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I'm surprised no one has written a review of this show yet. I went to both Chinese New Year shows in 1986, this night and the night before it. Both were incredible bay area shows.



Before each of the two Chinese New Year shows, a Chinese band opened the show. The Chinese band was playing already when we first came into the venue. They were playing Chinese music.



During drums, I made my way down to the main floor after an incredible He's Gone -> Smokestack followed by Comes A Time. Shortly after I arrived on the main floor, Space began. A few minutes later, something very unusual happened. The crowd started to cheer. It is not unusual for the crowd at a Dead show to cheer suddenly, but this was in the middle of Space, and it was a sustained cheering, long before the band was ready to come out of Space, so I knew it wasn't just because people had heard the first few notes of what the band would be going into out of Space. There was something else about the way the crowd was cheering. It continued for a while and became progressively louder. Then I noticed that the people on the main floor with me were starting to turn around and look toward the back of the venue. I looked up into the seating area on the sides of the venue and they were all looking toward the back of the venue too.



I turned around and couldn't believe my eyes. Weaving its way through the main floor, only a short distance away from where I stood, was a giant, brightly-colored Chinese dragon. It was writhing and swaying, and a few times it blew real flames from its nostrils. I was standing just behind the soundboard on the Phil side of the room and it was headed right for me. As it got closer, I could see that it was supported by several people who were controlling the motion of the giant dragon with sticks that they were using to make it look like the dragon was moving on its own. It took about 6 or 7 people to control it. As they came closer and made their way right past me, so close that I could touch them, I saw who it was. It was the Chinese band that had opened the show. They were controlling this huge fire breathing dragon that had emerged from the back of the venue during space and was winding its way toward the stage.



If you listen to recordings of this show, you can hear the crowd's reaction during Space. The cheering might be more noticeable on audience recordings of the show.



The dragon wove its way through the dense crowd, up one side of the stage, across the stage with the band still playing Space, and then it exited through the back of the stage never to be seen again. Shortly after that, the Dead went into one of the coolest Other Ones I've ever heard in my life, which didn't have the characteristic intro that The Other One usually has. It had a more subtle, almost spooky, lead in and it was not nearly as obvious at the time what they were going into.



I've searched the Internet long and hard for any photos that anyone might have of that dragon, but I have found nothing. It was one of the coolest, and most unexpected things that I have ever seen happen at a Dead show.

- August 24, 2013Chinese New Year 1986