2YicZ1VDjcSFtEbWQaZ7zbjVOpXCz4bPgRuICGaRdS-bF8uVkyH24hI3yo4kBE8pnq9JAEF6SHR0Q_Xl6n7Bnws/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="623" data-original-width="563" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizbOEFO3WWCsBlMlGDj-DZ0TBazn4gsHki0RX05nZcj58jLbCSce6r2YicZ1VDjcSFtEbWQaZ7zbjVOpXCz4bPgRuICGaRdS-bF8uVkyH24hI3yo4kBE8pnq9JAEF6SHR0Q_Xl6n7Bnws/s320/Brent+1968+Liberty+High+%2528trumpet%2529.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Correspondent Eric sends a photo from the 1968 Liberty Union HS Yearbook, with freshman Brent Mydland (circled) and his trumpet</i></td></tr>
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<div>
All we really know is </div>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>Brent graduated from Liberty Union High School in 1971</li>
<li>Rick Carlos played in bands with him in those days</li>
</ul>
<div>
We don't even know if Rick Carlos went to Brentwood. But, in the end, it didn't matter. Brent was a talented, quiet guy in a farming community. He was a million miles from the music explosion in the Bay Area 60s, even if he was just an hour from Berkeley. But a bass player in some now-forgotten band remembered when other guys asked for a good organ player. Not once, but twice Brent got the call, first from Rick Carlos for Batdorf & Rodney in late 1974, and then again from John Mauceri for the Bob Weir Band in late 1977. Brent ended up in the Grateful Dead from 1979 to 1990, and he's easily the most famous person who ever went to Liberty Union.<br />
<br />
Esteemed scholar LightIntoAshes noted that Blair Jackson, ahead of the curve as always, interviewed Brent Mydland on October 21, 1987, for the Fall 1987 issue of Golden Road Magazine. <a href="https://gdsets.com/magazines/gr15.pdf">The indispensable GDSets has scanned the entire issue, and the whole interview is worth reading</a>. But here are the backstory highlights, clarifying some hitherto unknown points:<br /><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>[Germany] We moved to Antioch when I was 1, so I don’t remember Germany.<br /><br />[Do you remember your first band?]<br />The first thing you could almost call a band? Yeah. We played a few bars on the river [in the Sacramento River Delta region] for small crowds. We did things like”When A Man Loves A Woman,” “For What It’s Worth.” We even did that Arlo Guthrie song “I don’t want a pickle/I just wanna ride my motor-sickle.” Anything with just two or three chords, cause most of the guys couldn’t play anything harder.<br /><br />I had a little Thomas organ you could barely hear. A couple of years later I got a Gibson Kalamazoo,, which was sort of like a Farfisa…I was even in a band where I used to sing “Morning Dew.”<br /><br />In my junior year in high school [at Liberty], there was me and one other guy who had long hair, and by “long” I mean the length I have it now [ca. 1987]. I got kicked out of school for long hair just before finals. I stayed out for a few days and then decided it wasn’t worth having to repeat a semester for that, so I got my hair cut. They said “Sorry, not short enough.” They mad me get a crew cut before they’d let me back in to take my finals. This was at Liberty High in Brentwood. SO I took my finals and then moved to Concord where you could have long hair in school [f<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2016/06/2925-willow-pass-road-concord-ca.html">or Contra Costa in the 60s, Concord was hip</a>]. I didn’t cut my hair for a long time after that.<br /><br />Senior year I got thrown out of the high school band for long hair anyway: “Sorry, we’ll lose points for your long hair.” So that was the end of my band career. I gave up trumpet and concentrated on keyboards.<br /><br />[What did you do right after high school?]<br />Senior year I got together with this guitar player named Dave DeMille who’d come up here from Southern California and went to another high school in Concord. The day after we graduated [1971] we drove down to L.A. and tried to get a band started down there. He knew a drummer and bass player who were pretty good. We were serious about it for about the first six weeks or so and then it kind of fell apart…I ended up living alone in a Quonset Hut in Thousand Oaks, writing songs and eating a lot of peanut butter and jelly…<br /><br />Eventually I came back to the Bay Area and lived with my dad and just jammed around for a couple of years. I played with a lot of different people. We’d have these jams that would turn into parties with like 300 people and we’d play until the police would break it up. Then I started playing in bands hat actually made some money, mainly playing Top 40 clubs. This was around ’72, I guess, and it was mainly black music.<br /><br />[Did you ever have to wear matching suits?]<br />Yeah, for a couple of months once. It was really embarrassing. I hated it. II’d rather not dwell on that [laughs].<br /><br />The best music I played back then was with this guy who’d gone to the Berklee School of Music [in Boston] and wrote this interesting music that sounded like John McLaughlin. We tried to get a band together and actually had some really nice music, but we never could get any gigs. I learned a lot from it but we couldn’t earn any money. So I ended up going back to playing rock ’n’ roll, though in cooler clubs, where we could play some originals. <br /><br />In one of the bands, I [had] played with a bass player named Rick Carlos, and he got a call from John Batdorf of Batdorf & Rodney asking him to come to L.A. to play with them. A couple of months later they were looking for keyboard player who could sing high parts so I went down there and checked that out an joined the band, which was a great experience.</i></blockquote>
<br />
Brent has compressed the Batfdorf& Rodney timeline a bit (Rick Carlos had been playing with B&R for two years), but we now see the essential thread.<br />
<ul>
<li>Brent grew up in Antioch, or thereabouts</li>
<li>He went to Liberty Union High in Brentwood, but graduated from a Concord high school</li>
<li>He played in various obscure bands from 1971-74, playing both originals and covers</li>
<li>Rick Carlos played in one of those bands around 1971-72, and doesn't appear to be from Brentwood</li>
</ul>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBoNffZo404sOLIyItvEKEbQc21CrHnzW7ZPoTYeUB7k4JYawHXfBbawlqSBP3EZfFsS_FEnkF-Q89xygAdpnH045512qHwk14X8G2rZ-L22H58BSbquTxogcG2NIXPJW2f7aIuGTKYS4/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBoNffZo404sOLIyItvEKEbQc21CrHnzW7ZPoTYeUB7k4JYawHXfBbawlqSBP3EZfFsS_FEnkF-Q89xygAdpnH045512qHwk14X8G2rZ-L22H58BSbquTxogcG2NIXPJW2f7aIuGTKYS4/" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Besides playing in the Grateful Dead, Brent Mydland played on the 1981 debut album by Bobby And The Midnites</i></td></tr>
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<br /></div>
<div>
<b>After The Bob Weir Band</b></div>
<div>
Per John Mauceri, Brent Mydland made something like $1000 a week on the road with the Bob Weir Band. For Brent, in 1978, that was probably the life he always dreamed of. Making actual money playing good rock and roll for a living, with a girlfriend back home in Thousand Oaks. Who could wish for anything more? Indeed--be careful what you wish for.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
In
August of 1978, Brent and his girlfriend were invited to Jerry Garcia's
birthday party, in the house he shared in Hepburn Heights (San Rafael)
that he shared with Rock and Niki Scully. Later, Garcia heard Brent play
live, in the Pacific Northwest, and raised the possiblity of Brent
replacing both Keith and Donna Godchaux. Weir in turn mentioned it to
Brent, and (per David Browne) Brent and his girlfriend were invited
backstage for the Closing of Winterland New Year's Eve show. Contemplate
that for a moment. If you see backstage footage from the video of a guy
who looks like Brent--well, it's Brent.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Keith
and Donna
Godchaux left the Grateful Dead around March 1, 1979, and Brent began
rehearsing with the Dead later in that month. Brent's live debut with
the band was April 22, 1979, at Spartan Stadium in San Jose. Brent held
down the keyboard chair for the Grateful Dead until his untimely passing
on July 26, 1990. I have not counted, but Brent has to have played
keyboards at more shows than any other member of the Grateful Dead
(Pigpen having mostly been supplanted in 1969). <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2012/04/bob-weir-bandbobby-and-midnites-1977-84.html">Brent also played for
about a year in Bobby And The Midnites, from Fall '80 until late 1981</a>.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Come
1982, Brent was dating Betty Cantor, and she recorded a solo album for
him. John Mauceri was called back to play drums. Mauceri asked Brent if
he should call Rick Carlos, but Brent rejected the idea, an irony
considering how Rick Carlos had given Brent his big breaks. Nonetheless,
Brent let Mauceri pick the bass player (Paul Solomon Marshall on bass, and Kevin
Russell played guitar). The album is interesting, but has never been
released.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/10/kokomo-with-brent-mydland-and-bill.html">In
1985, Brent played a few East Coast dates with a band called Kokomo,
including Bill Kreutzmann, ex-Santana bassist David Margen and guitarist
Kevin Russell</a> (ex-707, who
had played on the solo album project). The next summer, with the Dead
off the road due to Garcia's coma, and finances precarious, the band was
reconstituted as Go Ahead, adding Alex Ligterwood (ex-Santana) on
vocals and Jerry Cortez (ex-Youngbloods) on lead guitar. <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2012/11/go-ahead-with-brent-mydland-and-bill.html">The 1986 Go Ahead tour was very fondly remembered (check the Comment Thread)</a>, and successful
enough <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2014/07/go-ahead-and-bob-weir-1987-88-brent.html">to have an encore tour the next Summer.</a></div>
<div>
<br />
In 1987, "Touch Of Grey" hit big time. The Grateful Dead were a huge concert attraction, and Brent had songwriting credits on the album. Brent co-wrote more songs on the next album, <i>Built To Last</i>. Suddenly, from living hand-to-mouth, money was rolling in. John Mauceri, by his own admission, had spent the 1970s and the early part of the 80s drunk and stoned. Drinking was one of the things he had shared with Brent. Mauceri always stayed with Brent when he was in the Bay Area, but by the end of the 80s, a sober Mauceri would try to reach out to not-sober Brent, but he couldn't get through. Brent had everything he could have ever wanted, and it all crashed down around him.</div>
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
<b>American Capitalism</b></div>
<div>
Being a musician or artist in America in the late 20th century was a hard, hard road. Yes, the potential rewards for a lucky few might be huge, but talent and ambition wasn't enough. So many things had to go right. If you were lucky enough to be a young man in San Francisco in 1965, or have a family connection to the music industry, or were willing to go out and meet every important person you could, maybe you had a fighting chance. While it doesn't diminish any star's talent to have been in the right place at the right time, it's another barrier for everyone else. We all know of musicians, either personally or from their music, who were talented and just never got the break.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Brent Mydland's father was from Norway, and apparently emigrated to Minnesota to study as a minister. Mydland Senior was a chaplain in the US Army when Brent was born in Germany in 1952. The Mydland family ended up in Concord, CA, afterwards, and seems to have stayed around there. Brent's dad, at least, seems to have done well enough to own a house or two. Brent himself, in the immigrant tradition, far surpassed his father. He had a wife and family, and more money than he must have ever expected. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Brent didn't really express his feelings, except through music, so we can't really know what he was thinking. The most appropriate choice seems to be the actual expression of a song not by Robert Hunter, but David Byrne</div>
<div>
<i></i><br />
<blockquote>
<i>You may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife</i><br />
<i>You may ask yourself, "Well, how did I get here?"</i></blockquote>
</div>
<div>
How indeed. Brent Mydland (October 21, 1952-July 26, 1990), Rest In Power.</div>
<br />
<div>
<i><b>Appendix: Notes from Jake Feinberg's Interview with John Mauceri (Nov 25, 2014)</b></i></div>
<div>
Jake
Feinberg interviews rock and jazz musicians from the late 20th century.
With no time limit and a wide-open format, his conversations roam far
and wide. <a href="http://www.jakefeinbergshow.com/2014/11/the-john-mauceri-interview/">What follows are my notes from Feinberg's interview with drummer John Mauceri on November 25, 2014</a>.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I
took notes for research purposes, so these are paraphrases rather than
transcriptions. I also left out parts that didn't focus on areas of
importance to me. <a href="http://www.jakefeinbergshow.com/">All of Feinberg's interviews are interesting, and it is well worth subscribing to his site.</a></div>
<br />
<div>
<b>John Mauceri</b> <b>Nov 25 2014 </b></div>
<div>
<b>Part 1</b></div>
<div>
Come from a showbiz family, mother was a dancer/ice skater, dad was a
singer/dj/comedian. She ended up in Vegas. Grew up in LV. Saw a lot of
shows backstage in the RatPack era as kids. Stepfather was a classical
percussionist. Not really a drummer, but he had drums around the house.
Attracted to drums right when the Beatles broke through. Also played the
vibraphone, and took lessons for a few years. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Buddy Rich lived a block away, his daughter was friends with my younger
sister. I used to stand outside his wall and listen to him practice. But
I didn't care about jazz, I just wanted to rock. This was around 1967,
there was no FM radio. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I was doing after hours clubs in Vegas, and I also did original stuff,
and that's where I met Rick Carlos. I was 16, Rick came in with a band
called Terracotta. They were all from the East Bay (Contra Costa), and
they came to LA with this drummer (David Blanchard). The band were legal
adults. They heard about me (through an agent) and he put me with this
band. Three guitars and a bassist, a lot of three part harmonies. Good
singers, good songwriters. I hooked up with them</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We opened for Jethro Tull and Spirit. We moved to LA the day after I
graduated from High School. A month later we broke up. I cried. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Carlos went back to the Bay Area. I went back to Vegas, I was
semi-homeless. Reconnected with my biological father. I was in touch
with Mark Rodney, whom I knew from Vegas (his dad was Red Rodney). Mark
had heard Terracotta. Batdorf and Rodney had done an album with Ahmet
Ertegun, and Mark called me, and I called Rick. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Rick Carlos was an East Bay Funk guy, he liked Tower and Sons of Champlin, I was more into folk rock, Doors and Byrds. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
First tour with Batdorf and Rodney was with Bread, who were the biggest
band at the time. Ended up being in a solo band with Jamie Griffin</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I got kicked out of Silver. Rick and I were bounced out of Silver. Rick
went back to the East Bay. I ended up getting the David Blue gig [<i><b>note</b>: Mauceri has the timing wrong, David Blue was in 1973</i>].
I think my wife might have known him or something, I don't remember.
David Blue was on Asylum, so were B&D. They needed a bass player, so
I called Rick. Then they needed a guitar player so they got Don Felder.
David and Felder were doing duo gigs opening for Crosby and Nash. They
needed a band, so they got Rick and me. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We did a tour with Deep Purple. That was our one tour [<i><b>note</b>: forgot about Poco gig at Winterland</i>]</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Went to Jackson Browne in 76, worked with him for a year, and worked
with Lindley. Garcia was looking for a drummer, and Lindley recommended
me for a gig, and they sent me all the Garcia albums. Then I got a call
that they were using someone else (<i>Feinberg</i>: Buzz). But right after that I got a call from Bob Weir, who was needing to put a band together. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The Bob Weir thing only lasted a few months, but they were huge on the
East Coast. Bob was happy, and he talked about wanting to do more. I'd
gotten Brent into Bob's band. Rick had gotten Brent into the Batdorf
band. </div>
<div>
<br />
We did some shows with the Garcia Band, and Bob and Jerry got to hear Brent. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
John Batdorf had split up with Rodney, and he had Hartmann and Goodman
and we had Mark, Brent, RIck and me. However, mgmt wanted to replace
Rick and me with Tom Leadon (bs) and Harry Stinson (drums). I don't know
why.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I saw a [Dead] show in 68 at the Convention Center in Vegas. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I saw Brent spiraling down and tried to help him, but I wasn't
successful. Brent and I did a lot of drinking when we were young. We
always drank. In the Bob Weir Band he probably made 1000 a week, I made a
little more. When the Dead happened, he became wealthy very fast. I
would see shows and visit him, and we would get high and then I would go
home.He lost his license, then lost his family, and finally lost his
life.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I was friends with Jon McIntire. I used to stay with Brent when I was in
the Bay Area. I was out of the picture by then. It was very sad. Jon
said "they believe very much in personal responsiblity."</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I saw Mahavishnu in the Whisky and Billy Cobham was so intense I had to leave. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Flying Burrito Brothers: I was still doing drugs, so I don't remember
how I got the call. I did some dates in California with them. Sneeky
Pete the only original. Skip Battin, John Beland (ex-Dolly Parton) and
Gib Gilbeau. Toured Pacific Coast and the West, and did a tour of Italy.
[<i>probably late 70s</i>]</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Brent called me around '82 to work on his solo album. I'm the drummer
probably on all all of it. I asked him if he wanted to use Rick and he
said no, but he wanted me to pick someone I had been using. I got this
guy Paul Solomon Marshall (<i>sp</i>). We recorded at the GD studio
(Club Front). We were flown up from LA. He was dating Betty Cantor. She
was a really good engineer. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Brent was living with his parents. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Growing up he was into Brian Auger, Tower of Power and some of these
progressive rock guys. However, good as he was musically, he was just
inept socially. It was like all of his energy went into music. He could
play Jimmy Smith stuff like it was nothing. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I toured with the Dillards, toured with Hoyt Axton for a year. Height of my drinking and drugs, took time off to get sober. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>Part2</b></div>
<div>
Brent played on the last Batdorf and Rodney album Life Is You <i>(not credited)</i>. There was a single [<i>might be song "Somewhere In The Night," not on Life Is You]</i></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Jon McIntire was Bob Weir's road manager. One time, we played a
soundcheck at the beginning of the tour, and our road money was in a
briefcase backstage and it got stolen. It was like $15000. McIintire
called together both bands, explained that the money was stolen and that
he was going to sit in the audience and he wanted it back in two hours.
The money was returned. Never found out who did it, but we got the
money back.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
McIntire moved to LA for a while, tried to make it as an actor. My style
is based on four guys, Jim Gordon, Jim Keltner, Russ Kunkel and Hal
Blaine.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
[<i>can you tell me a Brent story?</i>] We were on the road with Batdor
&Rodney when Brent was in the band. We traveled together in a van.
Doubled up in rooms. Me, Rick and Brent would share a room. We would
flip coins to see who lost and sleep in the rollaway, Brent hated it.
One night he had slept in the rollaway twice in a row, Brent and Rick
flipped for it. Brent was mad and he went to sleep in the van. When he
woke up in the van (Summer) it was 100 plus degrees.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
When Brent wanted to express intimate feelings, he put it into a song.
You could get along with him, but if you had to wrangle with him,
disagree with him, he didn't know how to compromise or give and take.
Had a short fuse and got frustrated. I never had long intimate
conversations with him like I did with other people. Near the end, when I
got sober, I tried to reach out to him, but I couldn't succeed. I could
see him any time.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Appendix 2: Brent Mydland Discography</div>
<div>
A correspondent snipped out the Brent section from The Compleat Grateful Dead Discography. The Batdorf & Rodney details were not included, because they were not known at the time.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
from 'the compleat grateful dead discography':<br />
<br />
Sweet Surprise - Eric Andersen (Arista 4075) Brent Mydland sings on<br />
"Crazy River" and "Dreams Of Mexico" on this 1975 release. This is<br />
prior to Brent Mydland joining the Grateful Dead.<br />
<br />
Silver - Silver (Arista 4076) A pre-Grateful Dead Brent Mydland plays<br />
on this 1975 release. Brent Mydland was in this band before he joined<br />
the Grateful Dead. Two of Mydland's songs appear on this album:<br />
"Musician (Not An Easy Life)" and "Climbing". Prior to Silver,<br />
Mydland had been with Batdorf and Rodney.<br />
<br />
A Wing And A Prayer - Matt Kelly (Relix RRLP 2010) With Jerry Garcia,<br />
Bob Weir, Billy Kreutzmann, Brent Mydland, and Keith Godchaux. It<br />
includes "Over And Over" (3:38), co-written with Brent Mydland.<br />
<br />
- Go Ahead ( ) This unreleased album includes "Nobody's", written by<br />
Brent Mydland, which was broadcast on the "Grateful Dead Hour".<br />
Members included: Jerry Cortez (guitars), Bill Kreutzman (drums),<br />
Alex Ligertwood (vocals), Brent Mydland (keyboards and vocals), and<br />
Dave Margen (bass).<br />
<br />
- Brent Mydland ( ) Mydland recorded and mastered a solo album, but<br />
it was never released. Intended for this album were "Tons Of Steel",<br />
with Monty Byron on guitar, a rock arrangement of "Maybe You Know",<br />
"Nobody's", "Long Way To Go", and "Dreams". Betty Cantor-Jackson did<br />
the engineering and production for this album. Other songs possibly<br />
intended for this "album" are "Inlay It In Your Heart", "See The Other<br />
Side", and "Take One". These comprise about 40 minutes of music.<br />
Some of the tapes that circulate in trading circles list a date of<br />
February 25, 1982. The possible songs slated for the album were<br />
"Inlay It In Your Heart", "Tons Of Steel", "Dreams", "Maybe You Know<br />
(How I Feel)", "Nobody's", "See The Other Side", "Long Way To Go", and<br />
"Take One". A tape of the original version of "Tons Of Steel" was<br />
played during the intermission of the Dead's June 21, 1984 broadcast<br />
from Toronto. Brent Mydland authored several songs, including "Fire",<br />
in 1987. Songs, in collaboration with John Perry Barlow, include<br />
"You're Still There", "Love Doesn't Have To Be Pretty", "It Doesn't<br />
Matter", and "It Is What It Is". Songs, in collaboration with Matt<br />
Kelly, include "If That's The Way", "Over And Over", and "Shining<br />
Dawn".<br />
<br />
Down In The Groove - Bob Dylan (Columbia OC 40957) Garcia, Weir, and<br />
Mydland sing backup on "Silvio". Hunter wrote "Silvio" (3:06) and<br />
"Ugliest Girl In The World" (3:32). Released on May 30, 1988. Some<br />
verses of "Silvio" originally appeared as verses in "Black Muddy<br />
River", dated September 14, 1986.<br />
<br />
New Frontier - New Frontier (Polydor 835695) Brent Mydland plays<br />
keyboards on "Motel Rain" on this California's band debut album from<br />
September, 1988. The band includes Timothy B. Schmidt, David Lindley,<br />
and Paulheno Dacosta. Out of print.<br />
<br />
Mahalo - Bill Kreutzmann (<a data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.ocean-spirit.net&source=gmail&ust=1591041122658000&usg=AFQjCNHIu-gWTbcPGCxzqYNf_zLMddzM9Q" href="http://www.ocean-spirit.net/" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">http://www.ocean-spirit.net</a>, 2003) This CD<br />
was released as a complimentary CD and not for sale or public<br />
broadcast. The cover artwork is "Sun Sun" by Bill Kreutzmann. The<br />
five tracks on the CD are: "Girl Like You" (Jennings/Seals) (4:06),<br />
recorded at Front Street on July 24, 1985 by BBDK (Bill Kreutzmann,<br />
David Margen, Brent Mydland, and Kevin Russell); "Are You Lonely For<br />
Me" (Berns) (21:42), from a live performance by Garcia/Saunders<br />
(Martin Fierro, Jerry Garcia, John Kahn, Bill Kreutzmann, and Merl<br />
Saunders) at the Keystone in Berkeley on January 17, 1974 with ;<br />
"10,000 Mics" (Dipirro/Kreutzmann/Woodson) (8:58) by the Trichromes<br />
(Mike Dipirro, Sy Klopps, Bill Kreutzmann, and Ralph Woodson) at the<br />
Sy Klopps Studios on March 30, 2002; "Hey Jude > Dear Mr. Fantasy"<br />
(14:47) by Go Ahead (Jerry Cortez, Bill Kreutzmann, Alex Ligertwood,<br />
David Margen, and Brent Mydland) at the Capitol Theatre in Passaic,<br />
New Jersey on October 31, 1986; and "Eyes Of The World" (9:41) by The<br />
Dead (Rob Barraco, Jeff Chimenti, Mickey Hart, Jimmy Herring, Bill<br />
Kreutzmann, Phil Lesh, Joan Osborne, and Bob Weir) at a rehearsal on<br />
May 27, 2003.<br />
<br />
The Twilight Zone (CBS Broadcasting, 1985) The Grateful Dead and Merl<br />
Saunders, with Bob Bralove, wrote a number of the scores for this<br />
series which premiered on September 27, 1985. The main and end titles<br />
music is by the Grateful Dead. This TV series, produced by Phil<br />
DeGuere, was broadcast in 1985 and 1986. The opening theme piano<br />
music is Merl Saunders and Brent Mydland playing together. Robert<br />
Hunter had been hired to write the introductions to each episode, and<br />
had been considered to do the voice-over as well. One of the<br />
agreements between CBS Entertainment and Grateful Dead Productions<br />
(i.e., the band members) is dated June 12, 1985. Individual band<br />
members recorded a number of stings and bumpers that were used to<br />
present different moods in the programs.<br />
<br />
The Heroes Journey: The World of Joseph Campbell ( ) Premiered on<br />
May 29, 1987 in Los Angeles at a benefit for the Hermes Society. The<br />
soundtrack includes Mickey Hart, Jerry Garcia, and Brent Mydland<br />
playing.<br />
<br />
Nobody's - Go Ahead ( ) The video for this song by Brent Mydland was<br />
directed by Justin Kreutzmann and Gian-Carlo Coppola.<br />
<br />
Transformation Of Myth Through Time - Joseph Campbell ( ) Music<br />
composed by Rand Weatherwax, and performed by David Jenkins on guitar,<br />
Brent Mydland on piano, and Jerry Garcia on banjo. Broadcast on PBS<br />
in 1990.<br />
<br />
The Music Never Stopped (2011) This film, directed by Jim Kohlberg,<br />
was released on March 18, 2011. It is adapted from the essay "The<br />
Last Hippie" by Oliver Sacks. The Grateful Dead are played by actors<br />
Phil Bender (Jerry Garcia), Rich Campbell (Bob Weir), Buzz Roddy (Bill<br />
Kreutzmann), Ethan F. Hamburg (Phil Lesh), Mark Greenberg (Mickey<br />
Hart), and Paul Sigrist (Brent Mydland). The soundtrack includes<br />
several Grateful Dead songs: "Uncle John's Band", "Sugar Magnolia"<br />
(live), "Not Fade Away / Goin' Down The Road Feeling Bad" (live),<br />
"Truckin'" (live), "Touch Of Grey" (live), and "Ripple".</div>
<br />
<br />Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com19tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-14176981991226639102020-05-24T10:53:00.005-07:002022-07-17T06:19:04.566-07:00The Grateful Dead in Upstate and Central New York 1969-79 ('Til Your Night Job Pays)<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfcPmLeyq4DQVM-83u2UQCWGdCbaq4LDpjpH7jNPH3nNki4yLiScWScqGeprgWN48UDGhHtLvmCdZMErZZv14xanple6LcjrOtTFhJ6ZXMG3qj07-YAvrhp7upiy9xqQtM-ryqfGGasL4/s1600/NYC+and+Hudson+River+RR.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="632" data-original-width="800" height="252" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfcPmLeyq4DQVM-83u2UQCWGdCbaq4LDpjpH7jNPH3nNki4yLiScWScqGeprgWN48UDGhHtLvmCdZMErZZv14xanple6LcjrOtTFhJ6ZXMG3qj07-YAvrhp7upiy9xqQtM-ryqfGGasL4/s320/NYC+and+Hudson+River+RR.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The New York Central and Hudson River Railroad predicts the Grateful Dead's touring schedule half a century afterwards. Coincidence? No. </i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The Grateful Dead were a San Francisco band who managed to stake their first claim in Manhattan, followed shortly by Brooklyn. In ensuing decades, the band went on to sweep the East and West Coasts, as well as New England, the Southeast, the Mountain West and even London. What ultimately became a vast edifice of Grateful Dead fan strongholds, however, was built slowly and haphazardly, and tends to get lost in more glamorous strains of Dead history. One overlooked region in Grateful Dead history is the early and perpetual popularity of the band in Upstate and Central New York, in cities like Albany, Rochester, Syracuse and Buffalo.<br />
<br />
Manhattan shines a bright light on anything it finds popular, so bright that it darkens whatever is nearby. People from outside New York City do not think much about the geography and importance of the other cities in New York State, and those in Manhattan and the other boroughs think about the other cities even less. People who have never lived or worked in Manhattan vaguely refer to those other cities as "upstate New York" without thought (a Brooklynite recently told me <a href="https://twitter.com/bourgwick/status/926959228266450945">"anything above Columbus Circle is upstate"</a>), but in fact the cities both North and West of Manhattan have their own dynamics. Without all those cities in New York State, the Grateful Dead would have a far more difficult time touring successfully in places like Boston, Manhattan, New Jersey and Philadelphia. This post will look at the importance of Upstate and Central New York in the touring history of the Grateful Dead.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Summary: Making It Pay</b></i><br />
In early 1970, at the dawn of the Sam Cutler era, the only logical way forward for the Grateful Dead was to make a living from touring. Thanks to huge studio costs from <i>Aoxomoxoa</i>, they were hugely in debt to their record company. So even if they had some kind of hit album, they wouldn't be seeing royalties for quite a while. Thanks to Lenny Hart's management practices and general perfidy, once he stole something like $155,000 from them--$155K in 1970 dollars--they had no cash, either. So although the Grateful Dead were genuine 60s rock stars, by any accounting, and true underground legends, financially they were in the same place as some bar band with a Friday night residency. If they couldn't make enough coin from live performances, they weren't going to make it.<br />
<br />
Things weren't entirely bleak, however. While the Dead had been able to play paying gigs in San Francisco from their earliest days, their underground cred and word-of-mouth had made the band popular elsewhere. Manhattan fell first, then Boston. They were popular in colleges, since 60s and 70s teenagers away from home for the first time wanted to see a band that played the Fillmores. As the 70s wore on, New Jersey and Pennsylvania were another source of paying gigs.<br />
<br />
But if a band is going to make money on the road, any band, it has to stay on the road. So Sam Cutler and the Dead had to find gigs to play that fit in with the good ones in the big Northeastern cities. Central and Upstate New York provided the perfect solution. There were cities upstate, not as big as Boston or New York, but cities nonetheless, and they had young people who wanted to rock. Initially, the Dead played New York State because they could. Syracuse or Rochester were near enough to New York, Boston or Pennsylvania that some paying nights could be added to keep the wheels turning.<br />
<br />
Two things happened. One partially expected, or at least hoped for, and another quite out of the ordinary. First of all, the Dead played cities in Upstate and Central New York often enough that they started to build a fan base around those cities. That's how rock music was supposed to work.<br />
<br />
The unexpected factor was this: the very fact of geography that made Central and Upstate New York an easy transit for the band made for easy traveling by their fans. Once Deadheads in Brooklyn, Cambridge and New Jersey realized that they could just drive a few hours and catch more Dead shows in Syracuse or some college gym, the viability of Dead shows in New York state rose considerably. Deadheads traveled to see the band--if it was easy for the band to get there, so it was for the fans. When the Grateful Dead enterprise morphed into its own self-supporting ecosystem in the early 1980s, Central and Upstate New York were absolutely central to the organism. <br />
<br />
Herein lies the tale. <br />
<br />
<i><b>What Is "Upstate" New York?</b></i><br />
New York state residents, even ones who never get above 110th Street, know that there is a big difference between "Upstate" and "Central" New York. New York was founded because Manhattan was an excellent port of entry, allowing goods to flow down the Hudson River to Europe and points South. The cities and towns that are directly North of Manhattan are all linked to the Hudson River or related tributaries. These include important cities like Albany, the State Capital, and also resort cities like Woodstock and Saratoga. They are all "up the Hudson" from Manhattan, and thus "Upstate New York."<br />
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Central New York is West and mostly North of the Hudson, running from Lake Ontario all the way down to the Pennsylvania border. The major cities are all tied to different bodies of water, which is how they were founded back in the 18th century. Buffalo is on Lake Erie, Syracuse is near Lake Ontario and Rochester is near Lake Oneida, all in the Northern part of the Empire State. Binghamton is on the Susquehanna River, in the Southern part of the New York, near the Pennsylvania border. As to "Western New York," New Yorkers, in my experience, only refer vaguely to it, usually as an uncivilized area West of where you happen to be at any time. There remains a distinct difference between Upstate and Central New York, however, with Upstate retaining a connection to Manhattan, while the Central area stands on its own. For simplicity, for this post I will just refer to the totality of Upstate, Central and Western New
York state as "Upstate," with the recognition that it is a complicated
misnomer for people who have lived and worked there.<br />
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<i><b>"Low Bridge, Everybody Down:" Central New York Economic History</b></i><br />
The economic history of New York State is simple: the Erie Canal made Manhattan the dominant focus of American commerce, and New York City has never relinquished that position. In the early 19th century, the hardest problem to solve in the vastness of America was moving goods to market. There was land, there were resources, and there were people to work the land and extract those resources. But who would buy them? Canal technology went back to the Ancient Romans, of course, but it had been exploited by the Industrial Revolution in the latter 18th century (the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_River_and_Kanawha_Canal">James River Canal in Richmond, for example, had been started in 1785</a>). The most important canal in American history, however, was the Erie Canal, which was completed in 1825.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erie_Canal">Originally, the Erie Canal ran about 363 miles from Albany, on the Hudson River, to Buffalo, at Lake Erie.</a> It was built to create a navigable water route from New York City and the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes. The effect of the Erie Canal on transportation, and hence New York's economy, was <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erie_Canal">nothing short of revolutionary</a>.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
It was faster than carts pulled by draft animals, and cut transport costs by about 95%.[8] The canal fostered a population surge in western New York and opened regions farther west to settlement. It was enlarged between 1834 and 1862. The canal's peak year was 1855, when 33,000 commercial shipments took place.</blockquote>
There was an additional network of lesser canals, built throughout the 19th century, that linked to the Eric Canal and the Hudson River. Thus farmers and manufacturers in much of New York State could reach Europe and the American South through the Hudson River and Manhattan. At the same time, Toronto and the Great Lakes were accessible via Rochester and Lake Ontario, while Buffalo could reach Cleveland via Lake Erie, and by extension (and the Detroit River), Detroit and Chicago. Chicago itself was only founded in 1833. The goods and resources of the entire Upper Midwest flowed through the main Erie Canal cities on their way to Manhattan. Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse all became important centers of manufacturing in Commerce by the middle of the 19th century.<br />
<br />
The age of canals was rapidly superseded by the age of railroads. In New York, however, the railroads simply built on the landscape defined by the canals. The most powerful Eastern railroad of the late 19th and early 20th century was the New York Central Railroad. The New York Central went from Chicago to Manhattan, terminating at Grand Central Station, a place so well known that Americans say "it's as busy as Grand Central Station" without actually ever having set foot at 42nd Street and Park Avenue. The New York Central (mapped up top) touched all the major stops in Central New York, expanding the links defined by the Erie Canal back in 1825. Central New York was a fully integrated part of the American economy until the mid-1950s. For various reasons outside the scope of this blog, Central New York began to decline in economic importance in the 1960s, so the cities stopped growing. Nonetheless, places like Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo still had young people, and those young people wanted to part of the rock explosion that they had read about in <i>Rolling Stone</i> magazine. Enter the Grateful Dead.<br />
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<b>August 16, 1969 Woodstock Music And Arts Fair, Max Yasgur's Farm, Bethel, NY</b> <i>(Saturday)</i><br />
It is paradigmatic that the Grateful Dead began their assault on Upstate New York at the Woodstock Festival in 1969. This was probably true of many, if not most of the bands at the festival. The hippie rock explosion was still a big city thing, extending to a few college campuses, but even those were the kind of places that prided themselves on being ahead of the curve. College students in the 1960s really, really wanted to see the bands that played the Fillmores, but they didn't always get that chance. One of many reasons that Woodstock was so well attended was that there were many young people in Central and Upstate New York who just wanted to see the bands they had been reading about. One of those bands was the Grateful Dead.<br />
<br />
In 1969 the Grateful Dead were underground legends, with their name far better known than any of their music. There were few, if any, FM rock stations outside of New York City at the time, so radio play of any of the Dead's albums would have been all but nonexistent. Nonetheless, the Dead kept turning up, playing for free when something was happening, whether in San Francisco or Columbia University, or finding themselves in the midst of controversy or trouble. Anyway, back in the day "Grateful Dead" was spooky in its own right, just as "Sex Pistols" would be a decade later. Indeed, the Sex Pistols are a good comparison to the Dead, unlikely as it may seem, as that band's infamy far exceeded airplay for "God Save The Queen."<br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead were at Woodstock, along with most of the other active touring rock bands. The Dead actually came onstage at Woodstock at about two in the morning, in between Mountain and Creedence Clearwater Revival. Of course, it was a big one, and the Dead blew it. How bad did the Brown Acid have to be for the band to need a guest--Country Joe McDonald--to speak coherently to the crowd on their behalf? In general, the Dead's Upstate New York debut was a debacle (John Fogerty tells the story of coming on after the Dead in the middle of the night).<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuLnb9ZsehdTLR4eInjhrCDOB9yZSNiDcsnUVo9OQ_ywm0yFpoQr9UpchLskxcHESlgIR0o2wZRUOlWdTHdIiqj025h3-Lyt00BYO-Z6cTcGcwlzw4j7UUMrJH8YGdBRZh2pIs8wIx6Zc/s1600/bufalonews19700317ad.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuLnb9ZsehdTLR4eInjhrCDOB9yZSNiDcsnUVo9OQ_ywm0yFpoQr9UpchLskxcHESlgIR0o2wZRUOlWdTHdIiqj025h3-Lyt00BYO-Z6cTcGcwlzw4j7UUMrJH8YGdBRZh2pIs8wIx6Zc/s1600/bufalonews19700317ad.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A listing from the March 17, 1970 Buffalo News, showing that night's Philarmonic Rock Marathon with the Grateful Dead at Buffalo's Kleinhans Music Hall. Also an imported laser beam light show.</td></tr>
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<b>March 17, 1970 Kleinhans Music Hall, Buffalo, NY: Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra/Grateful Dead/The Road </b><i>(Tuesday)</i><br />
The Grateful Dead's second show in Upstate New York was as odd as Woodstock, in its own way. It was in Buffalo, which is either in Central or Western New York, depending on who you ask, and where you are when you are asking. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/04/march-24-1970-pirates-world-dania-fl.html">The Dead had a little tour booked, with shows at the Capitol Theater in Port Chester, in metro NYC, and then a couple in Florida, at an amusement park and then a rock festival.</a> Then they went to Cincinnati. So to start the tour off, the band played a Tuesday night show in Buffalo, three full days before the first show in Port Chester (Mar 20). The strange scheduling was the last legacy of Lenny Hart's peculiar management practices.<br />
<br />
Even stranger, the show featured not only the Dead and a local band, but the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra. The Orchestra "jammed" with the Grateful Dead. <a href="http://www.thedeadblog.com/grateful-dead-buffalo-philharmonic-1970/">The story sounds quite weird, just right for 1970 Grateful Dead</a>. How did it happen? Who knows? Someone invited the Grateful Dead, and they showed up. I don't think it was the kind of show that turned symphony fans, or hippies for that matter, into Deadheads for life.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">West Gym at Harpur College, SUNY Binghamton, where the Grateful Dead played on May 2, 1970</td></tr>
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<i><b>Early 1970s: Filling Up The Itinerary</b></i><br />
Sam Cutler stripped down
the Grateful Dead operation and put the boys on the road, and they
toured hard. The goal was to get paid, as many nights as possible.
Whenever the band had a few good dates, Cutler's goal was to find some
places in between to get a payday. If a band is on the road, they are
staying in a hotel somewhere, so even a smaller show that makes a little
money is worthwhile, because it's better than getting nothing. So the
Dead played various random shows in Upstate New York in the early 70s,
because it fit their schedule.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-5p5hfN8v4tK-aW4SkGmc1-b8fGUHd0JkfuieJFg4UHBiR3Pb_KM9Xu9sGs4PBjUxity13p4j4VN-zEpdrOmD1OLYF5UrvYkhuzOSY13pRMjUJjTP0cx5vDgaJ0LRzGoHcfO6MX85g9k/s1600/SUNY+Alfred+19700501.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="803" data-original-width="954" height="269" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-5p5hfN8v4tK-aW4SkGmc1-b8fGUHd0JkfuieJFg4UHBiR3Pb_KM9Xu9sGs4PBjUxity13p4j4VN-zEpdrOmD1OLYF5UrvYkhuzOSY13pRMjUJjTP0cx5vDgaJ0LRzGoHcfO6MX85g9k/s320/SUNY+Alfred+19700501.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">SUNY Alfred Homecoming, May 1, 1970. The Dead started at 8:00, and another band kicked off a dance in another building at 10:00 pm.</td></tr>
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<b>May 1, 1970 SUNY Alfred, Alfred, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>Debut of <i>"An Evening With The Grateful Dead."</i></b><i> (Friday)</i><br />
In May 1970, the Grateful Dead debuted their new format, "An Evening With The Grateful Dead." Rock concerts at the time typically had three (or more) acts. For the Spring '70 tour, however, the Dead would play an acoustic set, then the completely unknown New Riders of The Purple Sage would play a set, and then the electric Grateful Dead would do a full performance. The business concept was that the Dead could get the money the promoter would spend for three bands, provide a full evening's show and do it with fewer band members and road crew than was required for three actual bands.<br />
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The first concert of the tour was at SUNY Alfred, in Alfred, NY. Alfred, NY is about 90 miles Southeast of Buffalo, approximately between Buffalo and Binghamton. The show was the "homecoming" (alumni reunion) for both SUNY Alfred and nearby Alfred University. As such, it was a guaranteed payday, not dependent on attendance or promotion. That was a good thing, since only a few hundred people actually saw the show (J<a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2011/05/ln-jg1970-05-01gdall-126minssbd.html">GMF has uncovered the entire remarkable story of the show</a>). The Dead got paid, but the Alfred show didn't have much of an impact on their history.<br />
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<b>May 2, 1970 West Gym, Harpur College, SUNY Binghamton, Binghamton, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b> <i>(Saturday)</i><br />
The Grateful Dead had another paying college gig on Saturday, May 2, and this one was another legendary show. The band was playing at the State University of New York at Binghamton, in Binghamton, NY. Up until 1965, the school had been known as Harpur College, until it was absorbed by the SUNY system. The school currently has 17,000+ students. While it surely had fewer students in 1970, it wasn't tiny.<br />
<br />
Binghamton, NY doesn't resonate with most people, but IBM got started
nearby, and General Electric and Alcoa had big operations there. Binghamton is near the Pennsylvania border, at the confluence of the Susquehanna and Chenango Rivers. Binghamton had been <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chenango_Canal">a main stop on the Chenango Canal (now NY Highway 12)</a>. The Chenango Canal connected the Susquehanna River to the Erie Canal, which made the city into a manufacturing hub. The canal was replaced by the Erie Railroad (l<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delaware,_Lackawanna_and_Western_Railroad">ater the Erie Lackawanna, which was the parent of NJ Transit's Morristown Line</a>), but the town retained its importance. GE, IBM and others continued to make the area economically prosperous from the 1950s through the 80s.<br />
<br />
As we all know, what was remarkable about the Binghamton show was that the entire 7-hour extravaganza was recorded and broadcast on the Pacifica Radio network (including KPFA in Berkeley and WBAI in New York). <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/09/grateful-dead-live-fm-broadcasts-1970.html">Although the show was not simulcast, to my knowledge, but rather broadcast sometime in June (probably June 21), nonetheless much of the country got several hours of the real, live 1970 Grateful Dead.</a> No wonder the show was bootlegged and taped so widely. From a Grateful Dead touring point of view, however, it was just another gig that paid, if a good one. <br />
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<b>May 8, 1970 Farrell Hall, SUNY Delhi, Delhi, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage </b><i>(Friday)</i><br />
After Binghamton, the Dead had some college shows in New England: Sunday, May 3 at Middletown, CT (Wesleyan), Thursday May 7 at Cambridge (MIT) and Saturday May 9 at Worcester, MA (Polytech). There were two free concerts as well during this time, but they don't pay, and working bands gotta work. So the Dead were able to book another college gig on Friday, at SUNY Delhi in Delhi, NY.<br />
<br />
Delhi is a tiny village between Binghamton and Albany, population around 5,000. SUNY Delhi was founded in 1913, but had only started to expand in the 1960s. Even now it only has 3,000+ students. Back in the day, however, even small schools had entertainment budgets. Delhi was near enough to New England that the band could make a quick trip back and forth and get paid. <a href="https://archive.org/details/gd70-05-08.aud.miller.32056.sbeok.flacf">We have an eyewitness account, from the archive</a>. It sounds like a lot of fun:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
This was my first dead concert (can't count expo 67) you lose site of the fact that the Kent state shootings were on everyone's mind. talk of starting to shut down campuses etc. the concert started with NRPS but they blew out the electric circuits one at a time so that the first 2 hours was just a big sound check ( which was ok because you had to step outside to smoke, there were a lot less than 200 people there ) We came down from Oneonta for the show and once they guit blowing fuses & started to play the music was a lot better than these tapes sound, they played until 2-3 and apologized that they had to travel the next day. worth the trip.</blockquote>
After an inexplicable trip to Kirkwood, MO (May 14), likely a Lenny Hart legacy, the Dead finished up at Fillmore East (May 15) and Philadelphia (May 16--<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/may-17-1970-fairfield-university.html">Fairfield on May 17 was canceled</a>). Tiny Upstate New York college gigs had helped keep the band on the road, even if two of those were thinly attended.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ5aWYIEXgUho4lZ8cgqStjwdQxtjC4uyUkdNfadnRX1tebWuyxUZvrcflINp4KNIg0WwzKHULSrBZf_U1StgSjZ6AQjzN1R11eqMVXEFMRQ-xKN23RhUMasa0LeCL0DZQCVUoBwD0oXk/s1600/Edwardsville+%2528IL%2529+Intelligencer1970116.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="478" data-original-width="507" height="301" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ5aWYIEXgUho4lZ8cgqStjwdQxtjC4uyUkdNfadnRX1tebWuyxUZvrcflINp4KNIg0WwzKHULSrBZf_U1StgSjZ6AQjzN1R11eqMVXEFMRQ-xKN23RhUMasa0LeCL0DZQCVUoBwD0oXk/s320/Edwardsville+%2528IL%2529+Intelligencer1970116.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An AP wire service report from November 16, 1970 describes how the Grateful Dead did not perform at the Albany Armory after the building was cleared due to a bomb threat (published in the Edwardsville, IL <i>Intelligencer</i>)</td></tr>
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<b>November 15, 1970 The Armory, Albany, NY Grateful Dead/Buddy Miles Express/Pacific Gas and Electric</b> <i>(Sunday)</i><br />
On the next Eastern swing, in October and November 1970, the Dead had a different schedule. There were a few jaunts to the Midwest, but mostly the band stuck to the Eastern Seaboard, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/10/november-9-16-1970-new-york-action.html">with gigs in Long Island, Port Chester, Philadelphia, Brooklyn and New Jersey</a>. Still, as the tour wound down, there were nights to fill, and they got filled Upstate.<br />
<br />
On Thursday, November 15, between 4 nights in Brooklyn (Nov 11-14) and Monday at Fillmore East (Nov 16), the Dead were booked to headline a Sunday night show at the relatively small Armory in Albany. Albany, approximately 150 miles due North from Manhattan, was and is the Capital of New York State. Albany is straight up the Hudson, and the epitome of "Upstate." Although the city only has a population of about 100,000, the suburbs have become much larger. By virtue of being the state Capital, the importance of the city far outstrips its size.<br />
<br />
The Dead had replaced Delaney And Bonnie And Friends as headliners, over the Buddy Miles Express and the SF band P, G &E. The gig was a debacle. There was a bomb threat, the theater was emptied, and the Dead did not return, so they didn't play. Read the news article above (<i>Rock Group Skips Concert After Bomb Threat Sunday</i>) <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/november-15-1970-armory-albany-ny.html">and the Comment Thread for some intriguing suggestions of who phoned in the threat</a>. Whatever the reason, the Grateful Dead would not return to Albany for nearly twenty years.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGDt5BqW0RyHtHIn_SwY0gSlP7infJxeohZhLY_zk-4yEmkXwUsd-VNiokqhSmku1z3AB21Dw6GUyV4-bEh3jLA6AJMupCA1-VEQKao1XBeRu8AZBQkcVAlNhrPgfG4BWUIDiR5HD-5OQ/s1600/Palestra_Full+Rochester.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="530" data-original-width="1000" height="169" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGDt5BqW0RyHtHIn_SwY0gSlP7infJxeohZhLY_zk-4yEmkXwUsd-VNiokqhSmku1z3AB21Dw6GUyV4-bEh3jLA6AJMupCA1-VEQKao1XBeRu8AZBQkcVAlNhrPgfG4BWUIDiR5HD-5OQ/s320/Palestra_Full+Rochester.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A recent photo of The Palestra at the University of Rochester. Palestra (correctly translated Palaestra) means "Wrestling Ground" in Ancient Greek.</td></tr>
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<b>November 20, 1970 The Palestra, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage </b><i>(Friday)</i><br />
With a big show at Boston on Saturday night (Nov 21), plus another one <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/03/november-22-1970-middlesex-county.html">Sunday (Nov 22) at a New Jersey Junior College</a>, the Dead needed a Friday night payday. They got one at T<a href="https://www.rochester.edu/athletics/facilities/palestra.html">he Palestra, the gym at the University of Rochester.</a> "Palestra" (properly transliterated as "Palaestra") means "Wrestling Ground" in Ancient Greek, which is why it has been used as an Arena name by various schools.<br />
<br />
Rochester is on the southern shore of Lake Ontario, East of Buffalo. It was a boom city going back to the 19th century--the Erie Canal came to Rochester in 1823-- and well into the 20th. The city was the birthplace of giant companies like Kodak, Xerox and Western Union. The city's population peaked in 1930 at 328,000. By 1970, it still had 296,000. Keep in mind, however, that the US population boomed after WW2, so while Rochester was a thriving city in 1970, its footprint was shrinking (in the 2010 census Rochester's population was just 210,000). In 1970, though, there were still plenty of young people there, and they wanted rock and roll, too.<br />
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Jorma Kaukonen, in town because the Airplane were playing across town at the War Memorial Auditoium, showed up to jam. <a href="https://archive.org/details/gd70-11-20.aud.cotsman.9001.sbeok.shnf">A fan recalls</a><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
My first Dead show. And what a doozy and scene it was (for pre-med,
egghead, army brat, 21 yo me), considering it was upstate NY university.
Hopped on that bus! Lots and lots of good stories from that concert! My
recollection is that it was a (Lesh-Jerry-Mickey) NRPS set, then an
acoustic Dead, then 3 electric Dead sets, at least the last one of which
had Jorma. I sooo wish I also had that Jerry NRPS set-- psychedelic
pedal steel ("get off the wah-wah pedal, son" is the punchline to one of
the stories). I remember Lesh trying to coax Jack on stage, <a href="http://e.g/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">e.g</a>.
playing the "White Rabbit" riff at him, but I don't recall Jack
actually getting on stage. Whew, Jorma stinging guitar is my memory. </blockquote>
The Grateful Dead began a long and fruitful relationship with the city of Rochester on this Friday night, in a modest college gym. They returned to the Palestra the next year, and then moved up to the War Memorial and even larger venues in subsequent years. Rochester's footprint would get smaller, but the city would become a critical stop on the Grateful Dead's touring schedule.<br />
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<b>April 18, 1971 Lusk Field House, SUNY Cortland, Cortland, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b> <i>(Sunday)</i><br />
By early 1971, the Dead actually had two kinda-hit-albums, getting regularl airplay on newly founded FM radio stations throughout the country. The band's legendary East Coast tour that Spring made Deadheads for life at every stop. College students and young hippies up and down the East Coast heard the band and jumped on the bus with both feet. They're still on board.<br />
<br />
Even so, the Dead still had to fill a date or two on the gig sheet. The Dead were <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2014/03/april-17-1971-dillon-gym-princeton.html">in between the infamous Saturday night show in Princeton (Apr 17) and an ultimately canceled show at Hofstra in Long Island (Apr 19)</a>. Cortland is an 18,000ish town midway between Syracuse and Binghamton. Like many places in Central New York, it was prosperous in the 19th century, but steadily declined in the 20th (although it did produce singer Ronnie James Dio, incidentally). Nonetheless, there was a SUNY outpost in Cortland, and an entertainment budget. SUNY Cortland had been established in 1868 as the Cortland Normal (<i>Teachers</i>) School, and in 1948 it joined the SUNY system. It now has 7100 students, but I don't know how many it had in 1971. <a href="https://archive.org/details/gd1971-04-18.sbd.lai.6251.sbefail.shnf">Whatever--the Grateful Dead apparently remain the biggest thing ever to hit Cortland. From the Archive:</a><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Hi...I was the person behind the appearance of the Grateful Dead at SUNY Cortland. This show was indeed fantastic. It lasted approximately 7 hours in total (someone thought it was a short show, it was not...I completed the clean up around 6 a.m. when the sun was rising!). It was an epic performance and still holds the record at 7,200 people for the largest indoor assembly ever held in the City of Cortland. There is an epic story behind how the whole production took place which I can't possibly go into here! My voice can be heard in some of the "tuning" segments! (JACKLEISUREPRO)</blockquote>
However much the band got paid at Cortland, it was worth it to keep
the wheels turning. And I bet those SUNY Cortland students, and any locals, are still on board with us.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A poster for Grateful Dead concerts in Rochester (Oct 26 '71) and Syracuse (Oct 27)</td></tr>
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<i><b><br /></b></i>
<i><b>Fall 1971: All Aboard</b></i><br />
The Fall 71 tour behind "<i>Skull And Roses</i>," which Warner Brothers supported with a $100K worth of FM broadcasts in almost every city, was the tour that locked in the Grateful Dead's future success. It may not have entirely seemed that way at the time. True, the Dead had released two albums that had gotten good airplay on FM radio. But FM radio was going nationwide by Fall '71, and more and more kids were listening in stereo. So the 14 broadcasts touched a huge portion of the country. No other band was playing 4 hours for free on the radio, and it set the Dead apart. The broadcasts also laid in a future store of FM dubs for the taper community, although no one knew it at the time. <br />
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<b>October 26, 1971 The Palestra, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage </b><i>(Tuesday) WCMF-FM broadcast</i><br />
<b>October 27, 1971 Onondaga County War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b> (Wednesday) <i>WAER-FM broadcast</i><br />
The Dead started their Fall 71 tour in the Midwest. The debuted in Minnesota (Oct 19), then a weekend in Chicago (Thurs/Fri Oct 21/22) and Detroit (Sat/Sun 23/24). The next weekend was Cleveland (Fri Oct 29) and Cincinnati (Sat/Sun Oct 30/31). There were FM broadcasts in each of the cities. In between, the Dead played Rochester on Tuesday (Oct 26) and Syracuse on Wednesday (Oct 27).<br />
<br />
The band had played Rochester the previous year, but the October 27 show was the band's first time in Syracuse.The Syracuse show was at the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oncenter_War_Memorial_Arena">Onondaga County War Memorial Auditorium</a>, the first of 5 shows the band would play there. Syracuse was only 90 miles from Rochester, and only 165 from Buffalo, but traveling long distance to Dead shows was an unknown phenomenon outside of Brooklyn. To make it work, the Dead were going to have to draw from the Syracuse area itself. <a href="https://www.syracuse.com/news/2012/01/live_at_the_war_memorial_the_a.html">The Onondaga War Memorial Auditorium held about 8,000 in concert configuration, and had been opened in 1949</a>.<br />
<br />
Both the Rochester and Syracuse shows were booked by Pacific Presentations. Pacific Presentations was actually based in Los Angeles, and partner Sepp Donahower had been part of the Pinnacle Dance Concerts company that had put on shows by the Grateful Dead and others back in 1967 and '68 at the Shrine Auditorium. Pacific went national in the early 70s, and they promoted many Grateful Dead shows in disparate places like Texas and New York State. It appears that for the Dead--and no doubt many of their Fillmore peers--they would much rather work with a familiar face rather than unknown locals. Big cities like New York and Chicago had major promoters, but touring FM rock bands were a new thing out in the territories.<br />
<br />
I assume the Palestra was packed, even on a Tuesday, because it was so small. I am curious how many tickets the band sold for a Wednesday night in an 8000-capacity hall in a new town. In the end, however, it didn't matter. Both shows were broadcast live on the local FM stations. <strike>I'm not sure of the call sign of the Rochester station, but</strike> The band played on WCMF-fm in Rochester, and WAER-fm in Syracuse. The Dead were broadcast live for four hours in Rochester and Syracuse on consecutive nights, and they have owned that part of the state ever since. I have to think however many tickets were or were not sold, a lot of suburban teenagers listened to those broadcasts in their bedrooms and thought "if that bus comes by again, I am getting on it."<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An aerail shot of the crowd of the concert at Watkins Glen Grand Prix Racecourse on July 28, 1973. It was the largest rock concert ever held, up unitl this time</td></tr>
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<i><b>Feed That Jones</b></i><br />
A parallel story to the rise of the Grateful Dead in Upstate New York was the part the region played in facilitating East Coast tours by Jerry Garcia and other band members over the years. By the time the Dead had become a guaranteed draw, Garcia was just starting to tour around on his own. Once the Dead took their "break" in 1974, the other band members toured around as well. Upstate New York cities would play the same role they had done for the Dead a few years earlier, filling in the gig sheet with paydays, however modest. The regular reappearance of Garcia and others had to have helped keep the Skull and Roses flag flying high when the Dead wasn't in town.<br />
<br />
The first, and most obscure, Jerry Garcia tour outside of Northern California, was in support of Howard Wales' <i>Hooteroll?</i> album. Garcia sat in with Wales' quartet for seven dates. They hadn't rehearsed, but Howard and Jerry had never rehearsed anyway. <br />
<br />
The Howard Wales mini-tour was seven shows in nine days, opening with a Friday night in Manhattan (Jan 21/Academy of Music), with a show in Boston on Wednesday (Jan 26/Symphony Hall). Among the other five dates was a Saturday night (Jan 22) at a tiny school in Syracuse and a Saturday night return to Buffalo (Jan 29). Since <i>Hooteroll?</i> had been on a Columbia label (Douglas Records), they
were supported by a Columbia act for the last four dates. <a href="http://www.walterkolosky.com/mahavishnuorchestrainformation">So, incredibly, John McLaughlin and the Mahavishnu Orchestra (with Jan Hammer, Jerry Goodman, Rick Laird and Billy Cobham) supported Garcia and Wales for four dates, including Buffalo</a>.<br />
<br />
The two shows in Syracuse and Buffalo probably did not generate a huge outbreak of Deadheads. The music (which we know from tapes of other nights) was pretty out there, and I don't even know of any eyewitnesses. Still, the two bookings helped keep Garcia on the road, which was the initial attraction of the bookings. Syracuse and Buffalo were easy traveling for the band, and that was the crucial geographical advantage of Upstate and Central New York.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A poster for the Howard Wales/Jerry Garcia Hooteroll: tour show at Setnor Auditorium in Syracuse, NY on Saturday, January 22, 1972</td></tr>
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<b>January 22, 1972 Setnor Auditorium, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY: Hooteroll? Howard Wales with Jerry Garcia</b> (<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2017/05/hooteroll-with-howard-wales-and-jerry.html">JGMF uncovered this long lost show, complete with a poster, which says "Hooteroll?"</a> The show is billed at "Crouse Auditorium", but there isn't actually a Crouse Auditorium. <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2017/05/hooteroll-with-howard-wales-and-jerry.html?showComment=1495164629679#c8288779501760586428">JerrysBrokendownPalaces was on the case</a>, however, and determined that the venue was Setnor Auditorium, at Crouse College, part of Syracuse University, capacity 700. The show appears to be presented by Syracuse University, so no doubt a college entertainment insured that a possibly small gate did not affect the band getting paid. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An ad for Jerry Garcia, Howard Wales and Mahavishnu Orchestra in Buffalo, NY on Jan 29, 1972 (h/t <a href="https://gdsets.com/garcia.htm#1972">GDSets</a>)</td></tr>
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<b>January 29, 1972 Century Theater, Buffalo, NY: Howard Wales with Jerry Garcia/Mahavishnu Orchestra presented by University of Buffalo</b> (<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Century_Theatre_(Buffalo,_New_York">This show was at the Century Theater at 511 Main Street, later the New Century Theater, capacity 3,076. </a>It had been the Shea's Theater, but not the same Shea's Theater that the Dead would play later in the decade. That Shea's Theater was across the street (at 646 Main Street). The show was promoted by a University of Buffalo Student Association, so once again a college entertainment budget insured a Garcia payday.<br />
<br />
In the later 1970s, the New Century Theater was a regular venue for local promoter Harvey Weinstein (see Mar 31 '73 below), now better known as a famous film producer and convicted rapist. Weinstein was a student at SUNY Buffalo, so there's good reason to think he has some involvement in booking this show. Given the penchant of Garcia and the Dead to work with promoters for whom they had already worked, it would make sense that Weinstein met Garcia on this tour, and was able to leverage that into booking the Dead 15 months later, when the full band returned to Buffalo.<br />
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<b>March 21-22, 1973 Memorial Auditorium, Utica, NY: Grateful Dead</b> <i>(Wednesday-Thursday)</i><br />
Utica, New York is 240 miles Northwest of Manhattan. At the foot of the Adirondack Mountains, the village was first settled in 1734, and incorporated in 1798. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, Utica and the nearby city of Rome were important layover cities for the Erie and Chenango Canals, and later the New York Central Railroad. Utica and Rome became important manufacturing centers, particularly of textiles. The population of Utica peaked at around 100,000 in 1960.<br />
<br />
For the Grateful Dead's big Spring 1973 tour, the band had three dates at Nassau Coliseum in Long Island (Thurs/Fri/Monday Mar 15/16/19) and one at the Spectrum (Saturday Mar 24), all major league arenas. To get through the week, they had to at least cover expenses, and that meant playing a minor league facility, although it had to be one with a concrete floor.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utica_Memorial_Auditorium"> The Utica Memorial Auditorium was a typical multi-purpose Civic Auditorium of the era, completed in 1960</a>. For floor events, it had a capacity of 5,700. Mostly it was used for minor league ice hockey, and the AHL Utica Comets (affiliated with Vancouver) still call it home.<br />
<br />
The increasing size of the Grateful Dead's sound system in 1973 made one-nighters harder to justify. So the citizens of Utica were lucky enough to get two nights of 1973 Grateful Dead. Thanks to the tapes, we know that the Dead absolutely killed it in Utica--as they did most nights in 1973--and anyone from Oneida County who got to see them there was lucky indeed.<br />
<br />
By 1973, Utica was already in decline, whether or not the locals realized it yet. The population was down to about 90,000 in the 1970 Census, at a time when the US population was increasing. From the Dead's point of view, a couple of modest paydays in a place with easy transit from Long Island and to Philadelphia made good sense. A few fond memories on <a href="https://archive.org/details/gd73-03-22.sbd.sacks.1822.sbeok.shnf">the Archive </a>and on <a href="https://www.dead.net/venue/utica-memorial-auditorium">Dead.net</a> suggest that a very good time was had, and it wasn't that crowded.<br />
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To put this in context, can you imagine Dead and Company playing two nights in a 5,700-capacity hockey arena 200+ miles from a big city? In order to make the big paydays in the Northeast, however, the Dead needed places to keep the fires burning, and Upstate New York fit that schedule.<br />
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<b>March 30, 1973 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead (Friday)</b><br />
The Grateful Dead had one more big show left on their Spring '73 Eastern swing, a show at the Boston Garden. The Garden was big-league in a big city, home of the NBA Boston Celtics and NHL Boston Bruins. Oddly, the Boston Garden date was on a Monday (April 2). So the band still had to fill the weekend.<br />
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By now, however, the Dead's Upstate history was starting to pay off for them. Up until now, the Dead had only played the tiny Palestra at Rochester University. But they had toured steadily, and had even broadcast the last Palestra show on local FM radio. Now, with a Friday night open, the band could move up the ladder in Rochester.<br />
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The Community War Memorial Auditorium in Rochester had opened in 1955, and had a capacity of over 11,000 for concert (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Cross_Arena">now the Blue Cross Arena</a>). It's not at all clear how many tickets the Dead sold this night, but since they kept coming back to Rochester, I have a feeling it must have been a lot. Another revealing detail is that there is only one very poor-quality audience tape circulating for this show, to my knowledge. What this tells me is that the Brooklyn types who were fairly sophisticated about about taping Dead shows were not making the journey yet to distant Rochester. I'm sure a few people made the trip, but road tripping to see the Dead was still a niche activity, not a culture yet.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Grateful Dead and The New Riders played the Buffalo Memorial Auditorium on March 31, 1973, promoted by Harvey N Corky Productions. "Harvey" was future film producer and convicted rapist Harvery Weintstein</td></tr>
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<b>March 31, 1973 Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage</b> (Saturday)<br />
To fill the Saturday night on their open calendar, the Dead finally made true landfall in Buffalo. Sure, they had played that symphony gig in 1970--so Buffalo got immortalized into "Truckin'"--and Garcia had played there with Howard Wales, but since the band had become a hit act they hadn't played the city. They did now. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buffalo_Memorial_Auditorium">The Buffalo Memorial Auditorium</a> (<u><i>not</i></u> War Memorial) was a big old concrete block, built in 1940 with a concert capacity of around 18,000.<br />
<br />
It's doubtful that the Dead sold out an 18,000 seater in Buffalo in 1973, even on a Saturday night. But they probably didn't have to. The economics of the show were probably that the promoter could break even on a half-filled arena, and the band and promoter split the overage. Why was there such a big venue in Buffalo? Buffalo, in its way, is a symbol of the history of the Erie Canal and New York State. When the Erie Canal took hold in the 1830s, Buffalo was the gateway to Lake Erie and thus the city was a critical transportation hub linking Canada, the Atlantic Ocean (via the St. Lawrence Seaway) and Manhattan, all via canals and later railways, feeding the Central and Upstate manufacturers. In 1940, Buffalo had a population of 575,901.<br />
<br />
By 1970, however, the world had changed and Buffalo was declining significantly, with a population of only 462,768. It was shrinking during the Baby Boom. Still, there were still a lot of people in Buffalo, many of them young, and they wanted to rock and roll like everyone else. The biggest local promoters were "Harvey 'N' Corky." The independent production company was run by Corky Burger and two brothers, Harvey and Bob Weinstein. After some years as successful concert promoters, the Weinstein brothers moved into the movie business. Miramax pictures was extremely successful in ensuing decades. Harvey Weinstein is also widely known as a convicted rapist.<br />
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It's pretty likely that Harvey Weinstein, a former SUNY Buffalo student, had had some engagement with the Howard Wales/Jerry Garcia concert in Buffalo in 1972, so that probably provided a level of confidence for the band to book with an untried promotion company. Things must have gone well, since the Dead played for Harvey 'N' Corky Productions again later in the year, and in 1977.<br />
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<b>July 27-28, 1973 Watkins Glen Grand Prix Racecourse, Watkins Glen, NY: Allman Brothers Band/The Band/Grateful Dead</b> <i>(Friday-Saturday)</i><br />
So much has been written about Watkins Glen that I don't have much to add. Suffice to say:<br />
<ul>
<li>It was the biggest crowd at a rock concert ever, up until this time</li>
<li>Nothing really went wrong</li>
<li>No one wanted to hold one of these mega-fests for a few decades. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/07/grateful-dead-performances-at-race.html">Certainly no auto-racing track operators were anxious to offer their facilities for the next dozen years, unfortunately</a></li>
</ul>
With respect to this story, however, young people from New York City, New England, New Jersey, Pennyslvania and all of New York State came to this show. Any high school or college students who didn't already know about the Grateful Dead did by the time school started, since all their classmates would have told their tales of Watkins Glen.<br />
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<b>September 17, 1973: Onondaga War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY Grateful Dead/Doug Sahm Band</b> <i>(Tuesday-Wednesday)</i><br />
The Grateful Dead came back for a fall '73 tour, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/01/horn-tour-september-1973-tour-itinerary.html">this time with a horn section in tow, amazingly enough</a>. The tour was anchored by a weekend at Nassau Colisuem (Fri/Sat Sep 7/8), a weekend in New England (Providence Sep 14/15) and a Friday night at the Spectrum in Philadelphia (Sep 21). In between, two gigs got squeezed in at William And Mary College in Virginia (Sep 11/12, where a young Bruce Hornsby saw the second show), and there were also two shows in Syracuse the next week.<br />
<br />
The Dead's sound system required them to play two nights in one place rather than multiple one-nighters. <strike>It's notable that the two shows in Syracuse were played, while the two shows in Providence were reduced to a single show. Now, granted, Providence Civic Center (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunkin%27_Donuts_Center">now Dunkin Donuts Center</a>) had a capacity of 14,000 and War Memorial in Syracuse was just 8,000, but this tells us that Syracuse was a better market than Providence</strike>. [<i><b>update</b>: a Commenter pointed out that I was incorrect, and the second night in Syracuse was canceled, just as in Providence, so the markets would have been parallel.</i>] It also tells us Deadheads weren't really traveling far in big numbers yet, since Boston fans weren't packing Providence. In any case, whether it had been by accident or design--probably mostly the former--the Dead had managed to build a good fan base in Upstate New York, and they could fill in the nights on the tour there.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4eXeuYVXi2dfR9TPapZLaInqudtZW7E_CBHmwqMM2wY8jbGmN8AuF0m4eU57p7KyjeQp9TjLQB4fUHVsgLKG96nrgyPFreFnsdUYnY_PhxN0tJ5xPJGsOrSKDPsOI9KAKKzgkNly6EAs/s1600/19730926.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="442" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4eXeuYVXi2dfR9TPapZLaInqudtZW7E_CBHmwqMM2wY8jbGmN8AuF0m4eU57p7KyjeQp9TjLQB4fUHVsgLKG96nrgyPFreFnsdUYnY_PhxN0tJ5xPJGsOrSKDPsOI9KAKKzgkNly6EAs/s320/19730926.jpg" width="196" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Dead's fall 1973 tour ended on a Wednesday nght in Buffalo, on September 26, 1973, when they played the Buffalo Memorial Auditorium. The opening act ("& Friends") was the Doug Sahm Band.</td></tr>
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<b>September 26, 1973 Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Grateful Dead/Doug Sahm Band </b><i>(Wednesday)</i><br />
The last date of the Dead's Fall '73 tour was a Wednesday night in Buffalo, playing again for Harvey N Corky. The significant thing about this show was that the band did not have another show the next weekend, so the Wednesday booking wasn't just a routing gig. The show in Buffalo had to have been profitable enough for the band to extend the tour a few days, and they had to have enough confidence in the promoters to feel they were actually going to get paid. Once again, the efforts that the Dead had made to play Upstate New York had really paid off, since they now had real audiences in not only Syracuse and Rochester but Buffalo as well.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE_2Zf7MYysWVYMEwv7kdmuMZ1tiPrtRth4mlKqjL-TNwv6e7NbLoUG0pyO-gd_Ah1H01LkcmWxx884aogjUxUblJpr_t-IkDchxHNzCU34F9QU1vJ1BbNSROJCVcmKdcatOmoDgPRmJY/s1600/Palace+Theater+Albany+NY.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="295" data-original-width="524" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhE_2Zf7MYysWVYMEwv7kdmuMZ1tiPrtRth4mlKqjL-TNwv6e7NbLoUG0pyO-gd_Ah1H01LkcmWxx884aogjUxUblJpr_t-IkDchxHNzCU34F9QU1vJ1BbNSROJCVcmKdcatOmoDgPRmJY/s320/Palace+Theater+Albany+NY.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Palace Theater, at 19 Clinton Avenue in Albany, NY, was built in 1928 and seats about 2,800. Jerry Garcia and other Grateful Dead members played this hall many times</td></tr>
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<i><b><br /></b></i>
<i><b>Fall 1974: The Interregnum</b></i><br />
The Grateful Dead's cultivation of an audience in Upstate New York paid an unexpected dividend after the Fall of 1974. After the October 1974 Winterland shows, the Grateful Dead went on "hiatus," and stopped touring. Pretty much all of their fans assumed that the Dead were done for. Many, maybe most, of the great 60s bands had broken up by this time, and it seemed like the Dead were just following the path carved by the likes of The Beatles or Jefferson Airplane.<br />
<br />
The demise of the Dead, however, meant that Jerry Garcia had to tour, and without benefit of any realistic record company support. Since the Dead were self-financing their own record company, there wasn't the flood of publicity and tour support for the ensuing solo albums. Any touring had to be cash-and-carry, profitable on its own axis. New Jersey promoter John Scher took on the role of tour director for Jerry Garcia, calculating how to maximize his presence in a region where he was a legend, but had rarely played under his own name, and had no record company buttressing him.<br />
<br />
<b>November 10, 1974: The Palace Theater, Albany, NY Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders had played a few shows in the NYC Metro area prior to this, but now they were touring for real. Upstate New York served the same purpose it had for the Garcia/Saunders ensemble as it had for the Dead. Jerry and Merl had a big four days of bookings in the NYC Metro area from Wednesday through Saturday (Nov 5-9), and used Albany to fill in the leftover date.<br />
<br />
The Palace Theater, at 19 Clinton Avenue in Albany, opened in 1931 as an RKO movie palace. It seats about 2,800. It had closed in 1969, but it was purchased by the city of Albany and re-opened soon after. The 1970 Grateful Dead show in Albany had been a debacle, of course (see Nov 15 '70 above), but time had passed. Albany was not a large city, but it was the state Capitol, with extensive suburbs, so there was a nascent Grateful Dead audience in the region, which would be cultivated later. The 1974 Garcia show was just a sort of opening salvo.<br />
<br />
<b>November 17, 1974: Auditorium Theater, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
For the next leg, Garcia/Saunders had four shows in Boston Metro (Nov 12-15), and a big double show at the Tower Theater in Philadelphia (Nov 16), l<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/12/the-grateful-dead-electric-factory-and.html">ong established as prime Grateful Dead territory</a>. For the final night, the band played at the Auditorium Theater in Rochester on Sunday night. Now, strictly speaking, as it was the end of the tour, they could have just flown home, but they were in town, it was near and it paid, so they played. Upstate New York was near to both New England and NYC Metro, so that made it uniquely useful. Although places like Rochester were far (ish) from New England, since the trucks didn't have to fight through New York or Boston Metro traffic, the actual transit was easy.<br />
<br />
The Auditorium Theater in Rochester, at 855 E. Main Street, was opened in 1930 as a Masonic Temple. It seats about 3,000. Though smaller than the War Memorial, the Auditorium Theater was larger than the Palaesta. The time the Dead had spent building a Deadhead audience in Rochster had paid off.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.rbtl.org/">The Auditorium Theater currently mostly hosts touring Broadway shows</a>. One interesting fact <a href="https://www.rbtl.org/theatre-history/">from the History Tab</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>One of the most puzzling secrets of the building centers on a
fascination with squirrels. During construction of the building, the
ornamental plasterer apparently felt the need to add a bit of whimsy by
including several images of squirrels and acorns throughout. Squirrels
appear above the building’s front door, while bird, grapevine and acorn
motifs can be found in the plaster work on the walls in some meeting
rooms. But look closely — the most striking example is on the ceiling of
the Auditorium. The plasterer has skillfully incorporated 64 squirrels
into the symmetry of the massive ceiling.</i></blockquote>
<a href="https://www.thoughtsonthedead.com/">If squirrels are your area, Go To... </a><br />
<br />
<b>October 25, 1975: Auditorium Theater, Rochester, NY Jerry Garcia Band with Nicky Hopkins </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
By late 1975, the Grateful Dead organization was hemorrhaging cash for The Movie, with no touring income and lackluster returns on record sales. When Jerry Garcia toured in the Fall, he needed to make sure it was lucrative. It is easy to forget now that Nicky Hopkins, first-call piano man for the Rolling Stones and all the Beatles, was a genuine rock star himself. He had toured with the Stones, and now he was touring with Garcia. The Jerry Garcia Band was actually an incorporated group with four equal partners (JG, John Kahn, Hopkins, Ron Tutt), but the name Jerry Garcia Band was chosen for commercial appeal. Garcia even included a few of his own songs in the set ("Deal", "Sugaree" and "Friend Of The Devil"). The new Jerry Garcia Band was a commercial proposition indeed.<br />
<br />
John Scher had the band touring hard. In most cities, the Jerry Garcia Band played early and late shows, so the paydays were good. And make no mistake, Hopkins was a tremendous pianist, and his ability to flow in and out of Garcia's guitar lines was beautiful indeed. This was no busman's holiday, but a real band on the road.<br />
<br />
Upstate New York dates kept the band working hard. The JGB started out in New England (Oct 22 and 23), with Boston on Saturday night (Oct 24). The next week, they played New York Metro area from Wednesday and Friday (Oct 28&30), Halloween Saturday night at the Tower in Philly and then two more shows(Capitol in Passaic Nov 1 and DC Nov 2). By inserting three nights into Upstate New York on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, John Scher made sure that the Fall JGB tour was solidly in the black.<br />
<br />
Scher and the Jerry Garcia Band returned to the Auditorium Theater in Rochester. 3000 seats was about right for Jerry on a Sunday night upstate. Since they couldn't really sell two shows, Garcia and Hopkins played two sets anyway for the lucky crowd. Regardless of how well this show sold, it was worth it for the band.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcmJnOKWrnjbeGiiCTRHeA3ycjgoXfPHDZNLgnkua2oGcRDbUc68mHnvFZGmM62BXWBZpNu8knpr92PKRfTP-DjDybXS13iauyGxelgwraqqDrLANq8v3vCfk7iEaMQ0NmIneToE9c5-Q/s1600/JGB+Buffalo+19751026.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="448" data-original-width="1000" height="143" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcmJnOKWrnjbeGiiCTRHeA3ycjgoXfPHDZNLgnkua2oGcRDbUc68mHnvFZGmM62BXWBZpNu8knpr92PKRfTP-DjDybXS13iauyGxelgwraqqDrLANq8v3vCfk7iEaMQ0NmIneToE9c5-Q/s320/JGB+Buffalo+19751026.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Thanks to <a href="http://gdsets.com/">GDSets.com</a><a href="https://gdsets.com/garcia.htm#1975">https://gdsets.com/garcia.htm#1975</a>, a ticket stub from the Oct 26 '75 JGB show in Buffalo</td></tr>
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<b>October 26, 1975: New Century Theater, SUNY Buffalo, Buffalo, NY Jerry Garcia Band with Nicky Hopkins </b>(<i>Monday</i>)<br />
The Jerry Garcia Band returned to the Century Theater in Buffalo, where Garcia and Howard Wales had played in January 29, 1972 (above). The promoters were Harvey And Corky, showing how Garcia and the Dead remained loyal to promoters they had worked with successfully in the past. New Century had a capacity of 3,076, so for a Monday night it was just booked for a single show.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>October 27, 1975: Bailey Hall, Cornell U, Ithaca, NY Jerry Garcia Band with Nicky Hopkins </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
There is a vast literature about the Grateful Dead at Cornell University, most of which I have not read. I do not know if anyone has noticed that Garcia first made landfall in Cornell in 1975 with the Garcia Band. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bailey_Hall_(Ithaca,_New_York)">They played Bailey Hall, constructed in 1912 and seating just 1324</a>. <br />
<br />
Cornell University is in tiny Ithaca, NY in the scenic "Finger Lakes" region. It is about 220 miles Northwest of Manhattan, truly in the center of New York State. Buffalo is Northwest of Ithaca, Syracuse and Rochester to the North, and Binghamton to the South. Cornell, founded 1865, is an esteemed Ivy League school, but there isn't much else in Ithaca. Cornell is a wealthy school, however, so they could pay out-of-town acts good money (guaranteed) to make the journey to the shores of Cayuga Lake.<br />
<br />
A Fall Tuesday night in the middle of New York State, a tiny auditorium built in 1912, two sets of primo Jerry Garcia, his bass player, the Stones' pianoman and Elvis' drummer. Two sets. If you weren't on the bus after that, Barton Hall wasn't going to matter.<br />
<br />
<b>November 6, 1975: Elting Gym, SUNY New Paltz, New Paltz, NY: Kingfish/Keith And Donna </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/09/keith-and-donna-band-tour-history-1975.html">Kingfish and Keith and Donna toured the East Coast in November</a>. In the Bay Area, with Jerry Garcia a regular in nightclubs since 1970, Deadheads were very casual about the opportunity to see Grateful Dead spinoffs. In the East, however, the chance to see 4 members of The Dead (Weir, Kreutzmann, Keith and Donna) plus an ex-New Rider (Dave Torbert) in the same night was somewhat of a big deal. The Kingfish/Keith and Donna bill played medium sized theaters that neither band could have played at home. I have to presume that the bands also only used one crew and one set of gear, another efficiency.<br />
<br />
While I don't think shows by Kingfish and Keith And Donna created legions of Deadheads, I can attest that they were both great live bands, and seeing them made for a fun night out. Long before the internet or anything else, tours like this helped keep the Grateful Dead fires burning in far away places.<br />
<br />
New Paltz was about 80 miles north of Manhattan, in between Manhattan and Albany. In the 1970s, a lot of good bands played Elting Gym at SUNY New Paltz. There must have been a sharp booking agent and a good entertainment budget at the University. For whatever reasons, a lot of board tapes seemed to have leaked out of there. The Kingfish/K&D tour opened in New Paltz on a Thursday, before higher profile shows at the Beacon (Friday Nov 7) and SUNY Stony Brook (Saturday Nov 8).</p><p><b>November 12, 1975 New Century Theater, Buffalo, NY Kingfish/Keith and Donna</b><br />The Keith and Donna tour followed the Garcia Band into Buffalo on a Wednesday night. <a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/10/bob-weir-and-kingfish-tour-history_07.html?showComment=1613190581631#c1102930694527244954">Thanks to commenter David for tracking this down</a>. <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/66933176@N02">Also, he found excellent photos of the show.</a><br />
<br />
<b>November 21, 1975: Loews Theater, Syracuse, NY Kingfish/Keith And Donna </b><i>(Friday)</i><br />
The tour played Friday night in Syracuse, setting up a Saturday (Nov 22) show in Scranton (Nov 23) and then Sunday in Boston (Nov 23). I<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T._Corey_Brennan"> know a former Scranton teenager who went to the Scranton show</a>, by the way, and he said it was a very big deal in Scranton. While he's no Deadhead, he's been fond of the band ever since.<br />
<br />
The bands played Loews Theater (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landmark_Theatre_(Syracuse,_New_York)">now the Landmark</a>), at 362 S. Salina St . The theater had opened in 1928 and had a capacity of 2,908<br />
<br />
<b>November 24, 1975: Palace Theater, Albany, NY: Kingfish/Keith And Donna </b>(<i>Monday</i>)<br />
While Monday is an odd night for a rock show, this was Thanksgiving week, so a lot of students would have been home from college. Following their pattern, the bands played the same theater in Albany where Garcia/Saunders had played the year before (Nov 17 '74 above). <br />
<br />
S<b>eptember 18, 1976: Ben Light Gymnasium, Ithaca College, Ithaca, NY Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
On Saturday, September 18, 1976, the Jerry Garcia Band played a gig at Ithaca College. Ithica <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ithaca_College">College was founded in 1892 as a Music Conservatory, and has a sterling reputation as a school for the performing arts</a>. Rod Serling, who created "The Twilight Zone" was a famous alumni. The school has about 6,000 students, and is just 2 miles from Cornell. The Ben Light Gymnasium was built in 1964, and has a capacity of 2,600. While places like Ithaca have rather mobile college students, and its hard to build up an audience (compared to regular cities like Syracuse or Rochester), there isn't much to do out in the countryside, so it's easy to draw an audience. A Saturday night in Ithica was probably a good payday for the Garcia Band.<br />
<br />
In fact, this little tour was fairly odd, and possibly worth a post in itself. Rock band touring in the 70s and 80s was basically iterative, in that the expense of going on the road only paid off if the band stayed out there and sold tickets for a couple of weeks in a row. When there were exceptions to this premise, it usually had to do with record company promotions.<br />
<br />
None of that applies with this September '76 JGB one week mini-tour. For now, my conclusion is that the first date, a Hells Angels "Boat Party" on the SS Duchess, was so lucrative that the entire trip was worth it. After the Wednesday night boat trip on the Hudson River (<a href="https://youtu.be/jYZ2hOWWyv8">you can see the video here</a>), the JGB played three out-of-the-way college shows and one oddball booking. The band played CW Post college in Greenvale (Long Island) on Thursday (Oct 16), then Seton Hall in New Jersey on Friday (South Oragne, Oct 17), and then Ithaca College. All three of these dates were probably modest but relatively guaranteed paydays, given that college entertainment budgets were providing a subvention to ticket sales. The last show was in Reading, PA on a Sunday night (Sep 20). John Scher would not have booked these gigs if the numbers didn't make sense, but it's hard not to think that the Hells Angels show was the big payday.<br />
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<i><b>Fall 1976-When Your Night Job Pays</b></i><br />
<b>September 27, 1976 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Monday</i>)<br />
<b>September 28, 1976 Onondaga County War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
The Grateful Dead returned to touring in the Summer of 1976. As always,
they needed money. When they hit the road in the fall, Rochester and
Syracuse shows made nice paydays on what would otherwise have been empty
weeknights. The band had a Saturday night show at the Capitol Center in DC (Sep 25), and then Columbus, OH (Thurs Sep 30), Market Sq Arena, Indianapolis (Friday Oct 1), Cincinnati (Sat Oct 2) and then Cobo Hall in Detroit (Sun Oct 3). Rochester and Syracuse took care of Monday and Tuesday on the way from DC to Ohio. Easy travel, good money. <br />
<br />
<b>May 8, 1977 Barton Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
Much has been written about the Barton Hall show in Cornell on May 8, 1977, so I have little to say. The Dead had laid the groundwork, in that Garcia had played Cornell (Oct 27 75) and nearby Ithaca College (Sep 18 76), and the New Riders had played Cornell in 1974 and Halloween '76 (see below). Still, tiny Northeastern college towns are a little different than some communities, since college students come and go. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barton_Hall">Barton Hall, opened in 1915, held 4,800</a> so it was a smaller Dead show for the era.<br />
<br />
The key point for my perspective was that Cornell was in between a big Saturday payday at Boston Garden (May 7) and weekend shows in Chicago (May 12-13). Cornell was sort of new territory for the Grateful Dead, up to a point, but the geography favored touring. Big Northeastern cities like Washington, DC, Philadelphia, New York and Boston are near to each other in terms of road miles, but the driving is always difficult. No matter the time of year or the route, all those cities have crowded highways between them. But going from any of those cities to places like Ithica or Rochester was a breeze. Empty roads by the standards of I-95, pretty scenery and an easy drive benefited the crew. Later, it would benefit Deadheads when they started to travel in big numbers.<br />
<br />
As we all know, the '77 Cornell show was one of the first truly high-quality Grateful Dead tapes not sourced from FM radio to circulate widely. I recall getting mine around 1979, although perhaps I am imagining that. In any case, one factor of the wide circulation of the Cornell tape was an implicit promise to the rest of the Northeast--it would be worth driving a few hours to catch a show like that. I can't help but think a lot of Deadheads looked at a map, whether they were in Boston, New York or Philadelphia, and said "hey, that's not too hard a drive, and it would be fun." And so it began.<br />
<br />
<b>May 9, 1977 Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Monday</i>)<br />
Right after Cornell, the Dead returned to Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, once again promoted by Harvey 'N' Corky. Buffalo Memorial was huge (18,000), and it was a Monday night, so the place was probably only half full. No doubt Harvey Weintstein, a shrewd promoter (and convicted rapist), had calculated that well in advance. The Dead made some money and played a show that was absolutely epic. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A ticket to see the Grateful Dead in the Reid Athletic Center at Colgate U. on Friday, November 2, 1977. The gym is now named Cottterell Court, but I believe that to be a later name.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>November 4, 1977 Reid Athletic Center, Colgate University, Hamilton, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
The Dead had a show in Toronto on a Wednesday (Nov 2), and a good booking in Rochester on Saturday night (Nov 5). To fill in the Friday, they played the gym at tiny Colgate University, in tiny Hamilton, NY. Hamilton is nearly in the exact center of New York State. It's not near anything. Many years ago, I visited Hamilton College, which (paradoxically) is in Clinton, NY. Pretty as it was, I though Clinton was way out in the country. Yet the Hamilton students assured me that Colgate, 20 miles to the South, made Clinton seem like Greenwich Village.<br />
<br />
Colgate is a well-regarded, well-funded University. It was founded in 1819, and has about 3000 students. Places like Colgate have entertainment budgets to bring in touring acts. This Friday night, they bought the Dead. Reid Athletic Center, built in 1959, seats 1,750 for basketball, and probably a bit more for a concert. Most Colgate students were probably there. We know the show burned. No, it don't happen like that no more.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs6E0HDQiMOOfatxXc-bWqjSvVeDElmaPzWEHMkEW7Gi81t647mpxk-eYWXxjk1jRDDgI9ihM_rqIb898d1_yW_S_snL6wNo4mJhaE1lh7JZjY7QAlsLtVY_sPQSjnNpjtgZQvsj_6yKg/s1600/Rochester+GD+War+Memorial+19771106.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="900" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs6E0HDQiMOOfatxXc-bWqjSvVeDElmaPzWEHMkEW7Gi81t647mpxk-eYWXxjk1jRDDgI9ihM_rqIb898d1_yW_S_snL6wNo4mJhaE1lh7JZjY7QAlsLtVY_sPQSjnNpjtgZQvsj_6yKg/s320/Rochester+GD+War+Memorial+19771106.jpg" width="180" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Some pictures from the next day's newspaper show us that a Dead show was a Very Big Deal in Rochester by 1977 (h/t @GratefulSeconds)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>November 5, 1977 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
By 1977, Rochester was a good gig for the Grateful Dead. All those odd weeknights had paid off. On this tour, they played the War Memorial and it was a big event. Where once Rochester had just been a geographical convenience, hard touring had turned it into a great gig for the band.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>November 6, 1977 Broome County Arena, Binghamton, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
The Grateful Dead returned to Binghamton in 1977.<a href="http://www.broomearenaforum.com/about/about-us/">The Broome County Arena, built in 1973, had a capacity of 5,000.</a> It's important to remember that all those Harpur College students who had seen the band in 1970 were long gone. Generally speaking, the Upstate SUNYs are often excellent schools, but the students don't plan to stay in the area when they graduate. The fact that the Dead could play a 5,000 seater in Binghamton, however, meant that there were enough Deadheads in the Southern part of the state to make it worthwhile.<br />
<br />
<b>November 20, 1977 Broome County Forum Theatre, Binghamton, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
Two weeks after the Dead's return to Binghamton, the Jerry Garcia Band played the city again. The Broome County Forum Theatre had 1,500 seats. <a href="http://www.broomearenaforum.com/about/about-us/">It was originally built as movie and vaudeville house, and opened 1919 as The Binghamton Theatre, closing in 1931</a>. It opened and closed various times under
various names throughout the 1970s. Finally, it was refurbished and reopened in 1975 as
The Forum Theatre.<br />
<br />
<b>November 29, 1977 Elting Gym, SUNY New Paltz, New Paltz, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
The Jerry Garcia Band did some hard touring in the Northeast in November and December, and Upstate New York filled in the missing days, just as it had for the Grateful Dead over the years. The Garcia Band played New Paltz on a Tuesday because they had a lucrative weekend (Philly Friday, Passaic Saturday, Manhattan Sunday, Long Island Monday). <br />
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<b>November 30, 1977 New Gym, Buffalo Stage College, Buffalo, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
The JGB train rolled on to Buffalo the night after New Paltz. Note that Harvey 'N' Corky were not the promoters. I don't know the exact chronology, but I think Harvey Weinstein had exited the concert business. <br />
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<b>December 3, 1977 Binder Gymnasium, Hartwick College, Oneonta, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
Oneonta was mid-state, in between Binghamton and Albany, in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains. Binder Gym was the old facility, which seems to no longer exist. It would not have been a large arena. John Scher was handling the Jerry Garcia Band touring arrangements East of the Mississippi River, as he did for the Dead. One of Scher's strategies was to fill in a lot of nights with shows at colleges. The money was not huge but reliable, and there was always a guaranteed core of restless undergraduates who would see any touring band. By the same token, since undergraduates moved on, the JGB rarely played the same colleges year after year.<br />
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<b>December 8, 1977 Palace Theater, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
The JGB returned again to the Palace in Albany for a mid-week show.This was a routing gig for shows in Long Island (Stony Brook Dec 9), DC (Friday Dec 10) and Penn State (Saturday Dec 11). <br />
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<b>March 10, 1978 Auditorium Theater, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
The Spring '78 JGB tour only included one show in Upstate New York. By 1978, however, Garcia was playing the 3,000 seat Auditorium Theater in Rochester on a Saturday night. Now, Garcia/Saunders had played there before (see Nov 17 '74 above), so in a way it wasn't an upward move. Compared to his contemporaries from the 60s, however, Garcia was holding on to his audience, and that was more than most of them were doing.<br />
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<b>May 4, 1978 Bailey Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY: Robert Palmer/Robert Hunter and Comfort</b> (<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/07/robert-hunter-and-comfort-performing.html">Robert Hunter toured the Northeast a few times with his band Comfort</a>. On the second and last go-round, a Commenter reported that Comfort opened for Robert Palmer ("Sneaking Sally Through The Alley" etc) at Cornell ( <span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="http://orgsync.rso.cornell.edu/org/ccc/pastevents5" style="background-color: white; color: #999999; line-height: 20.8px; text-decoration: none;">Confirmed by an interesting link to Cornell rock events</a>). There is a chance that this show replaced New Paltz (below), and may have been May 8.</span></span><br />
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<b>May 7, 1978 [<i>outdoors</i>], SUNY Albany, Albany, NY</b> <b>Bonnie Raitt/ Robert Hunter and Comfort </b>(<i>Sunday afternoon show</i>) <br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/07/robert-hunter-and-comfort-performing.html?showComment=1449039733294#c3860741333122227942">A Commenter (the former Comfort soundman) recalls that this was an outdoor show at SUNY Albany. </a><br />
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<b>May 7, 1978 Field House, Renssalaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY: Grateful Dead</b> (<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
The
Renssalaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy was founded in 1824. Troy is
in the same county as Albany, just up the Hudson from Manhatta. The RPI Field House (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houston_Field_House">now the Houston Field House</a>)was built in 1949, and held about 5,000. Troy filled the gap between a Saturday night show in Burlington, VT (May 6) and Tuesday (May 9) in Syracuse.<br />
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<b>May 8, 1978 [<i>venue</i>], SUNY New Paltz, New Paltz, NY: Robert Hunter and Comfort </b>(<i>Monday</i>)<br />
Robert Hunter's periodic appearances certainly helped make the Grateful Dead an ongoing presence in Central New York, although in this case he was probably overshadowed by an actual Dead tour. This show may have been replaced by Cornell (listed as May 4 '78 above). <br />
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<b>May 9, 1978 Onondaga County War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
A show at Syracuse's War Memorial filled a traditional slot, a weeknight. This time, the Dead were both coming from and returning to New England. Easy driving from New England to Central New York made it an easy choice. <br />
<br />
<b>July 15, 1978 TG's East, Greenwood Lake, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
After Comfort broke up, Hunter toured with just bassist Larry Klein. This was possibly Hunter's best configuration, benefiting from his ability to play anything he could remember while still being anchored by Klein.<br />
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<b>September 22, 1978 Fillmore Room, SUNY Buffalo, Buffalo, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
What was the "Fillmore Room?" Buffalonians, please fill us in [<i><b>update</b>: Buffalo scholar Gary reports that the Fillmore Room was in the student union on the old campus on Main St</i>].<br />
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<b>September 25, 1978 The Jabberwocky, Syracuse, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Monday</i>)<br />
The Jabberwocky was a long-standing folk and rock club in Syracuse. <br />
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<b>November 21, 1978 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
For this tour, a Tuesday night in Rochester helped bridge the gap from Chicago (Friday/Saturday Nov 17-18) and Capitol Center (Thursday Nov 23). <br />
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<b>January 14, 1979 Memorial Coliseum, Utica, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
The Dead had to cancel some November and December 1978 shows due to Garcia's illness. They returned to Utica, which was not really a garden spot in the Winter. <br />
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<b>January 20, 1979 Sheas Buffalo Theater, Buffalo, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
The Grateful Dead began to wind up the Keith and Donna era with a Saturday night show at Shea's Buffalo Theater, at 646 Main Street. The 3,000 lucky patrons who saw the band were treated to the last "Dark Star" of the Keith years.<br />
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<b>May 5, 1979 JB Scott's, Albany, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
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<b>May 9, 1979 Broome County Arena, Binghamton, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
Brent Mydland's debut in Upstate New York was a Wednesday night in Binghamton, between Penn State (Tuesday May 8) and a weekend in New England. <br />
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<b>August 31, 1979 Glens Falls Civic Center, Glenns Falls, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
Glens Falls is above Saratoga, the town farthest north on the Hudson River, straight up I-87. The Grateful Dead had a big Saturday night show in Rochester, followed by Madison Square Garden. Glens Falls filled in the Friday date. My suspicion, unproven, is that Deadheads were starting to travel to shows in New York State in some number from Manhattan and New England.<br />
<br />
Unlike many aging arenas that the band had played, the Glens Falls Civic Center, capacity 4774, was a new building that had just opened in 1979. <br />
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<b>September 1, 1979 Holleder Stadium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead/Greg Kihn Band/Good Rats </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
The Grateful Dead had used Rochester as a tour fill-in for nearly a decade, but by 1979 they had a genuine audience in the region. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holleder_Memorial_Stadium">Holleder Memorial Stadium was an aging football stadium. Built in 1949, it seated 20,000 for football</a>, so it's concert capacity was probably somewhat higher. The opening acts were minor (although Long Island's Good Rats could be counted on to play tasty), so this was just an all-day Grateful Dead show. Rochester was in the rotation now for the Dead, not just a weeknight stop-off.<br />
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<b>November 9, 1979 Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
Buffalo had upgraded, too. Instead of a Monday night booking, here was the Dead playing a Friday night. A lot more people probably filled out the 18,000-capacity arena than would have on a weeknight. <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8tL0EsxEd6qB6nXqEQ-fLPJGQsPK5tCJxu7vQCtzgIEglNRwj6MaEtsnBQUq4oSAeu0RTc0aDPBtExg3V4bY5MKiO9q61v7jV8-Rl84VipdXzIRv0cAYxXkkshV4-mNBFcgh2eHbqT5w/s1600/GD+Dylan+Buffalo+19860704.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1370" data-original-width="879" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8tL0EsxEd6qB6nXqEQ-fLPJGQsPK5tCJxu7vQCtzgIEglNRwj6MaEtsnBQUq4oSAeu0RTc0aDPBtExg3V4bY5MKiO9q61v7jV8-Rl84VipdXzIRv0cAYxXkkshV4-mNBFcgh2eHbqT5w/s320/GD+Dylan+Buffalo+19860704.jpg" width="205" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An ad for the Grateful Dead and Bob Dylan with Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers at Rich Stadium in Buffalo on July 4, 1986</td></tr>
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<i><b>Reaping The Harvest: Upstate and Central New York Touring 1980-95</b></i><br />
The Grateful Dead and the Jerry Garcia Band toured hard from 1980 through 1995. New York State played a big economic role in the Dead's extraordinarily successful touring venture. While cities like Syracuse and Rochester still filed in nights between huge bookings in places like Manhattan and Bosotn, the region became a substantial market in its own right. The rise of the Upstate and Central New York markets was all the more remarkable for the fact the 80s and 90s were essentially a period of decline after the 1980. The economy improved in the 90s, but that improvement was focused on the Sun Belt. No matter--the Dead sold out some very big houses in New York State.<br />
<br />
I have written out all of the Dead, Garcia and related performances (known to me) below, and you can track the history and reflect upon it for yourself. Two interlocking trends are important to understanding how the market evolved in New York State:<br />
<ul>
<li>Deadheads started to travel in bigger numbers in the late 1970s. There had always been a few Heads who traveled, many from Brooklyn. By the late 70s, the numbers of people who had driven outside their own area for a Dead show had increased enormously. I know of only one effort to capture this phenomenon, but it is just one person's story (Grateful Seconds map of his own touring history). There's a lot of great demography yet to be done on this. Once Deadheads started to travel, however, it mattered less whether the band was in, say, Syracuse or Rochester, since people from both cities would go to either.</li>
<li>Starting in mid-1983 (I don't recall exactly when), the Dead started offering tickets to just about all shows on a mail order basis. Suddently, you didn't need to have a friend in another city to stand in line, or hope you could snag one in the lot. Everyone knew weeks in advance what tickets they had, and could now plan accordingly. If you decided you liked the Grateful Dead, you could go full Traveler at your own discretion. This greatly magnified regional audiences. Someone in Boston, for example, might have gone to Hartford without a ticket, but not Rochester. Now, it was wheels up, and it was way more relaxing to road trip to New York state than Manhattan.</li>
</ul>
As a result of these two factors, the shows in the Grateful Dead's main outposts got larger and larger, and ultimately shrank down to two venues in Buffalo and Albany. In the early 80s, there were still weeknight shows in places Niagara Falls or Lake Placid, but there were fewer of those as the band got bigger.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEMZCCSV4JKkJKYVmA29JfGFDGQWV3PhzsQGIF4aZwZ7HEXltBqUQZFYJw9WiE-IcFafHOqgF5AXKHibS9VpAFFxXYinFgEKIOqyknm6_zY6lVMxPT6Bu0NEh3MRPwo6TUzWvGIr5gEIA/s1600/carrier+dome+at+night.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEMZCCSV4JKkJKYVmA29JfGFDGQWV3PhzsQGIF4aZwZ7HEXltBqUQZFYJw9WiE-IcFafHOqgF5AXKHibS9VpAFFxXYinFgEKIOqyknm6_zY6lVMxPT6Bu0NEh3MRPwo6TUzWvGIr5gEIA/s320/carrier+dome+at+night.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Carrier Dome at Syracuse University, built in 1980. It had a capacity of up to 49,000 for football, and almost as much for basketball.</td></tr>
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<i><b>Syracuse</b></i><br />
The Grateful Dead played three shows at Onondaga War Memorial in Syracuse in 1981 and 1982. In the fall of 1982, the band upgraded to the huge Carrier Dome at Syracuse University. The Carrier Dome (Carrier Air Conditioning was a major regional manufacturer) was domed stadium used for both football and basketball. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrier_Dome">The Carrier had opened in 1980, and the football capacity was 49,000</a>. Whatever the exact attendance was for each of these shows, it was way beyond Onandage War Memorial. This booking only makes sense if you realize that people were coming to see the Dead from all over the region. <br />
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<b>September 24, 1982 Carrier Dome, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>October 22, 1983 Carrier Dome, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>October 20, 1984 Carrier Dome, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
The Carrier Dome was huge, centrally located, had plenty of parking and had climate protection. Why didn't the Dead keep playing there? One unique factor to consider was that the Carrier Dome was on a college campus, and was home to both the football and basketball teams at Syracuse. The multi-sport home dates blocked out a lot of weekend dates, and colleges generally do not like to have big outside events on weeknights during much of the school year. Also, I don't know if the Carrier Dome was really designed to be used in the Summer.<br />
<br />
After 1984, the Dead didn't play Syracuse anymore. They did still play Rochester, and they played Buffalo up until the end, so all the Syracuse fans still got to see the band plenty--just not in Syracuse. Syracuse helped the Dead survive the 70s, and helped build the audience, but it lacked the venue to fit how huge the group became.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>November 14, 1993 Onondaga War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<div>
As a fitting coda, however, the Jerry Garcia Band had played all around Syracuse throughout the 1980s, keeping his band on the road between the big gigs. By 1993, the Jerry Garcia Band was so big that they played the Onandoga War Memorial Auditorium themselves on a Sunday.</div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An old postcard featuring Silver Stadium, home of AAA Rochester Red Wings. The stadium was built in 1929, and torn down in 1996. The Grateful Dead played there twice, in 1987 and '88. In 1988, the band drew 31,000 fans, the largest ever attendance at Silver Stadium (baseball capacity 15,0000></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>Rochester</b></i><br />
Rochester is a smaller city than Syracuse, so paradoxically it played a longer role in the Grateful Dead's touring history. From 1980 through 1985, the Dead played Rochester War Memorial Auditorium six times. Four of those six dates were on school nights. The Dead had made themselves a big deal in Rochester after all these years, and unlike a college campus the audience didn't move away. When the Dead had first played War Memorial, the 11,000 capacity might have seemed like a heavy lift, but once Deadheads started to travel, I figure a lot of tickets got sold to Deadheads on the move.<br />
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<b>July 2, 1987 Silver Stadium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
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<b>June 30, 1988 Silver Stadium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)</div>
By 1987, once the Dead hit their first peak, even 11,000 wasn't going to be enough. As we all recall, in 1987 the Dead did a stadium tour with Bob Dylan, just as "Touch Of Grey" was starting to hit. So the Dead needed bookings for their huge rig between a weekend at Alpine Valley (June 26-28) and a July 4 show with Bob Dylan in Foxboro Stadium. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silver_Stadium">Silver Stadium was an old minor league baseball stadium built in 1929, with a baseball capacity of 15,000</a>. The Dead played there on a Thursday night in 1987 and had 30,100.<br />
<br />
The band came back in 1988, bigger than ever. On June 28 the Dead had a huge show at SPAC (see below), and they had a doubleheader coming up at Oxford Plains Speedway in Maine (July 2-3). Silver Stadium got another Thursday night, and this time the band broke every Silver Stadium record with 31,000 attendance. But that was it for Rochester. There wasn't a big enough venue, and Deadheads all roamed about anyway.<br />
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<b>November 20, 1991 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<b>November 4, 1993 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
Just as with Syracuse, Rochester had helped keep the Jerry Garcia Band on the road all those years, but by the 90s the Garcia Band was big enough to play the Community War Memorial.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh7zWE0kF6yamN8C4nbACnYq8ZTJfoQ-6Y6WrzD4ZX2cpf74b0njFXISZGGaTa0YczCWn-xNidcvXVOza8e7INmpYAz8DWTUkvjhXGlDeN73PIrFtzLFYu_iuIYUkqpXVCjNTe-6lp-hE/s1600/spac-in-evening-1024x537.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="537" data-original-width="1024" height="167" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjh7zWE0kF6yamN8C4nbACnYq8ZTJfoQ-6Y6WrzD4ZX2cpf74b0njFXISZGGaTa0YczCWn-xNidcvXVOza8e7INmpYAz8DWTUkvjhXGlDeN73PIrFtzLFYu_iuIYUkqpXVCjNTe-6lp-hE/s320/spac-in-evening-1024x537.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A symphony performance at Saratoga Performing Arts Center (SPAC), in Saratoga Springs, NY. Note that almost none of the audience on the lawn can see the stage. The venue was built for symphony picnics, not rock band shows.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>Up The Hudson: Saratoga Springs and Albany</b></i></div>
<div>
Up until the Spring of '83, the Dead's home in the Southern part of New York State had been Binghamton. Certainly they had played some epic shows there. But there weren't really any big venues there, and the region wasn't thriving in the 1980s anyway. Starting in the Summer of 1983, the Grateful Dead had some huge shows at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saratoga_Performing_Arts_Center">the Saratoga Performing Arts Center</a>,
known by everyone as "SPAC." SPAC is located upstate in Saratoga Springs.
Saratoga Springs is due North of Manhattan, and just 34 miles above
Albany. The facility opened in 1966, and it is the Summer home of both
the New York City Ballet and the Philadelphia Symphony. The amphitheater
has 5000 seats and room on the lawn for 20,000, and in that sense it is
the forerunner of "sheds" like Shoreline Amphitheater. SPAC, however,
has the flat, grassy lawn above the bowl, with no sightline to the
stage.<br />
<br />
By 1983, the Grateful Dead were a big draw in
upstate New York. So just as they had chosen to play the larger Carrier
Dome in Syracuse the previous fall, to cover the Central part of the
state, for Upstate the band was booked at SPAC to accommodate the
greater number of Dead fans in the region. Whatever the expectations
might have been, the show was a roaring success. The Dead returned to
SPAC in 1984, '85 and '88. Even more remarkably, the Dead packed out SPAC on weeknights. I believe the band set some sort of
attendance record for the venue in 1988, but did not return. The oddity
at SPAC was that most of the audience could not see the stage. From 1990
onwards, the Dead played The Knickerbocker Arena in Albany, and that
roughly covered the same region.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGOzfz-YnWuZX0MD0zBOgkHj-amoOAKjwqEOhHAOOOvKFRlEUlNdsuax01qmuAvAZD4IlQlmM9w5ixdc02UguyiJDal3hXTUTRnCBWmrg79-3yNiISB3aeQokbfGTzP9CYcpoNOhNmmqo/s1600/SPAC+lawn+ticket+19830618.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="300" data-original-width="1000" height="96" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGOzfz-YnWuZX0MD0zBOgkHj-amoOAKjwqEOhHAOOOvKFRlEUlNdsuax01qmuAvAZD4IlQlmM9w5ixdc02UguyiJDal3hXTUTRnCBWmrg79-3yNiISB3aeQokbfGTzP9CYcpoNOhNmmqo/s320/SPAC+lawn+ticket+19830618.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A lawn ticket for SPAC on June 24, 1983. The Dead weren't visible on stage from the lawn (I was in seats in the bowl)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>June 18, 1983 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>June 24, 1984 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b><i>(Sunday)</i><b><br /></b><br />
<b>June 27, 1985 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>June 28, 1988 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
A unique detail about the 1983 SPAC show was that it was the only East Coast Grateful Dead show that I attended. I was visiting Manhattan and drove up with some friends. At the time, my only real experience with outdoor Dead shows was Berkeley's Greek Theater, where I had seen all of the 1980s shows up to that time (9 shows). I had a general idea that Grateful Dead audiences had a lot in common, and as we waited for the band to start, while SPAC was far larger than the Greek, the cheerful fans seemed pretty similar to those in Berkeley.<br />
<br />
Once the Dead came on stage and opened up with "Bertha, " however, the crowd absolutely lost their mind and went completely crazy, cheering at the top of their lungs. I turned to my Manhattan friend and said "everybody is completely nuts!" He waved his hand at me, and said calmly, "oh, this is nothing, you should see Philadelphia." The East Coast and the West Coast Dead crowds were very different animals at this time.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFIOSfgHFLzuh8bVx8rWRBrN3zriu-ZjqiLedW8Hf6LpC2nfK-XZd-TEludEj0MCyEC-9PfBeGzZnyvQB-PVbkbYWpt8gKRua4WYr9UZxqBe4r0NqvCkpQzqlYHTCaCDKZT48q0cEwFok/s1600/knickerbocker.albany.TimesUnionCenter.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="310" data-original-width="640" height="155" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFIOSfgHFLzuh8bVx8rWRBrN3zriu-ZjqiLedW8Hf6LpC2nfK-XZd-TEludEj0MCyEC-9PfBeGzZnyvQB-PVbkbYWpt8gKRua4WYr9UZxqBe4r0NqvCkpQzqlYHTCaCDKZT48q0cEwFok/s320/knickerbocker.albany.TimesUnionCenter.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Knickerbocker Arena in Albany, NY, opened in 1990. The Grateful Dead played the venue thirteen times.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>Albany</b></i><br />
Albany is the capital of New York State, just over two hours (135 miles) due North up the Hudson from Manhattan. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Times_Union_Center">The Knickerbocker Arena opened in early 1990</a>, and the Dead moved in almost immediately to take it over. The band played 13 concerts there in six years, and the Jerry Garcia Band played there in 1991 and '93. The Knick had a capacity of 15,000, but it was a good venue for a multi-night run. From the point of view of the venue, the Dead were often booked on weeknights, so they hardly interfered with other events. It did mean, ironically, that Albany was taking over the role held by Rochester and Syracuse in the past, profitable routing gigs to keep the wheels turning.<br />
<br />
Given Deadheads propensity to road trip by the 1990s, Albany was a reasonable drive from Brooklyn, Syracuse, New England or Philadelphia, particularly if you were planning to stay three nights. Albany became the headquarters for Upstate Grateful Dead shows, just as Buffalo became the locus for Central New York.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHRZi-CCT2BU8FvGrBN-qtWyLsNNZVWpB3ahVGlLS5i0G_hJyiySsHkX3qclyat209Wejm_MofJrvhVTT477gii67tyTTWONvSwYVq0-5mc1d8VyaEqBcCzVhsHLJ5FJ4YTcXoU9bqqTs/s1600/GD+Albany+19900324.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="290" data-original-width="600" height="154" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHRZi-CCT2BU8FvGrBN-qtWyLsNNZVWpB3ahVGlLS5i0G_hJyiySsHkX3qclyat209Wejm_MofJrvhVTT477gii67tyTTWONvSwYVq0-5mc1d8VyaEqBcCzVhsHLJ5FJ4YTcXoU9bqqTs/s320/GD+Albany+19900324.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<b>March 24-26, 1990 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sat>Sun>Mon</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>March 23-25, 1991 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sat>Sun>Mon</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>November 16, 1991 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Sat</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>June 11-12, 1992 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thurs>Fri</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>March 27-29, 1993 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sat>Sun>Mon</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>November 3, 1993 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wed</i>)<b><br /></b><br />
<b>June 21-22, 1995 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Wed>Thur</i>)<br />
<br />
<i><b>Truckin' Up To Buffalo</b></i><br />
Rochester, Syracuse and Buffalo were the most important cities in Central New York for building the Grateful Dead audience. In the 70s, gigs in those cities kept the Dead on the road, so they get those big paydays in New York, Boston, Philly and DC. Come the early 80s, however, Syracuse and Rochester became much more important than Buffalo. Much of that was just demography. In 1970, Buffalo had had a population of 462,768, but by 1990 it was just 328, 123. For contrast, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Raleigh--all in the Sun Belt--all doubled in population during the same period. Yet the biggest gis in the history of the Grateful Dead in Central New York were in Buffalo, long after the band had sized out of Syracuse and Rochester.<br />
<br />
The Carrier Dome seemed to offer a good Central State home for the Dead, but conflicts with the sports schedule and the college calendar caused problems. By the late 1980s, however, Deadheads traveled in large numbers, and none more that Northeasterners who had started the road tripping tradition decades earlier. Deadheads were going to go to the show. All that mattered were available tickets and parking.<br />
<br />
Rich Stadium, home of the Buffalo Bills, opened in 1973 in Orchard Park, a nearby suburb of Buffalo. It had a football capacity of 80,000, and more importantly, as an NFL stadium it was empty during the Summer. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Era_Field#Concerts">As a result, from 1974 to 2001, the era of stadium shows, a lot of big shows played Rich Stadium</a>. For the Dead, it worked great. It was in easy striking distance of Syracuse and Rochester, for one thing. I also think, without any direct evidence, that Canadian fans from Toronto and Ontario came to Buffalo in great numbers. There would have been plenty of parking.<br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead's first show in Buffalo was in 1970, in a concert hall, booked with the Buffalo Symphony. Their last show in Buffalo was 23 years later, playing a packed football stadium, headlining over a popular singer with numerous hits. Pretty much, that's the story of the Grateful Dead in Upstate and Central New York.<br />
<br />
<div>
<b>July 4, 1986 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Bob Dylan with Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers/Grateful Dead</b> (<i>Friday</i>)<b> </b><br />
<b>July 4, 1989 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/10,000 Maniacs </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<b> </b><br />
<b>July 16, 1990 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/Crosby, Stills and Nash </b>(<i>Monday</i>)<b> </b><br />
<b>June 6, 1992 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/Steve Miller Band </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<b> </b><br />
<b>June 13, 1993 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/Sting </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<b> </b><br />
<b>November 5, 1993 Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b><i>(Friday)</i><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0MqHTqAupYExWLVFvXVbeVGbcTu-LXCbJhmZWi1_N2jEhXPUgg21WMXt2Tegg16qcaG_EQa91RjqNcX4W-_djCNgBEOAYZgrb6Cz2RmHG015c9FtfVWR4I4exkPiLe3IGdXliOj-suO0/s1600/Glens+Falls+Civic+Center.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="450" data-original-width="600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0MqHTqAupYExWLVFvXVbeVGbcTu-LXCbJhmZWi1_N2jEhXPUgg21WMXt2Tegg16qcaG_EQa91RjqNcX4W-_djCNgBEOAYZgrb6Cz2RmHG015c9FtfVWR4I4exkPiLe3IGdXliOj-suO0/s320/Glens+Falls+Civic+Center.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Glens Falls Civic Center, in Glens Falls, NY, opened in 1979 (capacity 4,774)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>Roll Call: Grateful Dead Appearances in Upstate and Central New York, 1980-1995</b></i></div>
<div>
In this post, I have attempted to list every performance by the Grateful Dead and its members that was North or West of New York City (Westchester, Suffolk and Long Island are worthy of posts on their own, of course). Since I took an overview above, the balance of the post is a llist of the rest of the shows. I have put a few comments on certain events or venues, but I didn't want to repeat the same comment over and over.</div>
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<div>
<br />
If you have additions, corrections, insights or uninformed speculation about any of these shows, please add them in the Comments. I'm not only interested in missing dates, but accurate venue names (of college gyms for example) and openng acts. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigbrZ6QYm1eQFJjPYOl46LWV3YLfOufH6ZxsRm9hm9_oo9EP692eNIAlum4-KX3Oh9k5sxgIjOKv1noSNx7WgOH71VD1OObOMvyJxCGCEMRfmzA97anaURZZlVBOXgIMpGeK9nIWxPEX0/s1600/JGB+SUNY+Oswego+19800217.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="750" data-original-width="540" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigbrZ6QYm1eQFJjPYOl46LWV3YLfOufH6ZxsRm9hm9_oo9EP692eNIAlum4-KX3Oh9k5sxgIjOKv1noSNx7WgOH71VD1OObOMvyJxCGCEMRfmzA97anaURZZlVBOXgIMpGeK9nIWxPEX0/s320/JGB+SUNY+Oswego+19800217.jpg" width="230" /></a></div>
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<b>February 13, 1980 Palace Theater, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band/Rachel Sweet </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<b>February 17, 1980 Laker Hall, SUNY Oswego, Oswego, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oswego_Canal">Oswego is on Lake Ontario</a>, roughly between Rochester and Syracuse, and not far from Utica. Although the show would have been primarily aimed at students at SUNY Oswego, dedicated Garcia fans from those surrounding cities would have insured that the show was well attended. As the Grateful Dead became a larger attraction in Central New York, Garcia and Weir tended to be booked in smaller cities or college towns around the major cities.<br />
<br />
<b>February 19, 1980 Landmark Theater, Syracuse, NY: Jerry Garcia Band/Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
By this time, bassist Larry Klein was no longer touring with Hunter. From this point onward, Hunter's East Coast appearances were all solo.<br />
<br />
<b>May 7, 1980 Barton Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>May 8, 1980 Glens Falls Civic Center, Glens Falls, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>July 27, 1980 Palace Theater, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>September 2, 1980 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>March 13, 1981 Utica Memorial Auditorium, Utica, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>May 5, 1981 Glens Falls Civic Center, Glens Falls, NY: Grateful Dead</b> (<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>May 16, 1981 Barton Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
The Grateful Dead made their third and final appearance at Barton Hall. Remember, even if you were a freshman in May 1977, if you were making normative time you would have graduated by Spring semester '81. <br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>May 17, 1981 Onondaga War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>September 26, 1981 Buffalo Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>November 1, 1981 Tuttle North Gym, SUNY Brockport, Brockport, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
Brockport is just East of Rochester, and near Lake Ontario. When the Garcia Band played colleges in these areas, they were both encouraging new young converts while still providing a fix for the fans in the region. The Grateful Dead were no longer hip in 1981, by any accounting, but even established Deadheads were still not that old, so playing colleges was still a viable commercial strategy.<br />
<br />
<b>November 4, 1981 Palace Theater, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDBWJl5QfAV5p8-ntFmYNfmebBJgcF9HTnvyBk0EZqrr1EbaMQdIyT3FgQR0gdav0g0nY1UuNAW1XX_QgNdJjntMKKV8BPL7WNpYDwv5B0nB6PdxbDxI4SIlwWNts2HY1MSs5WR-iK0FE/s1600/Wier+Rochester+19820211.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="384" data-original-width="900" height="136" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDBWJl5QfAV5p8-ntFmYNfmebBJgcF9HTnvyBk0EZqrr1EbaMQdIyT3FgQR0gdav0g0nY1UuNAW1XX_QgNdJjntMKKV8BPL7WNpYDwv5B0nB6PdxbDxI4SIlwWNts2HY1MSs5WR-iK0FE/s320/Wier+Rochester+19820211.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<b>February 11, 1982 Auditorium Theater, Rochester, NY: Bobby And The Midnites/Joan Jett and The Blackhearts </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
It's fashionable these days to make fun of Bobby And The Midnites. The fact is, they were a great live band. Also, to the extent that there was a "Deadhead community," it was pretty undeveloped outside of places like Brooklyn and Berkeley. So seeing an actual member of the Dead at your local auditorium was a chance to connect with other like-minded souls.<br />
<br />
<b>April 8, 1982 Onondaga War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>April 9, 1982 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
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<br /></div>
<div>
<b>April 14, 1982 Glens Falls Civic Center, Glens Falls, NY: Grateful Dead</b> (<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>June 16, 1982 Music Mountain, South Fallsburg, NY: Jerry Garcia Band/Bobby And The Midnites (</b><i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
The
Garcia Band took one stab pairing themselves on tour with Bobby And The
Midnites. It's my impression that this was a fairly substantial show.
South Fallsburg is genuinely "upstate," pretty far up NY-17 (NW off I-87), and not near
any big cities. Garcia opened the show and let Weir close, his common
practice in the Bay Area. As it happened, it poured with rain during the
Bobby And The Midnites set.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<b>June 30, 1982 Auditorium Theater, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia and John Kahn </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>September 24, 1982 Carrier Dome, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>October 12, 1982 Red Creek Inn, Rochester, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
Throughout the mid-80s, Hunter played some clubs in the bigger cities in Central New York. Despite, or perhaps because, the gatherings were so intimate, I think Hunter's periodic presence did a lot to keep the flag flying. Hunter would periodically play songs that had been completely unheard live by almost all Deadheads, like "Easy Wind" or "Mason's Children," and it set him apart from the other Dead spinoff groups.<br />
<br />
<b>October 24, 1982 Clark Gym, SUNY Buffalo, Buffalo, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
Was Hunter billed with another act for this show?<br />
<br />
<b>October 26, 1982 The Landmark, Kingston, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
Kingston is upstate on I-87, on the Hudson River, between Poughkeepsie and the Catskills.<br />
<br />
<b>March 10, 1983 The Chance, Poughkeepsie, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
Poughkeepsie is about 85 miles due North of Manhattan, straight up the Hudson River.<br />
<br />
<b>April 12, 1983 Broome County Arena, Binghamton, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
The Grateful Dead make their last appearance in Binghamton. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>April 15, 1983 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>May 25, 1983 Shea's Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>May 26, 1983 Auditorium Theater, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia and John Kahn </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGt_mzCtFf_4axLhOJ8f3Kdb519lUSL3BM6Fhtv7-8ncpQBG_BRw8oKDyguzgPZ8lKqg_eZ5W0yBlUibf6dAPgnOSYGjlrnk-fYc5MrXHgRBOqX6gTdYBRJEMYM-QfkGBiVkmo5LODuEY/s1600/The+Chance+Poughkeepsie+June+1983.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1165" data-original-width="1600" height="233" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGt_mzCtFf_4axLhOJ8f3Kdb519lUSL3BM6Fhtv7-8ncpQBG_BRw8oKDyguzgPZ8lKqg_eZ5W0yBlUibf6dAPgnOSYGjlrnk-fYc5MrXHgRBOqX6gTdYBRJEMYM-QfkGBiVkmo5LODuEY/s320/The+Chance+Poughkeepsie+June+1983.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Some pretty good bands played The Chance in Poughkeepsie in June 1983. Still, it was a pretty small place fot the JGB to play, even with double shows on a Saturday night.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>June 4, 1983 Chance Theater, Poughkeepsie, NY: Jerry Garcia Band/Rick Danko </b>(<i>Saturday early and late shows</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>June 8, 1983 Chance Theater, Poughkeepsie, NY: Bobby And The Midnites </b>(Wednesday)<br />
<br />
<b>June 18, 1983 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>August 20, 1983 J. Bee's Rock III, Middletown, NY: Robert Hunter</b> (<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
Middletown is on I-84, near the New Jersey border.<br />
<br />
<b>October 17, 1983 Olympic Arena, Lake Placid, NY: Grateful Dead</b> (<i>Monday</i>)<br />
Lake
Placid had been the site of the 1980 Winter Olympics. It was pretty far
North and East, near to both Montreal and Vermont. The venue would have
been within easy driving distance of Rochester, Syracuse, Albany and
New England. The Olympic Arena was a 7,700-capacity multi-use arena,
built for the Olympics. The Monday night show was in between a weekend
in Hartford (Oct 14-15) and a two-night booking in Worcester (Oct
20-21). In between, the band played Monday (Oct 17) at Lake Placid and
Tuesday (Oct 18) in Portland, ME. Since October 17 was a Monday, the
show was aimed at getting fans from the surrounding area, rather than
locally, since relatively speaking, not many people lived in Lake
Placid. Since the Grateful Dead had just initiated obtaining tickets by
mail, it was finally easy for East Coast fans to get tickets without
special connections.<br />
<br />
<b>October 22, 1983 Carrier Dome, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>October 23, 1983 Ben Light Gymnasium, Ithaca College, Ithaca, NY: Bobby And The Midnites </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>October 25, 1983 Shea's Theater, Buffalo, NY: Bobby And The Midnites </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
Hot Tuna was booked as well, but canceled because Jorma was ill.<br />
<br />
<b>November 26, 1983 Broome County Forum Theatre, Binghamton, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<b>December 11, 1983 Laker Hall, SUNY Oswego, Oswego, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>March 31, 1984 Coleman's, Rome, NY: Robert Hunter</b> (<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>April 1, 1984 Paradise Saloon, Syracuse, NY: Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>April 16, 1984 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>April 17, 1984 Niagara Falls Convention Center, Niagara Falls, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
Niagara
Falls was West of Rochester and North of Buffalo. It was also in
relatively easy range of Toronto and Ontario. Once again, the Dead
served local fans while remaining in easy driving distance of any
established fans. The band had played two nights in Hampton (Apr 13-14)
and were heading to The Spectrum in Philadelphia for three shows (April
19-21). In between, the Dead played and Rochester on Monday (Apr 16) and
Niagara Falls on Tuesday (Apr 17).<br />
<br />
<b>June 24, 1984 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>July 22, 1984 Red Creek Inn, Rochester, NY: Robert Hunter</b> (<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>August 15, 1984 Orange County Community College, Middletown, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
Middletown is a city in Orange County, New York, United States. It lies in New York's Hudson Valley region, near the Wallkill River and the foothills of the Shawangunk Mountains. Middletown is situated between Port Jervis and Newburgh, New York, near the Hudson River. Middletown is on the Port Jervis Line to Hoboken, so at least hypothetically commutable to Manhattan, if you took PATH. Realistically, however, it's upstate.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>August 24,1984 Festival Tent, Monroe County Fairgrounds, Henrietta, NY: Bobby And The Midnites </b>(<i>Friday</i>)<br />
Henrietta is just 20 minutes South of Rochester, so while in a way this was a new city, it drew from the same pool of Rochester Deadheads who had probably seen the band on multiple occasions.<br />
<br />
<b>October 20, 1984 Carrier Dome, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>November 27, 1984 Auditorium Theater, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia and John Kahn/Robert Hunter </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>June 27, 1985 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>August 6, 1985 The Casablanca, Rochester, NY: Kokomo </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
Kokomo featured Brent Mydland and Bill Kreutzmann. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/10/kokomo-with-brent-mydland-and-bill.html">I am the only person to try and tell the Kokomo story, such as it is</a>. By the next year, the band had evolved into Go Ahead.<br />
<br />
<b>November 7-8, 1985 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday-Friday</i>)<br />
<div>
<b><br /></b></div>
<div>
<b>July 4, 1986 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Bob Dylan with Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers/Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>October 8, 1986 USA Sam's, North Syracuse, NY: Go Ahead </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)</div>
<div>
Go Ahead featured Brent Mydland and Bill Kreutzmann. They toured pretty steadily in late Summer and Fall '86, when everyone was worried about Garcia's recovery from his coma. <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2012/11/go-ahead-with-brent-mydland-and-bill.html">Go Ahead was a pretty good band, and they are extremely fondly remembered, as the Comment Thread on my history will tell you.</a><br />
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>October 10, 1986 Trafalmadore Cafe, Buffalo, NY: Go Ahead </b>(<i>Friday</i>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>October 11, 1986 The Warehouse, Rochester, NY: Go Ahead </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<br />
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<b>October 26, 1986 Trafalmadore Cafe, Buffalo, NY: Robert Hunter </b><i>(Sunday)</i></div>
</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>July 2, 1987 Silver Stadium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>June 28, 1988 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Tuesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<div>
<b>June 30, 1988 Silver Stadium, Rochester, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday</i>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<div>
<b>July 4, 1989 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/10,000 Maniacs</b> (<i>Tuesday</i>)</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>March 24-26, 1990 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday/Sunday/Monday</i>)<br />
<br />
<div>
<b>July 16, 1990 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/Crosby, Stills and Nash </b>(<i>Monday</i>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>March 23-25, 1991 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday/Sunday/Monday</i>)<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Jul 13, 1991 Darien Lake Performing Arts Center, Darien Lake, NY: Hot Tuna/Bob Weir And Rob Wasserman </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<a href="http://darienlakepac.net/">The Darien Lakes Performing Arts Center is part of an amusement park</a>. <a href="https://www.darienlake.com/">Darien Lake is 40 mi East of Buffalo,</a> and stands as farthest west any member of the Grateful Dead has played in New York State save for Buffalo proper.<br />
<br />
<b>September 29, 1991 Palace Theater, Albany, NY: Bob Weir and Rob Wasserman </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>November 16, 1991 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>November 20, 1991 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<div>
<b>June 6, 1992 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/Steve Miller Band </b>(<i>Saturday</i>)</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>June 11-12, 1992 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Thursday/Friday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>July 22, 1992 Empire Court, Syracuse, NY: Bob Weir and Rob Wasserman </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<div>
<b>March 27-29, 1993 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Saturday/Sunday/Monday</i>)<br />
<br />
<div>
<b>June 13, 1993 Rich Stadium, Orchard Park, NY: Grateful Dead/Sting </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)</div>
</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>November 3, 1993 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Wednesday</i>)<br />
<br />
<b>November 4, 1993 Community War Memorial Auditorium, Rochester, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(Thursday)<br />
<br />
<b>November 5, 1993 Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, Buffalo, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b><i>(Friday)</i></div>
<div>
<b><br /></b>
<b>November 14, 1993 Onondaga War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: Jerry Garcia Band </b>(<i>Sunday</i>)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<b>June 21-22, 1995 Knickerbocker Arena, Albany, NY: Grateful Dead </b>(<i>Wednesday/Thursday</i>)<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSnR9L2Ex0dsR5nfzILy30TaCWbLeGO3PciNC7gvLie2tPXh65fbZaLi8sXZzqw1sUEu6V6gCz48jmJvyS_wCTUC3QCv-Rbmf1TiGan40Dr-jZV60VzbuEs1sBHGUfOPDKDLxrIP_BfBY/s1600/The_Stylus_Brockport_N_Y_1914_current_March_07_1974_Page_9_Image_9_NYS_Historic_Newspapers.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="545" data-original-width="424" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSnR9L2Ex0dsR5nfzILy30TaCWbLeGO3PciNC7gvLie2tPXh65fbZaLi8sXZzqw1sUEu6V6gCz48jmJvyS_wCTUC3QCv-Rbmf1TiGan40Dr-jZV60VzbuEs1sBHGUfOPDKDLxrIP_BfBY/s320/The_Stylus_Brockport_N_Y_1914_current_March_07_1974_Page_9_Image_9_NYS_Historic_Newspapers.png" width="248" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The New Riders played SUNY Brockport on April 5, 1974 (thanks to <a href="http://www.gratefulseconds.com/">Grateful Seconds</a> for the ad from The Stylus)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>Appendix: New Riders Of The Purple Sage Upstate New York Performances, 1972-74</b></i><br />
I know no one thinks I try and keep these posts from getting out of hand, but really I do. The New Riders of The Purple Sage were managed by Jon McIntire up through 1973, and booked by Sam Cutler's Out Of Town Tours until early 1974. So the New Riders were both beneficiaries and participants in the Dead's booking strategy in Upstate New York. The symbiotic connection between the Dead and the Riders meant that NRPS appearances also represented a gathering of the tribe, if a somewhat smaller one. Without writing another 4000 more words, here are the known NRPS dates from 1972-74. If anyone has additions or corrections, please add them in the Comments. <br />
<br />
<b><b>April 12, 1972 Clark Gym, SUNY Buffalo, Buffalo, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage/Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen </b><i> 2 shows 8 & 11:30</i> <br /></b></div><div><b>April 13, 1972 Field House, LeMoyne College, Syracuse, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>April 14, 1972 Proctor's Theater, Schenectady, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>November 29, 1972 Palace Theater, Albany, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage/Eric Andersen</b><br />
<b>December 2, 1972 [<i>venue</i>], SUNY Binghamton, Binghamton, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>December 12, 1972, [<i>Elting Gym</i>], SUNY New Paltz, New Paltz, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>September 6, 1973 Palace Theater, Albany, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>October 12, 1973 The Palestra, U. of Rochester, Rochester, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>November 17, 1973 Reid Athletic Center, Colgate University, Hamilton, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
Note that the New Riders had tried out playing at Colgate, under the aegis of Sam Cutler, four years before the November 4, 1977 show (above). So the Dead weren't entirely leaping into the unknown when they booked that date.<b></b><br />
<b></b><br />
<b>November 26, 1973 Onondaga War Memorial Auditorium, Syracuse, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage/Eric Andersen</b><br />
<b>April 5, 1974 Gym, SUNY Brockport, Brockport, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>April 6, 1974 Bailey Hall, Cornell U, Ithaca, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<a href="http://nrps.net/music/history.html">The NRPS Archive site lists Barton Hall</a>, but I find it more likely that the Riders played the much smaller Bailey Hall (built 1912, capacity 1328). <br />
<b>April 19, 1974 [<i>venue</i>], Buffalo, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>April 21, 1974 [<i>venue</i>], SUNY Fredonia, Fredonia, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage/Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen</b><br />
<b>September 14, 1974 [<i>venue</i>], SUNY Morrisville, Morrisville, NY: New Riders of The Purlpe Sage</b><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmRvJnbywkX5jFSszBkM0NnPNTX_m__l00CyGCSPh9_8oWIz-C3z09BGO04idlJr43s0l4atnkW7-MIon7tHYpz2Q8XzjzjulfNEdvIa5BeUD46xK7GgJ9RadG8W1Mgl72_m_Ri20UYmk/s1600/nrps+Rockland+19741123.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="457" data-original-width="320" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmRvJnbywkX5jFSszBkM0NnPNTX_m__l00CyGCSPh9_8oWIz-C3z09BGO04idlJr43s0l4atnkW7-MIon7tHYpz2Q8XzjzjulfNEdvIa5BeUD46xK7GgJ9RadG8W1Mgl72_m_Ri20UYmk/s320/nrps+Rockland+19741123.jpg" width="224" /></a></div>
<b>November 23, 1974 Fieldhouse, Rockland Community College, Ramapo, NY: New Riders of The Purple Sage/Waylon Jennings</b></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com22tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-25051933091018005262020-05-08T11:50:00.004-07:002021-11-04T15:49:19.918-07:00Mystery Shows 1965-70 (Really Lost Live Dead)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDV3DdzTThTkbO8ITfyQ4u45tgUH9xeF0SmZXsHH-zZj0KCqbZRh65MtZQyYAA5Q5-PpKNSxCbpX9dQ_YMc5NSjSMQDjNdH8WAAj17IYg9O_msiwTCArkFTratQYMXs9SCTCXdftSgzpQ/s1600/795+Willow+Ave-1+20160918.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="747" data-original-width="999" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDV3DdzTThTkbO8ITfyQ4u45tgUH9xeF0SmZXsHH-zZj0KCqbZRh65MtZQyYAA5Q5-PpKNSxCbpX9dQ_YMc5NSjSMQDjNdH8WAAj17IYg9O_msiwTCArkFTratQYMXs9SCTCXdftSgzpQ/s320/795+Willow+Ave-1+20160918.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr align="left"><td class="tr-caption"><i>The former Menlo Park Veterans Hospital, at 795 Willow Road. This old building is all that remained in 2018 from when Ken Kesey worked there as a night orderly. </i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
One of the purposes of this blog has been to identify known information about seemingly lost live Grateful Dead performances, and in so doing, provide a platform to collect pieces of information from different people all around the world. It speaks to the power of the Internet that, for example, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/03/november-22-1970-middlesex-county.html">a plausible but unconfirmed listing from New Jersey in 1970 can be buttressed by long unnoticed comments in other journals and Comments from apparent eyewitnesses</a>. All sorts of uncertainty about some live Grateful Dead shows had been greatly reduced, if not actually eliminated, thanks to input from interested readers.<br />
<br />
However, readers cannot contribute their information if they are not given a platform. I have tried not to create a post without some context, not just a piece of information but some other supporting evidence that at least suggests a show was a somewhat plausible occurrence. Nonetheless, over the years I have come across some information that is plausible but cannot be proved or disproved. My idea for this post is to list a few of these possible shows, in the hopes that someone has something to add. Since these events only have one data point, I have decided to combine them into one post, in the hopes that there may be some supporting information for at least one of these events.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifObPRPpZMpulRSGM6ysxbPnqwdHe9C7be6OEgx4ZotIRblXOGN06plV4gCsr-3JL7ba5ufftEb5FQSJgdRha5PqWl-ta5a4_PEOO0ZGANdwX06PaYsmBI7PqFRuJP8cMYpK_NvMJ8KO8/s1600/SFC19670211.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="186" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifObPRPpZMpulRSGM6ysxbPnqwdHe9C7be6OEgx4ZotIRblXOGN06plV4gCsr-3JL7ba5ufftEb5FQSJgdRha5PqWl-ta5a4_PEOO0ZGANdwX06PaYsmBI7PqFRuJP8cMYpK_NvMJ8KO8/s320/SFC19670211.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An ad for The Dragon A-Go-Go in San Francisco, albeit from the February 11, 1967 SF <i>Chronicle</i>. The Liverpool Five were an English band on RCA, though not actually from Liverpool.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Fall 1965: Dragon A-Go-Go, 49 Wentworth Alley, San Francisco, CA: The Warlocks</b><br />
I was fortunate enough to meet one of the earliest fans of The Warlocks, and she was full of fascinating tales. Among other things, she told me that i<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/09/summer-1965-top-of-tangent-117.html">n the earliest days of The Warlocks, with no place to play in the Summer of 1965, they would simply show up at Wednesday night at The Top Of The Tangent, just like when Garcia had been a banjo player.</a> Hitherto, no one had known about these shows, because no one had asked. She also sorted out some confusing details about a Warlocks' show at Menlo College, not far from Magoo's Pizza, where they had debuted.<br />
<br />
I also asked her if she recalled any other places The Warlocks might have played, and she speculated that they may have played a place in Chinatown called The Dragon A-Go-Go. Now, she was very clear--one of the reasons I found her memories of The Tangent and Menlo College so believable--that she had been to Dragon A-Go-Go many times, and she wasn't certain if she had actually seen The Warlocks there. If she did, it was a sort of audition for the band, and they probably must have flunked, since groups typically played Dragon A-Go-Go for at least a week at a time.<br />
<br />
Nonetheless, here's the scoop on the Dragon A-Go-Go. In the mid-60s, rock music was seen as a strictly teenage phenomenon. One response to this was clubs that allowed teenagers. In some cases, people over 20 were not even allowed (I don't know if they really checked IDs). In this case, based on the ads, it appeared that 18 year olds were welcome, so my suspicion was that high school students a bit younger could get in as well. Probably beer was available for adults, since the club was attached to a restaurant.<br />
<br />
My eyewitness liked to dance, and she liked to go to the Dragon A-Go-Go. Her favorite band to go see there was called The Liverpool Five, a popular but somewhat forgotten English band who cashed in on the Beatles craze. The Liverpool Five were actually from England, though not from
Liverpool, and had two albums on RCA in 1966 and 1967. They toured
America pretty steadily and were apparently a pretty good live band. <br />
<br />
<a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/12/49-wentworth-alley-san-francisco-dragon.html">The Dragon A' Go-Go was in San Francisco's Chinatown, at 49 Wentworth Alley near the intersection of Grant and Washington.</a> Although Chinatown was a genuine and long-standing community of
immigrant Chinese and Chinese-Americans, commercially Chinatown was
geared towards tourists. In the 1960s, Chinese restaurants were not
common in most places, and good ones were even less common, so Chinatown
made San Francisco an exotic and attractive destination. Since
Chinatown was in walking distance of both the Financial District and
North Beach (if you don't mind a few hills), it was accessible to the
majority of San Francisco visitors. Chinatown was an appealing
destination for families from the suburbs looking to spend a fun evening
in the City, because it was exotic and fun, but easy to get to.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/12/49-wentworth-alley-san-francisco-dragon.html?showComment=1265402821935#c6673953567807891172">The proprietor of Dragon A-Go-Go was Louis Chin. The club was in the basement of a restaurant called Kuo Wah, having replaced a nightclub called The Lion's Den</a>. The club seems to have been open from 1965 until at least 1970. Among the groups that played there were The Beau Brummels, The Outfit, The Frantics (whose members went on to form Moby Grape) and The Whispers. Some time after the Dragon A-Go-Go closed, Chin went on the open a club in San Francisco called Soul Train, with partners Don Cornelius and Dick Griffey (Cornelius was host of the famous <i>Soul Train</i> TV show). The addresss of Soul Train was 412 Broadway, later well known to Deadheads as The Stone.<br />
<br />
Did The Warlocks audition at Dragon A-Go-Go? They could have. My correspondent couldn't be sure, but I'm hoping someone out there has a shred of a rumor we can work with. The Dragon was professionally part of the North Beach circuit, so it would fit that The Warlocks would try to get a gig there, even if it didn't work out. I have seen many ads in the SF <i>Chronicle</i> for Dragon A Go Go, but they would never list audition bands, just the headliner, so unless The Warlocks played a full engagement, it's unlikely there would be an ad or listing with their name.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEif3QRew5rU6kfSbFFrvL8FlJ4bW5IjMO-mQv1mEJmJaBxUgir1qT_DlL69BTxwHOW0exX2YLCh4JkdxeC6a9W6dSvnVRHF5li12nPVqXhb65e-1PUabQAHD-QBkeuXmZtD-VYSfqeSjXc/s1600/American+Legion+Hall+SL+Tahoe.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEif3QRew5rU6kfSbFFrvL8FlJ4bW5IjMO-mQv1mEJmJaBxUgir1qT_DlL69BTxwHOW0exX2YLCh4JkdxeC6a9W6dSvnVRHF5li12nPVqXhb65e-1PUabQAHD-QBkeuXmZtD-VYSfqeSjXc/s1600/American+Legion+Hall+SL+Tahoe.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The American Legion Hall, at 2758 South Lake Tahoe Blvd [US 50], in South Lake Tahoe, CA</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Fall 1966: American Legion Hall, South Lake Tahoe, CA: The Grateful Dead</b><br />
Many families in both the Bay Area and the Sacramento/Central Valley
area would buy or rent second homes in Lake Tahoe, East of San Francisco, and they would spend
much of the Summer and many Winter weekends at Tahoe. Part of Lake
Tahoe's specialness was that it was a great resort for both Summer and
Winter. After 1960, when the Winter Olympics were held at nearby Squaw
Valley, Lake Tahoe boomed again, particularly for Winter sports. Since
the Lake was on the California/Nevada border, parents could go over to
the Nevada side and gamble, leaving their teenage kids to fend for
themselves.<br />
<br />
The first person to catch on to the vast quantity of teenagers in Lake
Tahoe was a guitarist named Jim Burgett. He started putting on dances at
the South Lake Tahoe American Legion Hall (at 2748 Lake Tahoe Blvd [US 50],
South Lake Tahoe, CA) in 1958. The story is complicated, but <a href="http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=138691289481646&set=a.138691156148326.24853.138690952815013">by the mid-60s Burgett was holding dances at the Legion Hall seven days a week from Memorial Day to Labor Day</a>.
For any teenagers spending a week, a month or a Summer in Lake Tahoe,
every night was Friday night, and with the parents often away in Nevada
anyway, the Legion Hall dances were the only show in town. Burgett's own
band played most nights, but on occasion he hired out of town acts as
well. When the Fillmore bands became popular, he would often hire them
to give his own band a night off (Burgett also played six days a week at
Harrah's Tahoe, believe it or not). <a href="http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jim-Burgett/138690952815013">The Jim Burgett saga is amazing, and well worthy of a book, which fortunately he is planning to write</a>. <br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead played an epically memorable show for Burgett at the American Legion Hall in South Lake Tahoe on August 19, 1967, followed by a weekend on the opposite side of the lake. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/11/august-19-25-26-1967-grateful-dead-lake.html">I have written about both the Legion Hall show and the shows at Kings Beach Bowl on North Shore on the weekend of August 25-26, 1967, at some length</a>. However, there was another little piece to the Lake Tahoe puzzle that got somewhat lost in the shuffle.<br />
<br />
Poking around the web on various message boards and comment threads, one
finds that numerous people have fond memories of the Lake Tahoe scene,
particularly Jim Burgett's dances at the American Legion Hall. However,
one commentator piqued my interest, and although like all internet
comments they have to be considered with some reservations, it's a
fascinating tidbit. Specifically, an old Tahoe hippie recalls seeing
the Grateful Dead at the American Legion Hall in the Fall of 1966, well
after Labor Day. There were less than 50 people present, and it was so
laid back that Pigpen actually wore guns on stage, in an old West styled
holster.<br />
<br />
This crazy story is not as far fetched as it sounds. Jim Burgett was
kind enough to respond to a few questions, and he told me that while he
held the master lease to the American Legion Hall, outside of the
Memorial Day to Labor Day window he often leased it to outside
promoters. In many cases, Burgett and his band were on tour, so Burgett
only had a general idea of what was being presented at at the Legion
Hall (he knew a concert promoter would be using it, for example, but he
might not know who the bands were). Thus some San Francisco entity could
have leased the Legion Hall to put on a Dead show, and found out that
the audience wasn't there in the Fall.<br />
<br />
Who would have put on such a concert, thinking that the outlaw Grateful Dead would draw a crowd in an empty Lake Tahoe? Likely suspects would be the crowd who originally started psychedelia at the Red Dog Saloon in Virginia City, NV, just about an hour Northeast of Lake Tahoe. The Red Dog Saloon crowd evolved into the Family Dog, and when Chet Helms took it over they became the Psychedelic Cattleman's Association. The Red Dog Salooon, for all its original hippie trappings, was very gun-positive, so if someone like Red Dog founder Mark Unobsky was involved, Pigpen may have felt very comfortable indeed wearing his holster on stage.<br />
<br />
<b>Fall 1966 Village Square, San Lorenzo, CA: Grateful Dead </b><i>(afternoon free concert)</i><br />
In a post about free Grateful Dead concerts, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/first-free-grateful-dead-concert-in.html?showComment=1591445988386#c5928230451078837146">a Commenter writes</a><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
One show was played in 1966 at the San Lorenzo Ca, Village SQUARE, FOR
FREE!!! and help make the Grateful Dead legendary. Early on. in thee
east bay area.not sure of any documentation but it did change some lives
forever</blockquote>
San Lorenzo is a tiny East Bay town, just between San Leandro and Hayward, and between the Nimitz Freeway (I880/17) and the Bay. Most Northern Californians have driven by it numerous times (just South of the 238/580 split), but never turned off there. In the Fall of 1966, it was pretty common for malls or downtowns to have free rock concerts to encourage teens to hang out and/or shop. So it makes perfect, absurd 1966 sense that someone in San Lorenzo heard about the Dead playing free concerts and called them. <br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBmUhIEWHK-tgOibnu345m03kZjHN7iBR5EIgzEH1ZykmcYNj42jCKZFkMyU0FvTougqHGRj1IUeDzLc04JhtIbWemulGyIJATwR0Pc5XUZG2y1Opih_2GTCdYCpSIuDKjynsq3HsOn_U/s1600/Cheetah-19680627-resize.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="970" height="220" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBmUhIEWHK-tgOibnu345m03kZjHN7iBR5EIgzEH1ZykmcYNj42jCKZFkMyU0FvTougqHGRj1IUeDzLc04JhtIbWemulGyIJATwR0Pc5XUZG2y1Opih_2GTCdYCpSIuDKjynsq3HsOn_U/s320/Cheetah-19680627-resize.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Cheetah (formerly The Aragon Ballroom), at 1 Navy Pier on Venice Beach, near Santa Monica, as it appeared in June 1968. Did the Grateful Dead and the Doors play here on January 22, 1968?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>January 22, 1967 The Cheetah, Venice, CA: The Doors/Grateful Dead </b><br />
This remarkable date is based on someone else's research, but since I have lost contact with him, I want to get it out there (<i>Len, if you're around, check in!</i>). Some years ago, a fellow scholar was working on a truly remarkable and absolutely thorough chronology of The Doors live performances. It was online for a while, but has since disappeared, and no book came out that I am aware of.<br />
<br />
One of the mysteries the Doors researchers was working on was a joint Grateful Dead/Doors show at the Cheetah in Venice Beach, on Sunday, January 22, 1967. According to his correspondent, this was kind of an "underground" show. The Cheetah--which may have still been The Aragon Ballroom--was just an underused dance hall for rent at the time. Venice Beach was Hippie Central, however, so even if only locals knew about the show, it could have done alright. The correspondent even recalled the weather, which research checked out.<br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead were in Los Angeles to play a bill with Timothy Leary on Friday, January 20. The Dead were underground legends, even though they had no album. The Doors had been an underground legend, but their album had been officially released on January 4, so they would have been the hot new thing in Los Angeles. Of course, the Doors and the Dead had played a double bill at the Fillmore the weekend before, and the Doors had attended (though not performed at( The Human Be-In in Golden Gate Park on Saturday, January 14.<br />
<br />
The Doors and the Grateful Dead were not fans of each other, to my knowledge, so they may not have hung out, and may have had no fond memories to recall. Or maybe it didn't happen? But--maybe it did...<br />
<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8qEa1jvljUbCAcQHOcYZkZuYerLKqp5gAloJ6CbwrEr75tfhFwLrZePFVXayz6Tzi3rzKMsylnLcGEAZfzr7z5FMc6osMMZvkpPwpaLBfaIVV0z8cGNUP7MxF9hSHuqcoqJAcLuQ1vWw/s1600/teenage+fair+Oakland+Trib+19670326.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="505" data-original-width="290" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8qEa1jvljUbCAcQHOcYZkZuYerLKqp5gAloJ6CbwrEr75tfhFwLrZePFVXayz6Tzi3rzKMsylnLcGEAZfzr7z5FMc6osMMZvkpPwpaLBfaIVV0z8cGNUP7MxF9hSHuqcoqJAcLuQ1vWw/s320/teenage+fair+Oakland+Trib+19670326.jpg" width="183" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An ad for the Teenage Fair in at the Oakland Exposition Hall from the Oakland <i>Tribune</i> on March 26, 1967</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>February or March 1967: Teen Fair, Oakland Exposition Center, 9th and Fallon Streets, Oakland, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Wildflower/others</b><br />
Up through the first half of 1967, the Grateful Dead rarely left the Bay Area, and thus took any paying gig they could find. While many of those shows are immortalized by Fillmore posters and the like, some of them were just junior college dances or other casual engagements. If the band was free one night, then making several hundred dollars was better than not making it. While there are inevitably numerous vague stories from back in the day, many of them half-remembered wishful thinking, I find any story that involves a payday far more believable than the usual "free in the park" tale. Thus I find it very plausible that the Grateful Dead played the Bay Area Teen Fair at the long-forgotten Oakland Exposition Center in February or March of 1967.<br />
<br />
America's premier journal of Wild Sounds From Past Dimensions is <i>Ugly Things.</i> Readers who are not familiar with <i>Ugly Things</i> should subscribe immediately, as the quality and breadth of their research transcends all other 60s research efforts. Back in issue #29, Ugly Things had the complete story of <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Wildflower.htm">The Wildflower</a>, a band whom many Deadheads will recognize from old Avalon posters, but about which little was known. After reading Erik Bluhm's exhaustive article, however, complete with pictures, with the whole Wildflower story laid out in fascinating detail, their tale becomes fully fleshed out.<br />
<br />
One interesting saga was the Wildflower's appearance at the Teenage Fair in Oakland in 1967, which Bluhm identifies as having been in February.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Though the idea of a Teenage Fair had originated in Los Angeles in the early '60s, the phenomena of the Teenage Fair quickly spread to the rest of the country. Booths were set up to display all sorts of things teenagers drooled over, from custom cars and surfboards and musical instruments. To a constant barrage of the latest sounds blaring from multiple stages, teens were encouraged to squander as much of their allowances as possible before curfew. </blockquote>
The earliest Teen Fair I know of in the Bay Area was in 1965 in San Mateo, and the last one I am aware of was in Santa Clara in 1969.<br />
<br />
Bluhm spoke with then 14-year old Hayward music fan Paul Honeycutt, who attended the show to see a Hayward group who had won a local "Battle Of The Bands," and ended up seeing The Wildflower. For our purposes, however, the most tantalizing comment is Honeycutt's final remark, after describing the Wildflower's fine set:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
We had to be back to get a ride home with my Dad, so we didn't get to stay to hear the San Francisco bands scheduled to play later. I think both the Dead and and Airplane and maybe Moby Grape played over the course of the weekend, but we missed 'em.</blockquote>
The Teenage Fair would have been a paid booking at a time when the Dead desperately needed ready cash. It probably wasn't that great a show, but it's very possible that the Dead played the afternoon or some other time when they wouldn't have been playing, so it would have been an extra payday. The Teenage Fairs generally promoted the event rather than the bands, so it's not surprising that we haven't found any posters, ads or publicity promoting the Grateful Dead at the Oakland Teenage Fair. <br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead had a pretty clear February, too, so they would have needed the money.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
January 30-February 5 Recording in Los Angeles<br />
Friday, February 10-Santa Venetia Armory<br />
Saturday, February 11-open <br />
Sunday, February 12-The Fillmore (Benefit concert)<br />
Friday-Sunday February 17-19 open<br />
Friday-Sunday February 24-26-The Fillmore</blockquote>
Triangulating from the known schedules of both the Jefferson Airplane and Moby Grape, the most likely date seems to be the weekend of February 10-11. All three bands were available. <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/07/january-april-1967-jefferson-airplane.html">The Airplane were on the East Coast from at least February 18 onwards</a>, and <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/12/moby-grape-performance-history-january.html">Moby Grape was playing The Ark (although that wouldn't rule out an early-in-the-evening set in Oakland)</a>. The Dead could have played an early set on Friday at the Teenage Fair and zipped over to Santa Venetia, or simply played Saturday February 11, when they seemingly had nothing else going on.<br />
<br />
Some years ago I did some research into the 1967 Teenage Fair in Oakland, which is how I learned about the Exposition Center. At the time, I only knew that the Wildflower had played, not the Dead or the Airplane. I came up with the dates March 17-26, but I only know the Fair ended on March 26, based on an ad in the Oakland Tribune (<i>above</i>) I find it unlikely, however, that the Fair ran for two months. It's possible the Fair had two runs, in both February and March, or something like that. It is typical of this sort of mystery that the only two solid data points (the eyewitness and the Oakland <i>Tribune</i> ad) conflict. <br />
<br />
For various wonky reasons, I do not rule out these dates. However, those dates do inherently cause a conflict with the Grateful Dead's touring schedule, as the band played for Bill Graham on the weekend of March 17-19 (Winterland and the Fillmore) and for Chet Helms at the Avalon the next weekend (March 24-26). If the March 17-26 date turns out to be correct for the Oakland Teenage Fair, there are three likely possibilities:<br />
<ul>
<li>The Grateful Dead didn't play the 1967 Oakland Teenage Fair</li>
<li>The Dead played a weeknight (note that Paul Honeycutt doesn't say what night he went), or</li>
<li>The Dead played an early set and went over to the Fillmore or Avalon, as the case may have been (keep in mind they had just released an album that week, and Warners would have wanted them to promote it)</li>
</ul>
On balance, I think the Grateful Dead played the Oakland Teenage Fair at the
Exposition Center in 1967. They definitely needed the money. They
probably played an hour long set for five hundred bucks or so, and
hopped back over the Bay Bridge. Most of the suburban kids wandering by
were probably a bit nonplussed, wondering why this strange bunch of
barbarians were playing such ragged music. A few years later, when they
were in college, they probably had a moment at their "first" Dead show
when they thought, "wow, these guys seem awfully familiar." Here's to
hoping that some of them are reading this, and have a sudden flash of
memory. <br />
<ul>
</ul>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlb2uxlXQPsFtoaRd0KaSgq6FEDI3-cCYUv9i49mZFoF2HbtKH-3ZPKlj-HBTuBcYnM0jhZwEXvDWiDD4VyG1VhYgnOYv9JkSb6W_4A47IP-NwmglQvNwRNfcIOu3_BmYOwcXdph1YtcM/s1600/Oakland+Exposition+Center+1966.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjlb2uxlXQPsFtoaRd0KaSgq6FEDI3-cCYUv9i49mZFoF2HbtKH-3ZPKlj-HBTuBcYnM0jhZwEXvDWiDD4VyG1VhYgnOYv9JkSb6W_4A47IP-NwmglQvNwRNfcIOu3_BmYOwcXdph1YtcM/s320/Oakland+Exposition+Center+1966.jpg" width="248" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A 1967 Midget Auto Racing poster from the Oakland Exposition Center. The Exposition Center was on 10th and Oak, now the Oakland Museum of California. It is very hard to find any traces whatsoever of the Oakland Exposition Center</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>The Oakland Exposition Center</b></i><br />
The Oakland Exposition Center was an important building in post-WW2 Oakland, but it is nearly entirely forgotten now. It is all but impossible to Google, and there seem to be few references to it. It seems to have served as both a sort of convention center and indoor sports arena. I think it was somewhat smaller than the Oakland Auditorium (now the Kaiser Convention Center), which is nearby. I do know that the Exposition Center had indoor motorcycle and auto races from the 1940s through the '60s, which was how I first found out about it. I also know it was sometimes used for Roller Derby, which has a very Oakland-centric history. I believe it also was used for various kinds of "Expositions," a now-archaic term for a sort of celebration of industrial innovation.<br />
<br />
The Oakland Exposition Center was torn down around 1968, to make room for the Oakland Museum of California, on the very same site. <a href="http://www.museumca.org/">The Oakland Museum of California</a>, around the block at 1000 Oak Street (at 10th) opened in 1969, and it is a worthy institution well worth visiting, but the Exposition Center has all but disappeared into the mists of time.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfFnZf2rF1bdj9_0xSCSeIG7KyVPZKqyo_gdi6iMBiAjcjnp5-nTSCaIGVUIhExvkBxC_vF5ByqKhaiB774D4n17RTCdhGeQbY1A73xV_LwVNPjoxofPkPCHY7SmKVnxjeoWd2IN7bNbw/s1600/SanMateoTimes19650422-a++copy.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfFnZf2rF1bdj9_0xSCSeIG7KyVPZKqyo_gdi6iMBiAjcjnp5-nTSCaIGVUIhExvkBxC_vF5ByqKhaiB774D4n17RTCdhGeQbY1A73xV_LwVNPjoxofPkPCHY7SmKVnxjeoWd2IN7bNbw/s320/SanMateoTimes19650422-a++copy.jpg" width="208" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A news item from the front page of the April 22, 1965 San Mateo Times, about the recent teenage fair. Future Cold Blood singer Lydia Pense won a prize. Attendance was 196,000 over nine days.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>Teenage Fairs</b></i><br />
My earliest sighting of a Teenage Fair in the Bay Area was in Redwood City in 1965. Redwood City teenager Lydia Pense, the future lead singer of Cold Blood, won a prize. The last one I know about is in Santa Clara in 1969. By 1969, some of the top bands at the Fair were advertised, since they were draws in and of themselves. Santana actually played the 1969 Teenage Fair in Santa Clara. I'm not aware of Teenage Fairs after '69. By 1970, youth culture was synonymous with the rock market, and hippies were too cool to ever to go to something as commercial as a Fair. Unless it was, y'know, like a Renaissance Faire, where people had bare feet and there were maidens, and jousting, and flagons of mead, and, like, man, it wasn't commercial at all.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwmPtVlLnd_-T-TNydIKauI1RnnUy7O0YQX7rQ2FwfCBfnSHwMmGPEjZx5avvHOow_XYloUQk-btj0XX1PaHy-HlmAHCVd9npUt8Yftcl3u3Tn6W3Tg6zfaf77vyo_KsYkjV9IqlQAjRw/s1600/Big+Sur+Equinox+19680322.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="852" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwmPtVlLnd_-T-TNydIKauI1RnnUy7O0YQX7rQ2FwfCBfnSHwMmGPEjZx5avvHOow_XYloUQk-btj0XX1PaHy-HlmAHCVd9npUt8Yftcl3u3Tn6W3Tg6zfaf77vyo_KsYkjV9IqlQAjRw/s320/Big+Sur+Equinox+19680322.jpg" width="284" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A flyer for the "Vernal Equinox" at Lime Kiln, near Big Sur. The multi-day festival overwhelmed the little town with hippies. Everyone had a great time, and it never happened again.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>March 19, 1968 Lime Kiln, Big Sur, CA: Jim Stern and friends (<i>with Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir</i>) </b><i>(Tues)</i><br />
There was a Vernal Equinox event on March 22, 1968, attended by perhaps
3,000 hippies, which was far too many for Big Sur. The weekend had
turned into a sort of wake for Neal Cassidy, who had died the month
before. There were, however, low-key events leading up to the Equinox.
Producer Jim Stern, then a local drummer, said in a Jake Feinberg
interview that his band sort of freaked out and bailed on playing, and
said that Garcia and Weir showed up in Big Sur to bail him out. This
would have been a sort of jam, presumably with other players, and a
sparsely attended thing. The exact date is unclear, but it would have
been daytime (March 20 definitely a possibility, and March 21 not out of
the question).<br />
<br />
<b>September 25, 1969 Ungano's, New York, NY: Grateful Dead</b><br />
Ungano's was nightclub on West 70th Street in Manhattan (mid-town), much favored by record companies for up-and-coming or newly-signed bands. Explaining why I think the the Grateful Dead played Ungano's on September 25, 1969 would take an entire post in itself.<br />
<br />
Conveniently, I have written that post. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/february-12-1970-unganos-new-york-ny.html">The Grateful Dead were advertised in the <i>Village Voice</i> as playing Ungano's on Thursday, February 12, 1970</a>. This was the night between legendary shows at the Fillmore East on Wednesday February 11 (when the Allmans and Fleetwood Mac showed up to jam) and Friday February 13 (with a 90+ minute "Dark Star">"Other One">"Lovelight"). In those days, Lincoln's birthday was February 12, so February 11 was like an extra Friday night.<br />
<br />
Did it happen? Did the Dead play Ungano's? I wrote out the evidence, and it generated a Comment Thread for the ages. To explain why I think the Dead played Ungano's on September 25, you have to <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/february-12-1970-unganos-new-york-ny.html">read the whole post</a> and then <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/february-12-1970-unganos-new-york-ny.html?showComment=1262578788599#c6288303054395272923">the whole Comment Thread</a>. <br />
<br />
<b>May 4, 1970 Central Park Bandshell, New York, NY: New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<div>
Several years ago I
had a lengthy exchange on AOL with someone from New York who described
in great, plausible detail seeing the New Riders play for free in
Central Park Bandshell at lunchtime in Spring 1970. Among the detailed
parts of his memory was that he had to cut class to do it (meaning
weekday), he was in the 7th grade (locks in the year), and it was
announced on the radio by WNEW-fm dj 'Real Alison Steele' (the teenage
crush of every adolescent New York boy). She apparently announced that
"Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead" would be playing. He didn't know who
the New Riders were (obviously), nor did he know what a pedal steel
guitar was. He figured it out the next year. If you do the sums, it
comes out that the schedule had to be</div>
<ul>
<li>Sunday 3 May--Middletown</li>
<li>Monday 4 May--possible Central Park Bandshell</li>
<li>Tuesday 5 May--possible Central Park Bandshell</li>
<li>Wednesday 6 May--Kresge Plaza, MIT</li>
</ul>
I
have searched in vain over the years for any corroboration, but the
details I was given (above) have the ring of truth to them. Periodically
I have tried to at least see if there was an announcement about free
noon concerts at that time, even if no band names were given out. In any
case--Garcia had to be somewhere on May 4-5, why not Central Park?<br />
<br />
Fellow scholar Jesse Jarnow points out the surrounding evidence suggests that the Dead were already in Massachusetts by May 5, so it makes Monday, May 4 more plausible. Remember, also that the Dead had a Fillmore East show coming up, and Bill Graham would not have wanted any publicity about a free Jerry Garcia show undermining ticket sales. On the other hand, no one knew better than Bill about how free concerts created buzz, so he would have supported a free show <i>sans</i> official advertising.<div><br /></div><div>[<i><b>update</b></i>: <i>Correspondent Larry sends along an article by Sparrow (that’s his name) who reports having seen a band “from Out West” who were “wearing Cowboy hats” in Central Park one afternoon (Chapter 10 at the link). Later he finds out it was the Grateful Dead. All signs suggest that it was actually the New Riders of The Purple Sage, on May 4, 1970 (or thereabouts). <a href="https://www.thesunmagazine.org/issues/551/on-time">See for yourself here at The Sun</a>.</i>]<br />
<br />
It is plausible that the free Central Park show was the next week, where the schedule was<br />
<ul>
<li>Sunday May 10-Atlanta, GA</li>
<li>Thursday May 14-Merramec JC, Kirkwood, MO</li>
<li>Friday May 15-Fillmore East (two shows)</li>
<li>Saturday May 16-Temple Stadium, Philadelphia, PA</li>
</ul>
While the Kirkwood, MO remains an enduring curiosity--how did it get booked, and how was it profitable for the Dead to play the show?--the band had to be somewhere between Sunday and Thursday. Maybe they returned to NYC, and played a midweek Riders show?</div><div>[<i><b>update 2</b>: thanks to research by Jesse Jarnow that surrounded the Dead's St. Louis box set, it has been determined that the New Riders played yet another free concert in St. Louis. On May 13, 1970, the New Riders played at Washington University in St. Louis, at The Quadrangle, where the Dead had played back in 1969. Apparently, there had been plans for the Dead to play the school, but they fell through, but the Riders still played a free concert. Dead manager Jon McIntire had gone to Wash U, so draw your own conclusions. These three free New Riders shows--Central Park, Boston and St. Louis--all daytime, all in big cities, seem to have been a nascent attempt to replicate the Dead model with the Riders by playing for free.</i>]<br />
<br />
There is a perpetual rumor of the band playing at a Tim Leary benefit at the Village Gate in Greenwich Village on Monday, May 11, but by Manhattan standards that would be high-profile. I don't believe the Dead would have played a Tim Leary Benefit by 1970, either.<br />
<br />
<b>May 9, 1970 (<i>downtown</i>), Boston, MA: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
Fellow scholar Jesse identifies another rumored free New Riders show, this time in Boston. <a href="https://archive.org/details/gd1970-05-06.sbd.gmb.95816.flac16">From the Archive review of the free MIT show on May 6, 1970</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Reviewer: Peter Sramek - favoritefavoritefavoritefavoritefavorite - September 21, 2017 <br />
Subject: An Amazing Day<br />
What I remember of this outdoor concert was standing 5 feet from Jerry
Garcia just mesmerized by his guitar work. I'm sure he was stoned out of
his head, but it just flowed without any signs of trying. And from what
I remember this performance was pretty impromptu. They were playing
officially the next day, but set-up outside for the afternoon.<br />
<b>A group of us went into downtown Boston later that weekend to see New Riders do a public concert and that was also amazing.</b></blockquote>
I am more inclined to believe that there were two free New Riders concerts in Manhattan and Boston, or none, than that there was just one. The Dead were in upstate New York (SUNY Delhi) on Friday May 8, and played Worcester, MA on Saturday night May 9. Worcester is just an hour from Boston, so the transit is very viable.<br />
<br />
<b>August 5, 1970 [<i>unknown venue</i>], San Diego, CA: Acoustic Grateful Dead</b><br />
The August 5 1970 show is different than most shows on this list, in that there is not only a tape, but a board tape that has circulated for decades. 15 songs, two sets (or two pieces of tape, anyway) of acoustic Grateful Dead, with John Dawson and David Nelson helping out here and there. The show has appeared in every list for many moons.<br />
<br />
But here's the thing. There's no evidence of any show in San Diego around then. The recording suggests a small place, but why would the Dead fly to San Diego to play some tiny place? You can suggest that it's really the Matrix or the Lion's Share, and that's fine, but why was it dated August 5 in San Diego?<br />
<br />
Now, it's true that during July and August 1970, the Dead's road crew was supported by Alembic, and the Alembic team had gone on tour with the Medicine Ball Caravan. The Dead had been supposed to be on the tour, too, but they pulled out at the last second. But Bob Matthews, Betty Cantor and many other Alembic regulars were out of town. So the Dead could play acoustic gigs, but not really electric ones. <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2012/02/new-riders-of-purple-sage-and-acoustic.html">The band did play some acoustic shows at the Lion's Share in San Anselmo, discussed at length by JGMF,</a> so maybe the "Aug 5" tape is from the Lion's Share. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/10/august-28-29-1970-thee-club-los-angeles.html">I myself have speculated that the tape is from a place called Thee Club in Los Angeles</a>, where the acoustic Dead (and the New Riders) played on August 28-29, but that doesn't explain the dating and "San Diego."<br />
<br />
The truth is out there.<br />
<br />
<i><b>Coda: Leave No Tern Unstoned</b></i><br />
If anyone has information, concerns, speculation or flashbacks about any of the above events please put them in the Comments.<br />
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</div>Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-47474463980905918802020-04-12T15:09:00.005-07:002022-04-26T17:53:53.070-07:00Riders Of The Purple Sage, Old, New and Resurrected (Who Was Bobby Ace?)<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBcUdnEsAGiUZ_C0ABTRfWJOS_jzvIHEHvmcRHHNAOs-38dUbT2_qqvv1Nq3tDiqDb8YqY63dEHwBfjkx-RzA5QVDf-ZTrzQXYtdxY2Y-RYwKP_DZgbgZGKY51Nbe1dgP3eAOz5Kq-72M/s1600/Dawn+Of+The+New+Riders+cover.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBcUdnEsAGiUZ_C0ABTRfWJOS_jzvIHEHvmcRHHNAOs-38dUbT2_qqvv1Nq3tDiqDb8YqY63dEHwBfjkx-RzA5QVDf-ZTrzQXYtdxY2Y-RYwKP_DZgbgZGKY51Nbe1dgP3eAOz5Kq-72M/s320/Dawn+Of+The+New+Riders+cover.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Dawn Of The New Riders of The Purple Sage</i>, a 5-cd box released by the Owsley Stanley Foundation at the end of 2019</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The end of 2019 has greeted us with two remarkable releases by, of all unlikely bands, the New Riders of The Purple Sage. The Owsley Stanley Foundation provided a remarkable 5-disc set called <a href="https://owsleystanleyfoundation.org/product/dawn-of-the-new-riders-of-the-purple-sage/"><i>Dawn Of The New Riders of The Purple Sage</i></a>. It included the second show ever by the band, before they even had a name, from August 1, 1969. There were also complete sets from August 28 '69, October 14 '69 and June 4 '70. As if that weren't enough, the discs were filled out with additional numbers from other sets on those weekends. Abruptly, a UPS delivery opens a wide window on the early music of the New Riders of The Purple Sage, and Jerry Garcia's critical role in their formation.<br />
<br />
Around the same time, the NRPS Archive continued its excellent series of releases with <a href="https://stores.portmerch.com/newridersofthepurplesage/featured-products/thanksgiving-in-new-york-city-2cd.html"><i>Thanksgiving In New York City</i></a>, a two-disc set containing the complete late show at the Academy Of Music in Manhattan from November 23, 1972. In contrast to the tentative explorations of the early Riders, the '72 band was road tested and battle hardened. They played a wide variety of originals and covers, rocking hard while the melodies soared. By then, Garcia's pedal steel chair had been taken by the great Buddy Cage, and Cage took Garcia's basic melodic template and exploded it into a remarkable kaleidoscope of sweet picking and sharp sustain.<br />
<br />
On February 5, 2020, Buddy Cage moved on up for his final load-out. <a href="https://relix.com/news/detail/in-memoriam-buddy-cage-1946-2020/"><i>Relix</i> had a nice Memoriam</a>, which you can read, but I recommend playing some New Riders of The Purple Sage music loud, really loud, in Buddy's honor. And Jerry's too, for that matter. The new releases will do nicely, and we can finally unravel not just the mythology of the early New Riders, but how their music actually evolved from a pickup bar band to a major touring band, in a musical sub-genre in which they were among the pioneers.<br />
<br />
When we look closely at the reality of the origins of the New Riders of The Purple Sage, rather than the myth, something unexpected comes into view. On the edge of Grateful Dead history, there were occasional references to a murky ensemble called Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck. The Cards Off The Bottom seem to have been a bigger part of the original plan than anyone thought, only to get written out of the origin story. <br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIJR8HTTZUvnv4q6J5LEU6b2YoPeM7u-6j6Om3O4D_vpfkeHFdA6Hw1t1GzaVecGSLIbJHTASbDYWc8pMWC7Gh3IfGlWsFGtEiqAkz0pS1y5wn7F3M0kLJHteGYcZPFSNLpYivzAKVp7c/s1600/Thanksgiving+in+NYC+NRPS+72.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="589" data-original-width="599" height="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiIJR8HTTZUvnv4q6J5LEU6b2YoPeM7u-6j6Om3O4D_vpfkeHFdA6Hw1t1GzaVecGSLIbJHTASbDYWc8pMWC7Gh3IfGlWsFGtEiqAkz0pS1y5wn7F3M0kLJHteGYcZPFSNLpYivzAKVp7c/s320/Thanksgiving+in+NYC+NRPS+72.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Thanksgiving in New York City, an archival release from the New Riders of The Purple Sage. It features both NRPS sets from the late show on November 23, 1972 at the Academy of Music in Manhattan.</td></tr>
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<b>NRPS Mythology</b><br />
The fable of the origin of the New Riders of The Purple Sage is simple, mythical and largely wrong. Sure, there are a few elements of truth in the myth, but the story has been repeated so many times--not least by members of the Dead and New Riders--that everyone now assumes that the myth is fact. The truth is far muddier, and the Owsley Foundation release at least untucks the covers of the story.<br />
<br />
The Riders were spoken about in many interviews, and still are, on occasion, but there was almost no actual information about the first version of the band. Up until the release of <i>Dawn Of The New Riders of The Purple Sage</i>, here's what we had about the 1969 incarnation:<br />
<ul>
<li>Two live tapes, Aug 7 '69 from the Matrix and Sep 18 '69 from the Inn Of The Beginning</li>
<li>Two studio tapes: "Marmaduke and Friends," with two tracks from 1968-69, and a four song demo from November '69, both released on the Relix lp <i>Before Time Began</i>. There were no liner notes.</li>
<li>No live reviews from the 1969 incarnation</li>
<li>No eyewitnesses, either</li>
<li>No on-stage photos</li>
</ul>
Journalists only became interested in the Riders around '71, and queried Jerry and others in interviews. Garcia, and later John Dawson and David Nelson, told the same story again and again. It goes like this:<br />
<ul>
<li>Garcia got a pedal steel guitar</li>
<li>Dawson went to a Dead rehearsal, found out Jerry had a steel</li>
<li>Dawson visited Garcia to play, Garcia found out that Dawson had a Wednesday night gig playing original songs in Menlo Park, and decided to accompany him</li>
<li>Garcia and Dawson invited Nelson to join them in Menlo Park</li>
<li>The trio invited Mickey Hart and Phil Lesh to join them on drums and bass, and went on the road. The theory was that they could acquire the money for the opening act while only bringing two extra people. </li>
<li>Later Dave Torbert replaced Phil, and then Spencer Dryden replaced Mickey. Then they made an album. </li>
</ul>
Only one thing about this myth is definitively incorrect--Phil Lesh never played on the road with the New Riders--but this simple story belies a far more interesting origin.<br />
<br />
<b><iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/605f4hszFtM" width="560"></iframe></b><br />
<b>Thesis: <i>What Was The Plan?</i></b><br />
<i>A clip from the Porter Wagoner syndicated TV show in the late 60s, playing "Old Slewfoot" (originally a hit for Johnny Horton). Many of the "obscure" country covers sung by Bob Weir were recorded by Wagoner around 1968--"Slewfoot," "Let Me In" and "Green Green Grass of Home," for example</i><br />
<br />
This will be a long post, and it will be kind of hard to follow if you aren't sunk in New Riders minutia like me, so I'll lay it out:<br />
<ul>
<li>Garcia and Weir watched a lot of syndicated country music TV shows on Saturday afternoon</li>
<li>In mid-1969, they conceived of touring like a country show, with a variety of interlocking performers filling an entire evening, ending with the headliners</li>
<ul>
<li>The New Riders of The Purple Sage were one part of the plan</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>A group called Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom was conceived as a vehicle for covers, duets and other material</li>
<ul>
<li>The Cards Off The Bottom would have included the members of the Dead, the Riders and additional players like Peter Grant</li>
</ul>
</ul>
<li>After various tentative explorations, the plan was scaled back</li>
<li>An Evening with The Grateful Dead was the end result, <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2011/05/ln-jg1970-05-01gdall-126minssbd.html">It debuted May 1 '70</a>, featuring the "acoustic Dead," the Riders and then the electric Dead</li>
<li>Ultimately, the Grateful Dead and the New Riders had to split apart, in order to keep both organisms thriving. </li>
</ul>
<i><b>Marmaduke: The Palo Alto Years</b></i><br />
John "Marmaduke" Dawson was a few years younger than Jerry Garcia. Dawson's family lived in Los Altos, just above Palo Alto, and he had gone to Peninsula School with Bob Matthews. Dawson was interested in folk music and The Beatles, so it's no surprise he was in the outer orbit of the very tiny proto-hippie circles of Jerry Garcia and his friends. According to one story, Dawson took some lessons from Garcia at Dana Morgan Music, but I can't verify that.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.blueheronblast.com/2016/12/marmaduke.html">Dawson made a self-financed album in 1964 that has recently surfaced</a>, and he seemed to be a typical folkie of the time. Dawson graduated high school in 1964, had a brief foray in college (Occidental, I think) and then an equally brief time in England, but seems to have returned to Palo Alto by the time of the Mother McRee's Uptown Jug Band. Dawson was around for the Warlocks' debut at Magoo's Pizza. David Nelson tried out Dawson as the bass player for the New Delhi River Band in Fall '66, but Nelson said that "Dawson wasn't really a bass player," a kind way of saying his friend's sense of time wasn't very strong.<br />
<br />
It's not really clear what Dawson was doing between 1966 and 1969, but it doesn't really matter. He was young and the world was changing, and he was thinking about being a musician and songwriter. There are only a few sightings of him from back then. There are hundreds of photos from the free concert at Palo Alto's El Camino Park on July 2, 1967 , and supposedly Dawson can be seen helping Bob Matthews with the Grateful Dead's equipment. I don't really know where Dawson lived at the time, but I assume it was the South Bay.<br />
<br />
Later, in mid-1968, Bob Matthews got a job building a recording studio in San Mateo, called Pacific Recorders. Some months later, the Grateful Dead would spend several months recording and re-recording <i>Aoxomoxoa</i> there. Initially, however, as Matthews and his girlfriend Betty Cantor built up the studio, one source of income was letting aspiring songwriters and bands record demos. Betty has mentioned playing kick-drums on some Dawson demos, essentially because his time was wobbly. While she didn't mention a date (and probably didn't recall one), it would make sense that these recordings were in mid-68, when Pacific Recorders was available for paying customers. It also makes sense that those recordings were later re-recorded or overdubbed, and they became the two tracks known as "Marmaduke and Friends" that were broadcast on KSAN and released on the Relix album.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSQNp0bJ5s2EM778t5uh7sP08KvWXTEHdrD4x3d2aK0rXxv__yBiukVqE72SQr3fMH_x6M0zxRNe5uAO5WUVRcdRaGWxQyZa5hjJzdjqVcDJyltXDMzt9DvwUMJ7gGgpQfusHkrXxBacU/s1600/NDRB+The+Barn+19661014+top.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1236" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSQNp0bJ5s2EM778t5uh7sP08KvWXTEHdrD4x3d2aK0rXxv__yBiukVqE72SQr3fMH_x6M0zxRNe5uAO5WUVRcdRaGWxQyZa5hjJzdjqVcDJyltXDMzt9DvwUMJ7gGgpQfusHkrXxBacU/s320/NDRB+The+Barn+19661014+top.jpg" width="247" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">In the Fall of 1966, the New Delhi River Band, with David Nelson and Dave Torbert, were more or less the house band at The Barn, in Scotts Valley, amidst the Santa Cruz Mountains. This flyer was for October 14 (NDRB) and 15 (Flowers)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<i><b>Nelson</b></i><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/02/david-nelson-and-new-delhi-river-band.html">I have written about what is known about David Nelson's rock career from 1965 through 1968 in great detail</a>. To summarize, he was in a psychedelic blues band called the New Delhi River Band who were popular in the South Bay, but never made it to the bigger stages. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/08/david-nelson-and-new-delhi-river-band.html">The group had ground to a halt in February 1968</a>, and Nelson seemed to have no musical activities for several months. The next sighting of Nelson was in Fall '68, when Betty Cantor describes him riding up to the <i>Aoxomoxoa</i> sessions at Pacific Recorders on an Indian motorcycle.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/search/label/David%20Nelson">In early 1969, Nelson started hanging out with the remnants of Big Brother and The Holding Company</a>, as he was old pals with Peter Albin. After at least one Matrix gig, however, any band plans went on hold as Albin and Dave Getz went on tour with Country Joe and The Fish. Nelson was mostly living at Big Brother's rehearsal warehouse, although by mid-69 he had moved to Divisadero, near Haight Street. Dawson and Nelson had some involvement in the <i>Aoxomoxoa</i> sessions, enough to be named on the back of the album, although it is unclear what their contributions actually were. I assume they did handclaps or backing vocals, which may or may not have been processed or erased in the endless sessions.<br />
<br />
<b><i>Marmaduke, Jerry and Dave</i></b><br />
Somewhere in the middle of April 1969 the mythology gets very potent. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/jerry-garcia-sneaky-pete-kleinow-and.html">We know that Jerry Garcia bought a Zane Beck D10 pedal steel guitar at Don Edwards' Guitar City in Lakewood, CO, on April 13 or 14</a>, while the Dead were on tour. He bought the steel the week after seeing Sneaky Pete Kleinow play one when the Flying Burrito Brothers had opened for the Dead at the Avalon the week before. Dawson has said that he attended a Grateful Dead rehearsal in Novato, and that Garcia told him he had a new pedal steel. Dawson invited himself over sometime later to hear Garcia play it, although whether it was at Garcia's Larkspur house or at the Novato rehearsal hall is unclear.<br />
<br />
Dawson played his own songs, so that Garcia would have something to play along to, and Garcia took a liking to them. Garcia then invited himself to one of Dawson's gigs. Dawson was singing his songs by himself on Wednesday nights at a Menlo Park "hofbrau" called The Underground, on El Camino Real. As near as I can tell, it was on 1029 El Camino Real, just a few blocks from Magoo's Pizza. The first such gig was probably May 7 or May 14. Garcia seems to have brought Nelson along shortly thereafter, and they seemed to have initially played as a trio.<br />
<br />
Some apparent facts that are never reflected on:<br />
<ul>
<li>John Dawson was an old friend of Bob Matthews from Palo Alto, and had known most or all of the band for some years. While Dawson still lived in the South Bay, he was still connected enough to hang out at a 1969 Dead rehearsal. By 1969, although the Dead were flat broke, they were genuine rock stars, and half of the hip Bay Area wanted to hang out at their rehearsals, so Dawson was not just nobody to them.</li>
<li>Dawson heard that Garcia had a new pedal steel guitar, and asked or invited himself to come over and see it, and Garcia appears to have agreed. So Dawson's connection to the Dead extended personally to Garcia, not just Matthews. Yet no one ever mentions Dawson around the scene any other time than the rehearsal, so there may be added layers that we don't know about.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<i><b>Rukka Rukka</b></i><br />
Dawson, Nelson and Garcia did indeed play a few Wednesday nights at The Underground (see below for a prospective list). According to the mythology, the trio decided to add a rhythm section and take it on the road as a "real band." While that isn't untrue, trace evidence suggests that someone, almost certainly Jerry Garcia, may have had a different plan entirely.<br />
<br />
Whatever was happening down at The Underground on Wednesday nights, rehearsals shifted to a "ranch" known as Rukka Rukka, where Weir and others lived (no ranching seems to have taken place, by the way). Weir and unknown others were playing with the Ur-Riders around June 1969, and that has been written out of the month. The <i>Dawn Of The New Riders</i> release gives us a taste of that, with Weir's guest appearance at the Aug 28 '69 Family Dog show. <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2011/05/ln-jg1970-05-01gdall-126minssbd.html">We had known that Weir played a few numbers with the Riders in the first appearances of "An Evening With The Grateful Dead" (May 1 and May 2 '70), but we can now see that was a leftover from a different plan</a>.<br />
<br />
More importantly, an enitely different band seems to have played a few gigs, according to Dennis McNally (p.321). The group consisted of Nelson, Dawson, Garcia, Weir, Lesh, Hart, Tom Constanten and Peter Grant. They played a date at <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/02/jerry-garcia-new-riders-of-purple-sage.html">Peninsula School in Menlo Park</a>, per McNally (s<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/05/grateful-deadjerry-garcia-tour.html">ee here for a discussion of the exact date</a>), and then a show on June 11 at California Hall. A flyer survives for the California Hall show, and McNally even found a setlist. We see some of the numbers that would turn up in acoustic Dead sets, for both Garcia and Weir, but it is tantalizingly unclear whether there was a separate set featuring Dawson and his songs. Peter Grant, an old pal of Garcia's, seems to have been the designated banjo player.<br />
<br />
Yet these two shows at Peninsula and California Hall have simply been dropped from the Riders origin myth, because they don't fit. What might Garcia have been thinking? While I am about to introduce a tangent that will ultimately require an entirely different, very lengthy--even by my standards--post, everything points to Garcia and Weir watching a lot of syndicated country music shows on weekend afternoons, which as you know is when touring rock musicians wake up.<br />
<br />
To most Americans, the best known syndicated country music show was <i>Hee Haw</i>, featuring Buck Owens and Roy Clark. That show, however, first aired on CBS (prior to syndication) in the Summer of 1969, so it wouldn't have been an influence.The most prominent of the syndicated shows from the mid-60s appear to have been <i>The Porter Wagoner Show </i>and <i>Buck Owens Ranch</i>. Fellow scholar Jesse Jarnow even pointed that in between songs of the first Grateful Dead "acoustic set" on Dec 26 '69, Weir even said (approximately), "I try to watch as much country music on TV as possible." So I'm not imagining things.<br />
<br />
Touring country music in the late 60s, as represented in the TV shows and often on stage, consisted of relatively large, multi-instrumental ensembles, sharing lead vocals and periodically joining together for some gospel-type numbers. There was a headliner, of course, but there was an opening act and all the guitar players sang a song, and so on, and a few people played a bunch of instruments. Hey--this kind of sounds like An Evening With The Grateful Dead, doesn't it? Some folkie songs, a little bluegrass gospel, some country honky-tonk with the New Riders and then the full deal with the Dead. Take another look at those old Porter Wagoner videos on YouTube, and tell me I'm wrong.<br />
<br />
Another ignored clue is the presence of Peter Grant at a few Dead shows in June, 1969. Grant played banjo through a Fender Twin Reverb ("set to stun" according to him). The peculiar little banjo experiment wasn't repeated after June '69. If Garcia and the Dead were gnawing on a different configuration, then Grant's seemingly random guest appearances take on a certain logic. Keep in mind also that Grant played pedal steel guitar, banjo and lead guitar, so he would have been a versatile addition to a multi-layered ensemble, just as Nelson and Dawson's harmonies were superior to Weir and Lesh's at the time. <br />
<br />
Weir got stripped out of the Riders, ultimately, to play his part in the acoustic set, and Grant receded back to San Jose, but those facts play no part in the myth. The Owsley tapes re-set the narrative, and we can see them an entirely different way. The Aug 28 show is the hitherto unknown mid-point between the initial Rukka Rukka incarnation and An Evening With The Grateful Dead, before Weir and Dawson were fronting separate ensembles.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-uU3L90ABE0mBnyuuISxKrGD-o2t7MKH3ITtYyaRsd0Z9JOox1W4ugvkPFK2yGu1aNG1eavMjkbNGh8dPgLLiiSMUMesFbb1LvNK77W2bg_A522Sbf_1oHvDSd_Bxm86dDurhGq8jCSY/s1600/Torbert+Hawaii+RS+1971.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="237" data-original-width="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-uU3L90ABE0mBnyuuISxKrGD-o2t7MKH3ITtYyaRsd0Z9JOox1W4ugvkPFK2yGu1aNG1eavMjkbNGh8dPgLLiiSMUMesFbb1LvNK77W2bg_A522Sbf_1oHvDSd_Bxm86dDurhGq8jCSY/s1600/Torbert+Hawaii+RS+1971.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A clip from a September 1971 <i>Rolling Stone</i> article by Ben Fong-Torres has the first recital of "The Call"</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Who Played Bass?</b><br />
For me, and pretty much nobody else, there's only question that acts as a fulcrum for New Riders' studies: who played bass? <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/12/new-riders-of-purple-sage-bassist-1969.html">I have written numerous posts on this topic</a>, and even my most loyal Commenters say "aren't you tired of this?" The answer--no. It's a critical question, and we are finally getting some answers, thanks to Mr. Owsley.<br />
<br />
The initial New Riders mythology, promulgated in <i>Rolling Stone</i> from 1971 onwards, was that Phil Lesh had been the bass player, until he was replaced by Dave Torbert in Spring 71. The myth has Torbert traveling from Hawaii to England, to meet up with old pal Matt Kelly, and stopping off at his parents' house in Redwood City. A chance call with an offer to join the New Riders changed his plans, once Kelly had given his old friend his blessing. Nice story, eh?<br />
<br />
For the release of the now-largely-forgotten New Riders album, <i>Brujo</i>, in November 1974, Columbia Records commissioned a Riders "Family Tree" from the great Pete Frame (later published in Frame's <i>More Rock Family Trees</i>). Besides revealing the existence of the New Delhi River Band, for the initial iteration of the Riders Frame wrote "Phil Lesh or Bob Matthews" as the bass player. I may have been one of the few people who noticed this--in 1975, at KFJC-fm studios in Los Altos Hill, CA, but I digress--but eventually historians caught on to the idea that Matthews had a role. Still, what about the "or"? Did Phil and Matthews alternate shows? What was the deal? Since we only had a few tapes, it was very hard to figure it out.<br />
<br />
The search was further confused by Robert Hunter's passing comments that he rehearsed with the New Riders as a bass player, but was never asked to join the group. Two bass players, and a third one who only rehearsed? What sort of band was this? Of course, no one asked the principals. Now, thanks to Owsley, we can review the historical periods of the New Riders from the point of view of their rhythm section, and not their far-more-famous front line.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRGaJFaJKZydhYpO_0xvxfyRc7MVLz0N_HxqVJMzewmBxajqBGwdfvZqMe_ecaWrFnjEcY1BXlAwaoUT8s21jLIeGQv89akxej7ePKwNQrecTH0EVXdbPoGx666eollGLJT3nTrWDheg8/s1600/Menlo+Hub+1029+E+l+Camino+20121116.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="480" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRGaJFaJKZydhYpO_0xvxfyRc7MVLz0N_HxqVJMzewmBxajqBGwdfvZqMe_ecaWrFnjEcY1BXlAwaoUT8s21jLIeGQv89akxej7ePKwNQrecTH0EVXdbPoGx666eollGLJT3nTrWDheg8/s320/Menlo+Hub+1029+E+l+Camino+20121116.JPG" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Menlo Hub restaurant in Menlo Park, as it appeared in 2012, at 11029 El Camino Real. Menlo Hub was probably the site of The Underground, where Jerry Garcia first played live with John Dawson in May 1969. Next door at 1035 (now Su Hong) was Guitars Unlimited, where Garcia and Weir briefly gave lessons in 1965. </td></tr>
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<i><b>Genesis: John Dawson at The Underground, Menlo Park, CA</b></i><br />
John Dawson had apparently been playing his songs at The Underground in Menlo Park (probably at 1029 El Camino Real) on Wednesday nights for some time. Garcia agreed to join him. I think the first night was May 7, 1969. One of the amazing details of the <i>Dawn Of The New Riders</i> box is the revelation that Owsley recorded three reels from May 14. I am assuming that May 14 was the first date with Garcia, Dawson and David Nelson but we will have to wait on the Owsley Foundation for that [<i><b>update</b>: Nelson had not yet joined]</i><br />
<br />
The Underground, whether at 1029 El Camino Real or not, was very near a music store called Guitars Unlimited, at 1035 El Camino. When Garcia and Weir were fired from Dana Morgan's for obscure transgressions, probably borrowing equipment without asking or paying, they both got jobs teaching guitar at Guitars Unlimited. I think they only taught there for a little while, as it was late 1965 and the Warlocks were morphing into the Grateful Dead. Few students seem to remember them teaching there (unlike Morgan's), and I think they mainly worked there to borrow equipment. Nonetheless, Garcia was still using Guitars Unlimited to work on his instruments as late as 1969 (there's a receipt), so it played a part. <br />
<br />
A peculiar, yet ungooglable footnote to this story, is an eyewitness description of Garcia persuading David Nelson to join him in playing with David Nelson. Writer Paul Krassner wrote an obituary for Jerry Garcia in <i>High Times</i>. Amidst many other reminiscences, Krassner quotes Ken Babbs as going with Garcia to Nelson's "bleak" apartment in San Francisco. Garcia persuades Nelson to join him in performing with John Dawson. Granted, the narrative is mediated through various filters, but it's still fascinating to read the tale, however vaguely recalled. On Wednesday nights in May and June of 1969, Garcia and David Nelson backed up Marmaduke at a tiny sandwich-and-beer joint in Menlo Park, just blocks from where the Warlocks had debuted just four years earlier.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-AX8zj-eGJROHVyEXZ0CHmYiuy4WWvfOibpUplzBGAKIlVewPDXRZ7qCfU-ZuuroEQEEnmy-9Ts5VPIC59TNSdwAHjNzAXaB1cwiEM6-Pcvqg1TDf7fqX3uWvdJYm_JKtYCofQe2j4yU/s1600/Cal+Hall+19690611.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="290" data-original-width="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-AX8zj-eGJROHVyEXZ0CHmYiuy4WWvfOibpUplzBGAKIlVewPDXRZ7qCfU-ZuuroEQEEnmy-9Ts5VPIC59TNSdwAHjNzAXaB1cwiEM6-Pcvqg1TDf7fqX3uWvdJYm_JKtYCofQe2j4yU/s1600/Cal+Hall+19690611.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom headlined a peculiar show at California Hall in San Francisco, on June 11, 1969</td></tr>
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<i><b>Hypothesis: Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom, Rukka Rukka Ranch, Marin County, CA</b></i><br />
So here's my theory. I can't prove it, but there's a lot of fragmentary evidence, and it has to be explained somehow. So let's try this on, and the Comment Thread can weigh in on the plausibility index. Remember, though--if you deny my theory, you have to have another one.<br />
<br />
In May and June of 1969 we know two things, more or less, about Garcia playing the pedal steel guitar<br />
<ul>
<li>Garcia, Nelson and Dawson were playing Dawson's songs as a trio, mostly at The Underground in Menlo Park</li>
<li>Garcia, Nelson and Dawson were "rehearsing" at a hideaway called Rukka Rukka Ranch, where Bob Weir lived along with Rex Jackson, Sonny Heard, Steve Parish and other scattered members of the Dead universe.</li>
</ul>
I think Garcia was envisioning a sort of country and western "revue," like you would see when Porter Wagoner or Merle Haggard played the county fair. The Grateful Dead plus some of their friends would be the "revue," including Pete Grant, David Nelson and John Dawson. There would be a chance to play some folk music, some bluegrass, cover some country songs and play some new material. Remember, not only did Dawson have a bunch of songs, the material Garcia and Hunter were writing would have fit right into the Porter Wagoner show. We can all imagine Porter or Merle singing "Dire Wolf." With Nelson and Grant on board, Garcia wouldn't be exclusively tied to playing lead 6-strng electric guitar on every number.<br />
<br />
I think the "Country Revue" concept was going to be called Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck. Whether the Cards would open for the Dead, or play their own gigs, or both, wasn't so critical at this point. Garcia was thinking big, trying to figure out how he could play traditional and country music on a variety of instruments while still doing the Grateful Dead thing.<br />
<br />
We know that Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom were billed at one show at California Hall in San Francisco, on June 11. The Peninsula School show wasn't advertised, and may have been before or after the California Hall show. [<i><b>update</b>: noted scholar LIA points out that McNally says the band was Garcia, Dawson, Nelson and Phil, but no Weir. So it doesn't quite fit in my proposed narrative, but shows that Phil was involved from the beginning</i>].The Cards Off The Bottom name then sort of disappears, but not entirely. One of the remarkable things about the Owsley box is that when Weir joins the New Riders for the Family Dog show on August 28, Dawson introduces him as "Bobby Ace of Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom." While this is clearly a kind of joke, it's also not a joke--Dawson and Weir sing a series of duets that have clearly been played before.<br />
<br />
The musical evidence provided by Owsley suggests that the plan was that the New Riders were an autonomous unit, but that they would be supplemented by Weir and others in The Cards Off The Bottom. By the time the concept reached fruition in May 1970 as An Evening With The Grateful Dead, the organization was a little different. There was an acoustic, folkie set, then the Riders then the Dead. Yet Weir's guest appearances with the Riders in early May '70, singing "Me And My Uncle," are a whiff of an earlier, grander plan.<br />
<br />
The name Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck was used one more time, for the April 17-19 shows at the Family Dog, previewing the acoustic Dead lineup. It's hard not to see a link between the name and the duets. And really--where did the name "Bobby Ace" come from? I think it came from the Cards Off The Bottom idea, as no one ever seems to have referred to Weir as "Ace" prior to that.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOs1dEO7Ek4ryv0LzGZBBud3r3JP5XFv4K-PQXTvXf5E_8BbrV9XUGnX8-YFqrJg46Dv1paL87Dccrhp7hzUKXA6ZN4qXA7L18zi234hQVcKkUap-b0r0KKZeU8_PbTwABsEfiIj9LBzA/s1600/Bears+Lair+19690801.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="221" data-original-width="394" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOs1dEO7Ek4ryv0LzGZBBud3r3JP5XFv4K-PQXTvXf5E_8BbrV9XUGnX8-YFqrJg46Dv1paL87Dccrhp7hzUKXA6ZN4qXA7L18zi234hQVcKkUap-b0r0KKZeU8_PbTwABsEfiIj9LBzA/s320/Bears+Lair+19690801.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jerry Garcia and John "Marmaduke" Dawson are advertised in the <i>Daily Cal</i>, playing at the Bear's Lair at UC Berkeley on August 1, 1969. SUPERB was the Student Union Performance sponsor.</td></tr>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<b><i>Antithesis: Marmaduke and Friends</i></b><br />
By the time of the Rukka Rukka rehearsals, probably in May, Garcia and Dawson were already playing in Menlo Park, with Nelson on board. The last known Underground show was on Wednesday, June 25. The trio also appears to have played on Sunday, June 29. The Grateful Dead hit the road after that, so no gigs seem likely for the next few weeks.<br />
<br />
The next time the band appears they are opening for The Grateful Dead (plus Cleveland Wrecking Company and Ice) at Longshoreman's Hall on Wednesday, July 16. The band has no name, but were probably introduced as "Marmaduke and Friends." There were equipment problems, caused by Owsley, and Blair Jackson describes the proto-Riders gig as "shambolic." The next show was actually billed as "Marmaduke and Friends" in the UC Berkeley <i>Daily Cal</i> newspaper. The band played two sets at the newly-opened student union pub The Bear's Lair. Both sets of this August 1, 1969 show are included in the <i>Dawn Of The New Riders</i> box set. It is indeed the dawn, as they are not even named yet.<br />
<br />
I will not describe the music--you can listen to it for yourself. But a few comments are in order. First of all, it's clear that there has been very little rehearsal. Garcia, despite his inexperience with the pedal steel, stays in the groove and atop the melody for every song. Not so much the other band members, save for Nelson. David Nelson's electric guitar is the rhythmic center of the band. Mickey Hart acts as a percussionist rather than a drummer. His parts are interesting, if not always particularly appropriate. He clearly has no real familiarity with country music, which is both good and bad. Bob Matthews' bass playing is very rudimentary, following Nelson's chords for the most part.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmo8HM55qtEqtnJK18foIquRIDBTbISEsD7WppjH8gv5BVjxQ9TkUgGTVGFEUD1a1egcHsE4NVEaLOK-KhU46r9o16u5ga9yCzKC3wPafUeldnddYV_g7IfJ7KIkTK95rb9KL30ogUVGw/s1600/Bear%2527s+Lair+and+Pauley+Ballroom+20100312.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmo8HM55qtEqtnJK18foIquRIDBTbISEsD7WppjH8gv5BVjxQ9TkUgGTVGFEUD1a1egcHsE4NVEaLOK-KhU46r9o16u5ga9yCzKC3wPafUeldnddYV_g7IfJ7KIkTK95rb9KL30ogUVGw/s320/Bear%2527s+Lair+and+Pauley+Ballroom+20100312.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Bear's Lair pub and coffee house opened on the UC Berkeley campus in about 1969. It was in the basement of the Student Union building. Pauley Ballroom, where the Grateful Dead played a few times from 1966-70, is two floors above the Bear's Lair. This photo was taken in 2013, but the basic configuration had not changed much since those days.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
The Bear's Lair was tiny. The band was probably playing in the front room. All of the band's comments are audible on the mics between songs. When Dawson suggests singing "The Lady Came From Baltimore," for example, Garcia says "yeah, good song" and plays along comfortably. Nelson seems to follow, as well. Mathews and Hart, however, muddle along, figuring out the song as they go. I doubt the band ever rehearsed much. Garcia and Nelson seem to have known a million songs, but Hart and Matthews didn't have their folk and bluegrass performing background.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdkSFyBn3FljwBlgB_wTY61hHmR81tJnH3k3nFYWP92r8S9EOdAIcsnCuhe0dyfWS1i4IC08e8IxWW4ULunwwvruWLP8N5tyb-OmG5kz-uBKJgBZ-BJjIaxEW0EXQrThqfEzJPuGun_90/s1600/SFC19690806a.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="97" data-original-width="418" height="74" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhdkSFyBn3FljwBlgB_wTY61hHmR81tJnH3k3nFYWP92r8S9EOdAIcsnCuhe0dyfWS1i4IC08e8IxWW4ULunwwvruWLP8N5tyb-OmG5kz-uBKJgBZ-BJjIaxEW0EXQrThqfEzJPuGun_90/s320/SFC19690806a.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The first appearance in print of the name "New Riders Of The Purple Sage," from Ralph J Gleason's column in the SF Chronicle on August 6, 1969. It says "...at The Matrix tonight and tomorrow night, <b>New Riders of the Purple Sage (W. Jerry Garcia)</b>"</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Synthesis: New Riders of The Purple Sage with Bob Matthews</b><br />
The first use of the name "New Riders Of The Purple Sage" was in the San Francisco <i>Chronicle</i> the next week, when the band played the Matrix for four nights. We have a tape from the second night (Thursday August 7). The band is a little tighter than at the Bear's Lair, but not much. The honky tonk feel of the band is in place, but the rhythm section hardly plays rhythm. Matthews had spent more time as an engineer than as a musician, and he played very simply.<br />
<br />
Nonetheless, Bob Matthews was the New Riders' first bass player. For the Dead's first "road trip" with the Riders, to Seattle and Oregon (Aug 20-23 '69), Matthews played bass. So much for the myth of only having to bring "two extra people" because Phil Lesh played bass. The next weekend (Aug 28-30), the New Riders opened for the Dead at the Family Dog, and Matthews again played bass. Thanks to the box, which has the complete set from August 28, and a few tracks from the next two nights, we know Matthews was the bass player. By this time, Matthews and Hart know the material a bit better, and the group sounds more like a band.<br />
<br />
Matthews' last gig as the New Riders bass player was September 18 '69, at the Inn Of The Beginning in Cotati. Our source is Matthews' himself, in an interview with Jesse Jarnow (@bourgwick). Conveniently, Matthews taped the show, by hanging his rig off a beam in the ceiling. The band is continuing to improve, but not very fast. In any case, <a href="http://www.alembic.com/family/history.html">Matthews was a partner in the newly formed Alembic Sound company</a>, along with Owlsey and Ron and Susan (Frates) Wickersham, and he didn't have time to moonlight as a bass player. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyA4SdVRa7ATRYuVQ_MIuUncciWOO_IXUnRP6itXPUYF11iXQYS65Iwr4YXu-9H41eSR2cESCQ11O75nMANW5JlE4a2tXvgcpKRhcAkIYbs3GgUu44Dbi3VXh5YhQMXEe7qd8hgEjnjJE/s1600/1048+University+%2528BK%2529+20090811.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyA4SdVRa7ATRYuVQ_MIuUncciWOO_IXUnRP6itXPUYF11iXQYS65Iwr4YXu-9H41eSR2cESCQ11O75nMANW5JlE4a2tXvgcpKRhcAkIYbs3GgUu44Dbi3VXh5YhQMXEe7qd8hgEjnjJE/s320/1048+University+%2528BK%2529+20090811.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">1048 University Avenue (at Tenth St), the site of Mandrake's, as it appeared in 2009. Jerry Garcia, Phil Lesh and Mickey Hart played this tiny club in Berkeley in October, 1969 (and Garcia and Hart twice more in April '70)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>New Riders of The Purple Sage with Phil Lesh</b><br />
With Matthews becoming a full-time sound engineer, Phil Lesh took over as bassist for the New Riders of The Purple Sage. Keep in mind that if my hypothesis is correct, then Phil had already been rehearsing with Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom, so he would have already played at least some of the material. In any case, unlike Matthews, Phil hardly needed rehearsal to play honky-tonk songs.<br />
<br />
<i>Dawn of The New Riders</i> provides us with the first glimpse of the New Riders playing live with Phil Lesh, a short 50 years after it happened. The tapes are from a tiny place called <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Mandrakes.htm">Mandrake's, at 1048 University Avenue(near San Pablo Ave) in Berkeley</a>. The Riders played Tuesday through Thursday, October 14-16, and the box includes tracks from the first two nights (for the full story of Mandrake's, <a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2009/08/1048-university-avenue-berkeley.html">read the unearthly 500+-Comment Thread here</a>, no I did not mistype the number). <strike>If my chronology is correct (see below), these would have been just Phil Lesh's second and third shows with the band.</strike><br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>[<b>update</b>: I am completely wrong. Bob Matthews plays bass at Mandrake's. It's even on the tape box. At the minimum, I was doing him a disservice, and he had improved as a bass player. It turns out that Matthews assertion that Sep 18 '69 was his last gig as a Rider is also incorrect, as he must have left much later. When Phil joined remains a mystery] </i></blockquote>
<br />
The New Riders' honky-tonk sound was designed to melodic and simple, befitting its country music roots. Phil Lesh uses his remarkable skills to find hidden melodies in the songs, and to bring them out from the bottom of the sound rather than the top, an unexpected twist. Garcia has something to bounce off now, with Phil on board. Phil cannot help but overlay some more complex rhythms into the melodies, leaving Nelson and Garcia to keep it simple. It goes without saying that Lesh's unique approach makes Mickey Hart's contributions less eccentric.<br />
<br />
With Lesh on board, the New Riders of The Purple Sage become a real band at last. Sure, they have a unique approach to melodies, and their rhythms might throw off Buck Owens, but for the hippie audiences they are playing for, it probably worked. The New Riders played little places around the Bay Area, never opening for the Dead, playing college and nightclub gigs. For all the problems Phil Lesh solves, however, it leads to another--Phil apparently got bored.<br />
<br />
All Deadheads take it as a given that Phil Lesh is a musical genius, so it's no surprise that he fills all the holes in the early Riders sound single-handedly. Phil's subsequent career, however, tells us that he never really liked playing bars, nor playing the same songs over and over. I think Phil's experience with the Riders is essential to his brilliant, understated playing on <i>Workingman's Dead</i> and A<i>merican Beauty</i>. Having figured the music out, however, Phil apparently lost interest in it. The New Riders of The Purple Sage did not cease to exist after November, 1969 but they pretty much ground to a halt. <br />
<br />
<b>Friend Of The Devil</b><br />
The New Riders, <strike>with Phil Lesh on bass</strike> played six dates in October 1969, and about a dozen in November. All of them were around the Bay Area, and none of them were opening for the Grateful Dead. The Dead played a share of local gigs, too, so there were opportunities for the New Riders to be booked, but it didn't happen, in distinct contrast to mythology.<br />
<br />
But here's the thing; after November 1969, what few and far between New Riders bookings there are were mostly canceled. There's nothing in December, as the Dead were mostly on the road. There's a benefit at Pauley Ballroom in Berkeley, on January 19, 1970, but we can't confirm that it happened. In February the Dead are mostly on the road, nor do the New Riders open no shows at home or away. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/06/march-1970-new-riders-shows-did-they.html">Riders showed were booked for March 12, 13 and 14, 1970 but I demonstrated that the band canceled </a>(replaced by Big Brother, itself an interesting story). There was one more booking, on March 18, 1970 at the Family Dog, when the Dead were between Buffalo and Port Chester. Amazingly, there is trace evidence that the Riders actually played, but that too can't yet be proven unless the Owsley Foundation still has the tape.<br />
<br />
Yet despite the lack of performances, the New Riders continued to exist. The explanation is one of simple geography. During the late 1969-early '70 period, Garcia and Mountain Girl shared a house at 271 Madrone Avenue in Larkspur with Robert Hunter and his girlfriend. David Nelson mostly crashed on their couch. A careful review of that underrated source, Robert Greenfield's <i>Dark Star</i>, a 1997 "oral biography" of Jerry Garcia, tells us the crucial clue on page 115: John Dawson lived across the street. Presumably Nelson slept at Dawson's when the Garcia house was full.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
[<i><b>update</b>: f<a href="https://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2020/04/riders-of-purple-sage-old-new-and.html?showComment=1586798587060#c3718837028409116152">ellow scholar Jesse interviewed David Nelson recentl</a>y. It turns out that Nelson and Dawson lived in Kentfield, about 3 miles and 10 minutes away. Nelson often crashed on the couch at the Garcias when he didn't want to drive home. So my general point about Nelson and Dawson living near is still true, even if it wasn't actually "across the street"</i>]. </blockquote>
Once you realize that Dawson lived across the street from Garcia, a number of extraneous threads start to link up. The period where Robert Hunter was rehearsing with the Riders but not performing with them? It makes perfect sense if you realize that Nelson and Dawson were over at his house playing with Jerry, so plugging in and playing along would have been easy. And the whole story about "Friend Of The Devil," as told by Nelson? In short, that Dawson wrote a song, Nelson played the tape for Garcia--remember he was probably sleeping on the couch--and next morning Garcia had added a bridge, so Hunter added some lyrics ("Got two reasons..."). It all makes sense when you realize that Garcia, Hunter, Nelson and Dawson lived in two houses across the street from each other.<br />
<br />
Was it coincidence that Dawson lived across the street from Garcia and Hunter? I hardly think so. You can't fault Dawson for anything, though. He was a songwriter looking for a chance, and even a part-time band with Garcia gave him an opportunity he might never get otherwise. So having the foresight to rent the place across the street kept the New Riders dream alive for him and Nelson.<br />
<br />
During the Dec '69-Mar '70 NRPS "Interregnum," Garcia and Weir played some brief acoustic sets with the Dead, and Garcia played a little pedal steel on some country covers, so the Bobby Ace idea was still floating around. All the Riders really needed was a bass player who actually wanted to play with them, and it wasn't going to be Phil Lesh. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1C-CPxY2WSKG_qobqwzH7VH1qC8IEOv9jYzHzJxPMmn8kILTPBYzF_0EJtZKLXy1bq7XWPo87XP00MdAo6qmVaYiKtgTNsZH4vnYI27KBefxRDB4jVuYKAhWSt_JWGz_IRk64Y2CTyIg/s1600/19700417.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="648" data-original-width="503" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1C-CPxY2WSKG_qobqwzH7VH1qC8IEOv9jYzHzJxPMmn8kILTPBYzF_0EJtZKLXy1bq7XWPo87XP00MdAo6qmVaYiKtgTNsZH4vnYI27KBefxRDB4jVuYKAhWSt_JWGz_IRk64Y2CTyIg/s320/19700417.jpg" width="248" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The flyer for what was certainly Dave Torbert's debut as the New Riders bass player, at the Family Dog on the weekend of April 17-19, 1970. Also billed were "Mickey Hart and His Heartbeats" and "Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck." We know the Dead played acoustic, but nothing else really about the shows.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>New Riders of The Purple Sage with Dave Torbert: The Call</b><br />
David Nelson had started <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/02/david-nelson-and-new-delhi-river-band.html">the South Bay's second psychedelic blues band, the New Delhi River Band, in mid-1966</a>. Later that fall, Redwood City's Dave Torbert joined the band on bass (having previously been in the folk-rock Sit-Ins and <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2011/03/good-news-performance-history-1966.html">the bluesy Good News</a>). <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2012/08/david-nelson-and-new-delhi-river-band.html">Nelson, Torbert and their bandmates made a good go of it through early 1968</a>, but the NDRB never made any money beyond Santa Clara County, even though they were known in Berkeley and other places. The band ground to a halt, and by Spring '68 Torbert started to play with Matt Kelly.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2013/05/shango-horses-and-matt-kelly-1968-matt.html">Torbert and Kelly were in various bands together (Wind Wind and Shango), but they ended up in a band called Horses that got to make a record for the White Whale label</a>. Despite this modest level of success, Horses broke up as well. Torbert went to Hawaii, mainly to surf, but also playing in a band called The Sun And The Moon. Kelly played blues on the Chitlin Circuit for a while, with Mel Brown, and then ended up in England. <a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2013/12/gospel-oakmountain-current33-1969-72.html">Kelly got in a band called Gospel Oak, who had signed with Kapp, an MCA subsidiary. Gospel Oak needed a bass player, so Kelly sent Torbert a plane ticket to London, via San Francisco, to join his band for the album</a>.<br />
<br />
For some years, the story was that Nelson or Dawson had called Dave Torbert's parents house "by chance" when he picked up clothes on his way to London. Torbert got the offer to join the New Riders as bass player. He called his friend Kelly, who graciously told him to take the offer to be in a band in California with Jerry Garcia rather than a long shot in London. Torbert helped the New Riders fly high, and Gospel Oak released an obscure album and disappeared.<br />
<br />
Was the call a "coincidence?" Of course not. David Gans, at my behest, queried David Nelson about this a decade ago, and Nelson conceded that they knew when Torbert would be there. At the time the Dead, much less the Riders, had no money (thanks to Lenny Hart), so they needed Matt Kelly's MCA money to fly Torbert home. How consciously the whole scheme was crafted can't really be known now, but in any case, Kelly got Torbert to San Franciso, and then let him join the New Riders. A contemporary interview (from Rolling Stone in 1971) concedes that David Nelson's girlfriend actually made the call, another sign that it was a planned event.<br />
<br />
The April 17-19 booking at the Family Dog, with The New Riders of The Purple Sage, Mickey Hart and His Hearbeats and Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck, almost certainly was Dave Torbert's debut as the New Riders' bass player. It was also the formal debut of the "Acoustic Dead," using the Cards Off The Bottom name for the last time. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/11/april-17-19-1970-family-dog-on-great.html">A tape of the Dead's acoustic set from April 18 was released a few years ago</a>. It's interesting to think that the naming conventions, at least, hint at a grander plan than the streamlined "An Evening With The Grateful Dead." <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV1URxdUEX18L7IxlaCa8h6rmzU3-LL1nwpzHEce3XhK1B-yB4Z3Z8gemT0KViBYXWO3zCn3M5pivNlRAFuuI6seBy9wEVkwDyGW2Z0sRjslbax-JZPFwgcHcRWHvihcZMf7xLEjzD_Ws/s1600/Spencer+Dryden+and+JG+1971.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="923" data-original-width="677" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV1URxdUEX18L7IxlaCa8h6rmzU3-LL1nwpzHEce3XhK1B-yB4Z3Z8gemT0KViBYXWO3zCn3M5pivNlRAFuuI6seBy9wEVkwDyGW2Z0sRjslbax-JZPFwgcHcRWHvihcZMf7xLEjzD_Ws/s320/Spencer+Dryden+and+JG+1971.jpg" width="234" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Spencer Dryden onstage with Jerry Garcia ca. 1971</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>Spencer, and The Return of Phil Lesh</b><br />
With Dave Torbert on board, the New Riders were like a real band. Starting on <a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2011/05/ln-jg1970-05-01gdall-126minssbd.html">May 1, 1970, they joined the Grateful Dead on tour. The shows were usually titled "An Evening With The Grateful Dead." </a>Garcia and Weir would open on acoustics, usually joined by Phil Lesh and a drummer, and occasional guest appearances by Pigpen, Nelson and Dawson. Then the New Riders would play a set, followed by a full two-set concert by the electric Grateful Dead. In those days, most concerts had two or three acts. The Dead were all the acts--hence the title "An Evening With..." That title was subsequently adopted by almost all touring rock bands who played a show without an opening act.<br />
<br />
<i>The Dawn of The New Riders</i> gives us a nice snapshot of the early Torbert-era band, although we do have plenty of tapes and a few photos from that era. Torbert has a solid sense of time and provides nice harmonies. The band has narrowed down their repertoire to the strongest of Dawson's material, and has selected some choice covers as well. As the June Fillmore West shows, however, the weak link was Mickey Hart. His percussionist approach to the drums worked with Phil Lesh, but did not lock in well with the rock steady Torbert.<br />
<br />
In the fall of 1970, probably around October, the Riders were signed by Columbia Records and started recording with Stephen Barncard at Wally Heider's. By all accounts, the sessions were terrible. Now granted, the musicians (save Garcia) were inexperienced in the studio, and were notorious for having a party, but I have to think the insurmountable problem was Hart. Radio music, particularly in a country vein, needs a steady beat, and that wasn't Hart's bag. The Riders recruited former Airplane drummer Spencer Dryden around that time, some months before Hart had to leave the Dead for personal reasons. Per Dryden's own story, he was approached about replacing Hart while Hart was still playing live with the Riders, so once again it was clear that Garcia (and possibly others) had a plan. <a href="https://www.blurb.com/b/9043957-the-band-s-with-me">Sally Mann Romano, then Dryden's wife, in her can't-miss book <i>The Band's With Me</i>,</a> makes it clear that it was Garcia who recruited Dryden.<br />
<br />
Spencer Dryden was more of a rock and R&B drummer than a country player, but he was solid like Torbert. In any case, the soulful backbeat provided by Torbert and Dryden was perfect for the psychedelic Buck Owens music the New Riders were trying to make. The Buck Owens sound was swinging country laid on top of a rock rhythm section, a kind of rural Chuck Berry sound. Dawson added some songs about dope and ecology, and Garcia added some sustain, and that was the Riders. Dryden's background in jazz and soul, along with the Jefferson Airplane, was an excellent fit with Torbert.<br />
<br />
Of the 10 tracks on the New Riders famous debut album, only two tracks survive with Hart on drums ("Dirty Business" and "Last Lonely Eagle"). Dryden plays on the rest of them. It's a wonderful debut album, with a kind of spare beauty that was only hinted at during the prior year's live performances. According to Stephen Barncard, the unsung hero of the recording was actually Phil Lesh. Lesh, credited as "Executive Producer" on the back of the LP, spent time in the studio helping to arrange the songs. Having played a couple dozen gigs with the band, Lesh knew the material. The melodies that his own playing hinted at on the 1969 Mandrake's tape were brought out by the entire band, directed by Phil himself. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1Ny58lHLArrdoZUkxjV3W2viQMKP3cXUlP55WbnE2SWnFIiYnclORXCcqcZ5cCeEj3SRx0qeBkIGlz7CM__Vw7GfQTpzxSU3Y_4NIWWeo786yWAMX7ChCJfjdQR8vN-oYxGbu_6KkiUo/s1600/Great+Speckled+Bird+lp+1970+w+cage.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="266" data-original-width="434" height="196" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1Ny58lHLArrdoZUkxjV3W2viQMKP3cXUlP55WbnE2SWnFIiYnclORXCcqcZ5cCeEj3SRx0qeBkIGlz7CM__Vw7GfQTpzxSU3Y_4NIWWeo786yWAMX7ChCJfjdQR8vN-oYxGbu_6KkiUo/s320/Great+Speckled+Bird+lp+1970+w+cage.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Buddy Cage (far right) as a member of Ian and Sylvia Tyson's band, Great Speckled Bird</td></tr>
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<b>Buddy Cage: Moth To Butterfly</b><br />
One way to look at the evolution of the New Riders is to see them evolving, paring back weak links to make themselves stronger. Some original Dawson songs from 1969 were simply not good enough to make the cut, and they dropped away. Bob Matthews and Mickey Hart, for different reasons, were not strong enough either, and they were replaced by better players. Ironically, by mid-1971 the weakest link was Jerry Garcia's pedal steel guitar playing. Garcia had great melodic ideas, and a beautiful feel for getting the right tone, but his picking was well below the quality of a full-time steel player. Garcia himself knew this.<br />
<br />
One of the many subplots of the Grateful Dead's adventures on the Trans-Canadian train tour in July 1970 known as Festival Express was the discovery of pedal steel guitarist Buddy Cage. Cage was playing with Canadian folk-rock stars Ian and Sylvia, whose band at the time was called Great Speckled Bird. Garcia apparently approached Cage on the train about replacing him in the Riders. It took a while to actually happen, but happen it did. In the meantime, Cage continued to tour with Ian and Sylvia and record with Anne Murray and others (that's him on "Snowbird" I believe). Around September 1971, just as the debut album was released by Columbia, Cage came to the Bay Area to rehearse with the New Riders.<br />
<br />
The loyal Garcia played the first leg of the tour with the New Riders. Columbia had paid to broadcast many of the NRPS shows, in conjunction with live Dead broadcasts, and Garcia was the main attraction of the Riders at that point. Garcia played 11 NRPS shows where they opened for the Dead, between October 19 (Minneapolis) and October 31 (Cincinnati). On November 11, in Atlanta, he turned over the chair to Cage. Cage is a rare musician whose very first performance with a new band was broadcast live on FM radio. No worries--Cage nailed it from the first note, which he continued to do for as long as he was in the New Riders.<br />
<br />
With an album, a record contract and no members of the Grateful Dead, the New Riders of The Purple Sage were free to be a real band. The new archival release, <i>Thanksgiving in New York City</i>, shows how good they had become after just a year with Buddy Cage. By this time, the band was playing two-hour shows, with a rich mixture of original material and covers of both classic country and contemporary rock hits. Much as we all love Garcia's tasteful steel licks, it's Buddy Cage who was the real deal with ten or twenty strings. Cage could encompass all of Garcia's melodic warmth, pick like any Nashville cat, and still get a rockin' edge from his steel guitar that made him a real rock and roller.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAKQK1AFUgAp6lgVzU9K2BlyVjyjk0gAlRKYhm3sFQH-NN0HHr2iFRCqKSFHjVhqafpFp8zePuhFe0e_H_tFGOFl79ON1zUFNGylOZ384fAT8ysG0sW6IA2v8WsVwS269FzBmuptAIEdQ/s1600/Bob+Weir+Ace+lp+1972.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="800" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAKQK1AFUgAp6lgVzU9K2BlyVjyjk0gAlRKYhm3sFQH-NN0HHr2iFRCqKSFHjVhqafpFp8zePuhFe0e_H_tFGOFl79ON1zUFNGylOZ384fAT8ysG0sW6IA2v8WsVwS269FzBmuptAIEdQ/s320/Bob+Weir+Ace+lp+1972.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The final trace of Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom was the title of Bob Weir's 1972 solo album, <i>Ace</i>. No one called him Bobby Ace, to my knowledge, prior to the Cards Off The Bottom.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>From Small Things Big Things One Day Come</b><br />
Jerry Garcia had been a bluegrass and folk player in the early 60s, and he became a signpost to new space as a psychedelic rocker later in that same decade. By 1969, he and Bob Weir were looking for a way to play all that music under the same umbrella, perhaps touring the nation like a kaleidoscopic Buck Owens. There would be some folk music, some honky-tonkin', somc original material and straight up psychedelic blues and rock and roll. Did it happen? Yes. But not quite the way it was originally conceived.<br />
<br />
America was ripe for country rock, and the New Riders of The Purple Sage were among other pioneers like The Byrds, Poco, The Flying Burrito Brothers and the Eagles. To thrive, the band had to subdivide from the Grateful Dead, like a one-celled animal, in order to thrive. And thrive the Riders did, at least through the 70s. The Dead's acoustic sets disappeared amidst equipment problems in the early 70s, but the country and honky-tonk material stayed, when the Dead added a slew of cover versions to their repertoire. The acoustic Dead was gone, but that music would reappear with Old And In The Way, another acoustic revival in 1980, and the various Garcia and Weir performances throughout the later 1980s.<br />
<br />
What little evidence we have for the nascent Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom seems to have been for some kind of contemporary honky-tonk ensemble. To different degrees, the Jerry Garcia Band and Kingfish filled these roles, playing the sort of Chuck Berry, Buck Owens and Bob Dylan material that had been hinted at by the early Riders. The Dead's huge range of musical interests, combined with the realities of the music industry, made it more sensible to have a slew of ongoing ensembles playing separately instead of touring as a single entity.<br />
<br />
You can still have the Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom experience, though, if you want it. If you have the time, set the Wayback machine to the mid-70s. Play some acoustic Dead, play some Old And In The Way, some primo New Riders, a little Kingfish, your favorite JGB set, and then a crushing two-set Grateful Dead concert. It should take about 9 hours. That was the idea, and you have to admit it was a good one.Make sure to play it loud for Buddy Cage, and for Jerry Garcia, and for Keith, and Pigpen and Nicky Hopkins and Dave Torbert and Spencer Dryden, too, and everyone else who we wish were still here.<br />
<br />
<b>Appendix: NRPS Timeline 1969-70</b><br />
For convenience, here is a timeline of known New Riders shows from the 1969-early '70 period. Follow the links for more discussion of the details around each show.<br />
<i>(<b>update</b>: <a href="https://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2020/05/new-riders-of-purple-sage-tour-history.html">I have made a considerably advanced version of this another post</a>) </i><br />
<br />
<b><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/jerry-garcia-sneaky-pete-kleinow-and.html">April 4-6, 1969 Avalon Ballroom, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Flying Burrito Brothers/AUM/Sanpaku</a></b><br />
Jerry Garcia hears Sneaky Pete Kleinow playing pedal steel guitar on Owsley's sound system.<br />
<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOKMzubJcdhcHQNH7xua5n0i2qbeEcetxv5lU1ChkMVF3EV5zZdys9SLEYoinK-86fctnjmVmZ40n-fnfCJ6Xo19qn0mlWSqAqCFDCfUXS7VzOsVMXhcc2TAFaDRZcZPuKh4QoSiPXwjA/s1600/Don+Edwards+Guitar+City+Lakewood+CO.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="599" data-original-width="1161" height="165" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgOKMzubJcdhcHQNH7xua5n0i2qbeEcetxv5lU1ChkMVF3EV5zZdys9SLEYoinK-86fctnjmVmZ40n-fnfCJ6Xo19qn0mlWSqAqCFDCfUXS7VzOsVMXhcc2TAFaDRZcZPuKh4QoSiPXwjA/s320/Don+Edwards+Guitar+City+Lakewood+CO.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Don Edwards' Guitar City, in Lakewood, CO (ca 'late 70s), where Jerry Garcia bought a pedal steel guitar on April 13 or 14, 1969</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>April 13 or 14, 1969</b> Don Edwards Guitar City, Lakewood, CO<br />
Jerry Garcia buys a pedal steel guitar from a well-known steel shop<br />
<br />
<b>May 7, 1969 The Underground, Menlo Park, CA: John Dawson</b><br />
This was probably the first Wednesday night that Garcia sat in with Dawson.<br />
<br />
<b>May 14, 1969 The Underground, Menlo Park, CA: John Dawson</b><br />
Dawson and Garcia played, because the Owsley Foundation has a tape. Neslon had not yet joined.<br />
<br />
<b>May 21, 1969 The Underground, Menlo Park, CA: John Dawson</b><br />
Likely a night that Garcia and Nelson backed Dawson (the Dead were booked May 28).<br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/12/grateful-deadjerry-garcia-tour.html">May 1969 GD/Garcia Tour Itinerary</a><br />
<br />
<b>June 3 or 4 (?), 1969 Peninsula School, Menlo Park, CA: unbilled benefit featuring Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom</b><br />
Although undetermined, the most likely date for the gig described in Blair Jackson's book is during this week.<br />
<br />
<b>June 4, 1969 The Underground, Menlo Park, CA: John Dawson</b><br />
I have indirect confirmation of this date. It's plausible to think that the Peninsula School gig was in the afternoon, and the club in the evening.<br />
<br />
<b>June 11, 1969 California Hall, San Francisco, CA: Bobby Ace and The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck</b><br />
Thanks to McNally (p.321), we know the band consisted of Garcia, Weir, TC, Phil, Hart, Peter Grant, Nelson and Dawson. McNally also found a setlist (not a tape), which consists of the typical covers performed by the "Acoustic Dead" in 1970. A tantalizing clue (ignore the Scientology Benefit side-story, which is tangential).<br />
<br />
<b>June 18, 1969 The Underground, Menlo Park, CA: John Dawson</b><br />
Impossible so far to confirm, but presumably the trio played this Wednesday as well.<br />
<br />
<b>June 25, 1969 The Underground, Menlo Park, CA: John Dawson</b><br />
Fascinatingly, McNally uncovered a setlist from a serious fan who kept such things. Until or unless the Owsley foundation releases the May 14 tape, this is our only insight into what the trio played in Menlo Park:<br />
<i>Tiger By The Tail / Fair Chance To Know / Mama Tried /
The Next In Line / I'm In Love With You / Stagger Lee /
Coat Of Many Colors / Whatcha Gonna Do / Truck Drivin' Man
/ If You Hear Me When I'm Leaving / The Race Is On / Six
Days On The Road / Jailbait Gets You Busted / Close Up The
Honky Tonks / Last Lonely Eagle / For What It's Worth /
I Still Miss Someone / Together Again / Superman / Lay Lady
Lay / If You Want To Run / Buckaroo / Long Black Veil /
Me & My Uncle / Delilah</i><br />
<br />
<b>June 29, 1969 The Barn, Rio Nido, CA: Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady/Jerry Garcia and Friends<i> </i></b><br />
The Owsley Foundation release of Jorma Kaukonen/Jack Casady/Joey Covington <i>Before We Were Them</i> was recorded on June 27, but there is one track from June 28. At the end, the announcer mentions a "jam" at Rio Nido and says that "Jerry Garcia and a friend" will be playing. This is all but certainly Garcia and Dawson, most likely with David Nelson as well. <i><br /><a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/05/grateful-deadjerry-garcia-tour.html">June 1969 GD/Garcia Tour Itinerary</a></i><br />
<i><br /></i><b>July 16, 1969 Longshoreman's Hall, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Cleveland Wrecking Company/Ice <i>Hell's Angels Benefit</i></b><br />
Unbilled, the soon-to-be Riders opened for the Dead. They came on late, due to equipment problems apparently caused by Owsley. The band played briefly, and per Blair Jackson's eyewitnesses, shambollically.Presumably Matthews and Hart debuted. Given that the Dead had toured much of early July, there can't have been much rehearsal.<br />
<br />
<b>August 1, 1969 Bear's Lair, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA: Jerry Garcia and Marmaduke</b><br />
The band plays two sets, starting at 10:30pm, at the tiny, newly-opened beer joint on the Berkeley campus. Confusingly, the Dead were booked at the Family Dog this night, but did not play. A union of light show workers were striking, and Garcia--union-born through his mother--would never cross a picket line. It's telling that in a non-confrontational Garcia move, he simply booked another gig and clearly had no intention of participating in any dramatic showdown at the Family Dog event.<br />
<br />
<b>August 6-9, 1969 The Matrix, San Francisco, CA: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
Tne New Riders of The Purple Sage name first appears in the San Francisco <i>Chronicle</i> when the band plays Wednesday thru Saturday night at The Matrix in the Marina District. We have a tape from Thursday (August 7, sometimes dated differently).<br />
<br />
<b>August 13, 1969 Family Dog On The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: New Lost City Ramblers/New Riders of The Purple Sage</b> <i>"Hoe Down"</i><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/04/family-dog-at-great-highway-august-13.html">This hitherto unknown show was mentioned in the Berkeley <i>Tribe</i> newspaper</a> (August 22-29).<b> </b><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/04/family-dog-at-great-highway-august-13.html?showComment=1272726193203#comment-c5794731571269825865">It appears that</a>
old South Bay pal Pete Grant sat in with the New Riders on banjo for a
few numbers. Not surprisingly, Garcia and Nelson were very excited to
play on the same bill with the New Lost City Ramblers, and at the end of
the show members of both bands played a few tunes together.<br />
<br />
<b>August 19, 1969 Family Dog At The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<strike>It's not clear that there was actually a show this night</strike> (it was the Monday after Woodstock)<b>. [<i>update:</i></b><i> the Owsley Foundation has a tape, so it happened]</i><br />
<b></b><br />
<br />
<b>August 20, 1969 El Roach Tavern, Ballard, WA Grateful Dead</b><br />
The Dead, The New Riders of The Purple Sage and a group called Sanpaku
were scheduled to play an outdoor venue in Seattle. They got rained out,
so the Dead played a scary biker bar in Seattle called El Roach. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/august-20-1969-roach-seattle-wa-updated.html">I have written about this at length</a>.Possibly the New Riders played as well.<br />
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<b>
August 21, 1969 Aqua Theatre, Seattle, WA Grateful Dead/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Sanpaku</b><br />
After the rainout, the Dead and their support acts came back and played Seattle's Aquatheatre, <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/guest-flute-players-with-grateful-dead.html">joined by Sanpaku flautist Gary Larkey</a>. This was <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/august-20-1969-unnnamed-bar-west-15th.html">the last performance at the unique outdoor venue</a>, and I have <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/august-21-1969-aqua-theatre-seattle-wa.html">written about it</a> as well. This booking was the first time the New Riders were billed as opening for The Grateful Dead.<br />
<br />
<b>
August 23, 1969 <a href="http://www.deadlists.com/posters/1960s/19690823.html">Bullfrog 2 Festival, Pelletier Farm, St Helens, OR</a>
Grateful Dead/Taj Mahal/Portland Zoo/Sabatic Goat/River/Sand/Notary
Sojac/Searchin Soul/The Weeds/New Colony/Chapter Five/Trilogy/Bill
Feldman/Don Ross/Mixed Blood/Ron Bruce</b><br />
The Grateful Dead headlined a rock festival in Oregon. This festival
was originally scheduled for the Columbia County Fairgrounds in St.
Helens, Oregon, about 30 miles North of Portland, but a local judge
voided the promoters contract. The festival was moved to private
property nearby. <br />
<br />
The festival ran three days (August 21-22-23). I assume Taj Mahal
headlined Friday night (Aug 22) and the Dead headlined Saturday. The
rest of the groups were Oregon bands. An eyewitness once reported (in a
letter to an Oregon newspaper) that the New Riders (and Country Joe)
played the show also, and I find that plausible since we know that
Nelson, Dawson and their equipment were with the band. <b></b><br />
<b><br />
</b><br />
<b>August 28, 1969 Family Dog at The Great Highway: Mickey and The Hartbeats/New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<b>August 29-30, 1969 Family Dog at The Great Highway: Grateful Dead/Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Rubber Duck Company</b><br />
Thanks to the Owsley box, we have music from this weekend. The Thursday night "Hartbeats" set was a jam, it's not clear if the Dead proper actually played. The event was promoted via handbill and was probably more like a public rehearsal. <a href="https://berkeleyfolk.blogspot.com/2010/09/commander-cody-and-his-lost-planet.html">Commander Cody's band had only recently relocated from Ann Arbor, MI to Emeryville</a>. <br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/grateful-deadjerry-garcia-tour.html">GD/Garcia tour itinerary July/August 1969</a><br />
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</b>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggArTiyfm7MJBPfkf_Fu-ZMGo_DnG5qVBBL_blppQg924jFI5CjKsCzH2NR4FUYsnHhbm33KovCb5h1Q7zyxDRiQeZJunUEPK4n2wyJVmHCAllmVaX3YjO742FQbJ0CfqYInmjTB2p1JU/s1600/Inn+Of+The+Beginning+20100712-4.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggArTiyfm7MJBPfkf_Fu-ZMGo_DnG5qVBBL_blppQg924jFI5CjKsCzH2NR4FUYsnHhbm33KovCb5h1Q7zyxDRiQeZJunUEPK4n2wyJVmHCAllmVaX3YjO742FQbJ0CfqYInmjTB2p1JU/s320/Inn+Of+The+Beginning+20100712-4.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Inn Of The Beginning in Cotati, as it appeared in 2010</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>September 18, 1969 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
Bob Matthews last gig as the New Riders bass player (per himself) was at t<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/07/8201-old-redwood-highway-cotati-ca-inn.html">his tiny bar in Sonoma County, which had opened only the year before</a>. Matthews hung his taping rig over a roof beam. The Dead promptly went on tour on the East Coast. [<i><b>update</b>: not Matthews last gig</i>]<br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/02/grateful-deadjerry-garcia-tour.html">GD/Garcia tour itinerary September 1969 </a><br />
<br />
<b> October 9, 1969 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
Apparently Phil Lesh's debut as the New Riders' bass player.<br />
<br />
<b>October 14-16, 1969 Mandrake's, Berkeley, CA New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
It seems that the shows on the <i>Dawn Of The New Riders </i>box were <strike>Phil Lesh's second and third performances with the band</strike>. [<i><b>update</b>: still Matthews on bass</i>]<br />
<br />
<b>October 17, 1969 Student Union Ballroom, San Jose State College, San Jose,CA New Riders Of The Purple Sage/The Fourth Way</b><br />
This may have been the very first rock concert at the newly opened ballroom (soon known as The Loma Prieta Room). The Grateful Dead would return to headline two weeks later. The Owsley Foundation has a tape.<br />
<br />
<i></i>
<b>October 22, 1969 Family Dog on the Great Highway, San Francisco, CA:
"Ecological Ball" with Lazarus/Garden Of Delights/Heavy Water/New Riders
Of The Purple Sage and films</b><br />
This show had been known from an obscure flyer, but this listing in the
Wednesday, October 22 Chronicle sheds slightly more light on the event.
Only the Riders and Lazarus were rock bands, as Garden Of Delights and
Heavy Water were light shows. The evening sounds like what today would
be called a "multi-media" event. The Riders probably played one set.<br />
<i></i><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/02/nrps-tour-itinerary-october-1969.html">NRPS Tour Itinerary October 1969</a><br />
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<b>November 3-4, 1969 The Matrix, San Francisco, CA New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
The four-song New Riders demo was taped at Pacific High Recorders in San Francisco sometime in November, with Phil Lesh on bass.<br />
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<b>November 6, 1969 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcfLRUdmjue-R4bP3a3RIJpqWwRMcw82uRydZttzMvvS6Ia2c6tSvtI5xtXYHGDDWks8sYIlUZCBE8U48LnVLRt6f7wjtcnl1t0F69BANSSADT1Qc_R4S1BBKCGTf6eIj_QnmWfp7B7oI/s1600/Poppycock--19691108+flyer.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="836" data-original-width="616" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcfLRUdmjue-R4bP3a3RIJpqWwRMcw82uRydZttzMvvS6Ia2c6tSvtI5xtXYHGDDWks8sYIlUZCBE8U48LnVLRt6f7wjtcnl1t0F69BANSSADT1Qc_R4S1BBKCGTf6eIj_QnmWfp7B7oI/s320/Poppycock--19691108+flyer.jpg" width="235" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Poppycock, at 135 University Avenue in Palo Alto, was one of the steady rock clubs around the Bay Area in 1969. This flyer is for November 8, 1969 and following. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b><b>November 13, 1969 The Poppycock, Palo Alto, CA: New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
</b><a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/2010/02/135-university-avenue-palo-alto-ca.html">The Poppycock, at 135 University Avenue (at High Street) in Palo Alto, was a fish and chips/beer joint that was also Palo Alto's first regular rock venue.</a><b> </b><br />
<br />
<b><b>November 18, 1969 Family Dog On The Great Highway, San Francisco New Riders Of The Purple Sage/David LaFlamme <i>"Square Dance"</i></b></b><br />
LaFlamme likely sat in with the New Riders.<br />
<br />
<b><b><i> </i></b></b><br />
<b><b><b>November 19, 1969 Fillmore West, San Francisco New Riders Of The
Purple Sage/Big Brother and The Holding Company/Barry McGuire & The
Doctor Naut Family</b><i><br />
</i></b></b>A Family Dog benefit was originally advertised for
Winterland, but the show was moved to
Fillmore West.<br />
<br />
<b>November 20, 1969 The Poppycock, Palo Alto, CA: New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<br />
<b><b>November 22-23, 1969 Family Dog On The Great Highway, San Francisco< CA:
New Riders Of The Purple Sage/Anonymous Artists Of America/Devil's
Kitchen</b> </b><br />
The second night, and possibly the first night as well, was likely canceled due to a Grateful Dead show in Boston on November 23.<br />
<br />
<b>November 26, 1969 The Poppycock, Palo Alto, CA: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
J<a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2013/05/nrps-november-26-1969-poppycock-palo.html">GMF found this listed in the Berkeley <i>Tribe</i></a>. Wednesday before Thanksgiving, the third week in a row that the Riders were booked at the Poppycock<br />
<b><b><i> </i></b></b><br />
<b>November 27, 1969 Family Dog on The Great Highway New Riders Of The
Purple Sage/Lamb/Cleveland Wrecking Company/Deacon and The
Suprelles/Rafael Garrett Circus</b><br />
This was part of a multi-media extravaganza including stage performers and films (whom I have not listed). <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdYQMcYIUBVd-4bwt_yvObOAiB8bdOp-s6BcmuLO8F3i5am5b7KPSWIzH30TP3U24qyqbZlINC5-elBXOAj5zKv-1gZObhtChd97DM2M7PJc1rCvbQlsCDzpnnuxXJE_uj4PiHvqIJDsc/s1600/SFC19691128a-1.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="57" data-original-width="412" height="44" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdYQMcYIUBVd-4bwt_yvObOAiB8bdOp-s6BcmuLO8F3i5am5b7KPSWIzH30TP3U24qyqbZlINC5-elBXOAj5zKv-1gZObhtChd97DM2M7PJc1rCvbQlsCDzpnnuxXJE_uj4PiHvqIJDsc/s320/SFC19691128a-1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A clip from Ralph Gleason's SF <i>Chronicle</i> <i>Ad Lib</i> column on Nov 28 '69</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>November 28-29, 1969 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: New Riders Of The Purple Sage</b><br />
The New Riders returned to Cotati for yet another show, this time
apparently for a full weekend. Its possible that the Riders played
Friday (28) and that Joy Of Cooking played Saturday (29), but I will
take Gleason at his word here, even though his hastily-typed <i>Ad Lib</i> section often had typos or casually elided certain bills.<br />
<br />
The IOTB show was Phil Lesh's last show with the New Riders in 1969, and possibly ever.<br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/04/grateful-deadjerry-garcia-tour.html">GD/Jerry Garcia tour itinerary November 1969 </a><br />
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<b>January 19, 1970 Pauley Ballroom, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, CA: New Riders of The Purple Sage Benefit</b><br />
This benefit show was advertised. It's not clear if it happened, or if the New Riders played at it if it did.<br />
<br />
<b>February 7, 1970 Fillmore West, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Taj Mahal/Big Foot</b><br />
I am no expert on tape lineage, but some old circulating audience tapes had John Dawson singing with the Dead (I think on "Together Again"). The old tapes were compilations of some sort, and could have been mis-dated.<br />
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<b>March 12, 1970 Inn Of The Beginning, Cotati, CA: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/06/march-11-1970-inn-of-beginning-cotati.html">Booked, but the Riders canceled (check out the great Comment Thread)</a>.<br />
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<b>March 13-14, 1970 New Orleans House, Berkeley, CA: New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/06/march-1970-new-riders-shows-did-they.html">Once again, the Riders canceled, because they either had no bass player or Phil simply wasn't interested. </a>The reformed Big Brother took up the dates, it seems.<b></b><br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge4Tp9MFXpRaKk6pMnveHfeQpZzlBeNHzu1DKEw3J7RqUSOyGCkdeGTCeG8GOibr5IVqqdEnhZQXUREAd26nw1ng1BUXu0hv0dn3K2a9X1GuxFC6xmYrYQsFym04_zL4_k8lVGBQ9L4p4/s1600/Tape+Vault+Compendium+%25281970318%2529.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEge4Tp9MFXpRaKk6pMnveHfeQpZzlBeNHzu1DKEw3J7RqUSOyGCkdeGTCeG8GOibr5IVqqdEnhZQXUREAd26nw1ng1BUXu0hv0dn3K2a9X1GuxFC6xmYrYQsFym04_zL4_k8lVGBQ9L4p4/s320/Tape+Vault+Compendium+%25281970318%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This photo from p.4 of Tapers Compendium V1 shows tapes in the Grateful Dead Vault, probably ca. 2004. If you blow it up and look on far right of the upper shelf, you can see several tapes marked "3/18/70 Hot Tuna" and "3/18/70 NR." So some recording of the night was made. Investigations continue (<i>thanks JJ and DM for the photo</i>)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b><br /></b>
<b>March 18, 1970 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady/New Riders of The Purple Sage</b><br />
For many years I thought it was impossible that the Riders played this date, since the Dead were between Buffalo (Mar 17) and Port Chester (Mar 20-21). <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/06/march-1970-new-riders-shows-did-they.html?showComment=1347145557037#c668224265330859656">Incredibly, however, there is a photograph of the tape boxes.</a> Maybe Garcia, Lesh and Hart flew home to help mix Workingman's Dead? I hope the Owsley Foundation still has this...was it Phil's last gig as a New Rider?<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>April 17-19, 1970 Family Dog on The Great Highway, San Francisco, CA: Mickey Hart and His Heartbeats/Bobby Ace And The Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck/New Riders of The Purple Sage/Charlie Musselwhite</b><br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/11/april-17-19-1970-family-dog-on-great.html">The formal debut of the Acoustic Dead, all but certainly the debut of Dave Torbert as the New Riders bass player, and the last glimpse of the Cards Off The Bottom Of The Deck.</a><br />
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<br />Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com48tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-43111659766407092352019-08-08T07:35:00.001-07:002019-08-08T15:16:19.399-07:007/3/69 Reed’s RanchGuest Post by Dr. Beechwood<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59gpTWf3PC1Cc_NUyrhyphenhyphen9LO064prSbBXHrwZNZKpDH9mASDafdKh0YRRSfNOCqqbvyyGISaje94aSiHcivNu0HzM3o5su83J9Ehu2pcwPJyYzk3CAH8_9ygliARG8i9PPfQHBpUW4Dd4/s1600/handbill.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="950" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi59gpTWf3PC1Cc_NUyrhyphenhyphen9LO064prSbBXHrwZNZKpDH9mASDafdKh0YRRSfNOCqqbvyyGISaje94aSiHcivNu0HzM3o5su83J9Ehu2pcwPJyYzk3CAH8_9ygliARG8i9PPfQHBpUW4Dd4/s320/handbill.jpg" width="202" /></a></div>
1969 was a massive touring year for the Dead. They played about 140 shows and toured across the country multiple times. In the Bay Area, they played favorite venues such as the Fillmore West, Avalon Ballroom, and Winterland, and they generally played “underground” club shows in other parts of the country, such as the Ark in Boston, the Electric Factory in Philadelphia, the Kinetic Factory in Chicago, and of course the Fillmore East in New York City. They also played a number of college ballrooms, including the University of Arizona, University of Utah, Purdue, University of Oregon, and the University of Colorado (on April 13, 1969). And, on the other end of the crowd-size spectrum, Woodstock on August 16.
The summer of 1969 began with two nights at the Fillmore East (6/20 and 6/21), a free show in New York City’s <a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2013/06/june-22-1969-central-park-nyc.html"> Central Park </a> on 6/22 , then two shows in Santa Rosa (6/27 and 6/28). The show listed in Deadlists.com at <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/07/june-29-1969-barn-rio-nido-grateful.html"> The Barn in Rio Nido </a> on 6/29 was, as we know thanks to some detective work by Corry, the main proprietor of this blog, likely just a jam session with Jerry and Hot Tuna and others.<br />
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A bit more than 50 years ago, on July 3, the Dead returned to Colorado for their second show of the year in the Rocky Mountain State (after the 4/13 CU-Boulder show). But this venue was not a university ballroom—it was “Reed’s Ranch” in Colorado Springs, located about a two-hour drive south of Boulder and 60 miles south of Denver.
According to local Steve Schmitt in <a href="https://www.csindy.com/coloradosprings/rock-of-ages/Content?oid=1346255"> an article published in the Colorado Springs Independent </a>, "It had a really small stage, and it was actually inside a rodeo barn, so it kind of smelled like horses and cattle." Colorado Springs is the location of Colorado College, the U.S. Air Force Academy, and more recently, a significant number of conservative religious institutions.
The venue may have been chosen partly because Bob Weir went to high school for his sophomore year in 1962-1963 in the town of Fountain Valley, located about 10 miles to the southeast of Colorado Springs. This is where he met his collaborator John Barlow. In fact, according to <a href="https://www.csindy.com/coloradosprings/bob-weir-finally-graduates-fountain-valley/Content?oid=3119187"> the Colorado Springs Independent </a>, he returned in 2015 for the 50th Anniversary of his classmates (who would have graduated in 1965) and actually played with a local band, in addition to playing (with a borrowed guitar?) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_p_t9xAyIQ"> Me and My Uncle </a> with some of his friends at the event.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8P-yOUwyytg1zOjEOIF0EDR5VrHfe0h5sforhyphenhyphenfunIjUkHgYwHp0IquBcUYv8x6NrZL6bRbBvf-Q66RtKNVZ9JgYvt4Ji47NYT7xj6MWvPLuS9PoTreH5wzvs5rOwpfoomusVAnamAsc/s1600/ReedRanchLocality.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="560" data-original-width="1220" height="147" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8P-yOUwyytg1zOjEOIF0EDR5VrHfe0h5sforhyphenhyphenfunIjUkHgYwHp0IquBcUYv8x6NrZL6bRbBvf-Q66RtKNVZ9JgYvt4Ji47NYT7xj6MWvPLuS9PoTreH5wzvs5rOwpfoomusVAnamAsc/s320/ReedRanchLocality.png" width="320" /></a></div>
The actual ranch no longer exists, as the modern town of Colorado Springs now has a population of nearly 500,000, whereas in 1969 it was less than 200,000. There is a neighborhood located about 10 miles northwest of downtown called “Reed Ranch” (population 836), thus it’s likely that the original ranch was sold and subdivided for residences. This location is consistent with the hand-drawn map that was on the poster (see above), as well as a comment in a short Reddit thread from a Colorado Springs local who said it was near Centennial Road.
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The concert was on a Thursday night starting at 8:30 pm, according to the poster, and tickets were $4.00. Another band on the bill for this show was Alice Cooper. I don’t know if they played together other times, but at this point, the band “Alice Cooper” had been together since they formed in high school in 1966. In 1969, their music was more psychedelic than their classic rock material of the 1970’s. Their first album was released on June 25, 1969, only a week before this concert, and it came out under Frank Zappa’s “Straight Records” label. According to <a href="https://jerrygarcia.com/show/1969-07-03-reeds-ranch-colorado-springs-co-usa/"> jerrygarcia.com </a>, other bands on the bill were Zephyr, a Boulder band formed in 1969 by Tommy Bolin (later of the James Gang and Deep Purple), the “Holden Caulfield Blues Band” and Devin Mikles (or Deven Michaels), a solo act <a href="https://www.dead.net/show/july-3-1969">, according to a post</a> by user “Devin Mikles” on Dead.net.<br />
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Somone with username <a href="https://archive.org/details/gd1969-07-03.sbd.miller.92771.sbeok.flac16">“MFP Productions”</a> (SEE UPDATE BELOW) on archive.org wrote that he was part of the promotion team who set up this concert. He mentions picking up Owsley, who was still the Dead’s soundman at the time, at the Denver airport and bringing him to the show. He (Duane) stated that ticketless fans broke through the doors after the music started, so they opened them up (presumably to avoid a riot, likely because security measures were “informal”). He said that some of these interlopers were local cowboys, who came in to start causing trouble (“rednecks kicking hippie’s asses” was a common occurrence back then). But after the Dead opened with Green Green Grass of Home, a country song made popular by Porter Wagoner, he said the cowboys mellowed out and “all was cool”.<br />
<br />
The promoters apparently lost a lot of money, but at least it was a memorable evening.
Eyewitness accounts from the 60’s can be suspect, but another poster on Archive, “Doc Holliday987”, was at the show, and says that it was “a mini-Woodstock” in a large barn. He writes that the Dead came on around 3 am and that fans were there until nearly dawn. Another person is quoting his friend “Glenn” who stated that Jerry was "out of it" and that Phil had to tune his guitar. I’m skeptical. In any case, the Dead only played about 10 songs, and the entire set (that is known from the recording) lasts about an hour and a half. Archive.org poster (<a href="https://archive.org/details/gd1969-07-03.132377.sbd.miller.flac16">“Mind Wondrin”</a>) mentions that the Dead were kicked out of a Ramada Inn in Colorado Springs when Pigpen smashed a cigarette machine.<br />
<br />
The band at this time consisted of Jerry, Bob, and Phil, Pigpen and Tom Constanten on keyboards, and the two drummers. It’s the same lineup that appears on Live Dead which was recorded at several shows in the Spring. But the repertoire had changed since early ’69, with the addition of some relatively new cover tunes that they played during this show, such as Green Green Grass of Home (debut 5/31/69 Eugene OR) and Slewfoot (debut 6/11/69).
There’s a great recording online, and the music speaks for itself, so I’m not going to do a detailed show review. Highlights include Morning Dew, High Time, and He Was a Friend of Mine. If you want to read some commentary about the show, check out the
<a href="http://www.rockthebodyelectric.com/2010/09/monday-dead-7-3-1969-reeds-ranch.html">"Rock the Body Electric blog</a>
or just listen to the Archive.org recording (by Bear?) mastered by Charlie Miller:
<a href="https://archive.org/details/gd1969-07-03.sbd.miller.92771.sbeok.flac16">https://archive.org/details/gd1969-07-03.sbd.miller.92771.sbeok.flac16
</a>
or
<a href="https://archive.org/details/gd1969-07-03.132377.sbd.miller.flac16">https://archive.org/details/gd1969-07-03.132377.sbd.miller.flac16 </a><br />
<br />
<b>
Setlist: </b><br />
Green Green Grass of Home<br />
Slewfoot<br />
Sittin’ on Top of the World<br />
Morning Dew<br />
High Time<br />
Me and My Uncle<br />
Casey Jones<br />
Hard to Handle<br />
He Was a Friend of Mine<br />
Lovelight<br />
<br />
<b>Postscript:</b> If you’re interested in another one of my guest posts on a different Dead Blog, check out <a href="http://deadessays.blogspot.com/2015/11/the-updated-grateful-dead-song-graph.html"> the Grateful Dead Song Chart</a>, which shows every time they played one of their original songs. <br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Update 10:20 am on 8/8/19:
</b>
One of the promoters of the show, Duane Washchuck, just called me to discuss his memories of the event. He moved to the Haight in the summer 1968 and said that he saw a free Dead show that summer. Based on info from <a href="http://deadessays.blogspot.com/2015/06/free-shows-benefits-1965-1975.html">the Grateful Dead guide</a>, it was likely the 6/1/68 Panhandle show. By 1969 he was living in Colorado Springs and he says that he and his friends were the first hippies in the area, living in the area near Cheyenne Mountain and Rock Creek. Together with about four of his friends, all in their early 20's, they formed a production company called "MFP Productions", the acronym stands for "Mother F'ing Punks". He said they would do light shows and body painting at a music venue called "Kelker Junction", and he mentioned The Who as one of the bands he saw there. According to <a href="https://www.facebook.com/thewho/posts/50-years-of-the-who18-august-1968-the-who-play-a-one-off-gig-at-the-kelker-junct/10155385149942331/">this Facebook page</a>, The Who played one show there on August 18, 1968.<br />
<br />
One of the MFP guys was named Eddie Shackleton, and he knew some people in the Dead organization. He was apparently responsible for landing the gig. Because the Dead were driving out to Chicago for the July 4-5 shows, they decided to add this show for the night before. Given that it today it's a 14 hour drive from Colorado Springs to Chicago, and that they were playing until dawn, it's amazing that the band made it to Chicago on time and were in any condition to play that night!
The MFP guys painted a bread truck with info about the show and drove it around the area. But because of the lack of security, they lost a bunch of money on the gig when the doors opened and people flooded into the venue. Duane said that the the barn was packed and that he estimates 300-400 hippies and cowboys were in attendance.
Duane doesn't remember much about the show, understandably, but did remember climbing into the rafters of the Barn to plug in the main power after someone had unplugged a cord. Duane said, "It was such an honor to be a part of this experience."<br />
<br />
Thanks to Duane for sharing these memories, and he requests that if any of the MFP guys reads this, to get in touch with him via email at duane.azre@hotmail.com.<br />
<br />
And thanks to Corry for letting me contribute to Lost Live Dead!<br />
<br />
<br />Dr. Jeffhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17771229779025430726noreply@blogger.com11tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5493557313410969282.post-88169734513415396372017-06-22T06:00:00.000-07:002017-11-07T17:16:51.631-08:00First Free Grateful Dead Concert In Every City (Business Innovations)<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdlSdXuUaxe7insja0z4WFOBhVzbAFqo3aj98Vf-7wn5MUevVL05Q_Y3MXm7OVitSneCtPTzheewQ8Jnaa7RSiBeRARUFX-CJ_FAPiXxiKdmABY-Ex3VRRQIgxVdm6nRWk4vavMIn3RgA/s1600/panhandle-path+SF.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="563" data-original-width="750" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdlSdXuUaxe7insja0z4WFOBhVzbAFqo3aj98Vf-7wn5MUevVL05Q_Y3MXm7OVitSneCtPTzheewQ8Jnaa7RSiBeRARUFX-CJ_FAPiXxiKdmABY-Ex3VRRQIgxVdm6nRWk4vavMIn3RgA/s320/panhandle-path+SF.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Panhandle abuts Golden Gate Park, but actually it is part of the Haight Ashbury neighborhood rather than the park itself.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Music in Late Capitalism, and performance in general, was designed to be a scarce resource, withheld until payment was offered. If music was performed too freely, than people would stop paying for it. As a practical matter, this led to some mid-century nightclub economics that Jerry Garcia derided as "Cabaret": playing a short set to sell drinks, and then taking a break, and either turning over the house or forcing everyone to buy more drinks for the next set. Radio disrupted this model, but not by much, since a listener didn't know when their favorite song would be played, and thus kept listening to ads while they were turned in.<br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead had a contrary assumption about music. To the Dead, if you gave people music for free, they would just want more of it, and pay for that privilege. Prior to the Grateful Dead, free concerts in the music business were the actions of the desperate. Free concerts in 1966 and '67 San Francisco upended the notion that music was a finite commodity, and the Grateful Dead were fundamental to that equation. When free concerts became an untenable promotional scheme, the Dead moved to live FM broadcasts, another area in which they were pioneers. Ultimately, the Dead formally encouraged their fans to tape concerts in the mid-1980s, again undermining decades of music business orthodoxy. Thus the Dead are credited with "inventing" internet marketing, since giving it away in the hopes that people will pay later is the go-to business model for the internet.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004QZ9P6A/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1">I am hardly alone in the formulation that the Grateful Dead were foundational in enticing fans by simply playing music for free</a>. Of course, Bob Weir and others have said that the Grateful Dead often did what was easiest, with little forethought, and so assigning them as incipient marketing geniuses may not be entirely warranted. While I think the Dead's influence in the music business has been overstated, however, it isn't irrelevant. Whether the Dead gave away music for free by accident or design, it has had a profound effect on the 21st century live music market. Today, free concerts abound all over cities and college campuses in America, and many performers accept that at least some free performances help get your music across to people who otherwise might never hear it. This post will look at the Dead's free concerts as a commercial endeavor, primarily by examining the first free concert in any city where the Dead played. Since the 20th century is now complete, this analysis probably has no current commercial value, but it should make for an interesting catalog.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnWsECnbngEusatXY8j_LK6YmEFLJ_W_cgyH6VABT0L5RnnB2g7bKSnGmMHMwiX2Vn4j7XW7tFQxj3f48tVb05SOFvoBi-88oGnMF-wRSSyhRmDq0x3clXumx2a3edg5q3-PopHDVg-uQ/s1600/Stanley-Park-map+Vancouver.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="507" data-original-width="700" height="231" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnWsECnbngEusatXY8j_LK6YmEFLJ_W_cgyH6VABT0L5RnnB2g7bKSnGmMHMwiX2Vn4j7XW7tFQxj3f48tVb05SOFvoBi-88oGnMF-wRSSyhRmDq0x3clXumx2a3edg5q3-PopHDVg-uQ/s320/Stanley-Park-map+Vancouver.gif" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Grateful Dead played a few locations in Stanley Park in Vancouver, BC, from the back of a flatbed truck, on August 3, 1966</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>August 3, 1966 Stanley Park, Vancouver, BC: Grateful Dead/United Empire Loyalists</b><br />
The first free concert by the Grateful Dead can very definitely be identified. Remarkably, it was on their first international trip, to Vancouver, British Columbia. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GA2WPPK/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1">The story was recounted in detail in Rock Scully's biography</a>, and <a href="http://armenia.city.tripod.com/UEL/uel02.htm">confirmed by the teenage members of the opening act</a>. I wrote about <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/august-5-1966-english-bay-beach.html">the band's trip to Vancouver at my usual length</a>, but I will focus on just a few key points here.<br />
<br />
Briefly, the Grateful Dead had been invited to play the Vancouver "Trips Festival," a three-day Acid Test under a more polite name, from July 29-31. As the Vancouver event was modeled on the San Francisco Trips Festival from January, the two brightest lights from that event were invited to Vancouver. Although the Grateful Dead and Big Brother and The Holding Company would be legendary within 18 months, at the time they were just penniless musicians. Big Brother took the train to Vancouver and hitchhiked to the venue (with Dave Getz's drums), and I don't think the Dead had any more glamorous of a trip. The Vancouver Trips Festival was not particularly well attended, although the Dead in fact played well (<a href="http://www.dead.net/store/new/grateful-dead-50th-anniversary-deluxe-edition-2-cd-set?intcmp=home/bigbanner5">and their performance has recently been released</a>).<br />
<br />
The Dead were an underground sensation, though, so a local promoter had booked a show with them for the next Friday night (August 5). However, the Dead had no record, and no one in Vancouver who hadn't been to the Trips Festival had heard them, so they had to be concerned about ticket sales. The Dead hung out and rehearsed at the suburban homes of the teenage members of the opening act, and while driving around they spotted a bandstand at a public park in Vancouver.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/august-5-1966-english-bay-beach.html">So it came to pass that on August 3, the Wednesday before their show, the Grateful Dead and the United Empire Loyalists drove around Stanley Park in Vancouver, rapidly setting up their gear on bandstands, performing a few numbers and then being chased away by the cops</a>. They played at least two places. Their teenage hosts were enthralled, and dedicated themselves to a life of rock and roll (until they went to college, but that's another story). How much the Vancouver free shows helped ticket sales wasn't clear, but the paying Vancouver show went ok, and it sparked an idea. The band's initial success in Vancouver was due to underground buzz, since that was all the Dead had to offer. Free concerts were a way for the band to generate that buzz themselves, and let the underground do their advance work.<br />
<br />
The West Coast was sort of a separate touring market from the rest of North America up through the early 70s, and Vancouver was part of that. The Dead drew well in Vancouver, but I don't know if many in Vancouver were even aware of the free concerts. The Dead did not play Vancouver after 1974, but I think that was because touring the Northeast was more desirable. The important thing about the first trip to Vancouver, however, was the idea of publicizing shows by playing free concerts.<br />
<br />
<b>September 1966 Speedway Meadows, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco: Grateful Dead</b><br />
The most mysterious and chimerical free shows in Grateful Dead history are the least documented. Various old-timers assert, with the casual confusion so classic of 60s memories, that in the Fall of 1966 the Grateful Dead played some free concerts in Speedway Meadows at Golden Gate Park. There were no permits, no cops, no suburban wannabes, no hassles, nothing but fun. Of course, there were no tapes, no photos, no posters nor any other evidence that they really happened. Did they happen? We may never know.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://hooterollin.blogspot.com/2015/12/grateful-dead-performance-list-july.html">The timing makes sense. Rock Scully and Danny Rifkin managed to take control of 710 Ashbury in September of 1966</a>, and with the band rehearsing on Haight Street (at the Straight Theater), quick free concerts in the Park would have been easy. Everyone says that 1966 was the real summer of love, when a relatively small group of long hairs had the time of their lives, so any free show would only be known by word of mouth and attended by a few hundred people at most, most of whom probably knew each other. So, realistically, these concerts were more like parties than concerts, even though they were held in public spaces. The commercial value of the free Speedway Meadows concert was probably close to nil, since the only people attending were insiders who probably came to Dead concerts anyway.<br />
<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/mGvlkInNc5M" width="560"></iframe><br />
<b>October 6, 1966 The Panhandle, San Francisco, CA: Grateful Dead/Big Brother And The Holding Company/Elektric Chamber Orkustra </b><i>Love Pageant Rally</i><br />
LSD was made illegal in the State of California on this Thursday, and the Grateful Dead and Big Brother held an unsanctioned free concert in the Panhandle. There had already been at least one free concert in the Panhandle, with Country Joe and The Fish on August 13, and the Dead had played some free shows at Speedway Meadows in Golden Gate Park. Still, the October show was the first free Grateful Dead show in the Panhandle. This was a seminal event, because it was publicized, at least on the underground jungle telegraph. A few thousand freaks from everywhere in Northern California converged at the Panhandle, and discovered that there were a lot more of them in the Bay Area than anyone thought.<br />
<br />
The "Love Pageant Rally," as it was known, was also an important milestone in the history of free Grateful Dead concerts, and indeed free concerts in general. It was a free concert, yes, but it was widely publicized and so drew a large crowd. This was in distinct contrast to any performances in Speedway Meadows, which seem to have been somewhat secret. Above and beyond the fact that the event was publicized, the location insured that numerous residents and commuters would see it or hear it, whether they wanted to or not.<br />
<br />
The Panhandle is not actually in Golden Gate Park, but adjacent to it, in residential Haight-Ashbury. The Panhandle is so-named because it is a grassy extension of Golden Gate Park (it is the "handle" if the park is the "pan"). It runs eight blocks East of the park, from Stanyan to Baker, bordered on both sides by Fell and Oak streets. Fell and Oak are important one-way throughways for San Francisco drivers ("Oak to Oakland, Fell to the fog" is the directional mnemonic). A weekday event in Speedway Meadows could pass by unnoticed, but thousands of people, young and old, were going to see or hear any Panhandle event.<br />
<br />
Not coincidentally, the Grateful Dead were on the bill that weekend (Oct 7-8-9) at the Fillmore, booked below Jefferson Airplane and Butterfield Blues Band. Airplane and Butterfield were headlining three weekends, mostly at Winterland, with various opening acts. However, during the first weekend, police had shot a black man in the Fillmore district--nothing ever changes, does it?--and there were violent disturbances in the neighborhood. All the suburbanites who normally drove into the city were afraid to park in the Fillmore district. The Airplane/Butterfield shows for the first weekend (Sep 30-Oct 1)were moved from Winterland to the smaller Fillmore Auditorium, but even then, only a few hundred people showed up. Thus the next weekend's shows were moved to the Fillmore as well, and Bill Graham had to be nervous about ticket sales.<br />
<br />
Thus a few ideas came together at once. The Grateful Dead played for free, as they apparently had been doing on occasion already. They publicized the event, and did it in a relatively public place, to insure that a crowd showed up, making them local heroes. And they did it the day before a show when they really needed the ticket sales, when they didn't have a record or any other way for potential fans to hear them. I don't know for a fact about attendance at the weekend Fillmore shows, but presumably things went well enough.<br />
<br />
What may have started as a lark soon became a method. Initially, the Grateful Dead did not have a record, and when they did they weren't getting any airplay, and even when FM radio finally arrived the band still didn't get as much airplay as other bands. The band's willingness to play for free, however, set them apart, and they became underground legends, more widely known than heard, so when they played a new city for free, there were a lot of curious people who would check them out. To be fair, other San Francisco bands liked playing for free, too, for the same reasons, but the Dead made a project of playing for free outside of San Francisco.<br />
<br />
<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3lvH6gZH3j8" width="560"></iframe><br />
<b>January 14, 1967 Polo Grounds, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Quicksilver Messenger Service/The New Age/Loading Zone/Sir Douglas Quintet </b><i>Human Be-In</i><br />
On a Saturday afternoon in January, some leading San Francisco bands played for free at the Polo Grounds in Golden Gate Park. There were 20,000 or so hippies dancing around in their psychedelic finery. The event was picked up by TV network news, back when that was universally watched. Not only was the idea of professional bands playing for free unthinkable, it was winter in the rest of America. If you were a teenager, shivering in Peoria or Pittsburgh, watching rock bands playing for free in the California sunshine while young women danced in the park, San Francisco was the promised land. And the networks didn't even say anything about Owsley.<br />
<br />
In fact, by the time of the Human Be-In, the Dead had played free concerts in the Panhandle three times: The Love Pageant Rally (Oct 6), the Artists Liberation Rally (Oct 16) and the "New Year's Wail" (Jan 1). However, notwithstanding the stealth gigs in Speedway Meadows, the Be-In was the Dead's first performance in the actual Golden Gate Park. The Be-In also made free concerts a "thing" in San Francisco, and it immediately spread. There were Be-Ins all over, though mainly on the West Coast: Los Angeles, Seattle, New York, Vancouver, San Jose and so on. Colleges and other hip places had their own attempts at Be-Ins, even if they were lacking psychedelic bands and indeed, psychedelic transportation. <a href="http://rockarchaeology101.blogspot.com/search/label/North%20Carolina">Raleigh, NC, for example, had a Be-In on May 7 (at Umstead State Park), with a bluegrass band, since the only psychedelic blues band had already moved to San Francisco</a>.<br />
<br />
After the Human Be-In, the "Free Concert In The Park" was an established thing, not just in the Bay Area but all over the country, extending all the way to England. The Grateful Dead, however, were the most devoted practitioners of it as a promotional device, long after other bands had stopped doing it. The fact that the Dead were from San Francisco, and had played at the original Be-In. made their willingness to play free concerts all the more iconic. It may have been that the Dead were simply doing what was easy for them, but to fans in various cities it made them seem like alluring outlaws.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxOp3qc36EiqPYwkbHH2CO2ksm2-Akr0Wili0xQsWuEnx2MEy3hYpKX_M0uGTlO47b65gQUYv-VQP42ty3FyHZT_RzL34eeso8xf2aT4niI84AvB8p7nVigkewPTHOvE4_4J_J8f8Axs0/s1600/GD+NYT19670601.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="235" data-original-width="280" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxOp3qc36EiqPYwkbHH2CO2ksm2-Akr0Wili0xQsWuEnx2MEy3hYpKX_M0uGTlO47b65gQUYv-VQP42ty3FyHZT_RzL34eeso8xf2aT4niI84AvB8p7nVigkewPTHOvE4_4J_J8f8Axs0/s1600/GD+NYT19670601.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A photo of Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead playing live, for free, at Tompkins Square Park in Greenwich Village on June 1, 1967. The photo is probably from the next day's New York <i>Times</i>.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>June 1, 1967 Tompkins Square Park, New York, NY: Grateful Dead/Group Image</b><br />
The first real test of the Grateful Dead's unique promotional approach was no less of a place than Manhattan, the media capital of the United States. The Dead were booked for a two-week run at the Cafe Au-Go-Go in Greenwich Village. All the hip bands played the Au-Go-Go, but the Dead had a new album that wasn't getting any airplay on AM radio. New York wasn't Dayton or Modesto--people young and old had a million choices of things to do, and needed a good reason to choose one thing over another.<br />
<br />
<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/june-1-1967-tompkins-square-park-new.html">So the Grateful Dead did the San Francisco thing, hooking up with a local collective and rock band called the Group Image, and playing a free concert in Tompkins Square Park in the East Village </a>(bounded by East 10th Street, Avenue A, East 7th Street and Avenue B). The Group Image (and perhaps other bands) had already played for free at Tompkins Square Park, but they were locals who could easily be seen around the way. As far as I know, no visiting rock band had played for free in a Manhattan park.And even if one had, it would have been some carefully scripted appearance sponsored by a radio station or something. Yet here was a band headlining a hip East Village club playing live, for free, a few blocks from their gig. Unorthodox? You bet. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/june-1-1967-tompkins-square-park-new.html?showComment=1260988832872#c4798606218581362167">But Scully commented how amazed the Cafe Au-Go-Go was at how much buzz there was around the neighborhood after the free shows</a>.<br />
<br />
The Dead's residency at the Au-Go-Go was a success, and the free concert at Tompkins Square played its part. Manhattan is a world unto itself, but <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=0tMVBQAAQBAJ&lpg=PA1&dq=jarnow%20heads&pg=PT23#v=onepage&q=cosmic%20comix&f=false">Jesse Jarnow did an excellent job of placing the Dead's free concert in Greenwich Village in its cultural context, in his indispensable book <i>Heads</i></a>. Taking no chances, the Dead played a free concert in Central Park the next Sunday (June 8). Central Park was a long way from Greenwich Village, but it was still in subway range. There are free rock concerts in Manhattan all the time now, but it started with the Grateful Dead.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3yYYStisdcqRDTYiR75ds2NbU-FCfwPgFls0zG-394G_G0UmKk5eyghYUL3_269F5p-GFmLJUYj9LO3braR0MVaTN8ZHw1Y2gm12H5-9VoOwyaFsPt5F2_PVIg_OvLbA8_IGCGahNUlc/s1600/monterey+pop+campers+Mercury.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="628" data-original-width="620" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3yYYStisdcqRDTYiR75ds2NbU-FCfwPgFls0zG-394G_G0UmKk5eyghYUL3_269F5p-GFmLJUYj9LO3braR0MVaTN8ZHw1Y2gm12H5-9VoOwyaFsPt5F2_PVIg_OvLbA8_IGCGahNUlc/s320/monterey+pop+campers+Mercury.jpg" width="315" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A San Jose Mercury News photo of campers at the football field at Monterey Pop Festival. The Grateful Dead and other bands played for free for the campers, as the festival went on nearby.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b>June 17, 1967 athletic field, Monterey Peninsula College, Monterey, CA: Grateful Dead/others</b><br />
<div>
The Monterey Pop Festival broke the San Francisco scene worldwide. The Summer Of Love in San Francisco was memorialized by a hugely successful rock concert 120 miles South of the city. The event received worldwide press coverage, and the entire music industry knew that something big was happening under their noses. Unfortunately, pretty much no one noticed the Grateful Dead's musical performance on Sunday night (June 18), particularly after the Jimi Hendrix Experience followed them.<br />
<br />
However, the entire press contingent noticed that the Grateful Dead set up a stage at the athletic field of the junior college across the way. The Dead and Quicksilver played sets, and apparently various musicians wandered over periodically to jam or sit in. Other performers may have included <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Eric%20Burdon.htm">Eric Burdon and The Animals</a>, Country Joe and The Fish, <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/08/steve-miller-band-performance-history_26.html">the Steve Miller Band</a>, and members of The Byrds and The Paupers, although the precise details have never been confirmed. From a marketing point of view, the Dead got far more attention for playing for free than they did for their "official" performance, even though very few of those writers actually heard the band's performances at the athletic field. The Monterey free concert, however, for which there are no first-hand accounts, nonetheless may still be one of the most important free concert the Dead ever played. The Human Be-In would have happened with or without the Grateful Dead. At Monterey Pop, however, it was the Dead who organized the free concert, and the entire music industry took note. The industry was against it, of course, but they saw it. </div>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The July 4, 1967 Stanford <i>Daily</i> described the Palo Alto Be-In, where the Grateful Dead played for free</td></tr>
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<b>July 2, 1967 El Camino Park, Palo Alto, CA: Grateful Dead/Anonymous Artists of America/New Delhi River Band/Solid State/The Good Word </b><i>Mary Poppins Umbrella Festival and Be-In [free concert]</i><br />
Using equipment that they "borrowed" from the Monterey Pop Festival, the Dead played a few free concerts, including another one in Golden Gate Park (June 21). They also played for free in Palo Alto (I had originally thought that this concert was on Saturday, June 24, but <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/06/july-2-1967-el-camino-park-palo-alto-ca.html">an article in the Stanford Daily confirmed the date of Sunday, July 2</a>). Among the other bands, the Anonymous Artists Of America included Jerry Garcia's wife Sara (they were now separated), and future New Riders David Nelson and Dave Torbert were in the New Delhi River Band. The Palo Alto Be-In was not widely covered in the local press, so it did not have a huge impact on the Dead's prospects. It added to their legendary status in Palo Alto, but the event was largely forgotten until I resurrected it (I actually attended this show, but I was 9 years old, so I don't remember much). Returning to Palo Alto added to the Dead's legend, but they would always be legends in Palo Alto, so commercially their appearance didn't matter much.<br />
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<b>July 16, 1967 Golden Gardens Beach, Seattle, WA; Grateful Dead/Papa Bear's Medicine Show/Time Machine/Daily Flash/Karma/Brick </b><i>(afternoon free concert)</i><br />
By 1967, various cities on the West Coast were booking underground psychedelic rock shows. All of them were on the Fillmore model, with a light show and no seats. When a band from San Francisco or Los Angeles could be enticed North, a few local hippie bands would be added to the bill, and it made for nice little shows. California bands got to spread their wings, and Pacific Northwest promoters got to have some more profitable bookings. The Seattle area had a particularly active scene, promoted mainly by Boyd Grafmyre. <a href="http://www.chickenonaunicycle.com/Country%20Joe%20Shows.htm">Country Joe And The Fish initiated free concerts in Seattle, playing downtown in Volunteer Park on June 10, 1967, before a local booking</a>.<br />
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Once again, however, when the Grateful Dead made their first trip to Seattle, they were legendary, but they had never played Seattle, nor did they have a hit record. The band had booked three shows in Vancouver (July 13-15) where they had already played, so rather logically they added a Sunday night show (July 16) in Seattle. They were booked at the Eagles Auditorium, which was the local psychedelic ballroom at the time. Following their pattern, they played a free concert in a Seattle park right before their Eagles show.<br />
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Golden Gardens Park is in Ballard, a neighborhood of Seattle. I do not know if the Dead actually played on a beach at the park (the park is on Puget Sound). I would expect they played on a grassy field rather than a beach. Golden Gardens is not far from <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2010/01/august-20-1969-roach-seattle-wa-updated.html">El Roach, where the Dead played on August 20, 1969, when they were rained out of the Aqua Theater</a>. I don't know how many people attended the free concert, nor how well the Sunday night concert went at Eagles.<br />
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Since the Grateful Dead were invited back to Eagles Auditorium, however, for two more shows (September 8-9, Friday and Saturday), the initial Seattle concert at Eagles must have gone alright. The free concert magic seems to have worked. On Saturday, September 9, between the two gigs, the Dead played another free concert in Volunteer Park in downtown Seattle. Volunteer Park was just a few miles from the University of Washington, so the Dead's primary audience was nearby. I think the weekend at Eagles went well, but I don't know of any eyewitness accounts of the Volunteer Park show. Still, the strategy must have worked. Certainly, the Dead owned Seattle after 1967, so they must have got something right.<br />
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<b><i>update</i></b><br />
<a href="http://www.historylink.org/File/8192">JGMF sends along a link to a summary of an article about the Golden Gardens show</a>, from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer of July 17, 1967<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Located in Ballard, Golden Gardens was typically a place where the “straights” hung out, far away from the usual hippie hangouts near the University District and Capitol Hill. The crowd of 2,000 people who gathered at the park for the Be-In was a mix of all folks who just wanted to enjoy some rock music in the hot summer sun. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The bands performed on a flatbed truck with electricity provided by a small portable generator. Brick went on first, followed by Karma, The Daily Flash, The Time Machine, and Pappa Bear's Medicine Show. The Grateful Dead came on last. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
The Dead were in Seattle for a show that evening at the Eagles Hall, and since they were veterans of many Be-Ins in San Francisco, the band and their manager, Rock Scully, decided to take part in the gathering at Ballard. The Be-In was arranged by Tim Harvey of Overall Cooperative Structure and Jerry Mathews of United Front Productions. </blockquote>
By this time, "Be-In" type events were common on the West Coast, but the Dead were tuned in to the advantages of playing at them. Papa Bear's Medicine Show were a popular Vancouver band, and Daily Flash were Seattle's finest psychedelic export.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A 2010 photo (from CN Tower) of the O'Keefe Center in Toronto</td></tr>
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<b>July 31-August 5, 1967 O'Keefe Center, Toronto, ON: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Luke And The Apostles</b><br />
The Grateful Dead did not play that much in Canada, but in the 1980s they drew fairly well in Toronto. They probably could have played Canada as much as they wanted, but supposedly their was some hesitance to cross the border. Although Toronto was smaller than Montreal in the 60s, Toronto became Canada's largest city, and the 5th largest city in North America, so success is Toronto was critical for Canadian success. Once again, free concerts were integral in introducing Toronto to the Grateful Dead, but uniquely, it was not the Grateful Dead who played for free.<br />
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As 1967's "Summer Of Love" was ending, Bill Graham took the Jefferson Airplane and The Grateful Dead to Toronto and the East Coast. Graham booked a week at the O'Keefe Center, the city's most prominent auditorium, in downtown Toronto. The shows were billed as "The San Francisco Scene Comes To Toronto." By this time, the San Francisco Scene implied free concerts, and Graham did not disappoint. He had learned from the bands that playing for free was a great substitute when radio airplay was not forthcoming.<br />
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<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/07/may-august-1967-jefferson-airplane.html">Graham had primed the pump by having the Jefferson Airplane play a free concert the week before the O'Keefe shows, at Nathan Phillips Square in Toronto on July 23</a>. Luke And The Apostles and a group called Spring Garden Road were also on hand. At the time, the Dead were still back in San Francisco. By the time the week's shows began, however, the Airplane had already given Torontans a taste of what to expect. The Toronto shows apparently did very well, no doubt helped by a follow-up free concert by the Airplane in Phillips Square, on Saturday, August 4.<br />
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<b>August 6, 1967 Place Ville Marie, Montreal, QC: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead </b><i>(afternoon free concert)</i><br />
Montreal in the 1960s had a booming rock scene. Bill Graham came through the city with two of the hottest bands from what was the coolest city in rock at the time, and had them play a free concert downtown at lunchtime. This was unprecedented in Montreal, as it was everywhere else, giving it away for free with the implicit assumption that you couldn't resist paying for it. The Dead and the Airplane were playing at the "Youth Pavilion" at the World's Fair later that same day.<br />
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<b>August 6, 1967 Youth Pavilion, Expo '67, Montreal, QC Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead <i>(free concert)</i></b><br />
The International World's Fair, known as Expo 67, was held in Montreal from April 27-October 29, 1967. By any standard, the fair was hugely successful. The Dead and The Airplane played for free outdoors at the "Youth Pavilion." The bands probably actually got paid, but as far as I know it was free for the fans, except insofar as they had had to pay for admission to the fair itself. Montreal seems to stand alone in Grateful Dead history as a city where the Dead played for free twice in the same day, but never had a gig where people had to pay to see them. Montreal seems to be an instance where we can see the non-genius side of the Dead's "marketing," Montreal had an exciting scene, and the band even had Rosie McGee for <i>parlez-vous</i> duties, but after playing twice for free at the biggest event in Montreal history, the Grateful Dead never returned (the Airplane didn't either).<br />
<b><i>update: </i></b><br />
<a href="http://jgmf.blogspot.com/2009/12/gd-november-18-1970-montreal-forum.html">JGMF reports that the Dead did attempt to play Montreal, on November 18, 1970</a>, but the show was canceled due to "political unrest."<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A current photo of the Ann Arbor West Park bandshell, where the Grateful Dead played a free concert on August 13, 1967. The sculpture was probably not there at the time.</td></tr>
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<b>August 13, 1967 West Park, Ann Arbor, MI: Grateful Dead </b><i>(afternoon free concert)</i><br />
Ann Arbor, MI, home of the University of Michigan, was about 40 miles from Detroit. University of Michigan is always paired with UC Berkeley as the best of public universities, and in the 60s they were also amongst the most forward looking and radical as well. There was always a lot of connections between Berkeley and Ann Arbor, in politics, music and other ways. In that respect, Ann Arbor was a far more fruitful pasture for the Dead than Detroit city.<br />
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On the Sunday following the Grande Ballroom shows, the Dead played a free concert in West Park in Ann Arbor, at 215 Chapin Street, under the bandshell. This was apparently the first outdoor free concert in Ann Arbor. McNally (p.211) reports that the free show was financed by Warner Brothers, to promote the album, so clearly Warner Brothers was slowly catching on to the Dead's unique method to promotion. Notorious Michigan radical John Sinclair was involved, so the Dead were right in the thick of the local political ferment, and there are color photos of the shows.<br />
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However, while Ann Arbor may have seemed like a perfect place for the Dead to build an audience with a free concert, a few things got in the way. The first was that the Midwestern weather in Ann Arbor is never very favorable to outdoor shows, and the August show was when school was out. Furthermore, most Ann Arbor students caught their rock shows in Detroit, so there was a lot of overlap. Thus, while I'm sure the Dead had many early adherents in Ann Arbor, those fans were more likely to move to Berkeley than build up the audience in Michigan. The Grateful Dead did alright in Michigan over the next few years, but it didn't really become a stronghold of Deadhead culture. [<b><i>update</i></b>] <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/first-free-grateful-dead-concert-in.html?showComment=1498190872578#c6092501821688846059">LightIntoAshes reports</a> that Warner Brothers probably had little do with the Dead's performance. He also noted that there had been free rock concerts in Ann Arbor by various Detroit bands, so the Dead were not the ones who initiated the concept in Ann Arbor.<br />
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<b>September 16, 1967 Elysian Park, Los Angeles, CA: Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead </b><i>(afternoon free concert)</i><br />
San Francisco and Los Angeles had been locked in a partially imaginary battle for California supremacy since the 1950s. Rather hilariously, from our vantage point, San Francisco had been the stodgy home of old California money, and Hollywood was the land of free thinkers. The LSD-and-Fillmore revolution upended this equation somewhat, but not enough to tip the balance. As a result, bands like the Dead and the Airplane were looked on dismissively by Southern California. This was because only Los Angeles had the cultural self-confidence to look askance at other California innovations.<br />
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Bill Graham had promoted a giant show at the Hollywood Bowl on Friday, September 15, headlined by Jefferson Airplane and supported by the Dead and Big Brother (Big Brother actually canceled). The day after the Hollywood Bowl show, the Dead and the Airplane played a free concert at Elysian Park in Los Angeles. Elysian Park is in Central Los Angeles, near the foot of Sunset Boulevard, and not far from Chavez Ravine and Dodger Stadium. Elysian Park was established in 1886.<br />
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However, Los Angeles, being LA, had picked up on the free concert trend soon after the Human Be-In in San Francisco in January (Jan 14 '67), and had held a series of "Love-Ins," starting on March 26. These shows featured all sorts of hip bands. Thus, when the Dead and the Airplane played Elysian Park, it was cool for their fans, but already a regular thing. Unlike other cities, the Dead didn't initiate free concerts in Los Angeles. The Dead always drew well in Southern California, but that was only because it was perhaps the biggest rock concert market in the country, not because the band was an exceptional draw.<br />
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<b>September 24, 1967 City Park, Denver, CO: Grateful Dead/Captain Beefheart/Tracy Nelson and Mother Earth/Lothar and The Hand People/Crystal Palace Guard</b><br />
Denver, however, just a week after Los Angeles, was a different story. Denver is unequivocally part of the West, but back in the 1960s it wasn't much like California. Chet Helms had the bright idea of opening an outlet of his Family Dog in Denver, so bands could play both Denver and then the Avalon in San Francisco. It was a very sound idea. It made sense of the new touring economics of rock bands, and he correctly read that there was a growing population of hippies in the Denver area.<br />
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<a href="http://home.netcom.com/~mstelk/id2.html">The Denver Dog opened on the weekend of September 8-9 with Big Brother, then the next weekend with Quicksilver Messenger Service, and on the weekend of September 22-23 the Dead headlined</a>. True to their pattern, the Grateful Dead played a free concert at City Park in Denver on Sunday, September 24. City Park is a large, central park that includes the Denver Zoo. I do not know exactly where the Dead played. The photos show a very small and casual event, with not even a raised stage. In this case, the concert wasn't to promote ticket sales, as the band had already played, but to promote the Denver Dog and set the table for a return visit. A local flyer (above) indicated that it was a "Be-In," but the Dead were not specifically named.<br />
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Once again, it's pretty clear that the Dead's Denver free concert was the first free concert by a visiting act that actually had a record. The Denver Dog itself ended badly. The Sheriff wanted to chase the hippies out of town, and his constant busts and hassling bands ended the venue as a paying proposition (Bob Seger's song "Get Out Of Denver" wasn't just his imagination). But the Dead owned Denver ever since that first concert. It took a while, sure. But it's hard not to draw the conclusion that the Dead created some pretty positive mojo by being the first to play for free. Now, of course, the remaining band members can play Folsom Field, <a href="http://www.westword.com/music/timothy-leary-and-the-grateful-dead-turned-on-denvers-city-park-in-1967-9638031">but it seems to have started with a little fun in the park on a Saturday afternoon</a>.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A wire service story from April 16, 1968 (published in the Colorado Springs <i>Gazette</i>) about the Grateful Dead's free concert in Graynolds Park in Miami, described as a "Love-In."</td></tr>
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<b>April 14, 1968 Graynolds Park, Miami, FL: Grateful Dead/Blues Image</b><br />
The Grateful Dead debuted in Florida with two weekends at Miami's Thee Image. They also attempted to remix <i>Anthem Of The Sun</i> at Miami's famed Criteria Studios. It's unclear to me if the Dead played the shows because they working at Criteria, or that the band was working at Criteria because they were booked in Miami. In any case, nothing much seems to have come from working at Criteria.<br />
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The South was slow to grab on to psychedelia, for any number of reasons, but Miami was and is both part of the South and yet somewhat independent of it. <a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/12/thee-image-and-miami-rock-scene-march.html">Thee Image was the first real psychedelic rock venue in the South that featured the same touring bands who played the Fillmores, and I have tried to tell the story elsewhere</a>. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/10/august-28-29-1970-thee-club-los-angeles.html">Proprietor Marshall Brevetz became good friends with the Dead, and they played for him a number of other times, in Florida and later in Los Angeles.</a><br />
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For the very first weekend in Florida, however, the Dead did not apparently draw very well at Thee Image. They had their own solution, however. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2009/12/greynolds-park-love-in-north-miami.html">On Sunday, April 14, they played for free in Greynolds Park in Miami, an unprecedented event in Florida rock history</a>. The Dead knew a thing or two about free concerts, and not only were the next weekend's Dead shows well attended, but Thee Image took to regularly presenting acts for free in the park. The Dead have been popular in Miami and South Florida ever since.<br />
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<b>May 3, 1968 Low Library Plaza, Columbia University, New York, NY: Grateful Dead</b></div>
<b>May 5, 1968 Central Park, New York, NY Jefferson Airplane/Grateful Dead/Butterfield Blues Band</b><br />
From the point of view of anyone who has not lived or worked in New York City, the Dead had already played a free concert in New York, when they arrived in the city on June 1, 1967 (see above), and another a week later in Central Park (June 8). New York, however, is a universe unto itself, and each Borough is like a separate country. So from a New Yorker's point of view, the '67 concert in Tompkins Square Park was in Lower Manhattan, in the East Village at E. 7th Street and Avenue A. Many uptown Manhattanites would be more likely to go to Connecticut or Woodstock than the Lower East Side, so from that perspective the '67 concert would not be seen as a free concert "in their own city."<br />
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This time around, however, the Dead played a free concert at Columbia University, at 116th Street and Broadway, way up on the Upper West Side in what would become Seinfeld country. Two days later, the Dead (<a href="http://rockprosopography101.blogspot.com/2009/07/may-september-1968-jefferson-airplane.html">along with Jefferson Airplane</a>) played another free concert at the Central Park Bandshell, near E. 72nd Street. Thus the Dead had covered Lower, Central and Upper Manhattan, and both the East and West side. Granted, they had not played the Outer Boroughs, but by playing free concerts in multiple locations, more residents of the whole city had an easier chance to see them. In any case, after four free concerts in the city, by 1968 the Dead established themselves as a popular act in New York Metro, and they remain so to this day.<br />
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<b>November 23, 1968 Memorial Auditorium, University of Ohio, Athens, OH: Grateful Dead</b><br />
After a poorly attended concert in Columbus, OH (where Ohio State University is located), the band was persuaded to use an off-day to play for free at Ohio University, in Athens. about 75 miles to the Southeast. Eyewitness accounts suggest that the place was packed, and the Dead played two sets. It's hard to say exactly how much impact this unpublicized event had, but the fact is that the Dead drew very well in Cleveland and Cincinnati for the next few decades, so maybe all those Ohio U students returned to the big city with legendary tales. In any case, this unique indoor free concert fit with the Dead's "strategy" of playing for free when their might be an audience, in the hopes of future returns.<br />
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<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2017/06/first-free-grateful-dead-concert-in.html?showComment=1498178643401#c6161120667776737945">Thanks to fellow scholar runonguinness for pointing out this show</a>. He also includes some great links, from <a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2015/08/november-23-1968-memorial-auditorium.html">the indispensable Deadsources</a>.<br />
<br />
<b>July 7, 1969 Piedmont Park, Atlanta, GA: Grateful Dead/Delaney and Bonnie and Friends/Chicago Transit Authority/Spirit</b><br />
By mid-1969, the Grateful Dead were legendary for their free concerts. Readers of <i>Rolling Stone</i> and other magazines who lived outside the Bay Area seemed to believe that the Dead played for free in Golden Gate Park every month, if not every week. Thus, although many rock fans had barely heard the Grateful Dead's music, the band was synonymous with the 60s rock axiom that music was "for the people," and was best provided free.<br />
<br />
In the May of '69, a newly formed band of musicians from Florida lived in Macon, GA. They took to playing free concerts at Piedmont Park in Atlanta. These concerts were the first whiff of San Francisco for the city. The band played heavy, jamming rock, and there was at least one black musician amongst the long-haired white hippies. The regular Sunday afternoon concerts became a social event of sorts in Atlanta for the local long-hairs, and the city of Atlanta discovered that the world did not end. Atlanta in general had always been a good music town, but the band from Macon made hippie guitar-rock part of the Southern soul and blues mixture. By mid-summer, the Macon band had stabilized their lineup and had been signed by Atco Records (via their Capricorn imprint) and was known as the Allman Brothers Band.<br />
<br />
As young people in the New South were drawn to rock music, as they were everywhere else, a giant rock festival inevitably followed. Unlike many regions, the first Atlanta International Pop Festival, on July 4-5, 1969. It was actually held at the Atlanta Motor Speedway, in Hampton, GA, 30 miles South of the city. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/07/grateful-dead-performances-at-race.html">It was one of a flurry of rock festivals held at Motor Racing facilities in 1969</a>, and one of the most successful. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlanta_International_Pop_Festival_(1969)">Over 150,000 fans saw more than twenty acts at Atlanta Pop</a>. Promoter Alex Cooley actually had a certain amount of guilt at having made money at a rock festival. So on the Monday after the festival, Cooley staged a free concert at Piedmont Park, including four bands who had played at the Festival. On top of that, he paid to fly the Grateful Dead in from Chicago, where the band had just finished playing the Kinetic Playground.<br />
<br />
Thus there was an all-day free concert in Piedmont Park on the Monday after the Pop Festival, featuring a few of the bands from the festival, with the Dead as the concert closers. After the Dead's set, there was some sort of jam. It's a little murky who played with who. The Allman Brothers certainly played earlier in the day, but may not have been present at the end of the event. In any case, the Piedmont Park show was the first point of contact between the Allmans and the Dead.<br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead were the mark of cool in 1969, and when the Dead played a free concert in Atlanta, their coolness was transferred to the city. Atlanta reciprocated, too: Piedmont Park was the Dead's first show in Atlanta, and the city was a great market and guaranteed tour stop throughout the life of the band. Nothing more clearly illustrates the power of a hip band playing a free concert in order to generate paying customers in the future. The Grateful Dead returned to Atlanta the next year, and the city was a regular tour stop for the band long before any other places in the South.<br />
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<b>May 6, 1970 Kresge Plaza, MIT, Cambridge, MA: Grateful Dead</b><br />
Boston and its sister city, Cambridge, just across the Charles River, have always been filled with college students and young people. The schools in Boston are large, varied and important, too: Harvard, MIT, Boston University, Boston College, Tufts, Brandeis, Northeastern and more. The city of Boston has always been not just a great music town, but a town that makes taste, too.<br />
<br />
By 1970, the Dead had already played the Boston area a number of times and had a solid following. Indeed, the band's only New Year's Eve concert outside of the Bay Area had ended a three night stand at the Boston Tea Party the previous December. On May 6, 1970, however, the Dead played a free concert at a rally protesting the National Guard killing of 4 students at an antiwar protest at Kent State University in Ohio.<br />
<br />
The Dead considered themselves "not political," but the Kent State killings were seen as trans-political, an issue of what we would now call "Social Justice." Of course, the Dead were always willing to play for free, and saw it as good business, but I have no doubt that the individual band members were as appalled as other Americans that the Ohio Guard had fired on protesting college students. Playing a free concert at a protest rally at an elite University in Boston assured that the Dead were always seen as being "on the right side of history."<br />
<br />
In the ensuing years, the Dead's ongoing credibility stemmed from events like the MIT rally. As it happens, the band had a paying show at MIT's DuPont Gym the next night (May 7), so you can just as well see it as the Dead drumming up business. Whether you see the concert as calculating or sincere, however, keep in mind that plenty of other bands were on tour that week, and there were protests at Universities all over the country. How many bands with record contracts played those protest rallys? Few, if any. The Grateful Dead did play a Kent State protest, for free, and their underground status continued to set them apart from their peers.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_9WZBsfNzM6PtD3FqzUXJSqcB8nJvWGfIdJobclna0QNjZtIvAIODECy7LXDg-iUdI7lYVApYysDYSlhL_OmHwQVpCz61AkwAucUuQkCsQEhAZduT0CIE02udeoIlbPWhNZYzmgcjc5Q/s1600/The+Tech+MIT+19700505-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="293" data-original-width="468" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_9WZBsfNzM6PtD3FqzUXJSqcB8nJvWGfIdJobclna0QNjZtIvAIODECy7LXDg-iUdI7lYVApYysDYSlhL_OmHwQVpCz61AkwAucUuQkCsQEhAZduT0CIE02udeoIlbPWhNZYzmgcjc5Q/s320/The+Tech+MIT+19700505-1.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From the MIT student paper, <a href="http://tech.mit.edu/V90/PDF/V90-N23.pdf">The Tcch, May 6, 1970</a>. The final item in the schedule for the day's protest observes that there will <i>not</i> be a free concert by the Grateful Dead at 2 pm (h/t <a href="http://gratefulseconds.blogspot.com/">GratefulSeconds</a>)</td></tr>
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<i><b>update</b></i><br />
Fellow scholar <a href="http://gratefulseconds.blogspot.com/">David (of Grateful Seconds)</a> sends along this clipping from <a href="http://tech.mit.edu/V90/PDF/V90-N23.pdf">the MIT student paper The Tech, from May 6, 1970</a>. It shows the underground at work. The schedule of events explicitly states that there will NOT be a free Grateful Dead concert in Kresge Plaza at 2 pm.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6nDrew6tv0j6RYqkuaWPhadTYhJkO5VN21cX03Ia_rtxQ6vgANw-Z0d_YXDQpssSsmmJg7njY9nDqgQqoQn2lEX9veA8z5dmAuvteIIuAnWFWjOXjmPdQNX8LhcIrUy3r3qrl09I-ZFU/s1600/Festival+Express+Daily+Star+19700626.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="559" data-original-width="600" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6nDrew6tv0j6RYqkuaWPhadTYhJkO5VN21cX03Ia_rtxQ6vgANw-Z0d_YXDQpssSsmmJg7njY9nDqgQqoQn2lEX9veA8z5dmAuvteIIuAnWFWjOXjmPdQNX8LhcIrUy3r3qrl09I-ZFU/s320/Festival+Express+Daily+Star+19700626.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An ad for the Festival Express concerts at CNE Grandstand in Toronto on June 27-28, 1970 (the ad is from the Toronto <i>Daily Star </i>of June 26, 1970) The Grateful Dead played the first day, billed under The Band and Delaney & Bonnie & Friends</td></tr>
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<b>June 27, 1970 Coronation Park, Toronto, ON: Grateful Dead</b><br />
There was a dark side, however, to the Dead's reputation for playing free concerts. By 1970, there were a lot of hippies who felt "music should be free," and resented paying anything at all for concerts. There had been a lot of outdoor rock festivals in 1969 and '70, and most of them had deteriorated to the point where large numbers of fans were let in for free. In most cases, the promoters took a bath, and very few rock festivals ever repeated in the same venue, if they repeated at all. Needless to say, bands and promoters wanted to get paid, but as rock crowds got bigger that was turning into a tricky proposition.<br />
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The Grateful Dead, Janis Joplin, The Band and others participated in the infamous <i>Festival Express</i> tour (memorialized in a wonderful movie). The idea was that a traveling circus of bands would cross Canada by train, playing at stadiums across the continent. While the music performed at the Festival Express concerts was great, the events themselves were financial debacles. One of the reasons was that many Canadian fans, like young rock fans everywhere, felt that the bands should just play for free. In Toronto, this turned into a serious problem. The threat of riots was eased significantly when the Grateful Dead played a free concert in a Toronto park.<br />
<br />
The Festival Express tour was to begin with a two-day concert at Toronto's Canadian National Exhibition Hall. There were numerous acts on the bill, with The Band headlining. Also on the bill were Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead, Ten Years After, Delaney and Bonnie, Traffic, the James Gang and others. The Dead were booked to play on Saturday, the first day. The Grateful Dead had played Toronto once since the week at the O'Keefe, playing two shows at The Rock Pile on July 8, 1969. The Rock Pile, at Yonge and Davenport, near the University, was Toronto's equivalent of the Fillmore, and every great 60s touring band had played there. So the Dead would not have been entirely forgotten in Toronto. The scene on the ground in 1970 was tense, however. <a href="http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2013/07/june-27-28-1970-festival-express-toronto.html">Thanks to Deadsources, we can get the story directly from the Toronto Daily Star of July 29, 1970</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Jerry Garcia, the guitarist of San Francisco's Grateful Dead, came onstage [at the stadium] asking the youngsters to cool it. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Then Police Inspector Walter Magahay talked the promoters into staging a free 24-hour "rehearsal" at Coronation Park on the lakefront opposite the CNE where bands could donate their time to play for the would-be crashers who didn't have the $10-a-day, $16-a-weekend price of admission. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
More than 6,000 swarmed to the park by 7 p.m. when the equipment was set up and Ian and Sylvia, James and the Good Brothers, and the Grateful Dead started the rehearsal off.<br />
Another 6,000 swarmed over after Saturday night's official concert end and camped out on the grass listening to the jamming that went on under the stars until 4 a.m. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"It saved the day," said Constable John Sagar, one of Metro's new "mod squad" community relations officers in charge of Coronation Park, who wore a yellow T-shirt with a peace symbol on it. "It took one heck of a lot of pressure off."</blockquote>
Eyewitness reports suggest there was an acoustic set and an electric set, although they may not have been one after the other. Incidentally, the Canadian duo of Ian and Sylvia had a fine backing group featuring Buddy Cage on pedal steel guitar. Garcia and all the New Riders were intrigued. Cage became friends with them on the tour, and he is still in the New Riders today.<br />
<br />
The Toronto episode pointed up how the Grateful Dead's original strategy of playing for free was starting to work against them. When the band had been an underground cult act, they could perform stealthy gigs without much trouble. Since no Top-40 radio stations were really playing their records, it was a way to get their music out. By the middle of 1970, however, the landscape was quite different. FM rock radio played lots of album tracks, including Grateful Dead ones. On top of that, <i>Workingman's Dead</i> had been released in June, 1970 and it was very radio friendly. The Dead, unexpectedly, got lots of FM airplay, but it meant that some free outdoor concerts were going to attract too many fans and too much trouble, for no financial return. Toronto was a perfect example.<br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead, however, were ever-inventive. As the free concert, and its cousin, the outdoor rock festival, declined as a means of getting fans to hear the Dead's music, the band found another way. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2011/02/grateful-dead-live-fm-broadcasts-1968.html">Since 1968, the Dead had been experimenting with live broadcasts of complete concerts</a>. It took them a few tries, but by the middle of 1971 they had finally gotten it right. <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2014/09/july-2-1971-fillmore-west-san-francisco.html">When the Fillmore West closed in 1971, the Dead broadcast their entire July 2 show on San Francisco's biggest FM rock stations</a>.<br />
<br />
The Fillmore West broadcast was the Dead's promotional model for their fall tour. The Dead had released a new double live album (<i>Grateful Dead</i>, aka "<i>Skull & Roses</i>"), and with $100,000 of promotional support from Warner Brothers, there were live FM broadcasts in 14 cities.<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2015/03/grateful-dead-live-fm-broadcasts-1971.html"> I have discussed the FM broadcasts at great length elsewhere, so it needn't be recapped</a>. Some comments from Jerry Garcia in the <i>Village Voice</i> in December of 1971 make it clear that the FM broadcasts were seen as an extension of the free concert concept (from Al Aronowitz's <i>Pop Scene</i> column in the <i>Village Voice</i>, reprinted in the cd booklet for <i>Dave's Picks Volume 22, Felt Forum, New York, NY 12/7/71</i>):<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Well, you know," says Jerry Garcia, "we've always been into free concerts and the broadcast was kind of a free concert without any hassles. Ever since Altamont everything has been so sticky when you try to do a free show. With us the whole trip is to make music available."</blockquote>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhhJrS8_aimFh6iAbmHfKsbXXvAdtVzYg-7M5tXN5dy-KAOPxqwEdA4GsRf__gyRJloTaMW3zPZh01y-mal1iWPm_MthCLLC_VJakWsO-kTrI5Eeq-9NXlCB3KgBQTdxbrgWqfwN-vi1c/s1600/Barry+Barnes+book.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="346" data-original-width="228" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjhhJrS8_aimFh6iAbmHfKsbXXvAdtVzYg-7M5tXN5dy-KAOPxqwEdA4GsRf__gyRJloTaMW3zPZh01y-mal1iWPm_MthCLLC_VJakWsO-kTrI5Eeq-9NXlCB3KgBQTdxbrgWqfwN-vi1c/s320/Barry+Barnes+book.jpg" width="210" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004QZ9P6A/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1">The Grateful Dead adventure is a business model</a>, like it or not</td></tr>
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<b><i>Aftermath</i></b><br />
It's no coincidence at all that when the Dead started broadcasting live on FM radio, the commercial value of playing free concerts no longer made much sense. There were only six more free Grateful Dead concerts, one free Jerry Garcia concert, and one free Mickey Hart show where Garcia showed up anyway (<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/05/may-30-1975-speedway-meadows-golden.html">May 30 '75</a>). The Hart show, the Garcia show (Sep 2 '74) and two of the Dead shows were in San Francisco (Sep 28 '75 and Nov 3 '91). The other free concerts were in different cities, and were the final gasps of the original strategy, from which the Dead probably received little commercial benefit.<br />
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<b>June 21, 1971 Chateau d'Herouville, F: Grateful Dead</b><br />
The Grateful Dead were invited to France, I believe by a rich person, to hang out at a Chateau that had been converted to a recording studio. The Grateful Dead, probably unlike other bands who went to the Chateau, decided to play a free outdoor show for the locals (query: how do you say "townie" in French?). There is video and audio of this relaxed event, but it was just the band having fun on someone else's dime.<br />
<br />
<b>May 13, 1972 Fairgounds, Lille, F: Grateful Dead</b><br />
As I understand it, a French promoter had booked some shows that sold very few tickets, and they had to be canceled. After some negotiations, the Grateful Dead ended up playing for free at the Fairgrounds in Lille, France. One important point to take away from this was that even by 1972 the Grateful Dead were the only remaining band who would be asked to play for free when a concert fell through. This was another unintended byproduct of the Dead's musical generosity, namely that--just like the internet--the clients always wondered if they could get it for nothing. The band did not play Lille again.<br />
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<b>September 30, 1972 athletic field, American University, Washington, DC: Grateful Dead</b><br />
Sam Cutler made one last try to use free concerts to promote the band. The key to his strategy seems to have been the fact that many schools had entertainment budgets for students that were large enough that the band could actually get paid even when the students got in for free. The first attempt at this was on an athletic field at American University in Washington, DC. American U. is a large (currently 13,000+ students) private research institution, founded in the nation's capital in 1893.<br />
<br />
The Grateful Dead would end up being a huge draw in Washington, DC. However, I don't think the American U. show had much to do with it. It rained the day of the show, and apparently only a few hundred students showed up. While the Dead played a pretty good show--it was 1972, after all--I don't know if much buzz came from such a thinly attended event. No matter--<a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2016/02/the-grateful-dead-in-north-carolina-and.html">thanks to relentless touring throughout the South</a>, DC ended up being a convenient midpoint for fans from the Northeast and Southeast, packing both indoor basketball arenas and outdoor stadium shows.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "georgia" , serif; font-size: 10.4px; line-height: 20.8px;">The crowd at the Grateful Dead concert at Alumni Lawn, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN, October 21, 1972 (</span><a href="http://thevucentennialclass.blogspot.com/2008/10/final-look-back-at-dead-concert.html" style="background-color: white; color: #999999; font-family: Georgia, serif; font-size: 10.4px; line-height: 20.8px; text-decoration: none;">from the VU <i>Hustler</i> newspape</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "georgia" , serif; font-size: 10.4px; line-height: 20.8px;">r)</span></td></tr>
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<b>October 21, 1972 Alumni Lawn, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN: Grateful Dead</b><br />
The last stand of the Grateful Dead's strategy was at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. Nashville was new territory for the Dead, and Cutler managed to persuade the school to pay the Dead to put on a free concert instead of playing the acoustically awful gym. It was a beautiful fall day in the South, and <a href="http://lostlivedead.blogspot.com/2013/04/october-21-1972-alumni-lawn-vanderbilt.html">15,000 fans saw an amazing concert, fondly remembered by Vanderbilt students of that era</a>. The band rolled into town, they played, they conquered, and they left behind Deadheads for life.<br />
<br />
The band never did it again. The played two 1978 shows in Nashville, but many of the Vanderbilt students would have been long gone. After Watkins Glen, big outdoor concerts made every city and school nervous. In any case, once the "Oil Shock" of 1973 hit the economy, colleges and universities started chopping their entertainment budgets, so there wouldn't have been any way to finance a repeat of the Vanderbilt experience.<br />
<br />
As an economic strategy, however, the Grateful Dead no longer needed free outdoor concerts. FM broadcasts spread the Grateful Dead's music far and wide throughout the 1970s. While changes in the FM radio market made the live broadcasts rarer, those same broadcasts provided the seeds for bootleg records and then tape trading. So in that respect, despite their lack of planning and rookie mistakes, the Dead found a way to circumvent the music industry's distribution system at least three times, and all of them are now part of the menu of possible music promotion strategies. Up and coming bands all over the country hope to play for free at parks and public spaces, usually officially sponsored as a regular part of civic or school entertainment. Whether the Grateful Dead were shrewd visionaries or accidental heroes, they laid the cornerstones for the marketing of 21st century music.<br />
<br />Corry342http://www.blogger.com/profile/08049035074121231425noreply@blogger.com54