Please vote. Make sure your friends + relatives do, too. RIP Phil Lesh.

Don't sleep. These people are not fucking around.

Photo: Greg Gaar 1975 (Golden Gate Park)

I saw the Grateful Dead for the first time in 1976, and quite a few times thereafter. I feel very fortunate. Phil Lesh’s playing was foundational to the band, essential to what they did. And his memoir is probably my favorite of all the books written about them.

This posthumous appreciation of Lesh in the New York Times, written by the veteran critic Jon Pareles, really nails what made his musical contributions so unique, and so key to their magic.

I happen to be in California staying with an old friend, and coincidentally, we were watching Lesh perform in some recent Terrapin Clubhouse videos the night before he died. This one, with harpist Mikaela Davis, is from last month. And as you can see/hear, dude was searching for the sound, joyfully, right up to the end. RIP.

And PS — Steven Hyden reminded me of this scene from Freaks and Geeks, which remains one of the best renderings of the way music can shape us in our formative years. It’s beautiful, and kinda heartbreaking.

Catch you next week. - Will