Anthony Coscia with his scale model of the Grateful Dead’s Wall of Sound. ALEX LEARY/THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
SOUTHBURY, Conn.—In 1974 the Grateful Dead revolutionized concert audio with a three-story, 28,800-watt system called the Wall of Sound. Fans were blown away, but the wall only lasted a year.
Nearly 50 years later, Anthony Coscia has built a one-sixth scale model in his basement—and fans are going wild once again.
“He’s nuts,” says Richard Pechner, a former roadie who had the grueling job of assembling the real wall each show. “I mean, look, I absolutely love what he’s doing. He’s not faking it. He’s trying to replicate it. It’s a mind blower.”
Stuck home during Covid-19, Mr. Coscia has labored four hours a day over two months, creating a social-media phenomenon among Deadheads, few of whom experienced the Wall of Sound—he didn’t either—but who hold it in mythical status for its size and pioneering of high fidelity concert audio.
The pandemic has driven people to bread baking, binge watching and dog ownership. For music lovers, the lack of concerts has stirred a yearning for sonic bliss that the best live stream can’t produce.