Fans attending Dead & Company concerts this summer have a chance to take home unique, hand-painted guitars signed by the entire band, commemorating historic venues on their tour.
The collection was created by New York City-based guitar brand D’Angelico Guitars and will be auctioned to raise funds for over a dozen charities.
The first guitar in the series, the “Dancing Bears” model, will be auctioned throughout the tour—closing at the final show in Mountain View, CA (July 30). The other guitars each celebrate one of four legendary venues and will be displayed and auctioned at those specific locations: Citi Field in New York (June 25 and 26), Folsom Field in Boulder, CO (July 2 and 3), Alpine Valley in Elkhorn, Wisconsin (July 9 and 10) and Fenway Park in Boston (July 15 and 16).
The auctions will take place at the “Participation Row” social action village inside each venue, organized by the non-profit organizations HeadCount and REVERB.
Last July, HeadCount auctioned a signed custom D’Angelico guitar—previously played by the Grateful Dead’s Bob Weir on stage—for an eye-popping $526,000 in a Participation Row auction at the final Grateful Dead concert in Chicago. Seventeen charities received over $32,000 each from that auction.
Some beneficiaries of the Dead & Co. auctions will include: HeadCount, Reverb, NORML, Rainforest Action Network and Equality North Carolina. This is all on the heels of Dead & Company donating an additional $100,000 to the Human Rights Campaign and Equality North Carolina to support their fight against the controversial HB2 bill.
Fans who don’t wish to bid on a guitar will also have the chance to win a signed D’Angelico “Lightning Bolt” guitar by visiting non-profit organizations on Participation Row. Anyone who completes actions with three organizations is entered into a free drawing for the signed guitar, and also receives a free “VOTE” pin compliments of Participation Row sponsor Clean Energy Advisors.
Dead & Company includes Grateful Dead members Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann and Bob Weir; singer/guitarist John Mayer; Allman Brothers' bassist Oteil Burbridge; and "Fare Thee Well" and RatDog keyboardist Jeff Chimenti.
For more, visit deadandcompany.com.
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