Grateful Dead

Phil 85, Part 2

In the 2nd part of the Deadcast’s Phil Lesh tribute, we get deep into his singular bass playing with Phil’s son & bandmate Grahame, Phish’s Mike Gordon, & musicologist Rob Collier, while touring Phil’s high adventures with Ned Lagin, radio co-host Gary Lambert, & other friends.

Guests: Grahame Lesh, Mike Gordon, Ned Lagin, David Crosby, David Lemieux, Gary Lambert, Rob Collier

Phil 85, Part 2, supplementary notes

by Jesse Jarnow

Phil Lesh told his own story in his soulful memoir, Searching For the Sound, as well as reading the accompanying audiobook.

In this episode, musicologist Rob Collier breaks down some of Phil’s bass playing.

We’ve delved into Phil Lesh’s songwriting on our “Box of Rain,” “Unbroken Chain,” and “Pride of Cucamonga” episodes, and went under the hood of the Mission Control/Osiris bass in our “Loose Lucy” episode.

We were once again able to draw on several great archival sources to let Phil tell his own story. Thanks immensely to Gary Lambert for the audio from the Grateful Dead in the Gone World radio special, to David Gans (and Blair Jackson) for interview excerpts of Phil Lesh and Jerry Garcia (available in full in Conversations With the Dead), and to Andy Childs, for use of his 1974 London interview (who contributes these days to Caught By the River).

From the late 1980s through the early ‘90s, Phil Lesh and Gary Lambert hosted Rex Radio, later known as Eyes of Chaos/Veil of Order, on Berkeley’s venerable KPFA. Some playlists are available here. For the last year or so of his musical career, Phil and his Friends occupied the Terrapin Clubhouse.

In the summer of 2001, Phil Lesh and Friends performed what became known as the Planet Jams. Grahame Lesh finished and recorded a version of “Jupiter” with Robert Hunter’s lyrics, featuring Phil on bass, for Midnight North’s 2023 album, Diamonds In the Zodiac.