Hello everyone.
Hope your fall is nice and cool. While being knee deep in the return of
football, my mind can’t but help wander to my other fall passion, Fall Tour.
There is just something special about seeing music in the fall. The leaves
begin changing, the days are shorter, and there is a buzz in the air as the
music moves indoors. And this journey into the past is all about my first real
Fall Tour show, the Grateful Dead at the Spectrum in Philadelphia, PA on
September 13, 1993.
You can stream the
show here
I was attending
Penn State at the time. I did not have a car up at school so getting around,
and especially getting to shows was a very difficult proposition. But luckily,
my roommate, who we will call E, had a car. Our plan was to drive east to Bloomsburg,
meet up with some friends and then head down to the show.
We met “W” at his
apartment on Sesame St. in Bloomsburg. Sorry, but Snuffalufagus was nowhere to
be seen. To say his apartment was the typical college disaster area does no justice
to actual disaster areas. It was pretty beat up. The bong had the blackest of
black water in it and mold or fungus growing up the insides. The bathroom had 2
toilets, but no stalls, just the 2 commodes side by side. We originally were
going to crash there after the show but decided against that 5 minutes after we
left.
I was not as
prepared as I normally am for a show in the fact I did not know how to get to
the Spectrum. Remember, these were the days before GPS and the Internet. I
mean, I would have had to go out and find an actual map. So we followed them
down to the Philly area. We take an exit and the next thing I know we are
driving into a mall parking lot. One of W’s friends, who I will just call Bro,
because he was a “bro” well before that term became mainstream, said he needed
to get a new chair. It seems that his old chair had been stolen during a party
the weekend before.
So what better time
to shop for a chair than on the way to a Grateful Dead show? WTF? Are you
kidding me? As some of you might be aware, I REALLY don’t like being late for
shows. And then it’s an Ikea for no
less? Because what better way to spend your time before raging a show than by perusing
the home furnishings of socialists who don’t include instruction and all the necessary
tools? So this douchebag takes his time, sitting in different chairs. Like a steroid
fueled Goldilocks, this one to too hard, this one is too soft. Dude, let’s
hurry the fuck up. I could have been 2 beers into the Lot by now.
So we finally
leave and get on the road. Upon arrival at the historic Spectrum, I’m not even
parked in the Lot and see my friend Kristian tailgating. Yes, if I hadn’t been
delayed I wouldn’t have been parking in that Lot but I saw that guy at shows
all the time, even in super random situations, so I would have seen him anyway.
09-13-93 The Spectrum, Philadelphia, Pa. (Mon)
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1: Bucket, Jack A Roe, Same Thing,
Stagger Lee, B. T. Wind, Dire Wolf, Let It Grow
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2: Scarlet> Fire> Playin> Dark
Star> Terrapin> Drumz> Jam> Easy Answers> Days Between>
Good Lovin E: I Fought the Law
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While I would see
8 more Grateful Dead shows, this one I consider one of the last great shows I saw.
Just on my readings and research, by 1994 Jerry was really enjoying opiates
again. The first set is solid, with the highlights being Bucket and Dire Wolf. Even Same Thing, which can
be a blues based slog, had some pep in its step.
The second set is
where it’s at. First half of the set is all classic Grateful Dead. I wasn’t a
huge fan of some of the originals they wrote in the 90’s but this was all
killer, no filler. E really wanted to hear Terrapin and after the
Playin>Dark Star, I thought there was no way they were going to do it. While
the Dark Star was VERY short, the Terrapin was very epic. The jam they do out
of Space is a pretty good as well. I was
glad I got an I Fought the Law encore as I had always loved the Clash’s take on
it. The Dead’s had a little less energy.
We made the long drive back to State College
in one piece, which was a good test run for the next major show I had coming
up, the Jerry Garcia Band at the Meadowlands Arena in Halloween.
Dave Kemp
BA American Studies
PhD Rock and Roll
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