Lambchop’s singer, songwriter and guitarist reflects on his free whiff of the good ol’ Grateful Dead.

So your college chick fire,
puppy fine, dope smokin’ Bill Monroe on the Alumni Lawn
Bare-breasted fun festival justice and clarity
Open the door for you like a silly clown
Are you talking to me mister?
I abhor that live in the past
Be it the first date or the last gasp
More fuckin’ facts than you’re able to grasp
Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey
Over and over ‘til the words drip off his tongue like rose
water into a warm bathtub
A ponytail dances on the pathway nearby
As the sun burns her thighs and your forehead
Breathe deep now this won’t hurt a bit
Pardon me while I throw a fit
First your heart and then your ribs
Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey
Want to lose this loss again
One stroke of the master’s pen
Again and again

“Alumni Lawn,” off the 1996 Lambchop album How I Quit Smoking

On Oct. 21, 1972, in Nashville, Tenn., on Vanderbilt University’s Alumni Lawn, the Grateful Dead gave reportedly their last “free concert.” I was there.

I arrived mid-morning. The mist had burned off and, yes, the ground was still wet from the “morning dew.” My brother and I rode in with my father who worked at the university. After he dropped us off, we walked over to stake out a spot on the lawn. The word all over town was that the show would draw as many as 15,000 people though, in reality, it ended up being more like 5,000—still a massive number for any concert in Nashville at that time. Nashville was a pretty dinky Southern town entrenched in the completely repressive, non-progressive environment that was typical of most of the Southeast in 1972. It was brutal.

At the time, the country was deeply divided. Nixon was still in office, the draft was in full force, and there was a sense of dread and foreboding similar to the present day. The notion that the Grateful Dead would be playing a free show in Nashville was unfathomable. Yet it happened.

Massive credit is due to the incredible programming coming from the university’s student-run concert committee. They were fearless and, over the course of the early to mid-‘70s, they brought an incredible, diverse music series to a city that, outside of the university students and a few freaks, probably couldn’t have cared less. During that time, I saw many great bands. My first unaccompanied concert was earlier that year—Fleetwood Mac (with Peter Green!), Ashton, Gardner and Dyke, and J. Geils Band (with Magic Dick!). Other highlights were Muddy Waters, Kris Kristofferson and Billy Swan (Kris was so drunk he fell off the stage!) and JJ Cale (and his dog). At the beginning of his show, JJ had his dog walk out on stage before him and proceeded to play solo with him by his side until the dog got up and walked offstage. JJ just stopped, shrugged and followed him offstage—end of show.

My brother was an early Deadhead. He had just gotten Europe ‘72 a few weeks prior to the concert. We were stoked. I was massively into the more country, bluegrass-y elements of the Dead, like Workingman’s Dead and Jerry’s solo record, Garcia. Anything that had a steel guitar on it was my jam.

I was also way into New Riders of the Purple Sage and The Flying Burrito Brothers. I dressed in the style of those guys and had hair down to my ass. I hung out at Sho-Bud steel-guitar shop on lower Broadway just to hear the old guys sit around and jam upstairs. Where else in the world was an entire store with two levels totally dedicated to the steel guitar? I thought the instrument was from outer space and hearing it co-opted by “rock” music at that time was nothing less than a subversive act of rebellion—reclaiming country music as an insurgent form of expression. The same idea went for the clothes. Western shirts, blue jeans and jackets, cowboy hats and boots—the pointier the better. The concept was tight.

In 1972, in Nashville, your hair length and type of dress not only made a statement about your politics, but also made you a target on the street for a lot of bigotry and aggression. It was a form of protest and you wore it proudly because it was the only voice you had as a young person in Nashville at the time.

On that October day, thousands of us from all over the region gathered not only to hear the music but also to let the town know we existed and would not be ignored. That’s what a free concert meant to us. Sure, it was about music, but outdoor events lent themselves to what we now refer to as civil acts of defiance. Knowing now that it was to be the last of its kind for the Dead makes it all the more incredible.

No sooner had we arrived than my brother immediately ditched me for his older friends who had managed to get into the student-only section of the show up front. I remained further back on Jerry’s side of the stage—still close enough to see Jerry smile and Pigpen’s slo-mo slump down from his bench during the course of the first set. I’m pretty sure he had gone to “sleep” behind his organ. My memory of the set is remarkably clear. They kicked it off with a white-hot “Bertha” and, a little later, they answered the musical question on all our lips by playing “Tennessee Jed.” Folks went nuts once they realized what was being sung, though it was still a new part of the Dead’s repertoire.

I recall seeing Jerry on the side of the stage prior to the start of the show. I was on my way to the brand new—and only—Burger King in Nashville. It was directly behind the stage across West End Ave. He seemed relaxed, smoking, whatever—and as the day wore on, he seemed eager to get out there to play, checking on his gear from stage right. Meanwhile, back at that Burger King, the hippies were causing havoc by ordering “25 Whoppers, hold the meat!” I know, it sounds quaint now but, at the time, it was yet another act of rebellion and a jab at corporate encroachment on our fucked up little sliver of the South. Look at us now…

Kurt Wagner is the frontman of the Nashville-bred, alternative-country band Lambchop. They released their latest LP, This (is what I wanted to tell you), on March 22 via Merge.

This article originally appears in the March 2019 issue of Relix. For more features, interviews, album reviews and more, subscribe here.