By Lorraine Meier

Celebrating 60 years of the Grateful Dead’s music, the City of San Francisco rolled out the red carpet for the Dead & Company last month. The festivities featured San Francisco Municipal Railway (Muni) buses wrapped in Grateful Dead-inspired psychedelic colors, a special rose planted in Golden Gate Park’s Rose Garden – and the most anticipated of the festivities – three concerts at the Polo Field featuring Dead & Company during the first weekend of August.

Tickets sold out almost immediately after going on sale. Single-day tickets sold for $245 and the weekend pass cost $635. There was a VIP ticket level at $1,725 and a “Golden Road Super VIP” ticket for $6,346 that was described as a “top tier experience.”

Sooner than they sold out, ticket prices surged on resale sites like Stubhub, with some tickets offered for $10,000.

Ticketmaster had face value tickets in the weeks leading up to the shows and single-day tickets were available at the box office on show days.

“A limited number of tickets are held for the artist when the show goes on sale,” said Ruth Carlton, the senior vice president of concert operations at Another Planet Entertainment. “Any unneeded tickets are often released to the public, typically in the days or weeks leading up to the event. This is standard practice in the live music industry.”

These festivities brought an estimated 180,000 Dead & Co. superfans to west side neighborhoods, along with a number of people searching for tickets.

Mint Wilson from Sausalito walked around Golden Gate Park with a finger up “looking for a miracle” – their plea was a play on the Grateful Dead song “I Need a Miracle.”

“I’m looking for a wristband for entry to the show,” Wilson said. “Six of my friends got free wristbands. Five of them for all three shows. I had to work, so I got here after my friends.”

Gates to the festival opened at 2:30 p.m. each day.

On the Richmond District side of the park, the North Gate entrance proved to be chaotic with many concert goers arriving at 6 a.m. and forming two different lines along the sidewalk on Fulton Street and other queues on trails throughout the park. At least five separate lines funneled in thousands of ticket holders, many eager to be as close to the stage as possible.

A seemingly less chaotic entry process occurred at the Sunset’s South Gate entry at 34th Avenue inside the park. People started lining up there at 7:30 a.m.

There was a First Entry lottery system available through a randomized drawing that allowed the ticketed fans, if chosen, access to be the first to get into the venue. 250 spots were selected for each day.

Cherie L. traveled from St. Louis, Mo. for the shows. “I paid face value for tickets when they went on sale and I tried for the lottery, but wasn’t chosen,” she said. So, she sat first in the VIP line at noon for the Saturday show.

Some fans managed to listen to the performance without a ticket. One of these individuals, a man identifying as “Fish” from Washington state, sat just outside of the concert grounds to listen to the music.

“I don’t have a ticket,” he said. “I drove here in my van and parked it in Bernal (Heights.) That’s where I’ll be staying. I have my bike to transport me around the City. The music never stops.”

Psychedelic Muni

Muni buses were decorated specifically to celebrate the landmark occasion with custom psychedelic designs. The decorated vehicles ran on three routes that could be taken to get to the concert: 5-Fulton, 7-Noriega and N-Judah.

Muni also offered $25 T-shirts to commemorate the occasion.

San Francisco public transportation wrap campaigns are typically paid for by advertisers, but the City financed the three Grateful Dead-inspired vehicles from Muni’s marketing budget, in part because of the economic boost the City expected from the events.

According to data from Mayor Daniel Lurie’s office, the August concerts brought more than $150 million into the City’s economy.

Shakedown Street

Not all of the events related to the concerts were held in the concert grounds. On John F. Kennedy Promenade, approximately a mile east of the Polo Fields, the City sanctioned a 200-foot stretch of the promenade from Transverse Drive to Blue Heron Lake Drive to be turned into “Shakedown Street” for the first weekend of August.

Shakedown Street has followed the Dead around for decades. It is a marketplace that typically happens organically, rather than an event that is organized and planned, with vendors selling tie-dye apparel, handmade jewelry, posters, patches and Grateful Dead merchandise. It is typically set up in a parking lot adjacent to the venue.

“The San Francisco Recreation and Park Department permitted Molly Henderson of Noel Mae Designs to organize Shakedown Street at the recent Dead and Company concert,” said Tamara Aparton, deputy director of communications and public affairs for Rec. and Park. “Vendors applied directly through Ms. Henderson, who credentialed participants under the terms of the permit. A vendor committee selected participants based on criteria that prioritized local merchants and artists offering handmade, diverse goods suited to the Grateful Dead fan community.”

Henderson did not reply to requests for an interview.

Sunshine Powers, one of the organizers of Shakedown Street, said that there “needed to be a sanctioned event. One that was regulated. We didn’t want it to burden the community.”

Roughly 100 vendors were permitted into the space, many arriving from around the nation to sell their wares on the street. Brant and Lindsey Waite traveled from Texas to be part of the festivities. Their business, Shakedown Streetwear, sells small-batch clothing.

In other venues, “You might have to pay Ticketmaster or Live Nation a $100 fee to set up because it is parking spaces you are taking up. And sometimes you didn’t have to pay anything at all,” Brant said.

The Waites said they paid $700 for their space and a refundable deposit of $150 for clean-up in case a mess was left.

“It was worth it,” Lindsey said. “There is a safety aspect of it too because they provide overnight patrol so we can keep our booth set up. They put up fencing and porta potties and other things you wouldn’t have just hanging out in a parking lot.”

“Vendor fees were set and collected by the organizer, with Rec. and Park receiving 10% of gross receipts for booth fees as required,” Aparton said.

Many vendors who joined in did not have the proper permitting to be selling their wares at the event.

“There hasn’t been a whole lot of enforcement in some of these areas,” Powers noticed.

Aparton said that the City had its own enforcement teams in the park “cracking down on illegal vending that included park rangers, Public Works inspection supervisors, Department of Public Health staff and San Francisco Police Department officers.”

“During the Dead & Company weekend, they seized 17 hot dog carts, 145 nitrous gas containers, 17 coolers and various amounts of merchandise including drinks, alcohol and food being sold,” Aparton added.

“The vendors that were unsanctioned took away business from other businesses,” Powers observed.

Some of the unauthorized vendors sold illegal substances, dozens hawking large balloons filled with nitrous oxide gas (NO2) – commonly known as laughing gas.

“Ice cold fatties. Get your ice-cold fatties. Three for 20 dollars, one for 10,” some unsanctioned vendors yelled.

NO2 when inhaled is known for its euphoric, hallucinogenic effects. The legality of nitrous oxide depends on what it is being used for and where. It has legitimate uses in medical and industrial applications, but recreational use and sale is illegal.

While illegal, there is a longstanding connection between this gas and the Grateful Dead.

As noted in Dennis McNally’s book, “A Long Strange Trip,” “the Grateful Dead was indeed very stoned on nitrous while recording Aoxomoxoa. On top of everything else, they brought nitrous oxide tanks into the studio and truly lost themselves in the mix!”

Thousands of deflated balloons littered the park after the concerts, with some still present on park trails in the following days.

On Saturday, Aug. 2, on the second day of the festival, San Francisco Police officers arrested a 32-year-old man from Philadelphia, Pa. and seized 100 metal nitrous tanks – as well as numerous balloons – while patrolling the area of 35th Avenue and Fulton Street.

Grateful Dead Rose

Outside of the more chaotic additions to the neighborhoods, The Rose by Grateful Dead is now a permanent addition to the park’s Rose Garden. Wendy Weir, Grateful Dead founding member and guitarist Bob Weir’s sister, approached JB Williams and Associates, an independent plant hybridizer that specializes in roses, with an idea to make a special rose to commemorate the band.

The Ruby Red Grateful Dead Rose is a hybrid from two different flowers that took two years to create, according to ABC News.

A red rose has been associated with the Grateful Dead going back to 1966 and the skull and roses album art on the 1971 “Grateful Dead” album. “The Rose” by the Grateful Dead will be available to the public in limited quantities. For more information, go to gratefuldeadrose.com.

“Next year, Another Planet Entertainment will be required to negotiate a new agreement with the City for Outside Lands,” according to District 4 Supervisor Joel Engardio. “This new agreement will require Board of Supervisors approval. Any new agreement must ensure there are more opportunities for local merchants to participate, resident feedback is swiftly acted upon and community access to Golden Gate Park is preserved during event set-up and staging.”

Music comes back to Golden Gate Park in October with the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival. The following weekend on Oct. 11, The Midway SF will present global superstar Khalid and joining him will be Lauv in Robin Williams Meadow.