The Grateful Dead was founded in the San Francisco Bay Area amid the rise of the counterculture of the 1960s. The founding members were Jerry Garcia (lead guitar, vocals), Bob Weir (rhythm guitar, vocals), Ron "Pigpen" McKernan (keyboards, harmonica, vocals), Phil Lesh (bass, vocals), and Bill Kreutzmann (drums). Members of the Grateful Dead had played together in various San Francisco bands, including Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions and the Warlocks. Lesh was the last member to join the Warlocks before they became the Grateful Dead; he replaced Dana Morgan Jr., who had played bass for a few gigs. Drummer Mickey Hart and non-performing lyricist Robert Hunter joined in 1967. With the exception of McKernan, who died in 1973, and Hart, who took time off from 1971 to 1974, the core of the band stayed together for its entire 30-year history. The other official members of the band are Tom Constanten (keyboards; 1968–1970), John Perry Barlow (nonperforming lyricist; 1971–1995), Keith Godchaux (keyboards; 1971–1979), Donna Godchaux (vocals; 1972–1979), Brent Mydland (keyboards, vocals; 1979–1990), and Vince Welnick (keyboards, vocals; 1990–1995). Bruce Hornsby (accordion, piano, vocals) was a touring member from 1990 to 1992, as well as a guest with the band on occasion before and after the tours.
The name "Grateful Dead" was chosen from a dictionary. According to Phil Lesh, "[Jerry Garcia] picked up an old Britannica World Language Dictionary ... [and] ... In that silvery elf-voice he said to me, 'Hey, man, how about the Grateful Dead?'" The definition there was "the soul of a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". According to Alan Trist, director of the Grateful Dead's music publisher company Ice Nine, Garcia found the name in the Funk & Wagnalls Folklore Dictionary, when his finger landed on that phrase while playing a game of Fictionary. In the Garcia biography, Captain Trips, author Sandy Troy states that the band was smoking the psychedelic DMT at the time. The term "grateful dead" appears in folktales of a variety of cultures.
Live performances
The Grateful Dead toured constantly throughout their career, playing more than 2,300 concerts. They promoted a sense of community among their fans, who became known as "Deadheads", many of whom followed their tours for months or years on end. Around concert venues, an impromptu communal marketplace known as 'Shakedown Street' was created by Deadheads to serve as centers of activity where fans could buy and sell anything from grilled cheese sandwiches to home-made t-shirts and recordings of Grateful Dead concerts.
In their early career, the band also dedicated their time and talents to their community, the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco, making available free food, lodging, music, and health care to all. It has been said that the band performed "more free concerts than any band in the history of music".
With the exception of 1975, when the band was on hiatus and played only four concerts together, the Grateful Dead performed many concerts every year, from their formation in April 1965, until July 9, 1995. Initially all their shows were in California, principally in the San Francisco Bay Area and in or near Los Angeles. They also performed, in 1965 and 1966, with Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters, as the house band for the Acid Tests. They toured nationally starting in June 1967 (their first foray to New York), with a few detours to Canada, Europe and three nights at the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt in 1978. They appeared at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, the Woodstock Festival in 1969 and the Festival Express train tour across Canada in 1970. They were scheduled to appear as the final act at the infamous Altamont Free Concert on December 6, 1969 after the Rolling Stones but withdrew after security concerns. "That's the way things went at Altamont—so badly that the Grateful Dead, prime organizers and movers of the festival, didn't even get to play", staff at Rolling Stone magazine wrote in a detailed narrative on the event.
Their first UK performance was at the Hollywood Music Festival in 1970. Their largest concert audience came in 1973 when they played, along with the Allman Brothers Band and the Band, before an estimated 600,000 people at the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen. They played to an estimated total of 25 million people, more than any other band, with audiences of up to 80,000 attending a single show. Many of these concerts were preserved in the band's tape vault, and several dozen have since been released on CD and as downloads. The Dead were known for the tremendous variation in their setlists from night to night—the list of songs documented to have been played by the band exceeds 500. The band has released four concert videos under the name View from the Vault.
In the 1990s, the Grateful Dead earned a total of $285 million in revenue from their concert tours, the second-highest during the 1990s, with the Rolling Stones earning the most. This figure is representative of tour revenue through 1995, as touring stopped after the death of Jerry Garcia. In a 1991 PBS documentary, segment host Buck Henry attended an August 1991 concert at Shoreline Amphitheatre and gleaned some information from some band members about the Grateful Dead phenomenon and its success. At the time, Jerry Garcia stated, "We didn't really invent the Grateful Dead, the crowd invented the Grateful Dead, you know what I mean? We were sort of standing in line, and uh, it's gone way past our expectations, way past, so it's, we've been going along with it to see what it's gonna do next." Furthermore, Mickey Hart stated, "This is one of the last places in America that you can really have this kind of fun, you know, considering the political climate and so forth." Hart also stated that "the transformative power of the Grateful Dead is really the essence of it; it's what it can do to your consciousness. We're more into transportation than we are into music, per se, I mean, the business of the Grateful Dead is transportation." One of the band's largest concerts took place just months before Garcia's death — at their outdoor show with Bob Dylan in Highgate, Vermont on June 15, 1995. The crowd was estimated to be over 90,000; overnight camping was allowed and about a third of the audience got in without having purchased a ticket.
Their numerous studio albums were generally collections of new songs that they had first played in concert. The band was also famous for its extended musical improvisations, having been described as having never played the same song the same way twice. Their concert sets often blended songs, one into the next, often for more than three songs at a time.
Tapes
Like several other bands during this time, the Grateful Dead allowed their fans to record their shows. For many years the tapers set up their microphones wherever they could, and the eventual forest of microphones became a problem for the sound crew. Eventually, this was solved by having a dedicated taping section located behind the soundboard, which required a special "tapers" ticket. The band allowed sharing of their shows, as long as no profits were made on the sale of the tapes.
Of the approximately 2,350 shows the Grateful Dead played, almost 2,200 were taped, and most of these are available online. The band began collecting and cataloging tapes early on and Dick Latvala was their keeper. "Dick's Picks" is named after Latvala. After his death in 1999, David Lemieux gradually took the post. Concert set lists from a subset of 1,590 Grateful Dead shows were used to perform a comparative analysis between how songs were played in concert and how they are listened online by Last.fm members. In their book Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn From the Most Iconic Band in History, David Meerman Scott and Brian Halligan identify the taper section as a crucial contributor to increasing the Grateful Dead's fan base.
After the death of Garcia in 1995, former members of the band, along with other musicians, toured as the Other Ones in 1998, 2000, and 2002, and the Dead in 2003, 2004, and 2009. In 2015, the four surviving core members marked the band's 50th anniversary in a series of concerts that were billed as their last performances together. There have also been several spin-offs featuring one or more core members, such as Dead & Company, Furthur, the Rhythm Devils, Phil Lesh and Friends, RatDog, and Billy & the Kids.
El Paso
Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
I fell in love with a Mexican girl
Night time would find me in Rosa's Cantina
Music would play and Felina would whirl
Black as the night were the eyes of Felina
Wicked and evil while casting a spell
My love was strong for this Mexican maiden
One night a wild young cowboy came in
Wild as the West Texas wind
Dashing and daring, a drink he was sharing
With wicked Felina, the girl that I love
So in anger
I challenged his right for the
Love of this maiden
Down went his hand for the gun that he wore
My challenge was answered in
Less than a heartbeat
The handsome young stranger lay
Dead on the floor
Just for a moment I stood there in silence
Shocked by the foul evil deed I had done
Many thoughts ran through my mind
As I stood there
I had but one chance and that was to run
Out through the back door of Rosa's I ran
Out where the horses were tied
I picked a good one
He looked like he could run
Up on his back and away I did ride
Just as fast as I
Could from the West Texas town of El Paso
Out through the badlands of New Mexico
Back in El Paso my life would be worthless
Everything's gone in life, nothing is left
But it's been so long since
I've seen the young maiden
My love is stronger that my fear of death
I saddled up and away I did go
Riding alone in the dark
Maybe tomorrow a bullet may find me
Tonight nothing's worse than this
Pain in my heart and as last here I
Am on the hill overlooking El Paso
I can see Rosa's Cantina below
My love is strong and it pushes me onward
Down off the hill to Felina I go
Off to my right I see five mounted cowboys
Off to my left ride a dozen or more
Shouting and shooting
I can't let them catch me
I've got to make it to Rosa's back door
Something is dreadfully wrong, for I feel
A deep burning pain in my side
It's getting harder to stay in the saddle
I'm getting weary, unable to ride
But my love for
Felina is strong
And I writhe where I've fallen
Though I am weary, I can't stop to rest
I see the white puff of smoke from the rifle
I feel the bullet go deep in my chest
From out of nowhere, Felina has found me
Kissing my cheek as she kneels by my side
Cradled by two loving arms that I'll die for
One little kiss and Felina
Good-bye
The song "El Paso" by the Grateful Dead is a narrative ballad that tells the story of a cowboy who falls in love with a Mexican girl named Felina in the West Texas town of El Paso. The singer frequents Rose's Cantina where he watches Felina dance, but she is also coveted by another cowboy who challenges the singer to a duel over her. The singer kills the man and is forced to flee El Paso to New Mexico. Despite his fear of death, he returns to El Paso to see Felina one last time before he is shot by one of the cowboys pursuing him. In the end, Felina finds him dying and kisses him goodbye.
The song's lyrics were written by Marty Robbins and were initially released in 1959. The Grateful Dead began performing "El Paso" in 1969, and it eventually became a staple of their live shows. The song was featured on the band's 1972 live album, "Europe '72," which was one of their most popular and critically acclaimed releases.
Line by Line Meaning
Out in the West Texas town of El Paso I fell in love with a Mexican girl
I fell in love with a Mexican girl in El Paso.
Nighttime would find me in Rose's Cantina
I spent my nights at Rose's Cantina.
Music would play and Felina would whirl
Felina would dance to the music.
Black as the night were the eyes of Felina
Felina had eyes as black as night.
Wicked and evil while casting a spell
Felina was wicked and evil, and had me under her spell.
My love was strong for this Mexican maiden
I loved Felina deeply.
I was in love, but in vain I could tell
My love for Felina was unrequited.
One night a wild young cowboy came in, wild as the West Texas wind
A wild young cowboy came into Rose's Cantina.
Dashing and daring, a drink he was sharing
He was a daring cowboy who shared drinks.
With wicked Felina, the girl that I love
He shared drinks with Felina.
So in anger I challenged his right for the love of this maiden
I got angry and challenged him for Felina's love.
Down went his hand for the gun that he wore
He went for his gun.
My challenge was answered, in less than a heartbeat
He accepted my challenge in an instant.
The handsome young stranger lay dead on the floor
I killed the cowboy.
Just for a moment I stood there in silence
I stood there in silence, shocked by what I had done.
Shocked by the foul evil deed I had done
I was shocked by how wicked my actions were.
Many thoughts ran through my mind as I stood there
I had many thoughts running through my head.
I had but one chance and that was to run
My only option was to run away.
Out through the back door of Rose's I ran, out where the horses were tied
I ran through the back door of Rose's where the horses were tied.
I picked a good one; he looked like he could run
I chose a horse that looked fast.
Up on his back and away I did ride
I rode off into the night.
Just as fast as I could from the West Texas town of El Paso
I rode away as fast as I could from El Paso.
Out through the badlands of New Mexico
I rode through the harsh badlands of New Mexico.
Back in El Paso my life would be worthless
My life would be worthless if I returned to El Paso.
Everything's gone in life nothing is left
I had lost everything.
But it's been so long since I've seen the young maiden
It had been a long time since I saw Felina.
My love is stronger that my fear of death
My love for Felina was stronger than my fear of death.
I saddled up and away I did go, riding alone in the dark
I rode off alone into the dark.
Maybe tomorrow a bullet may find me
I knew I could die at any moment.
Tonight nothing's worse than this pain in my heart
My heart was aching badly that night.
And at last here I am on the hill overlooking El Paso
I finally reached a hill overlooking El Paso.
I can see Rose's Cantina below
I could see Rose's Cantina from the hill.
My love is strong and it pushes me onward, down off the hill to Felina I go
My love for Felina pushed me down the hill towards her.
Off to my right I see five mounted cowboys
I saw five cowboys on horseback to my right.
Off to my left ride a dozen or more
I saw more than a dozen cowboys on horseback to my left.
Shouting and shooting; I can't let them catch me
The cowboys were shouting and shooting, and I couldn't let them catch me.
I've got to make it to Rose's back door
I had to make it to the back door of Rose's Cantina.
Something is dreadfully wrong for I feel a deep burning pain in my side
I felt a deep burning pain in my side and knew something was wrong.
It's getting harder to stay in the saddle
I was finding it hard to stay on my horse.
I'm getting weary, unable to ride
I was feeling tired and couldn't ride any longer.
But my love for Felina is strong and I rise where I've fallen
My love for Felina gave me the strength to rise and keep going.
Though I am weary, I can't stop to rest
I couldn't stop to rest even though I was exhausted.
I see the white puff of smoke from the rifle
I saw the white smoke from a rifle.
I feel the bullet go deep in my chest
I felt a bullet hit me in the chest.
From out of nowhere, Felina has found me
Felina found me unexpectedly.
Kissing my cheek as she kneels by my side
She kissed my cheek as she knelt by my side.
Cradled by two loving arms that I'll die for
She held me tightly in her loving arms, and I was willing to die for her.
One little kiss and Felina good-bye
Her kiss was the last goodbye from Felina.
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
@chrism8269
I remember when I was a kid and showed my Grandpa this cover and he gave is approval of the Grateful Dead! It meant the world. He really liked all the songs off reckoning.
Bobby can really connect to these country songs.- his album blue mountain is a true country album. It’s great if y’all haven’t listened to it!!
@exit747steve1
16 20 yr old kids in 4 separate cars drive from El Paso to Vegas to see the Dead and they play a song just for us!!! great times fo sho!!! 4 nights @ the Luxor followed up by 4 nights of camping shenanigans on Lake Mead in the most remote, awesome area we couldve hoped for. we were on top of the world!
@Motormouth2112
747 you wrench or drive ??
@stellabloo
This is one freakin loooong song ... to play AND sing through 10 verses - with chorus and superb improv - is a musical feat of talent and endurance. Now picture 90 minutes or more at this intensity - with an unscripted repetoire of 400+ songs (never played exactly the same way twice) - repeated 70-80 times a year for 30 years .... and you might get the remotest glimmer of why the Dead are the enduring figures of legend that they deserve to be ;)
@mrbobevans
Marty wrote some very long songs, such as "Pride and the Badge." He was notorious for playing long sets at the Opry after having driven in a car race. He is a national treasure whose music will live forever
@Frontmanfrg
@stellabloo. Well put. The Dead were awesome and I doubt we will ever see something as amazing as they were.
@walliegirl2
@Tim Scallon Marty Robbins is something so great that we may never witness again.
@danfuller478
For years Jerry didn't take a solo on El Paso. Towards the end he started again. He needs a little time to find it here, but when he does... it's there!
@zackt112
i was two months old when this concert took place. sadly never got to see jerry.live but i did see get to see the dead this year =]. peace zack
@Burghound56
This may be the most beautiful version I have heard. Very distinctive and elegant.