Grateful Dead

These were great shows. I had a portable dat player with me and I found a guy with the great audience tapes (Schoeps cmc mk4 mics). This show was great. All 3 of them the music especially the drums just flowed through my entire body. It was really just a band beyond descriptions. The Stranger is sick... One of the best non Brent Strangers ever. The solo for Peggy-o I have learned note for note. So much emotion from Jerry. Mathilda is a Harry Belafonte song. I know that now but at the time I had no idea. I just knew I had never heard it before. Morning Dew was glorious. I was on the lawn. I remember walking in and the drum circles before the show. I was there alone I think although i found some people to stay with at the camp ground. We were at a really cool campground although I don't know where it was or who i was with. It was a while ago. 27 years ago now..

This was my first show back alter an accident that left me in a wheelchair -all is good as I had done more by that fateful than most in a lifetime - so I just keep on keeping on man.I remember driving down from Chitown for the final two shows of this set. It poured so hard we could hardly see the road, tornado warnings al around us and crazy lighting show mid afternoon! We made it to our usual spot in the lot and and partied in the bus. Rolling into the venue was strange after all those years of hiking from Happy Campers Joes Farm field. I had box seat with friends but as I rolled down nobody stopped my so I kept going to front row, which would be my spot sans Soldier Field and Shoreline shows till the final 102nd and last of em. When they opened with tho Stranger, how fitting, for me after 3 year gone. I remember and can her on the HQ tape I got how darn quiet the pavilion was during DEW. Jer backing off the mic to give it that eerie sound effect - "I guess it doesn't matter anymore....." a few Phil Bomb and after JER started pounding the Tiger I thought we might see a Dew like a 78-79! wow the OG Kush at that show was just smoothing things out and I was starting to feel right back at home with the boys...Peggy-O a 10 beat BIODTL and then the rain songs came after Box out of space I figured something was cooking in the kitchen. And as they did every year, the HCS broke the skies wide open to an Indiana sunset, once again "controlling the weather" my bro--in-law would say after a blazing hot sunny weekend in the city to close the tour when the circus was in town shutting down LSD with people dancing in the streets from car to car waiting for the traffic to move an inch -to a cool Sunday evening and cold windy monday you could tell the circus had left. However. The Chicago lot scene like no other, miles of great lot eats n shopping. But the Deer Creek show will stick with me for life with all the makings for a welcome home like no other. Rated Best of Shows for that year in dBase, and for good reason a Bluesy mix setting the stage for the boom fest in the city the following weekend with fireworks so low people were running for cover in the stands behind the stage. One of the best weeks off work ever.

I remember it raining ever harder as all of the "rain" songs progressed . My wife and I waded slowly through ankle deep mud until we were right at the stage.... Bobby was SCREAMING angrily at the mike at the end of Looks Like Rain ....and then as if right on cue a small opening in the clouds formed right over our heads and the stage as they broke into Here Comes Sunshine and by the end there was hardly a cloud left in the sky. Just another common mystical experience at a Dead Show...... And why not ...I need a miracle every day!!! I'll never forget that!!!