Some of the comments here are confused with the 1989 concert at JFK. This is the 1987 concert. The venue didn't close for good until after the 1989 GD show.

This will sound ridonculous but hey this was 30 years ago. When they hit Terrapin Station I knew we were getting one of those condensed sets. Where an entire show gets packed into 1 jumbo set.
I had just recovered from the Rainbow Runs and i was looking forward to dancin' my butt off.
So I am feeling somewhat shortchanged by the Grateful Dead when Encino Man appears and they play what I can only describe as watching a car accident in slow motion.
Augh, and don't get me wrong I really like Bob Dylan.
After hearing the studio outtakes and the rest of the tour plus JOEY from the live album I have a better feel for that time period but truthfully it was at the time the biggest let down.
I also felt this tour pushed Brent to the background and i was glad when he again took the centerstage bright lights.
And don't let those Dylan fans jive talk ya, Dylan owes both his right and left nut to THE GRATEFUL DEAD reviving his sorry butt during the Summer of 87
"That was all I had to say
and it's alright"

What a grate time! It was super hot that day & all the new touch heads were everywhere along with the Dylan fans made for a crap ton of people. Jerry was clean and playing grate. Healthy Jerry, I remember it well. It lasted longer than I thought it would. Wish I didn't lose my stub, lost so many, they just seem to melt away during the shows. Would be nice to have them all. Awesome show though & an awesome night. Good ole days.

it was hot that day and a little too warm for a owsley experiment but intrepid trips must go on---a vendor was selling red-white and blue snowcones so i got 2 for my temples and watched the flame burn in the links from top row and finally mellowed out for the show about an hour in---rare treat seeing bobby d with the boys---one i won't forget

twasnt the last jfk show that was 7789 both were smokin hot over100000 each time they had sprinklers on and spraying us on the field with hoses grate grate summer and i saw the worlds largest marshmellow fights

for its guest jam.

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/11-greatest-guest-jams-at-grateful-dead-concerts-20150520

This was my first show, and I am dying for a copy of that video, keithrev. cable2@cox.net

WOW!! I've been looking for this show for a long time, and here it is! This was my first show. I was 15, skipped school that day to go for the life changing experience.
I remember it like it was yesterday. My friends Brandon and Dan lived in the sub burbs and went to get the train into the city. We had to run for the train and I fell and skinned my knee so bad I have the huge scar to this day! Got to shakedown street and sampled almpse everything we could get. WOW, what a night. The show was amazing. Been hooked ever sense then. Live in Sacramento now after a trip around the world. May the music never stop!

I have the video of this show.
It was the finest dead show I ever saw.

This was an amazing show for many reasons. It was my wife's (now ex-wife) first Grateful Dead show.
It was so hot that afternoon,and yes, those damn fiberglass benches didn't help. BUT... there's nothing like a Greateful Dead concert and I'd say most of the people at the show were really cool. I remember the kid standing on his seat in front of me asking, "Can you see OK sir?" Although I never got to hook up with my dear friend Lippe that day ("We'll meet at the tent") it was a total trip. The chemistry was great that day as well as the smokables! The one weird thing I recall was seeing this guy up at the top row of JFK (a few rows in back of me)totally naked and doing this karate kata/dance on the bench. Luckily he didn't fall and a good time was had by all. Check this show out!

check out the miracle...real upbeat & hot, if short, as was the trend during '87

For confirmation of this see the following link. ;)

http://www.archive.org/details/gd89-07-07.sbd.wiley.7855.sbeok.shnf

This was the last show, or event of any kind played at JFK. This stadium was built in the 1920s and hosted many Army-Navy games. Also my first ever concert 1976 Peter Frampton and Yes.. (Dreamweaver Gary Wright too, not to mention the fukn MUMMERS), among many others including Clash/Who. Think the USC coliseum in LA for a reference (check here for history, including confirmation of the first sentence). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_F._Kennedy_Stadium

I didn't have to take a leak at this show (de-high-dration?), but friends who did say they saw sparking wires hanging from the ceiling.

Wished they'd saved the stadium, it would be a great place for soccer.....


It was a scorcher of a day, but cooled nicely when the sun went below the seats. I sat wayyyyyyy in the back on fiberglass bleacher seats that made your ass itch. .... But I didn't sit too much because I also made it down to the field to boogy when Iko launched. I can't remember that starting too many first sets. I think the set list was a fine one and China-Rider is always fun no matter what.

Keep in mind that this was in the middle of the Dylan/Dead tour, but it was regrouping after the band played solo gigs in Pittsburg and Roanoke.

Pittsburg (at the Civic Center with special guests the Neville Bros). .....They didn't open the roof but they tore it off... you MUST check that out for the second set Shake-o-Down-Day-O-Women-R-Smarter...space... Knockin on Heaven's Door....made me drool when I heard it and still gives me goosebumps.

The next day we went to Roanoke for a dandy show (crazy fingers-truckin-comes a time) in a 10,000 seater. Hampton must have been booked. So heading backed to Philly (hometown) for a 100,000-seater was all icing.

What I really liked about this show was a leisurely 90 minute set. Dylan was a bonus. And Gotta-Serve/Joey were good with gravel-voice Jerry in the choir. Dead played well, Dylan was resurrecting, but who cares thats all history, and so is JFK.

My only regret of this show is they didn't play Sampson and Delilah......"I would tear that old building down!"

Overall: a good audience recording - which is always my favorite. I'll take a high quality audience that captures the "feel" of the show over a soundboard any day. The show, itself, however is a mediocre late 80s summer big venue show. In other words, well played, but basic and not too high energy (understandable given the temps and the grueling nature of stadium touring). This is the first time I've heard this show since I was there.

The scene: this was my third and final show of the 87 summer tour (Kingswood and Silver Stadium prior). My friend Colin and I went down a few days early because we didn't have tickets yet and wanted to make sure we got down and bought some before it sold out and we were on summer vacation, so why not? A less-than-honest cop stopped us in the park across the street a couple of days before the show and pocketed our stash and made us throw our pipes as far as we could. Of course, I'll take less-than-honest over handcuffs any day!!! The day before the show tickets went on sale at the Spectrum (right next to JFK) for a Cure show. Funny mix of goths and Deadheads. The day of the show was hot hot hot. The sprinkler showers inside the venue were awesome. We parked ourselves on left side of the lawn just in front of the soundboard. I think this was the largest show I ever attended (about 90,000+).

The music: decently played, but pretty standard. The Cassidy is very good, but that's probably the high-point. Someone else mentioned the China>Rider being one of their favorites, but it sounded pretty standard to me at the time and still does now. We didn't know what was going on at the time with the one long Dead set format, so when they started China>Rider, we weren't sure if they were just pulling out something cool to end the first set, or what was going on. By the time drums came around we understood that they were just sort of combining their usual first and second sets. The Dylan set is interesting for nostalgic purposes, but is otherwise not too great. It's well played, but Dylan was not completely on top of his game and he sounds downright aweful at times. I remember about halfway through I'll Be Your Baby Tonight, my friend and I looked at each other with "what the ?" looks on our faces and without a word started walking back toward the stands to sit and wait for the show to end. "Highlights" of the set are anytime Dylan's not singing (e.g. jams in Watchtower) and perhaps Balled of a Thin Man (but maybe that's just cause I love that tune, no matter how badly it's sung). We heard Touch from the parking lot as we walked out a little early (only show I ever did that).

I have fond memories of this one. Crazy scene, hot day, big GA venue, nice tune selection for the Dead. Selected "MX missile" for myself!

Check out the Cassidy. One of the best ever executions of the jam: great energy and playing, band incredibly synced, then Jerry leads the band through some incredible improvisational extensions to the peak, and nobody misses a beat (sometimes when things got really heavy in Cassidy, it seemed like it was too much and they would come apart. this version triumphs). Pretty amazing; I remember hearing it on someone's tape deck at a later show's lot that summer and immediately identifying that it was JFK. A real deep, psychedelic version.

Hot and intense on the field, I remember walking through one of the "shower" type sprinklers they had set up after the Dead's set and coming out the other side reborn down to the last cell.

How lucky we were to be able to go to those shows!

I'm so happy to find this one out here. I was at this one with a strange collection of folks - my girl friend who dumped me like a week later - a girl I had just met through a friend who I now have been married to for 17 years - a former roomate who killed himself years later...
I remember it was a typical Philly summer day, 90+ degrees and 101% humidity. Before the show started there was a spontaneous marshmellow battle on the grass (later dubbed the cream puff war) and they did a sound check by blasting Dixie Chicken over the amps and getting everyone fired up. The Dead came out and just blew everyone away, despite the heat, just rockin the place from the first notes of Iko.

Dylan's set, was fairly lame though, and I agree with other reviews that the Dead alone did better versions of many of these songs. I remember feeling cheated, too when they closed with Touch of Gray. At the time it was the big hit and brought a lot of jerks into the scene and we had grown to hate it - but today it sounds awesome! This is the first time I've heard this whole show since the day it happened. Thanks the gods for Tapers!!!

My then wife was 6 months pregnant with our son when we saw this show. She almost passed out trying to get into JFK. Think I'll give this to hin along with the ticket stub.

is this the only source of this show?

I remember being so excited when the album Dylan & the Dead came out, then I made the mistake of listening to it. It seemed so sterile, so flat.(In my opinion the only songs worth keeping were "I Want You" and "Joey".) To hear this well made audience tape brought joy to my heart.
First of all the fact that I could find it, God bless archive, and the fact that the set was so much better than I had often heard. The Dead's set alone is well worth a download. I'll forever be envious of people who saw the Dead on the East coast, their shows seem to grow more mellow as they moved west.

Hi. My name's Gus, and I wanna know who the hell "jboyaquar" is, and why he follows me around everywhere I, um, surf.

I'm giving this one five stars because it was such utter mayhem they could have come out, stood on their heads, and played jawharps and tambourines for two hours and it wouldn't have mattered. It was like being an extra on the set of a Mad Max film. And the fact that I can actually listen to it amazes me, even if it may not be the first show I'm likely to throw on the stereo. I was convinced for some reason that no one had tapes of these shows. Go, Archive.

When we left, we realized we'd locked the keys in the car and had to get a Philly police towtruck driver to slim-jim it for us. When we thanked him, after a few tense minutes (it was a tricky door), he almost shat a brick. "I've been on the force for fifteen years and no one's ever thanked me before." Wow. Nice work if you can get it.

My first show as well. I was 17 and my buddy Tobin, who had dropped out of our prep school and run away from home the year before, insisted we had to go see the Dead. We headed down in a two car contingent from Northern VA/Southern MD, accidentally ditched Tobin at a piss break, wrecked the station wagon coming off the turn pike and piled the whole crew into the compact. By the time we got to the stadium I was heavily in the throws of some intense green gels - and there was Tobin waving to us.
I got down to the field and abandoned my shoes, turned for a moment to conduct some business, turned back and all my buds were gone - about that time I turned to the guy next to me and said, "I didn't know these guys were a country group! But I can dig it." By the time Watchtower came around I was a convert.
What a great show - it was hot, I was lost, I had no idea how I would get home but I didn't care.
Didn't see Tobin again till Hampton Colloseum the next year when I went with Trish. By then it was a lifestyle....

This was my first show. I went down the night before to hang out in the parking lot and and promptly fell into some great, er, stuff...Wink, wink. Then I ran into some more great stuff and by show time I literally could not form complete sentences. I was unfortunate enough to be wearing jeans, which was a bad choice as it was around 105 110 degrees on the field. I ran into my friend Dave Hand and we went up in the bleachers which were rumoured to be made of fiberglass. I don't know if they were or not but our assess definitely itched. I remember being really high and this black kid from the neighborhood fell over from heat exhaustion behind us. Later I heard one of his friend's say, "Even their music makes you high." I'm guessing it was the first time these kids ate shrooms or lsd. It was pharmaceutical supermarket in the parking lot in those days. I was so dosed I don't remember much. I was such a newbie (barely 17 Years old) that I remember this guy asking me right before Aiko what I thought they'd open up with, and I thought, "How the hell should I know." This was before I was hipped to the alternating Bob and Jerry routine and the limited number of "set openers," etc. I remember thinking Dylan was pretty bad live. Cool first show.

That "Western Whining Slide" on I'll Be Your Baby Tonight is Jerry on pedal steel guitar for the first time(the tour that is) since New Riders days.

1st Set: Let's lively up ourselves with a bouncy "Iko." A swaying "Jack" continues proceedings in a mostly upbeat way. I wonder if the sweltering heat played a factor in the boys not performing at the same 'uuumph' they were at in Roanoke. Besides, this version is nowhere near the blockbuster the one that closed the first set a couple of weeks ago at Alpine. A good-natured "Sugaree" follows. Jerry's all over the place from 5:30-6:05. "Minglewood," like almost always, is a good time...though this is not one for the books. "Well, don't everybody shout at once, ok?" The following "Althea" is perky. "Esau" is standard. "We're going to take a moment and play a game, it's called take a step back." Jerry issues some minor guitar marching orders, (what is the skiffle called?) "You see what happens, their eyes don't bug out, and they look better. And if they look better, we play better." And they do, the misfortune is that the next tune is the unchanging "Push." That being said, it swings more than usual, and Jerry's got verve in his vocals. "Cassidy"'s musical climax is an emotional revelation. Bobby's now trying the desperate tones as "people are in trouble." C'mon Bobby, you know you've experienced some of that 'Brotherly Love' before. Those unmistakable chords fill the air and we're all good..."China's" bright and airy without any of the mental coarseness that would expect to arise in rough Philadelphia. {MY association with the city does not equate with 'soft'...so the delightful delicacy of Jerry's notes makes me :)}"Rider" is quite kind. "LLR" is a very pretty love gone missing ballad. "Terrapin" is the right choice; however, this version's seems affected by the weight of the heat baring down. It's just too sticky and sluggish. "Drums/Space" come and go, the latter of which very nicely increases in momentum so we enter a rockin' extended "Miracle" intro. Both the "Black" and "Around" that follow are pleasant enough, but the boys are obviously holding back their energy for Dylan in the 2nd set. "Saturday" is pleasant, but sounds like a version to end the 1st set...which-technically it is.

Moving on to Dylan... his drawl sounds like a normal person's voice If they had kleenex stuffed below a rolled back tongue. "Tangled" as an opener was a hi-light. "Be Your Baby Tonight" is magnificently adorned by someone's western whining slide. However, most of the songs that follow lack both distinction and a purpose for over 60,000 fans to pack a sweltering JFK stadium. Even more, the Dylan tunes the Dead cover sound sharper with more present-day urgency than any of the versions they do with the writer, himself.

3 stars... but not really a keeper.

Sound is a bummer, but great parking lot at JFK and an overall good Rock and Roll event. We drove down from the Jersey Shore in my friend's grandfathers spanking new minivan. Being the responsible member of the group, I volunteered to drive home. At the tolls on the turnpike, our friends in front of us had no toll money. I said take ours and when the gate goes up, we'll follow you through. They pay, gate goes up, they go through, me fast on their bumper, then SLAM!, the gate crashes down on our hood. Do we wait for assistance? Hell no! Accelerate through the bastard! CRASH, SPLINTER, SCHREECH, CRACK. We smashed through the gate and high tailed it back to the Shore. I pull up in front of my friend's house and left him passed out in the back seat. Needless to say there was extensive damage to the minivan. Oh well, I went for a swim in the ocean at 5 a.m. My friend spent the rest of the summer grounded and working off the damage expenses. God Bless the Grateful Dead!

Man was this a terrific show- it was so damn hot on the floor that people were passing out. But just a fantastic concert- the boys blazing, the crowd crazing, hoses dousing, Dylan, well, croaking. As shows goes this one got a 5 star/9.5 out of 10 rating.

The sound of this recording, however, doesn't even come close to a 5 star rating, especially when compared to some of the top notch sound recordings available on the archive. It's actually hard to listen to. Kinda like being at the show, but being a block or two from the stadium. I give it a 3 just for the memories.....

the whole show is a highlight and better sounding than some of the others from the summer '87 tour.

I took Jerilyn who is a big Dylan fan to this show. We had only recently met and we were trying to see if there was some chemistry between us. She is a beautiful tall blonde ballet dancer. This was the first time I had seen the big screen projections at a stadium gig. We were waiting for the band to come on and the camera man must have decided that she deserved to be up on the big screen. I looked up and saw the two of us 30 feet high! WOW! Well, it turns out there wasn't any chemistry. But she said that it was the best concert she had ever been to!

This audience recording is very good.

this is one great show! I wasnt there but i have listened to this download a bunch and i must say it sounds just great. IT opens with a nice Iko that is a fun way to start a show. The true jem though is the set with Dylan. Historicaly this is a significant time in Dylan's life as he almost retired at the begining of the rehersals with the dead, they helped rejuvinate him and his energy shows through. Great songs here that arnt included in on the Dylan and the Dead CD. Check out John Brown and Simple Twist of Fate!!

heheheh ... the show started out in the late afternoon in a stadium packed with about 110,000 people. sitting right behind the sound engineer's tent at the start, the sounds of iko iko -> jack straw made for a great beginning ... China Cat Sunflower > I Know You Rider got the whole stands going right in the middle of the show ... i remember there was a guy passing around a phattie about 18" long and all the bikers around the place were hootin' and hollerin' ... it just tore the place down. the sound system really kicked butt that night and so did the visuals ;-) ... but don't be fooled ... dylan and jerry were in a weird way. they even forgot words to their own songs ... more than once. just listen to All Along The Watchtower and you'll laugh at how sad it was, but be amazed that so many fans were still enjoying themselves. and hey, the licks were pretty good ... and phil was clearly in good form. definitely a great show to have, especially if you were there. :)

Nice show all the way around. Also some interesting banter, and a complete train wreck false start w/Dylan.

I'm glad to see this one available, as this is a show I was at that I only remember a few snapshots of ;-p