I attended the 1993 run here. Easy to get to off hwy 3 as I recall - Had floor seats one night - Kind of cool how one minute your in the parking lot and then you walk down a ramp and your on the floor. . The big screens with band members pleading for people not to jump from the bleachers to the floor which the dumbshits did anyway....However the majority of the East Coast heads I spoke with were really cool!

My wife was five month's pregnant with our first son, so we had to stay up in the seats. It was the first concert held inside the stadium itself (before the arena was built) and the place was pretty new. Wayne Newton was playing at the racetrack in the complex behind the stadium which made for an interesting mix of crowds. The Meadowlands security force had been quoted in the newspapers as saying that their arena was impregnable, and that no one without a ticket was going to get in. HAH! What a joke! Rowdy, skinny, long haired, drug-crazed degenerates were climbing over the fences in droves! Security guards were running around, tripping and falling like the Keystone Cops. They would grab one guy, while six ran by, it was hysterical.

Waylon Jennings was supposed to open, but at the start, John Scher the promoter got on stage and said, "Waylon Jennings wouldn't be here with us today, so fuck him!" Then he introduced Willie Nelson. At first, the sound was terrible with squeaks and echoes so bad, people were booing and walking out. The Dead started but then they walked off the stage after only a few minutes. For the next few hours or so, their magnificent crew worked like demons. At one point, Bobby came out and coined his, now legendary quote, "We must make everything absolutely perfect for you..." The crew worked feverishly pulling wires, climbing poles, and testing, constantly testing, but it all paid off; they sounded wonderful!

In the years that followed, I've heard people claim that the band wasn't at their best that day but i beg to differ. With the sound problems, obvious internal issues, and the pigs smacking Dead-Heads right and left, i'd say that they did far better than they ever could have been expected to. Billy was the only drummer then, and he had a big cast on his right arm, but he played his ass off! He did a solo that had people screaming and rolling around like they were having fits. He had a mallet in his left hand and he was using the cast against the drum heads with his right. Plaster was flying everywhere! At the end of it, his cast was hanging in shreds.

My son Sean was born in January of the next year, and his I.Q. is genius; coincidence? (LOL) Actually, he's an avid Nine Inch Nails fan (y'know, Trent Watzizname), but he loves to memorize lyrics of all genres, especially Hunter's. We've taken all four of our kids to Grateful Dead shows and although they have their own personal preferences, they all love the Dead!