What's a Deadhead

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A.�� The name Deadhead is given to one of the fans of the pioneering sixties hippie jug band The Grateful Dead.

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Q.�� That name rings a bell.

A.� �It would�- The Grateful Dead are one of the cornerstones of American rock music, having grown from their original roots as a rambling small-time jug band into one of the most popular live acts ever to play on tour.

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Q.� �How did it all begin

A.� �The roots of The Dead go back to the mid-sixties when San Franciscan band The Warlocks, led by bluegrass enthusiast Jerry Garcia became the house band for Ken Kesey's famous multi-media events, including the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. The band changed their name after Garcia read the term in a dictionary, referring to a famous Egyptian prayer.

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Q.�� It all sounds very flower power.

A.�� That's because it was - The Grateful Dead story is the very embodiment of the flower power generation, and it includes most of the famous names and places of the times. The band lived and rehearsed in a communal house on 710 Ashbury Street, the epicentre of San Francisco's hippie culture. They were bankrolled by the famous chemist and LSD manufacturer Owsley Stanley, and built a reputation for their long free-form jam sessions held at many of the hip free concerts that provided the musical accompaniment to the flower power era. In fact, even through the far more capitalist times that followed the Summer Of Love, The Grateful Dead probably symbolised and embodied the ideals and lifestyle of the hippy movement more than any other band before or since.

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Q.�� So a band with a history like that must have secured a record deal pretty quickly

A.� �They did, and promptly lost it again! The Dead were signed to MGM in the mid sixties, but their studio demos proved to be a disaster, and they were dropped soon after. The addition of Mickey Hart as second drummer, and a spot at the legendary Monterey Festival saw the band's fortunes take an upturn, and by 1969, having secured another deal with Warner Brothers, Garcia realised that their forte was their live shows, and their seminal Live / Dead album kicked off a recording career that, although patchy, at least more or less lasted the course in tandem with their famous touring schedule.

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Q.�� Did the live album secure a future for The Dead

A.� �Followed as it was by a brace of classic studio albums, Workingman's Dead and American Beauty�- the second as homage to the band's country and bluegrass roots, the future�seemed secure. It was around this time that The Grateful Dead commenced their legendary touring and live performance schedules which saw them on the road for most of the next thirty years, playing shows that often passed the five hour mark, with band and audience alike locked into extended jam sessions of their best-loved tunes, mutually lost in a haze of acid-fuelled euphoria.

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Q.� �Was the personnel of the band permanent

A.�� Not especially�- the death of keyboard player Rod 'Pigpen' McKernan who finally succumbed to years of alcohol abuse saw the addition of long-term member Keith Godchaux, whose wife Donna also joined the band as a backing vocalist. Through the last half of the 1970s the band released a series of disappointing studio albums, which led to a break from studio work for seven years.

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Q.�� Were they still living the hippy ideal

A.�� Absolutely. The Grateful Dead were the living proof that with enough good vibes, and good acid, it was possible to live virtually constantly as a touring commune, the additional personnel of road crew, managers, family and friends, meant that The Dead's touring party was the size of a large village, all living, eating, sleeping and playing together, sharing chores and financial reward equally. People may have scorned the hippy ideals of the band, but it worked for them, for a considerable time.

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In the mid 80s the Godchaux couple were dismissed from the band, Keith perishing in a car accident soon after. The band continued, and in 1987, with an irony that was not lost on The Dead, they scored a hit album�- In The Dark, and even a hit single Touch Of Grey. The oldest and most idealistic hippie outfit in America suddenly found a whole new generation of fans via MTV, who placed the video for the single, complete with tongue-in-cheek skeleton figures playing the song, on heavy rotation. The Grateful Dead were suddenly hip, more than 20 years after they started.

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Q.� But it couldn't last

A.� Unfortunately not. In 1980, keyboardist Brent Mydland died of a drug overdose, the third keyboard player lost to the band, his replacement was ex-Tubes player Vince Weiniock, and what appeared an odd choice, with an odd title�- 'satellite' keyboard player Bruce Hornsby, from Bruce Hornsby And The Range, joined the band, having been a long-time friend and fan of The Dead from years ago.

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The end came in 1985 when Jerry Garcia finally succumbed to years of heavy drug use, which combined with diabetic complications to provide a fatal heart attack. With its founding father gone, the band could not survive, and The Grateful Dead have passed into rock music folk law as the band who outlived all the cynicism and style changes that went on around it, and became an enduring legend. Various offshoots featuring band members continue to record and tour, so the spirit of The Grateful Dead lives on, and the Deadheads still gather to reminisce and see their heroes play.

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By� Andy Hughes