page_title: Deadhead
section_title: Recordings of shows
hierarchical_section_title: Deadhead / Recordings of shows
caption_attribution_description: Bob Weir and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead performing at the 2009 Mid-Atlantic Inaugural Ball during the Obama Inaugural.
context_page_description: A Deadhead or Dead Head is a fan of the American rock band the Grateful Dead. In the 1970s, a number of fans began travelling to see the band in as many shows or festival venues as they could. With large numbers of people thus attending strings of shows, a community developed. Deadheads developed their own idioms and slang.
  Much Deadhead-related historical material received or collected by the band over the years is housed in the Grateful Dead Archive of UC Santa Cruz. Archive founding curator Nicholas Meriwether, who has also written extensively about the culture and its impact on society, predicted, "The Grateful Dead archive is going to end up being a critical way for us to approach and understand the 1960s and the counterculture of the era... It's also going to tell us a lot about the growth and development of modern rock theater, and it's helping us understand fan culture."
context_section_description: At almost every Grateful Dead show, it was common to see fans openly recording the music for later enjoyment. This can be traced to shows in the late 1960s, with the number of tapers increasing yearly.  In 1971, Les Kippel, from Brooklyn, New York, started the First Free Underground Grateful Dead Tape Exchange.  The purpose of "The First Free Underground Grateful Dead Tape Exchange" was to preserve the heritage of the Grateful Dead's concert history by exchanging copies of recorded tapes made from audience members.  This started a new era in recording, collecting, and trading Grateful Dead tapes.  Often referred to as the "Original Napster", the tape exchange grew into an international movement that continues today.
  The "Tape Exchange" evolved into Dead Relix magazine, co-founded by Kippel and its first editor, Jerry Moore (1953–2009), a native of The Bronx, New York.  First fliers were handed out at concerts in 1973, followed by a first issue in 1974. In 1974, Dead Relix evolved into Relix magazine and kept the Grateful Dead in the news while they took a year off in 1975.  In 1980, Toni Brown became owner and publisher of Relix.  In 2000, it was sold to Steve Bernstein. Relix is the second-oldest continuously published rock magazine in the world, after Rolling Stone.  Relix is still the only publication that supports the heritage of the Grateful Dead.
  There were other Deadhead magazines that came about in the 1970s, notably, Dead in Words and In Concert.  The 1980s saw the production of Terrapin Flyer, Dupree's Diamond News, Golden Road, and Acid.  Dupree's Diamond News was distributed as an in-concert newsletter at several hundred Grateful Dead concerts, where it averaged 10,000 copies per run.  Dupree's Diamond News was also distributed on a quarterly basis as a full-color, 72-page magazine to approximately 35,000 international subscriptions.
  In 1998, Grateful Dead scholar Johnny Dwork, the founder of Terrapin Flyer and Dupree's Diamond News, published the award-winning, three-volume The Deadhead's Taping Compendium: A Guide to the Music of the Grateful Dead on Tape.
  Fans were also known to record the many FM radio broadcast shows. Garcia looked kindly on tapers (he himself had been on several cross-country treks to record bluegrass music prior to the Grateful Dead), stating: "There's something to be said for being able to record an experience you've liked, or being  to obtain a recording of it ... my responsibility to the notes is over after I've played them." In this respect, the Dead are considered by many to be the first "taper-friendly" band.
  It is a matter of strict custom among Deadheads that these recordings are freely shared and circulated, with no money ever changing hands. Some bootleg recordings from unscrupulous bootleggers have turned up on the black market, but a general "code of honor specifically prohibited the buying and selling of Dead tapes." These recordings, sometimes called "liberated bootlegs", are still frowned upon by the community and that feeling "has spread into non-Grateful Dead taping circles."
  Many Deadheads now freely distribute digital recordings of the band's music, and there are several websites that provide and promote legal access of lossless music.
caption: Bob Weir and Mickey Hart of the Grateful Dead performing on January 20, 2009 at the Mid-Atlantic Inaugural Ball during President Barack Obama's Inaugural
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