by
Elizabeth Lundholm-Sury, '96, J.D. '99
On November 14, 2003, at the Convocation Center, Bob Weir and Ratdog personified a real campus truism: Some things change, some stay the same, and some just keep getting better.
Rich Gordon has a long brown ponytail flowing down his back, a scruffy
beard and serene smile. On
November 14, 2003, he was at the NIU Convocation Center in DeKalb for
the Ratdog concert. Ratdog is the band fronted by former Grateful Dead
rhythm guitarist Bob Weir. Asked whether he was at the show the last time
Weir was in town, in 1977, Gordon turned to his companion, also ponytailed,
also bearded and wearing the same smile. He asked, “Was I there?”
The man standing beside Gordon was his father, John, and his answer
was yes. Rich was seven years
old on October 29, 1977. The young family sat up in the bleachers at the
Chick Evans Field House and watched and listened from above as the crowd
swayed, spun and rocked to the sounds of Jerry
Garcia,Weir, Phil Lesh, Donna and Keith Godchaux, Bill Kreutzman and Micky
Hart, collectively one of the biggest acts ever to play at NIU. The father
and his now 33-year-old son sat in the less-crowded upper seats for Ratdog,
too, and watched and listened from above. Some things never change. The
Gordons were among a number of fans who were at both concerts.
The crowd assembled at the Convocation Center for Ratdog was smaller
than the one for the Dead in
1977, but the music pumping through the Convo that night was decidedly
Grateful. The dancing and swaying and spinning, the waves of tie-dye,
and the friendly atmosphere were timeless. The crowd may have been a little
bit older this year, but, according to Weir, “The front row always
looks pretty much the same as it always does, since the younger crowd
has the energy to be up there.” Ratdog is the latest and most eclectic
of Weir’s projects outside of the Grateful Dead. The band draws
crowds
all over the country and plays a combination of Grateful Dead songs, cover
tunes and original
pieces. Ratdog is a mixed bag of younger with more seasoned musicians.
The members’ background
experience ranges from playing with jazz quartets and blues combos to,
well, the Grateful Dead.Weir is the undisputed leader of Ratdog, a position
he never really assumed as a member of the Grateful Dead, since Garcia
was in the driver’s seat. “I guess at some point,” he
said, “I’m going to have to consider myself a lead guitarist.”
After the show,Weir said that he and his band are accustomed to playing
at places like the Convocation Center. He said that it was easy to listen
to the notes as they danced and bounced in the facility and play accordingly.
Jim Dombek, ’77, who was at the Ratdog show with his wife, pauses and sighs when he thinks about setting up a concert at the new Convocation Center. “What a dream,” he said, “I mean, they’ve got the power they need, the structure they need, the show goes up and down so easily.” Dombek, a lifelong Dead Head, never would have imagined in 1977 that he’d be back at NIU watching Weir play in 2003.
In 1977, Dombek, now a banker in Sycamore, was a member of the NIU Student Association Concert Committee. Dombek said the committee tried to get acts that were “on the cusp,” but always had its ear to the ground for bigger acts that would wow the student population. The concert committee in Dombek’s era brought acts varying from Dave Mason and Peter Frampton (who played the entire Frampton Comes Alive album months before its release) to Muddy Waters, Rick Derringer and the Tubes.When a local promoter heard that the Grateful Dead were interested in starting to tour again, the committee wanted a piece of the action. After taking a hiatus of over a year and a half, it seemed that the Dead was interested in making several college stops to promote a new album, Terrapin Station. Dombek said the local promoter made some calls to the Dead’s New York booking agent and, much to the delight and surprise of the committee, the Dead agreed to come to DeKalb the following month. “We had to come together really fast,” Dombek said, “and somehow, we got it together.”
The Grateful Dead traveled with a huge amount of equipment, a huge group of people, and a huge list of demands. The field house would be big enough, but would need to be outfitted with special trusses and brackets for the light show equipment. The men’s locker room, of all places, would be turned into a traveling kitchen, essential for the Dead, who employed a full-time caterer.
Dombek and the concert committee projected that the Grateful Dead show would cost approximately $42,000, more than any concert ever put on at NIU. The committee was confident that the school would stand to make some money on the concert since it was likely to sell out. Dombek was quoted in the Northern Star on Monday, October 24, 1977, explaining that tickets for the concert, scheduled for Saturday of the same week, would go on sale for $8 and $9 at an undisclosed location on Thursday, October 27. An announcement indicating where the tickets would be sold would be made on Wednesday night. “What we intend to do at this point is to inform everybody at the same time where the locations for the ticket sales will be so we don’t get lines for three, four or five days. Technically, we don’t want even one-day lines, but if people want to make that effort, it’s okay.” Not surprisingly, people did make that effort. When WDEK disc jockeys announced at 9:05 p.m. on Wednesday that tickets would go on sale the following day at Huskie Stadium, the line started forming immediately. However, there were still a few kinks left to be worked out. Nary a ticket could be sold until the Board of Regents approved the signing of the contract.
At the start of the Regents meeting on Thursday, October 27, 1977, NIU Student Regent Rick Resnik asked the board to rearrange its agenda so that the matter of the Grateful Dead concert contract could be heard first. Surely the board was unaware that the crowd was growing over at the stadium. Resnik assured the board that NIU would profit, and explained that the concert committee stood to make about $1,000. The board approved the contract, a call was made to the stadium, and tickets went on sale. The circus was coming to town.
Dombek and his fellow members on the concert committee began setting up the field house about three days before the show. Large reinforced aluminum trusses were erected toward the ceiling, the locker rooms and hallways were cleaned and re-arranged, and a canvas tarp was placed over the basketball court. A stage was put up and the committee awaited the arrival of the band, its four equipment trucks and the inevitable fun and mischief that accompanies a Grateful Dead concert.
When the Dead rolled into down, Dombek said, they were all business.
Masters of the road, the crew had the unloading process down to an art.
The speakers, amplifiers and wiring that together made up the Dead’s
famous “Wall of Sound” were unloaded and arranged in what
seemed like record time. According to Dombek, a welding specialist needed
to be called in, for a pretty penny, to repair one of the ceiling trusses
that gave out early on the Saturday of the show. There were surprisingly
few other problems in set-up, however. The more difficult task was ensuring
the Dead’s grocery list, which in 1977 was loaded with organic produce,
hormone-free meats and fine wine,
was filled. It proved to be quite a scavenger hunt, and Dombek said it
took two committee members to do the shopping.
Lilia
Chacon, ’79, now a familiar face on Fox news in Chicago, was a reporter
for the Northern Star in 1977. She covered many concerts, plays and art
exhibits and remembers her assignment covering the Dead show well. She
interviewed the Dead’s caterer, Cy Kocis, on Saturday before the
show.What struck Chacon backstage was the Dead’s “refined
taste and attention to fine things, good food and good wine.” Chacon
and Dombek both remember that the band members had requested
organic items, and Chacon’s story said that Kocis explained that
the Grateful Dead family was “into clean food.” Dombek said
one of the things the committee members struggled to find for the band
was bottled water. “They were really ahead of their time,”
Chacon said. Before the show, Kocis served a dinner of ratatouille and
shrimp Vera Cruz, accompanied by a selection of fine Bordeaux and Burgundy
wines. Chacon said it seemed as though the band had learned to take the
snags and variables out of being on the road. She said that she had expected
the Dead’s backstage to be a wild party, but it had turned out to
be “a really calm and controlled place, really comfortable.”
Fully nourished, the Dead took the stage that night and played for over three hours to a near-capacity crowd of approximately 5,000. The audience was made up of students and community members alike, and the early-season snowstorm outside was not a hindrance, but a fun oddity. Phil Gelato came into town from Western Illinois University, where he was a student, to go to the show with friends from NIU. He said his group walked to the show, throwing snowballs and generally having a great time on the way over. The concert is one he’ll never forget, partly because “Jerry [Garcia] was super animated, right from the start.” and partly because “It was a packed house and we were in the gym?!” Gelato never thought he’d be back in DeKalb to see a concert like Ratdog’s 26 years later.
Weir continues to play with the surviving members of the Grateful Dead,
but the band’s current incarnation is known simply as “the
Dead.” After Garcia’s death in 1995, the band members refrained
from playing together for several years. Having played together in twos
and threes from time to time in
their native California through the late 1990s, all of the former members
of the Grateful Dead played together again for the first time on August
3, 2002, at Alpine Valley in Wisconsin. Weir described the event. “It
was pretty much fun, I can tell you that. The energy at that event was
something, and the crowd was every bit as responsible as we were for that.
It was impossible not to have fun at that show.” Weir said that
both Ratdog and the Dead will continue to grace the Midwest with shows,
as “it’s always pretty cozy for us around these parts.”
Gelato said that he sees a difference between the 1977 Grateful Dead show and the 2003 Ratdog concert. He said, “We were a lot more rowdy in the ’70s, we were really whooping it up that night.” Some in the Ratdog crowd, like 17-year-old J.P. Pacelli from Hinsdale, who came into DeKalb with friends for the show, might take issue with Gelato’s comparison. He and his buddies were whooping it up pretty well themselves, particularly during Weir’s electrifying version of “Sugar Magnolia,” a song that was played in 1977 as well. Between the two concerts, the Convocation Center was clearly the better venue, with better seating, better concessions, and most importantly to the fans in attendance, better sound.
It seems that on November 14, 2003, at the Convocation Center,Weir and Ratdog personified a real campus truism: Some things change, some stay the same, and some just keep getting better.
