Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, August 11, 1995                   TAG: 9508110057
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

GARCIA

Deadheads are mourning the death of Jerry Garcia because they will miss the unique music he made with The Grateful Dead. But more than that, they have lost a man lionized by the '60s counterculture, with whom it aged through the malaise of the '70s, the greed of the '80s, the social fragmentation of the '90s.

Dead concerts were not nostalgia trips built on memories of back when. They were ever-changing, improvised performances that drew on Garcia's knowledge of bluegrass, folk, blues, jazz, country and reggae for musical inspiration, while never changing in tone from the laid-back '60s as generation following generation gathered round, enjoyed - and felt accepted.

It was an acceptance that didn't always extend beyond the Deadhead community. When 21,000 fans showed up in Roanoke for a 1987 concert, some residents complained about the spectacle of a couple of thousand people camping out on the Civic Center parking lot, many of them doing drugs, a few acting unruly and most leaving their trash. The city had to clean up after them like the long-suffering parents of irresponsible adolescents.

Those able to overlook the thoughtlessness, though, could sit back and enjoy the show, onstage and off. For some, the Dead were a cult.

Garcia epitomized the sweetness of the hippie era and its idealistic altruism. The Dead not only allowed fans to record their concerts, they encouraged the swapping of bootlegged tapes. It's impossible to imagine one of the cultural commodities known as rock stars today cutting such a deal with the target market.

But Garcia also embraced the destructive self-indulgence of the hippie era. His music at times was self-indulgent. And decades of abusing drugs, booze and even fast food left him struggling, at 53, to get control and stay alive. Too late. Garcia and his music (the Grateful Dead cannot exist without him) were a common reference for people seeking warmth and humanity in a consumer culture; his death is a warning of the cost of decadence.