Patrulha do Rock!!!

Photo by MARK R. SULLIVAN, Illustration by SHELDON L. SNEED/Gannett New Jersey Related Stories 10 years later, deadheads fondley remember the man that will not fade away

By MATT KATZ and TAMMY PAOLINO
Courier-Post Staff

Ten years ago today, Jeff Lucas, then the economic director of Cherry Hill, was visiting businesses on Route 70 when he stopped inside the Woodstock Trading Company.

Lucas was chatting with the person at the register of the store, which sells anything and everything related to the band the Grateful Dead, when the phone rang.

"He picked up the phone and listened to the caller," Lucas said. "He began to cry, and through his tears, he announced to everyone in the store, `Jerry is dead.' Everything changed inside, and people were screaming, crying and holding onto each other for support."

Lucas excused himself, and decided to return another day.

When news broke on Aug. 9, 1995, that Grateful Dead frontman Jerry Garcia had died at age 53, scenes such as the one Lucas witnessed took place all over the country - and well beyond.

Deadheads, as fans of the band are called, came out of the woodwork - from members of Congress to young fans who had never even seen Garcia's masterful guitar work live in concert.

Garcia's life was cut short by years of drug abuse and other poor health habits, and it ended with a heart attack while he sought treatment for heroin addiction in a drug treatment facility.

But if his death was a long time coming, it was no less of a shock to those who loved the man and his music.

Garcia's influence can still be heard emanating from computer speakers in dorm rooms and tape decks in baby boomers' cars.

A decade later, Garcia is known as more than just a rock star who fell the way so many others in his line of work fall. He symbolized a still-thriving cultural movement that spans generations and, as Garcia himself put it, defies explanation.

"You need music," Garcia once said. "I don't know why. We need ritual. We need magic, and bliss, and power, myth, and celebration and religion in our lives. And music is a good way to encapsulate a lot of it."

Heart has its seasons

On an anniversary that brings more smiles than tears, South Jersey's Deadheads welcomed the opportunity to speak with joy and gratitude about what Garcia and the Grateful Dead have meant to their lives.

"The Grateful Dead, and Jerry in particular, could sum up the meaning of life in one sentence," said Mike Neas of Voorhees, whose 10-year-old son Sam was an infant when the family went to Garcia's memorial service in California.

Neas described Garcia as an uncle figure. "You really had to see Jerry perform to realize you were in the presence of something special," he said.

Garcia didn't swing the microphone stand around. He didn't get down on his knees and jam on the guitar or set off pyrotechnics. He barely even spoke to the crowd.

But the adoration was endless. His shows attracted legions of followers who would literally live their lives on tour. His guitar work kept thousands in the aisles spinning and dancing.

His voice spoke like a poet. One of Neas's favorites? "Eyes of the World":

Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world

The heart has its beaches, its homeland and thoughts of its own

Wake now, discover that you are the song that the morning brings

But the heart has its seasons, its evenings and songs of its own.

Neas said other bands have benefited after Garcia's death, "because it spawned a whole generation of bands that wouldn't be possible."

Commonly called "jam bands," groups like Phish and String Cheese Incident have enjoyed Grateful Dead-style popularity. Like the Dead, they reserve a section of the audience for tapers, they play different set lists each night and they thrive on the improvisational jam.

And like Deadheads, fans of these bands put an index finger in the air outside concerts looking for a "miracle" free ticket. They sell "glass," or marijuana paraphernalia, in exchange for a ticket or just a ride to the next show.

And they travel great lengths to see their bands - like to Bonnaroo, the annual festival in Tennessee where a Garcia-less Grateful Dead regrouped as "The Dead" and headlined in 2003.

"If I could have seen one band, it would have been them (with Garcia)," said Chris Childers, 18, of Cherry Hill, who has copies of more than 50 Grateful Dead shows. "I would have loved to have been there, hanging with the Deadheads."

Childers was wearing a Dead shirt to the String Cheese show last month, and he said his favorite band is Phish. He sees a connection among all three bands.

"What appealed to me about the whole thing, it's not just what's given to you, it's the energy of the show," he said. "They make it up as they go along. . . . You feel like a family when you come out."

Fans at the String Cheese Incident show were still singing nursery rhymes when Garcia was unleashing psychedelic-infused poetry and meandering guitar riffs before thousands. But they told of older siblings, friends and parents who passed along the tapes, handing off the baton of Garcia and the Dead.

The band's influence can be seen, in part, in the numbers. They sold more than a million copies of four different albums. But the brilliance and uniqueness of the band can only really be heard within its live performances, which were like raindrops - they happened all the time, and they were always different.

The band sold more than 10 million tickets in 30 years, more than any band in history. They played the Spectrum in Philadelphia 53 times - the third most of any venue they ever went to - and they performed in Philadelphia a total of 67 times, according to Setlists.com.

An ode to the Dead's shows at the Spectrum (all of which were sold out) is a banner that still hangs from the rafters.

"Life as I knew it in fun land was not the same after he passed," said Joe Tropea, a 37-year-old mortgage broker who saw 110 shows, including Garcia's side project, the Jerry Garcia Band.

He remembers "excursions" - the summer of 1987, specifically.

What is it about the band, and Garcia in particular, that continues to elicit such devotion? Here are some answers. The following are fond remembrances of Garcia from area fans, sent via e-mail. To read more, visit our Web site at courierpostonline.com:

Remembering Jerry

"Jerry is an American icon. The world is a smaller place without him. He was and is the antithesis of today's celebrity culture. He was all substance and no image. (I say this) having seen him hundreds of times in many formats, first and foremost with the Grateful Dead, a band that shook The Spectrum to its rafters with classics like `Sugar Magnolia,' `Playin' in the Band,' `One More Saturday Night.'

"He was not a perfect person, his weaknesses well-documented and tragic. He was a great storyteller with a guitar and a voice. His mission was to spread the joy of music. I think he succeeded.

"God bless you, Jerry. May you rest in peace." - David Griffith, Cherry Hill