Off the Charts: Ratdog

The music never, ever, ever stopped

By Newt Briggs

With a few notable and disturbing exceptions, Deadheads, like revolutionaries, tend to trickle back into the mainstream--their hemp jewelry and didgeridoos traded for tortoiseshell glasses and laptops. At such times, it can be hard to distinguish a reformed 'head from the rest of the flock--unless, of course, you ask the suspected convert where he or she was when Jerry died. For those who never dropped four-way windowpane LSD at a Dead show, the answer will be a puzzled, "Who's Jerry?" (or possibly, "You mean Jerry Orbach?"). But to a former Deadhead, it is a question of cosmic significance--a date and time etched on their brain like a dancing bear patch on an old Army duffel. The question refers specifically to Aug. 9, 1995, the day that Jerry Garcia died.

Preceded into the afterlife by keyboardists Ron "Pigpen" McKernan, Keith Godchaux and Brett Mydland, Garcia passed away in his sleep at Serenity Knolls Chemical Dependency Center in Forest Knolls, Calif. There, he was seeking treatment for a relapse into heroin addiction, but his heart succumbed to opiates and cholesterol before he could recover. The news of his passing shook the nation's itinerant hippie community to its corduroy core. Lighters were raised, live versions of "Not Fade Away" were played on a seemingly endless loop and everyone remembered where they were and what they were doing at that exact moment. (As it turns out, the vast majority were taking bong hits and watching "Small Wonder" reruns in their parent's basement.)

Now, almost 10 years after Garcia, the world is largely the same: Jam bands still solo on into the night, Volkswagen campers still roam America's highways, rich kids still panhandle for change on Haight Street in San Francsco and college students still chomp down hallucinogenic mushrooms that they know were cultivated on cow shit. Although the Dead disbanded shortly after Garcia's demise, the core members--Bob Weir, Mickey Hart and Phil Lesh--drifted into spinoff projects that, to varying degrees, have made the world safe for pot brownies, impromptu drum circles, patchouli oil and middle-aged public nudity. They have also convened for sporadic reunion shows, including several in support of 2004 Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry. A major U.S. tour is planned for the band's 40th anniversary in 2005, but until then, holdover Deadheads will have to satiate their musical appetites with...

Bob Weir's Ratdog: The closest incarnation to the original band, Weir's spinoff is really more like a Grateful Dead-lite, regularly performing Weir-penned Dead songs such as "One More Saturday Night" and "The Music Never Stopped." Weir has also been know to cover Garcia songs--an artistic decision that has been met with mild rancor within the Deadhead community. A recent post on Philzone.com outlines the dispute: "I will absolutely PUKE if I ever hear [Weir] sing another Jerry tune! It has nothing to do with Jerry tunes being sacred or anything. It has everything to do with how he puts his hideous Ratdog spin on a Jerry song... P.S. Bob Weir is now almost 60 and he recently said that he prefers to be called Bobby? C'mon, PLEASE! I'll never call him Bobby. That's for kids!"

Mickey Hart's Planet Drum: Always the most musically adventurous of the group, Hart evolved from classic rock into worldbeat, winning a Grammy for 1991's Planet Drum and parlaying that success into a New Age career rivalled only by Yanni, John Tesh and Enya. Among his other accomplishments, Hart testified in front of the Senate about the healing power of drumming and organized the "world's largest drum circle" at Earthdance 2004. As Hart notes on his website, "This beast had 4500 heads, 9,000 hands, was carrying many drums, and coming right at me." (The description can also be applied to Hart's favorite Japanese porn.)

Phil Lesh's Phil Lesh and Friends: "Hey, I'm Phil Lesh and these are my friends--River, Algernon, Sadie, Leland, Moonbeam, Chance, Skyler, Van..."