“Please, don’t murder me,” Jerry Garcia sang again, now in a voice weathered by age and abuse, as cops pivoted their heads, hoping to catch sight of the man who’d vowed to kill Garcia before the night was over.Īlong with the likes of Alpine Valley Music Theatre in Wisconsin, the Deer Creek Music Center had become a destination spot, a revered haven, for the Dead and their fans alike. But tonight, in the middle of Indiana, they again injected it with the crisp, merry gait of the recorded version, and even the song’s refrain harked back to its original impending-death inspiration. They’d played it innumerable times since, occasionally slowing it down a half step. Twenty-five years had passed since the Dead had recorded that song at Pacific High studio. Three songs into the show, the house lights still on, the time had come for “Dire Wolf,” but with a perverse twist no one had anticipated. It was the most in sync I ever saw the two of them.Excerpted from "So Many Roads: The Life and Times of the Grateful Dead" That first set ends in a powerful rendition of Let it Grow, but I think they both battled to a draw. Jerry and Bob were in peak form with both seemingly trying to one up the other. Some ups, some downs and some incredible music. Listening back on this 26 years to the day later and it's a microcosm of my entire Dead experience. I eventually let her make the call and we left. However, it felt like a mass of humanity everywhere we turned. We knew we wouldn't get back down to that spot on the floor, roughly 75-100 feet from the stage so I just tried to find a place where she would not feel claustrophobic. The second set? Well, it was all too much for my wife, who had to bail out at the set break before totally freaking out and naturally my first obligation was to make sure she was alright. Yet that first set is etched in my mind as the best set I got to see in my short 25 show stint. It was hot, we were packed in like sardines and some guy pissed on the one of the mats covering the field right in front of us. That minute and a half of dead(no pun intended) air after FoTD was clearly them discussing the crowd surging forward. I was at the show on the floor with my first wife and a couple of friends. This is the first time I've ever got to hear the soundboard of the first set.
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