Jerry Garcia Band live at Eel River 08/10/91 Larry Mishkin, Jim Marty and Rob Hunt try to make sense of Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) recent announcement vowing to block marijuana banking until the Senate passes comprehensive legalization. They also speculate how the recent Delta variant surge will impact fall music festivals. Finally, in remembrance of his passing they share their passion for The Jerry Garcia Band and play a clip from their legendary Eel River 1991 concert. Produced by PodCONX https://podconx.com/guests/larry-mishkin https://podconx.com/guests/jim-marty https://podconx.com/guests/rob-hunt https://deadheadcyclist.com/ Photo courtesy of Jay Blakesberg
Jerry Garcia Band live at Eel River 08/10/91
Larry Mishkin, Jim Marty and Rob Hunt try to make sense of Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) recent announcement vowing to block marijuana banking until the Senate passes comprehensive legalization. They also speculate how the recent Delta variant surge will impact fall music festivals. Finally, in remembrance of his passing they share their passion for The Jerry Garcia Band and play a clip from their legendary Eel River 1991 concert. Jim also gives a review from the Tedeschi Trucks Band concert at Red Rocks (See photo links below)
https://podconx.com/guests/larry-mishkin
https://podconx.com/guests/jim-marty
https://podconx.com/guests/rob-hunt
Photo courtesy of Jay Blakesberg
Tedeschi Trucks Band Red Rock 2021 Photo 1
Tedeschi Trucks Band Red Rock 2021 Photo 2
DC 0080921 b
[00:00:00] Larry Mishkin, Jim Marty and Rob Hunt: Hello everyone. And welcome to another episode of the deadhead cannabis show. I'm Larry, Michigan of Michigan lunch cargo, and very excited to talk to you today. We got a lot of great things to talk about. Let me quickly introduce and say hello to my co-hosts. Rob hunt Rob of Lenay holdings out in New York for the summer.
How are you, sir? Well, Larry excited to be back on the show this week. Yeah, we missed you last week, but you know, Jim and I managed to hold down the Fort just like the good old days. So, but you were missed with your your insight and your, your dead nerdism is always missed. Well, like I like to say it as it is where I'm also joined today by my other co-host CIM, Marty have a bridge west.
Jim is in, where are you? Which part of Colorado are you in? I'm in Denver today. And it's a beautiful day in the mid eighties and a blue sky. Lovely, We got lots of good stuff to talk about. Maybe we'll start on the marijuana side because we've got so much on the music side that if we start there, we'll never make it [00:01:00] back over to the marijuana side.
Rob, right before we hopped on, we were all talking about what's going on with the safe act, which is something that we've talked about on this show before. But there were some updates involving Corey Booker. You want to bring us up to speed? Sure. So for everyone out there listening, I think most people are pretty familiar with safe act is, and essentially it's a way for cannabis-based businesses to have access to financial institutions where previously they have, a lot of them have banking relationships, but these are banking relationships.
Now where the banks can feel comfortable, there'll be nothing that would prevent the feds from coming in and coming after them for money laundering or for any other nefarious activity for banking and cannabis. Cannabis-based claims. And so if safe were to pass would absolutely open up the banking industry to canvas companies in a way that we haven't seen to date, but there are issues with that.
And that said, the, the banking would, for the most part go to the larger companies, the, the companies have the savvy and have the ability to work with the larger financial institutions would be the ones that'll be the beneficiaries of the change in the law. [00:02:00] And what Cory Booker is now saying.
No, that's great. But if that's all we're doing is just, creating more wealth for the already wealthy, without addressing the issues of social justice and, canvas reform that helps the people that have been badly prejudiced by the drug war. Then I'm not sure that I'm in favor of it.
Obviously Booker's pushing for much more broad sweeping reform on a, on a federal basis. So safe is a nice first step for the industry, but it's not necessarily a nice first step for those that are struggling and still don't have access to to the industry itself. So essentially he's saying if we're widening the Gulf and the process of passing safe, then I will oppose safe or, and I think what's likely to happen is that, Booker's going to look for some sort of a solution.
Okay. If we pass safe, there needs to be some other, rider tacked onto it that allows for more social justice to be done at the same time. While we wait for a larger act like new Schumer's bill to go through or for, say for states to go through. So knowing that we think legalization is probably still several years away as [00:03:00] we've discussed what can be done in the near term and Booker?
I think, it's, it's, it's rare to think that the. Would be the, the ones who know stifling progressive legislation. But in this case, it'd be doing it to try to create something that's more beneficial to everyone rather than just a specific group of the already wealthy. Now, Rob, one of the things that we've often talked about is that for the most part, these topics tend to be fairly bipartisan and support, right?
That there's a lot of red states that have been introducing new marijuana laws. And we're going to be talking about two more states that are just coming online in a minute. Right. So what I find that's interesting about this is it doesn't really seem to, to swing one way or the other along party lines.
What seems to be the hold up with this as it is? Is it Booker's amendment now that's going to slow things down or will that help clear some roadblocks and speed it up? Yeah, I mean, it's a good question. I mean, ultimately the roadblock is the same roadblock that's always been there, which is a 60 vote threshold in this.
[00:04:00] So, getting anything across the line is, is relatively tricky. But what I'll say is that, the Dems normally are banking on the fact that their coalition of 50 right now would all vote in lock step on any sort of canvas legislation. But even that's not the case, it might be the case on safe because it's not, sweeping change in, in legalization.
But but to actually get 10 people to cross the aisle is difficult in this situation. Now we're talking about Dem saying, well, If this doesn't do what we want to do in terms of, supporting a lot of our constituents that we claim to be looking out for them. We'd rather throw our own bill than to put through something that is, very unpopular to a lot of our constituents because it doesn't give them the ability to actually participate in an industry that has, now largely it's been handed over to a large group of MSOE that don't need the help don't need the, they've already got access to banking relationship.
So, yeah, I mean, if the Republicans were smart on this issue, going into the midterms, they might say, oh, it's really the Dems that are, that are stifling progress. Like we're in [00:05:00] favor of it. We would have voted for safe. We're, we're all for changing the banking regulations, but you know, it's Booker and his coalition that stopped it.
So this is the first time that Booker's opening the door to allowing the GOP to, to come in and, and sort of turn the tables on how they think about canvas fell, policy and lives. Well, very interesting points. Go ahead, Jim. Yes. Permanent county point of view almost all of our clients and we have over 500 license holders, nationwide clients.
They all have checking accounts. They don't have true banking. I think the real benefit of the safe app will be to allow retail stores to accept MasterCard and visa. That's the big one. If you go into a dispensary and they take MasterCard and visa, they're there. Deceiving MasterCard and visa and saying they're a pizza shop or something like that.
So to me, that's the real benefit of the safe banking act is allow credit cards allow [00:06:00] get some bank loans, lines of credit. Cause the industry you are correct. It does not have banking in the true sense, but most cannabis companies can get a checking account. Jim, let me ask you this question. Is there any way to S.
What making credit card services available to this industry would do to the overall level of sales. Do we think that would increase sales, which would sales pretty much remained the same because people are finding the cash to buy what they want. What do you think about that? Well, outside of cannabis I think the business statistics are people will spend between 10, 10 and 20% more.
If they can use a credit card for any person. So I think that would carry over to the cannabis industry. So it wouldn't just be so much a question of if they would buy versus how much they would buy. Right. Okay. Very interesting. And that's a good point, actually, that, when we talk about banking, banking tends to be a pretty broad topic in this industry, and sometimes you can break it [00:07:00] down and, and certainly the ability to do business by plastic would make a lot of sense.
Rob, what do you think about that?
I think that Access to credit cards is very, very helpful. It certainly makes things more convenient and certainly makes the the ability for these companies to be efficient, significantly easier. And if you think about that every single day, they've got to figure out where to deposit cash, filling out SARS reports, finding armored car services, to do pickups, all the other inefficiencies that go along with the cash business that are alleviated through the use of, traditional means of of accepting.
It just makes a huge difference for the industry as a whole, but again, for that to happen, I think that, safe, safe would certainly, I think, solve it. But then it's a question of whether or not visa, MasterCard discover, et cetera, would actually still, change their policies or whether they would say, okay, that gives us some comfort, but until legalization happens, we don't want any part of this.
And I think there's a fair amount of financial institutions, including the credit card companies that may take that up. [00:08:00] So we'll see, we'll see whether or not passing safe is the is the panacea that people hope for with respect to a credit cards and B institutions like Wells chase and be Yvette.
Yes. As a side note, very few people, especially the millennial generation carry very little, if any cash. In fact that's interesting up at red rocks for concerts this year, the vending people will not take cash. It's all credit. So, yeah, it'd be a huge step forward. Hopefully it'll, we'll see something happen here before the end of the year.
I mean, oh, go ahead. I was gonna say we all deal with it. I mean, I think all of us fed clients that pass in cash, not that we want to necessarily accept. I mean, obviously if one still gives me my 10 99 at the end of the year and all the rest of the fun stuff that goes along with that, but I've had to accept cash as a, as someone who's worked in the cannabis industry for years, as part of just, What we sign up for when we get into this industry.
So, I'd certainly rather be paid by check by every client. I'd rather be paid by, electronic means and wire transfer, et cetera. But, we just haven't had that available to us every time. It's [00:09:00] most of the time, that's how I get paid, but I'm sure there, I'm sure you've had that Kleiner too, that paid you.
Absolutely. But, but you, you touched on something a second ago when you focused for a minute on the public perception as to what's holding up the bill this time around. And what's important about that is of course that Cory Booker is doing it because he's w. A politician, who's trying very hard to bring this concept of social equity into the industry.
It's a, it's a concept that people spend a whole lot of time talking about, but I can't say that I've seen very many good examples of it, where it really worked out the way everybody hoped and expected. And it was, it was greeted in a, in a positive way. And I don't mean to suggest that that people don't believe that.
That certain groups should have certain benefits perhaps, and, advantages, especially in an industry that has caused so much more collateral damage on their communities perhaps than others. But the question becomes, when you have something as valuable as, as the safe banking act and as, as, as all of [00:10:00] the good that it can bring in terms of safety and financial certainty and all sorts of things like that, is that the place where we want to draw the line for something like this, or is it to say, this is exactly the place to draw the line, because this is so important that in order to get that, we have to have this.
We're going to, we're going to have this attached to it and, and force you to pass this in order to pass that. And I'm not enough of a politician. Do you know, to be able to explain that game very well myself, but yeah, I see that happening more and more where social equity issues get tied into other related issues.
And then sometimes it works, but sometimes it works perhaps in the way that the sponsors hadn't. Well, looking at the timeline. Now, Congress is about to go on it's August recess. So that only leaves them a few weeks before the end of the year. And then next, as soon as we turn into 20, 22, that's an election year.
So I don't know that we're going to see any comprehensive cannabis legislation in 20, 22. I hope we do, [00:11:00] but I am not optimistic. Yep. Well, and speaking along these lines for a second, Rob the other social equity issue that we were talking about that I know that you and I were very surprised to hear about because of the fact that there is a This is a democratic administration.
Although Joe Biden has not established by any means that he's a friend of the cannabis industry. But now there's news out that prisoners who have been released to home confinement even including low-level offenders now that the COVID threat is, is, has reduced sufficiently enough that the administration wants them all to be returned to jails.
Is that correct? That is correct. And it's unfortunate. I mean, obviously the policy is uniform across all, all offenders, not just drug offenders, but you know, under under the Trump administration, there was a policy that allowed a lot of people that were low level offenders to be released to home confinement when the threat of COVID was so large, that it was seen to be unfair to.
Expose people or potentially expose people to a disease when Kobe was running rampant through through a lot [00:12:00] of institutions, federal incarceration places. But the expectation is that, even as that subsided and these people weren't really seen as harm harmful to their society, and we're still following the rules of home confinement.
That they'd probably be able to stay that way. But as of last several days, the Biden administration has asked these people to return to to, to incarceration, which is something that I think is terribly unfortunate. Especially for low level drug offenders. It just doesn't, it doesn't make a great deal of sense, especially because a lot of those low level drug offenders are people that violated probation or violated parole and were returned to prison.
They might've had an underlying, other offense. And the thing that got them back was the fact that they tested positive for cancer. So you stick those people back in jail. It doesn't seem to make a great deal of sense. And certainly, I, I don't think there's a great deal of justification.
I would agree with that. Assuming that we are talking about offenders, whose primary offense that puts them behind bars was low-level drug offenses. Right. And that's a little, little drug offense wasn't [00:13:00] maybe adjacent to, or in addition to something that might be a little more strict or serious and require.
And require incarceration, but certainly if we're just talking about people who are low level drug offenders you would almost think that this would give the Biden administration and any other administration perfect cover, right. They were released within the midst of a health crisis. I don't think there's a huge public outcry for a return of low-level drug offenders to jail.
I know there's been a huge outcry about concerns about convicted felons and, and, and, and, and people convicted of serious crimes. Possibly being led out or released for COVID or other things like that. But I don't think we see a whole lot of clamoring from people saying I went low level drug offenders put back in jail.
And in fact, most people probably know somebody or know somebody who knows somebody who's a low level drug offender. It, it flies in the face of what the Biden administration said. They're going to do. They've been very clear saying, we're going to say we're no longer going to prosecute. Low-level drug [00:14:00] offenders.
We're not going to incarcerate low level level drugs. So their, their whole policy of, of how they're going to treat new offenders. They've now backtracked on existing offenders and it doesn't give me a great deal of confidence that they're going to stay true to what their their mantra was going into the election cycle of how they're going to treat low level offenders in general.
Yep. Yep. I agree with all that. It doesn't say we're swinging into 2022 and I don't think we're going to see a lot of policy changes on cannabis. Yup. Except at the state level where we have both Rhode Island and well, Ohio coming on board for sure. Rob, what's the latest on Rhode Island?
Well, I understand the latest is there still a Gulf between the governor's mansion and the state house, but that Gulf is getting smaller and smaller. The belief is that going into the fall session, they're going to be able to find something that's. They're going to agree to. So they're not there yet, but the word on the street, or at least the word in Providence is they're very, [00:15:00] very close.
And the state lawmakers have certainly said, this is a priority for them in the fall session. So, if you were to say handicap, this one, I would expect we're going to see adult use legalization before the end of 2021 coming out of Rhode Island, or at least the framework that we passed, early 20, 22.
But Rhode Island is looking, looking pretty good together, which is, one more in new England think that would leave New Hampshire left for adult use to go through to complete the the sixties. Excellent. So always nice to see somebody else come on board, especially out there. And it's great as we fill up holes in the map.
But just as importantly for many reasons, Ohio is is coming on board as well. What do you know about that one? That one's more important, significantly more important to downs. It is a nice state, we all like the ocean state, but yeah. How many people. Ohio's a major population state.
So now we're talking about something that moves political needles. In what we're seeing there is that a adult use legalization is being proposed directly out of the state house, which is something that, we'd love [00:16:00] seeing. I mean, it's, the lawmakers are ready to get behind this thing and they're not waiting for ballot initiatives to get it done.
So if there's real movement in Ohio, I mean, again, add that to the list of other major population states that we're expecting movement from, including Pennsylvania, Virginia, and flow. And Ohio. So, kind of the last one, that's a major population state that has not either already moved or was not already in process.
The last state to go after that would be. So, Ohio, that's big news for, for Ohio. It's big news, for the industry. And I can tell you as a Michigan fan, that it's about damn time. This team that kicks our ass every year finally gets some legalized marijuana in their state. So we don't always just have to worry about it when they come down Arbor.
Yeah. And not to mention that Ohio is a red state once again, to the bi-partisan nature of the issue. Well, that's very true. Both both read in terms of the Buckeyes and red in terms of their political leaning. And yes, your point is well taken Jim, there it's another state that's coming online for marijuana.
And the other thing to take about Ohio is that [00:17:00] lawmakers are doing this somewhat in a reactionary way, because at the same time that they're proposing something, they've officially introduced the bill at the state level, they're doing it because they know that there's a valid initiative. So if they don't preempt this thing, it's passing, to, to Jim's point Ohio, the red state are not the support for adult use.
Legalization is absolutely there. It's going to go through now. It's a question of what goes through, if they can say, all right, let's, let's craft it in a way that we, like, rather than the way that, you know, someone that's going to draft the bill in favor of whatever they want. We're smarter to do it now knowing that's coming either.
Yeah. I think that makes a lot of sense. Okay guys, good marijuana talk as always. There's, there's lots more to talk about, but we have a ton of music to talk about today and I, I don't want to get lost in all of that because we are all huge fans of live music and love to see it and hear about it whenever we can.
Jim lead us off and give us a quick rundown on the Tedeschi trucks show that you were lucky enough to see this past weekend. Yeah, so it was, [00:18:00] well, it was last weekend and great, great set. A really strong performance, but about a 60 minutes in the sky opened up a blinding rain and hail, bender red rocks, hundreds of times.
And this is the first time I had hail. And so it was a mad scramble. We went up top to the museum were packed in there. So, as one of my friends said, this is gonna be a good test of our COVID vet. And none of us have gotten sick in a week since I think we're okay. But my son Jack was down download red rocks with his girlfriend and they crammed in with about a hundred guys and girls into the lower men's room and waited out the full hour storm there.
So many people. I dunno it need a pass to get in the tunnel, the backstage pass. So we didn't try for that. But a lot of people left. During that day we didn't think they were coming back on. Cause it was just thunder, enlightening all around us. As we're walking down the stairs, I'm telling my friends, I wouldn't hold on to that metal [00:19:00] handrail.
If I were you. And So anyway, we waited it out and they came back on. Finally. I mean, like I said, by the time they came back on of the 10,000 people that were there for the sold-out show, that was maybe a thousand that were left and they just hit a killer second set. They had we got more angel from Montgomery.
We got into sugary long Derek trucks jam. So it was a lot of fun. It was a great time. Just a crazy, crazy night. Well, I got to tell you this, besides the fact that I love to ask you. The second night of red rocks, 1984, there was a huge hailstorm that hail came down so hard. We were all driving to the show in my, in my girlfriends Ford Tara's hatchback.
She's not my wife, but she was my girlfriend at the time. And it was a brand new hatchback that she had gotten for graduation from the university of Michigan. And she drove it all the way out to red rocks with a whole group of us. Despite her father telling her not to do it and her saying what [00:20:00] could go wrong.
So we were on one of those roads that you get onto the highway, Jim, to head west to red rocks, just a few miles east of the, of the, of where red rocks is. I don't remember which one it was, but there was a red roof into wherever we were staying and we had gotten something to eat. We we're trying to get to the highway and it started raining and then it started hailing so hard.
We couldn't see anything. You couldn't get under the bridge. Cause all the, the, the, the, the lanes there were filled up with people stopping. So she pulled into a gas station thinking she could go into recover, but we couldn't do that either. So we just sat in her car and listened to the hell, beat down.
She had a steel, your face sticker on the hatchback in the back. And all of a sudden, the piece of glass held together by the steal, your face. Popped out 30 seconds later, the glass on the hatchback was gone. Five minutes later, the hail stopped. We got it all scooped out of there. We put our tarps on there.
We drove off to red rocks. We got there for just at the very end of the second set, and then the next day had to deal with the broken glass. But that was our hail story at red rocks in 1984. And when I saw Tedeschi [00:21:00] trucks in Chicago, a few years ago, up at Revinia festival in Highland park, we were sitting under the a pavilion and at one point, Susan Tedeschi just came out and said, Hey, look, they're telling us there's going to be a terrible storm coming through here in a few minutes.
All you people out of the London, it's a huge, huge LUN at, at Ravinia where people go and they picnic and they bring all sorts of fancy food and stuff. She was like, we suggest that you're going undercover. And within 20 minutes it was raining so hard. You couldn't see outside of the pavilion. And when it stopped 45 minutes later and the band came back out, there was nobody left on the lunch.
So, same kind of a thing. We just happened to be lucky enough to have pavilion seats that night. But Tedeschi trucks apparently can bring that out. Right, right. Yeah. It was like a private show for the second set. Exactly. Very nice. And in the world of live music, by the time, I'm sorry, I was going to say quickly that I love Jim, that he brought up angel from Montgomery.
Cause I think Susan Tedeschi sings it better than, than anyone. I mean, Bonnie Raitt obviously did a great job with it and it was originally a John Prine song. If you think about, I think of John Prine as being, top five greatest lyricists of [00:22:00] all time and just exceptional. And I always find it interesting when writers write songs from the point of view of the opposite gender and writing that song.
And from the perspective of a woman was just a really, really interesting way for prior to think about it. And when he just discussed angel from Montgomery, the goal of that song was to, to evoke desperation. Like how do I, how do I sing about the, the feeling of desperation. And the lyrics angel from Montgomery, they have stickers absolutely magical.
And you hear what Susan Tedeschi singing and she's like, does it as, as well as anyone ever could. So hopefully she nailed it. When you saw her at red rocks. It's one of my all time favorites in general. And definitely when she performs it. Yes. Yes. In spite of being soaking wet and freezing cold, that was a great angel from Montgomery industry.
I love how they do that too. That's always a lot of fun. That's a nice little transition that they pull off. But in the world of live music due to the vagaries of when we taped the show versus when it's aired as of today, I have not yet seen by the [00:23:00] time this show airs, I will have seen. A couple of fish shows down at deer Creek, which I'm very, very excited about it.
It'll be my first fish shows in quite some time. And it should be a lot of fun. Although fish has now sent out an announcement saying that due to current COVID conditions, That they're asking all of their fans to bring and wear masks during the show. So, I think that'll be interesting both in terms of seeing how many people actually comply with that.
And who's the first person to invent the mask that can hold its own joint. So I figure, any of those things are just right around the corner and it should make it great, but I've been looking at the set list and they look very, very exciting. I've been listening to a little bit of the music and they sound great and I, I just cannot wait to get out and see fish.
And if I can't see the dead or dead end company or anything like that, then fishes the band I want to see. And deer Creek is a great place to go see them. I haven't been there since I saw the dead in the early nineties. So I'm excited to go back. Yeah. The shows I've heard have been really, [00:24:00] really good.
And our three shows in Denver are just a few weeks away. So we're all looking for. That my three tickets ready to go. It's beautiful. Beautiful, beautiful. Curious about whether or not the the, the Delta variants going to start shutting down, live music again. Cause we're certainly starting to see, mass mandates all over the place.
We're starting to see major cities rethink their policies. LA is certainly now, rethinking whether or not they are allowing people to gather indoors that mask, man. I mean, for the first time, we're actually seeing a ton of anti-vaxxers now rush to get the shot based on the perception that the Delta variant is, the viral load is just that much greater and it's that much more dangerous.
So, I just, when I thought we were out of the woods and I just firmly believed that coming into June, July, I'm now worried about, are my kids going back to school this fall in person. And and I don't know the answer to that right now, based on, kind of the, the sheer volume of people that decided not to get back.
Well, Rob, let me tell you something. My son is supposed to get married in Atlanta over labor day weekend, and he was supposed to be married in Atlanta over labor day weekend, [00:25:00] last year. And the wedding got postponed for a year because everything was shut down due to COVID. We were very, very hopeful and once the vaccine came out, as close to confidence as we could be that this wedding was going to go forward this year.
And although we remain very hopeful as far as we can tell the people we've invited and, and the folks who would be coming themselves are vaccinated. I certainly can't say what the conditions will be like four weeks from now. And whether people will feel comfortable making that travel, we're, we were already questioning the safety of going to the crowded fish.
I said, look, I've been vaccinated. I got my mask. I'm going to see fish shells. I kind of drew my line in the sand there. Little uptick here in Colorado, as I've been mentioning your hospitalization was right around 300 for many weeks. We've taped up to 400, but again, that's what 10,000 people, every night at red rocks, that's with an all star game.
So, it seems to be under control that, the virus hospitalizations go, we'll just watch it over the next few weeks. See if it continues to tick up. Well, definitely begs the question. What are we going to see [00:26:00] happen? If we do go back into some sort of a lockdown, what does that mean for the canvases?
As the canvas industry can go through another sort of second period of of massive revenue production based on, people staying home, not spending money on other things. I mean, I can't see us going into a full lockdown like we did previously, but if we go back into sort of a closet, half locked down, do we think that's going to endure to the benefit of the of the canvas industry in general?
Or do we think that it's not going to have the same effect that it had in 2000. I think it will have a bigger effect this time around, because I think people will have seen how it was done the first time around. And I think that people will be far more, I think the mental effect of a second lockdown, or even a partial second lockdown will be much greater than the first lockdown.
And I think the people will be turning very quickly to things like marijuana to help lighten the mood. Kind of get them through these times. And I would be very excited if I was the owner of a marijuana dispensary or a cultivation center, or a new licensee here in Illinois who just got one of those licenses.
And boy, you want to be up and running as fast as you can [00:27:00] because we saw what happened during the first lockdown with the poor sales numbers. When each week we all talked about how our respective states were, beating sales records week after week after week. And I, I firmly believe that that that will happen again, then, it was just tasteful as it might be to, to all of us a lockdown or any kind of a change like that will I think definitely push up the adult use cannabis market and the medical market.
Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting here in Colorado, a lot of my clients are having sales that are flat or below last year. On the other hand, the ones that are in tourist towns, like. Durango are seeing record sales month after month after month as the tourists all come back to Colorado. I'm sure that's big for them.
Good talk, nice diversion into cannabis again for a second. Important and good to do. Swinging back over to music for a minute here. Where we were going to is that we are currently, or again, due to the way we tape at the time we're taping, we still are. But by [00:28:00] the time this is aired, it will be over the days between for Garcia, marking the eight or nine days between his birth and his passing.
It gets great airtime on the grateful dead station on Sirius XM. And for this whole week, instead of playing regular dead shows, they're playing all Jerry Garcia band shows three per day with David Ganson, Trixie Garcia, hosting them. And the banter between the two of them is very fun and very interesting.
And, Trixie tells great stories about Jerry as a father and how he would sit around and doodle cartoons for them. And, Makes you wonder what it would be like to have Jerry at the table, when you come home from school and you got to sit down for dinner, but seems to have done her very well, but it may do what go back and take a look at all the Jerry Garcia band stuff that I have.
And I know Rob you and I have talked about this before and Jim, even you and I as well, I think on any given night, I would be just as excited, if not, even more excited to go see a Jerry Garcia band show than a grateful dead show. I mean, for those [00:29:00] of us who were grateful dead fans, but really Jerry Garcia band, Jerry Garcia fans, the chance to see JGB was just, get rid of all the other background noise.
And let's just focus on Jerry for two and a half or three hours. And he would typically rise to the occasion. I've been listening to more JGB than grateful dead in the last couple weeks. Like even independently of what Sirius has been doing, but just in general, when I'm like working on contracts or working on other things, I've just been plugging in the headphones and just turning on JGB.
I got to tell you like it, I find it in so many ways to be just so much more exciting to listen to if you're just a pure Garcia and through. Just because it's, there's never this waiting for other players to kind of take their solos. I mean, if there's another solo, it's just Melvin and Melvin crushing it in the back and forth banter between those guys are, previous to that, whether it was mural song whoever was playing keys, at the time I saw Garcia on stage, the happiest, the smiley, just, sort of the playful list was definitely with JGB much more so than it was with the grateful dead.
The grateful dead in [00:30:00] many ways seem formulaic form, but the the joy that he seemed to experience playing the songs that he played versus his repertoire of what he wanted to play. It's so much fun and the venues are so much smaller, which is much more intimate and much more enjoyable. So I love, love the Garcia band and and I love talking about the Garcia band, cause it's always overshadowed by the grateful dead, and there's gotta be people there.
Like, let's say tab more than the fish, or that like, different iterations of other solo artists more than, than their primary path. But for me, it was an easy decision, like don't Ms. Garcia, van shows, you can miss a dead show here and there with dentists. I couldn't agree with you more Rob.
And I mean, I love the grateful dead and there was something about the whole grateful dead experience that was very special and unique to a grateful dead show. And I think one of the other things we talked about is, if there was going to be one night where. There was going to be magic made.
I think I'd rather be at a dead show to watch magic made with the whole experience perhaps than just a Garcia band. Not that I wouldn't take it from Jerry too. Of course, [00:31:00] but you know, it's really kind of Matt, trying to match up to very, very fine French wines, both of which are great. And well, depending on what mood you're in, maybe one versus the other.
But the Garcia band was just consistently great. And I never remember seeing the Garcia band and walking out of there thinking, yeah, that wasn't such a good show. And, and I had that feeling after a certain number of dead shows and one, one show in particular, which is part of a box set that garcia.com has released.
Are some shows the jury recorded over a three or four year period playing there every other year in August of 87, June of 89 in August of 91 at a place called French has camp along the eel river in California. I was never fortunate enough to make it up there. Rob, do you have any familiarity with that venue?
Yes, but I've never seen a show there it's one of those places I kind of was like the pilgrimage to go see where it was because like one of the tapes I wore to death was the French's Campbell river from 87 Garcia band. So, in that heard so many great things [00:32:00] about speaking to people that actually went to those shows, just what an intimate, cool place it was basically right on the river.
And it's it's a pretty darn cool story. And anyone that's been in that area, first of all, like, redwoods I believe it's Mendocino county that they're in it's just a beautiful, beautiful place. So there's very few spots. I mean, we talked about that fish show from, in Vermont few weeks ago.
And I told you that the only thing I could think of that would compare to that would be, we'd be fractured. So, or in Colorado, Jimmy, obviously you're very familiar with state bridge, but sort of the same kind of a venue where it's just next to a river. Super cool, super small and intimate.
So it's one of the spots that I really, really wish I'd gotten to see shows there. And it's a spot that they've done a lot of reggae shows over the years as well.
Yes. I also have been listened to a lot of Jerry Garcia band and I'm looking forward to hearing that. Nice lead in Jim, just to give the audience a little introduction on August 10th 91. The Garcia band played its final show of its three show run that that make up this [00:33:00] box set on the eel river. This is a clip from the second song of the first set.
It's the band doing a great cover of van Morrison's and it stoned me and the, the, the guitar solo that we're going to listen to, I think is probably a perfect example of what Rob was just talking about when Jerry can just step out and he can take the, the, the spotlight for the entire time on the music between the lyrics.
And instead of having to make sure that Bobby gets his licks in and the keyboardist and everybody else, Jerry just goes to town on it. And Dan, if you've got that teed up for us, we'd love to listen to.
[00:34:00] So that is the boys jumping off the boys, Gerry jumping off into an amazing solo between verses on and it's stone me from this live at the EAL on August 10th 91. I, as much as I love talking about it, it's too bad. We just can't sit here and listen to the whole thing because it's really that good.
And I will be listening to it on my way home. And what I like about it, Rob, even more than anything is, the covers the Jerry would play. And of course this is a great cover but he takes this song and he goes right into another cover. Another Chuck Berry tune, which he played a few times himself, but [00:35:00] somehow the dead never got around to playing.
You never can tell say Louvie known as the obviously the dance tune from Thank you. Pulp fiction. Senior moment there when John Travolta and Uma Thurman get up and do that little dance scene, which for me is the highlight of the whole movie. They got the Chuck Berry version of it, but the Jerry band, I have it on a few different cherry albums, one from Hampton and a few others.
And. When Jerry plays it, man, it's just something special. It's a great, great tune. And there, there's not a, there's not a song on this album, where I get up and walk out of the room for five minutes and you lay down Sally and the second set. Everybody needs somebody to love. It's just, it's, it's great fun.
And you can tell what a great time he's having with it. Well, that's the really cool thing about the Garcia vans. It's primarily a cover band, it's there's, there's obviously a handful of originals that were written. Some, some of them ended up in the dad's repertoire as well, but you know, a lot of them that were just, Garcia.
But the vast majority of what he played were the songs that he loved were songs that, were either old gospel tunes or old, kind of, plantation songs. And then there was a lot of Motown, a lot of [00:36:00] early sixties music as well. And I think that if you look at who his favorite lyricists are like, obviously Bob Dylan is, primary.
He seems more Dylan song than anything else. But I think a close number two is probably van Morrison. The handful of songs there, Jimmy cliff being another one that, kind of kinda the same area. But, when you think about songs that aren't covered by a lot of other people we talked about Susan Tedeschi playing angel from Montgomery and what a great song that was, cause the emotions that John Prine developed on that, but the, the emotions that, that van Morrison puts into stone, me of just like the, the, the simplicity of the youth and just just, w how amazing, childhood.
So it's a, it's a wonderful song and it makes a lot of sense that it's to the jury would cover, the, the, everything we know about him was kind of like almost this, this playfulness about him and, almost like a childlike curiosity that he took into everything that he did and, and you can, and you can hear it, and, and, sometimes when I'm listening to his.
I, I, it, I can actually envision him sitting up on stage [00:37:00] smiling as he's playing, like you feel the smile coming through. You can. You can really feel that in it. And it's, it's just great to see, sometimes I admit, Garcia band shows can be a tad predictable, and if you see a bunch of them in a row, you might wind up seeing a large number of repeats, but I don't even care.
If I hear some of these tunes two or three or four times in a row, that just means I got to hear Jerry play him two or three or four times in a row. There's, there's, there's nothing there that I'm, like I say, I hope Bobby fans don't yell at me, but there's no red rooster sitting in there.
We're all going to get up and go to the bathroom really fast and come running back. It's just, I don't see it a surprising stat, Larry. I mean, she'll always ask me like what song I saw Garcia play the most. And then when we think it's a, a grateful dead song, but surprisingly as sisters and brothers, cause he played it.
Every single Garcia band show and bread box will be number two, bread box. He played almost every show and then third would be deal. Cause I saw it with both the grateful dead and Garcia. And even though deal closed, the majority. JGB sets, you'd still get to, let's spend the night together and you get some other closers once in a while as well.
So it wasn't a hundred percent, but I don't think I saw a Garcia band show if I [00:38:00] did maybe no more than two or three that didn't have sisters and brothers in it. And very few more than that, that didn't have box. How sweet it is was as you said, a very consistent opener, there's certain things that you're, I stop I'd press off probably 30 shining stars, so I didn't mind the repeats at all because I loved the songs.
Yup. And, and like you said, I mean, it didn't matter if you heard Jerry play at three times, however you heard it. Those other times was not the way he was going to play it tonight when there was going to be something different. And to me, that's half the fun is listening to it and finding those differences and seeing where he's changed things.
And, trying to get a sense for, is he in a good mood? So he all sounds a little more uplifting or, a little more, down or whatever the case may be. But he definitely talked through his guitar and. It was a very unique group, with, with Marel and with with John con.
Well, and then of course Melvin St. Hugh, another senior moment. But I love . That's what I love about you, Rob, when my kids aren't here, I need somebody else I can fall back on. But like, [00:39:00] John and all of those guys that they just had a great little relationship and they just went around playing these shows.
And I think for Jerry, there was as much of a release as anything. Yeah. And look, there's certain artists I think are hard to cover. And a lot of people say van Morrison is a hard one to cover. Cause his voice is just so legendary that, how do you go in there that it's easy to cover Dylan because.
If you could sing it better than he could, and he could play guitar better than, can you improve on an already great song, but, Van's a tough act to follow. And the two songs that I think Jerry just did so well that, that were fan songs were stone me and and bright side of the road.
If you listen to at Hampton, Virginia, I think November of 91 bright side, it's just like, he comes into the second verse on that thing. So. That that I think van would listen to it and go, yeah. Okay. That's that's how you sing. Brightside, let's just speak to her.
I know the song. I know the the show and I'm familiar with it, of course, from, from van. It is, it's a great tune. And, and I love it. It's stone me. It, it's just, it's always been a favorite song of mine. And [00:40:00] Jerry does, he has a voice that has that same type of emotion in it, and he's capable, Maybe we don't talk about it enough.
I mean, I always thought that, clearly is a great guitar player, but I think he's a really, really wonderful singer too. And I think that was his musical roots and he, he understood the, the, the, the, the value of, of what he could do with his voice. Right. There's some versions of Samson and Delilah where he gets jumps in on the idea of tear this whole building.
No, he just drags it out a little bit and sometimes he doesn't, but you know, when you can tell boy, when he's, when he's doing those little things with his voice, just the way he cracks and enrolls it, it's, it's really special. And he nails and it's stone me on this version and, and, and others, my sisters and brothers, it's always the tune.
I sometimes find myself going back and listening to again right away, because I wasn't quite paying attention close enough to it the first time around. So I want to make sure I really. I really get it. And then deal as a card is a tool that I'll sit in my car in the parking lot or in my driveway waiting for it to end before I get out.
Cause I, I can't find a suitable place to just cut it up, [00:41:00] cut it off and get up and walk. And that brings up the, the great question of, would you rather see the dead play deal or would you rather see Garcia band play deal? Because for me it's diamond close. I think RC band deals blow dead deals.
I don't know. Sure. I absolutely agree with that. And I think that, a lot of these tunes did slide over onto the grateful dead side, a large number of his tunes did. But they weren't ever played the same. And I think that even when he was playing it with the dead, it was kind of like, okay, this is my tune, but I gotta make sure that Bobby doesn't fuck up.
I gotta make sure that Phil stays where I need him to stay. I gotta make sure the drummers. When he was playing with his band, they all, they, they lived in breathed with him. They knew where he was going. They knew what he was doing. They knew how he wanted to do it. And he knew how he wanted to do it.
And sure, I think, he just takes some of these tunes and just go to town. Having said that, that's what I think we're going to the trans transition from, Garcia band, the grateful dead, all that. Well, they tried to do it a few times, but it never came out the way that, Garcia, Ben already had it down and Rubin's such an amazing song.
You'd think it's [00:42:00] perfectly suited for the grateful dead, but ultimately it's ended up being a much better Garcia. It's funny. You mentioned that one of my all time, all time, favorite Jerry songs, and it's such a beautiful song and yes, it's wonderful to hear when he plays it. And it's a shame that, the dead couldn't quite find a way to play it more.
I say that about a lot, a lot of their tunes. I, I think there's what, like two or three times that the dead played mission in the rain or something, very rarely, but they popped it in there a few times. I love that song. I would, I love the fact that, he was playing comes a time in 85 and then they are 85 and then they brought it back again, later it's just a beautiful song.
And to hear Jerry sing these tunes, even if it's with the dead, of course, it's still great. But yeah, when he's with his guys, you know what I mean? John Kahn plucking on that base with all due respect to Phil, who I love and think is the greatest bass player of all time. Maybe, John on these songs, there's, this is his band and his tunes.
He was picked and designed to play these songs. Yep. Absolutely. And by the way, I'm a sucker for background singers. So, I always loved Gloria and [00:43:00] Jackie and those guys made me really happy. And when I think about why he covered van Morrison, van Morrison and a very similar band composition with the Garcia band was with with the female backup singers as well.
But it's made it, perfectly translatable from vans repertoire over to the Garcia events. Well, and those, the voices, one of these days we'll get around on the show to talking about Donna pro or my, for or against. Right. And, and I've heard the guys on the dead show on Sunday night and they almost, reflectively defend her.
And I get that, it's never anything personal about Don. It's just, sometimes her voice could make a tune and other times it could destroy a tune. And I just never found the dead while they were playing together as the dead to be a place that was. As well suited for the female vocalists for the, it was, it was just like a lot of male testosterone music coming together in a magical way and whatever it was, and it was.
But on the Jerry Garcia band. Likewise, I can't imagine it without those two. And they're, I mean, they have great voices, but it's more than just their voices, they, weren't [00:44:00] just given words. They're not just other singing words. They know the tunes, they know the songs, they understand it and you can hear them the way that they sing and in the way that they support Jerry and where they come in and where they drop out.
And it used to be great to see them play and they just be back there, and back and forth singing, just cranking it up. And when they were cranking it out, Jerry always had a big smile on his face, so you just knew that in his mind, this is the way the song should sound. And that's why I think that, a lot of the gospel songs are so well suited to the Garcia band as well because Gloria, Jackie, and and Melvin all came out of, playing a lot in church.
Those guys were, were, primarily in, in the song selection again, whether it's lucky, old sun or Mississippi moon or sisters number. There was a lot of, the traditional gospel that was in there. I'm trying to think of some other ones that, that were, kind of.
Swing low, which was on the acoustic, the jury Garcia, acoustic live L and they play a killer version of swing low. I love that my mother used to sing me that when I was a kid, here's Garcia up there, just cranking it out, like, like nobody's business. And there is, there's just, one great tune after [00:45:00] another that he comes by.
And so, yeah, I mean, clearly we could sit here and talk about Jerry all day and I would never get bored. That's it? That's the part of the show. Larry, it's fine. We'll start out doing all that. Right. No, I absolutely agree because it is just a wonderful and Obviously when Jerry around forever, but you know, only Jerry could find a way to die.
And by doing it, create this perfect little fan of days that works out perfectly for everyone to just take the focus off the band and just drop it right on him during this period of time. And. Everybody's on board with it. The band members are on board with it. As far as I can tell, all the radio stations are on board with it, and we just go home every night and it's all my wife, no, no grateful dead this week.
It's all Jerry. And, she loves Jerry too. I think by the end, she's probably happy to get some grateful dead back, but I'm, I'm just thrilled to have so much good Garcia music to. So listen to all night and really regret not having gone out and been able to see him a few more times. Yeah. Well, I love that we did a show about the JGB, [00:46:00] rather than just, the grateful dead.
I think we should do more. I think we should talk more about individual members of JGB and the influence that John Kahn had and I was playing, or the influence that mural Saunders had on his playing. But perhaps we should find that as a theme, coming up on one of their birthdays around, one of their other milestones, but it's, it's under appreciated under-covered and and for all those out there that don't know that much about the Garcia band or know that much about the other iterations of Jerry.
So, different lineups, whether it's reconstruction or whether that's Legion of Mary or whether it's I'm old enough. There's a ton of good music out there. That's, non grateful dead, but still as Garcia that get out there and start, start scouring because there's so many fun, fantastic lineups and different iterations that are out there.
I completely agree. And as this show is airing on the ninth, I believe which is in fact the date of Jerry's passing, we would be remiss if we didn't mention that. And. Rather than giving him the the famous sendoff that Rush Limbaugh gave him about, just another cheap, [00:47:00] dope dealer, died today or whatever it was.
I think it's very important to remember Jerry and all the great things he did for all of us, not just the music, but everything that he stood for and everything that he brought to the table and everything that he did that helped create this band that we all love. And can't get enough of it. We talked about going to fish and we talk about widespread panic and we talk about all these other bands and those bands aren't really anything.
If the grateful dead aren't there to really kind of set the stage and pave the road and show everyone how it was done. And I think most of those people know that and appreciate it too, but we can talk about it all day, but it's important every now and then just to stop and take notice of this and.
Note that I'm sure for his family, it must be a difficult day and hope that they know that, all the Legion of Jerry fans out there love them and support them. And we'll hopefully be respectful enough to give them their space that they deserve. Yeah. Well said. And I think I'll let you end the show with exactly that I've got nothing else to say tonight.
Aside from, we'll see you next week. And thank you. Thank you, Jerry. Absolutely. Thank you, Jerry. Thank you [00:48:00] to Rob hunt and Jim Marty. Thank you to our producer, Dan Huston. This is Larry Michigan from Chicago, and we will talk to you next week. Have a great week. Be safe, be fun and use your cannabis responsibly.
Okay.
