Grateful Dead

Hello everyone, I'm J.Chimmy from Louisville, KY. I don't have a laundry list of shows I attended and I don't have a long history in the scene. I discovered the Dead when I was 15 and I've been hooked ever since. I don't expect to run into a bunch of old friends I made on tour but I do hope to make some new friends.

Hi all from Ottawa Canada. My first show was Wonderland 1984 WOW! I went to shows right up until the last tour though I stopped touring in 1989 as having children made it seem too difficult. I've been raising a family, making a living and writing /playing music ever after. Life's good but not AS good without Jerry!

HI everyone JUSTaHEAD is how im known around the net at the few places i visit.Nice to meet some new kind like minded ppl.And im sure you cats will hear more from me.Nce to be here. _____________________________________________________________________________ If I knew the way,I would take you home.....

What do I offer you so you know me? Here's something from my journal, maybe most apt to why I'm here. Apologies for its length, my friends... 6-27-93 Morning after my 25th anniversary Grateful Dead Show - RFK Stadium, Washington, D.C. How would I explain to my son and his heirs the reasons I leave his five-year-old world to travel to something he knows as "The Grateful Dead"? Why these curious preparations - jacket with pins & patches; odd t-shirts; beaded ancient necklace and these books? Why my excitement and why his mommy's chagrin, unease? There must be many ways to start to answer - one is to say that every so often a man's gotta dance hard and sweat like a meat-eater to a rhythm he loves and songs he holds dear... I live so much in the light of the mind and my daily physical lethargy that these explosive outbursts of physical, sensual energy are dear. And because in some ways the Grateful Dead experience and allied encounters are pretty much what remains of things that were important when I was forming as a young man, twenty-five and more years ago when I lay in my parents' house, my home, and listened to the first Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane's Surrealistic Pillow stacked on my monophonic hi-fi, the summer I turned 20 - 1967- and listened to musicians do things with music which I never had considered before - pushed boundaries, opened new doors in old forms (especially in Viola Lee Blues). My life was encountering the limitless potential that the present holds at 20 and here was its soundtrack. And amazingly here I am 25 years later and the band is still playing and the dances are still danced and it's quite all right for a middling-age coot like me to join in with the youngsters and share in their excitement and discovery and celebration that the universe is a miraculous and a dangerous place, and that singing and dancing its joys and sorrows, ecstasies and defiances in groups come together ritually is a good thing, and maybe a necessary one. And there is in my blood and in the myths of my parents' lore the family pioneer spirit, the frontier imperative, the draw towards and over the boundary in confidence of one's own ability to meet the challenges there with the wisdom of experience and the boldness of a restless, inquisitive mind and the reliance that one's hands can grapple, one's feet can carry, one's back can bear, and one's mind can understand and guide the others in the task. I think of those pioneer ancestors who were not content to settle, but when they did took solace and strength from their celebratory, re-creational communities - barn dances, hoe-downs, wedding parties and Saturday Nights on the town and in my time I look at the "cosmic pioneers" around me, discovering and creating the present and the next millennium, sojourners on the great wave of incredible changes that is our time, and explorers and discoverers, Lewis and Clarks of their own psyches. Which brings me to drugs. In the beginning, yes, there were the drugs for me. LSD, mescaline and pot. And yes, they worked their charms then for better or for worse and how I see things and think of them inescapably has been affected. For many Deadheads the drugs are the point- to alter their chemistry and revel in it in a safe and pretty and dedicated environment - but not for me, for nearly 20 years. It's not the drug experience I go to encounter, because I believe I pushed that as far as I could long ago and to continue would be variations on an old, if interesting, still-not-furthering theme. Then why do I go, in short? Because at a Dead show I encounter my youth, my old self and memories of my growth, memories of when my love, too, would walk with me and dance with me at these shows. I guess it would be a touch of nostalgia because I long to share those things again. But I don't long for that past and I'm certainly not trying to recapture it for longer than a passing, smiling nod. The music is all new, and I go for the present (in every sense of the word), to hear and see performed live, in all good companie, lyrics and music I treasure and that is wound around and within the deepest places my heart and spirit cherish: respect for the planet and the others on it, love when it's possible, awareness that all can be lost and the abyss descended yet climbed again, encounter with the great Other and an abiding optimism that there's nothing one can face that beats out love and kindness and charity. I go to be reminded, and, with others, to affirm. Days Inn, Capitol Centre, D.C., 7-8 AM @->--- @->--- @->--- @->--- @->--- @->--- I dunno, it must have been the roses! First show 11/23/68 ATHENS OHIO ... Anyone have it for trade? Cheer'n'merry Sunshine!

Hey now! The origins of my handle are too obscure to be of any interest but was what I used on the old dnc site so what the heck... You can call me Fritz too, if you want. First show (well, second set anyway) was the mighty fine 7-7-84 at Alpine. Quite a trip for someone who had bleach blonde mohawk only six months earlier. Mostly caught shows in the Chicago area with some side trips to Georgia and one to California. Stuck around until the bitter end. RMGD hooked me up with a good group of local fiends and met more through the original Deadnet. Kinda a Jerry guy I suppose if I had to choose, but since I don't, just push play and let's enjoy!

Ooh, cool dog, Kaiser! Post about him/her in Deadhead Pets!

Hi all, I'm pretty much known as irenie at various message boards. For whatever reason, the new deadnet didnt let me sign in with that, so now I'm Weir freakin- like my blog. Looking forward to checking things out around here. I'm also living in the Bay Area. As you can probavly tell, I'm a big Bobby Weir freak.

I'm Randy, originally from the Jersey Shore, but now living in the Bay Area. My first show was on Jerry's 31st Birthday at Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City in '73 and saw tons of great shows on the east coast between then and Englishtown in '77. Then i moved to Marin County and got to see tons more shows, as well as run into the boys around town from time to time. Glad to meet you all and so happy to see the new site finally up and running.

Am I the only one here whose internet Dead experience was largely formed by rec.music.gdead on the Usenet? I'm really David Pelovitz, which became Vitz in high school and stuck into grad school. Took a number of years to earn that Dr. though. I'm a little leery about posting, mostly because I fear the time I will end up committing. My daughters (Cassidy - 6 & Jordan - 4) take most of that these days. At least they like the Dead (though I recently showed them the Yellow Submarine DVD and now there lives are nearly defined by the Beatles). I'm living in Wisconsin these days, but hail from central NJ (equidistant from NYC, Philly & the Jersey shore). I can commiserate with aud re: the Phillies, but I skew toward NYC teams in general.

Hey now, Dee! Dee and I "met" while working on the newsletter for one of my erstwhile clients. We bonded over dogs much as Vivi and I bonded over horses, and then came to the realization one day that we were both Deadheads. It's a small world after all... I have her Valentine dog art by my desk. The dog looks like my Rex...