The Grateful Dead :: Fillmore Auditorium, San Francisco, CA (7/3/66)

A curious — and fascinating — listening experience. In some ways, the band is almost unrecognizable. Tempos are decidedly fast paced, even on laments like “He Was A Friend Of Mine.” Some tunes are dominated occasionally by the garage-y buzz of Pigpen’s Vox Continental organ. Vocals aren’t fully figured out yet. The Dead in the summer of ’66 was one of many similar Bay Area groups, wearing disparate influences on their sleeves, figuring things out, operating in a space where the rulebook hadn’t really been written. They were also first and foremost a dance band, which partly explains the aforementioned tempos.

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