Got To Find A Number To Use

8 – Hallelujah hatracks (Really?)

4 – Dead keyboard players. Not 4 keyboardists for the Dead, 4 dead keyboardists. How is it possible that the mortality rate for musicians in an improvisational country-rock outfit is higher than that of those guys who parachute into forest fires? The family crest of the Dead keyboardist read Pertransiit sine me (Go on without me).

3 – Fancy little shoe racks for TC’s fancy little ankle boots.

210,000 – Number of dollars Lenny Hart stole from the band while “managing” them.

40,000 – Number of dollars Lenny Hart stole during the meeting to try to explain the financial irregularities when someone left the door to the safe open. They were trusting men, at first, our Dead.

88 – Keys on a piano.

176 – How many Keith usually saw.

1 – Number of times a crew member looked Phil directly in the eyes. Just that once.

95 – Live albums released, 110 if you count the Digital Download series (One of which I’m listening to now, the Donna-tacular 4/30/77 at the Palladium in NYC. (Audience copy, if you’re into that sort of thing. Harumph. But, seriously, it’s an AUD: think about whether that’s the person you want to be. AUD guys are to Enthusiasts what fat guys fluent in Klingon are to Trekkies)

13 – Studio albums

2 – That were any good at all.

0 – Number of times the question, “How many fingers does the Grateful Dead have?” can be answered with a whole number.

12,000 – Amount extra versus a standard P.A. it cost to tote the Wall of Sound around. Luckily, it was worth the price because it was “the righteous thing to do, man.” That is an exact quote from Blair Jackson, who was actually talking about something else entirely, but FUCK CONTEXT.

6 – Months it took the righteous thing to do to break the band’s back.

2 – Drummers.

1 – Drummer.

2 – Drummers.

12 – Teenage male hustlers found horribly mutilated throughout the 80’s in a pattern correlating to the Dead’s tour schedule. The culprit was never found, but was described as having luxuriously thick blond hair and singing the high harmony part. The pattern stopped briefly in 1989, but picked up again–far more rapidly now–in 1990, except this time it was females and there’s a weird theory that there were two guys based round this mystery man they call Suburban Lanky. Doesn’t make any sense at all, if you asked me.

40 – Milliseconds after Bobby asked, “Tonight, what if we open…wait for it…with the encore?” that his dick got punched.

300,000  – Dollars spent by Mickey in the winter of 1977 to create his most ambitious percussive masterpiece to date. Mickey planned and rehearsed diligently. He spent over a year writing the score and hired musicians from all over the world, building them a brand-new studio. Then he locked them in that brand-new studio, set it ablaze, and recorded their dying screams. Lou Reed is quoted as saying, “Why didn’t I think of that?” The album was never released, except in Norway where it reached #31 on the Billboard-flurgen charts.

14 – Bucks for the Oven-Roasted Shrimp and Sun-Dried Tomatoes at Phil’s new hotspot, Terrapin Crossroads. Come for the food, stay for the Phil!

Dead Koan

Once, a master asked his student, “Why does Billy punch dicks?”

And the student did not answer, because he had been punched in the dick.

That master also wrote a famous haiku called “Summer Tour”:

The shorts of Garcia

Have been put on–motherfuck!

He just punched my dick

Candyman

You know the first of The Rules, don’t you? Life is short: listen to 1973. Now, you might substitute in 1977 or 1974 or certainly the hidden gem year of 1971. But you’d never throw in ’88, would you?

But then there’s this! (How am I treating this show like I discovered it? It’s fucking famous.) 6/28/85 at Hershey Park Stadium. Check it out, starting at the Brobdingnagian Music Never Stopped and it just gets better from there.

P.S. Except of course for Garcia losing his way through Terrapin, lyrically speaking. but aside from that, it gets better. For little gay kids and for a handful (at most) of weirdos listening to a specific musical performance given 18 billion years ago.

P.P.S. Holy shit, listen to Morning Dew and then realize that, had you been at this show, you would have been listening to this face-boiling Dew and not, like, 100 yards away is a rolly-coaster. God bless America and all her ships at sea.

P.P.P.S.  So, of course, after 6/28 ends, I throw on 6/30 and there are some audacious moments: the Shakedown is outstanding, parts of the Stella are great, but my overall opinion is not swayed–Life is short: listen to ’73.

Easy Answers

Okay, Grateful Dead cocktail party games. Annnnnnnnnnnd: go!

Dead as countries Phil is Germany, technical and peevish; Brent is Canada, adorable and drunk; Billy is Mozambique, because Mozambique’s flag has a fist holding an AK-47 on it. No secrets, there.

Dead as Wars, Ancient Phil is most certainly the Punic Wars, all of them: savage, righteous, salted. Mickey is the Warring States Period, just because I like the name. (I was thinking about reading about the history of China, so I looked at the shop and the smallest of the books was so heavy that the Dead lugged it around with them in ’78 “just because.” Plus, I know I should care about the place where a sixth of the world lives, but try reading that wikipedia page. I get three sentences in, tops.) Garcia is the Persian War.

Dead as animals(visual) Garcia is obviously a koala: just picture a koala, now add the glasses. (That image isn’t getting out of your head, sorry.) Brent is a hedgehog. Donna is a squirrel. Phil is halfway between an ostrich and a giraffe.

Dead as animals (metaphorical) Bobby: Springer spaniel. Garcia: silverback gorilla. Phil: halfway between an ostrich and a giraffe.

Dead as rivers: TC is the Danube; Vince is the CayuhogaCuyahoga; Billy is the Mississippi: mighty, proud, and difficult to spell.

Most appropriate Dead song for the funeral of a FTM transsexual He’s Gone. 

Least appropriate Dead song for the funeral of a MTF transsexual He’s Gone.

Play By Number

On 2/22/74, at Winterland, the Dead played BIODTL with a 22-beat opener. Or, as Bobby thought of it, “Just keep hitting an F chord until Garcia nods at me.”

P.S. Check out 11 minutes into the Playin’, when Garcia starts paying the twisty little riff to Slipknot! for the first(?) time. Billy sure didn’t know what was going on.

P.P.S. AND THEN HE PLAYS IT AGAIN IN EYES. I JUST POOPED WITH JOY. AND OREOS.

Been All Around This World

Going through the Library to reorganize the shows and had some silly ol’ thoughts about the way folks were namin’ places back then, and I sure did wanna share some of ’em with you. Maybe it’ll getcha smilin’.

Lloyd Noble, Sam Boyd, Henry J. Kaiser, Roscoe Maples…who were these mysterious and brave people cutting swatches of life out of the broadcloth of the world? We’ll never know. (Oilman, gambler, shipbuilder, lover of pavilions. What’s weird is that Sam is short for Samantha and Roscoe is a family name, so these four names actually represent two men, two women and features a full range of ethnic diversity. Kidding: they look like political cartoon Robber Barons from the 1890’s.)

Everybody’s terrifying old favorite: War Memorial Stadium.

Was Red Rocks as bad as blue balls?

Legion Stadium is clearly where the end of Days will be kicking off.

The Mosque? In Atlanta?

Pirate’s World, Catholic Youth Center, gym, assembly hall, gym, gym, gym. They played a lot of shitty barns, didn’t they?

The Jai-Alai Fronton in Miami, which is redundant, because all a fronton is for is jai-alai. It’s like a velodrome or an aquarium or Billy’s second bedroom: only one thing gets done there and you should have realized it going in. Now, you’re sticky. (Jai-Alai is a great game: wiry Cubans who just barely sized out of jockey school whipping what amounts to a cue ball against a wall at 170 mph and catching it with wicker. Plus, betting.)

The hippie names: the Family Dog, the Great Highway, the Warehouse, the Euphoria Ballroom, the University of Oregon.

The beautiful ones: the Boston Music Hall, the Academy of Music, Winterland, the Great Western Forum, the Beacon Theatre.

The strangely generic: Atlanta Municipal Auditorium, Cape Cod Coliseum, Broome County Arena. (Was there not ONE MAN of the high standards of, say, Sam Boyd in the community? HARRUMPH.)

The cheery: Merriweather Post Pavillion. (Say it out loud. Fun, right?)

The outdoorsy: Buckeye Lake, Pine Knob, Alpine Valley

The Hellenic: the Greek Theater.

The Hellenistic: St. Paul Auditorium.

From The Crotch Of Me

I have a crush on Donna. There, I’ve said it.

Just Like Frankenstein

Wanna laugh? Go listen to Ramble On Rose from the famous RFK show in 1973. Gentlemen, I know it’s impossible to always be playing the same song, but can we not at least play in the same key?

P.S. Wanna keep laughing? Keep playing the show until you get to Box of Rain, where you will learn that no one informed Phil’s larynx about the whole “perfect pitch” thing.

P.P.S And then, of course, keep listening to the way they take Stella Blue from train wreck to utter, tear-inducing revelation in less than two verses until, for the first time in the show, they’re in the groove and Garcia’s all, “I’m gonna fuck shit up now, fuck it up so very hard.” AND HE DOES. (The previous two sentences are to be known as Exhibit A in the case of Why Hasn’t UCSC Called Yet?

P.P.P.S Go listen to Billy on He’s Gone. Go back and listen to that man RIGHT NOW or we can’t be friends anymore. The only explanation for Billy’s prowess is that on days off, he secretly roamed the countryside cutting the heads off of other drummers and absorbing their skills through the Quickening.

If I Told You ‘Bout All That Went Down…

As is my wont (and my tont and my soupt), this begins with a plea, an urgent command from the Library to listen to something, something you’ve almost definitely heard before, but listen to Keith here on 5/7/77 playing Mississippi Half-Step on THE ORGAN FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE THE TOUR STARTED, THANK YOU.  Forget the sheer tonnage of beatdown Garcia is bringing: listen to the B3!

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Okay: I can tell how many people are clicking on what links and the cold, hard fact is that not nearly enough of you are going on to listen to 8/24/72 even though I keep telling you and breaking your toys in front of you and making you wear Dead Mom’s lipstick every Wednesday night. Humpday? Huh. You got no idea.

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In the early days, they all had different relationships with the concept of being in tune. Phil agreed whole-heartedly when it came to his bass and his voice in the early days, but after his vocal sabbatical, he was just all over the place. Bobby played in tune and sang out of it, Garcia sang in tune, and played out of it. Keith was just plain out of it.

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Tupac keeps making popping up, Morrison went to Africa like Rimbaud, and people will be seeing Elvis along the highway for as long as the Republic stands. Garcia? He’s gone.

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39:07 for The Other One on 9/17/72? Why? Why, Grateful Dead: why would you let this happen? Forget the sheer tonnage of notes; instead, note the date: September 17, 1972. It’s been released, officially, as Dick’s Picks 23. This is not just a show they played, this is something they offered for sale in the market with their imprimatur. In other words. the Dead are telling us that this is behavior that they are proud of. “Most bands could play a song for maybe 20 minutes and then it would get weird and sad. It took us 40 minutes. GRATEFUL DEAD RULES, EVERYBODY ELSE DROOLS”

I Will Not Condemn You

There have been new visitors to the bloggings, mostly from the wonderful and masculine-smelling Reddit, which was exciting and sexual. Problem was, I think the last few postings on the bloggings have been kind of weird and insular and not really about the Dead as much as my wrestling with the Creeping Insanity and that fucker just having his way with me. No contest, just taking his sweet time.

Until I yearned for it.

That is the kind of shit we had the meeting about.

Right, right. Sorry. So: who is this for? If you fit any one of the following descriptions, you should dive into the archives.(Actually, physically dive into them. Running start right into the computer: I swear it will work. It is an app.)

• You love the Weather Report Suite, yet realize the lyrics are so dumb they ought to be quarantined. Black dirt live again, my ass. (But here’s an awesome WRS from the Curtis Hixon Convention Center in Tampa on 12/18/73. This is one of my favorite names for a 70’s arena. I just wish it had merged with the nearby building in Pembroke Pines to become the Curtis Hixon Sportatorium, which is the most 70’s you can get in three words. You can almost picture the enormous tie knots and boxing still being relevant.
• You’ve ever idly wondered whether, after building the Wall of Sound, they considered building a Wall of Sight. Or maybe a Wall of Taste. (Warning: do not taste the Wall of Taste.)
• You like the parts that are in between the songs better than the songs.
• Occasionally–not always, but certainly not never–Jack Straw gets on your last nerve.
• You have forgiven Vince, but still choose not to listen to his dinky tinklings.
• Your ongoing argument with yourself regarding The Greatest ___ Ever! has resorted to factionalism, dirty-fighting, and–since Billy is involved–crotchpunching.In my head, it feels as though each year has achieved sentience and is now throwing evidence around when I’m trying to do other things like eat or cry or eat while I’m crying. It’s like the Italian parliament up there, but with nary a spicy meatball.
• You want Sugaree to be longer. No matter how long it is, you believe it could stand to gain another 8 minutes or so.
• You’ll put up with Bobby’s cowboy bullshit, but not his first set turn as Silly Dixon.
• You got here by googling “rule 34 grateful dead.” You are sick, though constantly recurring, blips on my analytics and I welcome you to a place where you’ll be accepted. (Warning: there will be NONE of that “slash” fan fiction stuff where you take other people’s characters and hump them together like they were your childhood toys. However, we may dip our toes into that shiver-inducing pond by figuring out the most horrifying match-up: my money’s on Phil/Billy, because in the whisper of time before Billy started punching dicks, it would be awkward.)
• Now you’re thinking about it, aren’t you? Even if you don’t want to, your brain’s just going “Brent/Mickey? Hornsby/Phil?” Tell me what the worst of the terrible, terrible images your brain is rifling through right now against your will in the comments. Best one wins a lifetime supply of Beard! for men with beards. Have a beard? Use Beard!