Bob Dylan is certainly one of the most influential songwriters of all time because he was one of the first to show that it was possible to write about topics other than love and still achieve success. For more than 60 years he has been touring and recording non-stop, so he had the chance to see many incredible acts and even perform with them on stage or studio. One of those bands was The Grateful Dead that even toured for a while with Bob and once he gave his opinion on the group’s guitarist and singer Jerry Garcia.
Bob Dylan’s opinion on Grateful Dead’s Jerry Garcia
The Grateful Dead was formed in Palo Alto, California back in 1965 and was active for 30 years until 1995. The band came to an end when Jerry Garcia sadly passed away at the age of 53. A few years ago, the band had toured with Dylan and their friendship even got bigger. After Garcia’s death, Dylan shared a special message to Rolling Stone magazine about his dear friend.
“There’s no way to measure his greatness or magnitude as a person or as a player. I don’t think eulogizing will do him justice. He was that great. Much more than a superb musician with an uncanny ear and dexterity. He is the very spirit personified of whatever is muddy river country at its core and screams up into the spheres. He really had no equal.”
“To me he wasn’t only a musician and friend. He was more like a big brother who taught and showed me more than he’ll ever know. There are a lot of spaces and advances between the Carter family, Buddy Holly and, say, Ornette Coleman, a lot of universes. But he filled them all without being a member of any school. His playing was moody, awesome, sophisticated, hypnotic and subtle. There’s no way to convey the loss. It just digs down really deep,” Bob Dylan said.
The Folk Rock legend performed several times with the Dead back in the 80s. They spent more time together in 1987 when a successful stadium tour featuring both happened in North America. They played separately and together at those concerts. The result of it was a collaborative live album called “Dylan & The Dead” (1989). That album was produced by John Cutler and Jerry Garcia. It only has songs composed by Dylan that he performed with the Grateful Dead.
Bob Dylan said Garcia showed him his songs could have been better
Dylan recently paid tribute to the band covering the track “Friend Of The Devil” during his North American tour in June, 2022. It was the first time since 2007 he performed a Grateful Dead song live. Talking with Edna Gunderson, in an interview back in 1997, he said that Jerry Garcia showed him that his songs could have been better recorded.
“I can’t say that I’ve made any great-sounding records. A lot of the older songs were just blueprints for what I’d play later on the stage. Jerry Garcia proved that to me. He took a lot of the songs and actually recorded them and sang them a step further than they were on my records.”
“He heard where they should go. I would hear his versions of songs of mine and I’d say, ‘OK, I understand how it should go.’ Then I would play that and might even take it a step further. There have been other artists who have recorded my songs and shown me the way the song should go,” Bob Dylan said.