... but don't get the whole collecting shitty bootlegs aspect of it.
This was the reason I started recording bands live in the first place. It was always neat to trade tapes; not just the Dead, but to hear what other tapers were listening to, "talking shop" and technique.
Other notes, I love the Dead but certain decades bug me more than others. Went to shows, had a great time. Bobby is a cheese ball, but great rhythm guitarist. Hate to be "that guy" about Jerry "being" the dead, but I went to a couple of war rat/further/"new" Dead shows and it just felt like people were sucking the "it'll never die" teet.
Trey was the inevitable but wrong choice for these shows, but I wouldn't go anyway, so, there's that.