By the summer of 1987, the Grateful Dead were riding one of the most unlikely commercial surges in rock history. "Touch of Grey," the lead single from *In the Dark*, had broken into mainstream radio and MTV rotation just weeks before this show, effectively introducing the band to a new generation of listeners even as the core faithful had been filling arenas for years. Brent Mydland was now firmly embedded as the band's keyboardist — nearly a decade into his tenure — and his muscular, gospel-inflected playing had become central to the band's sound in ways that distinguished this era sharply from the Keith Godchaux years. Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann, and Mickey Hart rounded out a lineup that had genuine chemistry, even if the year-round touring grind was beginning to leave its marks. Park West Ski Resort in Utah is an unusual setting for a Dead show, and that's part of what makes it worth a look. The band wasn't a stranger to outdoor amphitheaters and festival-style grounds, but a ski resort in August — up in the Wasatch Mountains east of Salt Lake City — carries its own particular atmosphere. High altitude, open air, the kind of setting where sound travels strangely and the crowd energy takes on an almost communal, campfire quality.
Shows in this region during the late '80s drew devoted followers from across the Mountain West, and there was often a looseness to these more far-flung stops that you don't always get in the band's regular rotation cities. The one song confirmed in our database from this night is "Promised Land," the Chuck Berry cover that the Dead made their own through decades of use as an opener. Garcia loved Berry deeply, and "Promised Land" — with its cross-country narrative and joyful velocity — was a natural fit for a band that spent its life on the road. When it's firing right, it's a shot of pure momentum, the band snapping into gear and telling the audience in no uncertain terms that the night is beginning. A crisp, confident "Promised Land" tells you a lot about where the band's heads are at. The recording details for this show remain somewhat limited, but audience tapes from this era have improved significantly with modern transfers, and the outdoor setting may have captured something with unusual spatial warmth. If you're curious about the Dead at a commercial peak playing somewhere genuinely off the beaten path, this one deserves your attention — press play and let the mountains do their work.