Grateful Dead
Date 1983-08-27
Seattle Center Coliseum
Seattle WA

d1t01 - Tuning
d1t02 - Jack Straw 
d1t03 - Deep Ellum Blues-> 
d1t04 - My Brother Esau
d1t05 - Brown Eyed Women
d1t06 - Little Red Rooster
d1t07 - Ramble On Rose     //
d1t08 - Looks Like Rain-> 
d1t09 - Deal 

d2t01 - Tuning
d2t02 - Touch Of Grey-> 
d2t03 - Playin' In The Band-> 
d2t04 - Uncle John's Band-> 
d2t05 - drums->
d2t06 - space       //
d2t07 - Throwing Stones-> 
d2t08 - Black Peter-> 
d2t09 - Phil Jam * >
d2t10 - One More Saturday Night 
d2t11 - Encore: It's All Over Now Baby Blue 

//   tape flip
*    more like  Wang Dang Doodle tease

Source Audience Recording: Beyer M 201c: Master Maxell MX90
Location: set 1: 70 feet from stage|DFC
Lineage: Master AUD: Beyer M201's (hyper cardiod)X-Y >> Sony TCD5M w Maxell MX 90| Dolby B ON 
Playback: Nakamichi CR-5A ->Tascam DR-680 24/48
Processing: i7Windows7 Audacity > cdwav editor > TLH flac level 8 
The tour story is in the setlist file.

Taped by Kyle Holbrook & Chris Kidwell
Transferred by Kyle Holbrook
===================================================================================================================
The tour story:
We found out it looks a lot closer of a drive than it actually took us from Portland to Seattle. We wound up meandering all over the place and then it turned out we saw something we wouldn't have had we kept to the beaten path. A reindeer farm. Somewhere south of Seattle Chris spotted a sign saying "reindeer farm, pet the reindeer". What red blooded Deadhead wouldn't be intrigued? I can say this was one of the most magical traveling finds I've ever run into; we pulled into this dirt parking area with room for at least 20 cars and the style of fencing I was used to in Texas horse or cattle ranches. Chris had been driving therefore I had been sleeping and as I opened my eyes I saw a field full of tiny reindeer approximately the size of an average goat. They came up to the fencing, there were feeders you could put a quarter in and feed them grains. They have fuzzy antlers with different amounts of fuzz and moss type growth on the antlers. They were sort of gentle but not as "human friendly" as goats or cows, when you reached to touch them they would mostly shy away or take the food and be skitterish. It was sort of cold and we had jackets on while outside and only spent about 15 minutes out of the car, was just about to get back in when an old pickup pulled up. It was the reindeer farmer who told us a bunch of cool facts about the breed of reindeer (I actually do not remember those details, you guys keep kidding me about how/why I can recall so much!). He then asked us for a donation showing us the signs educating the public and that they were a refuge of sorts for not only the reindeer (must have been 400 or so in our view) but other animals. I think we gave him $5.00. I will never forget seeing hundreds of tiny reindeer in this field on a foggy dew soaked morning in the interior of Washington State. 

We wound up in Seattle early in the day, and located the Coliseum then decided to check out some sights. We went to the area of the Space Needle and took an unguided tour of the base and gift shops. I think we paid for parking in a city garage close to the Coliseum and were on foot with Chris' camera in tow. Strangely, there was a convention at the Seattle center connected to the coliseum and outdoor model photography was the topic. Dozens of professional photographers and dressed up models were in the court yard area which one model might be having their picture taken by 8 to 10 photographers at the same time. Chris took a photo of me and his friend Jeff we were hanging with where we were in effect photobombing the models! It was a surreal setting to say the least! Someone sent us to Pike's market where we watched them throwing the fish onto the ice and  witnessed the gorgeous beauty of the Seattle setting for the first time in my life. We wound up getting tickets at the box office for this GA show and Chris decided to pull a Jedi mind-trick and slip through security without being checked or having his ticket ripped. I was able to gain entry with my deck so we had in all of our recording gear.

This show was a barn burner first set with a very standard for 1983 second set. I will NEVER forget leaving the coliseum almost screaming about how I watched Jerry go into a trance-like state about three minutes into Touch of Grey, and from there on out it seemed he was barely present. I was unaware at the time this was the bite of the Chinese White dragon which ultimately affected Jerry, Brent and so many of their friends (John Kahn comes to mind). This was the first of many of these types of revelations for me as we traveled more and more around the country following these guys; of course, they like to party as much if not more than us fans! I realize looking and listening back I Was just naive and this had been they way of the Dead since their inception, some shows are going to be better than others for dozens of reasons, but the show must always go on. The crowd was loving it and at high energy, and the rest of the band picked up some slack so you couldn't say it was a "bad" show, just not as powerful or energetic as Frost had been for instance.
 
All that said, this recording, especially the first set has long been one of my favorites and if I recall Chris' as well. We were in the impact zone as fellow taper Moke calls it; the tape said 70 feet from stage but we may have been closer to 50 feet, wherever it was, Healy and crew had that place dialed in and we had an incredibly polite West coast audience making for a sublime level of quiet during Looks Like Rain for example. The hypercardiods in XY in that location made such a smooth, realistic snapshot of our experience. The Jack Straw opener doesn't suffer from much PA tweaking and about three minutes in Healy had it cookin', Jerry then took over for an amazing Deep Ellum Blues, as a still young Deadhead, I had not heard this song much live and recall thinking, man these guys have a great songbook; at that stage I still had no idea of the Delta Blues origin of the tune. Every one of these renditions from Brown Eyed Women to the Rooster and Ramble on Rose and especially the Looks Like Rain > Deal are perfect specimens of Grateful Dead circa 1982-1985. As mentioned above Jerry struggled during the second set with several vocal flubs and some non existent solo slots but Phil and Bobby pulled it off with Brent providing some Jerry vocal support. Hell, Bob makes a major flub in verse two of Uncle John's band because he and Brent were assisting on Jerry's vocals as Jerry was barely able to remember the words. ON the other hand, Jerry sings and plays Black Peter and Baby Blue pretty well. The whole thing times in at 83 minutes and is certainly one of the shortest second sets I recall. Of course every Deadhead's mileage varies and I recall even that night Chris telling me I was being too critical that it wasn't as awful as my experience comes off. So, my fellow picky deadheads, check it out, celebrate the music and passions the band and fans brought to their traveling circus and if you get confused, listen to the music play.  

On to Eugene and the celebrated First run of shows at the Hult Center.   
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   144:39.597    2499724900 B                            0.7496  (20 files)

