Music In My Shoes
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Music In My Shoes
E72 Wake Up to Find Out: U2, Grateful Dead, and The Law
Ever had a concert experience so powerful it stays with you for decades? Those magical nights when the music and memories fuse together to create something truly unforgettable? That's what we're exploring in this deeply nostalgic journey through legendary concert moments.
We kick things off with spontaneous concert adventures from the pre-internet era. Remember when buying tickets meant physically going to a record store and getting whatever seats they handed you? Jim recounts how an impulse decision led to witnessing U2's iconic ‘The Unforgettable Fire’ tour at Madison Square Garden in 1985, while Jimmy shares his technique for sneaking into better seats at Atlanta's Omni arena.
The narrative shifts to one of rock's most celebrated collaborations - the night jazz saxophonist Branford Marsalis joined the Grateful Dead at Nassau Coliseum in 1990. What began as one song invitation turned into an entire set of improvisation that produced some of the Dead's most transcendent music.
We then travel to spring 1995 for a poignant look at Jerry Garcia's final tour. Despite his weakened voice, these Atlanta and Tampa shows represent the last opportunity I had to see the legendary guitarist before his untimely death.
The episode isn't just concert tales - it's filled with fascinating musical connections across generations. From The Who's power chords on "I Can't Explain" to Billy Bragg borrowing Simon & Garfunkel's lyrics, we trace the lineage of influence that keeps music in constant conversation with itself.
Have you experienced a concert moment that changed everything? Share your stories with us - we'd love to hear how music has shaped your most cherished memories too!
"Music in My Shoes" where music and memories intertwine.
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Remember Something Old
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You can contact us at musicinmyshoes@gmail.com.
He's got the feeling in his toe-toe.
Speaker 2:He's got the feeling and it's out there growing. Hey everybody, this is Jim Boge and you're listening to Music In my Shoes. That was Vic Thrill kicking off episode 72. As always, I'm thrilled to be here with you. Let's learn something new or remember something old. So, jimmy, april 1st 1985. I get home from work in my 71 Buick Skylark Nice and my brother and I decide we're going to go to the mall and see if there's any tickets left to see U2 at the NASA Coliseum two nights later, april 3rd 1985. You know, tickets used to be a whole different process. Like you used to go somewhere and you'd yeah, like a record store that had a ticket master machine or something.
Speaker 2:And you were at the mercy of them. You said I wanted two tickets. You got what they gave you. They handed you something Correct and you were at the mercy of them. You said I wanted two tickets. They handed you something. You didn't know exactly where it was. Sometimes they had a little book. I don't know if they did that by you. They had like a little book and they would show you like a little plan of the seating diagram, but really you were at the mercy of the ticket. I think ours at the time was called Ticketron maybe Ticketron yeah.
Speaker 2:The Ticketron gods of where you were going to end up. So we went again. You couldn't order online. There was no online in 1985. All right, you could order from a scalper.
Speaker 1:I mean you could get online right. You could get behind the person in front of you.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:As they say in New York.
Speaker 2:They do say that, in New York they do say that. But now it is in line. Yeah, like I'm going skating, yeah, something like that. So we go up to this place and we buy tickets and I have to be honest with you, it's a Monday. I got paid on Friday, got paid every week back then and I'm out of money. I used all my money that weekend. It was a great weekend, okay, sounds like it. No idea what I did, but it was a great weekend because I had no money left.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So we buy two tickets. We're about to walk away and the girl that sells us the tickets is like hey, by the way, I have two tickets to tonight's show at Madison Square Garden. They're my personal tickets. I can't go because I'm working here. So I'm like why didn't you tell us that in the first place After you bought them? After, I'm like I have no money. I just spent all my money. All I had was however much it cost to get the one ticket for me to go to the show.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 10 bucks or something. It was more than that. Fifteen maybe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was going to say it was probably fifteen, I don't remember exactly and she shows us and it's like hey, these tickets are better, we can see better, we're closer, we're lower than we're going to be at the Coliseum. You know my brother's kind of like yeah, we just spent our money. But it really was, I spent my money. My brother didn't spend all his money. I don't even think my brother worked. Yet my brother buys the tickets for us. And now we're on our way. We're going to go to Madison Square Garden, we're on Long Island, but we told my mother we were running up, we'd be back in a few minutes, we'd be ready for dinner. We get home, we run in. We're like we got to eat as quick as we can. We got to get the train so we can go to New York City. We got to get to Madison Square Garden. She's like you told me you're going to the Coliseum two nights from now.
Speaker 2:We got tickets for that also but we just got tickets for the garden. We're going there. We drive down to the Hicksville train station, we get on the LIRR, we're going to Penn Station, which Penn Station is right underneath Madison Square Garden, so you can go right upstairs, right up to your show and see whatever it is. And it was the Unforgettable Fire Tour, just like what I talked about seeing back in december when I went to see them at radio city yeah, radio city, and you know again some of the songs they played 11 o'clock, tiktok.
Speaker 2:I will follow seconds. Two hearts beat as one new year's day, october. You plus the songs that were from the Unforgettable Fire, gloria, 40. They ended with 40. What a great song that is. And again, we talked about this when we talked about the December show. I mean, those are just some classic songs. That's like a really good show. You wish you could go to that show today and, you know, listen to it and watch it and just enjoy it, because that was a really good time for them. So the song Bad, which I wasn't thrilled with on the album I've talked about that before it absolutely sounded great because I guess from playing it, playing it, playing it, it just was freaking awesome. It really was. So three and a half months later, U2 plays Live Aid, july of 1985. Yeah, their performance of Bad.
Speaker 2:The TV camera pans the crowd and a person holds up a shirt or a towel and it says Madison Square Garden, april 1st 1985. And I was like, I was at that show and every time, like all my friends, we all recorded it on VHS. Every time that was on, no matter where I was, I'd always stop it and rewind it so I could tell everybody I was at that show, not Live Aid, I was at the Madison Square Garden show that this person had some. It was crazy this shirt, towel, thing, I don't know what it is so much that I was so excited to share it with everybody 40 years later about how excited I was about it. Yeah, but I know you saw U2 in 85.
Speaker 1:I did. Yeah, that was at the Omni in Atlanta and we had similarly bought tickets at Turtles Records here in Atlanta and you get what you get and they were nosebleed seats and my buddy, andy Jordan, and I decided, well, what, what happens? Cause there was called like aisle 101. I think that you would go down and that's how you got to the floor. You couldn't get there from everywhere, you could only get there from the end, like you're looking at the stage from far away, you know, like under the basketball hoop type area. And we were like what happens if we just go and we show him, start to show him our tickets from the nosebleeds and then we just run?
Speaker 2:That was not your game plan.
Speaker 1:That was our game plan, and so we both did it. We were like, well, we can't both like do it one after each other. We needed to do it at the same time. So whichever one of us went first started to show the ticket. We both just took off, and so the guy's choice was either he has to chase after us and then everybody's going to run the gate, or he has to just kind of throw his hands up and say, oh, they got through. And I don't know if he had a walkie talkie or whatever, but we darted down an aisle. We were in like the 13th row and ended up. You know, these poor people in the in the middle, let us in, let us crowd into their aisle. That we didn't pay for, and it was an incredible show, unforgettable.
Speaker 2:Oh, you meddling kids Unforgettable.
Speaker 1:No pun intended.
Speaker 2:There you go. So question you're a pretty tall person. Were you this tall at that point in time?
Speaker 1:85, I was probably pretty close.
Speaker 2:I was probably 6'2", 6'3". It's not easy for you to hide in a crowd.
Speaker 1:No, exactly, the guy probably could have found me if he really wanted to. But he also didn't want to admit to his boss that some guys ran past him, so maybe he just forget it.
Speaker 2:I believe that. I definitely believe that that's a good story, but it was a great tour, wasn't it Did? You ever see them after that.
Speaker 1:I did. I saw Joshua Tree and then I saw a lot of the show, like every time they've come in this century. I've seen them in Atlanta but I kind of missed a lot of the 90s. The Zoot TV tour I didn't go to. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Awesome. I saw Zoot TV. I saw it at the georgia dome. It was the first show at the georgia dome and they didn't have the sound all going the right way. But I saw him a couple weeks later, legion field in birmingham and it was fantastic. There I actually had uh field tickets and it was a blast there had a great time at that show.
Speaker 2:So, talking about the Nassau Coliseum, here on March 29th 1990, the Grateful Dead play the Nassau Coliseum and Bramford Marsalis sits in with them and it's probably, in my opinion, probably one of the best collaborations the Grateful Dead ever did on stage and they were around for 30 years. They had, you know, over 100 different people sit in with them and and Branford. When you listen to it, it is just amazing. It adds such a different dynamic to the band.
Speaker 1:And he's a trumpet player, right.
Speaker 2:Saxophone.
Speaker 1:Oh okay, Saxophone player Wynton plays trumpet, maybe he might yeah.
Speaker 2:I'm not sure who plays, except I know what Branford does because he was with the Grateful.
Speaker 1:Dead.
Speaker 2:But bassist Phil Lesh invited Branantford to accompany them on one song and he comes out. He plays on this song called Bird Song and it's fantastic. And they only played one more song after that and then they had a break. They do a little intermission. They have two sets to their shows and he's kind of like hey man, that was fantastic, I had a break.
Speaker 2:you know they they do like a little intermission. They have two sets to their shows and he's kind of like, hey, man, that was fantastic, had a great time. Like no, you can't go anywhere. That that was great, you got to come out and play the whole second set. It's like I don't even know the songs you know. But that's the one thing with the grateful dead. You know they go off into these jams and they go into these different things.
Speaker 2:I think for a jazz person it's much easier to be able to do that free form and that flow and kind of get into it. Because now you had Jerry Garcia on guitar doing lead and then Brantford would play and then back to Jerry. Like it was an exciting thing for all of them and you know it's a legendary show. 35 years later it's really cool to listen to it Again. The dynamic of Brantford with them, it's just cool.
Speaker 2:Like songs you never would think, hey, we need to have a saxophone on this. You would never in a million years think it. But it's like now I can't imagine it not being on there. You know Really good and you can listen to it. It's on an album. It's called Wake Up to Find Out. So if anybody out there wants to listen to it, check it out. You know, jazz meets rock, rock meets jazz and again, freeform music, I think, at its best Like it's just because he never even heard the songs, he's just going along with it. So if you get a chance, please give it a listen. Let us know what you thought. Staying with the Grateful Dead. I saw the Grateful Dead at the Omni, where Jimmy saw you too. I saw the Grateful Dead at the Omni March 26th, march 27th and March 30th 1995. The Omni being here in Atlanta, and I went to three of the four shows, and five years after the awesomeness of Spring 90 that I just talked about, it was a little bit different.
Speaker 1:Spring 90. Okay, that about it was a little bit different. Spring 90. Okay, that was the Grateful Dead show. That was with Branford Marsalis.
Speaker 2:The whole Spring 90 was a great time for them. But five years later Jerry's voice got kind of weaker, his guitar playing wasn't as good. He was probably extremely unhealthy at that point, but it was still the Grateful Dead, it was still Jerry Garcia. I mean, I've been listening to these three shows the last couple of days and it's still like I wish I could go. Even with a weak voice, even with that, you know, not able to do everything he could do on the guitar at one point, not able to do everything he could do on the guitar at one point, it's still enough for me. I mean, it is just so good. So the first show Ramble on Rose, me and my uncle Big River. You know I could go on with all the songs, but some great songs.
Speaker 2:Second night, I took a guy to his first Grateful Dead show and the highlight of the night is an 18 minute version of Sugary and I really thought that Jerry gave it everything that he had. It sounded so good and at one point the song is kind of ending and it's like all of a sudden it's like nah, I'm not ready to finish, and then he just goes like back into the song and the band was kind of like ready to you know, segue into something else and boom, they're back, you know, and it is really good, especially with it being 1995, to hear a song that that, that's that good, loved it, loved it. Uh, they did soads playing in the band, uncle John's band, days Between Sugar, magnolia. Now, bob Weir sounded fantastic. He still had his voice Sounded great on the 95 tour. I didn't go to night three but I made it to the final night in Atlanta, night four, and Jerry's voice definitely seemed to be a bit weak after multiple shows. They played Touch of Gray, good Morning, schoolgirl, friend of the Devil, loose Lucy. Phil Lesh was on vocals for Broken Arrow, you know Alabama Getaway, and then they opened up the second set by tuning into the Beer Barrel, polka, and then went to China, cat Sunflower and, I Know you Rider, I mean just a ton of great songs over the three nights that I was there.
Speaker 2:So there's actually a story, jimmy, about night two and the story is as I told you, I took a guy for the first time and the part of town he lived in, he's like hey, can we take the train from the Buckhead station? And I'm like yeah, yeah, that's fine, I didn't really want to do it. I didn't live anywhere near there, but this was going to be his first time. I just wanted it to be a cool night. So you know, we meet over at Buckhead, take the train and after the show. So I went to three nights.
Speaker 2:Let me let me just uh preface all this with I couldn't afford to to go and to buy food at the arena every night and and buy a Coke or an adult beverage. I had a child that was not a newborn but a toddler. I really had to watch my money and it was already enough buying tickets to three shows, never mind trying to eat and drink and be merry at all these things. So this night I don't buy anything at the show because I'm like I can't, I can't do it. Show ends. We take the train back to Buckhead, like I mentioned, I get in my car and I'm driving in the road that's in front of the governor's mansion. Here they have a roadblock and most people would say you didn't drink, you didn't do anything. What are you worried about? My tag was expired. Oh, no, okay, so my tag was expired and I'm like big deal.
Speaker 2:And it is a big deal, okay, and they always say where did you come from? They always ask you where you're coming from and I wanted to say, oh man, I came from the Grateful Dead show and I'm like this is not going to go. Well, no, all right. So I'm like thinking what am I going to do? You know, hey, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, and it looks like it's every third car. They're stopping and they're letting the other two go. And I look and I'm like I'm the third car I'm getting stopped, my tag is expired. Okay, I don't know what possessed the guy in front of me, but he decides to make a U-turn and you can't just make a U-turn. The road is pretty small. He like turns, backs up, turns and then goes, and then the police have their lights on. The police are literally right there. And that was my break, because I just went, you just went, I just went.
Speaker 2:That was like me at the U2 concert it was like you at the U2 concert and I just went and I was like, oh my Lord. I was like, yeah, my tag is expired and I just came from the Grateful Dead show at the Omni and I didn't even drink. I mean I couldn't afford it. I swear, you know. Yeah, it just wasn't going to end up well until the idiot in front of me made it end up well for me by doing that. Just absolutely crazy.
Speaker 1:You know, it's like they say every zebra in the pack doesn't have to be faster than the lion, they just have to be faster than the zebra next to them.
Speaker 2:That is correct. Yeah, I like that, jimmy. So to end up on the Grateful Dead, april 7th 1995, I went down to Tampa and the final show that I ever saw, the Grateful Dead with Jerry Garcia. So it's 30 years ago last night of the spring tour and Black Crows open up for them, and it was at the old Tampa Stadium, which Chris Berman from ESPN would call the big sombrero. Do you know what I'm talking about? If you looked at the stadium it looked like a sombrero hat that he would call it the big sombrero.
Speaker 2:And seeing the Grateful Dead, you know I had only seen them indoors, I had never seen them outdoors and it was the first time seeing them outdoors and I just felt so far away from them and I just felt kind of detached from the whole thing. Well, I'm glad I went. It's definitely not one of my favorite shows. The Black Crowes opening up was cool, you know. That was definitely, you know, fun. The experience was fun. You know, I had a buddy in Orlando. He let us stay at his place and you know, you never know when you're going to go to a show and it's the last time that you see a band. So I actually bought the Tampa Tribune that day just to kind of read. I like to do that when I go to a different city and it has on the front it was a Friday. It has on the front page of like the weekend section, it has the Grateful Dead Steely. You know the steely face, everybody knows the Grateful Dead Steely face.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's what that's called. Yes, okay.
Speaker 2:That I'm wearing on my shirt right now.
Speaker 1:Why do they call it a steely face?
Speaker 2:Yes, it's the steely face. It's a skull. Yeah, it's the steely face.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 2:So it has the lines on it that say their heads have more than a touch of gray After 30 years. The Grateful Dead come to Tampa Stadium tonight and I have that framed and it's in my basement and I think it's one of the coolest pieces of memorabilia that I have, because it's not something that everybody has. You had to buy the paper and you had to say, yeah, I want to hang this up, but it's also the last show I went to. It's got a cool little tagline. So you know, it's just a reminder of that last time getting to see and hear Jerry, and I'm glad that I had those moments 30 years ago, since they played with them. Let's revisit some great music from the past and to get a start, at April 3rd 1965, the who I Can't Explain peaks at number 93 on the Billboard Hot 100. It's the first who single to use the band name, because I think they were called the High Numbers, if I'm not mistaken, before that, oh yeah.
Speaker 2:So they had released a single. It didn't do that well, and you remember some of the lines dizzy in the head and I'm feeling blue, the things you've said. Well, maybe they're true. Power chords, get the song started. I'm a chord, you know. I don't know if junkie is the word, but I I love power chords I just really do, and they're kind of staccato.
Speaker 1:You know it's a tight little chords he's hitting.
Speaker 2:It's just very impactful yeah, and it reminds me of the kinks yeah you know all day and all the night.
Speaker 2:I think it's very similar. It's a a song that when Pete Townsend he was 18. He was close to 19 when he actually wrote the song. But it's just really, really cool and I think those type of chords they were very popular in the 60s. I think it was easy for bands to be able to build something off of that. Yeah, so got a feeling inside Can't explain. Hey, I can't explain. But you know, what I can explain Is that on April 5th 1975, tangled Up in Blue by Bob Dylan peaks at number 31 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. Now it's a song covered by many bands over the years. The Grateful Dead played it so many times. Jerry Garcia would do it solo, but my favorite version is from the bootleg series Volume 5, live 1975, the Rolling Thunder Review. That's an album name. Right there, jimmy, that's a whole album name.
Speaker 1:That's the whole album name. That's the whole album name.
Speaker 2:All right, yes, but it's a live performance from Boston Music Hall on November 21st 1975. Just Bob, a guitar, a harmonica and his voice, and it is just so good. I mean really, really good. Let's move up 10 years now, to spring 1985. I'm driving my 71 Buick Skylark. I'm driving to work and I have a tape that I made, a cassette tape. You know, for people that don't have cassettes or don't know about cassettes, he had a tape, what do you mean? He had scotch tape. So you know, just trying to make sure that I'm explaining everything, but it was a cassette tape that I made off the radio of WLIR 92.7. And Joan Jett and the Black Arts Cherry Bomb the dance mix, the extended version, followed by Kirstie McCall, a New England, the extended version.
Speaker 1:Now let's back up for a second. I thought that Cherry Bomb was the Runaways.
Speaker 2:So Cherry Bomb was the Runaways which Joan Jett was in. Right, she did not sing the vocals on Cherry Bomb, ah, and it was from 1976. They supposedly wrote that song because the song that they were going to audition with they weren't really good at it. So they really wrote this song quick because I think Joan kind of had some of the guitar and maybe Lita Ford had some of the guitar ready and boom, they were able to bust this out and use this song as an audition. How cool. So Joan Jett released it, re-released it or released it, like I said, a cover of the Runaways in 1985. And you know, it's really cool the extended version and then, when it goes right into this, a new england, which is also a cover of billy bragg's 1983 song, which I absolutely love that.
Speaker 2:I love that it is a great, great song and that song came out. I was 17 when billy bragg came out with that. I mean just fantastic, like you, can you know, be like wow. This song makes an impact on me. But last episode we spoke about Rush's nod to Simon and Garfunkel's the Sound of Silence. Well, billy Bragg gave his own nod to Simon and Garfunkel with the opening lines exactly the same as Simon and Garfunkel's leaves that are green. I was 21 years when I wrote this song. I'm 22 now, but I won't be for long. I think that's just so cool that we have back-to-back episodes of two different bands giving nods to Simon and Garfunkel for songs that are on the same album from the same year. I just think that's cool. And again, I was 17 when Billy Braggs came out and I'm like, oh man, 21. That's four years from now.
Speaker 1:That's so old man yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, I'm 28. No, I'm not 28 now. I wish I was 28 now. I'm 58 now and it's like it seems so long ago. It almost seems comical about thinking oh, four years till 21,. Five years till 22. Wow, years were longer back then. Yeah, I think so. I definitely think so. But you know what, speaking of longer, according to my watch, it's Minute with Jimmy, it's time for Minute with Jimmy. Minute with Jimmy, minute with Jimmy.
Speaker 1:It's time for Minute with Jimmy. Minute with Jimmy, minute with Jimmy. All right, I had thought about saying something different in this Minute with Jimmy, but then you brought up a story that made me think about this.
Speaker 1:In 1985, april 1985, when I went to the Omni to see you two on the unforgettable fire tour, I went to the train station in atlanta. I went to the brookhaven train station, which is barely anything to it. There's an escalator going up, an escalator going down and a platform to catch the train. So I came in there. I had my dad's old raincoat on, which is like a trench coat, and I had a beer in each pocket. I was planning on maybe drinking on the train or something. I don't know what my plan was. But this dude came in right behind me and he tapped me on the shoulder and flashed a badge and he said come here. And he took me behind one of those big gray columns that they have and you know buildings like that and he's like what's in your pockets? And I said, uh, beers. And he's like you need to pour those beers out you didn't even try and hide it and then he says uh, how much money do you have on you?
Speaker 1:what I had 20, because I was gonna buy a t-shirt. I'm like 20. He's like that's gonna cost you that 20. So I gave him the 20 and I went back to my friends and they were like where were you? And I said well, I almost got arrested, there was a cop. And I explained it to friends and they were like where were you? And I said well, I almost got arrested, there was a cop. And I explained it to them and they were like that wasn't a cop, you just got mugged.
Speaker 2:I'm not sure why I'm laughing. I should not be laughing that you got mugged. Oh my God, it was a pretty clever trick.
Speaker 1:I mean, the guy just saw a mark. He was like, yeah, that kid, I can get whatever he's got out of him.
Speaker 2:Were you able to tell the beer was in your pockets, I guess?
Speaker 1:so I mean it was probably swaying, you know. Oh, mm-hmm. Wow, yeah, I mean it was. But yeah, as soon as the guy got my money he went down that escalator and he was out of there. He wasn't patrolling the station or anything, he was, yeah. So that's what happened. That's A Minute with Jimmy.
Speaker 2:A Minute with Jimmy, and that's the long arm of the law working in strange and mysterious ways. Well, listen, if you want to contact us about that issue that Jimmy had that night, you can at musicinmyshoes at gmailcom. Please like and follow the Music in my Shoes Facebook and Instagram pages. Feel free to share the podcast with your friends on social media. For those of you who already have, I say it all the time, it is appreciated. That's it for Episode 72 of Music in my Shoes. I'd like to thank Jimmy Guthrie, show producer and owner of Arcade 160 Studios located here in Atlanta, Georgia, and Vic Thrill for the podcast music. This is Jim Bosch, and I hope you learned something new or remembered something old. We'll meet again on our next episode. Until then, live life and keep the music playing. Thank you.
