Do you know anyone who has seen one Grateful Dead show?

My brother and his wife, 10/26/89 Miami and it was a barn burner, 

Not for us, but you sure seemed to have a good time.

Yeah had a college friend who came out for Dylan and the Dead at Foxboro. I doubt he ever went again. I also count that as my worst show.

At least a 1/2 dozen.

But one of those has seen at least four Q shows.  And plays a good dozen or more GD songs w/me during our Satiddy Night Massacrees of Popular Music.

Of the others, none got on the bus but one did have a real good time.  

"When I closed my eyes, I could see what they were playing.  Garcia was in yellow."

I dated a woman who saw one - I took her. I doubt she ever saw another one.

I brought my youngest brother to a show at the New Haven Coliseum in the spring of 1984 (04/24/84), and he said he enjoyed it, but not enough to see them again.

https://archive.org/details/gd1984-04-24.sbd.walker-scotton.miller.32620...

I took my ex wife to Highgate 94. It was one and done for her.

My girlfriend lived in Denver area all thru the 80s and early 90s and even went to tons of Red Rocks.

Nary a GD show ever.

Since we met she's been to Phil eight times that I can think of.

So no, I don't know anyone.

Multiple college friends. 

A good friend saw only one GD show (Buffalo) but that was before I knew her.  For her credit, she used to do Burning Man quite a bit back when it was more of a low key event for artists as opposed to celebrities.

Two people.

when I first moved to CA in 1994, a guy that I worked with told me just after Garcia died that he has seen him one time a long time ago. I asked him where? He said the only thing he remembers was that it was a pizza place in Menlo Park and that the floor was covered in popcorn.

Another guy I worked with told me one time growing up in San Lorenzo he went to day on the green. His only show ever.

my dad went to one GD show in i believe 78 in chicago. a deadhead friend of his convinced him to go. he is a big fan of some really really great classic rock acts like yes, the doors, steely dan, camel, etc etc, but he is also pretty into more accessible songwriting based music and some pop, and doesnt really have any experience with drugs or interest in consciousness, so im guessing the jam induced trance state just kinda flew over his head.

id guess it could have been different if he went to the right show with the right songs that spoke to him, and later on he might have become more interested in the jams and experienced some of the magic, but it wasnt to be. im sure we have all had the experience of trying to get a friend into the dead, finally getting them to a show, and then the show you choose ends up not being a great show or the song/jam selection just doesnt speak to them.

tbh thats kinda how my first show went, i wasnt really impressed with the music or interested in it much beyond drums/space being a trippy spectacle, but my love of psychedelics made me go back a few times for the party scene, and as luck would have it, i had a downright religious experience at my third show and the rest is history. if you dont get a great show that speaks to you as your first time, and dont really have another reason to go to more shows, i can really really easily see people just going to one show and having the entire experience fly right over their head. for me it took that peak experience at my third show, and after that night it was like i learned a new language, and could hear the music in a totally different way, but that would not have happened without friends pushing me to go and the drug/party/lot scene incentivizing me to return.

Yes.

my buddy craiggers went to 73 santa barbara and that was it.

I know several who went to see the Dead and Dylan at Autzen Stadium in Eugene...    they weren't dead fans before, and they continued to not be fans after, lol
(but they did get their one show in!) 

Yep. A neighbor 'kid' while growing up and now developed good friend whom is a few years older than I am and saw the band over 6 years before I first did in the same place - The Rosemont Horizon (IL): "They just kept going on and on and on and on..." He's now a longtime San Francisco resident and welcomes me to crash there whenever I'm up that way, even/especially for shows. LOL. Licorice and/or Strawberries ain't for everyone!

.

>>>if you dont get a great show that speaks to you as your first time, and dont really have another reason to go to more shows.

I had a boss who as a teenager discovered American Beauty and Workingman's Dead. He didn't bother to research beyond that, but knew he really liked those albums. He heard about them coming to Landover in the 80's and convinced his parents to let him go alone by having them listen to the albums. It was just good wholesome Americana no reason to be worried about your teenage son going. He has a pretty funny story about showing up alone as a teenager with no idea about anything that he was about to witness. He didn't really have a good time. It was just so beyond what his expectations were. 

Oh yeah, my parents went to 9/18/87, to see what it was all about. They left at setbreak and missed the epic Set II.

^My Mom went with a friend under similar circumstances but she/they had enough fun to go back for more! (6.19.88 Alpine and 6.22.91 Soldier Field).

Rev Shabazz and I both only caught 1 show with Jerry.  Would have seen more had he not died a month and a half later.

Some friends insisted on bringing a grip of multi-genertional family members to see one of JGB's '91 Fall Tour shows.

"....a pit of sin!!" LOL

>>>Rev Shabazz and I both only caught 1 show with Jerry<<<

Then you two only saw one Grateful Dead show.

And at that point, barely one.

But still, one.

And I know many folks who only saw one, again mostly in the later years when the band was much more popular and considered more "acceptable".

The most common comment from those people is generally in the area of, "I figured I'd go see what it was all about. I was on the lawn at Shoreline. I liked the energy & fun of the crowd, and the flea market in the parking lot was interesting and kind of fun, but the music? I don't know."

A shame those folks (and Timmy & Shabazz) never saw the Grateful Dead when they were really the Grateful Dead.

But we get what we get, and there was great music before the Grateful Dead, and there's been & continues to be great music after.

But there was only one Grateful Dead.

LONG LIVE THE GRATEFUL DEAD!

Wife's brother. He likes music and pot, but he's not someone who likes to go out, and he's not fond of confusion and chaos. Probably 'on the spectrum". He was divorced - don't know what year it was - so my wife set him up with a female Deadhead she knew and got him some tix for a Boston area show..

He never went back. Said he liked the music but not the date or the hub-bub.

I took my parents to their one and only Dead show, MSG, Fall '82, second night.  My mom's purse was stolen on the way in.  My dad was impressed when a firecracker went off and the boys kept playing without losing a beat.  They liked the Good Lovin' but overall I don't think they were impressed.  For a historical perspective, the first night was a barn burner.  Second night was a bit subdued.

Pease.

My first roomate in Humboldt was an old hippie tree planter named H.D. Venable,  who grew up in the shade of the Big A in Anaheim.  He saw one of the Day On The Green shows with The Who.  Said he Iiked the music, but that he didn't like large crowds, so he never went back.

One of my former neighbors.

"Oh, the Grateful Dead, I saw them once".

Cool, where?

"Egypt."

If that didn't get you on the bus, probably nothing would...

With Kesey, Walton, and the Pranksters there, the crowd chatter may have annoyed him.

>>>>>And at that point, barely one.
 

Samba In The Rain *sigh*

I know an entire busload that were one and done. A friend had/has a cool old 50s bus and we decided it would be fitting to round up as many gamers/uninitiated friends as we could. It was just 100 miles to Seattle. Show was 6/12/80. We even picked up people right off the street en route who had no clue of the event etc. If we saw likely suspects on the street we'd pull over and offer a free ticket and dose. Maybe 5 people had seen the GD previously. 

I took my mom to 1 show in Salt Lake City 95. She had never seen them live and wanted to go. 

I took a crew of guys I used to install swimming pools with to a show at Blossom Music Center. We got all boomered up and we all had a riot. I remember one guy, Billy D while walking out of the venue next to me, he kept repeating to me "Joe Kidd, we're in the valley of the Grateful Dead" as if were were in a mythical fairy land, which it kinda was. I left for Florida a little while  after that and I know one of the guys went back to see some shows not sure if the rest made it back.

Yes, my (future) sister-in-law  went to one show with us in 1990. She left early and vowed never again.

Was at my sister's wedding reception and the energy was crackling with one of her single friends at my reception table. She said that she would def join me at a GD show.

It took 4-5 months for the boys to come around. Expectations were high on my end for a hot first date.

But..... she did not want to party or dig the lot scene. She did not dance and sat through most of the first set.

2nd set .... I was fed up and just totally blew her off as I bopped to the tunes next to her sitting self.  Got a peck on the cheek before she ran from the car.

Do not expect that she caught a 2nd show....

1 1/2 shows, not one. I took my cousin to 10/27/80. He seemed to like the show. The next spring I took him to 5/6/81. He went to call his girlfriend during the set break, (from a pay phone, remember them?) he came back and told me he had to leave. 
 

He broke up with that girlfriend that summer. It took far to long to extricate himself. No more Dead concerts after the 1/2 Nassau show.