My roommate second year of college. Met him first year, ended up rooming with him the next. He would constantly play the dead. I honestly did not like it right at first, but he played it incessantly. His dad was a huge head and introduced my roommate initially. My roommate wasn't new to the music but was still exploring all the tunes the Dead had to offer.

I think hearing Europe 72 is really what got me into the music. After falling head over heels for it, I could not stop. Caught Ratdog and the Allmans at Susquehanna Bank center in August of 2008. Have not looked back since.

Though i have not been to a show with my old roommate in a while, I got a group of 2 or 3 people I go with consistently who were old friends that my roommate also got into the dead. It's weird to think about it. Not saying I would never have become a deadhead if I never met him, but he was the main reason my friends and I are heads now.

Seeing numerous stories here about how the party enticed many people and knowing many more stories along the same lines long before, I'm glad I never felt a need to go when I could have for that reason. I liked the GD's music (esp the Terrapin Station album, B Side suite specifically), never really listened to live shows and the ones I did were just terrible sounding back then, so it never really clicked.

Fast forward almost a decade later and a pretty rough divorce that left me in a deep and very dark hole & listening to a lot of aggressive and/or angrier music, when I was ready to climb out, who but who walked through the door, pretty literally at that, Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead. Some 8 years after Jerry moved on no less. Sat down one day, turned on, tuned in, curled up in a ball on the couch and dropped out. Put in Dicks Picks 18 and the rest was history.

That moment got me hooked on the GD, and by then the quality of traded live shows had increased tremendously thanks to technology & the internet - thank God for digitalized archives and the tapers.

In that journey I left my body, and re-found many paths I had strayed from as well as learned a few things that day about myself, about life and our connection to it both individually and collectively, and about music and the Grateful Dead. Was right after that The Dead would announce their return and that they would reunite with all plus Jimmy, Joan and Jeff. Bonnaroo bound was I. :0) :0) :0)

Im still a youngin' and i only wish i could have lived to see Jerry. My dad has always been a dead head, and i just grew up listening to them. I have always loved the music, but what really go tme hooked was my first furthur show. Although it is not the same a dead show i feel as if it is the closest thing to it. Ever since that first show ive been hooked. i just love the vibe that it gives off. just a great feeling.

My dad and grandpa have loved the Dead and seen them well over a 100 times, (my dad saw 99 he claims, [not including JGB etc]) and my poppop saw a bunch too, going back into the 69's.
I first saw Phil & Friends 10/12/07. Blew my mind. Went back for more when I could, been fully on the bus for four nice years!
What keeps me coming back is the amazing people, gorgeous music, and best feeling ever.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<JERRY!!! (he smoked me out b4 my first show)

After hearing 5/8/77 that helped to get me hooked big time.

Curiosity,

I was in the Navy, and went downtown in Norfolk Va. on a night off. There was Grateful Dead a show at the Scope '82 or '83, seems like 82. A friend and I went to see what it was like.

Didn't trip or even smoke any weed. Just took in the sights.

Mickey was playing that big round drum set then.

Later we went to some Hampton (83, 84) and Norfolk (84) shows.

Those I tripped at. What times...

It was a lot of influence from friends that got me to my first show. But it was the music that made me stay.

Back in about the late 80's I'd totally gone over the edge into Hendrix, Floyd, Zep as well as a lot of reggae at the time. Up to that point I'd only heard some studio stuff and what was on the radio, Touch of Grey I think, etc. and I thought they were barely interesting but honestly a little cheesy except for some of the more psychadelic things like the spacey shit from the infrared roses disc and I thought the country rock vibe of the other stuff which sounded like a different group altogether was definitely not up my alley but beyond that they were just ok and no real big deal to me :- ) needless to say I just did not get it. BUT THEN one day - totally sober I might add- I heard the LIVE cd, one from the vault, and from the opening sound of the crowd with I believe B. Graham introducing the band and then the LAUNCH into Help/Slipknot/Franklins Tower I was like WTF is this!!! This is the coolest shit I've ever heard. It entirely grabbed me by the head, heart, and nuts 100%, I could just feel the energy and the on the spot joy/creative creation for lack of a possibly better word taking place in making this music. It's been over 20 years and the music still has things to reveal. So that was the start of it and then quite awhile later I went to my first show, Vegas, but that 's another story altogether.

people turning me on to their records. hooked even before a show but really TOAST at Day on The Green.

I was 18 and just graduated high school. I was working at a restaurant as a cook (I was going to culinary school that fall) and he says to me- "you of all people need to come to the dead with me". We'd been hanging out after work ,etc. and they'd smoke pot but I barely drank back then. So we drove all the way to Wisconsin from CT and spent a week cooing in the Alpine drought of 1988. I was really into Led Zep and the Doors, and I liked music with a real strong lead guitar player. But from the tpes it all sounded lke mud. So the thing that got me was when we were at Alpine and waiting for the show to start, the usher guy let me walk way up to the front (we were aud) and let me take a few pictures. All that beautiiful stuff up there just blew me away. These guys were serious!

And then it was the wild dancing. I was into Jim Morrison's "break on through" concept, and right here before me, in that big ass aisle/walkway that seperated the lawn from the seats were people doing just that. Glad to say the next year I was down ther, tripping balls and digging with the rest of them... what a time!!!! I went from a total square to a pot smoking slightly bent square over a year....

Interestingly enough I got hooked well after the bus was in the garage.Jerry was already gone,and to make it worse I was old enough to have gone to shows when he was still alive.Anyway it happened at a party and a cd was playing in the backround.I later learned it was american beauty.The music affected me in such a profound way that I walked away from everyone lost in the sound.That was about 12 years ago.My love has only grown from the country psychedlia,to soul shattering jams that lift the subconscience.It is not a music but a devotion, almost a religion.I can see why people follow them around I wish my life allowed me to take a year off and do just that,but I can only wait to get to the next show.to get to terrapin.Peace!