Thirty-Four

Today, back to 1989 at the Deer Creek Music Center in Noblesville, Indiana.

This is a nice show.  The two songs played to open the second set are "Foolish Heart" and "Victim or the Crime," which were fairly new at the time...they made an odd pairing.  I like them both, although I am more fond of "Foolish Heart."

"Victim" was not at all popular, from many accounts I have read.  Not hard to hear why.  It's a difficult song, with lyrics that challenge.  A story (disputed through the years) goes that the lyricist (Gerrit Graham) was asked to change the word "junkie" since it touched a little too close to home for some in the family...interesting stuff.

I also think of that song in reference to perhaps the main reason Deer Creek became infamous, the "riot" of 2 July 1995.  Folks stormed the fences and broke into the show, injuring many and drawing the attention of the band.  They canceled the next night's show, and at the next tour stop (St. Louis) a letter was distributed containing the following text:

This Darkness Got To Give

Dear Dead Heads:

This is the way it looks to us from the stage:

Your justly-renowned tolerance and compassion have set you up to be used. At Deer Creek, we watched many of you cheer on and help a thousand fools kick down the fence and break into the show. We can't play music and watch plywood flying around endangering people. The security and police whom those people endangered represent us, work for us -- think of them as us. You can't expect mellow security if you're throwing things at them. The saboteurs who did this can only do it if all Dead Heads allow them to. Your reputation is at stake.

Don't you get it?

Over the past thirty years we've come up with the fewest possible rules to make the difficult act of bringing tons of people together work well -- and a few thousand so-called Dead Heads ignore those simple rules and screw it up for you, us and everybody. We've never before had to cancel a show because of you. Think about it.

If you don't have a ticket, don't come. This is real. This is first a music concert, not a free-for-all party. Secondly, don't vend. Vending attracts people without tickets. Many of the people without tickets have no responsibility or obligation to our scene. They don't give a shit. They act like idiots. They think it's just a party to get as trashed as possible at. We're all supposed to be about higher consciousness, not drunken stupidity.

It's up to you as Dead Heads to educate these people, and to pressure them into acting like Dead Heads instead of maniacs. They can only get away with this crap if you let them. The old slogan is true: If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.

Want to end the touring life of the Grateful Dead? Allow bottle-throwing gate crashers to keep on thinking they're cool anarchists instead of the creeps they are.

Want to continue it? Listen to the rules, and pressure others to do so. A few more scenes like Sunday night, and we'll quite simply be unable to play. The spirit of the Grateful Dead is at stake, and we'll do what we have to do to protect it. And when you hear somebody say "Fuck you, we'll do what we want," remember something.

That applies to us, too.

Phil, Jerry, Bobby, Mickey, Billy and Vince

As I mentioned in a previous post, within a week the final concert had been played, and just over a month later Jerry was gone.  It was a surreal way for it all to come crashing down, and "Victim," for me at least, still conjures quite a bit of that.

Anyway.  Take a listen.  Have a good day.

Set list after the break...

Bertha
Greatest Story Ever Told
Candyman
Walkin' Blues
Peggy-O
Queen Jane Approximately
We Can Run
Bird Song

Foolish Heart
Victim or the Crime
Crazy Fingers
Truckin'
Smokestack Lightnin'
drums
China Doll
All Along the Watchtower
Stella Blue
Sugar Magnolia

Brokedown Palace