The Fillmore in San Francisco is a historic music venue, named after its original location at the intersection of Fillmore Street and Geary Boulevard. Known as the Fillmore Auditorium in the mid-1960s, concert promoter Bill Graham began a series of concerts featuring bands from the counterculture of the time. In 1968, due to his spiralling success, he moved to a larger venue which he named Fillmore West. Having closed in 1971, and after extensive repair work to fix earthquake damage, Graham's was revived when Live Nation reopened the original Fillmore venue in 1994.

San Francisco in the mid-1960s was the hub of the LSD and Hippie scene and the cultural and political rebellion of 1967's Summer of Love. The resulting influence of these factors on the artists of the area created the fantastic psychedelic posters of the Fillmore. Art dealer Jacaeber Kastor said of the posters, "They couldn't just tell you the information about the show. They had to tell you what kind of people you might meet, what kind of far out trip you might have or perhaps even reveal the mysteries of the universe. Wow. Quantum mechanics, visual mudwrestling, Acid test pop quiz on a phone pole!"

This gig was held at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, with bands that had all developed in San Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium. It was headlined by Jefferson Airplane, a seminal psychedelic band whose 1967 album Surrealistic Pillow is considered one of the key recordings of the Summer of Love. Second on the bill was Grateful Dead, an American rock band formed in 1965 in San Francisco. The band was known for its unique and eclectic style, fusing elements of rock, folk, psychedelia, and space rock and for live performances of long musical improvisation. Also playing were Big Brother and the Holding Company, a seminal San Francisco psychedelic rock band featuring Janis Joplin on vocals.