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We would like your comments and recollections on live experiences past, and on tapes present for shows which have not yet been covered in DeadBase. We already have extensive coverage for every show from the years 1988-1994; also please check for older conflicts, either via DeadBase IX, or e-mail us. We are most interested in the color that coveys your live Dead experiences to those not so fortunate as to be there then, and in realistic reviews on tapes not yet in global circulation. Selected responses may be published in a future issue of DeadBase. (Posted 6/1/96)

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4-22-69 The Ark, Boston MA - Peter Lavezzoli (dharmadrum@aol.com)

The three shows at the Ark in Boston are widely regarded as among the finest from 1969. While all three have worthwhile moments, it is the middle night (4-22) which stands out as the strongest and most consistently exciting of the run. Many of the shorter songs in the first set are played as well as one would expect from this era. Top of the World could often be sloppy, but here it opens the show with precision and energy. This is followed by a very exciting and emotional Morning Dew, played at a brisker tempo than what would become customary in later years. Jerry's vocals and guitar are very expressive. BIODTL and Schoolgirl continue to raise the energy level, Pigpen particularly sounding inspired on the latter. Doin That Rag is another song, like Top of the World, that could often sound sloppy and unrehearsed in concert. But once again, this show is an exception, and Rag is about as tight and emotional as I've heard it. Having cleared that hurdle, it was now time to jam. Cryptical>Other One (which sufferes from a brutal cut in the master tape)>Cryptical>Death Don't is a crowning achievement. The Cryptical suite is bursting with visceral psychedelic power. Death Don't is especially frightening in its intensity, Garcia singing with a desperation that I've heard in few other versions. And this only the end of set one.

Set two is seamless and flawless in every way. Dupree's is perfectly segued into Mountains of the Moon, which is one of the most gorgeous live versions of this song. Mountains, rather than coming to a stop, beautifully moves into Dark Star with the same kind of delicate transition that is heard on the first faded-in moments of Live Dead from 2-27-69. 4-22-69's Dark Star is the longest documented version from 1969, almost clocking in at thirty minutes, even with yet another cut in the master tape before the second verse. Without the cut, who knows how long it actually ran? But length is not the only thing that makes this Star special, it is a very well developed version with lots of emphasis on group improvisation. The spaces stay thematically rooted in Dark Star rather than wandering off into a different type of "jam." 4-22 also has one of the finest complete medleys of Star>Stephen>Eleven>Lovelite, where all four pieces are well developed and the transitions between songs are well negotiated. Stephen and Eleven both soar heavenwards, and the transition into Lovelight is perfect. Lovelight itself also has that extra something, with a full-fledged Caution jam sandwiched in between, and lots of extra rapping from Pig. After this, it's no surprise that the Dead chose not to do an encore.

The first show was scheduled for Sunday, October 27th, but everyone was excited about the Halloween show. This was a tough ticket to get. If you mail-ordered, it wasn't hard, but you could detect the enthusiasm easily enough: my mail-order ticket was #6744, and I sent in my order on the first day! I also got tickets for the Sunday show. At the time, I lived just over 200 miles from Oakland, so I had two separate road trips planned to accomodate those two shows. October was filled with anticipation, but sometimes reality intrudes even when the Grateful Dead are involved. First, I came down with a terrible cold, and I knew I'd have to skip the Sunday show.

Secondly, and much more notably for the rest of the world, Bill Graham perished in a helicopter crash. This news just seemed to find us, wherever we were. No one seems to remember how they first heard it; it was as if the bushes and floorboards whispered about the tragedy. It was like Obi-Wan Kenobi sensing "a great disturbance in the force." And it hurt! A number of us gathered, for whatever reason, at my house. Even with my cold, my senses were not dulled enough to miss the import of the news. Graham had been intertwined with the Grateful Dead since... since... well, since the 1960's, we knew! Memories poured forth and landed on the table like spilled wine.

There was this duality with Graham. Some older Deadheads remembered Graham as "mean" -- a guy who was rude to the crowd, a guy who had an iron rule and didn't care who suffered. Those same heads remembered Graham as a man who cared about the music and the scene and was passionate about making it as good as it could be. Everyone knew that Graham and the Dead were tight, and any friend of the Dead was a friend indeed.

After the reminiscing was over, a concern arose: would the shows go on? A phone call to the Oakland Coliseum produced the news that, yes, the shows were still on. Nevertheless, a strange air fell over us. What did this all mean? How would the band react? My cold was bad enough to cause me to miss the Sunday show. I gave my ticket to a head named Dave Nielsen. Nielsen, sporting a head of long wild blond hair, practically snatched the ticket out of my hand and bounded away to the truck with a gleam in his eye: Grateful Dead, Dead ahead! He promised a full report upon his return. I almost wished that Nielsen hadn't returned. Back then, the internet wasn't quite the force it was nowadays, and posted reviews and setlists weren't always timely, complete, or accurate. Nielsen phoned me the next morning to boast that Carlos Santana AND Gary Duncan had sat in with the Grateful Dead. So much for the question of how the band would react to Bill Graham's death.

Over the following days, we heard reports of the Monday and Wednesday shows, and they weren't notable. In fact, most people reported that the shows were decidely average and unremarkable. Reports aside, Thursday saw plenty of activity around my dwelling. The application of makeup for costumes; the packing of ice chests; the procuring of small quantities of certain substances. In particular, we fortified ourselves with "ants." At this time and all during the summer in Central California, blotter acid on light-brown paper was making the rounds. Imprinted with a single black ant, "ants" were the rage because they were cleaner than anything that had come around in years. They didn't have the power, the visuals of liquid. They didn't have the cartoonish mystery of other blotter... mickey mouse, TNT, orange suns. What "ants" had was consistent purity that made it impossible to ever decide how strong or how weak they were. You could take half a blotter hit and fall asleep two hours later; you could take one and one third hits of blotter and watch the hills melt into puddles of fiery liquid.

The drive to Oakland was uneventful; as usual, we got there around 3:00 and found the parking lot had already been open for some period of time. The standard vehicles were already parked... the great big buses, the VW camper vans, the four-wheel drive vehicles flying flags. Exiting our vehicle, we descended into a stream of costumed people... oh yeah, it was Halloween! My cold had left me, the air was cool but not chilly, the Grateful Dead were in Oakland for Halloween and not London... all was well! (You'll recall that one year prior to this date, the Dead had been on tour in Europe, where they played Werewolves of London as the encore at the Halloween show in London.) The hiss of nitrous oxide tanks echoed around us. Cars raced from the parking lot gates and filled in the spots around us. The sun was descending in the California sky. Skateboard wheels clicked on cracks in the asphalt. Various vendors, some costumed, some not, some ALWAYS costumed, approached us to sell us beer, veggie burritos, fatty eggrolls... and mushrooms, lots of mushrooms. But we had "ants." And did we ever had "ants." The question was how many "ants" to ingest. I'd been gobbling this stuff for most of the summer and was used to it, so I happily took my share... of two. Wisely, I cut one in half... two "ants" and your world could fall away, and we also had plenty of beer to drink and several eighths of incredible California and Oregon Indica. This was not the night to go overboard before even getting into the show!

The decision was made to go and stand in line. Our crew was a foursome. The obvious leader was Hasan (accent on the first syllable), owner of the truck that ferried us to the show. The loudest and most boisterous was Chris, and there was NO WAY that Chris was only going to eat one and a half "ants." Chris was a two-ant man, and he made sure that Hasan followed his lead. (So who's the leader?) Phil was the veteran of the most shows... he'd been going for ages. I brought up the rear. Fittingly, I was voted to go and stand in line. I had only juts reached the line when the rest of my crew arrived, toting beers. We played cards in line until we were let in.

The line at the Oakland Coliseum is notoriously well-organized and disciplined. People do cut in line but usually pay the price of some verbal harrassment for doing so. The line starts in the parking lot in an area demarcated by ropes and the presence of yellow-jacketed security guards. But these weren't Cap Centre or Meadowlands 'jackets; these were guards who worked for Uncle Bobo. The late Uncle Bobo. The line eventually reaches the ramps that wind up to the entrances of the Coliseum Arena. There, police and yellow-jackets let groups of 'heads up the ramp before cordoning off the flow and making the rest of the line wait for a minute or two. It's very orderly and no one ever really pushes or shoves. Beers get dusted; pipes get stowed; tickets get checked. This night, as we reached the top of the ramp and stood in another mini-line to have our backpacks checked, we heard the voice of a female Graham-guard: "we're only checking for bottles and cans. DON'T WORRY, we're not looking for your drugs. We don't care if you have drugs." We missed Bill Graham really badly at that moment.

Inside, controlled chaos reigned. Volleyball was being played in a cleared area at the far back of the floor. Even though we'd been in line relatively early, we'd underestimated the Oakland crowd; there must have been a good three thousand people in there already. The floor was already half filled. This was realized with a bit of alarm, and so we clambered down the stairs to the floor. After gazing around and realizing that we'd lost our chance at the better positions, we took a position exactly in line with the soundboard against the white line that marked the end of the floor and the beginning of an imaginary aisle. That aisle would have remained imaginary if not for the Oakland police and Graham's yellowjackets, who politely but firmly, we knew, would keep it clear.

It's difficult to really put the magnitude of this show into words. It is one of the strangest things I've ever experienced. Sure, "ants" probably had a lot to do with that. And the infusion of Indica helped blast away any lingering fragments of reality that had tried to attach themselves to me. Still, it wasn't until second set that it REALLY got stranger. Scarlet->Fire + Truckin' is how the second set began. It was pointed out by Hasan, who could barely speak, that this is exactly how the Dead had opened their second set in London one year ago. Hasan was practically giddy with the satisfaction that the Dead would play Werewolves tonight! Chris was so cooked on "ants" that I couldn't help but grin... normally headstrong and sure, Chris was looking a bit like he'd bitten off more than he could chew, and Truckin' was not helping matters. Phil hadn't said a word since halfway through the setbreak, but that was normal. Phil could have eaten five "ants" and you wouldn't have known the difference.

Now, I'm pretty short and our position on the floor wasn't the best, so I couldn't figure out why the crowd was going so wild as Truckin' ended and Spoonful began. Eventually I saw why... someone new was onstage, some guy with a guitar! From halfway back on the floor with the power of "ants", it looked like a chimney sweep. That didn't seem right, but with the Grateful Dead, knowledge always finds you. And it did this time, as it always did. Someone in our group gleaned the knowledge from a fellow who'd been here on Sunday night that the chimney sweep was Gary Duncan.

A pause after Spoonful gave way to the opening sounds of Dark Star. Dark Star had been in the rotation for awhile now, so it wasn't the surprise of a lifetime. Especially since it had been played twice in Boston. Still, this doesn't diminish the excitement! High fives slapped around our heads. Pipes and other smoking apparatus appeared in the hands of every other person. The ceiling, already filled with a haze and looking to be two thousand miles away, disappeared beneath the resulting cloud. Excitement was so palpable that Scooby Doo and Shaggy could have cut donuts out of it. Heck, if I'd had a knife, I'd have tried it myself. Dark Star crashes. It was a great night. Dark Star filled our heads and our souls. I watched bliss spread across the faces of my friends.

Just as suddenly, a man appeared on stage to remove that bliss. A tall man. The music got scary. Phil's bass suddenly sounded meaner, scarier. The bliss was gone. The knowledge found us again. I could barely see the tall man over the heads of the equally tall people in front of me, but yet his image found my eyeballs and stayed there. The knowledge came unto us that this was Ken Kesey, and he was hear to remind us that we were at a funeral. Uncle Bobo was dead and there was no time for bliss. Kesey rambled his ragged rap as the music pulsed behind him. Like a storm, the music began to rage as Kesey raged, and it exploded into fury when Kesey screamed something at us. I was so high that I'd only been catching every third or fourth word of his rap. But I caught the last word, alright. "D E A T H ! ! !" Hasan looked at me with a shattered look of amazement. We looked back to the stage to find that Kesey had disappeared. Chris was laughing a wild laugh and Phil, our Phil, was looking intently at the stage.

The storm rose higher and raged harder until we were left with nothing but Mickey and Billy. That night, Drums and Space were so long and so intense and so dark that people began to get worried. It was physically exhausting. We'd been standing for a good hour, dancing too, but you couldn't dance to this. Hasan didn't know whether to sit or stand. He tried to do both and looked silly doing so, and he knew it. All around us, acid-takers and shroom-eaters raised their hands into the air and stretched, trying to reclaim their reality and failing. This night was so strange that no one could find a foothold. When you tried, you'd look right into the eyes of people wearing skull makeup, top hats, and werewolf outfits, and you'd lose it again.

Like a beacon from a lighthouse, we eventually caught the notes of Dark Star. Thank you, Lord! People rose from where they'd been sitting as if the preacher had just walked into the churchhouse. Even this eyedropperfull of familiarity was welcome in what had become a strange, strange evening. That chimney sweep had come back out during Space and remained for Dark Star. Oh, I reminded myself, it's really Gary Duncan. He's a good guy.

The Last Time followed Dark Star, and everyone sort of looked at each other with the import of the song before abandoning that thought to dance around. Form! Musical Stucture! Standing on the Moon followed, and it was simply beautiful. There are better versions, yes, but there aren't that many of them. The tapes will confirm this. And we needed this. Personally, I needed Stella Blue, but it had been played on the second night of this run. I looked up during Standing on the Moon to see that the Chimney Sweep was gone.

Throwin' Stones->Not Fade Away closed out the show. During this time, three friends of Hasan appeared out of nowhere. Sure, I guess we were on the aisle, but it sure seemed strange. They were simply demolished by mushrooms and were making guttural grunts and groans trying to communicate. They kept hanging onto Hasan and trying to talk to him. Not only were they failing, but Hasan didn't want to talk. If I could have spoken, I'd have told Hasan to tell them that they should be good or the chimney sweep would get them... but I couldn't say much. Werewolves on London was the encore (sung as Werewolves of Oakland) and it rocked... hard. A simply wonderful evening.

As we left the coliseum and burst out into the evening air, we looked each other over and silently marvelled at what had just happened. Chris and Phil's pupils were so big that I don't think they had any iris left. Hasan was still trailed by his three shrooming friends. One of them was had his two hands cupped together, and the other two friends were gathered around him as though he held a talisman of some sort. As Phil and Chris wandered in front of us, Hasan and I peered at the talisman. It was a huge mushroom, a cap and stem. It looked blue and purple... it looked bloody powerful! Hasan's friends were apparently contemplating eating it. They still couldn't talk and were making bizarre noises while gazing at the psychedlic mushroom. Eventually the fellow with the mushroom found his tongue and said something to Hasan about finding his stuff and catching a ride home with us. Hasan was quite diplomatic but he and I both knew that we'd not see this fellow again this evening, and certainly not if he was going to actually eat more mushrooms.

Back at the car, we talked about the experiences that we'd all had that evening. Then we realized that we still had a two hundred mile drive in front of us. It was Hasan's truck, so he got behind the wheel. Phil and Chris, those maniacs, got in the bed (there was a shell) to take bong hits. Hasan somehow made it out of the parking lot, but I had to help him negotiate the freeway onramp. I don't really know how you help someone drive onto a freeway onramp, but I know that I did it and that Hasan asked for and needed my help. Like I said, it was a strange night.

A hundred miles down the road, on a lonely stretch of highway 101, we pulled into a gas station. Hasan got out to gas up the car. Phil went into the convenience store for food. Chris and I lingered in the car. I talked Chris into packing me a bong hit, and, still in the front seat, I took the bong and prepared to suck down my hit. Chris exited the vehicle and went toward the convenience store. I began to smoke. Just then (did you guess?) a highway patrolman swung his cruiser into the gas station. I guess policeman get hungry, too.

As the officer got out, his back to me, I could see Chris at the door to the store, looking back my way. He was absolutely horrified to see my still enjoying my hit as the officer walked towards him, and he ducked into the store as fast as he could without looking obvious about it. I had to go and see this for myself, so I went into the store after I'd finished my business. There we were, covered in tie-dye, reeking of smoke, sharing the store with a clerk and a cop. Phil was so engrossed in his choices of either grapefruit or orange juice that he didn't even see the cop next to him. Chris was so spooked that he had grabbed a variety of snacks and was already at the counter. I could see his neck bulging with nervousness, and I imagined I saw sweat pouring down it, too. Of course, I KNOW that I saw the potato chip packages turn orange from yellow and then red from orange, so who knows what I saw. Chris paid for his food as fast as he could and beat a hasty retreat. Outside, we reconvened and jumped in the truck, and left the cop at the store. Another victory for our side.

I never saw another show like this one. I knew I never would. I kept going, I kept hoping. I saw Branford in Los Angeles in 1994, and that was something! But it wasn't like Halloween 1991. Nothing was. The Grateful Dead, with many other bands, played a tribute concert to Graham in Golden Gate Park in San Francisco on November 3rd, a Sunday. They'd opened their concert the Sunday before with Sugar Magnolia, Bill Graham's favorite song, but they left it unfinished. We had expected them to finish it at the Halloween show, but as we talked about this possbility during setbreak, some head who said he was from New York said that they'd finish it at the Golden Gate Park concert. And he was right. The dead closed their set that day with Sunshine Daydream. They played four shows leading up to and including New Year's Eve, and then that was it. No more New Year's shows. It just wasn't the same without Uncle Bobo.