The Cult By the Lake: The Grateful Dead Exhibit

Unlike most college students who travel to warm, far away locales for spring break, my short vacation was spent in Cleveland, caught in the frozen throes of swooping gusts rolling off the shores of Lake Erie.  Why Cleveland, you may ask (I asked myself the same question as friends of mine geared up for trips to South Beach and Las Vegas), but something more than the winds generated by the Great Lakes was pulling me to visit the North Coast.

Cleveland is home to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and for someone who loves music and history like I do, when you combine the two, Cleveland is the premier destination to visit - especially when they have temporary exhibits that need to be seen.

Exhibit at R&R HOF

This year's exhibit is dedicated to the greatest American rock band: the Grateful Dead. Opened in April 2012 and continuing up until March 24th this limited-time exhibit, titled The Long, Strange Trip, culls together hundreds of artifacts to commemorate the band's 50 years of making rock and roll music;  highlights include various musical equipment, handwritten lyrics, original artwork and other rare tidbits.

The Grateful Dead formed in 1965 in Palo Alto, California and became one of the most popular groups of the San Francisco scene and the defining band of the countercultural movement. With a unique blend of rock, blues, country, psychedelia and improvisational jazz, the Dead are known for long shows and extended jamming onstage and a differing setlist every night. The Dead  performed as a single unit up until the death of lead guitarist Jerry Garcia in 1995, but original members created offshoot bands that maintain the experience the Dead have created.

So, why the Dead? Why are they an appropriate subject for a blog on cult film?

Even with a long, influential career and induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, the Dead are considered the epitome of a cult band. With 13 studio albums and nine live albums, the band never reached the commercial success of their contemporaries (the band had one unlikely top 10 hit in 1987). It was outside the studio, performing 2,300 live shows, where the Dead built up their fan base and found success that has eluded many popular bands.

The Dead are known for having the most dedicated fans of any band. In the 1970s fans would follow the band along their travels to different cities across the country. "Our audience is like people who like licorice," said Garcia . "Not everybody likes licorice, but the people who like licorice really like licorice."  The fans dedication has led to the label of "Deadhead" to describe their loyalty to the band. In return, the Dead garnered a cult following and became one of the most successful touring acts in the business.

Concert promoter and friend Bill Graham said of the band, "The Grateful Dead aren't the best at what they do; they are the only ones that do what they do." Furthermore, in the 70s, stickers were passed around that said, "There is nothing like a Grateful Dead concert." The band was known for putting on one hell of a show. Performing nonstop for most of the year, shows would run on for three to four hours every night, featuring a rotating setlist every show, and because of the bands improvisational quality, no song was ever played the same way twice.



Original "Wall of Sound" blueprint

Besides the band's unique thoughts about what a performance should be, the Dead had even more grandiose ideas about how a concert should sound. In 1974, when the band was only making $125 a week, the Dead spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to develop the most advanced and visually imposing sound system ever conceived. The new sound system was mammoth, in both sound and size, and was devised as a way to accommodate the bigger arenas they were playing.  The band wanted the best sound possible, so along with their sound engineer, they built what was referred to as "The Wall of Sound." Instead of setting up equipment across a stage, the band stacked speakers on top of each other in towers. Along with this new setup, the band invented new technology that allowed each band member to control his instrument through each stack of speakers. Because the setup was behind the band, they didn't have to rely on front stage monitors to hear what they were playing; instead, the band heard what the audience heard to ensure the crowd received the best listening experience possible.  The setup was monstrous. Comprised of 641 speakers and requiring 26,400 watts of power from 55 600 watt amplifiers, the "Wall of Sound" showed the band was serious about playing music for the fans.

The exhibit in Cleveland features pieces from the infamous sound system. Tucked away behind metal railings, guitars, drums, and pianos were three speaker cabinets from the "Wall." I was minutely disappointed with how such an important phase in the band's sonic history was represented. The "Wall" was big, and I feel more could have been incorporated. I've been to plenty of museums and have seen artifacts from ancient cultures and dinosaur bones (creatures that were much larger than "Wall," but breathed just as much power and freight into anyone who've seen them), but never have I been more in awe than what I witnessed at The Long, Strange Trip exhibit. I was so excited that when the employee sitting in front of the exhibit left, I reached over the railing and smudged some of my DNA all over the wooden speakers. I am now part of the Grateful Dead history. Yes!

Speaker cabinets behind guitar case

But pictures can't do the "Wall" justice. You would have to see and hear it in person to fully appreciate the marvel it truly was. But that was almost 40 years ago, and until someone invents a time machine, that moment is gone forever. But if you want to see the "Wall" in all its glory and witness the affection between the band and its fans, than The Grateful Dead Movie is the perfect document.

Original Theatrical Poster

Released in 1977 but filmed in 1974, the concert film documents the Dead's five-night run at San Francisco's Winterland Arena (the band's home venue) from October 16-20th. These five shows brought to close the year's tour and signaled, at the time, what was to be a definite hiatus from touring. Strange that a band would decide to stop performing gigs, especially when the band created their reputation on the road, and more so after a year like the Dead had in 1974.

The year was a creative apex musically for the Dead. They reached plateaus they never thought possible before, creating beautiful melodies, harmonious, exploratory jamming on stage (including inspired, seamless transitions in between songs); and experimented with new sounds and equipment, including the new sound system, which presented a band that sounded fresh to audiences ears. But all that was merely a mirage.

The band was in financial ruin: their new single didn't chart, their new album faired poorly, they depended on larger venues to preform, and the "Wall" was a bitch to setup and break down after every show. And it didn't help that certain members of the band and crew were lost in a blizzard of cocaine and heroin. By the end of the year, the October Winterland shows were booked and tickets were stamped: "The Last One." The band was broken and tired, but you wouldn't know it by listening to them play.

Here's a scene from the film showing the crew setting up the 'Wall."

The movie doesn't begin like other concert movies. He hear the opening notes of the band's single "U.S. Blues," but instead of seeing the band perform the song, the film begins with a ten-minute animation segment. We have a skeleton - dressed as Uncle Sam - dancing in space, caught in an intergalactic pinball game. The skeleton, cruising down the highway on a motorcycle, is shrouded in a kaleidoscope of hallucinogenic images, until he wakes up in jail with other imposter Uncle Sam's. The Statue of Liberty busts her head through the wall and frees the skeletons from the jail cell, her bright torch morphing into the real disco ball hanging in Winterland's ballroom, 1974.

Original Animation Cell

The Grateful Dead Movie is unique in that it doesn't just present the music of the band. It goes beyond the traditional concert film and tells a story. The film presents both sides to that story, offering incite from band members about their future, and anecdotes from fans about the good ole' days, before the music industry - and the Dead - become mainstream. The following clip shows the relationship between the "Deadheads" and the music created by the Dead.

It doesn't get stranger than that for the Grateful Dead. Okay - maybe it does, but the fans do have a funny way of showing their appreciation. And if anyone is wondering if these people are the dangerous drug-fueled baby eaters the press made hippies out to be, have no fears, they're just really digging the music.

And after the last song on October 20th was played, as roses piled up on the stage, the band bowed and walked off into darkness and into retirement. And not even the band knew for how long.

But a band like the Dead couldn't be keep off the road for too long; fact is, the boys couldn't stand not playing. After a year and a half break and a new album, a revitalized version of the Dead hit the stage in mid-1976. By 1977, after three years of editing, Jerry Garcia pieced together his baby, The Grateful Dead Movie, a true testament to the Grateful Dead experience.

It's true what they say, "In the land of the dark, the ship of the sun is drawn by the Grateful Dead." The band continued truckin' on for another twenty years, continuing their commitment to the music and their fans.