He got locked in the box of being Jerry Garcia.

This is not the movie I expected it to be. If you’re looking for the Altamont story, an in-depth analysis of the band’s keyboardists and their deaths, this flick is not for you. Actually, I’m not sure this film will satisfy anybody, even the hardest core Deadheads, because it’s mostly others telling their story of the band, and if you were ever touched, if you were a fan, you’ve got your own. Buying the albums, trading the tapes, going to the show… Each concert was different, and that’s what built the legend, much more than the passing of cassettes, it was a living breathing thing that was palpable, very different from a show today, still-influenced by MTV, with a firm setlist and production, the Dead made it up as they went along, and if you weren’t there you might miss out, but what made the band go nuclear was the hit, “Touch Of Grey,” suddenly everybody was clued in, because some things never change, it’s always about the single.

And when the band reaches the pinnacle it’s always about the money. You’re the center of an ecosystem. If you leave the road, if you break up, what are all those people gonna do for a living? And the responsibility weighs heavy. Everybody says go, from the manager to the agent to your fellow players, never mind the audience, and then you self-destruct. This is what happened to Kurt Cobain, I believe it’s what happened to Chris Cornell, and it definitely happened to Jerry Garcia.

But you don’t want to hear that. You want to put these people on a pedestal, invest them with your hopes and dreams, and the greats were never in it for that. They wanted acknowledgement, they wanted success, but they didn’t want to fulfill expectations, they wanted to experiment, they wanted to be free, like in the sixties.

If you’re watching on Amazon there are six episodes. And it becomes an endurance test. And if you’re not up for the full investment, just watch the first and the last, they’re superior. But that’s the difference between then and now, we had few options, we experienced boredom, we’d go to the Grateful Dead show and it would be one hour of greatness, one hour of trash and two hours of mediocrity, not that anybody would admit it. But at least give them credit for trying to climb that hill, achieve greatness. And this flick mirrors a Dead show, and when it’s on, it’s SPECTACULAR!

Like is said in the flick, Ronald Reagan wanted to erase the sixties. The Republicans still want to achieve this, even though it was fifty years ago. But if you were alive back then, you know the sixties were not overrated, our only regret was they didn’t continue, that we didn’t get to participate in everything, we wanted to go to the Acid Tests which we didn’t know existed until Tom Wolfe’s book, that’s what made Woodstock so big, everybody had gotten the memo, they didn’t want to be LEFT OUT!

But first there was just a germ of an idea.

You’ve got to start with economics. You could live on next to nothing. You could pursue your dream. Even I did this, spending two years skiing in Utah. No American does this anymore, they’re afraid of missing out on their career, and it costs too much to do it. And don’t criticize the ski talk, Jerry Garcia loved to SCUBA dive, and even their old road manager, Sam Cutler, says you’ve got to get away from it to survive, he even referenced snow skiing.

But, once again, you don’t want your heroes to be human.

And if you’ve met your heroes you’re sorely disappointed almost all of the time. Your image does not comport with reality. And today everybody wants the responsibility of being a star, but Garcia stopped talking, he was afraid of people hanging on his every word.

So, it’s the turn of the decade. From the fifties to the sixties. The beatniks paved the way, and the poets did too. And you became a musician not for the money but because you got the bug, you were bitten. And Garcia was and his goal was never to make commercial music, but the music in his head. And first and foremost it had to be FUN!

That’s a running theme in the film, along with Garcia’s infatuation with Frankenstein. Jerry only wants to do it if it’s fun. And he’s into the moment, not the legacy, he’s all about the now. So if you’re looking for instruction, if you’re looking for lessons, I wouldn’t start with the Dead, they were making it up as they went along. Hell, try that, but good luck surviving. You see times have changed. You can’t make it here. But Jerry, et al, did.

And they all acknowledge Jerry is the leader, the teacher, the inspiration.

And Jerry was inspired by what was going on around him and a high school student named Brigid Meier. And when she returns, 28 years later, when Jerry has Dennis McNally track her down you know all men are the same, looking back, never forgetting where they were, who they were, the women that influenced them. It’s not about hanging with the rich and famous, it’s about hanging with those who knew you when.

And that’s the essence of the picture, the Brigid Meier story.

As for the rest…

I really don’t care what Al Franken has to say about the band. Or Steve Silberman. Or even Nick Paumgarten, the most articulate of the three. Because, like I said, we all have our own stories.

And the stories are not fully fleshed out. Joe Smith has told me numerous times about telling the band to make one for him, after multiple uncommercial LPs, but somehow the band just gets divine inspiration and makes “Workingman’s Dead,” even though Joe says a lot, this is not included.

Nor is the formation of their own record company.

Nor is there emphasis on the postcards and their fan club.

And they mention European tours and going to the pyramids but you want to know more about road life, and you want to know more about relationships, Mountain Girl is only mentioned by her daughter Trixie. And I won’t say the film is a whitewash, but there’s very little negative in it, and there’s always negative in life, it’s amazing we get along at all.

So, the early footage is revelatory. As is some footage of the initial European tour. But this flick is not about facts, but feeling. And too often they miss the feeling. You get the feeling of what it was like to be in the band before it was signed, which makes the initial installment so good, and the mania of the end, when there were more people outside the stadium than in it, but the all night Fillmore shows, how “Workingman’s Dead” and “American Beauty” blew up the band, working with Lowell George… That’s nowhere to be found. The Dead meant the most in the seventies, the eighties and nineties were a victory lap, and although they say this about the later period, they don’t go into depth about the commercial heyday of the 1970s.

So I’m disappointed.

I think most people will be disappointed. Assuming they watch it at all.

Have you got four hours to watch a Grateful Dead movie? Only the most hardcore Deadhead does, and there are not enough nuggets here to satisfy them.

Maybe the film had to be sixteen hours long.

Or there had to be a cut and uncut version.

The definitive story of the Grateful Dead has yet to be told. And isn’t that just the point? The story is continuing, it will never die, the act will probably outlive its members, which is rare these days.

Because they were in it for the music.

Until they were in it for the business and it destroyed them.

Forgiveness – Spotify

When did we evolve into a zero tolerance society?

People are imperfect, they make mistakes, unless forewarned, should they pay the ultimate penalty? Should they lose their jobs, get kicked out of school for having a brain fart, even when premeditated with a blind spot, even when conscious?

My college had an honor code. Break it and you faced the consequences. But those kids who were just kicked out of Harvard for writing bad stuff on Facebook… I don’t want to defend it, some of it was truly heinous, but do they deserve to lose their place in class? Does Kathy Griffin need to have her career decimated? Does Bill Maher have to be kicked off of HBO? Just because someone commits a faux pas and offends someone, does their employer have to invoke the nuclear option? The employer maintains, as does the complainer. The one who made the mistake…

Have you heard anything from Michael Richards recently? I’m not sure he ever got over his mortification from making racist comments in the heat of the moment.

And there’s a camera everywhere.

No one bats a thousand and no one ever gets it all right. Is this the culture we want to live in, where everybody walks around inhibited, afraid to speak? It’s the free exchange of ideas that makes our society great. You find out you’re wrong and you adjust. Impulse is the core of creativity. Once you start filtering your instincts, you screw it up.

Now I’m not saying repeat offenders shouldn’t pay a price. Bill O’Reilly had a blind spot that he was unwilling to admit to, he was a serial harasser.

But Billy Bush? Come on, we’ve all been in that situation, hanging with someone richer and more powerful than we are, we’re uptight, we don’t quite know how to act, so we agree, we play along. Come on, you’ve never winced at your behavior, what you’ve said after an encounter?

I mean does it have to be so black and white? Is Comey a bad guy forever because he interfered with the election, or can he be a good guy now?

And this isn’t right or left. Everybody deserves a pass, at least now and again.

Certain things are beyond the pale, like killing someone. But there are even exceptions there, having to do with premeditation, insanity, but in the court of public opinion you’re guilty, you get no trial, and you’re permanently on the sidelines while everybody else moves on and forgets about you.

This is kind of like the drug laws. Or three strikes and you’re out. We’re so busy creating rules to make us feel safe that we coarsen our society.

Now I don’t know where to draw the line, this is a gray area.

But in schools, there’s a zero tolerance policy.

And in media.

And you become a pariah. I’m pissed at Al Franken for canceling appearances with Kathy Griffin and Bill Maher. That’s how you know who your true friends are, whether they stand by you or abandon you in times of crisis. Al can say he’s worried about voters, but grow a pair, will you? What’s more important, getting re-elected or standing up for what’s right?

Didn’t Don Henley sing it was about forgiveness?

But that was almost thirty years ago. When our rock stars were chiaroscuro, not held up as perfect, before they all got plastic surgery and told us they were better than we were.

And the stars used to sing about love. That’s one of my favorite verses, from Todd Rundgren:

And when you feel afraid, love one another
When you’ve lost your way, love one another
When you’re all alone, love one another
When you’re far from home, love one another
When you’re down and out, love one another
All your hope’s run out, love one another
When you need a friend, love one another
When you’re near the end, love one another
We got to love one another

Love is the answer. Something John Lennon preached and got shot for. If he wasn’t so damn famous, he wouldn’t have been a target. Everybody on the edge is a target, but we need those pushing the envelope to enlighten us, to stimulate us, to entertain us.

What did Ian Hunter sing, once bitten twice shy?

How about that. Give somebody a bite. And then be on guard for other failures, other trips over the line.

But when someone screws up just once, why should they pay the ultimate penalty?

the Axe Files – Ep. 147 – Gov. Jerry Brown

I know, I know, I’m overloading you with missives. Hell, I’m thrilled you’re subscribing and reading AT ALL! It’s just that I’m both excited about life and overwhelmed, and there’s just so much HAPPENING!

Like listening to the BBC re the election on Sirius this morning. What a great world we live in where we can tune into the source and get a take. But there are fewer outlets in the U.K., at least it seems that way, whereas in America we live in the land of chaos, nowhere so much as in the land of podcasts, most of which are vanity projects, but some resonate.

Like the Axe Files. Wherein David Axelrod interviews both right and left wingers. He gets their history, and if we’re lucky their take on what’s going on now. I mean he even had Karl Rove, and that guy who wrote “Hillbilly Elegy,” whom I now deplore. J.D. Vance may have come from nothing, but after Yale he became part of the tech/financial complex, working for Peter Thiel, and I’d rather listen to someone still in the belly of the beast. Did you read that story in the “New Yorker” about the opioid crisis in West Virginia? The EMT went to the same house for O.D.’s three times in one day, FOR THE SAME PEOPLE!

Now we live in a land of disagreement, where there’s little leadership and we feel that we’re on our own, then you listen to Jerry Brown on the Axe Files and you see a glimmer of hope.

That’s right, Governor Moonbeam. Who dated Linda Ronstadt. Who kept running for President and losing. He’s Governor again, but not for long, hell, he’s 79 years old. But he’s as fresh and as motivated as ever. And listening to him talk is stimulating and energizing and THIS IS THE BEST PODCAST I’VE HEARD ALL YEAR!

We need leaders. We need people who are speaking English. Brown pulls no punches, says exactly what he thinks, with no hems and haws. He just lays it all out. And I believe even if you disagree, if you’re on the right, you’ll think he makes sense.

And at the end he recites all the California triumphs. High taxes, but a great economy with a reserve.

But I don’t want to get into the specifics, I want you to LISTEN!

And no one’s got any time, I know. I went to the Dylan Nobel speech and it had under a hundred thousand listens. Now I see it’s got 661,050, and to tell you the truth, you don’t have to listen to all 27 minutes, when he gets talking about “Moby Dick” and “All Quiet On The Western Front” it’s boring, it’s like he had to appeal to the naysayers, say he’s part of the canon of literature. But BEFORE THAT? Wow, he talks about inspiration, locking on to Buddy Holly, hearing records, getting inspiration, finding his direction, not worrying about popular culture but going his own way, it’s so INSTRUCTIVE!

But even more I want you to listen to Jerry Brown. All of it. Because it’s the wisdom of experience. He himself makes that point, when he was first governor when he was 36, he thought experience was the problem, now he knows that’s wrong. And he learned how to get along, to compromise, and this is a better Commencement speech than you’re ever gonna hear.

If you listen to podcasts. If you’re worried about the world surrounding us. If you’re interested in stimulation… PLEASE LISTEN!

“The Addicts Next Door”

“2016 Nobel Lecture In Literature-Bob Dylan”

RapCaviar

Is driving the culture. It’s more important than radio. It’s where rap records get started, and rap rules America.

How did this happen?

MILLENNIALS! The pooh-poohed generation has taken over. They threw a monkey wrench into the British election and they’re skewing music listening. This is the way it always happens. Just when you think everything’s copacetic, when there is no change, change happens.

The debate about Spotify has been about compensation.

But the true story about Spotify is INFLUENCE!

Spotify is where records get started. And they do so very quickly. This is not radio, where you massage program directors and wait for your slot, where you have arguments about what and what doesn’t work. Spotify knows INSTANTLY! Either a track is saved or skipped. And with this data, the service places winning tracks on other playlists and they become hits. Radio is last. And at this point radio reaches more people, but 6,962,977 people are subscribed to RapCaviar, and that’s just plain NUTS!

And in the mobile version, there are videos interspersed in the playlist, there’s a whole culture, a whole ecosystem, lacking in other genres, especially those which have not moved to streaming. Once again, country and rock and every other genre should IMPLORE their acolytes to subscribe to Spotify. As for Apple Music, it’s a black hole behind a paywall with no readily discernible data. It’s anti-now. Apple should be publishing reams of data, to not only help artists but to cement their place in the culture.

But right now it’s limited to Spotify.

And why is it African-Americans are always on the cutting edge of technology? First with pagers, then with smartphones and now streaming. They’re open to something new, they go where the action is, they create the action, they’re aware of the rules whereas everybody else keeps whining that their cheese has been moved.

And African-Americans drive the culture.

So the whites are hip-hop fans, and they’re all aware of RapCaviar, they pay attention to it.

The most popular rock playlist on Spotify is Rock This, with only 3,664,155 followers. Even Rock Classics only has 2,315,715 followers.

Hot Country has 3,794,358.

ElectroNow has 4,253,946.

Ultimate Indie has only 1,707,052.

None of the Folk and Americana breaks seven figures, they don’t even get to half of that. Metal is even worse. Punk is just about as bad.

So if you’re focusing your fans on downloads and CDs you’re only hurting yourself. People discover new music on Spotify. And it will only become more powerful. They’re going to steal radio’s thunder while stations keep putting out press releases how healthy the genre is. In an instant world, who wants to be last? In an on demand world, who wants to wait to hear what they want and be unable to skip?

Right now hip-hop rules Spotify, that’s where all the money is going. If you want to get paid, you need to advocate for your genre’s playlist, you’ve got to play the streaming game.

Or you’re gonna be left out.