Steppin' Out with the Grateful Dead: England '72 is a live box set from the Grateful Dead that collects performances from seven of their eight shows in England during their spring 1972 tour of Europe (their first tour of the UK and continental Europe).
The band visited England three times on the tour. They had booked four concerts in London (condensed to two) and one for Newcastle before touring mainland Europe. After the tour began, an opportunity came to return to England to play the stormy Bickershaw Festival, in between dates in Paris and Amsterdam. To make up for the poor sound and crowded shows at the last-minute replacement venue, the Empire Pool, they added more dates at the end of the tour, returning again to London for four performances at the acoustically favorable Lyceum Theatre in the West End.
The Grateful Dead first entertained the idea of going to Europe as early as 1967, and actually had a tour penciled in for the spring of 1968; in fact they even talked about coming home the long way, playing Australia and Japan, too. However, when work on completing Anthem of the Sun dragged on that winter, the tour was scrapped. There were two one-shots in Europe a little later: in May 1970 a generous promoter brought the group over to the oddly named Hollywood Festival in Newcastle-Under-Lyme, England, where the Dead shared the bill with Traffic, Free, Mungo Jerry and Jose Feliciano, playing before 40,000 people on a stage that was framed by a huge inflatable phallus on one side and giant pink breasts on the other; very strange. And in June 1971, after a festival they were supposed to be a part of near Paris was rained out, the Dead played a couple of sets for a handful of townspeople from Auvers-sur-Oise (where Van Gogh is buried) on the grounds of the Chateau d'Herouville, a supposedly haunted mansion that doubled as a recording studio and party hangout for Europe's rock royalty all through the '70s.
But the timing couldn't have been better when the Dead finally did make it to Europe for a tour in the spring of 1972. They were riding high on the success of Workingman's Dead, American Beauty and the live "Skull and Roses" albums. Garcia had just released his eponymous solo debut, and most of the band had pitched in to record Bob Weir's excellent Ace LP, released that spring. The Dead had turned a new corner with the addition of pianist Keith Godchaux in the fall of '71. With his deft rhythmic touch, strong instinct for imaginative coloration and uncanny ability to slide seamlessly into every genre the band tackled, Keith added power, dimension and flexibility to the group's sound - there are many Deadheads who consider the spring of '72 through the "retirement" shows in the fall of '74 to be the Dead's creative apex. The '72 Europe campaign also marked the band's first extended outing with new backup singer Donna Godchaux; another fundamental change in the band's sound.
- Jerry Garcia – lead guitar, vocals
- Bob Weir – rhythm guitar, vocals
- Ron "Pigpen" McKernan – organ, harmonica, vocals
- Phil Lesh – bass guitar, vocals
- Bill Kreutzmann – drums
- Keith Godchaux – piano
- Donna Jean Godchaux – vocals
- Cold Rain and Snow
- Greatest Story Ever Told
- Mr. Charlie
- Sugaree
- Mexicali Blues
- Big Boss Man
- Deal
- Jack Straw
- Big Railroad Blues
- Hurts Me Too
- China Cat Sunflower->
- I Know You Rider
- Playing In the Band
- Good Lovin'
- Ramble On Rose
- Black-Throated Wind
- Sitting On Top of the World
- Comes A Time
- Turn On Your Lovelight->
- Goin' Down the Road Feelin' Bad->
- Not Fade Away->
- Hey Bo Diddley->
- Not Fade Away
- Rockin' Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu
- Black Peter
- Chinatown Shuffle
- Truckin'->
- Drums->
- The Other One->
- El Paso->
- The Other One->
- Wharf Rat
- One More Saturday Night
- Uncle John's Band
- The Stranger (Two Souls In Communion)
- Dark Star->
- Sugar Magnolia->
- Caution (Do Not Stop On Tracks)
- Brokedown Palace
