4-18 DCU Center

Venue History

Show Recap

DCU Center

::venue info

Aside from Boston, Worcester is the place most-played in Massachusetts in the Grateful Dead’s history, including 12 shows at the Centrum 1983-1988, and a show in both 1969 and 1970 at smaller venues. The show in 1969 took place almost 40 years from the date of these shows by The Dead, on 4/20/69 at Clark University. In 1970 they returned to Worcester, playing the Worcester Polytechnic Institute on 5/9/70, the magnificent tour that included stops at Harpur College (Dick’s Picks Vol. 8) , Alfred, NY and MIT, amongst other great shows. Starting in 1983, the band played the Centrum every year up to 1988, with the exception of 1986.

Loads of great music was played at the Centrum, including the Fall tour shows in 1983, 1984 and 1985, and Spring shows in 1987 and 1988. In 1983 and 1984, the band played excellent Help>Slip>Franklins at both runs of shows, and in 1985, on 11/5/85, the band offered a Happy Birthday wish to Bill Walton, who could be seen hanging out onstage beside the monitor along with several of his Boston Celtic teammates. If you get a chance, check out the version of Let It Grow from 10/9/84 at the Centrum, truly a monster rendition. In 1987 the band had its triumphant return to Worcester after Jerry’s 1986 coma, and in both 1987 and 1988 all three annual concerts were broadcast live on the radio on WCUW. The Centrum was a bit of a smaller venue than the band usually played at the time, so these radio broadcasts certainly brought the music to more people who wanted to hear it than could actually fit into the building.

We'll update this page shortly after the show with the setlist and to recap each performance by The Dead as it relates to the context of the Grateful Dead's history at this venue or city.

Grateful Dead archivist David Lemieux will be out on the road with The Dead at selected shows, including this one. He'll be hanging out at the Grateful Dead Productions merchandise booth to answer questions, talk about the archives, or anything else. This booth will have available the brand-new Hartford '77 release, Rocking The Cradle: Egypt 1978, and loads of other great music, and is the only place aside from dead.net where you'll be able to pick up the 9-CD Winterland 1973 boxed set and all of the Road Trips releases including the recent Volume 2 Number 2 from 2/14/68. David will be around before each show, at the set break, and after the show, so feel free to come by and say hi.

Pre-show

The first night of a two night run has a great feeling. Everyone is very tired from a late night in Albany and an early morning here, but the knowledge of a second night with no load-in feels good. The Centrum is a funky older building, but with a certain charm, especially considering all of the great Grateful Dead shows that took place here. For all of the Bay Area hockey fans on the tour’s crew, it’s pretty trippy to see San Jose Sharks logos all over the building, as the Centrum is the home to the Sharks’ AHL affiliate. It’s a coolish day, with the building surrounded by plenty of parking lots and garages, each filled loads of people by 2 PM. As we hang out during the set up, we have another Bay Area connection, watching the Oakland A’s vs the Toronto Blue Jays. The Worcester dressing room artwork and coat hangers are truly one of a kind. There’s a little extra work to do today as the show is being broadcast live on Sirius-XM’s Grateful Dead channel, with the mix being sent out on the airwaves being the front of house mix enhanced by the recording engineers who are producing the live concert CDs available at the concerts.

First set

One of my favourite Bob Weir tunes opened the show, Feel Like A Stranger, and judging by the reaction of the crowd, it was everyone’s favourite tonight. A really nice, meaty jam that wrapped up very tightly, followed by a GDTRFB that had the entire hall up and dancing. This venue has a lot of character, and it’s fun looking around at a sold-out 14,000 people arena, everyone swaying to the music. Another dose of 1969 followed, with Mountains of the Moon>Dupree’s Diamond Blues. These older combinations sure are a welcome addition to the shows, mixed amongst the “newer” material like the other night’s Foolish Heart. It’s been a very dynamic set thus far. They then went into 1979 with Althea, a very nice version with Bobby’s slide guitar paired up with Warren’s to create a dense, layered sound. Then came a long, drawn-out and very spacey and inspired Bird Song, always one of my favourites. This one went way, way out there. It’s been great to see that 4.5 shows into the tour, there have been no repeated songs. They are really drawing on everything and anything from the Grateful Dead repertoire. Following this Bird Song was another tour-first, China Cat Sunflower>I Know You Rider. Three tunes from Aoxomoxoa! A very good setlist, and exceptionally well-played. All crowd-pleasers, too. And it was a verrrrry long set, about 90 minutes, so all of the Sirius and XM listeners out there must be having a blast checking this out. With the mix from the recording crew, it sounds wonderful.

Second Set

They’re really digging into the way past on this tour, opening tonight’s second set with a dynamite Dancing In The Street, in its 1966-1970 arrangement, not the disco-Dancing of 1976-1979. It was, as would be expected, very heavy on the jams. That then led into a long Milestones, with the “sidemen,” Warren and Jeff, both taking lengthy solos, while Phil and drummers held the whole jam down, with Bobby doing all sorts of cool things in his inimitable guitar-playing way. A note on Bobby, and that’s that he’s not only playing great on this tour, but he’s prominent in the mix, and his tone is crystal clear and always just exactly right. He’s playing some of the best guitar I’ve ever heard him play, which is saying a lot, as he’s been playing great guitar for 45 years or more. Milestones then slid into Terrapin Station, with Warren taking the lead vocal duties, and doing right by the classic Jerry tune, found here in its traditional pre-Drums slot. This version of Rhythm Devils is as way-out there as all of the versions so far on the tour, with Mickey and Billy once again playing off the sounds of deep space. They’re really shaking the building. And once again, Space is reaching some very cool places. Out of Space came two nice, mellow, introspective tunes, Days Between and Bird Song’s reprise from earlier. Then Bobby blew the roof off the place (again) with two monster rockers, One More Saturday Night and an encore of Johnny B. Goode. A great way to send us out the doors, or in my case to the laptop. It’s nice to know there is another show tomorrow in this cool smallish building. Thanks, Worcester!

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