Not how you want to start a weekend but alas nobody’s getting out of here alive.
Death comes for all of us and today it took Phil Lesh.
I know enough to know there’s better opinions and more knowledgeable people to speak on the matter.
This is the best I can do.
The Grateful Dead need no introduction.
From 1965-1995 they played more live music than anyone in history.
And they did it with a sound so unique that it defies explanation.
Mostly, they’re irreplecable and I’m here to argue that’s directly because of Phil Lesh.
To understand why, you have to first understand the roots of the band.
They started in 1965.
Bill offered Jerry a job to give guitar lessons.
Guitar lessons were exchanged and shortly thereafter, a band called Mother McCree’s Uptown Jug Champions was born.
But no Phil Lesh.
Not yet at least.
The unique thing here is that it’s all acoustic.
But really it’s a completely different sound than Mother McCrees in 1964.
Then in 1965, Jerry Garcia wanted to go electric.
So they went electric and changed their name to the Warlocks.
But in the process, they needed tofindelectric equipment, which was expensive.
So they brought along a below average bass player whose family owned the local music store.
The music’s alright but Jerry really knows the bass player blows.
He’s a composer dropout from UC Berkley and he loves doing drugs.
It’s a perfect fit for a group of misfit toys, and from here, everything changes.
Phil Lesh made things weird.
He made it unique.
He got the band to break into 30 minute improvisations.
And as I pop in this out, a stark realization comes to the front of my mind.
Jerry Garcia is arguably one of the best guitar players of all time.
Certainly one of the most recognizable and absolutely one of the most unique.
His image and status so far exceeded the rest of the band combined.
And comparatively, Jerry played with much better musicians than his bandmates in their time apart.
But he always said there was no greater challenge or better feeling than performing live with the Grateful Dead.
That’s because of Phil Lesh.
What makes that significant is the Grateful Dead relied on simplicity in the structure.
Example: Morning Dew is three chords.
Example: I Know You Rider is three chords.
To play along with them can be as easy or as hard as you want.
Somehow in that way he was both uniting the stage while pursuing his own individual sound.
The Grateful Dead, in a sense, existed long before Phil Lesh showed up.
Why and how is worth 10,000 words so I’ll just settle on this.
There’s no Grateful Dead if there’s no Phil Lesh.
He will be missed.
kindly do yourself a favor and read some tributes from some smarter people.
They’re definitely out there.
For now here’s the only song he sang for the band.
- He wrote it for his dad while he was dying from cancer.
Really powerful stuff if you think about it.
EDIT: *One of two songs.
He also sang Unbroken Chain.
