1964 - My live rock concert journey began not at the Fillmore, but at the Cow Palace, Berkeley Community Theatre and San Francisco Civic Auditorium. The KYA (1260 AM) "Boss of the Bay" concerts at the Cow Palace were extravaganzas. A dozen acts in 3 hours, rapid fire. My 17-year old sister Jeanne and one of her girlfriends were kind enough to allow me and my buddy, Dave Ferguson, to tag along. I was 13 years old and we were buzzing about it for days. The groups I remember were The Ronnettes, The Righteous Brothers and Sonny and Cher.
1965 - The KYA shows were great but what came next was a revelation. I had already come under the spell of The Beatles and Bob Dylan and was struggling with my first acoustic guitar when my friend Randy Helsing scored a couple of Bob Dylan tickets at Berkeley Community Theatre. "Subterranean Homesick Blues" had already blown my mind on the radio and the album Bringin' It All Back Home on the "HiFi" turntable at home but I will never forget my first experience of being in the presence - live, raw and in the flesh - of true genius. A solo acoustic set, intermission and then a full band electric set. The vision, the poetry, the power...I was a goner.
A couple of months latter Randy and I came face to face (we had great seats) with a strutting, raw powerhouse of a British R&B band - The Rolling Stones at the San Francisco Civic Auditorium (now called the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium and deservedly so). At that point they were doing mostly American rock and blues covers but even then, you could tell that there was something special about these guys. That "something special" would carry them through the next 50 years.
Up next and right soon - The Fillmore. Until then.