Life lessons on two wheels to the tunes of the
Grateful Dead
This Week in Grateful Dead History
Week 1
I wish I was a headlight on a northbound train.
Even the most cursory examination of the lyrics of Grateful Dead songs quickly uncovers one of the most fundamental aspects of the band’s identity: This is an American band, rooted in American culture, and built around easily recognizable locales and deeply American principles and history.
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This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 13 - March 23, 1974
Comic book colors on a violin river
A few weeks ago we explored the seemingly oxymoronic nature of Grateful Dead as a band name. “Upon scrutiny” we came to the conclusion that the words, “grateful” and “dead,” are not the strange bedfellows they appear to be, but actually complement each other to perfection if considered in the context of the psychedelic-inspired “ego death” experience the band and most Deadheads were engaged in during the Acid Test years (and, of course, well beyond). Still, if there were a Jeopardy category called, “Strange band names of the Sixties,” Grateful Dead would most likely be the “Daily Double.” And there are plenty of other band names that came out of that same period that appear to defy logic, regardless of how hard you try to spin them.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 26 - June 26, 1974
Don’t lend your hand
As spring turns to summer, we bid a fond “fare thee well” to Spring ’77 and find several wonderful summer tours to continue our concert trip around the sun. It’s hard to go wrong with the Summer ’74 run of 18 shows, beginning on June 8 at the Oakland Coliseum and finishing on August 6 at Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City, NJ. Among the many first-rate concerts of this tour, the June 26 show at Providence Civic Center in Providence, RI gets the Deadhead Cyclist’s vote for T.W.I.G.D.H.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 23 - June 7, 1977
I will not forgive you
June 7, 1977 was my sixth Grateful Dead concert. But it wasn’t supposed to be. After touring through the East and Midwest, the band was scheduled to play three shows at their home venue, Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, June 7, 8 and 9, to finish off their now-famous Spring ’77 tour. My newly fellow Deadhead sister, Janet, and I had already pocketed tickets for the June 9 show, but during the afternoon of June 7, as we were both working in a health food store in Santa Cruz, one thought began to preoccupy my brain: The Dead are playing tonight at Winterland. The Dead are playing…TONIGHT…just 90 minutes from here. After an hour or so, thought morphed into compulsion.
All Material Copyright 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023 by Stewart Sallo