Tent

The items listed below are not tents as such, but they can be used for camping:. Volume 15 and later are released in the HDCD format. These larger tents are seldom used for sleeping in, except in emergencies. About three new volumes were being released each year. This made these styles relatively unsuitable for casual or occasional campers. Started in 1993, as of January 14, 2006 there are thirty-six volumes in the series, each covering a part or all of one or more concerts. These guys had to be positioned and tensioned fairly precisely in order to pitch the tent correctly, so some training and experience were needed. The above list does not include the Dick's Picks series of concert recordings taken from the band's archives, selected by archivist Dick Latvala and, after his death, David Lemieux.

All the tents listed here used a substantial number of guy ropes (8 to 18).
. Sizes are given in feet, since this is the size such tents were sold as (well before many English-speaking countries considered metrification). As of now, any future plans are unknown, and are largely contingent on Weir and Lesh making up. Most of these are single-skin designs, with optional fly sheets for the ridge tents. Their inability to reconcile these differences kept Deadheads from seeing a tour to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Grateful Dead, and also made the annual celebration honoring Jerry Garcia seem a little flat, as his own bandmates couldn't put aside their differences to take the stage together in his honor. You may still find ridge tents sold as 'Scout patrol tents'. The band did not tour in 2005, due to a fight between Bob Weir and Phil Lesh over how they believe certain things happened in the history of the band.

Most of these tent styles are no longer generally available. Haynes is best known for his work with Gov't Mule and the Allman Brothers Band. For ease of assembly, the sections for each pole are often connected by an internal cord running the entire length of the pole. Blues." The band accepted Warren Haynes as their new lead guitarist. For ease of transportation, these poles are made in sections some 30 cm to 60 cm long (1 to 2 ft), with one end of each section having a socket into which the next section can fit. The members would continue to tour on and off through the end of their 2004 Summer Tour, the "Wave That Flag" tour, named after a lyric from the song, "U.S. Flexible poles used for tents in this section are typically betweeen 3 and 6 metres long (10 and 20 feet) and are normally made of tubes of fibreglass with an external diameter less than 1 cm (1/3 inch). On February 14, 2003, (as they said) "reflecting the reality that [was]," they renamed themselves The Dead, reflecting the abbreviated form of the band name that fans had long used and keeping "Grateful" retired out of respect for Garcia.

These tents are usually so heavy (25 to 80 Kg) that it takes a rather strong wind to blow them away; at these weights you need to be able to get the car fairly close to where you want to pitch the tent. The mid-2002 fall tour of The Other Ones, with Bob, Bill, Phil and Mickey, was so successful and satisfying that the band decided the name was no longer appropriate. Many tents which use rigid steel poles are free-standing and do not require guy ropes, though they may require pegs around the bottom edge of the fabric. The remaining members occasionally got together under the pseudonym Crusader Rabbit Stealth Band during the late 1990s, infrequently playing unannounced shows. Especially compared with older tent styles, current tents have several important characteristics, which make tent pitching/striking much easier than it was 50 years ago:. Though some of them occasionally toured through the late 1990s under the name "The Other Ones", they mainly chose to pursue various solo projects, most notably Bob Weir's Ratdog, Phil Lesh and Friends and Mickey Hart's music for the 1996 Olympics. Only a few of the many possibilities are listed here - have a look at camping/tent websites to see what variety is on offer. Following Garcia's death in 1995, the remaining members formally decided to disband.

With modern materials, tent manufacturers have great freedom to vary types and styles and shapes of tents. These records largely featured the band's laid-back acoustic musicianship and more traditional song structures. Instead they may act as a store or provide shelter from sun, rain, or dew. The 1969 live album Live/Dead did capture more of their essence, but commercial success did not come until Workingman's Dead and American Beauty, both released in 1970. Shelters are not normally used for sleeping in. The early records reflected the Dead's live repertoire — lengthy instrumental jams with guitar solos by Garcia, best exemplified by "Dark Star" — but, lacking the energy of the shows, did not sell well. These factors interact with each other, so some compromise is almost inevitable:. Most connoisseurs believe that the Grateful Dead's true spirit was rarely well captured in studio performance.

There are many factors to take into account when selecting a tent. Often (both in performance and on recording) the Dead left room for exploratory, spacey soundscapes—a form of psychedelia that might run the gamut from strange to exotically beautiful. If a tent has had to be packed wet due to inclement weather, it is important to dry it out thoroughly as soon as possible, otherwise mildew may form. Individual tunes within their repertoire could be identified under one of these stylistic labels, but overall their music drew on all of these genres and more, frequently melding several of them. After a trip, hang the tent up over a washing line or similar, gently sponge off any mud on the underside of the groundsheet, and leave the tent to air for a few hours. The Dead were not inclined to fit their music to an established category such as pop rock, blues, folk rock, or country/western. The simplest way to prolong the life of a tent is to ensure that it is always clean and dry before packing it away between camping trips. This was natural, because they played psychedelic dances, open-air park events, and closed-street Haight-Ashbury block parties.

There are two reasons for this recommendation:. The Grateful Dead’s early music (in the mid 1960s) was part of the process of establishing what "psychedelic music" was, but theirs was essentially a "street party" form of it. Most books or articles on camping recommend that newly acquired tents should first be pitched at home, well before you actually go camping. Listening to their first LP (The Grateful Dead, Warner Brothers, 1967), one is also reminded that it was recorded only a few years after the big "surfing music" craze; that California rock-music sound seeped in, to some degree, as well. Experience indicates that camping is more comfortable if the actual number of campers is 1 or even 2 less than the manufacturer's suggestion. But the new Dead music was also naturally different from bands like Dylan's or the Spoonful, partly because their fellow musician Phil Lesh came out of a schooled classical and electronic-music background, while Ron "Pigpen" McKernan was a no-nonsense deep blues lover and drummer Bill Kreutzmann had a jazz background. These numbers indicate how many people the manufacturer thinks can be crammed snugly into a tent in sleeping bags without any allowance for personal belongings, luggage, inflatable mattresses, camp beds, etc. It was natural for Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir, each of whom had been immersed in the American folk-music revival of the late 1950s and early '60s, to be open-minded toward electric guitars.

Many tent manufacturers indicate capacity by such phrases as "3 berth" or "2 person" (prior to political correctness becoming such an issue the phrase "2 man" would commonly be used). Grateful Dead members have said that it was after attending a concert by the touring New York "folk-rock" band The Lovin' Spoonful that they decided to "go electric." Gradually, many of the East-Coast American folk musicians, formerly luminaries of the coffee-house scene, were moving in the electric direction. Where quoted, groundsheets may be 5000 mm or more. Former folk-scene star Bob Dylan had recently put out a couple of records featuring electric instrumentation. For camping all year round, look for at least 2000 mm; expedition tents intended for extreme conditions are often rated at 3000 mm. The Grateful Dead formed during the era when bands like the Beatles and Rolling Stones were dominating the airwaves. Fabric with a hydrostatic head of 1000 mm or less is best regarded as shower resistant, with 1500 mm being usually suitable for summer camping. Kahle claimed that the whole affair had been a "misunderstanding," but John Perry Barlow, one of the band's lyricists, claimed that concerts had been restored after several members of the band had backed away from their earlier opposition after realizing they had created a public relations "catastrophe.".

Standing on a groundsheet increases the pressure on any water underneath. Several days after the announcement that the concerts had been removed, Brewster Kahle of Archive.Org made a cryptic announcement that audience tapes of the concerts would again become available, though so-called board tapes would only be available as streaming audio. Heavy or wind-driven rain has a higher pressure than light rain. The removal of the Dead's concerts from Archive.org created a storm of protest, in addition to a rapidly spreading boycott of the band's remaining commercial products. This indicates the pressure of water needed to penetrate a fabric. However, David Gans, host of a syndicated radio program, "The Grateful Dead Hour," speculates that the band is motivated by money, noting "when they were making $50 million a year on the road, there wasn't a lot of pressure to monetize their archives."[5]. Regardless of country, rain resistance is always quoted as a hydrostatic head in millimetres (mm). The band's spokesman, Dennis McNally, claimed such a repository "doesn't represent Grateful Dead values" because it doesn't foster one-to-one connections between fans.

The metric system is used in this article (sometimes with ft or lb in brackets). In November of 2005, the Dead's management outraged fans by asking the operators of the popular Internet Archive (archive.org) to stop making concerts available for download, and to offer only streamcast recordings instead. In many other countries, including the UK, tent dimensions are given in centimetres and weight in kilograms (abbreviated as cm Kg). Not surprisingly, these Internet-only albums have met with the same success as their CD-based brethren. In the USA, tent dimensions are usually given in feet and/or inches, and weight is given in pounds (abbreviated as ft in lb). In the summer of 2005 the Dead began offering downloadable versions of both their existing live releases, and a new internet-only series, The Grateful Dead Download Series, that is available exclusively through both their own GDStore.com (which offers the albums in both 256 kbit/s mp3 files and FLAC files -- a preferred audio standard for those who archive Dead and other fan-made live recordings on the Internet) and the iTunes Music Store (which offers them in their 128 kbit/s AAC format). Since stitching makes tiny holes in a fabric, it is important that any seams are sealed or taped to block up these holes. All three series of releases continue to this day.

Nylon or polyester are much lighter than cotton and do not absorb much water; with suitable coatings they can be very waterproof, but they may deteriorate more over time (slow chemical breakdown due to ultra-violet light found in sunlight). A series of videos began to trickle out of "The Vault", starting with View From the Vault (recorded in Pittsburgh on July 8, 1990 at Three Rivers Stadium) and View from the Vault II (recorded in Washington, DC on June 14, 1991 at RFK Stadium); these releases are accompanied by the simultaneous release of multi-disc soundtrack CDs of the same shows represented on the videos. Cotton absorbs water, so it can become very heavy when wet, but the associated swelling tends to block any minute holes so that wet cotton may be more waterproof than dry cotton. There have been at least 36 Dick's Picks releases as of November 2005. Tent fabric may be made of cotton (canvas), nylon, or polyester. Starting in 1991, the Grateful Dead released numerous live concerts from their archives in two concurrent series: the From the Vault releases are multi-track remixes, whereas the Dick's Picks series (named for the band's late archivist, Dick Latvala) are based on two-track mixes made at the time of the recording. . After the show, a deadhead with the post-show munchies could probably find a grilled cheese sandwich made on a camping stove at the door of a VW bus by a friendly hippie.

Smaller tents may be sufficiently light that they can be carried for long distances on a person's back, or on a touring bicycle, a boat, or even a pack animal. (Some deadheads would earn their entire touring budget selling such items.) Concertgoers typically congregated in the lot for hours before a show, playing guitar, hacky sacking and getting high. Depending on tent size and the experience of the person or people involved, such tents can usually be assembled (pitched) in between 5 and 25 minutes; disassembly (striking) takes a similar length of time. One could find items for sale at many cars in the lot, from grilled cheese sandwiches to "kind" brews and nitrous balloons. Tents for recreational camping are generally transportable by car. The parking lot of a Grateful Dead concert was as much a part of the event as the concert itself. Larger tents are discussed in a separate section below. Whatever their differences, the deadheads are often considered to be the most devoted fans in the rock world.

The bulk of this article is concerned with recreational camping using tents capable of sleeping from 1 up to about 10 people. The late 1980s and 90s saw the Grateful Dead attracting a huge following that left many long time deadheads in doubt as to whether people were coming out for shows to see the band, or simply to be part of the atmosphere. Tents range in size from those barely large enough for one person to sleep in up to huge (circus) tents capable of seating thousands of people. These new followers were deemed "Touchheads" by the more established fans, a reference to their relative inexperience with the band. Modern tents are usually made of fire-retardant material. In the 1980s, the band scored a top 40 hit with the song "Touch of Grey" (from In the Dark), which garnered a much younger and more mainstream fandom that was considered sharply different from the traditional Deadheads. Tents were first used as portable homes by nomadic peoples, but today, their main application is for recreational camping. The band allowed sharing of tapes of their shows, as long as no profits were made on the sale of their show tapes.

Some tent styles are free-standing, while others are attached to the ground using guy ropes tied to stakes (pegs). For many years, almost all of their shows would have dedicated taping sections. A tent is a shelter, consisting of sheets of fabric or other material draped over or attached to a frame of poles. In contrast to many other bands, the Grateful Dead encouraged their fans to tape their shows. Another warm weather option. Many of their fans, commonly referred to as Deadheads, would follow the band on tour. These were slung like a hammock, but had a rain-resistant roof and side walls made of mosquito netting. Bitchin'!!" Kelly/Mouse Studios then began including the icon in most of the band's posters and graphics.

Hammock tents were used to some extent by US troops in the Pacific during World War II. The band's skull-and-lightning-bolt icon is called Steal Your Face, a sanitized version of the icon's original name, Skull Fuck, which was a direct reflection both of the anti-establishment sensibilities of the times and of the Grateful Dead's role as a voice for the "hippies." Garcia and McKernan are said to have been tripping on ancient icons from the Aztec or Mayan visual lexicon, particularly the celebration of Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) and to have exclaimed, "Fuck they're all skulls.. More elaborate models may unfold sideways on both sides to provide two twin sleeping areas; a large canopy can then be erected at one end to give a substantial living area. '. Simple touring models unfold within seconds to double in length, providing a sleeping area for two people and a floored living area; a canopy can be erected beside the trailer to double its width. The rising cost of fuel and personnel, as well as friction among many of the newer crew members (and associated hangers-on), contributed to the band's 1974 "retirement." The Wall of Sound was disassembled, and when the Dead began touring again in 1976, it was with a more logistically practical sound system. As the top of the trailer is unfolded, poles swing into place to support a fabric canopy. The Wall's quadraphonic format never translated well to soundboard tapes made during the period, as the sound was compressed into an unnatural stereo format and suffers from a pronounced tinniness.

The body is typically about 120 cm by 180 cm (4 ft by 6 ft) or a little larger and has a hinged top. Because this was often switched to the vocal mikes, many of Lagin's parts were lost in the mix. A trailer tent looks rather like a luggage trailer for towing behind a car. Synthesist Ned Lagin, who toured with the group throughout much of 1974, never received his own dedicated input into the system, and was forced to use the vocal subsystem for amplification. Also a warm weather option. The Wall of Sound was very efficient for its day, but it did have its pitfalls in addition to its sheer size. Sling a hammock under a flysheet to get a softer bed than lying on the ground. Though the initial framework and a rudimentary form of the system was unveiled in February 1973 (ominously, every speaker tweeter blew as the band began their first number), the Grateful Dead did not begin to tour with the full system until a year later in 1974.

Really only suitable for reasonably warm weather. Four semi trucks and 21 crew members were required to haul and set up the 75-ton Wall. Not much privacy and not much to keep insects or animals out. It was the largest portable sound system ever built (although "portable" is a relative term). Make a basic bivouac by combining a flysheet with a groundsheet. It was capable of producing acceptable sound at a quarter mile, and excellent sound for up to six hundred feet, when the sound began to be distorted by wind. These have no poles or other support and can be very light weight (about 0.6 Kg or 1.3 lb) but they are also more expensive than a reasonable quality 4-person tent. The Wall of Sound used 89 300-Watt solid state and three 350-Watt tube amplifiers to produce 26,400 total Watts RMS of audio power.

A bivi-bag or bivouac sack is basically just a waterproof cover for a sleeping bag. The signals were summed, the sound that was common to both mics (the sound from the Wall) was cancelled, and only the vocals were amplified. In earlier times it was common for the circus elephants to be used as a source of power for pulling ropes to haul the canvas into position. The vocalist sang into the top microphone, and the lower mic picked up whatever other sound was present in the stage environment. Nowadays such large tents are made of some artificial fibre (polyester or vinly) and are often erected with the help of cranes. The Dead used matched pairs of condenser microphones spaced 60mm apart and run out-of-phase. A circus tent usually has one or more oval or circular arenas surrounded by tiered seating which might accommodate thousands of people. Because of this, a special microphone system had to be designed to prevent feedback.

A "Rub Hall" is a large tent used primarily as emergency warehousing. The Wall of Sound was designed to act as its own monitor system, and it was therefore assembled behind the band so the members could hear exactly what their audience was hearing. Properly installed party tents are dramatic and very strong. Because each speaker was producing the sound of just one instrument or vocalist, the sound was exceptionally clear and intermodulation distortion between instruments was nonexistent. Sizes range from 9X10 to 120x400. One channel amplified the bass drum, and two channels amplified the other drums and cymbals in stereo. The highest quality party tents are held down with tensioned rachets. Phil Lesh's bass was quadraphonic, each of the four strings having its own channel and set of speakers.

These tents are very expensive and require specilized equipment and skill to erect, so they usually must be rented from a tent rental company. Vocals, lead guitar, rhythm guitar, and piano each had their own channel and set of speakers. They are made from tough vinyl. After Owsley Stanley was released from prison in late 1972, he, along with Dan Healey, Mark Raizene of the Grateful Dead's sound crew, and Ron Wickersham, Rick Turner, and John Curl of Alembic Inc accomplished this by essentially combining eleven separate sound systems. "Party tents" or "marqees" are common for large wedding, fairs, and other gatherings. The desire driving the development of the Wall of Sound was for a distortion-free sound system that could serve as its own monitor system. Guy ropes were connected every 2 ft around the top of the walls - these had to carefully tensioned to hold the pole upright and keep the tent in shape. The band also welcomed Dan Healy into the fold on a permanent basis that year; Healy was a more superior engineer than Stanley and would mix the Grateful Dead's live sound until 1993.

A bell tent had a circular floor plan some 10 ft to 15 ft across, a single central pole some 10 ft high, and walls about 3 ft high. Because of this, Alembic would play an integral role in the research, development, and production of the Wall of Sound. There were poles about 5 ft high at each corner and in the middle of each side, and a 10 ft or 12 ft pole in the centre - the walls were vertical and the roof was pyramid-shaped, so there was plenty of headroom over most of the tent. In 1971, the band purchased their first solid sound system from Alembic Inc Studios. These tents had a square floor shape with sizes ranging from 8 ft square up to 15 ft square. After Stanley was placed in jail for LSD production in 1970, the group briefly used house PAs, but ultimately found them to be less reliable than the systems conceived by their former soundman. Despite the use of 9 poles and 12 guy ropes, such a tent could be pitched by an (experienced) family of four in some 10 to 15 minutes. Stanley's sound systems were delicate and finicky, and frequently brought shows to a halt with technical issues.

A square centre-pole tent was often used for family camping in the first half of the 20th century. The band were never satisfied with the house system anywhere they played, so in their early days, soundman Owsley "Bear" Stanley designed a PA and monitor system for them. If strong winds were expected then two additional storm guy ropes would be attached to the top of each pole. The Wall of Sound was an enormous sound system designed specifically for the Grateful Dead. Often had two guy ropes at each corner, and guy ropes every 2 ft along the sides. Musically this may be illustrated in that the band not only improvised within the form of a song, yet also improvised with the forms. Longer models might have an additional upright pole in the centre to help support the ridge pole. A hallmark of their concert sets were continuous sets of music where each song would blend into the next (a segue).

Normally had a single upright pole at each end with the tops joined by a horizontal ridge pole. The band was famous for its extended jams, which showcased both individual improvisation as well as a distinctive "group-mind" improvisation where each of the band members improvised individually, while still blending together as a cohesive musical unit, often engaging in extended improvisational flights of fancy. The side walls were usually about 3 ft high. Their numerous studio albums were generally collections of new songs that had been initially played in concert. Usually had a rectangular floor shape with sizes ranging from 8 ft by 10 ft up to 10 ft by 16 ft, and ridge heights around 6 ft to 7 ft. (They also appeared at the legendary Monterey Pop Festival in 1967 and the even more famous Woodstock Festival in 1969; their largest concert audience came in 1973 when they played, along with The Allman Brothers Band and The Band, before an estimated 600,000 people at the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen.). A ridge tent could sleep 5 to 8 people. With the exception of 1975, when the band was on "hiatus" and played only four concerts together, the Grateful Dead toured regularly around the USA from the winter of 1965 until July 9, 1995—with a few detours to Canada, Europe and three nights at the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt in 1978.

Some models had a horizontal ridge pole joining the tops of the end poles to support the centre of the tent. In their early years, the band was also dedicated to their community, the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco, making available free food, lodging, music and health care to all comers; they were the "first among equals in giving unselfishly of themselves to hippie culture, performing 'more free concerts than any band in the history of music'" ^[4]. Earlier versions had a single upright pole at each end, while later versions often had two poles at each end, arranged rather like an 'A' shape, in order to make access easier. They promoted a sense of community among their fans, who became known as Deadheads, many of whom followed their tours for months or years on end. There were guy ropes for each pole, at each corner, and in the centre of each side, and these guy ropes helped to maintain the required shape. The Grateful Dead are well-known for their near constant touring throughout their long career in music. The side walls were usually about 1 ft high. Owsley "Bear" Stanley was the Grateful Dead's soundman for many years; he was also one of the largest suppliers of LSD.

Usually had a rectangular floor shape with sizes ranging from 4 ft by 6 ft up to 6 ft by 8 ft, and ridge heights ranging from 3 ft up to 5 ft. Robert Hunter and John Perry Barlow were the band's primary lyricists. A pup tent is a small version of a ridge tent intended for 2 or 3 people. For a year and a half, Welnick was often joined by special guest Bruce Hornsby on piano. Different styles may have the pole going either along or across the tent. Almost immediately, former Tubes keyboardist Vince Welnick joined on keyboards and vocals. These are the modern equivalent of older style pup tents, and have the same feature of somewhat limited headroom. He became the third Dead keyboardist to die.

Single-hoop tents use just one flexible pole and are often sold as light-weight 1 or 2-person tents. Brent Mydland was the keyboardist for the Dead for 11 years until his death in 1990. To help withstand strong winds they are rarely more than 120 or 150 cm high (4 to 5 ft). Keith Godchaux died in a car accident in 1980. This makes them more suitable for use in snowy conditions. Keith and Donna left the band in 1979, and Brent Mydland joined as keyboardist and vocalist. Geodesic tents are essentially dome tents with 2 or more extra poles which criss-cross the normal two poles to help support the basic shape and minimise the amount of unsupported fabric. In early 1972, Keith's wife, Donna Jean Godchaux, joined the Dead as a backing vocalist.

Another variation is to use a large dome as the living area, with up to 4 tunnel extensions to provide sleeping areas. Two years later, in late 1971, Pigpen was joined by another keyboardist, Keith Godchaux, who played grand piano alongside Pigpen's Hammond B-3 organ. One variation is to use a basic dome as the sleeping area; one or two hooped poles to one side are linked by a tunnel to the dome to provide a porch. Tom "TC" Constanten played keyboards alongside Pigpen from 1968 to 1970. Hybrid dome/tunnel tents are now common. Hart rejoined the Dead for good in 1975. Sizes range from 1-person tents with very limited headroom up to 8 or 10-person tents with headroom exceeding 180 cm (6 ft). Hart quit the Grateful Dead in 1971, embarrassed by the financial misdealings of his father, Dead money manager Lenny Hart, and leaving Kreutzmann once again as the sole percussionist.

These are almost always double skin tents. Bill Kreutzmann played drums, and in 1968 was joined by a second drummer, New York native Mickey Hart, who also played a wide variety of other percussion instruments. Tunnel tents may offer more usable internal space than a dome tent with the same ground area, but almost always need guy ropes and pegs to stay upright. All of the previously mentioned Grateful Dead members shared in vocal performance of songs, although none of them had a particularly strong or tuneful voice. The former helps keep the inner tent dry, but the latter may be easier to pitch. Ron "Pigpen" McKernan played keyboards, harmonica and was also a group vocalist until shortly before his death in 1973 at the age of 27. Depending on the pole arrangement, some models pitch outer-tent first, while others pitch inner-tent first. Bob Weir, the youngest original member of the group, played rhythm guitar.

These may be single-skin, or single-skin with partial flysheet, or double skin. Classically-trained trumpeter Phil Lesh played bass guitar. ranging from lightweight 2-person tents with limited headroom up to 6 or 9-person tents with headroom exceeding 180 cm (6 ft). One of the main influences on his musical style was bluegrass music, and Garcia also performed-—on banjo, his other great instrumental love-—in the bluegrass band Old and in the Way with mandolinist David Grisman. Dome tents have a very simple structure and are available in a wide variety of sizes. Jerry was a native of San Francisco and grew up in the Excelsior District. These pole units support the centre and ends of the roof, and are usually outside the tent. De facto bandleader Jerry Garcia was the lead guitarist for the band—-although he was often seen both by the public and the media as 'leader' or a primary spokesperson for the Grateful Dead, he was reluctant to be seen that way, especially since Garcia and the other group members saw themselves as equal participants and contributors to their collective musical and creative output.

There are three separate pole units, with each unit consisting of two uprights and a connecting ridge. . Sizes may range from 13 ft by 8 ft (2 rooms) up to 25 ft by 10 ft (4 rooms), with wall and roof heights similar to those of frame tents. These various influences were distilled into a diverse and psychedelic whole that made the Grateful Dead "the pioneering Godfathers of the jam band world." ^[3]. Removable internal dividers allow the cabin to be split into 'rooms'. Their musical influences varied widely with input from the psychedelic music of the era, combined with blues, jazz, rock and roll, and bluegrass. With a hydrostatic head of only 1000 mm, they may best be considered as summer tents. The Grateful Dead became the de facto resident band of Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters, with the early sound heavily influenced by Kesey's LSD-soaked Acid Tests, as well as R&B.

They often have nylon walls, polyester roof, and a polyethylene floor, plus an awning at one or both ends. 62), "...Jer (Garcia) picked up an old Britannica World Language Dictionary...(and)...In that silvery elf-voice he said to me, 'Hey, man, how about the Grateful Dead?'". Cabin tents are single-skin tents used mainly in the USA. Some claim it was a Funk & Wagnalls, others an Oxford Dictionary, but according to Phil Lesh, in his biography (pp. The larger 8-person models may exceed 5 metres (16 ft) in length and/or width. The name "Grateful Dead" was chosen at random from a dictionary. The smaller 2-person models were less than 3 metres square (10 ft), but these have largely been replaced by dome or tunnel tents. The Grateful Dead most embodied "all the elements of the San Francisco scene and came, therefore, to represent the counterculture to the rest of the country" ^[2].

The center of the gently sloping roof is often 210 cm (7 ft) high or more and provides reasonable headroom throughout. (Also see entry for the San Francisco Sound.) Of these bands, the Grateful Dead had members with arguably the highest level of musicianship, including banjo and guitar player Jerry Garcia, blues musician "Pigpen" McKernan, the classically trained Phil Lesh and drummer Bill Kreutzmann ^[1]. The walls are nearly vertical and are typically about 150 to 180 cm high (5 ft to 6 ft). Many bands from this area, such as Jefferson Airplane, Big Brother & the Holding Company, and Santana, went on to national fame, giving San Francisco an image as a center for the hippie counterculture of the era. The living area is generally at least as large as the sleeping area, and there may be a specific section with window and extra air vents for use as a kitchen. Eventually, they moved to the Haight-Ashbury section of San Francisco. three season camping). The Grateful Dead's career began under the name "The Warlocks" in Palo Alto, California, but as another band was already recording under that name (interestingly, it was the future Velvet Underground), the band had to change its name in order to get a recording contract.

The outer tent is draped over a free-standing steel frame, and may be made of canvas or polyester (the latter often has a hydrostatic head of 3000mm, i.e. Many followers referred to the band simply as The Dead. They have a living area and one or more nylon/polyester inner tents. These so-called Deadheads were renowned for their dedication to the band's music. Frame tents are double-skin tents used in Europe and Australasia. Some of the band's fans followed the band from concert to concert for years. The exact positioning of any guy ropes is not too critical. Formed in 1965 in San Francisco from the remnants of another band, "Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions," the Grateful Dead were known for their unique and eclectic songwriting style—which fused elements of rock, folk music, bluegrass, blues, country, and jazz—and for live performances of long modal jams.

Relatively few guy ropes are needed (sometimes none). The Grateful Dead was an American psychedelia-influenced rock band. Poles which dismantle for ease of transport are either colour-coded or linked by chain or cord, so there is little doubt as to which poles connect where. 36: September 21, 1972 from the Spectrum, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The poles effectively hold the tent in the required shape. Vol. Fishermen's tents are also modified dome tents, often with a projecting awning high enough to sit under, but sometimes with no closable doorway. 35: August 7, 1971 from San Diego, California and August 24, 1971 from Chicago, Illinois with bonus tracks of August 6, 1971 from the Palladium, Hollywood, California.

Maximum height is typically about 120 cm (4 ft), and they are usually not large enough for an adult to lie down in. Vol. Some beach tents use specially treated fabric which is opaque to ultra-violet light, and so provide some protection against sunburn. 34: November 5, 1977 from the Community War Memorial, Rochester, New York with bonus tracks of November 2, 1977 from the Seneca College Field House, Toronto, Ontario. Beach tents are often a simplified form of dome tent and provide a useful (relatively sand-free) place to temporarily store beach equipment, but are at most showerproof. Vol. Because a gazebo is free-standing (no guy ropes or pegs needed), it is often used as a shelter for a temporary shop at a fair or street market. 33: October 9 and 10, 1976 from the Oakland Stadium, Oakland, California (one of Bill Graham's Days on the Green).

This structure provides a lot more usable space than does a flysheet, since the gently sloping roof allows for a reasonable amount of headroom even at the edges (like a frame tent). Vol. A gazebo uses a framework of metal poles to support a roof - the fabric down the poles is purely decorative. 32: August 7, 1982 from the Alpine Valley, East Troy, Wisconsin. There may be plenty of headroom between the poles, but the lower edges may be either at ground level or at most 90 cm (3 ft) off the ground. Vol. While a flysheet may provide a useful dining shelter, it is not advisable to cook under a flysheet due to fire-safety considerations. 31: August 4 and 5, 1974 from the Philadelphia Civic Center, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and August 6, 1974 from the Roosevelt Stadium, Jersey City, New Jersey.

Additional guy ropes are attached to the lower edges to pull them outwards away from the poles. Vol. The tops of the poles are attached via guy ropes to pegs, in order to keep the poles upright. 30: March 28, 1972 from the Academy of Music, New York City and March 25, 1972 (including five songs with Bo Diddley). Two opposite sides are held up in the middle by poles, or sometimes just a rope between conveniently placed trees. Vol. A flysheet consists of a single rectangular sheet of material. 29: May 19, 1977 from the Fox Theatre, Atlanta, Georgia and May 21, 1977 from the Lakeland Civic Arena, Lakeland, Florida.

Tent colour. Vol. Number of bedrooms. 28: February 26, 1973 from the Pershing Municipal Auditorium, Lincoln, Nebraska and February 28, 1973 from the Salt Palace, Salt Lake City, Utah. Frame and cabin tents have gently sloping roofs, so you want to take into account the wall height as well as the maximum height. Vol. Manufacturers quote the maximum internal height, but the usable internal height may be a little lower, depending on the tent style: ridge tents have a steeply sloping roof so the whole height is rarely usable, dome tents slope gently in all directions from the peak so something close to the whole height is usable in the centre, tunnel tents have a good usable height along the center line. 27: December 16, 1992 from the Oakland Coliseum Arena, Oakland, California.

Internal height. Vol. Some tents have additional poles so that the fabric doorways can be used as awnings. 26: April 26, 1969 from the Electric Theater, Chicago, Illinois and April 27, 1969 from the Labor Temple, Minneapolis, Minnesota. To allow for sunshine, an awning to provide shade may not go amiss. Vol. Alternatively, cyclists on a camping trip may wish for enough covered space to keep their bicycles out of the weather. 25: May 10, 1978 from the Veterans Memorial Coliseum, New Haven, Connecticut and May 11, 1978 from the Springfield Civic Center, Springfield, Massachusetts.

To allow for inclement weather, some covered living space may be desirable. Vol. If a group are backpacking, it may be preferable to use several small tents rather than one large one, since load-sharing is easier to arrange. 24: March 23, 1974 from the Cow Palace, Daly City, California. Even though children may be physically smaller than adults, their supply of toys may mean that they need just as much space, if not more. Vol. The number of people who will be camping determines how big the sleeping area(s) must be. 23: September 17, 1972 from the Baltimore Civic Center, Baltimore, Maryland.

Size of tent.