Fans of the Grateful Dead are bidding farewell to the band this weekend. This isn’t the first time.
Since the band lost its frontman Jerry Garcia almost thirty years ago, it has re-formed multiple times, continuously touring and winning over new generations. Along the way, each new set of fans has had their own opportunity to mourn, as my colleague Marc Tracy writes.
On the day Garcia passed away in 1995, Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir held a concert near Boston. One fan, Albie Cullen, remembered that the encore felt like an emotional farewell for Garcia and the band. “Everybody kind of knew that was the end,” Cullen said. But it wasn’t.
In 2015, the surviving members held a series of farewell concerts. It was another emotional send-off, but it wasn’t the end either. Within months, a new iteration was formed, called Dead & Company. It includes singer-songwriter John Mayer, who was born more than a decade after the original band was formed.
During Dead & Company’s eight-year run, the band once again became a cultural phenomenon. Longtime fans embraced Mayer, a talented guitar player. Many young fans discovered the group through streaming services or its extensive online archive of live concerts, and the band recently had its best week of record sales in 35 years. When I attended the band’s performance at Citi Field in New York last month, the stadium’s upper deck was filled with Gen Z fans dressed in tie-dye.
Tonight, Dead & Company is in San Francisco for the final show of what they claim will be their last tour. Even if that turns out to be untrue, fans have once again embraced the ritual.
“We like to say goodbye. We find a purpose in saying goodbye. It’s almost like practice,” Marc told me. “People genuinely appreciate the bittersweetness of it. You’re not supposed to enjoy sad things, but people watch sad movies all the time.”
Read Marc’s full story here.
NEWS
War in Ukraine
The Sunday question: Should Ukraine join NATO?
Bringing Ukraine into NATO would “draw a clear line that Russia wouldn’t dare to cross,” write Marc Thiessen and Stephen Biegun for The Washington Post. However, The Los Angeles Times’s editorial board argues that the support Ukraine needs after the war can be provided “without admitting Ukraine to NATO.”
MORNING READS
Lives Lived: Everett Mendelsohn, a long-time Harvard professor, became known for lecturing on diverse topics such as genetic engineering and the making of the atomic bomb, and for encouraging students to examine the impact of science. He passed away at the age of 91.
THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE
“Onlookers”: Ann Beattie’s new collection of stories, her “best in more than two decades,” examines the forces shaping America by focusing on Charlottesville, VA.
Our editors’ picks: “Directions to Myself,” a thoughtful memoir about parenthood and self-reflection, and eight other books.
Times best sellers: Colleen Hoover dominates the latest paperback trade fiction list.
THE MORNING RECOMMENDS …
Plan the perfect weekend in Telluride.
Use these kitchen compost bins.
www.nytimes.com
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