In my
book,
Cosmic Trends, I described one
of the first Grateful Dead concerts—at a
pizza parlor—when they were still known
as the Warlocks. Cosmic Trends’
Table of Contents lists a Chapter 14
short subsection titled, “Uranus-Pluto
Profile: The Warlocks.” A casual reader
could be forgiven for thinking that,
since my book is found in the New Age
section of bookstores, the Warlocks must
be about Wicca.
Cosmic
Trends is an astrology book that
connects events in history and popular
culture to the cycles of the outer planets,
and I included the Grateful Dead in my book
to help illustrate the cataclysmic cultural
changes that took place in the mid-1960’s.
Although I
wrote about the Warlocks in the third
person, I was present at their debut.
Several readers have written asking for more
information on this historic concert.
I attended
Palo Alto High School.
Pigpen (Ron McKernon)
was not exactly an alum, since he dropped
out, but Palo Alto was “home” to some of the
early Dead.
Phil Lesh (who
I recently saw in concert and wrote about in
my blog) lived a few blocks
from the high school—although he had not yet
joined the group when I saw them perform at
Magoo’s Pizza Parlor. My younger sister took
guitar lessons from Jerry Garcia at a local
music store. Dana Morgan, Jr., was an early
band member whose father owned the
Dana
Morgan music store (which closed in the 1980’s) in downtown Palo Alto.
A friend
of mine heard that a really good band was
going to be playing at Magoo’s Pizza Parlor
in nearby Menlo Park. It was May, 1965, and
I was a junior in high school. This band,
the Warlocks, had played one night already
and word was spreading that this was some
great music.
Although
memory is a bit tricky, I seem to recall
that they played two sets and that my
friends and I arrived during their first
set. I do know that they were already
playing when we arrived. A girl I knew from
my high school was there—much to my surprise
because she was not part of my own hip
little clique. She was dancing on the
sidewalk, as were a number of other people.
That was my first clue that something
amazing was going on. Dancing on the
sidewalk in Menlo Park? That was almost like
a guy not getting a haircut. Or painting a
school bus with psychedelic colors.
I was with
a group of three or four friends. The
atmosphere inside Magoo’s was strictly pizza
parlor—bright overhead lights, long tables,
ovens in the back. The band was set up by
the front plate glass window, confined to a
rather narrow area without a stage.
Jerry
Garcia was on the audience’s left, Pigpen on
the far right. Those two, especially, looked
somewhat menacing (at least to a suburban 15
year-old). They reminded me of outlaw
bikers. Bob Weir, Dana Morgan, and
Bill Kreutzmann were clean-shaven and looked more
like guys you might see in a high school
band.
The music
was stunning. I have never forgotten it,
although I cannot recall the specific set
list. I think they did some Stones covers
and I know that Pigpen sang “Little Red
Rooster.” They were not the
psychedelic Dead
or the Americana Dead. The music I heard was
raw rhythm and blues, propelled to a large
extent by Pigpen’s animal magnetism (I
suppose that’s a bit sexist, but it’s really
how he came across).
I left
feeling: Not only is this the best music I
have ever heard—it’s the best music I will
ever hear. It stirred something deep
within me, a kind of longing where a layer
of the superficial world had been peeled
back and I could see the possibility of
something beyond a life of neat cul-de-sacs,
trimmed magnolias, and hanging out at
Mitchell Park.
As I
mentioned in my book, when rumor spread that
the Warlocks had changed their name to the
Grateful Dead, we were confused. “What does
it mean? Great Full Dead? I don’t get it.”
“No, it’s Grateful Dead.” “Oh,
but…what does that mean?” We dug deep
to come up with answers. We parsed. We
looked to ancient texts.
In June,
1966, I graduated from high school and moved
to London. When I returned to the Bay Area
some 16 months later, the Dead had released
their first album,
which did not sound at all like what
I’d heard at Magoo’s.
See also:
Neil Young;
Kings of Leon;
Bob Dylan;
Arcade Fire;
Fiona Apple;
Coldplay;
