Boers: Finally, The Grateful Dead Are Gone

By Terry Boers--

(CBS) For the life of me, I simply can't pinpoint the exact moment I began to loathe the Grateful Dead and their smelly, disgusting fans with every fiber of my being.

I know we're looking at more than two decades ago, back to the days when the band would show up in my area for its annual date in Tinley Park at what is now the called the Midwest Amphitheater.

The traveling trash that follows them would show up early in their pathetic vans, insinuating themselves in just about every gas station or convenience store around, taking their bags of chips, Twinkies -- or whatever it is the hardcore stoners need -- and doing their very best not to pay for it.

Give them a couple of days in the neighborhood, and you'd be more likely to find gold bullion in a box for a buck rather than a bag of Jay's.

But even if you happen to be tolerant of the stupid and stinky, there's the music.

Even with me being a child of the '60s and a music lover at an early age, The Grateful Dead simply didn't matter. They were never a part of top-40 radio that I can remember, and they had ample time to do so given their birth date in 1965. Now, I'm not saying that hit-making is the be-all, end-all in music, but it was the way of the world back then, especially because there weren't a million gadgets around to find music. And the '60s were blessed with remarkable music played by many of the greatest bands of all time. In that venue, the Grateful Dead weren't a true player to my recollection.

Quick, say the Grateful Dead and the Beatles or the Rolling Stones or the Beach Boys in the same sentence and then go hit your hit head against a concrete wall. Repeatedly.

Now as more and more radio stations came into being, the Dead no doubt began to get their air time. But not my time. I'd hung the "I'm Not Interested" sign on them from the first time I heard them.

Some decisions you come to regret over time. That isn't one of them.

And despite the passage of time, I've somehow managed to keep that simmering fire of distaste in my gut, even as their one and only top-10 single "Touch of Grey" hit the charts in 1987. Whoop de doo.

So let's fast forward to the Fourth of July weekend in Chicago.

From the second I heard that Dead were going to play a three farewell concerts in Soldier Field, I knew the Freak Show was on its way. My only hope was to stay as far away as possible from them, something I was thankfully able to do.

After the first concert on Friday, a Dead fan by name of Allen Burrows told the Chicago Tribune, "Through music, I was touched by the hand of Jerry Garcia, rather than the hand of God."

I hope Russell Wilson can somehow straighten God out on that one, although there's still that interception drivel to work on. At the very least, God has to wash his hands.

But Burrows, who's from Pittsburgh, wasn't quite done.

"I've sold grilled (sandwiches), I've sold pasta -- anything I could do,'' Burrows told the Trib. "I used to tell my mom and dad I was in jail" to pretend he needed money for bail.

This is a 45-year-old man with a 12-year-old son talking like a complete idiot. His parents must have been so proud.

Another Deadhead, Los Angeles native Jeff Enge, told the Trib's Stefano Esposito that he would be feel relieved at the end of the three days because he would get to "cleanse his soul.''

Lord knows Garcia certainly cleansed his soul over the years. According to various reports, the inspirational Garcia started taking pills as a teenager before moving on to acid-laced Kool-Aid and then speedballs. And you wondered why that Kool-Aid pitcher was always smiling back in the day.

There were countless stories of Garcia drooling on the mic during shows. He would also occasionally nod off, and many times he was forced to just hum along with a song because he couldn't remember the words.

Put all that on your resume for the job application at Apple.

And then there was the matter of weight.

Garcia would often inflate to more than 300 pounds, a rather hefty amount unless you're an NFL lineman or a roadside tavern.

As you might recall, Garcia died in 1995 while he was in a rehab facility at the age of 53, just a few weeks after playing in Chicago. No one doubts that the years of drug abuse and other health concerns took their final toll on his heart. Garcia had checked back into the facility after he once again had a relapse of his heroin addiction, according to reports.

I didn't see that mentioned anywhere this last weekend. If you're going to be the No. 1 Stoner Band of all time, don't you have to own that?

And wouldn't Garcia have loved the fact that Chicago police made just two arrests over the weekend, despite the fact that the equivalent of a marijuana cloud was just above the Dancing Flower Children?

One good breeze would have probably been enough to make everyone in Gary high. Wait, everyone in Gary already is high.

And that's not even the kicker. Tribune music critic Greg Kot, who's brilliant at what he does, said the Friday concert was "at best a Grateful Dead tribute show,'' noting, "The show developed little pace, with slack arrangements and some deep cuts that felt indulgent rather than revelatory.''

And you can bet that no one seemed in the crowd seemed to care, even after spending the thousands of dollars it took to get here and get in.

But as wasted as many of them were, they got exactly what they wanted, a final celebration of the Grateful Dead.

And I got exactly what I wanted, too.

The end to this musical massacre and the fingers-crossed hope that their repulsive fans will drift off into dreamland, never to be heard from again.

A longtime sportswriter for the Chicago Sun-Times, Terry Boers co-hosts The Boers and Bernstein Show, which can be heard Monday-Friday from 1 p.m.-6 p.m. on 670 The Score.