Graham performs with the Grateful Dead
Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum, February 23, 1993
Entire show available are archive.org
Playing with the Grateful Dead
On February 23, 1993 I played didgeridoo with the Grateful Dead at the Mardi Gras show at the Oakland Coliseum in California. This was more than a great opportunity to play with a famous band- the Dead had been my favorite band since high school and one of my biggest musical influences. I got the opportunity to play with the Dead mainly because Mickey Hart was releasing his solo albums on Rykodisc, which was also my label with my first band Outback and later with Dr. Didg.
Backstage before the show Mickey and I talked about how it would go down. The band would do “Playing in the Band”, which would evolve into the drum solo section. Then Mickey would bring the groove down to a stop and let me set up a new groove that I was comfortable with, and then they would join back in. We also had Sikuru joining us as a guest, an awesome African percussionist who has played some fantastic stuff on Mickey’s “Planet Drum” albums.
So, the jam coming out of Playing in the Band starts winding down, Jerry, Bobby, Phil and Vince leave the stage, and it’s time for me to join the drummers. Ramrod runs out and sets up my mic right on the Persian rug that Jerry stands on, I sit down, put on the headphones, and get ready to play. Mickey brings the groove to a halt, and I play a long sweeping note on my didg, “eeeaaaaooooow”, and a roar goes up through the crowd. Then I start into my riff, pretty close to what I play on the Dr. Didg tune Street Music, and Mickey, Bill Kreutzman and Sikuru join in. We get a groove going, and after a minute or two I think to myself “this needs to go somewhere…” so I stop playing my circular breathing riff and launch into some highly syncopated high “toots”, and immediately the other three guys respond and take the energy up a notch and I feel this thrill and think to myself “Holy SHIT, I’m leading the band!”, and then I drop back to my regular riff and listen really hard to everything else that is going on trying to make sure I am in synch with everyone.
Although I was playing continuously, they were taking what I was playing and bringing it up and down in the mix, creating a sound painting from all the musicians on stage. I was not aware of it at the time, but people who were there told me that at certain points they started firing up this third bank of speakers hoisted up at the rear of the coliseum, behind most of the audience, and they were taking my didg sound and panning it from the left speakers, to the right speakers, to the BACK speakers, and back to the left, so that it seemed like the didgeridoo was flying in circles around the top of the coliseum. This effect doesn’t come out clearly in any of the audience tapes I have heard of the show. Finally the jam went all spacey as Mickey started triggering synth sounds from a drum pad, and I started making the spaciest slowly pulsating didg sounds I could think of. Then Jerry came out and stood right next to me, facing backwards looking at his equipment and tuning his guitar. I thought to myself “Oh YEAH, I’m going to jam with JERRY!” but then a voice came in my headphones which said “Right. Time to get out of there” and I had to leave. Phil and Bobby came back out and it evolved into a space jam as Mickey and Bill left the drums and took a breather.
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