2000
  Grateful Dead Hour, KPFA 94.1 FM, Berkeley CA, 7/5/95, 8pm PDT
  
  David Gans: Yup, there was a riot in Noblesville, Indiana the other
  night, and it was sufficiently bad that the Grateful Dead were required
  to cancel the next night's show. And things have been getting weirder
  and weirder and it looks like they've reached pretty dang weird. I
  think I've got Cameron Sears on the line -- are you there, Cameron?
  . . .
  
  Cameron is the Grateful Dead's [tour] manager; he's there in St. Louis
  where the band played a show this evening. What can you tell us about
  what happened, Cameron?
  
  Cameron Sears: Well, I think the situation in Deer Creek is, um,
  something that we've seen manifesting in our crowd for quite some time
  -- there's been a -- it's been kind of an unpleasant tendency at that
  -- that being an insistence on breaking in to the show, gatecrashing,
  rock and bottle throwing at police and security, and a willingness on
  the part of a *few* people -- but a substantial few -- to make things
  at our show rather uncomfortable.
  
  DG: It seems like over the years there's been a increasing number of
  people who come along to shop in the parking lot and hang out out there
  with no real intention of going inside.
  
  CS: Well, that's true, and I think that was really the crux of what
  happened this past weekend -- there was an incredible number of people
  out there. By contrast, here in St. Louis tonight, where I'm still
  backstage at the show, and the band's performing, there's virtually
  *nobody* in the parking lot.
  
  DG: How'd *that* happen?
  
  CS: [Laughs] We're not quite sure, to be perfectly honest. But it was a
  welcome respite from what we've been through recently. And the
  regrettable thing, from the band's point of view, is that repeatedly,
  we make efforts to perform shows in places that you, the fans, like --
  such as Deer Creek, which I believe has been voted the most, you know,
  the favorite place of the Deadheads to go see the band play -- and now,
  we don't *have* that place to play anymore. And I can't honestly blame
  the people in Indiana for not wanting us to come back. Now, there's
  been no official ban, and there's been no official statement [on]
  anyone's part as to whether or not we would go back there. But the
  bottom line is that we don't feel comfortable putting police and
  security, and ultimately, members of our audience at risk. It's not
  right, and it's not acceptable, and it's not something that we consider
  to be in the spirit of the Grateful Dead.
  
  DG: That "spirit of the Grateful Dead" thing -- you know, this kind of
  behavior just doesn't fit with anything that I've ever understood about
  being a Grateful Dead fan and goin' to shows. I've been going to shows
  for 23 years, you know, and it's just never entered my mind that I was
  entitled to a free ticket, or that I would go and -- I just don't
  understand it, and I'm not asking you to psychoanalyze the audience,
  I'm just wondering where you think where we might go from here, in
  terms of trying to preserve the band's ability to play, our ability to
  enjoy the show, and somehow shed this insane entourage that keeps
  coming along without contributing productively.
  
  CS: Well, I think really the band has exhausted almost all of its
  attempts at trying to make a safe environment for people to come hear
  them perform, and that ultimately the responsibility is going to be
  borne by you, the audience. And we realize that there's a lot of great
  people that make up our audience, and we also realize that there's a
  very vocal minority that make it very difficult for us to have shows
  take place -- the situation at Deer Creek, probably the *most*
  appalling thing that we had to witness was the fact that there were
  people *inside* the facility cheering people on to break in to the
  concert, as well as *helping* them tear down the fence.
  
  DG: Wow. That just blows my little mind, I must say.
  
  CS: As the band is trying to do it's thing onstage -- you can imagine
  how they would feel, looking up the hill and seeing that take place.
  
  DG: I *can* imagine -- did it ever cross their minds to stop playing at
  that point?
  
  CS: I don't honestly know the answer to that. You know, I think they
  were so perplexed by what they were seeing that it just blew their
  minds.
  
  DG: You know, I'm perplexed by it too, Cameron. One time, I got out of
  my car in a parking lot at Shoreline and before I could even stand up,
  somebody was in my face offering me drugs, and I just flipped out. I
  screamed at this guy, I said, "you *moron,* if I was a cop you'd be on
  the ground in handcuffs right now."
  
  CS: Right.
  
  DG: "What are you *thinking?!* And then this last time at Shoreline,
  same thing -- the parking lots are filled with people. . . nitrous
  balloons, I mean, the whole, it's. . . it doesn't make any sense to me,
  and I'm wondering how we the audience can contribute to somehow
  reducing the insanity of this trip.
  
  CS: Well, I think ultimately, you know, there is a supply and demand
  marketplace that takes place in our parking lot, you know, and those of
  you who participate in it are, in fact, encouraging it. And with regard
  to the beer selling and the nitrous balloons and all that sort of
  stuff, if people weren't *buying* it, they would have to go away
  eventually. And you know, we try and create an atmosphere where people
  can have a good time -- we're not about trying to make it a police
  state or anything like that, but when the control of our shows gets
  *usurped* from us, as it has recently, on this summer tour and
  increasingly over the last year, we have no choice but to either fight
  back with stronger rules, which isn't our style, or -- stop playing. . .
  
  DG: Oy.
  
  CS: . . . which is another option that we've considered, you know. We
  are not beyond doing that, and as much as it pains me to say that, it's
  really an option that's available to us.
  
  DG: Is there a viable way for the band to take a couple of seasons off,
  and maybe lose some of the momentum of this "following" thing?
  
  CS: Well, we're considering that, you know, we don't know that that
  *is* viable yet. We hope that it doesn't come to that. . .
  
  DG: Yeah, same here.
  
  CS: . . . because that's what *is* the Grateful Dead, that live
  performance that we've all come to love, but. . .
  
  DG: Yeah. Let me bring Gary Lambert in here. He's the editor of the
  Grateful Dead Almanac; you know him, Cameron; most of the listeners
  know him as co-hosting our Grateful Dead marathons here.
  
  Gary Lambert: Hi, Cameron.
  
  CS: Hi, Gary.
  
  GL: Well, one little silver lining in this -- I just wanted to mention
  it. I spent a lot of the last couple of days on the Well, and on the
  Internet -- various Grateful Dead newsgroups -- and there is such
  unanimity in the revulsion about this event, and a lot of the really
  good-hearted people in the Deadhead community asking, "What can we do
  to help? How can we exert pressure on these people, how can we -- in as
  peaceful as way as possible -- make them feel unwelcome?" And of
  course, one way is not to patronize the whole circus in the parking
  lot. And I hope, if anything, this can be kind of a mobilizing point
  for the Deadheads who really care, who are there for the love of the
  music, to maybe recapture the scene.
  
  CS: Right. Well, we hope that, too. I mean, we're certainly not
  espousing any sort of vigilantism, or anything of the sort, but we are
  placing a fair amount of the responsibility on the audience, because
  after all, uh, I walk through the parking lot every night, and I hear
  people say things like, "Well, forget what the *band* thinks, we're
  going to do what we want."
  
  GL: Yeah, and you know, a lot of people don't understand -- I think
  people have this idea that a Grateful Dead show just drops out of the
  sky like Dorothy'
19d6
s house into Oz, and they don't know the incredible
  amount of hard work that the crew, the promoters -- I know you were out
  there often a year before an event, staking out the territory, talking
  to the local authorities, making them understand the Grateful Dead are
  not the Devil -- and so much hard work goes down the drain, especially
  when a show has to be canceled, which is something that the band would
  almost do *anything* rather than.
  
  CS: Well, the irony of this particular show is that -- and this is
  something that I really think is important -- we decided to do a Rex
  benefit in Indiana, because of the way we've been treated there,
  because of our fan base there, we know that we have a lot of people in
  Indiana that have supported us over the years, and we decided that, you
  know, we could put some of our "good energy" back into that community.
  And the reality is, now that that show was canceled, the proceeds from
  the Rex benefit will probably be cut in half.
  
  DG: Oh, that's such a shame.
  
  CS: And that really is a bummer.
  
  DG: So when you do a Rex Foundation show in a town, you leave some of
  the money *there,* is that true?
  
  CS: We leave a *substantial* amount of it there -- that's part of, you
  know, why we decided to take Rex shows and do them across the country. . .
  
  DG: That's a wonderful thing.
  
  CS: . . . because we have a fan base that is supporting us all across
  the country and we'd like to put a little bit back into all those
  communities.
  
  DG: Cameron, one thing that keeps coming up in the conversations I've
  been participating in on the 'net is the idea of restricting parking
  lot access to people with tickets. Is that a viable possibility at all?
  
  CS: We've played with that on and off for the last five or six years,
  and ultimately what happens is that there's a buildup of traffic on the
  surface streets that may back up onto the freeways and so on, that the
  police then say, "You gotta get these people off the streets, you gotta
  get 'em in the parking lot." And, you know, I think that's -- they
  intended to do that here in St. Louis and it was very effective. In
  some places it *is* effective and in some places it's just not
  workable. It's definitely something we're going to look at with
  increasing, uh, hope for. But, um, the other thing that I wanted to
  mention is that when we go to places like Vermont, or Portland Meadows,
  or some of these other places that are a little bit more unique, a
  little bit more, you know, low key -- they're not big stadiums, they're
  more *comfortable,* localized, beautiful surroundings, Buckeye et
  cetera -- we do that for the *fans* -- and for ourselves. But in
  Vermont we had another massive amount of people break into the show and
  we probably can't go back *there* now.
  
  DG: Wow.
  
  GL: And again, people on the inside -- I was right at the fence as it
  was coming down and I saw people on the inside who were there with
  their tickets, they were in the safe zone, they were encouraging people
  to come in. . .
  
  CS: That's right.
  
  GL: . . . and saying things like, "Oh, the Dead have enough money."
  
  CS: The other thing that bears mentioning is that I don't see these
  people showing any regard for their "fellow Deadheads." I have seen
  people *trapped* under the fence, as the crowd has run over it, and
  seen people sustain serious injuries. I've seen police officers get hit
  on the head with bottles. . .
  
  DG: Jeeez.
  
  CS: . . . I've seen a *lot *of things that I would associate with
  violent behavior, and we go to great lengths to try to protect the
  reputation not only of the Grateful Dead, but of our *fans,* and that
  has become increasingly difficult to do, as people are demonstrating
  that who *we* think they are, they aren't.
  
  DG: Well, I'm afraid that is not specific or unique to the Grateful
  Dead culture -- I'm afraid America is becoming an increasingly
  unfriendly place, and. . .
  
  CS: Right.
  
  DG: . . . what we're seeing *here* in our scene is unfortunately
  characteristic of what's happening in America, and some of it's
  inevitable.
  
  CS: Right, well I think we've always felt that our scene has been a
  microcosm of the world at large and, yes, you know, we deal with those
  problems that society deals with, and on the bright side, if we could
  help solve some of those problems in our own little neck of the woods,
  perhaps we could export that technology to the rest of the world.
  
  DG: [Laughs] Now that is the most optimistic statement I've heard all
  day, man.
  
  CS: I know -- every silver lining, you know.
  
  DG: That's great. Well, maybe when the tour is over, we can get
  together again and talk about this. I'm going to take some calls here
  from the audience and see what people have to say, and when you get
  back from the tour maybe you can come in and we can talk about this
  some more.
  
  CS: I'd be happy to do it.
  
  DG: Would you please give some fond regards and supportive thoughts to
  the band for us?
  
  CS: I certainly will, and in conclusion I just want to say one thing.
  We put a flyer out today that is circulating, will be circulating
  amongst the crowd this evening and for the remainder of the tour, and
  maybe into the future tours, but we were also heartened to see that
  some Deadheads had taken it upon themselves to write a similar
  document, and that has also been circulating, and I know that stuff on
  the 'net has been fairly positive. I encourage people to take that
  energy and channel it into some sort of productive change in all of
  this, because it really relies on your active participation.
  
  DG: Yeah, John Dwork, the publisher of *Dupree's Diamond News,* was
  asking on the Well yesterday about that. He circulates his flyer, you
  know, with the set lists and stuff, and he's *more* than willing to put
  some information out, so, uh, there is a substantial part of the
  Deadhead community that wants to work very closely with the band and
  make this stuff happen to preserve the scene for everybody. It's not
  just *your business,*, it's *our fun.*
  
  CS: Right on.
  
  DG: And thanks for callin' in, Cameron. . .
  
  CS: Thank you, David.
  
  GL: Safe travel home!
  
  DG: . . . and we'll talk to you soon.
  
  CS: Have a good rest of your show.
  
  DG: Hey, thanks. Take care.
  
  CS: Okay, bye.
.

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