One of my top three Grateful Dead shows and the best audience recording I’ve ever heard. This is one of those Dead shows that you play for friends who don’t understand what the fuss is all about. The band was tight and it was a free concert in Golden Gate Park so the vibe was great. Early in the show a woman in the audience gives birth to a baby and Jerry noodles a few notes of “happy birthday to you”. How many people have had Jerry Garcia play guitar for them as they were being born?
Years later Jerry mentioned that everyone on stage was on LSD.
Stream this show:
(download links bottom of page)
Aud Source: FOB Master Cassettes = 2 x Maxell UD 120
Lineage: 2 x Sony ECM-270 => Sony TC-152 >> MAC
Analog Sound Preservation: MAC >> Nakamichi DR-8 => Korg MR-1000 >> DSF [1-bit 5.6448 MHz Stereo] >> Korg MR-1000 => Korg AudioGate >> WAV [24/96]
Taped By: Bob Menke and Louis Falanga
Transfer By: Bob Menke
Mastering By: Derek McCabe
Taper Talk
— According to Bob Menke, “It was an overcast day and we got there early. About 8:30 in the morning. That is how we ended up about 10-15 feet from the stage. The mics were mounted on broom sticks (handheld) and they were split about 20 feet apart. The upfront vocals I believe are the product of a small (relative to PA speakers) speaker on the floor of the stage next to the right PA column. The vocals seem to be blasting from that speaker. Another very intersting point is the fact that the Jefferson Starship opened and their sound from the same PA absolutely sucked. Nothing approaching the clarity and sound quality the Dead got from the same system.”
01 – Help On The Way >
02 – Slipknot!
03 – The Music Never Stopped
04 – They Love Each Other
05 – Beat It On Down The Line
06 – Franklin’s Tower
07 – Big River
08 – It Must Have Been The Roses
09 – Truckin’ >
10 – Jam >
11 – Drums >
12 – King Solomon’s Marbles [1: Stronger Than Dirt, 2: Milkin’ The Turkey] >
13 – Not Fade Away >
14 – Goin’ Down The Road Feeling Bad >
15 – One More Saturday Night
16 – Crowd Outro
-= Download pt 1 =-
-= Download pt 2 =-
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Scattering Stars Like Dust.. 
Oh man, thanks for this. I was at this show. Was my first day in the bay area after a long 2,500 mile move and still had everything in the car. What a trip – literally and figuratively and what better welcome could there have been. JA sadly never morphed into anything close to the original in JStarship and their audio that day was a definitely a mess. The Dead picked it up, cleaned it up, and played it up. I think this recording may have been picking up vocals from one or more of the monitors there for the singers – these often have much better quality than the other equipment. The crisp highs as well as being able to hear both lead and backup vocals at the same level are also a clue. They monitors usually point back at the performers and if not carefully managed, or if the show is in a difficult setting, they can be tricky to keep from feeding back from the larger equipment amps behind the players. Sometimes to eliminate the feedback, they have to be turned a bit toward the audience. The singer can still hear his or her voice, just not quite as well or as clearly. We had long, beautiful jams that day, so the vocals were not the top of the show. Thanks again – mental blends of eucalyptus trees on the breeze and floating blue herbal haze halos have been revived.
Thanks for the reminiscence, Michael. I’m honored to be able to reconnect you with this show. I was a little 11 year old urchin when this show went down and growing up in the Sunset I was probably only a few miles away, riding around on my bike, smoking pot and getting into one sort of trouble or another. Unfortunately, due to the random trajectory of my life, I was completely unaware of the Dead back then (other than Casey Jones on local commercial rock radio) and didn’t get on the bus until much later in life. I’ve ofter wondered while listening to this show how my life might have been different had I stumbled across this while it was going down. Oh, well..
Peace