Grateful Dead

Keep That LoveLight Shinin'!!!!!!!!!!!!

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We were actually dry throughout the show(s). Friday afternoon, I talked my way inside the fence with my friend's VW bus. We parked down by the first row of speaker towers (the clinic tents, sheriffs trailer and next row of towers behind us) and the soundboard slightly down towards the stage and to our left). Dry sleeping bags, food, ice, drinks and a hella good view from the roof. We also ended up being a shelter, resource and recovery stop for many in our area. Will post more memories as they filter back from the depths.

Glad to be back on the long road home.

Glad to be back on the long road home.1972 Vega wagon and we were off to New York. Bought two tics at a dept. store. ($10.00 each) and headed north. An unbelievable life altering experience. The wall of sound was swaying. How does Bob Weir play that guitar with just one arm? Is he a cowboy or rock star? Just the best thing that has ever "come up on me". Thank you for a real good time.

peace through musicI was too young to go to woodstock and was pysched to go to Watkins Glen. I went to see the Allman Bros. The New York State thruway was closed with four lanes of cars,we made two extra out of the breakdown lanes. Some guys got on top of their cars and hollered for us to leave our cars there and just walk. So, we did!! I remember walking at dawn and for miles you could just see a sea of people walking, it was sooo beautiful like an exodus. I was back-packing my 2 yr. old son and a volkswagon bus (that you could hear coming for miles) stopped when it got in front of us and asked us if we wanted to hop in, yeah! When we got to the center of Watkins Glen we got out and a local elderly lady said she had some lunch for us and gave us lemonade and fried chicken. I never forgot all the kindness I experienced on that trip, or the huge blisters on my feet! Thank heaven for the cool soothing mud which healed them! Oh, yeah the music....when we finally got up the mountain you could hear the notes drifting down but there were so many people it wasn't feasible for a young mom and 2 yr. old to get near the stage, but a good time was had by a lot of good people. And the music was magical.

Fresh out of high school w/the parents' Dodge Dart and a carful of other crazed friends. A cararvan of three or four cars from NJ up to a few miles from the Glen -- and then a six-hour traffic jam. Got there Friday...thought the Dead's soundcheck that night beat their set the next day. The Band ruled on Saturday and the Allman Brothers also tore it up. The campfires dotting the muddy hillside gave it that post-war vibe. The Dead would really show off their stuff a few days later at Roosevelt Stadium...and we'd be there too....

Back in the days of my '65 impala SS. Was only my second or third show, don't really remember, don't have stubs. Missed the soundcheck the night b4, tho' had friends who had gone Wednesday who saw it all. Not gunna glorify a very apprehensive situation. Way-Way more people than promoters expected, shortage of alot of things. Sludge around port-a-johns was above ankle deep after the thunderstorm. BIG DIFFERENCE---- It was well into the Freak era that immediately followed the hippies. By this time the media had labled us "freaks of society", we kinda looked upon ourselves as "Volunteers" prolly partial thanks to the Airplane. Thank God it was when it was. Everyone was focused on the party and watching out for their neighbor. Had it been in the times to come, could have easily been "Woodstock 99" b4 it's time. Had to park somewhere along Seneca Lake and walk clear to the village, thru it, and up the mountain to the raceway. It took years (alot of them) before we started to admit to other groups of folks we knew that after the Dead played Saturday we bailed out and headed for home. It was simulcast on FM so we didn't really miss much except shoulder to shoulder people. (not even room enuf to lay down) Realize some folks didn't have the same experience. But feel the younger deadheads deserve a glimpse of the other side of the truth about it all. BUT---I have never regretted going and the show was great!

It was SOOOOOOOO hot and we were three football fields away from the stage, but we could hear. We heard a six hour set by the Dead if memory still serves me at all? Never met up with who planned to, but met up with lots of folks we knew, but did not know were going. It took hours to get home to Poughkeepsie where I then lived with all the cars leaving. However, I still remember being there and after this much time and smoke that is enough.

OK - full disclosure time. My "My Shows" list includes the "soundcheck" set from the previous night. The truth is that when me & Ricky got the car parked on the night of the 27th, we could faintly hear the Dead playin' from where we were. They were working their way towards Wharf Rat when we opened the car doors, and we followed our ears as best we could, but they we never actually did manage to locate the concert field before they were done. So, I actually heard part of that set, while they were playing it, but I wasn't altogether "there" - does that qualify as "attendance"? I think so. We could probably, in fact, apply the same arguments regarding whether or not I actually "attended" this show - Ricky and I were VERY tripped out, and during the Dead's sets (the first of the day) , I guess I was just listening on a different frequency band from the one that they were playing on - I wasn't able to identify a single song I heard from the Dead that day, although they were rapidly becoming my favorite band, and I was listening to their albums pretty much CONSTANTLY at that point ( I had yet to discover the taping universe!). I was deeply involved in some sort of paranoid hallucination about how they were going to put up some kind of a structure for the rest of the show, and only let the ticket holders in. I'd mellowed out some by the time The Band came on, and I really enjoyed their set. The Allman's first set was SMOKIN' hot, and when Jerry, Bob, Robbie Robertson, & Rick Danko came out for the Not Fade Away > Mountain Jam > Johnny B. Goode, well THAT was just MAGIC!!! ------------------------------------------------------ The simple fact that the "new right" has consistently been wrong does not mean that wrong is the new right.

2 weeks before my wedding. was all of 20 years old. still married after 34 years to the same woman. car fender kicked in as we arrived, somewhat drunk partyer. lost a fuel line on the way out and when i tried to get back to my car, which should have been a short walk, took a wrong turn and wound up walking for miles.

I THINK WE GOT THERE WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON....I THINK.......ME AND OBE AND HIS COUSIN IN MY TRIUMPH GT-6 WITH THE STEAL UR FACE LOGO PAINTED ON THE HOOD.......GOT TO DRIVE IT ALLTHE WAY AROUND AND AROUND THE TRACK 3 TIMES....WHAT A WAY TO START THE WEEKEND.......FRI NITE BOB WEIR KEEPS TELLING EVERYBODY THAT THIS JUST A TEST........RITE!!!!!!A FOUR TO FIVE HOUR TEST........MY BRAIN WAS TESTED BY SOME REALLY GOOD RED WINDOWPANE.........THE CROWD MOVED IN VARIYING CIRCLES.........WHAT FUN IT WAS NAVIGATING MY WAY TO THE FRONT OF THE STAGE........SATURDAY....... DAMN IT'S HOT.......I WAS IN SOME KIND OF MELLOW EUPHORIA........SEEMED LIKE THE DEAD WERE TOO......A WONDERFUL DAY CEPT FOR THOSE POOR SKYDIVERS COMING DOWN IN FLAMES..........THE LATE NIGHT JAM WAS A JOY TO BEHOLD........NAMED MY FIRST IRISH-SETTER PUPPY AFTER THE BROS SONG JESSICA..........STILL HAVE ALL THE MEMORIES......... WHAT'S UP WITH THAT....LOVE TO ALL ................................THE ROSE

parents away on vacation , some older guys i was gettin weed from had tickets . let see stay home , work or go to a show and party ,. took the later ,lots of first that weekend, got stoned on acid came back lost my job but gained a life long love of the dead and the times.

A saga of epic proportions - both in getting there which was a 2 - 3 hour hike after getting out of the car, with all roads gridlocked, getting to the front of the stage early Saturday am over, under, around and through 500,000 sleeping people, the concert itself with all the goodness and weirdness, and then getting back together with fellow trekkers Sunday am in Ithaca for breakfast in a downtown diner - almost shell shocked, or post orgasmic or whatever you want to call it, an altered state after all the multi dimensional navigating. The concert was abso-flooging-lutely the best I have ever been to compared to anybody else - Janis, Jimi, the Grape, Chambers Bros, Vanilla Fudge, Country Joe, Santana, NRPS, CSN&Y, Neil Young. It was off the chart on a number of levels, and will stay with me for the rest of my life.

Counting the "soundcheck" the day before as my second Dead show, this was my third! I must admit that I saw many better Dead shows in the following years as far as their performance was concerned, but I'm so glad to have been part of this historic event. Not as culturally signficant as Woodstock (which I was too young to attend) simply because Woodstock had already happened, but this was a great good-vibe time all around, and it was amazing be among 600,000 people and not notice one bad scene (no fights, violence, etc...) the entire time! It seemed that everyone knew we were here to relax and have a good time and treat each other well as kind human beings, despite the size and density of the crowd, and lack of available amenities. Could it have happened this way now? Even a few years later? I doubt it. If greedy corporations hadn't allowed people to bring in their own food and liquids as is the practice today, this could have been a disaster, because this festival had been set up to serve 150,000 people, not 600,000. But fortunately, the corporations hadn't taken hold in that manner... yet... and fortunately the promoters were smart enough to let the throngs in for free (like the original Woodstock) instead of keeping them out and creating riots... the tickets had already sold out anyway... My friend and I were still teenagers in high school, and we had only just barely gotten our "learners permits", so fortunately we were smart enough not to attempt to drive. We paid for a sleazy fly-by-night one-off bus service that advertised in the back of the Boston weekly alternative entertainment rag (The Phoenix) for a round trip to the festival in a funky old school bus. We never found it for the return home. When the music finally ended early Sunday morning we made signs that said "Boston" and got picked up by some cool folks from the area quickly enough. After breakdowns and long traffic jams, our funky old chartered bus lumbered into the festival. We staked out our blanket space near the first row of speaker towers in the crowd before the "soundcheck" started, which was like a whole surprise festival day in itself! With the 20/20 eyesight I had back then (those were the days), I could even barely make out the musicians on stage from there, and the sound was quite good! Got a few hours sleep that night right on the field under the stars in my sleeping bag. We didn't even bring tents! People kept pouring in and filling the spaces around us, but never did I feel claustrophobic. It was a sea of kind humanity. I didn't sense any of the selfish aggression that seemed to define a portion of concertgoers (and more of our society in general) in later years. There didn't appear to be masses crushing to get toward the stage upfront. A lot of people were up there for sure, but mellow and relaxed. Even the heavy drinkers just lay back and took it easy, instead of getting arrogant and into others faces. In the late hours of the show, during the after show jam following the Allman's closing set, there were unopened cans of food all over the muddy ground in the field everywhere. People were setting up cooking fires and communally sharing in what others couldn't drag out of the mud with them. The downpour earlier (during The Band's set) had turned the ground to mud and waterlogged everyone's belongings, making some things (blankets, sleeping bags...) very heavy and difficult to carry! I'm not going to do much of a review of the music, it's all been said before. As they say, it was "all good". I just wanted to report a little on my vibe of the experience. I'm so glad I made it!

There was to have been a West Coast version of this gig: Summer Jam w/Allman Brothers, Grateful Dead and Waylon Jennings at Ontario Motor Speedway. I think it was to be the same month.I bought tickets mail order (would've been my first Dead show) and still have tucked away the A3 size flyer to stick in the car window to gain parking. I presume that Watkins Glen either scared the California authorities or ticket sales were very poor, and it was cancelled. Hats off to the legendary Watkins Glen crowd though! Sounds like a ripper of a weekend!

I re-constructed the whole show over a 2 year period and it's complete with all available audience and soundboard recordings as well as some old 8mm video footage converted to DVD (In color too) everything that was recorded and that I could track down is in my journal. Just amazing! I was too young to have attended but my parents were there and so I made that for a Christmas gift for my father. Only 2 exist on the planet and I'm giving one to Levon Helm for his memoirs.Just thought I'd share that with you as a "piece of mind" that someone has a comprehensive compilation of such a monumental event. newspaper clippings, ticket stubs and all. Peace! -Jay P.S. due to copyright issues this is NOT for sale or trade. this is all legal public documents that anyone with time and effort could do themselves so no laws were broken.

hard to beleive, this past monday, july 28th was the 35th annevasary of the summer jam.. WHEW!!

As a young 18 yo, this was a life changing event. Although I was a bigger Allman Bros fan at the time, the whole event was awesome. From the 18 hour trek from LI, (normally a 8-9 hour drive), to the nice girl from NJ who had zero inhabitions. I don't remember too many details, but the experience itself was monumental.

we left at sunset--too many people for too little music--you needed to be at least within a mile of the stage to heart anything...

On the streets of NYC in the 70's this show was legendary. Those who had been there spoke of it with reverence as being better than Woodstock for them. They were like, 'yeah, sure, Woodstock, but the show to really be at was Watkins Glen'. And they'd say no more. Apparently there were no words to express this event. You had to be there.

some pix from this show: http://www.flickr.com/photos/grantdabassman/sets/72157603224730871/

This show should be released as a 5 or 6 disc set. The first & second discs are the GD's 7/27/73 soundcheck sets ; the third, fourth & fifth discs are 7/28/73 ate the Dead's set of the actual show. On the sixth disc are the encores with members of the Allman Bros Band & The Band on Not Fade Away, Mountain Jam, & Johnny B. Goode, if legal arrangements could be made. Sing Me Back Home should fit on the fifth disc.My copy of these shows are a mix of soundboard, FM broadcast, & audience recordings, they are nice and interesting, but nothing sounds all that great. The music shines through the less than stellar tapes that have been traded for years.

Nearly 4 years after my other post in 2012, I'll say it again, this show with the soundcheck event should be officially released, if all or most of the audio elements are there. That is, the soundboard recordings of the the Grateful Dead's portion of the 7/27/73 soundcheck and the full Grateful Dead 7/28/73 show, with the end of show jam of Not Fade Away Mountain Jam & Johnny B. Goode.

I was spending the summer visiting friends in Boston when we heard about the Summer Jam concert. We got a group together and headed out in a caravan of two vehicles (a VW Bus and a family station wagon). We left Boston in the evening on Thursday and drove all night. We stopped for breakfast at a friend's house in the lakeside town of Cazenovia, NY just outside of Syracuse. And then continued down thru Ithaca and then across to Watkins Glen. Because of the route we drove and our early arrival on Friday, we didn't experience any of the traffic hassle that some folks encountered. We drove straight into the Raceway grounds, found parking in one of the grassy areas and set up camp for the weekend. By late afternoon, we had the tents pitched with the camp stoves and coolers set up. Some of us decided to wander down to the stage area, maybe a fifteen minute walk. As we arrived, the GD were just beginning their soundcheck/evening concert. It really was a magical performance! The sun was beginning to set as the band started playing, the colored stage lights began to come up as the daylight faded out. It was a beautiful summer evening in upstate NY. The two set show was a relaxed, easy-going affair, with the band and the crowd enjoying themselves. The next morning we got up, made some breakfast and began to mill around restlessly, anticipating the day of music ahead. A group of us headed down to the stage area about 11:00 AM. Because I was willing to stand for the whole concert, I was able to walk up close to the stage... just to the right of the soundboard and a little behind. In the early afternoon the GD came onstage. I remember the drummer and piano player taking their places and the other members of the band walking out from the wings of the stage with their instruments. As Jerry Garcia walked onstage, I remember him looking up at the 600,000 people in the field and on the hillside. He raised up his hands and arms in defense, as if he was being hit by a wave of energy, and did a pantomime of stumbling backwards slightly. It was a very genuine moment and a spontaneous reaction to seeing such a great mass of humanity gathered together.

It was a sunny, summer afternoon in the Finger Lakes region of NY State and the GD were playing for the large crowd that had gathered for the daylong festival. The band was firing on all cylinders, and the sound system had great fidelity for an outdoor venue. Over the years, I have heard comments from folks who think that the band "played it too safe; and didn't take any risks" in an artistic sense that day. The setlists drew heavily from the Europe '72 and Skull & Roses songbooks, as well as the solo albums Ace and Garcia. I think that the band judged the moment and the setting just fine. There is a big difference between a show at a Ballroom in SF or a Music Hall in Boston being played at night with a psychedelic light show; and an outdoor concert in the middle of the day with an attendance in the hundreds of thousands. I really enjoyed the music that the band played that day! At the end of the concert, after the encore of Sing Me Back Home, I remember Jerry Garcia waving to the crowd and saying "Thanks everybody!" in that distinctive, raspy voice of his. Later that afternoon, The Band took the stage. I had never seen The Band in concert before, but I was familiar with the songs on their first two albums. Their set of music was tight and gritty with a lot of punch, like a tough bar band. They played one song after another, without any extended solos or long jams. I remember Rick Danko pacing around the stage with his fretless bass, spinning in circles and swaying back and forth. It was fortunate that he didn't smack any of the other players with the headstock of his bass guitar! A summer thunder storm moved in about half way thru their set. Most of the band members sought shelter, but Garth Hudson stayed at the keyboard of his Hammond B-3 organ and continued to play music. I stuck around in the rain, because I didn't feel like making the half hour trek to the campsite and back. Listening to the swirling sounds of the organ in the middle of a storm was eerie! Kinda like being in church or listening to the musings of Thor. After The Band's performance, I headed back to the campground for some dinner and a change of clothes. I sat around with my friends smoking joints and sharing a couple bottles of wine, probably Almaden! I think that's what we drank back then. I hadn't done any drugs or drinking during the day because I was worried about passing out in the summer sun and missing the music. But now, in the cool of the evening, I was getting primed for the ABB. At the time, I was just as big a fan of the Allman Brothers as the Grateful Dead. It was time to head back down to the stage area. The crowd was beginning to thin after a long day, and again I was able to walk right down front and stand close to the soundboard. The ABB that played at the Summer Jam was a different band than the blues/rock outfit "At Fillmore East". With the deaths of Duane Allman and Berry Oakley, and the addition of new members, the sound and the vibe of the band had changed somewhat. Lamar Williams was more laid back on bass... right in the pocket, but smooth not aggressive! And piano player Chuck Leavell added a more melodic sound to the rhythm section. But most of all Dickey Betts was headed in a country/rock direction with songs like Rambling Man, Blue Sky and Jessica. Bill Graham introduced the band by saying "And now for the Filet Mignon!". The newly reconfigured ABB really shined under the lights that night and the two drummer lineup was as powerful and hard hitting as ever! Gregg Allman growling on the vocals with his southern accent and Dickey Betts ringing sweet tones out of his sunburst Les Paul guitar. I stuck around for the late night jam session... but it wasn't my favorite part of the concert.The jam session was significant mostly for the musicians who were onstage together, rather than the actual music that was being played. Rick Danko was the band leader for the first few songs, but he was pretty drunk. Finally, members of the GD and ABB began to drift onstage for Not Fade Away, Mountain Jam and Johnny B Goode. But the music was a little disorganized and without any solid arrangements to build instrumental solos upon. The respective band renditions of these songs from other shows (the GD on Not Fade Away; and the ABB on Mountain Jam) are much better performances. A funny moment happened during Johnny B Goode... Bob Weir had to lean over and tap Dickey Betts on the shoulder to let him know that Jerry Garcia would play the signature Chuck Berry double-stop riff as a feature of his guitar solo. Without the timely reminder, Dickey Betts would have missed the musical cue. Such is the nature of a jam session! Well, that's my story... and I'm sticking to it! Everybody was a little groggy and moving slowly the next morning. We packed up our gear, said good bye to new friends in our campsite area and started the long drive back home.