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Speaker 1: Disgraceland as a production of Double Elvis The stories about

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Speaker 1: the Grateful Dead. In their early days as a band,

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Speaker 1: specifically about their harmonica player, pig Pen, are Insane, a

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Speaker 1: band known for their drug use, pig Pen did not

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Speaker 1: get high. His bandmates would smoke grass and he would

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Speaker 1: drink booze. His bandmates would drop LSD and he would

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Speaker 1: drink more booze. His bandmates would play improvisational electric music,

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Speaker 1: and pig Pen would play the blues ron Pigpen McKernin

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Speaker 1: was obsessed with the blues. He was one of the

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Speaker 1: band's strongest links to the traditional American music they loved,

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Speaker 1: in part because pig Pen was committed to living the

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Speaker 1: life of his blues musician heroes. Part of this meant

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Speaker 1: dedicating himself to the canon of pre and postwar Black

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Speaker 1: American music, but it also meant the steady diet of cheap,

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Speaker 1: highly potent olcolcohol known as rock gut, supplemented with even

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Speaker 1: cheaper barbecue and hot links, a diet that did him

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Speaker 1: in at the age of twenty seven. But prior to that,

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Speaker 1: pig Pen made great music. That music you heard at

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Speaker 1: the top of the show that wasn't great music. That

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Speaker 1: was a preset loop from my melochron called Mellow Open

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Speaker 1: Door Blues MK One. I played you that loop because

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Speaker 1: I can't afford the rights to Missus Brown. You've got

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Speaker 1: a lovely daughter by Herman's Hermits, And why would I

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Speaker 1: play you that specific slice of peacock cheese?

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Speaker 2: Could I afford it?

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Speaker 1: Because that was the number one song in America on

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Speaker 1: May fifth, nineteen sixty five, and that was the day

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Speaker 1: the Warlocks played Magoo's Pizza Parlor in Menmo Park, California,

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Speaker 1: taking the first step for what would become one of

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Speaker 1: the most culturally influential bands.

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Speaker 2: Of all time, The Grateful Dead.

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Speaker 1: On this episode, grass lsd rock gut Blues to the pig Pen.

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Speaker 1: In the beginning of The Grateful Dead, I'm Jake Brennan

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Speaker 1: and this is Disgraceland. Judy liston versus jam.

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Speaker 3: Capital Clay from Lewis and the Year, Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir,

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Speaker 3: and Phil Lesh were sitting in the back of a

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Speaker 3: car that belonged to a friend of Bob's.

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Speaker 1: They were getting high on one of Neil Cassidy's joints.

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Speaker 1: Cassidy the inspiration for Jack Kerouacs Dean Moriarty character and

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Speaker 1: his groundbreaking novel on the Road was a hero to

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Speaker 1: all of them. Smoking his dope was seen as a privilege.

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Speaker 1: Jerry and Bob had just played their second show in

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Speaker 1: their new electric band, The Warlocks. Phil had just seen

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Speaker 1: the first rock and roll show of his young life.

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Speaker 1: He was a friend, a fellow musician, but not part

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Speaker 1: of their band. Yet his mind was blown, and the

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Speaker 1: energy of it all was unlike anything he'd ever experienced.

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Speaker 1: It was a different type of gas from the singe

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Speaker 1: of the newly electric Bob Dylan's explosive lyrics that Phil

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Speaker 1: heard on the radio, the postal truck he delivered mail from,

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Speaker 1: and different still from the energy of the Beatles' backbeat

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Speaker 1: and clanging electric guitar as he watched on his television

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Speaker 1: set on the Ed Sullivan Show. For afar, up close

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Speaker 1: and personal, live electric music was something else entirely. It

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Speaker 1: was enough to set your brain on fire smoking Cassidy's dope.

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Speaker 1: They were all on a post show high, and the

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Speaker 1: performance was a success, sure, but that didn't matter. What

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Speaker 1: made the moment special was that they felt an unspoken

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Speaker 1: connection to something they held in the highest esteem. Tradition,

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Speaker 1: specifically the tradition of American music. That night, May twelfth,

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Speaker 1: nineteen sixty five, at Magoo's Pizza Parlor and Menlo Park,

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Speaker 1: just south of San Francisco, the Warlocks burned to join

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Speaker 1: up with Chuck Berry, Howland Wolf and Freddy King. Covers

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Speaker 1: jumped up blues numbers played with the energy of pent

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Speaker 1: up white teenagers desperate to shake some action. But Garcia Weir,

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Speaker 1: their drummer Bill Kurtzman, and bassist at the time Dana

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Speaker 1: Morgan didn't arrive at rock and roll from Dylan and

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Speaker 1: the Beatles, as so many of their peers would. They

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Speaker 1: instead arrived on the proper course of rock and roll lineage,

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Speaker 1: just as Dylan, Lennon and McCartney had via blues country,

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Speaker 1: and for Garcia and Company via bluegrass and jug band

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Speaker 1: music as well, music that predated and informed and led

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Speaker 1: to the creation.

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Speaker 2: Of rock and roll.

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Speaker 1: Prior to the formation of the Warlocks, Jerry Garcia, Bob

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Speaker 1: Weir and a long list of others put in time

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Speaker 1: with Jerry's jug band mother mccree's Uptown jug Champions. Jug

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Speaker 1: band music was traditional black party music, a genre that

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Speaker 1: dated back to the early nineteen hundreds. Its originators the

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Speaker 1: Memphis jug Band, Gus Cannon's jug Stoppers, and the Dixieland

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Speaker 1: jug Blowers traditionally featured in array of acoustic and makeshift

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Speaker 1: instruments washtub, bassed jews, harp, harmonica, washboards, stovetops, acoustic guitar, piano,

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Speaker 1: and of course the jug stonewaarer glass and blown into

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Speaker 1: by its player to create a deep, wild, buzzing sound.

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Speaker 1: Jug bands were hopped up energetic, intended to drive the party.

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Speaker 1: Jug Band music directly influenced the English skiffle groups of

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Speaker 1: the nineteen fifties and went on to influence the Beatles,

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Speaker 1: and of course jug band influence can be heard in

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Speaker 1: the American blues, bluegrass and folk that ran from Ma

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Speaker 1: Rainey to Bill Monroe to Woody Guthrie to Bob Dylan.

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Speaker 1: Nick could now in nineteen sixty five be heard in

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Speaker 1: the music of the Warlocks as well. Their set that

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Speaker 1: night was modern by bluegrass and jug band music standards.

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Speaker 1: They played Dylan's It's All Over Now, Baby, Blue, Rufus

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Speaker 1: thomas Is Walking the Dog, and Slim Harpo's on M

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Speaker 1: King B, among others, but it was all part of

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Speaker 1: the same tradition. A tradition that Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir

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Speaker 1: and their early bandmates were now a part of the

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Speaker 1: tradition of old Weird America. Dylan Rufus Slim. Their songs

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Speaker 1: were part of the deeper lineage, a history of music

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Speaker 1: that linked all the way back to traditional slave chants

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Speaker 1: and field hollers, music that after the Civil War evolved

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Speaker 1: into traditional ballads and breakdowns about bad bad men Stagger

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Speaker 1: Lee the Loner, the Pimp, the end of Billy Lyons,

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Speaker 1: railroad bill feared by brakemen everywhere, train robber extraordinaire, Tom

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Speaker 1: Devil creeping up into unsuspecting girls' beds under the cover

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Speaker 1: of night. And Willie Brennan, the highway robber, bold game

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Speaker 1: of English descent from out on the Moor. These men

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Speaker 1: were legends, folk heroes, desperate to survive their own demons

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Speaker 1: in an America that didn't want them, and America that

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Speaker 1: shut them out because of the color of their skin,

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Speaker 1: the class they were born out of, and their refusal

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Speaker 1: and or inability to conform to the standards of civilized society.

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Speaker 1: Their legends were born of murder, robbery, bootlegging, and other

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Speaker 1: violent acts of rebelliousness. The mythology of these men detailed

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Speaker 1: half a century's worth of rough and rowdy ways and song,

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Speaker 1: their casualties among them and their like Little Sadie who

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Speaker 1: caught a bullet from a forty four smokeless viola lee

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Speaker 1: whose fate inspired violence worthy of a life's sentence. And

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Speaker 1: the Knoxville girl, the victim of an unexpected dull flack

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Speaker 1: from a blunt stick to the skull by her psychotic lover,

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Speaker 1: who then drugger by our golden curls down to the

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Speaker 1: riverside and proceeded a beater to death. Outlaws, scoundrels, men

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Speaker 1: who were in league with the devil. It is perhaps

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Speaker 1: this storyteller's good fortune that those three qualifiers all make

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Speaker 1: up the old English origin of the word warlock, But

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Speaker 1: it is merely the humorous coincidence of cosmic Americana minus

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Speaker 1: the Tolkien magic. Warlocks are bad men, just the same

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Speaker 1: as outlaws, scoundrels, rounders, and ramblers. They are all part

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Speaker 1: of the same musical alchemy that runs from Tommy Johnson

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Speaker 1: to led Zeppelin to Jeffrey Leed a Slayer to Jack White.

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Speaker 1: What's the actual difference? They are threaded by the same spirit,

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Speaker 1: the sorcerer's alchemy, their musical alchemy, the pharmaceutical alchemy, white lightning, reefer,

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Speaker 1: the opium gong, junkheads, moocher sniffers, and ucci coachers, the

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Speaker 1: men with the jive. Preacher drank some ginger said it

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Speaker 1: was because of the flu, and that old man's been lying.

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Speaker 1: He's got the jake leg two. Tell it to me,

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Speaker 1: Tell it to me, drink corn liquor. Let the cocaine be.

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Speaker 1: Cocaine is gonna kill my honey dead. Drugs, liquor, magic,

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Speaker 1: murder killers, thieves, loose women, and other sort of characters

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Speaker 1: old weird America. This was the tradition of the Warlocks.

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Speaker 1: This was the tradition of the music they played that

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Speaker 1: night at Magoose weird, and they didn't mind. It suited

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Speaker 1: them just fine, because twenty two year old Jerry Garcia,

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Speaker 1: seventeen year old Bob Weird, nineteen year old Bill Krutzman,

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Speaker 1: and twenty five year old Phil Lesh were all weird

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Speaker 1: as fuck at a time when other kids their age

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Speaker 1: were taken solely by mop tops, beach blanket bingo and

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Speaker 1: the ensuing space race. These kids were, by comparison into

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Speaker 1: some weird shit mainly music from Way off the Grid,

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Speaker 1: Garcia with his jug band and bluegrass obsession, Weird with

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Speaker 1: his Garcia obsession, Krutzvin's New Orleans and R and B obsession,

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Speaker 1: and Lesh by the time he'd attended his first rock

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Speaker 1: show that night, was already deeply obsessed with classical avant

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Speaker 1: garde composition. But as weird as they all were, there

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Speaker 1: are all still just kids, kids from diverse, back working,

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Speaker 1: middle and upper class socioeconomic backgrounds. They were children of

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Speaker 1: the straight world, no matter how much they fancied themselves otherwise,

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Speaker 1: and their approach to the music they were into at

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Speaker 1: that young age was more scholarly than hand to mouth.

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Speaker 1: None of them lived the tragic lives of the anti

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Speaker 1: heroes portrayed in the folk songs they loved and performed

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Speaker 1: and that influenced them. They mind what they could from

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Speaker 1: those men from the myths and the legends of folk,

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Speaker 1: but otherwise they lived relatively straight lives, how thee it

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Speaker 1: lies that were quickly falling under the dominant influence of

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Speaker 1: cannabis and LSD experimentation, but nonetheless straight in comparison to

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Speaker 1: stagger Lee and Railroad Bill and the members of the Warlocks,

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Speaker 1: despite their youth, knew that by the rights of tradition

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Speaker 1: and because of who they were as people and the

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Speaker 1: nature of the music they played, that they were indebted

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Speaker 1: to tragic, old weird Americana. But the Warlocks were looking

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Speaker 1: to learn and play music, not die or end up

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Speaker 1: in jail, all but one of them, whereas pig pens.

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Speaker 1: Someone asked from the back seat inquiring about the fifth

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Speaker 1: missing member of the Warlocks, Ron McKernan aka Blue Ron,

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Speaker 1: because of his obsession with the Blues aka Pigpen, because

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Speaker 1: of his funk aka pig because his bandmates were not

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Speaker 1: without a sense of humor or brevity. The answer came

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Speaker 1: from in between hits of Cassidy's grass. Oh, Pig, he's

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Speaker 1: probably down by the train tracks, drinking junk. The bread

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Speaker 1: truck barrowed down the side of the mountain above Pawelatto

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Speaker 1: fits driver Tawny, a black man who'd rather do without

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Speaker 1: a stop by the white buzz he suspected were on

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Speaker 1: his tail, and in an unmarked car, pushed his truck

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Speaker 1: to the edge of the speed on it.

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Speaker 2: He believed his truck to.

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Speaker 1: Have magical powers, so he named it the Seventh Son

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Speaker 1: and the truck lived up to its name. It had

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Speaker 1: survived this run before down the mountain side from the

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Speaker 1: bootlegger in the Honda filled to the brim with as

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Speaker 1: much high power to illegal hooch, Tawny and his partner

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Speaker 1: could afford whiskey at only a dollar fifty eight gallon.

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Speaker 2: It was worth the risk.

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Speaker 1: His partner in crime had faith in the truck and

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Speaker 1: inn Tawny behind the wheel down shifting in makeshift Jake

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Speaker 1: bricks to save dough on Warren pads for the bread truck.

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Speaker 1: No doubt more dough more whisky. Tawny was smart, and

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Speaker 1: so was his partner, pig Pen. They'd make it down

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Speaker 1: without incident and take some of their stash out to

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Speaker 1: the railroad yard and post up by the tracks with

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Speaker 1: pigs harmonica, Tawny's acoustic drink junk and play the blues

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Speaker 1: drinking quote unquote. Junk was a reference to the type

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Speaker 1: of alcohol pig Pen harmonica player for the Warlocks, preferred

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Speaker 1: the lowest quality booze and wine he could get his hands.

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Speaker 2: On, bootleg whiskey, white port, and.

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Speaker 1: Lemon juice, a sweet wine known as ombre, and of

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Speaker 1: course night train. This constituted most of pig Pen's diet,

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Speaker 1: and the other part was filled by hot links, pigs feet,

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Speaker 1: and cheap barbecue food and drink that he knew. His heroes,

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Speaker 1: the blues men he worshiped, Lightning Hopkins, te Bone Walker,

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Speaker 1: Howling Wolf lived off of pure rock gut.

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Speaker 2: Didn't matter.

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Speaker 1: It was part of the life, like the bootlegging and

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Speaker 1: hanging out by the tracks playing music, as was everything

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Speaker 1: about pig Pen, particularly the.

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Speaker 2: Way he looked.

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Speaker 1: Unlike the rest of the Warlocks, pig did not look

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Speaker 1: at all like anyone or anything even remotely connected to

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Speaker 1: the straight world. He wore greasy denims so greasy his

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Speaker 1: genes stiffened. The grease on his jeans was second only

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Speaker 1: to the tremendous amount of grease, and his black hair

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Speaker 1: leather jacket, a bike team from a Harley permanently bolted

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Speaker 1: onto his wrist, and a big bad boil marking his chin.

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Speaker 1: He was the wild without Brando's physical attractiveness, and he

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Speaker 1: could have cared less. Little Walter was the archetype, not

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Speaker 1: Little Richard. Blue and lonesome and funky like Fred McDowell's

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Speaker 1: slad and funky, also like the filthy Peanuts character.

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Speaker 2: He drew his nickname from him.

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Speaker 1: Unlike his bandmates in the Warlocks, pig Pen wasn't interested

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Speaker 1: in smoking grass, or expanding his mind with LSD or

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Speaker 1: really anything that preoccupied the imagination of the middle class.

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Speaker 1: Pig Pen was almost solely interested in the blues he

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Speaker 1: grew up with it. His old man was a boogey

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Speaker 1: wiggy pianist who later turned in his heavy right hand

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Speaker 1: for a gig as a rhythm and blues DJ for

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Speaker 1: the Bay Area's KRE radio station. The old man spun

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Speaker 1: records under the name Cool Breeze, and his son, Young Ron,

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Speaker 1: was knocked out by those records. He made the short

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Speaker 1: leap backward from Elvis Presley to Arthur Crudup. Elvis was cool,

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Speaker 1: but barely raided amongst the originals. For every white version

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Speaker 1: of a rhythm and blues song, be it Elvis Presley

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Speaker 1: or Pat Boone or later the Beatles or b Dylan,

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Speaker 1: there was almost always a more interesting, authentic black version

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Speaker 1: of the song, and thus one of the earliest versions

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Speaker 1: of white America's concept of hipness took root in Pigmen.

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Speaker 2: To be hip in the.

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Speaker 1: Early nineteen sixties for young white musicians meant you were

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Speaker 1: into the blues, and that you identified with the plight

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Speaker 1: of black Americans. It was the same as it was

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Speaker 1: for the Beats in the fifties, whose own hipness equation

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Speaker 1: was answered by the subculture's affinity for early jazz, specifically

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Speaker 1: bebop musicians. So as a young white teenager who was

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Speaker 1: into almost nothing but blues music, pig Pen, when he

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Speaker 1: wasn't hanging and playing with the Warlocks, hung out almost

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Speaker 1: exclusively with Tawny.

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Speaker 2: A black man in.

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Speaker 1: Black populated East Powell out blues booze, nothing else. The

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Speaker 1: railroad yard, it was rhythm, not just romance. The sound

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Speaker 1: of the big trains tracked pig Pen's harmonica, his vocal

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Speaker 1: in Tawni's acoustic guitar. The world was suddenly smaller and

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00:16:03,440 --> 00:16:07,560
Speaker 1: the magic of history was suddenly less esoteric. Alongside those

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Speaker 1: old frights, pig Pen rooted himself into his own place

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Speaker 1: and time. He felt connected at one with the tragic

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Speaker 1: and cosmic continuum of old weird America. The pullman Porter

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Speaker 1: saw the fellow black man working his way through the

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Speaker 1: private railcar he was assigned to, and knew immediately that

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Speaker 1: death had.

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Speaker 2: Blown in through his door.

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Speaker 1: He lowered his gaze, went about his business waiting on

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Speaker 1: his wealthy passengers and ignored the man. The man was

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Speaker 1: moving quickly toward the front of the train, brazenly with

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Speaker 1: his side arm out in the open down by his

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Speaker 1: right thigh.

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Speaker 2: All casual.

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Speaker 1: It went unseen coupled with his determined stride, and the

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Speaker 1: passengers were none the wiser, so they were allowed to

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Speaker 1: live along with the porter for now. The porter knew

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Speaker 1: who he was, Railroad Bill. Of course, he of the

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Speaker 1: vendetta against the big railroads. He was the only black

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Speaker 1: man not wearing a pullman unit who was either stupid

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Speaker 1: enough or brave enough to enter the whites only first

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Speaker 1: class train car in eighteen ninety five. But the opulent

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Speaker 1: pullman cabin was in his final destination. He was headed

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Speaker 1: to the jackpot, the freight car, because that was where

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Speaker 1: the loot was. Sheriff McMillan, Stinsonville, and Stewart. They all

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Speaker 1: met their demise at the other end of Railroad Bill's rifle,

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Speaker 1: and so too with whoever stood in his way on

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Speaker 1: this day. Railroad Bill made his way into the freight

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Speaker 1: car and there were two Pinkertons on guard. Bill immediately

291
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Speaker 1: shot one and then instructed the other to open the safe.

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Speaker 1: He did as he was told, and then filled Bill's

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Speaker 1: gunnysack with all the cash and gold and silver bullion

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Speaker 1: that would fit. When he was done, railroad Bill dispassionately

295
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Speaker 1: emptied another blast from his rifle right into him. He

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Speaker 1: reloaded and made his way to the engine car at

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Speaker 1: the front. He ordered the brakeman to halt the steam

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Speaker 1: driven locomotive. His loaded shotgun pointed into his face made

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Speaker 1: it clear railroad Bill was not fucking around. The brakeman

300
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Speaker 1: gripped the heavy brake levers, pulled on the safety trigger,

301
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Speaker 1: and heaved the levers down with all his might, and

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00:18:02,920 --> 00:18:05,679
Speaker 1: as the train slowed, railroad Bill made his way to

303
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Speaker 1: the sideboard of the engine car and jumped into the night,

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00:18:08,760 --> 00:18:11,399
Speaker 1: fleeing away from the train with the loot and bolstering

305
00:18:11,440 --> 00:18:14,480
Speaker 1: the myth of railroad Bill in the process, a myth

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00:18:14,520 --> 00:18:16,720
Speaker 1: that would echo down through the ages and out of

307
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Speaker 1: pigs Harmonica decades later.

308
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Speaker 2: The train barreled through the yard.

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Speaker 1: The fire in the trash can burned passively warm Northern

310
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Speaker 1: California spring air, a bottle of night train between them

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00:18:30,960 --> 00:18:33,800
Speaker 1: on the ground, tawny beat down, a crude rhythm on

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Speaker 1: his acoustic the one to the five, again and again.

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Speaker 1: He added time perfectly with the rhythm of the old

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Speaker 1: train snaking its way past them. Pigpen blew into his heart,

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Speaker 1: came up for air after his solo.

316
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Speaker 2: And leaned into the lyrics.

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Speaker 1: Railroad Bill was standing on the hill. He never worked

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Speaker 1: and he never will. Oh ride ride Bill, Ride sounded

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00:18:56,200 --> 00:19:03,720
Speaker 1: about right to Pigpen, We'll be right back after this

320
00:19:03,840 --> 00:19:14,880
Speaker 1: word word word. The bartender Larry took his eye out

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00:19:14,920 --> 00:19:18,080
Speaker 1: and placed it on the bar. It was glass, of course,

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00:19:18,520 --> 00:19:22,160
Speaker 1: like the many tumblers and martini glasses stacked into various towers.

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Speaker 1: Behind the stick, there were hardly any pint glasses or stemware.

324
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Speaker 1: Beer and wine were rarely served, and this was a

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Speaker 1: booze joint. And when Larry took his eye out meant

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Speaker 1: the joint was jumping. Which tonight it most certainly was

327
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Speaker 1: the in room, a singles joint for the recently divorced,

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00:19:38,560 --> 00:19:41,359
Speaker 1: to stop overplaced for flight attendants, and a must stop

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00:19:41,400 --> 00:19:45,320
Speaker 1: for traveling salesmen between San Francisco and Pool Alto. The

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00:19:45,359 --> 00:19:47,200
Speaker 1: bar was where you went if you were middle aged,

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00:19:47,240 --> 00:19:49,879
Speaker 1: horny and hadn't quite given up yet on your chances

332
00:19:49,880 --> 00:19:53,520
Speaker 1: of getting laid plush reds on pitch black interior. The

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00:19:53,600 --> 00:19:56,440
Speaker 1: Inn room was decidedly adult, and it was also part

334
00:19:56,480 --> 00:19:59,119
Speaker 1: of the West Coast small to mid sized circuit rooms

335
00:19:59,119 --> 00:20:02,440
Speaker 1: for touring artists Smart and Gaye, Jackie DeShannon, and the Coasters,

336
00:20:02,480 --> 00:20:04,600
Speaker 1: where they all put in work on their paths up

337
00:20:04,640 --> 00:20:08,520
Speaker 1: and down the coast. Someone decided the Warlocks should be

338
00:20:08,560 --> 00:20:10,960
Speaker 1: the house band, warm up for the headliners and keep

339
00:20:11,000 --> 00:20:14,040
Speaker 1: the joint buzzing and the boo is flowing. Five fifty

340
00:20:14,080 --> 00:20:16,600
Speaker 1: minute sets a night, six nights a week. It was

341
00:20:16,720 --> 00:20:19,800
Speaker 1: real work, five sets a night, and by the estimation

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00:20:19,960 --> 00:20:22,000
Speaker 1: of all in the band, the pig pen. The only

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00:20:22,000 --> 00:20:24,600
Speaker 1: way to work through it was while experimenting with their

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00:20:24,640 --> 00:20:28,800
Speaker 1: new favorite pastime, LSD. The drug had recently made its

345
00:20:28,800 --> 00:20:31,840
Speaker 1: way to the West Coast via Ken Kesey's Mary Pranksters,

346
00:20:32,160 --> 00:20:35,480
Speaker 1: and during the Warlock's early days, everything about LSD appealed

347
00:20:35,480 --> 00:20:38,959
Speaker 1: to them, especially as it pertained to their musicianship, finding

348
00:20:39,000 --> 00:20:41,120
Speaker 1: themselves as a band, and learning how to write their

349
00:20:41,119 --> 00:20:46,639
Speaker 1: first songs. For Garcia, LSD combined with electric music was

350
00:20:46,840 --> 00:20:50,360
Speaker 1: total freedom. It was a liberation from the demanding rigidity

351
00:20:50,359 --> 00:20:53,320
Speaker 1: of bluegrass precision playing, and he carried the clarity of

352
00:20:53,320 --> 00:20:55,920
Speaker 1: his banjo playing along for the trip, while the rest

353
00:20:55,960 --> 00:20:59,399
Speaker 1: of the group melded their own influences classical, avant garde,

354
00:20:59,600 --> 00:21:02,840
Speaker 1: R and B, rock and the blues with Garcia's bluegrass.

355
00:21:03,520 --> 00:21:05,679
Speaker 1: The parts have been fused into one hole by the

356
00:21:05,720 --> 00:21:10,800
Speaker 1: spark of acid and electric instrumentation. Out behind the in room,

357
00:21:11,160 --> 00:21:14,080
Speaker 1: railroad tracks weaved their way north and south. While the

358
00:21:14,080 --> 00:21:17,560
Speaker 1: band performed, they could hear the passing trains. They latched

359
00:21:17,560 --> 00:21:20,480
Speaker 1: into the rhythm, and Pigpen rode that old timey rail

360
00:21:20,520 --> 00:21:24,760
Speaker 1: with his harmonica and sometimes with his orgon, while Garcia, Lesh, Crutzman,

361
00:21:24,800 --> 00:21:29,119
Speaker 1: and Weir channeled their latest obsession. Another train entirely jazz

362
00:21:29,160 --> 00:21:33,040
Speaker 1: alto saxophonist John Coltrane, who had been dominating.

363
00:21:32,480 --> 00:21:34,280
Speaker 2: Their collective musical imagination.

364
00:21:35,080 --> 00:21:37,720
Speaker 1: Train as he was referred to, provided a vision of

365
00:21:37,760 --> 00:21:41,800
Speaker 1: improvisation for Jerry, Garcia and Phil Lesh. Train would vamp

366
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Speaker 1: on one cord, which, from a practical standpoint for Lesh,

367
00:21:45,480 --> 00:21:48,240
Speaker 1: who would literally just begun to play as instrument the

368
00:21:48,280 --> 00:21:51,320
Speaker 1: electric bass guitar made all the sense in the world,

369
00:21:51,800 --> 00:21:54,840
Speaker 1: and Train's genius wasn't that he, as a soloist, would improvise.

370
00:21:55,160 --> 00:21:57,800
Speaker 1: It was that he would allow his highly qualified sidemen

371
00:21:58,080 --> 00:22:01,520
Speaker 1: to improvise along with him. The root chord vamping along

372
00:22:01,640 --> 00:22:05,000
Speaker 1: was their platform, the songs melody, their through line, and

373
00:22:05,040 --> 00:22:09,320
Speaker 1: their own creative imaginations, the steam powering their live performances

374
00:22:09,480 --> 00:22:13,000
Speaker 1: far the fuck out down previously on her track, before

375
00:22:13,000 --> 00:22:16,240
Speaker 1: inevitably returning back to the station from their trip together

376
00:22:16,600 --> 00:22:20,879
Speaker 1: as one, after achieving dizzying heights of collective improvisation.

377
00:22:22,160 --> 00:22:23,640
Speaker 2: It was during this heady.

378
00:22:23,400 --> 00:22:25,800
Speaker 1: Time at the Inn room where the Warlocks wrote their

379
00:22:25,800 --> 00:22:29,560
Speaker 1: first song, of course, it was called Caution, do not

380
00:22:29,760 --> 00:22:34,080
Speaker 1: stop on the tracks Garcia Lesh we are Chrismin. They

381
00:22:34,160 --> 00:22:37,160
Speaker 1: knew they were onto something. They all did except Pigpen.

382
00:22:37,880 --> 00:22:41,280
Speaker 1: Pig as the only non LSD in grass Dvote, hung

383
00:22:41,359 --> 00:22:44,000
Speaker 1: back and waited for his moment, and when it would arrive,

384
00:22:44,080 --> 00:22:45,840
Speaker 1: he'd dig into the parts of the set where the

385
00:22:45,840 --> 00:22:49,000
Speaker 1: band's improvisation took a back seat to more traditional blues

386
00:22:49,080 --> 00:22:51,960
Speaker 1: numbers aimed at making sure the crowd was still there

387
00:22:52,000 --> 00:22:55,240
Speaker 1: with them. Howling Wolfe's version of Little Red Rooster Junior

388
00:22:55,240 --> 00:22:58,520
Speaker 1: Wells version of Good Morning, Little Schoolgirl. Pig Pen's beloved

389
00:22:58,520 --> 00:23:01,399
Speaker 1: blues have been reduced to be among the functionary bridge

390
00:23:01,440 --> 00:23:04,639
Speaker 1: between the traditional music that first inspired the group with

391
00:23:04,760 --> 00:23:08,080
Speaker 1: this new weird Americana. The Grateful Dead were alchymating at

392
00:23:08,080 --> 00:23:11,720
Speaker 1: the in Room back in nineteen sixty five. For Pigpen,

393
00:23:12,080 --> 00:23:15,119
Speaker 1: this trip was getting strange, and it was only about

394
00:23:15,160 --> 00:23:16,040
Speaker 1: to get stranger.

395
00:23:38,400 --> 00:23:39,760
Speaker 2: They needed a new band name.

396
00:23:40,200 --> 00:23:42,520
Speaker 1: A downtown New York art band had beat them to

397
00:23:42,560 --> 00:23:45,280
Speaker 1: the vinyl press with the name of the Warlocks, though

398
00:23:45,320 --> 00:23:48,240
Speaker 1: they too would eventually abandon the Moniker for another name,

399
00:23:48,520 --> 00:23:51,919
Speaker 1: The Velvet Underground, But at the time for Garcia and Co.

400
00:23:52,400 --> 00:23:55,800
Speaker 1: A new name was needed. They were at Phil Lesh's house,

401
00:23:55,880 --> 00:24:00,000
Speaker 1: bandying about potential band names, all of which were utterly ridiculous.

402
00:24:00,119 --> 00:24:04,560
Speaker 1: Es Garcia grabbed Lesh's dictionary, closed his eyes, opened it

403
00:24:04,600 --> 00:24:07,679
Speaker 1: to a random page, pointed with his index finger, opened

404
00:24:07,680 --> 00:24:10,120
Speaker 1: his eyes, and there it was, in black and white,

405
00:24:10,520 --> 00:24:14,440
Speaker 1: The Grateful Dead. Without even knowing the meaning, the juxtaposition

406
00:24:14,520 --> 00:24:17,679
Speaker 1: of those two words immediately spoke to the group, and

407
00:24:17,720 --> 00:24:20,480
Speaker 1: when they read the meaning of the phrase, it was sealed.

408
00:24:21,600 --> 00:24:23,760
Speaker 1: The Grateful Debt is a folk tale about a hero

409
00:24:23,840 --> 00:24:25,879
Speaker 1: who comes upon a dead man, a dead man who

410
00:24:26,000 --> 00:24:28,680
Speaker 1: left nothing behind, who has no family to pay for

411
00:24:28,720 --> 00:24:32,840
Speaker 1: his funeral. The hero, expecting nothing in return, pays the

412
00:24:32,880 --> 00:24:36,359
Speaker 1: dead man's funeral debt. Later, the hero comes upon some

413
00:24:36,400 --> 00:24:40,439
Speaker 1: impossible task, whereupon the dead man from beyond the grave,

414
00:24:40,680 --> 00:24:43,639
Speaker 1: grateful for the debt the hero paid for him, comes

415
00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:47,600
Speaker 1: to the hero's assistance, helping him overcome his impossible task,

416
00:24:48,240 --> 00:24:52,080
Speaker 1: i e. The Grateful Dead. It's a story about karma,

417
00:24:52,119 --> 00:24:55,000
Speaker 1: about paying it forward, about a generosity of spirit that

418
00:24:55,119 --> 00:24:58,320
Speaker 1: was evident in the band's hip origins, demonstrated in their

419
00:24:58,359 --> 00:25:02,960
Speaker 1: improvisational playing style, in their personalities. The name was perfect,

420
00:25:03,880 --> 00:25:07,240
Speaker 1: so too was the newly christened Grateful Dead's timing. The

421
00:25:07,280 --> 00:25:11,080
Speaker 1: West Coast, San Francisco, in particular, was undergoing an evolution

422
00:25:11,240 --> 00:25:14,800
Speaker 1: from its beatific and bohemian subculture into the big bang

423
00:25:14,840 --> 00:25:17,359
Speaker 1: of the hippie movement, a movement that would not only

424
00:25:17,440 --> 00:25:20,199
Speaker 1: dominate the rest of the sixties, but also go on

425
00:25:20,240 --> 00:25:23,480
Speaker 1: to be the single most influential cultural movement this country

426
00:25:23,480 --> 00:25:27,280
Speaker 1: has ever seen. Ken Kesey's acid tests were sweeping the

427
00:25:27,320 --> 00:25:30,479
Speaker 1: subculture on the West Coast. These were the days before

428
00:25:30,600 --> 00:25:34,680
Speaker 1: LSD was officially made illegal, and Atkezi's tripped out parties

429
00:25:34,800 --> 00:25:38,000
Speaker 1: up and down the coastline in rooms painted fluorescent and

430
00:25:38,080 --> 00:25:41,280
Speaker 1: lit by strobe lights, black lights, and flooded with visuals

431
00:25:41,280 --> 00:25:44,480
Speaker 1: from video loops on repeat and with the new psychedelia

432
00:25:44,560 --> 00:25:47,879
Speaker 1: being improvised by the Grateful Dead as Keisei's Acid Test

433
00:25:47,920 --> 00:25:52,960
Speaker 1: house band, the crowd was eclectic, turned on in strange hip,

434
00:25:53,040 --> 00:25:56,040
Speaker 1: college kids, left over beats. From the beginning of the decade,

435
00:25:56,280 --> 00:25:59,720
Speaker 1: Hell's Angels poets. Whoever was as Kizi and his band

436
00:25:59,720 --> 00:26:04,200
Speaker 1: of t traveling Mary Pranksters categorized as being on the bus,

437
00:26:04,600 --> 00:26:07,240
Speaker 1: a phrase they coined while traveling the States in sixty

438
00:26:07,280 --> 00:26:08,640
Speaker 1: five and sixty six.

439
00:26:08,440 --> 00:26:10,560
Speaker 2: In an effort to spread the gospel of LSD.

440
00:26:11,560 --> 00:26:14,800
Speaker 1: The Acid Tests were a mostly West Coast localized version

441
00:26:14,840 --> 00:26:18,040
Speaker 1: of Kesey's Roving Tour. The Acid Tests were meant to

442
00:26:18,160 --> 00:26:21,600
Speaker 1: enlighten the nation in subvert square society. It was a

443
00:26:21,640 --> 00:26:25,679
Speaker 1: wild scene, to say the least. For Kisi and the

444
00:26:25,680 --> 00:26:28,840
Speaker 1: rest of his Mary Pranksters, the idea was simple, spread

445
00:26:28,880 --> 00:26:31,240
Speaker 1: the message and get on the bus. Bring the trip

446
00:26:31,240 --> 00:26:34,560
Speaker 1: to wherever the people demanded, and in February nineteen sixty

447
00:26:34,600 --> 00:26:38,639
Speaker 1: six that meant Watt's Los Angeles. The Acid Party was

448
00:26:38,680 --> 00:26:41,760
Speaker 1: about to hit the road, and so too was its house.

449
00:26:41,600 --> 00:26:43,000
Speaker 2: Band, The grateful Dead.

450
00:26:46,320 --> 00:26:49,919
Speaker 1: Someone had found an old rundown warehouse in Compton. Kesey

451
00:26:49,960 --> 00:26:52,800
Speaker 1: thought it perfect. Word got out that the acid test

452
00:26:52,920 --> 00:26:55,640
Speaker 1: was coming to LA. Hundreds of kids looking to get

453
00:26:55,680 --> 00:26:58,760
Speaker 1: turned on showed up, and the acid, mixed with kool

454
00:26:58,760 --> 00:27:02,199
Speaker 1: aid and served as punch, was particularly strong that evening

455
00:27:02,920 --> 00:27:07,520
Speaker 1: La Compton Watts. This was not San Francisco, not the Hate,

456
00:27:07,600 --> 00:27:09,879
Speaker 1: not even the Inn room, and far the fuck away

457
00:27:09,920 --> 00:27:10,720
Speaker 1: from the Goose.

458
00:27:11,080 --> 00:27:12,080
Speaker 2: This was dark.

459
00:27:12,520 --> 00:27:14,920
Speaker 1: Maybe it was the potency of the LSD that night,

460
00:27:15,040 --> 00:27:17,120
Speaker 1: or the set that the band was putting out there,

461
00:27:17,560 --> 00:27:20,720
Speaker 1: Death have No Mercy in this land, banging powerfully through

462
00:27:20,720 --> 00:27:23,800
Speaker 1: the band's new sound system, designed by chief head and

463
00:27:23,800 --> 00:27:27,760
Speaker 1: an LSD chemist, Augustus Ausley Stanley. And maybe it was

464
00:27:27,800 --> 00:27:31,440
Speaker 1: the scores of lapds circling the warehouse with its curious

465
00:27:31,480 --> 00:27:33,280
Speaker 1: young partygoers.

466
00:27:32,880 --> 00:27:35,280
Speaker 2: Wild eyed and manic young women with.

467
00:27:35,240 --> 00:27:38,440
Speaker 1: Their skirts too short, talking gibberish young men with their

468
00:27:38,480 --> 00:27:43,159
Speaker 1: hair too long, talking jive. LAPD cruisers circled the warehouse,

469
00:27:43,480 --> 00:27:46,280
Speaker 1: welcome to the show, the only show in town, the

470
00:27:46,320 --> 00:27:47,639
Speaker 1: long haired, freaky people of.

471
00:27:47,720 --> 00:27:48,520
Speaker 2: The god knows what.

472
00:27:48,720 --> 00:27:51,600
Speaker 1: In that warehouse, the cops were all tuned into the

473
00:27:51,640 --> 00:27:55,159
Speaker 1: same radio frequency in their cars, their windows opened, the

474
00:27:55,240 --> 00:27:57,960
Speaker 1: clap back from the patrol men squawking into and out

475
00:27:58,000 --> 00:28:01,160
Speaker 1: of the radios, escaping out into the of the nighttime air,

476
00:28:01,320 --> 00:28:03,280
Speaker 1: creating a literal feedback weap.

477
00:28:03,160 --> 00:28:07,680
Speaker 2: Of ignorance and squared on inside.

478
00:28:07,720 --> 00:28:11,440
Speaker 1: The band played on normally, the acid test gigs were freeing,

479
00:28:11,480 --> 00:28:14,480
Speaker 1: but something about that night had the band on the run,

480
00:28:15,200 --> 00:28:18,639
Speaker 1: frustrated by their inability to lock in. Scared like the

481
00:28:18,680 --> 00:28:21,600
Speaker 1: crowd of the cops lurking outside with the billy clubs,

482
00:28:21,640 --> 00:28:26,520
Speaker 1: their guns and their punitive, discriminatory, very unhip ideas about justice,

483
00:28:27,040 --> 00:28:28,959
Speaker 1: the dead lurched on stage.

484
00:28:29,320 --> 00:28:30,760
Speaker 2: Pig Pen was apart from.

485
00:28:30,600 --> 00:28:34,200
Speaker 1: The band, drunk, not stoned, and unable to latch onto

486
00:28:34,240 --> 00:28:39,600
Speaker 1: whatever his bandmates were failing to latch onto themselves. A

487
00:28:39,640 --> 00:28:42,880
Speaker 1: woman in the audience began to freak out too much acid,

488
00:28:43,160 --> 00:28:44,479
Speaker 1: and the band stopped playing.

489
00:28:44,520 --> 00:28:46,480
Speaker 2: And then pig Pen heard it, through.

490
00:28:46,320 --> 00:28:49,959
Speaker 1: All the madness familiality, the sound again of a passing

491
00:28:50,000 --> 00:28:53,040
Speaker 1: freight train out behind the warehouse. He looked into the

492
00:28:53,080 --> 00:28:55,880
Speaker 1: crowd and saw the woman freaking out, saw the men

493
00:28:55,920 --> 00:28:58,720
Speaker 1: trying to cool her out, saw them fail. He caught

494
00:28:58,720 --> 00:29:01,160
Speaker 1: her eye and grabbed the mic and stand and in

495
00:29:01,200 --> 00:29:02,880
Speaker 1: time with the rhythm of the passing train.

496
00:29:02,960 --> 00:29:06,800
Speaker 2: Out back, pig Pen Blue Wrong sang out, I want

497
00:29:06,840 --> 00:29:11,160
Speaker 2: to know do you feel good? The woman was.

498
00:29:11,120 --> 00:29:13,600
Speaker 1: Struck with silent, and the crowd began to come to

499
00:29:13,640 --> 00:29:16,280
Speaker 1: focus on the pig pen again a little bit louder.

500
00:29:16,320 --> 00:29:19,320
Speaker 2: Now, I want to know you feel good?

501
00:29:20,800 --> 00:29:23,800
Speaker 1: She moutled the word yes, looking straight at pig When

502
00:29:23,840 --> 00:29:26,160
Speaker 1: the train carried on, and so the pig pen.

503
00:29:26,800 --> 00:29:27,280
Speaker 3: I want to know.

504
00:29:27,400 --> 00:29:28,560
Speaker 2: Can you find your mind?

505
00:29:30,080 --> 00:29:33,320
Speaker 1: The crowd freak out chair concluded, responded immunity with.

506
00:29:33,440 --> 00:29:35,840
Speaker 2: Oh yes, I want to know what do you feel good?

507
00:29:36,320 --> 00:29:40,200
Speaker 2: And this time the crowd was rapturous. I said, oh yes, give.

508
00:29:40,000 --> 00:29:40,440
Speaker 3: Me a hair.

509
00:29:40,600 --> 00:29:43,640
Speaker 2: Yes, I said, I want to know your.

510
00:29:45,120 --> 00:29:45,360
Speaker 3: Good.

511
00:29:46,720 --> 00:29:49,240
Speaker 2: Pig Pan left goose, and I want to tell everyone

512
00:29:49,320 --> 00:29:51,360
Speaker 2: to have his rod this minute. You can gotta do

513
00:29:51,480 --> 00:29:53,120
Speaker 2: one more time. You gotta think about your neighbors. You

514
00:29:53,160 --> 00:29:55,760
Speaker 2: gotta think about your friends, you gotta think about your brother,

515
00:29:55,880 --> 00:29:58,200
Speaker 2: you gotta think about your sisters and everybody that means

516
00:29:58,240 --> 00:29:58,600
Speaker 2: something to me.

517
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:01,960
Speaker 1: He then pointed to the freak out chick, who was

518
00:30:02,000 --> 00:30:04,480
Speaker 1: by now enraptured with his sermon, and blurted out.

519
00:30:04,680 --> 00:30:09,000
Speaker 2: Somebody a little long, somebody wants a little bit of fency.

520
00:30:09,080 --> 00:30:10,800
Speaker 1: If I want to know the move and what I'm

521
00:30:10,800 --> 00:30:14,040
Speaker 1: talking about, I said, I want to know you don't

522
00:30:14,120 --> 00:30:16,120
Speaker 1: know what I'm talking about.

523
00:30:17,040 --> 00:30:20,840
Speaker 2: Now tell me what more the time? Do you a faito?

524
00:30:23,320 --> 00:30:25,479
Speaker 1: Then if you can, you got to get on up

525
00:30:25,480 --> 00:30:29,640
Speaker 1: out of this place because shit's about to get me.

526
00:30:31,720 --> 00:30:34,320
Speaker 1: And with that, pig Pen walked off stage and into

527
00:30:34,320 --> 00:30:36,720
Speaker 1: the la air, and by now the cops had the

528
00:30:36,760 --> 00:30:40,480
Speaker 1: warehouse surrounded. They'd place sawhorses around the exits to corral

529
00:30:40,520 --> 00:30:43,560
Speaker 1: the kids as they split. Pig was dejected and the

530
00:30:43,640 --> 00:30:45,840
Speaker 1: gig was a bust and the party was a bust,

531
00:30:45,840 --> 00:30:48,120
Speaker 1: and now if he wasn't careful, he might very well

532
00:30:48,160 --> 00:30:51,080
Speaker 1: get busted. As he made his way out back out

533
00:30:51,120 --> 00:30:54,120
Speaker 1: towards the tracks, he came upon Ken Kesey wrestling with

534
00:30:54,200 --> 00:30:57,160
Speaker 1: a giant barrel of red glowing kool Aid, and there

535
00:30:57,160 --> 00:30:59,880
Speaker 1: were numerous cops shuffling about wondering what he was up to.

536
00:31:00,560 --> 00:31:02,960
Speaker 1: Kesey bent down by the sewer drain on the side

537
00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:05,120
Speaker 1: of the road, pulling the barrel down with him and

538
00:31:05,160 --> 00:31:08,520
Speaker 1: emptying its contents out and into the drain, thus getting

539
00:31:08,600 --> 00:31:11,640
Speaker 1: rid of the remaining batch of LSD literally right under

540
00:31:11,640 --> 00:31:12,880
Speaker 1: the noses of the cops.

541
00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:14,480
Speaker 2: Pig Pen could not.

542
00:31:14,560 --> 00:31:18,840
Speaker 1: Believe how strange the trip had become, and just a

543
00:31:18,920 --> 00:31:21,600
Speaker 1: year later, his band, the band he'd started with his

544
00:31:21,680 --> 00:31:24,400
Speaker 1: close friend Jerry Garcia, would go on to sign to

545
00:31:24,480 --> 00:31:28,280
Speaker 1: Warner Brothers Records. They'd record numerous albums, two of them

546
00:31:28,320 --> 00:31:32,080
Speaker 1: Great Workingman's Dead and American Beauty, and those two albums

547
00:31:32,120 --> 00:31:34,400
Speaker 1: being the ones that hewed closest to the band's old

548
00:31:34,440 --> 00:31:37,680
Speaker 1: weird Americana roots, ironically in an effort to write a

549
00:31:37,680 --> 00:31:39,920
Speaker 1: pop hit for Warner Brothers, because the bulk of the

550
00:31:39,960 --> 00:31:43,200
Speaker 1: material on their other releases was like the Watts Acid Test,

551
00:31:43,320 --> 00:31:46,240
Speaker 1: too far out for the record buying public, and admittedly

552
00:31:46,320 --> 00:31:49,000
Speaker 1: too far out for pig Pen as well. He was

553
00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:52,400
Speaker 1: like an American Brian Jones, not recognizing the value of

554
00:31:52,440 --> 00:31:56,000
Speaker 1: the very band he and his hipness essentially created because

555
00:31:56,000 --> 00:32:00,400
Speaker 1: he was too fucked up. And by the time nineteen

556
00:32:00,480 --> 00:32:01,240
Speaker 1: seventy three year.

557
00:32:01,160 --> 00:32:03,360
Speaker 2: Olled around and everything had changed.

558
00:32:03,800 --> 00:32:07,400
Speaker 1: The hate community was scattered, all that money had changed everybody.

559
00:32:07,960 --> 00:32:11,600
Speaker 1: Janis was gone, oh ded three years earlier. She and

560
00:32:11,680 --> 00:32:13,880
Speaker 1: pig used to split half a gallon of Southern Comfort

561
00:32:13,920 --> 00:32:16,000
Speaker 1: every night they were together during their on again.

562
00:32:15,880 --> 00:32:17,120
Speaker 2: Off again relationship.

563
00:32:17,640 --> 00:32:19,840
Speaker 1: They used to make so much noise in Pig's bedroom

564
00:32:19,920 --> 00:32:22,520
Speaker 1: that band members who used harder drugs wondered how they

565
00:32:22,520 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 1: could ball all night while so gone on booze.

566
00:32:25,600 --> 00:32:28,120
Speaker 2: It seemed like an eternity ago.

567
00:32:28,240 --> 00:32:31,560
Speaker 1: The band was now settled into something resembling a professional groove,

568
00:32:31,960 --> 00:32:34,840
Speaker 1: writing music, regularly recording it, and then going out on

569
00:32:34,880 --> 00:32:38,800
Speaker 1: the road promoted like professional musicians. They even succumbed to

570
00:32:38,840 --> 00:32:42,960
Speaker 1: traditional promotional tactics of the behestive Warner Brothers weird as

571
00:32:42,960 --> 00:32:46,240
Speaker 1: fuck promo sure, but nonetheless part of the music industry

572
00:32:46,280 --> 00:32:49,480
Speaker 1: machine all the same. They weren't part of the straight world,

573
00:32:49,720 --> 00:32:51,640
Speaker 1: far from it. But they were now part of the

574
00:32:51,720 --> 00:32:54,680
Speaker 1: music machine, whether they liked it or not. And despite

575
00:32:54,720 --> 00:32:58,400
Speaker 1: their far out, acid inspired oral explorations on record and

576
00:32:58,440 --> 00:33:02,720
Speaker 1: on tour America, the Grateful Dead were creating and living it.

577
00:33:03,080 --> 00:33:05,680
Speaker 1: They were a world apart from the old weird America

578
00:33:05,760 --> 00:33:10,480
Speaker 1: that inspired them in the beginning. Traditional American music was tragic.

579
00:33:10,880 --> 00:33:14,560
Speaker 1: The Grateful Dead were becoming an institution but loved, lovable,

580
00:33:14,840 --> 00:33:17,800
Speaker 1: tripped out teddy bears, a far cry from the bad

581
00:33:17,840 --> 00:33:20,880
Speaker 1: men that inspired the ballads and breakdowns of the Warlocks,

582
00:33:21,040 --> 00:33:25,200
Speaker 1: Railroad Bill, Willie Brennan, and Stagger Lee. But the Grateful

583
00:33:25,240 --> 00:33:27,960
Speaker 1: Dead were still indebted to that tradition, and the Bill

584
00:33:28,080 --> 00:33:32,280
Speaker 1: was about to come to Tragedy was the currency. Death

585
00:33:32,400 --> 00:33:35,200
Speaker 1: was at the Dead's door, and death had no mercy

586
00:33:35,240 --> 00:33:40,600
Speaker 1: in this land. July nineteen seventy two, pig Pen's drinking

587
00:33:40,640 --> 00:33:43,680
Speaker 1: had spun out of control one too many times. He

588
00:33:43,800 --> 00:33:45,800
Speaker 1: wasn't quite out of the band, but he wasn't quite

589
00:33:45,880 --> 00:33:48,440
Speaker 1: in it either. The Dead were touring, but he couldn't

590
00:33:48,520 --> 00:33:51,680
Speaker 1: keep up anymore. His drinking was so bad that physically

591
00:33:51,760 --> 00:33:54,240
Speaker 1: he had flare ups of internal beating, and his playing

592
00:33:54,360 --> 00:33:55,480
Speaker 1: suffered greatly.

593
00:33:56,080 --> 00:33:58,320
Speaker 2: At a time when the band was exploring.

594
00:33:57,800 --> 00:34:00,880
Speaker 1: The further reagions of improvisation, his place in the band

595
00:34:01,000 --> 00:34:04,720
Speaker 1: was suspect, to say the least. Rock Scully, the band's

596
00:34:04,760 --> 00:34:08,360
Speaker 1: manager called him out on tour for falling asleep on stage,

597
00:34:08,760 --> 00:34:10,960
Speaker 1: and after that pig Pen was forced to take some

598
00:34:11,080 --> 00:34:13,640
Speaker 1: time off to try to regain his health, and the

599
00:34:13,680 --> 00:34:14,680
Speaker 1: band was certain.

600
00:34:14,440 --> 00:34:16,880
Speaker 2: He would recover, but pig Pen knew better.

601
00:34:18,280 --> 00:34:21,400
Speaker 1: He was in his Marin County apartment fixing to die.

602
00:34:22,239 --> 00:34:26,320
Speaker 1: He'd separated himself from his girlfriend, his family, his band, telling.

603
00:34:26,160 --> 00:34:28,600
Speaker 2: Them, I don't want you around when I died.

604
00:34:29,960 --> 00:34:33,840
Speaker 1: On March eighth, nineteen seventy three, Pigpen, in the throes

605
00:34:33,880 --> 00:34:36,880
Speaker 1: of an internal hemorrhage from cirrhosis of the liver, a

606
00:34:36,920 --> 00:34:40,000
Speaker 1: similar cause of death that killed Jerry Garcia's hero Jack

607
00:34:40,080 --> 00:34:43,399
Speaker 1: Kerouac led back in his bed and contemplated the new

608
00:34:43,440 --> 00:34:46,560
Speaker 1: set of lyrics he was working on. Seems like all

609
00:34:46,600 --> 00:34:50,880
Speaker 1: my yesterdays are filled with pain. There's nothing but darkness tomorrow.

610
00:34:51,440 --> 00:34:53,000
Speaker 1: If you're going to do like you say you do,

611
00:34:53,560 --> 00:34:55,560
Speaker 1: if you're going to change your mind and walk away,

612
00:34:56,239 --> 00:34:58,240
Speaker 1: don't make me live in this pain no longer.

613
00:34:58,719 --> 00:35:01,320
Speaker 2: You know I'm getting weaker, not stronger.

614
00:35:03,920 --> 00:35:06,879
Speaker 1: When he closed his eyes that last time, he knew

615
00:35:06,880 --> 00:35:09,280
Speaker 1: what he was doing, he knew where he was going,

616
00:35:09,520 --> 00:35:13,560
Speaker 1: and he knew why. It was tragic and necessary. As

617
00:35:13,600 --> 00:35:18,320
Speaker 1: the debt had come to Ron Pigpen, McKernan generously paid

618
00:35:18,360 --> 00:35:21,880
Speaker 1: it in his band, the dead would forever be grateful.

619
00:35:23,719 --> 00:35:25,080
Speaker 2: Tragedy had befallen them.

620
00:35:25,320 --> 00:35:28,439
Speaker 1: Their very own bad man had broken down, and now

621
00:35:28,520 --> 00:35:30,880
Speaker 1: the Ballad of pig Pen will forever be sun as

622
00:35:30,920 --> 00:35:34,800
Speaker 1: an integral piece of the Grateful Bed's origin story. Rooting

623
00:35:34,840 --> 00:35:37,640
Speaker 1: the lore of the band firmly in the tradition of

624
00:35:37,719 --> 00:35:42,920
Speaker 1: old Weird America. His tombstone says once and forever a

625
00:35:43,040 --> 00:35:46,600
Speaker 1: member of the Grateful Dead. He died at twenty seven,

626
00:35:46,960 --> 00:35:52,399
Speaker 1: and that is a disgrace. I'm Jake Brennan in this

627
00:35:53,080 --> 00:36:17,440
Speaker 1: his disgrace I have. Disgraceland was created by Yours Truly

628
00:36:17,480 --> 00:36:19,359
Speaker 1: and is produced in partnership.

629
00:36:18,840 --> 00:36:19,840
Speaker 2: With Double Elvis.

630
00:36:20,120 --> 00:36:22,399
Speaker 1: Credits for this episode can be found on the show

631
00:36:22,440 --> 00:36:26,160
Speaker 1: notes page at disgracelampod dot com. If you're listening as

632
00:36:26,160 --> 00:36:29,520
Speaker 1: a Disgraceland All Access member, thank you for supporting the show.

633
00:36:29,600 --> 00:36:32,319
Speaker 1: We really appreciate it, and if not, you can become

634
00:36:32,360 --> 00:36:35,720
Speaker 1: a member right now by going to disgracelampod dot com

635
00:36:35,760 --> 00:36:40,080
Speaker 1: slash Membership. Members can listen to every episode of Disgraceland

636
00:36:40,239 --> 00:36:44,120
Speaker 1: ad free, Plus you'll get one brand new exclusive episode

637
00:36:44,200 --> 00:36:48,400
Speaker 1: every month, weekly unscripted bonus episodes, special audio collections, and

638
00:36:48,480 --> 00:36:53,320
Speaker 1: early access to merchandise and events. Visit disgracelampod dot com

639
00:36:53,320 --> 00:36:56,279
Speaker 1: slash membership for details, rate and review the.

640
00:36:56,200 --> 00:36:58,680
Speaker 2: Show, and follow us on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter.

641
00:36:58,440 --> 00:37:02,120
Speaker 1: And Facebook at Disgraceland Pod and on YouTube at YouTube

642
00:37:02,160 --> 00:37:06,240
Speaker 1: dot Com, slash At, disgracelampod, Rock a Roller.

643
00:37:08,680 --> 00:37:10,239
Speaker 2: He's a bad, bad man,