“You know, Rob, you should think about staying in Rochester for the summer. It could be fun.”
Hold up, what?
I met Katy through Dagwood, my former Pledgemaster and two of the older brothers, Ratso and Les Nessman. She came to the Delt parties but was nothing like the rest of the girls that showed up to drink our beer or get high at the fraternity. She had red hair, which was unusual. More importantly, she lived off campus with her roommate, Kerry. They both worked at the bar near school that my fake ID allowed me access to. Thursdays were when the Delts hit the local establishments. I hadn’t really spoken to Katy other than to order a drink or some wings. My drunken mumblings definitely couldn’t explain how I ended up sitting on her couch on the last day of my sophomore year. Dagwood told me she thought I was cute, but said it like a threat. Then again, that was how he said everything.
“Gross, you gotta call her! What’s the matter, can’t figure out how to dial an outside line? Press 9, and say ‘listen here, Red. I’m coming over.’ That’s it.”
The fact that he was giggling through his words wasn’t instilling me with confidence, but that was also classic Dagwood. As crazy as he sounded, especially while drinking, he was surprisingly right about most of the things he said. I just didn’t have much confidence in myself at that moment. Since having my first one-night stand at the fraternity’s “One-Piece Party,” I hadn’t really found much success with girls. I wasn’t acting differently at the parties, but conversations weren’t leading to hookups. At least I was away from school a fair amount that year. I flew down to Chappaqua the day after my induction into the fraternity to see the Chargers play the Jets with my dad. They won 39-3, but went 6-10 on the season. Things just weren’t the same since Dan Fouts retired. He left the same year I saw my first Dead show, in 1987. At least I had that to kind of fill the void. I hit eight shows on the spring tour of ’91 and was scheduled to see six that summer. The band was still playing great and almost every night and were still sprinkling some rarities. I didn’t want to miss the show where they busted out “Help On The Way” or “Dark Star.”
Maybe my absence from school accounted for my lack of “action” or maybe I just wasn’t looking as hard. I hadn’t had a relationship since high school. Now, I couldn’t imagine wanting a girlfriend, let alone having one. I was nineteen years old and seemed to be avoiding the little responsibility I had. Still, the prospect of taking every girl I met into my university-issued twin bed wasn’t as appealing as it was as a freshman. What the fuck was happening to me?
Katy invited me over to watch the last episode of Beverly Hills, 90210. I hadn’t really watched the primetime soap operas of the ‘80s during my childhood, but this show had me hooked. It was like Happy Days, except there was more than one “cool character.” I wasn’t the only one watching, as FOX had announced that they were running their second season that summer to accommodate demand. I would need the entertainment anyway and not just because everything else on TV was reruns. My mom got me my first “real” job, working at a municipal bond company back in Westchester. It was just for the summer, but it would be five days a week. Not only would I be living with my parents, but I’d have to be there by 9:00 each day. Getting up at that hour seemed way worse than staying until 5:00. While I sat on the couch next to Katy, I dreaded the thought driving back to Chappaqua the following morning.
The episode wasn’t exactly helping. The Walshes were going to move back to Minnesota, so Andrea decided to “offer herself” up to Brandon. As I peeked next to me and noticed Katy’s freckles against her Irish skin, I couldn’t help feeling like I was also leaving something behind. She must have felt it too since she brought up me staying in town.
“I have to take this job,” I said. “My mom called in a favor.”
“What kind of job is it?”
“It’s like filing bonds or something. I’m not even sure.”
“Is that what you want to do when you graduate, work in finance?
“Fuck no, but I have to do something this summer. That is besides go to Dead shows.”
“OK, but me and Kerry aren’t really doing anything besides working at the bar. I don’t think either of our parents care. It doesn’t even sound like you want the job.”
“I don’t, I just don’t want my parents pissed at me.”
“Wow, Rob, I didn’t know you cared about stuff like that.”
I laughed. “Katy, I’m just a Jewish boy from Westchester County. It’s not like I was made in some Delt laboratory to forever be ‘Luca Brasi.’
“You coulda fooled me.” Her smile revealed that she was at least partially joking.
Before I knew it, it was time to go. Chappaqua was over six hours away. Katy told me to come by once I got back to school in the fall and kissed me on the cheek.
Shit, I thought. Was there such a thing as a mid-college crisis?
By mid-June, I’d seen all six of the shows I had tickets too. They were all really good, especially the ones in DC and New Jersey. In Washington, they’d played “Help On The Way” and “Dark Star” in the same set. At Giants Stadium, they opened the show with “Eyes of the World” for the first time ever and played parts of “Dark Star” instrumentally throughout. Thank God I’d seen them play the whole song in Washington, or the teases would have really pissed me off.
I was sitting at my desk at the Municipal Bond Insurance Corporation when my friend Yo called. A Delt a couple years older than me, he’d been my travel companion for all the shows that summer.
“Luuuuuuca. ‘Sup.”
“Nothing. How’d you even get this number? No one has called me here since I started.”
“Not even that girl Katy? I heard Dagwood saying she was into you.”
“Yeah, I might have fucked that up. Actually, I probably should just stayed up at Rochester for the summer.” “The Dead are playing Soldier Field this weekend.”
“I know, but my parents think I’m done touring until the fall.”
“Isn’t there an airport in Westchester? It can’t be that much to fly. Plus, I already bought us tickets to the show. They’ve never played in that stadium before. How good do they sound right now? It could be amazing.”
He was right about that Westchester County airport was fifteen minutes away from where I was sitting. The only problem was how to pay for a plane ticket. My parents had given me a credit card, but told me it was only for emergencies. Then again, the show was only two days away. That represented some urgency, didn’t it?
Plus, I could pay them back with the money I was earning at my boring job. Katy was right. There was no reason to have a grown-up job in the middle of college, especially when it had nothing to do with the boring job you would end of having after college. After declaring U.S. History as a major, I hadn’t really considered what I would do after graduation. I was pretty sure, however, it would have nothing to do with municipal bonds.
I was also feeling pretty stupid for leaving whatever I had with Katy behind. Living in Chappaqua didn’t present any opportunities to meet girls. The only ones that were back in town were the ones I went to high school with. It was June 20th and I was already ready to get back up to Rochester. That wasn’t what summer was about. At least I’d extend summer tour for one more show and avoid whatever the hell I’d gotten myself into back home.
“The band sounding really good and playing Soldier Field for the first time is not an emergency. Rob, I can’t believe your mother and I have to say this out loud.”
My parents were less than thrilled at my use of my American Express card. They agreed to let me go to Chicago, but only if I paid everything off before going back to school in August. Otherwise, I couldn’t take the car back with me. That would not only mean no Dead shows, but no chance being able to go off campus when I wanted to. I didn’t know if Katy would have me back to her house, but I wasn’t going to have Dagwood drive me over there in The Gunner. It was one thing when I was stuck at a bar, but the last thing I needed was him dropping me off like it was the fucking prom.
With the money it took to fly to Chicago on a Saturday, Yo and I didn’t have any money left for a hotel. Luckily, there was a Delt chapter at the University of Chicago. Yo was on the fraternity’s alumni relations board. His nickname came from the fact that his read hair and mustache
made him look like Yosemite Sam. Working the phones seemed like the kind of job that suited him. At Lamda Sigma Delta, “alumni relations” meant knowing which chapter wouldn’t mind putting up a couple of brothers from Rochester at a minute’s notice. The Chicago chapter sounded kind of lame. The only people living in the house for the summer were attending an enrichment program, Yo explained. Even though Rochester was almost as good a school as Chicago, I couldn’t imagine taking classes voluntarily. Then again, we were taking our own “enrichment” class.
The flight to Chicago was the shortest I had taken since my first weekend home from school. My parents didn’t give me the car until after my freshman year, so I flew home for vacations. The trip to O’Hare was so quick it didn’t occur to me that this would be the first stadium Dead show I’d be at without a car. The plan was to meet Yo at the airport and take a cab to the Delt house. When we got there, however, the place was empty. There was a note taped to the front door welcoming us and telling us they’d see us after “our concert.”
There was even a plastic shopping bag (with a paper one lining it) sitting on their LSD welcome mat. Inside was a six-pack of beer I’d never even seen before, Elephant malt liquor by Carlsberg. I had no idea that malt liquor came in anything but a 40 oz bottle and that a respected company would actually import it into the United States. But there were only a couple of hours before showtime at this point and we certainly weren’t turning down free alcohol.
As our car pulled up to Soldier Field, I felt a little rush seeing the façade I recognized from television. The Chargers won an overtime game there ten years ago, which was the last time they’d won their division, sadly. They were so bad now that the thought of football made me sad. I grabbed another Elephant out of the bag as we stepped onto the curb. It didn’t taste like malt liquor, which meant it was at least tolerable.
“Look up, Luca.”
As I heard the cab drive away, I saw the words “SOLDIER FIELD” etched into the concrete. I wasn’t sure what else I was supposed to be seeing.
“Yeah, so?”
“Can you imagine climbing into the show with grappling hooks?”
“Yo, how many beers did you have?”
“None, but I did drop acid on the plane.”
That explained it.
We found our seats in the level above the floor. We were directly across the stage and arrived just as Roger McGuinn, formerly of the Byrds started playing. His set was good, although his Rickenbacker guitar didn’t quite envelop the stadium its sound. It didn’t help that the wind was picking up throughout the show. At least Chicago was living up to its nickname. He ended with “Turn, Turn, Turn,” which I would forever associate with The Wonder Years, and “Eight Miles High.” The opening chords of the former song made me feel the sad nostalgia I experienced upon arriving at the show. However, I had a feeling it wasn’t about my struggling football team this time. I didn’t have the strength to engage whatever was eating at me, so I headed to the beer stand. Yo looked like he was tripping pretty hard and wouldn’t be up for any conversation.
Before I knew it, the Dead were onstage. I was relieved. The music was was why I came and I needed something familiar to anchor me as my beer buzz picked up. The crowd erupted as the band members took their usual spots did just that. It was so windy that Phil Lesh and Vince Welnick were wearing a black hooded sweatshirts and Jerry’s hair sprung out from both sides of his head like the cover of the Go To Heaven album. Bob Weir even traded in his jean shorts for actual jeans. They tore into “Hell In A Bucket,” which opened my first show at MSG four years ago. There was something about this song that usually meant a good show was coming. Jerry was tearing off solos with glee, and the tune let him play in a raunchy style that most of the Dead’s songs didn’t allow for.
Then came “Shakedown Street,” the song that opened up the second set of my first show. Now we knew they weren’t fucking around. This was an all-time version, too. Before launching into the jam, Jerry did a nice call and response bit with Bruce Hornsby, whose collar stuck out from his long sleeve shirt like he was a substitute teacher or something. Since joining the band as a “special guest” a year ago, I got the feeling he might have played that role in the band. I assumed he was the de-facto adult offstage, even though he was younger than the rest of them. During shows, Jerry usually looked over in his direction and often emerged from the exchange energized, just like he was during “Shakedown. On the big screen, you could see Hornsby almost afraid to blink while Jerry turned on his MIDI effects. He started the jam with a wicked note that signaled what seemed like it would be a sinister solo. But now Jerry’s guitar sounded almost like a clarinet as he locked on a nice funk theme. That’s what the song’s all about, isn’t it? No wonder Hornsby looked unsure when they’d try to bring this one home.
Every song selection and performance seemed to make perfect sense. Willie Dixon’s “Wang Dang Doodle” was the perfect cover for the Chicago crowd. “Friend Of The Devil” wove seamlessly into “When I Paint My Masterpiece.” A spirited “Brown-Eyed Women” was followed by a monster “Let It Grow.” It was clear that would be the set-closer because they were playing their fucking brains out.
The second set was similarly great. “Foolish Heart” had a jam that just kept climbing and climbing. The rest of the band clearly thought Jerry would stop, but he kept going. The outro lowed perfectly into “Looks Like Rain,” which let Bobby take control of the stadium crowd. Thankfully, it wasn’t actually raining. The wind was bad enough. “Crazy Fingers” then merged into “Playin’ in the Band.” was one of those “Playins” where the jam got so far out that you assumed they’d take it into the drums. Hornsby even started toying with the “Dark Star” theme. The jam was really that deep. Then he started playing the intro to “Terrapin Station” and we knew where this would end up. It was a perfect version and they even when right back to the “Playin’” jam with the “Dark Star” teases. As they left the stage for “Drums,” I thought that his really might be the best show of the summer.
Nothing that came after “Space” suggested otherwise. First, they finally played the middle of “Dark Star.” I assumed it was the middle since they did the first verse in Washington and Jerry was playing the melody on his guitar. People were losing their mind, but I somehow knew they weren’t going to sing the second verse. They ended “Playin’ In The Band” instead and dropped into an appropriately mournful “Black Peter.” After the prerequisite “One More Saturday Night” to close the set, the band emerged from backstage and played “The Weight” as I had ever heard them. Then out of nowhere, a massive fireworks display went off. It wasn’t the 4th and it wasn’t the last show of the tour, so it took everyone by surprise. As Yo and I looked up at the explosions above us, it occurred to me that my summer tour was finally over. I’d have to go back to Chappaqua and when I got to school in the fall, I was going to need to figure some shit out. But being at the show reminded me of why you take chances. If I hadn’t listened to Yo, I’d have missed this. I was about to share this epiphany with him when I saw how transfixed he was by the acid, music, and fireworks. I’d keep it to myself. After the lights to the stadium came on, he turned to me and said “That was fucking amazing, but there was only one thing missing.”
“Yeah, I know. They didn’t sing the second verse of ‘Dark Star.’”
“Nah, dude. We should have brought those grappling hooks.”
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