Fans of the Dead come alive in Las Vegas

Midway through their residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas during a record-breaking heat wave, Dead &Company played its jam band specials over the Fourth of July weekend for an eclectic crowd. The band’s audience — some die-hard fans, others just curious — came from all over the country (and the world) to pledge their own form of allegiance.

“You see people who are Sphere tourists who just want to get inside and see what it’s all about. They don’t necessarily have experience listening to the Dead’s music,” said Ashley, 35, a DJ and event host from Las Vegas. “It’s totally acceptable because Deadheads are the coolest, most down-to-earth crowds.” (Still, like some other fans, she declined to provide her full name.)

Ashley had come to hang out at Shakedown Street — the traveling bazaar where vendors sell rose quartz jewelry, crowns of roses, Grateful Dead-themed tarot decks and a virtual sea of tie-dyed shirts.

One of the vendors was Alex Mazer, 40, of Taos, New Mexico, who also goes by Buttercup. His brand, New Springfield Boogie, makes T-shirts, stickers and internet memes that combine counterculture references and “The Simpsons” (one image combined Bertha, the Grateful Dead’s flower crown-wearing skeleton, with Homer Simpson). Alex said that both characters were icons of American culture, “and they work together in a lot of ways.”

He estimated he had already seen 13 Dead &Company shows at the Sphere. “It is an orgy of sensation,” he said.

Shakedown often takes place in parking lots, but the Sphere edition was held in the Tuscany Suites &Casino, where the chimes of slot machines could be heard as the scent of tobacco wafted through the room from the casino.

“It’s different having Shakedown in a casino, but it’s OK. There aren’t all the nitrous dealers and somewhat dangerous people — the tough guys aren’t in here,” said Harry Perry, 74, a musician from Venice Beach, California. He follows the band around in his van, where he lives, and claims to have been to almost all of the shows by the Grateful Dead and its many iterations. Perry was selling T-shirts of himself to afford tickets, which start around $185.

Tom Egan, 54, has been seeing the band since 1990, when he first saw them in Pittsburgh. He brought his 9-year-old son from Orlando, Florida, where they live, to see his first show. Egan considered it the perfect way to celebrate Independence Day. “It’s about the freedom of the spirit,” he said.

Alexander, 41, a philosophy professor who had come from Vienna to see three shows, said he tried “not to think of it in national or political terms.”

“But by European standards we are very much into the Dead,” he said.

Downstairs from the bazaar, Jessica Rosen, 41, was operating a donation-based Shakedown Shuttle that was taking fans to the concert in a sprinter van. “Save your legs for dancing,” she yelled.

The casinos, Rosen said, knew of her: “A couple weeks ago, Harrah’s called and said, ‘We have a guy here who doesn’t know who he is or where he’s going, but he needs the shuttle.’”

Some concertgoers, dressed in everything from prairie dresses to cargo shorts, treated the walk to the Sphere as if it were a parade. They made their way to the venue from the Venetian, eager to experience the Sphere’s vibrating seats and see its curved LCD walls depict teddy bears, terrapins, jungles, rainbows and space.

Still others were “looking for a miracle” — that is, a spare ticket.

Nikko Cedrick, who was standing outside the Sphere wearing a silk scarf tied like a kerchief and a muted brown outfit, was holding up a single finger, indicating he needed one ticket. He had turned 18 just five days before, he said, and was celebrating his fifth anniversary of living in Nevada, where he had moved from the Philippines.

“My grandma was a singer and into the Dead,” he said. “A show changed my life. People are the energy and everyone is one.”

But before he could elaborate on that thought, Cedrick’s hope for a miracle became a reality: Someone handed him a ticket. He ran off into the Sphere without another word.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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