The band performed their first concert on 4 December 1965. In 1981, their leader Jerry Garcia talked to the BBC about how they became superstars but "never sold out".

The Grateful Dead began life as kings of the 1960s West Coast psychedelic scene, yet they were untouched by glamour. Long after bad vibes and commercialism soured the hippy dream, their heady mix of lengthy improvised guitar jams and communal celebration remained defiantly unchanged, until the 1995 death of leader Jerry Garcia in rehab at the age of 53. While contemporaries such as the Rolling Stones and Jefferson Airplane adapted to shifting trends, the Dead remained essentially the same.

It was hardly a recipe for superstardom, yet when Forbes magazine listed the world's 40 highest-paid entertainers in 1990–91, the Grateful Dead ranked 20th, with an estimated $33 million – putting them within touching distance of pop sensation MC Hammer. What a long, strange trip it had been for a band who started out three decades earlier playing in San Francisco's Victorian ballrooms to soundtrack hallucinogenic drug experiments.

With no obvious star performer and a fiercely non-commercial ethos, the Dead were a genuine underground band. Their success wasn't built on record sales – although in 1987 they scored an unlikely MTV hit with Touch of Grey, thanks to a video featuring life-size skeleton marionettes. Instead, they cultivated a devoted tribe of Deadheads who followed them from town to town in a travelling circus of hippiedom.

Garcia said in 1988: "To the kids today, the Grateful Dead represents America: the spirit of being able to go out and have an adventure." Fans gathered in venue car parks long before showtime for Shakedown Street, informal markets that sprung up and were named after the band's 1978 album. They never sold out, refusing corporate sponsorship and even encouraging the trading of bootleg tapes. They also prided themselves on ever-changing setlists, so devotees still pore over the nightly variations sparked by the band's unique chemistry.

In 1981, the BBC's Newsnight was on hand to witness the excitement of the faithful at the Dead's return to London for the first time in seven years, playing four epic nights at the Rainbow Theatre. Across the city in the Blitz nightclub, the New Romantic pop scene was in full swing, with bands such as Spandau Ballet reacting with dandyish flair to the ugly aesthetic of punk.

In History

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