Fifty-two years ago tonight, the Grateful Dead kicked off their well-documented Europe ’72 tour with a performance at the Wembley Empire Pool (now the SSE Arena) in London, England.
The show that night opened with an energizing performance of the Bob Weir-led “Greatest Story Ever Told”, and continued with a number of live favorites from the band’s early days including “Sugaree”, “Me And My Uncle”, “China Cat Sunflower” into “I Know You Rider”, “Black-Throated Wind”, “Loser”, the Ron “Pigpen” McKernan-led blues tune “Mr. Charlie”, “Tennessee Jed”, and “Playing in the Band”.
For the second set of the night, the band returned to the stage to deliver renditions of “Truckin’”, “The Other One”, “El Paso”, “Wharf Rat”, “Sugar Magnolia”, “Goin’ Down the Road Feeling Bad” into “Not Fade Away” and “One More Saturday Night”.
Select audio from the April 7th show was released by the band in 2011 as part of the Europe ’72 Volume 2 compilation, while the full-show audio was released as a stand-alone album as part of the Europe ’72: The Complete Recordings box set that same year.
Relive the band’s opening performance from their Europe ’72 tour via the Spotify player below.
Grateful Dead – Wembley Empire Pool – 4/7/72
(4/7/72) Wembley Empire Pool, London, England. @GratefulDead #GratefulDeadSub (Photo pull @Jasonep77) pic.twitter.com/rJxDwE4LwC
— /r/gratefuldead (@Gratefuldeadsub) April 7, 2021
[Originally published 4/7/22]
The post Grateful Dead Open Europe ’72 Tour At London’s Wembley Empire Pool, On This Day In 1972 [Audio/Photos] appeared first on L4LM.
