Grateful Dead Calls It Quits

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuter) - The Grateful Dead rock group will disband
following the death of its leader
Jerry Garcia in August, surviving band members announced Friday. 

The Grateful Dead, a symbol of the counter-culture revolution of the
1960s, has a huge and devoted following
almost 30 years after it was founded and was one of the world's most
popular draws on the concert circuit. 

``After four months of heartfelt consideration, the remaining members of
the band met yesterday and came to
the conclusion that the 'long, strange trip' of the uniquely wonderful
beast known as the 'Grateful Dead' is
over,'' a statement issued by the band said. 

``Although individually and in various combinations they will undoubtedly
continue to make music, whatever
the future holds will be something different in name and structure,'' it said. 

The band members urged the Grateful Dead's millions of loyal fans, known
as ``Deadheads'', to remember
that ``the music, the values and the spirit of this marvelous shared
journey endure.'' 

The decision to break up will come as a blow to thousands of tie-dyed fans
who followed the Grateful Dead
from concert to concert around the country. 

However, many fans felt the band should not continue without Garcia, its
portly, bearded guru who died of a
heart attack last August at the age of 53.


From tdpst5@pitt.edu Sun Dec 10 23:55:20 1995
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From: michaelz@zoka.com (Michael Z.)
Newsgroups: rec.music.gdead
Subject: SF Examiner article,12/9/95 [text]
Followup-To: rec.music.gdead
Date: Sat, 09 Dec 1995 16:41:14 -0800
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X-Newsreader: Yet Another NewsWatcher 2.1.3

Here's another take on yesterday's news from today's San Francisco Examiner.
MZ

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Members vote to disband

Michael Dougan
OF THE EXAMINER STAFF
Katherine Seligman and Craig Marine of The Examiner staff contributed to
this report.

Saturday, Dec. 9, 1995

TY: QUOTE ASSOCIATED PRESS / 1985 Katherine Seligman and Craig Marine of The
Examiner staff contributed to this report.

SAN RAFAEL - The mood inside the headquarters of the Grateful Dead was
anything but mournful an hour after the long-anticipated announcement that
the Dead, at last, is dead.

At least 20 people flitted from room to room in the old house, engaging in
animated conversation and laughter despite the fact that 30 years of rock
history had come to a quiet end.

"After four months of heartfelt consideration, the remaining members of the
band met yesterday and came to the conclusion that the "long strange trip'
of the uniquely wonderful beast known as the Grateful Dead is over," the
group said in a short statement faxed to the media Friday.

The announcement came four months after lead guitarist Jerry Garcia died of
a heart attack in a Forest Knolls drug rehabilitation center. While rumors
have circulated about potential new pickers who might have taken Garcia's
spot in the band, no serious consideration was ever given to replacing the
hefty, grinning guitarist, band manager Cameron Sears said.

"We all knew that having to replace somebody as gifted and phenomenally
talented as Jerry Garcia is a large task," he said.

Nor did the surviving band members - Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann,
Mickey Hart and Vince Welnick - believe they could play without Garcia.

"It would be presumptuous of us to consider calling ourselves the Grateful
Dead at that point," Sears said.

"It's partially a testament to who he was that the decision (to disband) is
being made."

For inveterate fans like a man who calls himself "Crazy Wolf," the
announcement was a final blow that capped four months of sadness over
Garcia's death.

"I'm bummed out, I'm devastated," he said as he milled around Friday night
at the corner of Haight and Ashbury streets, ground zero for the Dead
phenomenon. "I'm surprised because I'd heard there was a spring tour going
on."

"They were a great band," Toni Brookins said as she mulled the news with her
husband, "Bill the Cat," a band follower for 17 years. "It was like a
family, and Dad had died."

Like many fans, Brookins said she was sad but not surprised. No one could
replace Garcia, she said.

"I knew it was over when he died," Thomas Nelson said.

"How could the Dead be the Dead without Jerry?"

Sears said members of the band might perform as a group in the future, but
not under the Grateful Dead rubric. And their continuing individual careers
will be handled by the Grateful Dead's well-oiled business organization -
which means the 20-odd band employees will not be laid off.

"People feel we're going to close up shop, and that's not the case," Sears
said. "The individual projects that are currently in place will continue to
flourish, and we're going to support them."

Sears attributed the jocular mood in Dead headquarters to the staff's
knowledge that the organization would continue to thrive. "It's a time of
great transition here, and it has been since the day Jerry died," he said.

The band manager said guitarist Weir and keyboard player Welnick were
touring with their own group, and that drummer Hart was "in the studio now
completing what promises to be a terrific album."

Nor will the Dead's marketing arm - unique in the world of rock 'n' roll -
be severed. In a direct link with its millions of fans, known as Deadheads,
the band has engaged in the manufacture and distribution of its own
memorabilia and albums.

"That will all stay intact," Sears said. "We have a business to run. We want
to stay in touch with our audience."

The announcement of the band's dissolution most likely won't lead to a
stampede for Dead records, said Jim Portnick, manager of the Tower Records
store at Columbus Avenue and Bay Street in San Francisco.

"Usually when an artist dies, you'll see a run on their product, but I think
anyone could have seen this coming," Portnick said. "I mean, put two and two
together."

Records were never the Dead's forte anyway. The group made most of its money
from performing, and consistently ranked among the top-grossing bands.

The Dead were "barely in the recording business," band publicist Dennis
McNally said. Their last studio album -

"Built to Last" - was issued in 1989.

And it was not until 1987 - more than two decades after they attained
stardom - that the Dead managed a Top 10 hit,

"Touch of Grey."

The Dead first performed in 1965 as the Warlocks, a San Francisco band
riding the rock revolution of the era. In December of that year they became
the Grateful Dead - a name pulled at random from an Oxford Dictionary and
taken from English folklore.

The Dead debuted under their strange new moniker at the Fillmore on Dec. 10,
1965.

What the band did - and did like nobody else - was tour and play, often
logging more than 100 dates a year at which fans danced ecstatically to
their free-form blend of rock tinged by bluegrass and folk music.

Thousands of faithful Deadheads would follow the band from gig to gig. Many
heard hundreds of concerts.

As if haunted by their own name, the Dead were touched by death four times:
keyboardist-singer Ron "Pigpen" McKernan died of liver disease in 1973; his
successor, Keith Godchaux, was killed in a car crash in 1980 after leaving
the group; Godchaux's successor, Brent Mydland, died of a drug overdose in
1990; and Garcia died Aug. 9.

The band's last show was July 9 in Chicago's Soldier Field.

"We're here to continue doing the work that we've been doing," Sears said.
"But it's not going to include live performances. That's the difference."

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© Saturday, Dec. 9, 1995 San Francisco Examiner, All Rights Reserved.

______________________

Michael Zelner
Oakland CA USA
e-mail: michaelz@zoka.com
______________________

