May 13, 1983 at the Greek: My 7th Straight Greek Show

I was not able to break my Oakland Auditorium record at the Greek as my streak stopped at seven with this show.  I saw Garcia in the blazing 1975-1982 corridor, and by 1983 I began to ship shows (sacrilege I Know you Rider). This one has a hot middle of the show Bird Song, Let It Grow, China>Rider, Estimated>Eyes so you can't go wrong on the Friday night show

Of note,these were the first Greek shows where the heat came by and busted [some] for smiling on a cloudy day/

Ed Perlstein (buy his work), getty images can sue me for my zero dollars in revenue from my blog

1980-1982, 15 Straight New Year's Run shoes at the Oakland

1981-1983, 7 Straight Greek theater Shows

SET 1

1. Cold Rain And Snow
2. Greatest Story Ever Told
3. West L.A. Fadeaway
4. Hell In A Bucket
5. Loser
6. Little Red Rooster
7. Bird Song
8. Let It Grow

SET 2

1. China Cat Sunflower >
2. I Know You Rider
3. Estimated Prophet >
4. Eyes Of The World >
5. Drums >
6. Space >
7. Throwing Stones >
8. The Other One >
9. Wharf Rat >
10. Around & Around >
11. Good Lovin'

Keep Your Trey Job: Trey Meets Jerry at Dick's Pick 6: Hartford, October 14, 1983: City Welcomes Shakedown Vending

Hartford in 1983 was a city where Trey first saw the Dead, the show was given Dick's Picks 6 status, the City welcomed with open arms a vending Shakedown Street experience and the local ticket brokers offered to find you Dead tickets from anywhere in the USA. 

What a City. What a Country. What a World in 1983 up in Hartford, CT

This is the first Dick's Picks of the 1980's with the Core Four Block of Scarlet Fire Estimated Eyes right up there in your spine. Thanks Phil.

It wasn't just Trey first show but Mike says it's his favorite ever.   So interesting to me since there isn't all that much from 1983 I would consider at the top of my Dead concert lists, although I loved seeing Greek and Marin County shows that year.

Mind Wondrin  says this show has the best Day Job of 1983. I have never heard these ranked before.

From nugs.net As always, this is from the original, raw two-track tape, straight off the soundboard. In this case, the resident technical wizards had to work overtime, because for the first time they were working with a cassette tape rather than the customary reel to reel master. But, being wizards, they've beautifully captured the ragged-but-right essence of things and dragged it kicking and screaming into the digital domain. Among the highlights here are stellar performances of "Althea," "Scarlet Begonias> Fire On The Mountain," "Eyes Of The World," "Sugar Magnolia" and plenty more, including the first-ever recorded release of the long-lost Hunter/Garcia gem "Day Job," and the sinuous, exotic-sounding "Spinach Jam".

Near Nirvana: The Nine Times China>Rider and Scarlet>Fire Were Played In The Same Show

I like lists at Christmas, so today I present the nine times that China Cat Sunflower flowed into I Know You Rider and Scarlet Begonias streamed into Fire On The Mountain in the same show!

Luckily I saw two of these, at the New Year's Eve show 1980 in Oakland and the next summer at the Saturday show at the Greek 9-12-1981.  You can listen to any or all of these below.
All the China Riders were in the first set (first electric set in 1980) followed by a second set Scar Fire.

So of the more than 300 times the Dead played Scarlet Fire starting in 1977 to the end in 1995 only 9 were played in the same show as China Rider. You had to be lucky to see one of these babies

Note that three shows in a row in 1980 and 1981 also had a Lost Sailor>Saint of Circumstance in them for a trifecta evening.

These were special nights when you got the double dose. I hope you were there too.  Merry Christmas to everyone and thanks for reading my cryptic notes on my life and yours with the Dead


1. 2-3-79 Indianapolis

2. 11-8-79 Cap Center, a rare later era mid first set China here


3. 10-22-80 Radio City
4. 12-31-80 (I was there) Oakland. Here's the fine Wagner Miller NAK aud.
5. 7-8-81 St Louis Kiel
 6. 9-12-81 (I was there)  The Greek
 7. 12-9-81 For the third 1981 double dose, the Dead move from 9-12 in UC Berkeley to 12-9 at U Colorado. Poetic for the Band
8. 9-4-83 Park West Mountain High
9. 3-28-85
Also see  http://gratefulseconds.blogspot.com/2016/04/scarlet-less-fires-and-fire-less.html  and http://gratefulseconds.blogspot.com/2016/01/china-less-riders-and-rider-less-china.html for more Dead rarities involving these four master classes among Dead tunes.

What Did They Open WIth? Idaho, Boise, I'll 'ska September 2, 1983

The answer to the answer man today is: Wang Dang Doodle, the only opening tune the Grateful Dead ever played in Idaho.  Boise got the Dead at the Pavilion in the Student Union Building on September 2, 1983 during the interesting season when the band, after playing the normal Dead strongholds of Washington and Oregon played Boise, Park West Ski Area, and after Red Rocks and Manor Dows, played unusual settings in Grass Valley and Watsonville, CA

http://www.ktvb.com/news/local/idaho/extinct-otter-species-named-after-grateful-dead-guitarist/228598798

Reviewer: Brooklyn Peach - favoritefavoritefavoritefavoritefavorite - March 28, 2007 

Subject: Fabulous show!

I was at this show and can attest to it's amazing qualities. 1983 was the first year I joined in on Dead tour, and I thought it was one mind blowing show after another! This summer tour was fabulous all around, with a great parking lot scene! What a great way to see the United States...wherever you go, all your friends are there, too. This show stands out for me in that we were successfully smuggled into the show by circuitous routes, led by a helpful college student, and once inside proceeded to dance our butts off in the hall, culminating in a Sugar Magnolia that wouldn't quit, the segue into Sunshine Daydream being so prolonged that everyone started looking at each other like what's going on? come on already, dancing, dancing until we were ready to drop and finally the pause, and the downbeat...dancing til the last note, and then we all did drop (and I'm not kidding, everyone in the hall where we were did fall to the floor) and we lay there writhing and moaning from the fantastic experience of it all...and as I lay there I thought: What a great show! And as people started coming out of the arena, and having to walk over all the prostrate dancers lying on the floor in the hall, I thought what it must look like to them, like "That was a great show, but what the heck went on here in the hall?" Nothing but a communal orgasmic experience, resulting in the inevitable aftermath...pure bliss.

Wang Dang Doodle
Jack Straw
They Love Each Other
Mama Tried
Big River
Brown Eyed Women
New Minglewood Blues
Big Railroad Blues
Looks Like Rain
Deal

Help on the Way
Slipknot!
Franklin's Tower
Estimated Prophet
Eyes of the World
drums
Throwin' Stones
Goin' Down the Road Feelin' Bad
Black Peter
Sugar Magnolia

Baby Blue

The Cosmic Durability of the Grateful Dead Traverse Park West September 4, 1983

Hooray, its 1983 Dead.  The band always wanted to play outside in Utah and I can understand that.  When I moved to California on the Green Tortoise in December 1980 just prior to my first fivr night stand, we stopped near El Paso and took a little boat over to Mexico to get some Peyote. Which I enjoyed that night as daylight broke in Utah.  It was only then that I realized that every mountain in Utah was on fire and looked exactly like Mt Rushmore. True story.

Unfortunately I was a spoiled Bay Area Deadhead three years later in 1983 and walked or took Bart to most of my Dead shows instead of a short 1000 or so mile road trip to see an Oudoor Utah show at a ski resort or as the Honolulu Advertiser says in 1983, the cosmic durability of the Grateful Dead.   I heard that Scarlet>Fire is a killer at this show, as it most have been, and there is a nice three song video feed of the show at the bottom of this one.  So enjoy the look and feel and sound of Utah outdoor show in 1983 and tell me what really happened when you show this in person.

This was one of those historic shows with China>Rider and Scarlet>Fire played back to back to back to back.  

The Mecca: Berkeley's Greek Theater

Open Letter to David Lemieux ( vault@dead.net.). Please correct a terrible omission and officially release a Grateful Dead show from Berkeley. I know, I know, Jerry shows from Berkeley are all over the place, but guys, out of the 57 Grateful Shows in Berkeley (of which I went to at least 15) there were none (until I wrote this, haha), please do the right thing. 

My brother esau  Ralph with later Dead doctor Jordan

When I first moved to Berkeley on January 2, 1981 (after getting to town in time to see the 5-night run next to Lake Merritt in Oakland, I expect to immediately get a repeat of the Dead in the 1970;s, but WTF, no shows until September 11! But the announcement came that the shows were going to be at the beautiful outdoor Greek Theater at UC Berkeley, only a fifteen walk up the hill from my job at Rasputin Records. Wow.  I did not realize at the time that the band had played there on 10-1-67 ("Potpourri" according to Deadbase IX, page 10, "A Benefit for The Economic Opportunity Program" of which I have not seen even the set list and 10-20-68, where is a nice recording at archive.org. At least we get to hear Pigpen once at the Greek.

I love the 1981 shows, and the audience tapes are excellent on 9-11 and 9-12, but I have yet to see SBD's so I discount releasing 9-11-81, Mickey's real birthday Bobby, 20 years prior to that horrific day in NYC.  
And there were so many great day/nights at the Greek, with Friday starting at 7pm, Saturday at 5, and Sunday at 3, it was kind of like moving time zones to see the shows.

So many great nights, the nights in 1985 when Jerry played Morning Dew, China Doll and Comes A Time in the same set (6-14-85, where I was shut out of tickets and listened to it with hundreds of people in the hills right above) and the breakout of Cryptical  2 nights later.  There was of course the Dark Star encore in 1984. And this is not even mentioning the shows at the High School where Phil had gone in the 1960s.  Yes folks, the Berkeley Community Theater is the high school auditorium.  The run prior to the Field Trip in 1972 is perhaps the mose seminal of the Dead during that era.  The 8-24 and sadly incomplete 8-25 shows (go for the Charlie Miller versions) are always exactly perfect.

I was lucky to enjoy a few shows there in 1984 and 1986, the One More Halloween Night encore on 10-31-84 (thanks to Rick Sullivan for the tickets) and the Maybe You Know Brent meltdown on 4-21-86.

The wealth of opportunity for our friend David at the Vault (who I love and support, check out Scarlet/Fire in Atlanta) is right here in the 150 hours in his grasp.  , My choice for official release is May 21, 1982. While a great tape exists already, few people know that there is my short video before the show, which I am presenting right here now: 

https://www.dropbox.com/s/wpnff0snoqk3yxj/Outside%20Greek%205%2022%201982.mpg?dl=0 if you would like to come. You can see that dude I mentioned earlier here, or perhaps yourself.  I think Rob and Kirk at at the beginning. Rick and Cormac.

From a Spy novel

Gans Interviews Bobby

From Phil's Book

This is a beautiful show and I promised in the last edition I would give 1000 seconds today.  Of course, my favorite part of the show is the Playing>Uncle Johns>Drums>Space>Wheel>Playing sandwich, with the taste of the similar Lewiston show still on my taste buds. My Grateful Seconds for you now is the 17+ minute Uncle John's Band which does interesting and strange things as it leads into the drums. Enjoy! And please David, just any show from Berkeley,even 1986 just so we know you have filled all the seminal places that the guys have played. Thanks in advance.

1000 Seconds of Amazing UJB and Jam into Drums

Whole Show