That Eric Alper

Madison Square Garden, the world-famous New York City arena, was a home away from home for the Grateful Dead, a reliable sanctuary where the band would ultimately play 52 shows, a record at the time. The venue’s fine acoustics combined with the fans’ unbridled energy consistently brought out the best in the Dead. At the band’s 2015 induction ceremony into Madison Square Garden’s Walk Of Fame, Bobby Weir said “This place was both horrifying and titillating with an audience that was discerning but ravenous. We had to rise to the occasion every time.”

IN AND OUT OF THE GARDEN: MADISON SQUARE GARDEN ’81, ’82, ’83 is a new, 17-CD boxed set that celebrates the band’s rich history at “the world’s most famous arena,” introducing six previously unreleased shows recorded at MSG between 1981 and 1983. The collection is available now for pre-order and will be released on September 23. Production of the set is limited to 12,500 individually numbered copies and available exclusively from Dead.net. Full audio will also be available in its entirety as a digital download exclusively at Dead.net in Apple Lossless and FLAC.

The boxed set includes six unreleased concerts recorded at Madison Square Garden on: March 9 and 10, 1981; September 20 and 21, 1982; and October 11 and 12, 1983. IN AND OUT OF THE GARDEN features newly restored and speed-corrected audio by Plangent Processes, was mastered by Jeffrey Norman and produced for release by Grateful Dead archivist and legacy manager David Lemieux.

On the same day, the March 9, 1981 show from the boxed set will be released separately at all regular retail outlets. MADISON SQUARE GARDEN, NEW YORK, NY (3/9/81) will be available as a 3-CD set and digitally.

A previously unreleased performance of “Feel Like A Stranger” from the March 9, 1981 MSG show is available today on all digital download and streaming services.

“As Jerry Garcia famously said, Madison Square Garden was ‘juiced.’ It had an energy unlike any other venue the Grateful Dead played, particularly of this size, owing to the symbiotic relationship between the Dead, the Dead Heads, and New York City itself, says Grateful Dead legacy manager and archivist David Lemieux. “The Dead didn’t play the Garden until 1979, almost the midpoint of their performing career. but once they got rolling, they made it a home away from home, playing 10 shows in the next 15 years. These performances from 1981, 1982, and 1983 are six of the best the Dead played at the Garden, any of which could have been released on their own. We’re thrilled, though, to allow these six complementary shows to be housed together, each one its own story, its own event, but all contributing to the story that is the entirety of the Dead’s 52 show run at Madison Square Garden.”

IN AND OUT OF THE GARDEN (aptly named after the line in “St. Stephen,” which the band played live for the first time in four years at the October 11, 1983 MSG show) offers a front-row seat to the Dead in the early 1980s, an overlooked and underestimated era of rebirth for the band. At the time of the recordings, the group consisted of singers-guitarists Jerry Garcia and Bobby Weir, bassist Phil Lesh, drummers Bill Kreutzmann and Mickey Hart, and, on keyboards and vocals, Brent Mydland.

Mydland’s vocal power and colorful keyboard palette energized the band, invigorating older material like “The Wheel,” “Truckin’” and “Eyes of The World.” He also gave the band more musical flexibility, which encouraged them to dust off rarely aired treasures like “Dupree’s Diamond Blues” and “Crazy Fingers.”

IN AND OUT OF THE GARDEN touches on the three-year period after 1980’s Go To Heaven was released, a time when the Dead were constantly on the road, playing more than 200 dates. While they were in no rush to return to the studio during this time, they continued to write new music. In 1982 and ’83, the band performed most of the songs that would appear on 1987’s In The Dark, a Top 10 double-platinum album that stands as the group’s biggest commercial success. The new collection includes performances of four songs from that album – “Touch Of Grey,” “Hell In A Bucket,” “Throwing Stones,” and “West L.A. Fadeaway” – plus the B-side, “My Brother Esau.”

The set comes in a custom box featuring new artwork by Dave Van Patten celebrating the band’s eclectic fanbase, with a cavalcade of illustrated Dead Heads. The collection also includes detailed liner notes by award-winning music journalist David Fricke, who explores the band’s connection to the Big Apple. He writes: “Welcome to the unique, enduring phenomenon of the Grateful Dead in New York City, a mutual devotion, forged in concert, that ran for nearly as long as the band itself—from June 1, 1967, a free show in Tompkins Square Park on the Lower East Side (ahead of the band’s official, local bow at the Cafe Au Go Go), to the Dead’s last Garden run, six nights in October 1994…te Dead’s affinity for New York City…was instant and arguably their most profound with any city aside from San Francisco.”

The band’s offcial podcast, the Good Ol’ Grateful Deadcast, will also be deep diving into the MSG shows and is currently collecting stories from concertgoers at stories.dead.net.

IN AND OUT OF THE GARDEN: MADISON SQUARE GARDEN ’81, ’82, ’83
17-CD Track Listing

Madison Square Garden (3/9/81)
“Feel Like A Stranger”
“Althea”
“C.C. Rider”
“Ramble On Rose”>
“El Paso”
“Deep Elem Blues”
“Beat It On Down The Line”
“Bird Song”
“New Minglewood Blues”
“China Cat Sunflower”>
“I Know You Rider”>
“Samson And Delilah”
“Ship Of Fools”
“Estimated Prophet”>
“Uncle John’s Band”>
Drums>
Space>
“The Other One”>
“Stella Blue”>
“Good Lovin’”
“U.S. Blues”

Madison Square Garden (3/10/81)
“Mississippi Half-Step Uptown Toodeloo”>
“Franklin’s Tower”>
“Me And My Uncle”
“It Must Have Been The Roses”>
“Little Red Rooster”
“Don’t Ease Me In”
“Lazy Lightning”>
“Supplication”
“Brown-Eyed Women”>
“Looks Like Rain”>
“Deal”
“Scarlet Begonias”>
“Fire On The Mountain”>
“Lost Sailor”>
“Saint Of Circumstance”>
Jam>
Drums
Space>
“The Wheel”>
“China Doll”>
“Truckin’”>
“Sugar Magnolia”
“(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction”>
“Brokedown Palace”

Madison Square Garden (9/20/82)
“Shakedown Street”>
“New Minglewood Blues”
“Candyman”>
“El Paso”
“Dupree’s Diamond Blues”
“It’s All Over Now”
“Never Trust A Woman”
“Row Jimmy”
“Throwing Stones”>
“Keep Your Day Job”
“Scarlet Begonias”>
“Fire On The Mountain”
“Man Smart (Woman Smarter)”
“Terrapin Station”>
Drums>
Space>
Spanish Jam>
“Truckin’”>
“The Other One”>
“Stella Blue”>
“Sugar Magnolia”
“Touch Of Grey”

Madison Square Garden (9/21/82)
“Playing In The Band”>
“Crazy Fingers”>
“Me And My Uncle”>
“Big River”
“West L.A. Fadeaway”
“Beat It On Down The Line”
“Loser”
“Looks Like Rain”
“China Cat Sunflower”>
“I Know You Rider”
“Touch Of Grey”>
“Samson And Delilah”
“High Time”
“Estimated Prophet”>
“He’s Gone”>
Drums>
Space>
“Throwing Stones”>
“Not Fade Away”>
“Black Peter”>
“Good Lovin’”
“U.S. Blues”

Madison Square Garden (10/11/83)
“Wang Dang Doodle”>
“Jack Straw”
“Loser”
“Me And My Uncle”>
“Mexicali Blues”
“Bird Song”
“Hell In A Bucket”>
“Keep Your Day Job”
“China Cat Sunflower”>
“I Know You Rider”
“I Need A Miracle”>
“Bertha”>
Jam>
“China Doll”>
Drums>
Space>
“St. Stephen”>
“Throwing Stones”>
“Touch Of Grey”
“Johnny B. Goode”

Madison Square Garden (10/12/83)
“Cold Rain And Snow”
“New Minglewood Blues”
“Ramble On Rose”
“My Brother Esau”
“It Must Have Been The Roses”
“Cassidy”>
“Cumberland Blues”
“Looks Like Rain”>
“Might As Well”
“Help On The Way”>
“Slipknot!”
“Franklin’s Tower”
“Man Smart (Woman Smarter)”
“He’s Gone”>
Drums>
Space>
“Truckin’”>
“Black Peter”>
“Not Fade Away”
“Revolution”