Some people have a talent for giving answers so blisteringly simple, it stops you in your tracks. Once in a yoga class, a teacher was guiding us into a headstand (supported up against a wall), and when someone asked what the benefit of this pose was, the teacher replied, “To get a new perspective.” The explanation is confounding and brilliant all in one! And ultimately a reminder that maybe/probably/definitely we make things more complicated than they need to be. All that to introduce a new interview with The Grateful Dead’s Bobby Weir. At a young 77, Weir is about to start another Dead & Company residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas, and he had some straightforward yet profound words of wisdom to share with Rolling Stone:
Did you imagine that it would last this long?
The interesting thing is, I’ve never made plans. And I’m not about to, because I’m too damn busy doing other stuff, trying to get the sound right, trying to get the right chords, trying to get the right words, trying to get all that stuff together for the storytelling. And really, making plans seems like a waste of time. Because nothing ever works out like you expected it to, no matter who you are. So why bother?It’s been a while since I’ve seen the awesome fitness videos you used to post online. Are you still doing that stuff?
I’m about to get back into it because I miss it. … I’ve taken up running barefoot in the morning on rocky roads. Because I think that’s a great way to get grounded. I don’t run very fast, because I want to breathe through my nose. And I try to incorporate meditation into that. And sometimes I meditate with a mantra and sometimes I just straight-up meditate while I’m running. Or trotting, I guess, really. It’s a practice that’s amounting to something for me. … I just followed my footsteps, really. We’ll see where it leads to. Maybe I’ll live longer, or at least happier.You joined the band in your teens. At this point you’ve seen so many of your brothers go. What has that been like for you?
Every day, things change. I’ll say this: I look forward to dying. I tend to think of death as the last and best reward for a life well-lived. That’s it. I’ve still got a lot on my plate, and I won’t be ready to go for a while.You yourself had a scare, a little more than a decade ago. What do you think you learned from that experience?
Which scare was that?When you collapsed onstage in 2013.
Oh, right. Take it easier on myself a little bit, and stuff like that. I have ambitions. I build my life around challenges and that kind of thing. If somebody tells me I can’t do something, watch my dust.One day, Jerry [Garcia] was hammering me about how I was lazy. I don’t know exactly what caused him to think of that. … I’m not real sure that was the case, but I also don’t think I was as industrious as he was. He practiced more than I used to. I now have taken to practicing a lot myself. He was a dear friend of mine, so if he criticized me for being lazy, then we’re going to do something about that. But I’ve probably been going a little too far in the other direction.
My old friend Ken Kesey, one time we were talking … and he was telling me about living on a farm up in Eugene [Oregon], where he was parked. Every two or three years it snows overnight up there. There’s a decent accumulation. And if he gets up in the morning and he sees a blanket of snow, he just automatically goes out to his four-by and gets in and drives on out to the highway and starts pulling people off the side of the road. He was telling me about how in every single instance you can follow the tracks of the car that goes off the road, and you can see that they start to drift in one direction, and then crank the wheel and go off in the other direction. Every single time. It’s a matter of overcompensating. The point he’s making is pretty obvious: Don’t overcompensate.
“Going barefoot on rocks is a great way to get grounded” is so stunningly simple, yet completely true! That being said, ouch! I know Weir says he’s only moving at trot speed, but I still hope he’s being really careful. Some rocks hurt at any speed (that’s the best fortune cookie wisdom I can muster after a week with a bad cold). The entire interview is chock-full of lovely insights. He talks about feeling like music is what will bring us together in these fraught times (I’m willing to try anything), the upcoming 60th anniversary of The Grateful Dead, and a memoir he’s (leisurely) writing, with the fabulous working title, It’s Always July Under the Lights. Though that’s likely to change, based on Weir’s follow up comment: “Except that’s not true anymore. The new lights that they have, it’s not always July under the lights.” Another concise observation!
Photos credit: IMAGO/mpi04/Avalon