There aren't a whole lot of musical acts you know my name that basically have zero radio
play, but you sure know the Dead - thanks in large part to their devoted legions of
"Deadhead" fans that kept showing up at concerts for decades.
But the Grateful Dead's transformation into one of the most beloved touring acts in the
world was definitely a "long, strange trip."
For all of the positivity the band embodied, they were also beset by a series of unfortunate
incidents, controversies, and… ironically enough, deaths.
Here's the tragic story of the Grateful Dead.
Childhood trauma
When lead guitarist Jerry Garcia was 5 years old, a wood chopping accident severed a large
chunk of the middle finger on his right hand, which he later claimed improved his ability
to play the guitar.
The same year, Garcia's father drowned during a fishing trip, and he and his brother were
sent to live with their maternal grandparents.
Eager to see the world, Garcia decided to enlist in the Army at the age of 17, but it
didn't pan out.
Garcia made it through basic training, but was given the boot that December, sending
his life in a new direction.
Woodstock flop
There were many iconic performances at Woodstock in 1969, but the Grateful Dead's set wasn't
one of them.
By the time they took the stage, the band was ridiculously high, but their love of intoxicants
was only the first in a series of mishaps that led to a lousy performance.
On the night the Dead were scheduled to perform, rainstorms had turned the stage into a deathtrap.
After a delay of several hours, the band was finally given an "all-clear" and a reassurance
that they wouldn't be electrocuted.
By then they were all on LSD, and recordings of the set reveal long breaks between songs,
drug-fueled banter, and overall confusion that led to a sloppy, 40-minute performance
of "Turn on Your Love Light".
The band managed to get through five tracks before their amps overloaded and they finally
called it quits.
Pigpen departs
Ron "Pigpen" McKernan was a founding member of the Grateful Dead and the first to pay
the ultimate price for his vices.
While the rest of the band explored inner consciousnesses with LSD, McKernan opted to
stick with alcohol — and lots of it.
In 1970, his doctor told him to stop touring with the band and fight his addiction.
McKernan returned to the band in late 1971 and stayed through their 1972 European tour,
then his health took a turn for the worse.
His final appearance with the band was at the Hollywood Bowl in June 1972.
A year later, at just 27, internal hemorrhaging ended his life.
His landlady discovered his corpse in his apartment two days later.
Musical amnesia
Garcia struggled with smoking, drugs, and overeating for most of his life.
These destructive habits began to get the better of him in the mid-'80s.
According to the LA Times, in July 1986 an untreated, abscessed tooth resulted in an
infection, which lead to a diabetic coma that lasted five days.
"I just laid down one day and didn't get up."
When Garcia regained consciousness, he'd lost the ability to play the guitar and had to
relearn all his songs and solos.
Amazingly, the band was back to performing live by December 1986, five months after he
emerged from the coma.
Another keyboardist lost
After keyboardist Keith Godchaux left the band in 1979, the impressively bearded Brent
Mydland joined the Grateful Dead.
Mydland proved to be an asset throughout the '80s a skilled keyboardist and a deft songwriter,
penning a large portion of what would become their final studio effort, 1989's Built to
Last.
Mydland's life ended in 1990, at the age of 37 after a lethal dose of heroin and speed.
Losing Jerry
After surviving his diabetic coma in 1986, Garcia seemed like he was finally ready to
kick his old habits.
In December of 1987, he welcomed a baby daughter, his fourth child.
His struggle to lose weight and quit smoking continued in the years that followed.
In the summer of 1995, he checked into a drug treatment facility in Forest Knolls, California,
and never checked out.
A little over a week after his 53rd birthday, Garcia passed away in his sleep.
They never quite hit it big
The Grateful Dead were undeniably popular, but they never enjoyed what you might call
"mainstream success."
The closest they ever came to a chart-topper was "Touch of Grey," a 1987 track that made
it as far as No. 9 on the Billboard charts.
Their albums didn't fare much better.
The only studio album to make into the Top 10 on Billboard's album charts while the band
was together was 1987's In the Dark.
This was joined in 2017 by a live performance from 40 years earlier, Cornell 5/8/77, which
debuted at number 10.
The Grammys weren't kind, either, but the Dead did win Grammy Hall of Fame Awards in
1999 and 2016, and a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2007.
Poor Billboard performance didn't hurt their sales, though.
As of 2014, they'd sold over 35 million albums.
Rainbow-gate
Surviving band members gathered for a series of farewell concerts in 2015 dubbed "Fare
Thee Well: Celebrating 50 Years of the Grateful Dead."
They did only five shows, but made over $52 million.
The concerts were legendary, but according to Time, many tickets initially priced between
a $60 and $200 were snatched up by scalpers and resold at outrageous prices.
The negative press was severe.
Rolling Stone called the series a "cash grab," and Billboard even critiqued a rainbow that
appeared over the crowd during the first show.
Rumors claimed it was simulated and had cost the band $50,000.
We may never know.
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