Jerry Garcia Gets Pissed Off! War Story #10 The Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) Capital Center Show, 1991, Landover Maryland, Stop That Train I'm Leaving. The Cap Center Concert Like No Other. Jerry Gets Mad!

--By Patrick Tyrrell

What's up -- War Story #10, Jerry Garcia Gets Pissed Off.

Hey Luke, what's up man?

I've met with the psychiatrist Luke, and he says I have no mental illness, just attention deficit disorder only.

Right now I am in jail since March 5th because a gangster judge, named Judge Cullen -- "He's the gang leader judge" -- he told me on March 5th that if I appealed his wrongful verdict, I would have to go back to jail, for appealing it.

Well, if I didn't appeal the three charges I already won on appeal so far, I would have three convictions already, but I won those three on appeal because I didn't do them. Nobody did those. . . except in the lying neighbor man's conniving warped little mind. This one is another one of those rigged verdicts like the other three, which no jury could ever possibly convict on.

Of course, Judge Cullen--"He's the gang leader judge" didn't have to put me in jail for appealing his decision, and it is actually illegal for him to do so the way he did it, so we'll see how my lawyers handle it, and how it plays out, but I don't really care Luke, because It's not important.

War Story #10 Three McLean, Virginia Dudes at a Jerry Garcia Band Concert in Landover, Maryland. Jerry Garcia Gets Angry with Us.

"I have seen where the wolf has slept by the silver stream.

I can see by the mark he left, you were in his dream" -- Robert Hunter, lyricist for Th Grateful Dead, in the song, "Cassidy"

I had finally seen The Grateful Dead play.

My first concert of theirs I got inside of was at RFK stadium, in Washington D.C., in June of 1991.

I had followed that June,1991 Grateful Dead concert with an epic road trip up and down the East Coast with a friend of mine named Jeff and his sister's friends.

We partied at a farm house in Connecticut, surrounded by tall grass, where a band with long, straight, very clean, brown hair, who were wearing cowboy-hat-shaped designer hats sat around playing old John Lennon songs on acoustic guitars as The Sun came up.

We also stayed with Jeff's sister's friends in Stone Harbor, New Jersey.

The East Coast road trip culminated in a second Grateful Dead concert at Giant Stadium, at The Meadowlands, in East Rutherford, New Jersey, which occurred later that same month, June,1991.

At the 1991 Giant Stadium Grateful Dead show, I scaled the exterior wall of Giant Stadium, free climbing it, and getting over it, then jumping down, to get in, while escaping the New Jersey Mounted State Police they may be called who were riding up right behind me on horseback.

The officers were on their horses coming after me; before I jumped that wall and another fence; and before I broke out onto the football field where the NFL Team The New York Giants used to play; before I found myself dancing around on the 50 yard line as The Grateful Dead were jamming in the middle of playing the song "Cassidy".

"I have seen where the wolf has slept by the silver stream.

 I can see by the mark he left, you were in his dream" -- Robert Hunter, Th Grateful Dead, "Cassidy".

I remember the night turned green.

Yes, gate crashers do suck, Luke, but I am not a gate crasher. I'm a fence jumper and a wall scaler -- like Spider Man.

That scorching hot summer of 1991 was the beginning of a long strange trip I have been on with the Grateful Dead.

It likely ain't over yet. The trip took a hiatus for the entire 21st century until I went on tour with Dead and Company on their Final Tour, a couple years ago, in the Summer 2023.

You can read about The Noblesville, Indiana Summer 2023 Dead and Company show at WAR STORIES #5, #6, AND #7 = HIGH SPEED CAR CHASE IN GEORGETOWN & WEST VIRGINIA, & BACK AMONGST THE INDIANA CORNFIELDS OF MY BIRTH, BY DEER CREEK LAKE WITH DEAD & COMPANY IN 2023, THE FINAL TOUR. It's War Story #7 there.

But this War Story here is about what happened back in the autumn of the year 1991 after the simmering summer of 1991 had expired. The weather had long-since cooled down, and Jerry Garcia's other band, Jerry Garcia Band (JGB), came to town in November.

It was November, 1991, and two of my friends -- Jeff and Nick -- and I had tickets to see the Jerry Garcia Band (JGB) play at the Capital Center, in Landover Maryland, which is the stadium where The Washington Capitals hockey team and The Washington Bullets NBA Basketball Team used to play their sports.

Jeff drove us there in his 1990 black Nissan Pathfinder SUV. Traffic got bad near the stadium with lots of police checkpoints further holding up traffic trying to weed out intoxicated drivers.

We eventually parked the car and drank a lot of alcohol in the parking lot of the stadium, listened to music, and talked with people, many of whom were selling home-designed tee-shirts or other items in the JGB parking lot there, or playing bongo drums, and then we went inside.

Jeff was stumbling around a little bit. He was wearing snakeskin cowboy boots, a faded purple tie-dyed shirt, and a black leather jacket with little metal studs on it. He was my friend who had traveled with me in the summer on the East Coast road trip. He was thin, and his brown hair was cut so it was fuller on top and took on the shape of a tulip bulb over his eyes, like one of The Ramones.

Nick was the other dude who was with us, shorter and younger, he had long black hair and this was his first JGB or Grateful Dead band show that he had ever attended; although he would later catch every Grateful Dead show of the 1994 summer tour, touring across America the year he graduated from high school.

We found our seats which were to the right of the stage if you were facing the stage, and the three of us sat down in our seats. Jerry Garcia hadn't come out yet.

Jeff had his knees drawn up towards his stomach, hunched over in his seat and was groaning and clutching his stomach, but me and Nick felt alright, it must of been all the drinking in the parking lot outside that got to Jeff and not us.

Jeff was seated to my left, I was seated in the middle, and Nick was sitting on my right.

"Oh gawdd!!! Oh gawddd!!" Jeff kept groaning. He was really not feeling well at all.

Suddenly, I watched as if in slow motion -- Jeff's mouth opened and the most perfectly formed 'chunks' in a syrup of pink and orange vomit gushed forth like a disgusting geyser from Jeff's mouth. A Thick projectile laden stream of soupy barf hit the people seated in front of Jeff -- right on the top of their heads and to the back of one of their heads.

The man who had sustained most of the regurgitated food smacking him at high velocity in his hair and cranium looked up and back at the three of us totally appalled. Jeff's vomit was coating his hair, and dripping down onto his shoulders and over his eyes. I could make out croutons from a salad Jeff had eaten earlier in the day. The salad croutons were covering one of the man's ears surrounded by what appeared to be 1,000 Island Salad Dressing. Pieces of lettuce were plastered to the side of the man's face and stuck messily in his sideburns.

The man tried to comprehend what had just happened to him, but he couldn't, so he just stammered only half-confidently, "Are you guys serious? You guys can not really be serious. Is this really happening?"

I shifted into damage control mode.

Jeff felt better after throwing up, but he thought I should be the one doing the talking.

"Hey man that's unfortunate," I said to the man, "I feel for you, but, hey, you know what? It's one of those things that was possible that could happen, and now it has."

"You were aware of the risks coming in here," I said to him, "This is the Jerry Garcia Band concert man. People get wasted in here. I am a little surprised you seem to not have known about the risks that this could happen to you if you came to this concert. When you go to a rock concert, please don't get surprised, people drink and party at rock concerts. Some people throw up."

That is what I told the man who was drenched in my friend Jeff's vomit.

"I am soooooooo mad right now," said the man who had two of his friends with him who were standing alongside him looking mad too.

"How do you expect him to clean this off?" one of the others asked me.

"Well, I guess, go into the restroom and use the sink and the paper towels, that's what I would do," I advised them.

"Again," I continued, "I am sorry your friend didn't know this could happen to him. This is the Jerry Garcia Band concert. Jerry Garcia Band fans get even more wasted and more intoxicated than Grateful Dead fans do at shows. I guess the concert ticket should probably have a better warning on it for people like you who didn't hear or do not know, I do sympathize."'

!------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------!

!------------------------------Jerry Garcia Band Ticket---------------------------! ! Capital Center, November, 6 1991 ! ! Landover, Maryland. ! ! ------!-!------------------------------------- ! ! $35.00. ! ! The bearer of this ticket bears all risks ! ! and responsibilities to withstand acts ! ! of God, or other concertgoers, or any ! ! one else, these "Things That Might ! ! Happen" include, but are not limited to! ! bodily secretions, foul odors, bloody ! ! accidents, insulting behavior, loud. ! ! noises, and obnoxious behavior. ! ! Please refrain from complaining or ! ! otherwise making things like this an ! ! Issue. Thanks.-------------------! !------------------------The Capital Center Management.-------------------!

! ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------!

!-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------!

That was my argument, Luke, acting in my friend Jeff's defense. How did I do? Well pay attention to the rest of the story to find out. Apparently my strategy was less than a winner. :(

The three irate concertgoers got up and marched off, the three of them showing us large amounts of clenched teeth outrage as they stared us down while leaving.

"OK, I think we're cool now," I told Jeff and Nick.

The three individuals did not come back.

Eventually little tinkering sounds of musical instruments began to occur coming from the vicinity of the stage.

An overweight Jerry Garcia soon appeared on stage wearing an XL-XL purple tie-dye tee-shirt, similar to the one Jeff had on, and the concert began.

Sort of;

The Jerry Garcia Band sounded like they were going to play "Stop That Train, I'm Leaving" by Peter Tosh, but Jerry Garcia would play a few notes and stop, play a few more notes and stop. And then, Jerry would stand there awkwardly as if to say, "Well, what did you think?"

This went on for some time, and it has never happened at any other show ever.

By this time, many people were looking back at the three of us like we did something wrong, and the stage spotlight moved from over the stage to shine right on us more than one time.

Jeff was hunched over in his seat, he was sick again.

Jerry continued to play a few notes, stop and stare, play a few notes, and stop and stare.

Eventually, I stood up and shouted during one of Jerry's awkward pauses because I couldn't tolerate the tension that hung in the Capital Center air like a knife. I was loud enough so the the whole Cap Center could hear me, and I yelled;

"Hey! Jerry's fucking with the audience!!? Jerry, man! Stop fucking with the audience!," I screamed,

I yelled it several times to try to get Jerry's attention to stop messing around.

"What?" Said Jerry, pretending to cup his ear, "say what?" he asked and chuckled softly in a giggly sort of a way into his microphone.

"Pat, I think we should leave," said Nick.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, let's go," said Jeff who looked like he might throw up again.

"OK," I said, but I was disappointed.

We got up and left as quickly as we could.

We didn't know where the exits were, so Nick and I ran, with Jeff stumbling along next to us in his clumsy, grey snakeskin cowboy boots. We ended up bolting through the emergency exits which set off the fire alarms.

We all three ran through the parking lot to Jeff's truck, and when we got there some Maryland police were right behind us on foot. I was in the back seat, Jeff was in the driver's sear, and Nick was in shotgun.

The police repeatedly opened and slammed Jeff's car door of Jeff's truck into Jeff's shin, over and over again, while yelling at us. I don't know why Jeff didn't move his leg out of the way of the door, but he didn't. They were berating and yelling at the three off us, and at one point they asked to see our IDs.

When we showed them our IDs, and they ran them through their computer, one of the IDs, I don't know which one, told the Maryland police to let us go. They immediately stopped violently injuring Jeff's leg in the door, stopped screaming profanities at us, and one of them very matter-of-factly stated to us in an extremely calm voice;

"OK, you guys can go."

The leg smashing incident seemed to have sobered Jeff up enough to drive us home to McLean, Virginia, and we all went back to our houses with the tale of this messed up incident to tell.

I never did see The Jerry Garcia Band play, and I don't think Nick or Jeff ever got to see them either.

This has been War Story #10 written and presented to you by Patrick Tyrrell and rocknrollconcerts.com.

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