Fare Thee Well Quotes

“Tensions spread from the front office to backstage. At the Raleigh, North Carolina, stop the first week, Mickey Hart told manager Cameron Sears he didn’t want to see Weir on his bus that night. In the middle of Hart’s spaghetti dinner, however, Weir climbed aboard Hart’s bus and started making his way down the aisle. “Don’t you RatDog this band,” shouted Hart. Weir unceremoniously dumped Hart’s plate of spaghetti on his lap. Judo black-belt Hart leaped out of his seat, slapped a quick move on his erstwhile bandmate, threw him down to the floor—“You understand that I love you,” he told Weir—and escorted him off the bus. Nobody said a word.”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“John Mayer”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“Weir had become a modern-day troubadour—an ancient archetype certain to be recognized by Joseph Campbell, the myth expert and author of Hero with a Thousand Faces, the book on which film director George Lucas partially based his Star Wars trilogy. Campbell was one of dozens of unlikely people to stumble into the Dead camp. At Mickey Hart’s invitation, Campbell attended a Grateful Dead concert. Campbell told Hart he could tell “the band is tied at the heart. You are shaking hands with the ancients.” Campbell was guest of honor at a dinner party Hart threw at his home that Weir also attended.”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“Drummer Hart has never slowed down—from ancillary projects like an art exhibit of slices of bark from redwood trees he found on his morning walks around his Sonoma ranch to a deep plunge into astrophysics with Nobel laureate George Smoot, manipulating sounds recorded from deep in space. Using UC Berkeley’s supercomputer, Smoot and his team showed Hart waveforms millions of years old and he turned them into sound files—sonifications—to use in recordings. Hart was literally playing with the Big Bang.”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“We treat it as repertoire. In Grateful Dead terms, that means every performance can be different. All versions of the songs are true, just like a fairy tale.”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“After the concert, for an additional $150, VIPs could attend a reception in the auditorium’s upstairs ballroom, where they nibbled expensive desserts and listened to a string quartet play while a bluegrass fiddler sat atop a large wrapped gift box and sang “Box of Rain.” Wavy Gravy, the clown prince of Woodstock, dressed as Ludwig van Beethoven, sang “Happy Birthday” to the birthday boy, who was accepting his well-wishers while seated on a king’s throne on the stage, as regal as a king without actually wearing a crown. “Don’t eat the brown strudel,” warned Gravy.”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“The Grateful Dead has always worked as a democracy,” Hart continued. “Phil’s the odd man out. So he took his marbles and split, like a little boy would. That’s his prerogative; God bless him, I wish him well. But believe me, we don’t miss him. We’re having a great time without him. It couldn’t be better. If someone doesn’t want to play with you, you don’t play with them. We have no fight with him; he’s sort of at odds with himself. I think that liver transplant didn’t go so well. He might have gotten the liver of a jerk.”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“Dear Friends & Family: We regret to announce that Steve Kimock has chosen to flee the Bob Dylan / Phil Lesh Tour. We apologize for any inconvenience, pray for your forgiveness, and look forward to your continued support. “I ain’t gonna work on Maggie’s Farm no more…” Signed, running & shooting behind him as fast as he can… —Steve Kimock”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

“The next night was an off night in Virginia Beach, and Hart sent a room service spaghetti dinner to Weir and his girlfriend, Natascha. “I love you more than spaghetti,” read the note. When he joined them for the dinner, they sat down talking like nothing had ever happened the night before. Brothers will fight.”
― Joel Selvin, Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip