LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City.
An article I posted a couple of days ago about Pink Floyd performing at Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City in 1973 made me want to see a list of every act that played there. And since none existed, I decided to make one myself. You can see it below.
I started with setlist.fm but found other sources, too, including this great article on rockprosopography101.blogspot.com. I used a variety of other online resources, too, to clarify information and correct errors. If anyone has any information to add, please do, in the Comments section below.
Roosevelt Stadium, located in the Droyers Point section of Jersey City, opened in 1937 and was demolished in 1985. I concentrated on the years of 1972 to 1976, when promoter John Scher presented major rock concerts there every summer. Through the years, the stadium hosted baseball games, boxing matches (including one featuring Sugar Ray Robinson), professional wrestling, other sports events, drum and bugle competitions, and more. The Brooklyn Dodgers played 15 games there in 1956 and 1957.
In 1946, Jackie Robinson broke the Major League Baseball system’s color barrier by playing for The Montreal Royals in a season-opening minor league game against The Jersey City Giants.
This ad shows four 1972 Roosevelt Stadium shows at the top.
Here is the list of 1972-’76 Roosevelt Stadium concerts. I included links to setlist.fm pages that give total or partial setlists for certain acts.
July 13, 1972: Chicago
July 18, 1972: The Grateful Dead
Aug. 10, 1972: Alice Cooper, The J. Geils Band, Flash (featuring former Yes member Peter Banks)
Aug. 19, 1972: The Kinks
Sept. 6, 1972: Joe Cocker with The Chris Stainton Band, Mark-Almond (featuring Jon Mark and Johnny Almond), Patto
Sept. 17, 1972: Leon Russell, Captain Beyond
Sept. 19, 1972: The Grateful Dead, New Riders of the Purple Sage
June 18, 1973: Pink Floyd
July 26, 1973: Three Dog Night, T. Rex
July 31 and Aug. 1, 1973: The Grateful Dead (July 31, Aug. 1), The Band (July 31, Aug. 1)
Aug. 12, 1973: Santana, Tower of Power
Aug. 18, 1973: Grand Funk Railroad, Lee Michaels
Aug. 25, 1973: The Beach Boys, Poco, Stanky Brown
June 7-8, 1974: The Allman Brothers Band (June 7, June 8), Grinderswitch
June 30, 1974: Seals & Crofts, Maria Muldaur, The Souther-Hillman-Furay Band, England Dan & John Ford Coley
July 7, 1974: Eric Clapton (with guest appearance by Freddie King), Ross
Aug. 6, 1974: The Grateful Dead
Aug. 8, 1974: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, Jesse Colin Young
Aug. 20, 1974: Emerson, Lake & Palmer
Aug. 23, 1974: The Beach Boys, The Eagles
Sept. 2, 1974: Chicago, The Doobie Brothers, Ozark Mountain Daredevils
June 14, 1975: Pink Floyd
July 6, 1975: Alice Cooper, Johnny Winter, Leslie West with Corky Laing, James Gang
July 19, 1975: The Eagles, Seals & Crofts, Poco
July 25, 1975: Yes, Ace
Aug. 22, 1975: The Faces/Rod Stewart, Ten Years After, Lynyrd Skynyrd
Aug. 31, 1975: The Doobie Brothers, The Outlaws, New Riders of The Purple Sage
Sept. 13, 1975: The Allman Brothers Band, The Charlie Daniels Band, Muddy Waters
June 17, 1976: Yes, The Pousette-Dart Band
July 10, 1976: Kiss, The J. Geils Band, Bob Seger & the Silver Bullet Band, Point Blank
July 29, 1976: The Eagles, Boz Scaggs
Aug. 4, 1976: The Grateful Dead
Aug. 28, 1976: The Beach Boys, The Richie Furay Band
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8 comments
My cousin Kathy and I attended the September 13th 1975 Allman Brothers show. My car wouldn’t start after the show so we spent the midnight hours at a diner across rt. 440 sipping coffee until the following morning when we were able to start it.
My car, a 1979 Triumph TR6 was very temperamental and wouldn’t start below a certain temperature. Of course that night was quite cold for September.
Wow, this article brought back a great memory.
I was there too, awesome show. I remember 2 guitarist with the allmans, but looked it up and there was only Dickey Betts…..
June 30, 1974: Seals & Crofts….I recollect that Seals & Croft were billed for that date but we’re unable to be there.
Not sure you’re write about that. Setlist.fm has an entry for them (though it’s just one song). And I found this photo online that’s labeled as drummer Jeff Porcaro performing with Seals & Croft at Roosevelt Stadium in 1974. https://x.com/barneyhurley1/status/1642605248177905666?s=20
You might notice that the CSNY show on August 8, 1974 coincided with the speech where Richard Nixon resigned from the presidency. We all knew that Nixon had scheduled a speech that night, and David Crosby kept disappearing off-stage between songs so that he would be ready to announce the resignation as soon as it became official.
Which year did The Grateful Dead get rained out? Can’t remember if it was 74 or 76. Then the makeup was pretty much free I don’t remember anybody having stubs or tickets. What amazing shows those were. Jerry in his prime was the energizer Jerry!
’74. Show was originally scheduled for Fri., Aug. 2; was postponed to Tues., Aug. 6. Good account of what happened here: http://deadsources.blogspot.com/2022/02/august-2-6-1974-roosevelt-stadium.html
OK thanks Jay. I recall ropes being hurled down from inside the brick walls and coolers tied on and hauled up like some mad pirate movie. Between sets we went to restrooms behind home plate where we encountered the Hells Angels. They were walking for wide; one wheeling his bike. One had a Crocodile Dundee knife; another had a huge circus leather whip wrapped around his arm. No eye contact from me as they passed by…I was too high for this. The crowd parted like the Red Sea. The show was incredible as stated in the article. The Wall of Sound…I miss those days but remember Roosevelt Stadium fondly.