Deadhead Cyclist Archives
Deadhead Cyclist Archives
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 24 - June 9, 1977
If you plant ice
Franklin’s Tower was first performed at Winterland on June 17, 1975. As was most often the case – inclusive of the studio version on the 1975 release, Blues for Allah – the tune was the exclamation point on the seminal Help on the Way/Slipknot/Franklin’s Tower medley that leads off and occupies most of Side 1 of that album. Franklin’s Tower was found in the Dead’s setlist six times during the Spring ’77 tour, culminating in arguably their best performance to date, as part of this week’s pick for T.W.I.G.D.H., June 9, 1977, also at Winterland.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 25 - June 17, 1975
We just ride
It was a “slam dunk” picking T.W.I.G.D.H. for the week of June 15, since one of the most special nights in the band’s history took place on June 17, 1975 at Winterland. The show was billed as the Bob Fried Memorial Boogie, and it was one of only four times the Dead performed during the year of their interminable hiatus. Bob Fried was an artist who had died of a stroke earlier that same year, but not until he had designed dozens of signature ’60s and ’70s rock posters – most with a decidedly psychedelic spirit.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 28 - July 8, 1978
Sometimes we live
When a band has played more than 2300 shows, it’s hard to imagine that any one of them would achieve legendary status. But there are certain Grateful Dead concerts that firmly fit into that category. For starters there’s little disagreement that 5/8/77 at Cornell University’s Barton Hall would be on such a list; the 12/31/78 Closing of Winterland comes to mind; 2/27/69 at the Fillmore West – from which the epic, Side 1-long Dark Star on the Live Dead album was derived – would have to be included; the Great American Music Hall show on 8/13/75 is an obvious choice; 5/26/72 at London’s Lyceum Theater, the final date of the Europe ’72 tour, has been immortalized on the album of the same name; and more recently, the 12/15/86 show at the Oakland Coliseum arena – the Dead’s first performance in more than 5 months after Jerry Garcia collapsed in a diabetic coma on July 10 of that year and almost died – easily deserves such distinction.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 27 - July 4, 1989
Give me five
Despite Grand Funk Railroad laying claim to the title in their 1973 album, “We’re an American Band,” there is no more American band than the Grateful Dead. Songs like Cumberland Blues (Lotta poor man got to walk the line/Just to pay his union dues), Truckin’ (Arrows of neon and flashing marquees out on Main Street/Chicago, New York, Detroit and it’s all on the same street), Me and My Uncle (Me and my uncle went riding down/South Colorado, West Texas bound/We stopped over in Santa Fe/That being the point just about half way), and The Music Never Stopped (There’s a band out on the highway/They’re high steppin’ into town/It’s a rainbow full of sound/It’s fireworks, calliopes and clowns) evoke an indisputable sense of Americana.
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 29 - July 18, 1976
The work of his day
After an interminable hiatus in 1975 (and by “hiatus” I mean 4 Dead concerts, numerous recording sessions, the release of the Blues For Allah album, and plenty of shows by Kingfish, Jerry Garcia and Merl Saunders, and the other splinter groups that performed that year), the boys (and the girl) finally hit the road for a summer tour in June of ’76. After 17 shows in Boston, New York, Passaic, NJ, Upper Darby, PA and Chicago, the summer revival continued with 6 wonderful shows at the 2200-seat Orpheum Theater in San Francisco. The last of these concerts, 7/18/76, was a clear choice for T.W.I.G.D.H.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 30 - July 22, 1984
Let your life proceed
Free will versus fate. The debate is as fundamental as any other in the realm of human existence, and has been taken up by many of the great philosophers throughout recorded history. Aristotle (385-382 B.C.E.) said, “The man is the father of his actions as of children”; Augustine (355-430) tipped the scale in the other direction with his belief that all things are determined in some manner by God; Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) believed in free will conditionally: “A man has free choice to the extent that he is rational”; René Descartes (1596-1650) suggested that free will lies in our thoughts: “Except our own thoughts, there is nothing absolutely in our power”; and more recently, Nobel Prize winning author Isaac Bashevis Singer (1902-1991) humorously claimed, “We must believe in free will, we have no choice.”
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 31 - July 31, 1974
All I leave behind me
Each year as the calendar turns from July to August, Deadheads are confronted with both Jerry Garcia’s birthday (August 1) and the anniversary of his death, in 1995 (August 8). This one week period is commonly referred to as the “Days Between,” after a song by the same name that was written by Garcia and his legendary songwriting partner, Robert Hunter. The tune was to have been recorded for a studio album that the band began working on in ’92, that was never finished.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 32 - August 8, 1982
There’s a dragon with matches
According to the Chinese zodiac, the next Year of the Dragon is not due until 2024, and we are currently in the midst of the Year of the Rat. But with all due respect to Chinese culture, we may need to depart from this ancient tradition and designate 2020 as the year of the “dragon with matches that’s loose on the town.”
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 33 - August 13, 1975
It’s fireworks, calliopes and clowns
As we reach the week following the “Days Between” (the period from Jerry Garcia’s August 1 birthday through his August 9 passing), one can’t help but be struck by the enduring nature of the Grateful Dead. More than 50 years have gone by since the band’s first performance under the name, “Grateful Dead,” and almost half of that period has passed since their final performance on July 9, 1995. And yet, quite literally, the “music never stopped.” What is it about the Grateful Dead that has captivated millions the world over from multiple generations over the course of more than a half-century?