The Dead

[Drunk Monk]

Rumor has it, after last week's announcement about the Grateful Dead playing a Pennsylvania Barack Obama benefit show Oct. 13, that the reunited band - Bob Weir, Mickey Hart, Phil Lesh and Bill Kreutzmann - is contemplating a tour in the spring. They played for Obama in June; before that, they hadn't played together since 2004. Has politics drawn them together again? Let's call it brotherly love, musical companionship, a desire for a better world. "They're all broke," said my spy.

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/22/DDA312VVP6.DTL&hw=leah+garchik&sn=002&sc=584">http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... 002&sc=584</a><!-- m -->

Friendship - the kind of long-lasting comradely love that outlives differences and spats - is no joking matter. My spy, whose comment was lightly reported Monday, was wrong about the reasons the Grateful Dead will play together again.
They're going to Pennsylvania because they're all public citizens supporting Barack Obama, and Pennsylvania polls showed that voters were dead even there.
And if they tour together again, it's got nothing to do with financial need. The premise was false; no one's hurting. The Grateful Dead is "built on true love," says Mickey Hart, "and that thankfully has come around for us once again. You cannot make the kind of music that we do just for the money." Whatever split them up has been put aside, and they are "embarking on the next step of our long strange trip for the right reasons."

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/09/23/DDHP130NAE.DTL&hw=leah+garchik&sn=001&sc=1000">http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.c ... 01&sc=1000</a><!-- m -->

See my post on http://brotherhoodofdoom.com/phpBB3/view...1144#p7729