Some Longtime Deadheads Are Skipping San Francisco's Grateful Dead 60th Anniversary Shows Over Cost

San Francisco is preparing for a Grateful Dead celebration on a grand scale, but not every devoted fan plans to take part. Dead & Company will mark the band's 60th anniversary with shows Aug. 1-3 in Golden Gate Park, and some of the most committed Deadheads say the price of admission has soured them on the event.

The city is getting into the spirit. Muni buses are wrapped in Summer of Love-style designs, City Hall will be lit in tie-dye colors, and dozens of parties and tribute acts are planned around town. Officials expect as many as 60,000 fans in the park each day, with thousands more gathering nearby. Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, named for the band's original concert promoter, will serve as a pop-up merchandise store.

Three-day general admission costs $635. VIP options start at $1,800 and top out at $6,300 for the "Golden Road" pass, which includes unlimited dining, faster entry and a private viewing deck. Only two of the Grateful Dead's six original members are in the lineup.

The writer of the original piece said their own father, a lifelong fan who once received cassettes of Dead shows in the mail from fans he met online, turned down an invitation to fly in. He called the event a "money grab" that "totally goes against what the Grateful Dead was all about." Tickets had sold out by the time the writer reached the front of the online queue.

Others echoed that view. John Zirinsky, 41, of Mammoth Lakes said high prices and Ticketmaster's dominance have changed who attends Dead & Company shows and "killed the vibe." He will instead attend The Heart of Town at Pier 48, a smaller festival hosted by Grahame Lesh, son of founding bassist Phil Lesh, who died last fall. Aaron Suttschenko, 47, of Cincinnati, who runs a popular Instagram account devoted to Dead concert moments, called the event "a straight-up mockery of the original magic."

Gavin Kelty, 63, who saw the original band dozens of times in the 1980s and '90s, remembered a mail-order lottery system in which fans decorated their return envelopes. Tickets cost $25 or $30 then, he said. Fans also pointed to free Golden Gate Park shows in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Before Jerry Garcia died in 1995, the band never charged more than $35 a ticket, about $63 in today's dollars, not counting scalper prices.

Brenna, 29, a Michigan fan who gave only a first name, called the anniversary a "hype gimmick." She noted that Dead & Company billed their 2023 outing as a "final tour" and then booked a residency at the Las Vegas Sphere less than a year later. She said she had followed Dead spinoff bands in the 2010s and relied on "Miracle" tickets, which fans give each other just before a show.

Some fans are going despite their reservations. Michelle Rajotte, 58, said the anniversary should have been accessible, and that fans had speculated it might be free. She is attending because of her family's ties to the band, saying she has "spent my retirement fund following around this band." Eric, a San Francisco resident who has followed the Dead for 25 years, is using a payment plan from Ticketmaster or Klarna and said he wishes the money were going to charity.

Representatives of Golden Gate Park Concerts, part of Another Planet Entertainment, did not respond to questions about ticket prices or production costs. Mayor Daniel Lurie's office has highlighted the economic upside, noting high hotel demand from July 31 to Aug. 3 and an estimated $31 million generated for the city by Dead & Company's 2023 Oracle Park concerts.