04-20-1969

Clark University

Worcester, Massachusetts

This show is another sweet example of how awesome the Dead were, day in and day out, in 1969. The Dark Star here goes down several different paths, each one more compelling than the last. The Death Don’t Have No Mercy is exceptional as well, with some delightfully restrained playing that creates an achingly intense experience. And, the Lovelight is, well, another tremendous ’69 Lovelight.

Recording info
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Identifier:
gd69-04-20.sbd.lutch.4992.sbeok.shnf
Source:
Soundboard
Notes:
crossfades of two short dropouts in Morning Dew at 3:29 and 7:19 crossfade of reel flip in the beginning of The Eleven fades to begin and end the set all other crossfades were edits of flips between songs where no music was disturbed no DAE, resampling, or bulk processing of waveform was performed
Description:
Morning Dew, Good Morning Little Schoolgirl, Doin’ That Rag, Dark Star > St. Stephen > The Eleven > Death Don’t Have Mercy; Encores: Dupree’s Diamond Blues > Mountains Of The Moon
Lineage:
SBD > Cassette Master (Ampex C-90, no Dolby) > DAT(M)@ 44.1K via Panasonic SV3700>DAT(1)>DAT(2) > WAV via Sony SDT9000 DDS drive using VDAT0.6f > Soundforge 4.0
Transferrer:
Rob Eaton and Jamie Lutch
Play
Pause
Back
Forw.
Volume
00:00
1
Tuning
02:13
2
Morning Dew
09:38
3
Good Morning Little Schoolgirl
10:43
4
Doin’ That Rag
06:25
5
Dark Star
21:13
6
Saint Stephen
06:17
7
The Eleven
06:44
8
Death Don’t Have Mercy
10:00
9
Turn On Your Lovelight
22:35
10
Dupree’s Diamond Blues
03:46
11
Mountains Of The Moon
05:12
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Clark’s Atwood Hall is an academic building with a 640-seat student theater inside. Over the years, it hosted some amazing concerts as the student activities board would get bands who were already playing Boston to schedule a night at Clark, under an hour to the west. As someone reports on Archive, not only did the Dead play there in the late 60s, but so did Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Chuck Berry, the Chambers Brothers, the Byrds, the Flying Burrito Brothers, James Taylor, Ray Charles, Ten Years After, and a host of other bands.

A couple folks on Archive contend that this was actually the second show the Dead played at Clark. The first supposedly came about a year earlier. As one of these commenters, a former Clark student, explains,

The Dead made their first appearance at Atwood Hall in late ’67 or early ’68. They performed a lot of material from Anthem although it had not been released yet. I was sitting near the center aisle when all of I sudden, maybe 40 minutes into the set, Paul MacGalliard goes running down the aisle towards the stage. That’s funny, I thought. I wasn’t used to seeing Paul, a man of significant size, move so fast. I was working with the theater group, learning stage lighting, and Paul, who was a year or two ahead of me, tolerated me and taught me the ropes. Suddenly I realized that all of the little red lights on the guitar amps had gone out. The Dead had blown out the power, but I was so entranced, I didn’t even notice. The stage lights were still on, they were on a different circuit. The band members all picked up percussion instruments and just kept playing. (Maybe this was not the first time this had happened). They kept jamming until Paul threw the breakers and the power came back. The Dead played a while longer until the circuits heated up and they blew the power again. It was no use, they excused themselves, and promised to come back, which they did in April of 1969. We had new power lines in Atwood, installed especially for them.

In support of the earlier Clark show, someone points out that you can hear Jerry saying in the initial tuning that “Last time we were here, it was a colossal disaster…this time it will be worse!”

Regardless, the Dead’s show here in April was originally scheduled for the 19th. However, the equipment did not arrive on time, leading them to push back the date from Saturday to Sunday night, allowing for another 4/20 show.

On this night the Dead shared the bill with Roland Kirk. Rumor has it that Kirk insisted on getting top billing – playing last – by bringing a gun to the negotiations with the Dead.

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Comments

3 responses to “04-20-1969”

  1. Dean Haas Jr Avatar
    Dean Haas Jr

    I was there for the ’69 concert, and first saw them in July ’67 in San Francisco. Clark always brought in great bands back then. I also saw Hendrix, Frank Zappa, It’s a Beautiful Day, Janis Joplin, and others, thanks to Bob Ector, who brought them there.

    1. Cole Torres Avatar
      Cole Torres

      Hello Dean!

      My name is Cole Torres, and I am a student at Clark University. I am involved in a project conducting interviews about multiple classic performances that have taken place at Clark, many of which you have mentioned you’ve attended. We would love to include you in our project! My email is colestorres@icloud.com. If you want to be involved, I can be reached here, and we can contact you further. Thank you for reading my comment, and I hope we can speak in the future! (P.S. This project is low commitment, and the interview will be virtual)

  2. aurora50 Avatar
    aurora50

    My first Dead concert, though I’d known about them since 1966…Pigpen’s sister was in my Marin Cty CA, highschool class, and we all bought the first album in support.Was really surprised to have them then show up in Mass, in the same lecture hall where I took Psych 101 and heard Serena Sue H lecture on the Modern English Novel!

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