Swiped off Deadnet-

Tonight's Dead to the World opens with a brief but exciting excerpt from Ratdog 3/31/06 in New Hampshire, and then segues into 90 minutes of The Waybacks. From their performance at The Freight 3/11, I have a 20-minute "Cumberland Blues" that
will knock your socks off; that will be followed by a set recorded March 8 in the KPFA performance studio.

DTTW airs from 8-10pm Pacific Time on KPFA 94.1 in northern California, and on the web at www.kpfa.org and www.kfcf.org

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From The Contra Costa Times:

OUR NEIGHBORS: CHRIS TREADWAY

Wavy Gravy's groovy party

THE STANDARD-BEARER of the '60s is turning 70, and that means it's time for a party. The next step of what Berkeley's own Wavy Gravy calls his "descent into geezerhood" comes on May 20 when a lineup of nine acts -- including two led by former members of the Grateful Dead --takes the Berkeley Community Theater stage for a celebration concert.

Performers will include Bob Weir and Ratdog, Mickey Hart and Friends, Steve Earle, Gillian Welch, David Lindley, John Trudell, Linda Tillery, Nina Gerber and Hamza el Din. "And surprise guests which I'm not at liberty to talk about for various reasons," Gravy said.

The counterculture clown has also invited students from the after-school clown academy at Prescott Elemen-tary School in Oakland to perform.

As always, proceeds from the annual birthday concert benefit the Berkeley-based Seva Foundation, which works to eliminate curable and preventable blindness in India, Nepal, Tibet, Cambodia Bangladesh and Tanzania. "Seeing the poorest of the poor getting cataracts taken out and occular lenses put in was one of the most amazing moments of my life," Gravy said.

To date Seva has made close to 2.5 million eye surgeries possible and has also expanded its scope to address diabetes and lack of potable water on U.S. Indian reservations. It has also started community garden projects on American Indian lands and, believe it or not, is working to bring back bison.

"They're an excellent source of low-cholesterol protein," Gravy said, adding, "Actually they named one of the stud buffalo after me. The Wavy Gravy buffalo is in constant competition with another buffalo named Mike Bison."

As if in proof of Seva's effectiveness, foundation co-founder Dr. Larry Brilliant was appointed in February to head Google.org, the philan-thropic branch of the online search engine. and Gravy, who has made Seva a personal cause and is a founding board member, was at Google headquarters for the formal introduction, along with former vice president Al Gore.

To keep the official record straight, the day of the concert is not really Gravy's birthday. "We had to move the birthday, for mercantile reasons, from the 15th to the 20th," he said.

And May 20 doesn't necessarily begin and end with the show.

"For the high-rollers of the world there is dinner at Berkeley Downtown Restaurant and a post-show reception," Gravy said, plus orchestra pit seating and a numbered, limited-edition concert poster. Those tickets, dubbed Circle of Awe, cost $1,000. Circle of Hope tickets (dinner, poster and orchestra seating) are $250 and Circle of Compassion tickets (orchestra seating, event poster and post-show reception) are $200.

Tickets for the show alone are $35 and $50. And remember, it's for a good cause.



Have a community item or a tip? Call Chris Treadway at 510-262-2784, e-mail ctreadway@cctimes.com, or write to West County Times, 4301 Lakeside Drive, Richmond, CA 94806. Our fax is 510-262-2776.

IF YOU GO

Tickets for Wavy Gravy's 70th Birthday are now on sale at all Ticketmaster outlets and online at http://GDTSTOO.com. Special pre- and post-show reception tickets are on sale through Seva Foundation special events, 510-845-7382, Ext. 332, or visit www.seva.org-/specialevents.
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it's a beautiful afternoon here. Something about the warmth with friendly breezes brings me way back in time to one day when I was in high school. 1975? Seems like we took off like that fairly often.. I think- I could check dates but I'm going by boyfriends-not-years here. I was sort of (the 70's!) with a guy named Mike. He was the year ahead of me. No idea of whatever happened to him? He was moody but cute.
It was just about this time of the day- after lunch, when someone came out to Washington Park (behind the school's "smoking lines") and said they heard of a free concert in GGP! Wouldnt take my group long to decide we could skip the rest of the school day and head up to the city for fun! ALWAYS! no matter how lovely the weather would be here on the Peninsula (Burlingame to be specific) it would always be freezing and foggy at the Park. Oh but what fun it always was!
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I cant remember and am too lazy to check whether I posted a link to this article/interview yet?