Grateful Dead

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my 1st date rainy as heck and the floor was movin yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaeyes>china doll ya

This is the first concert I ever attended and one of my first exposures to the Dead. What a way to start! For me Playing in the Band, Truckin', Sugar Magnolia and Uncle John's Band were highlights. There was a cool light show and spring-loaded floor made dancing easy. I became the founding Director of the Stanford Concert Network ten years later and we put on another concert at Maples with Pat Benatar. The Department of Athletics facility manager nearly had a coronary when the floor started bouncing. That was the last concert in Maples to date. There’s a new (non-spring loaded) floor there now so maybe that will change. We also promoted concerts with the Dead in Frost Amphitheater for several years. Those were great days and great shows.

I followed up my first NYE's show with this at Stanford. It was good show.

When I got on the bus it started with the '89 Alpine Valley shows. And, subsequently, for most of us, and this is the essence of the Dead's musical genius and communal mentality, we see a live show here and a live show there, then after a few years we all find our favorite songs that we almost grow personal attachments toward. They also come from Dead-related experiences with friends. That one-time in mid summer with boats, barbeque and beers. Add ropeswing here or disc golf there, dogs, kids , or that occasional roadtrip. The "Here Comes Sunshine" playin' while the breaking clouds and ending rain makes a rainbow. The "Mississippi Half Step" that hits at "Across the Rio Grande-Oooo...." and you actually hit the Rio Grande Gorge Bridge west of Taos, NM after leaving Ashland, OR the day before..... Whoa, I digress, I'm going off on my own tangent, but I think you get the point. I grew to love these specific songs, "Here Comes Sunshine", "Eyes", "Row Jimmy", "They Love Each Other", "Loose Lucy", "U.S. Blues" (always a superb encore) and "China Doll" always came up in my top 10 during the parking lot conversations pre-show. The conversations introduced me to the archives and I became a collector, like a lot of us did. And it was then that I've got to say, when I found this show in '93. This one has taken on a transcendental, mystical, philosophical and/or spiritual experience for me. I can honestly say my road with the Grateful Dead is inextricably interwoven. On February 9th 1973 my mom started labor and I arrived in the early morning on the 10th CST. So, when I saw the specifics on this show it sealed my fate a devotee- like it was hard. God!!! I love the 'Dead'!!! Oh, did I mention they had a unique tour schedule that year and zipped out to the Midwest immediately after the Stanford show and played in Mpls. for a show on 2.17.73. a week after I was born there. I'd like to think that somehow the Grateful Dead knew I was comin' Thanks guys, You rock!!!

If this was your 1st show...you're one lucky dog.

...I turned 18 just the week before. This was a wonderful introduction to the Dead. I was on the floor and it was bouncing like crazy. (fyi...there was at least 1 other concert there in the 70's -- I saw John Mayall and the Mark-Almond band at Maples around 1974). Stanford put on many great concerts over the years - at Frost Amphitheatre....Clapton; The Band; Santana; Loggins and Messina, Tower of Power, etc. And some excellent shows at Memorial Auditorium - Michael Bloomfield and Friends (one of the best shows EVER); Elvin Bishop; Doc and Merle Watson; John Fahey, Taj Mahal, and many more. It was just a darn good time to see live music in the Bay Area! No Live Nation, no corporate BS. Bring whatever you want into the shows - often times I'd bring a camera or my dad's movie (reg 8) camera and film part of the shows....

a good day. ......And there were days I know when all we ever wanted was to learn and love and grow.

Ha Ha, its great to hear the others' take on the floor that day. This was a wooden gymnasium floor and some fool actually thought we would all sit quietly in folding chairs carefully lined up auditorium style in front of the stage. About the time deal came up in the 1st set, as the heads started dancing, the floor started bouncing, causing the chairs to move and tangle up our feet.Deadheads being what they are were equally organized and industrious in removing, folding, and stacking the chairs along the walls. Amazingly the floor bounced in a wave like pattern travelling 4 or 5 inches up and down making it easier to dance than to stand still. It wasn't until U.S. Blues and sugar mag that the heads capitalized on the physics of resonance and made a concerted effort to get in sync on the thing, or maybe there was no choice but that floor started to travel what seemed like a full 6 or 8 inches. You had to move with it or you were knocked down. We all settled down for uncle john's band but come round and round we pushed the envelope. I honestly thought we were going to bring the place down but it was so fucking fun that we couldn't stop. I'd always figured that was why they never had another show there so when I read SCNDirector's account of the Pat Benatar show ten years later I have to assume there was no institutional memory and new people in all the key slots cause I doubt anyone who was there the first time would have advised anything other than "whoa, don't ever do that again". ziph P.S. I remember Jerry's lead in sugar mag actually had a beginning, middle, and end, telling a melodic story. He used to do that all the time in other tunes but not so much with sugar mag. I was quite fulfilled after this show.

Ha Ha, its great to hear the others' take on the floor that day. This was a wooden gymnasium floor and some fool actually thought we would all sit quietly in folding chairs carefully lined up auditorium style in front of the stage. About the time deal came up in the 1st set, as the heads started dancing, the floor started bouncing, causing the chairs to move and tangle up our feet.Deadheads being what they are were equally organized and industrious in removing, folding, and stacking the chairs along the walls. Amazingly the floor bounced in a wave like pattern travelling 4 or 5 inches up and down making it easier to dance than to stand still. It wasn't until U.S. Blues and sugar mag that the heads capitalized on the physics of resonance and made a concerted effort to get in sync on the thing, or maybe there was no choice but that floor started to travel what seemed like a full 6 or 8 inches. You had to move with it or you were knocked down. We all settled down for uncle john's band but come round and round we pushed the envelope. I honestly thought we were going to bring the place down but it was so fucking fun that we couldn't stop. I'd always figured that was why they never had another show there so when I read SCNDirector's account of the Pat Benatar show ten years later I have to assume there was no institutional memory and new people in all the key slots cause I doubt anyone who was there the first time would have advised anything other than "whoa, don't ever do that again". ziph

The first timers are classics now but the China/Rider is probably my most favorite ever!! Even the opening jam from Jerry on El Paso is the best ever! Listen closely!