Photo: Jay Blakesberg

In the December issue of Relix we celebrate the life and career of pioneering bass icon Phil Lesh through reflections from his friends and collaborators (as well as a previously unpublished interview). We will continue to share these over the days to come, joining reminiscences from Jimmy Herring, Mike Gordon, Dave Schools and Jason Crosby.

“The greats know that there’s so much more to know. They’ll tell you, ‘I am as much of a student now as I ever was,’” Dead & Company bassist Oteil Burbridge says in admiration of Phil Lesh, whose music he began to engage in depth following his years in Aquarium Rescue Unit and The Allman Brothers Band.

When I spoke with Dave Schools, he suggested Phil had approached music in a way that paralleled Col. Bruce, with the goal of being confident but egoless.

Yes, there’s the philosophy that if your intention is right, then there can be no wrong. That comes with the absolute duty to go beyond what’s safe for you—a duty to fling yourself off the cliff, a duty to deliberately go into the unknown, knowing that to other eyes that don’t have the same philosophy, it could seem wrong or a failure when really it’s just exploring. With that, the idea is you’re totally fine with being incorrectly judged for whatever the outcome is.

The Acid Tests freed the Grateful Dead because they weren’t under any pressure to perform to any standards. They didn’t even have to play at all if they were tripping too hard. So it was total freedom. It overlaps with what I call the enharmonic views of Sun Ra, Ornette Coleman, Col. Bruce and others.

It’s a seeming paradox to be egoless and confident, to be bold and egoless, but it is an act of bravery, especially when you’re subjecting yourself to that kind of almost certain judgment that’s not favorable towards you and your own nakedness. You’re exposing yourself.

You didn’t start exploring the Grateful Dead in depth until later on in your career. Can you talk about delving into Phil’s role and how that impacted your perceptions?

What often happens to me is that the stuff I didn’t really understand at first is different when I have to learn it. I had learned “Franklin’s Tower” for the Allman Brothers but that was one out of 60 tunes we had. But then, for the Kreutzmann Trio with Scott Murawski, I started really digging in. I had to figure out everybody’s approach to understand what was actually happening.

Phil is such an enormous part of the uniqueness of the Grateful Dead sound and why it doesn’t sound like any other band. He’s such a big part of it. Using myself as an example, if you had stuck me in his place, it would’ve been really funky but much more conventional. Whenever I hear the Grateful Dead, I go, “Oh, I could never make it sound like that no matter how hard I try.” So it’s not even worth trying.

He’s such an enormous part of it, much more than I realized, because everybody focused so much on Jerry. In general, people focus more on a lead singer, and then next to that is a lead guitarist. People don’t normally notice bass as much, unless it’s funk. Even when it’s upfront, people don’t really give it the weight that it deserves.

As I’m learning these tunes, I was like, “Oh my God, this guy is so much of the uniqueness of this sound.” Not that any of them aren’t unique, but he is subversively different than 99% of bass players.

He said it straight out with the Beethoven quotes like, “It’s every artist’s duty to confound the expectations of the listener.” That’s a serious statement to think about. Then he followed it up with “Never play it the same way once.” So right there twice he’s saying that if you’re not ready, if you’re not open-minded enough, you’re going to be frustrated. It might even make you mad. I’ve seen it make people mad. [Laughs.]

Phil was so intentional about what he did. His knowledge of harmony is so deep, and there are so many things he did on bass, that if I wasn’t into jazz and classical music, I probably wouldn’t have caught it all when I finally did dive in and found a lot.

I used to call Jimmy or text him when I’d find all these cool things, like the bass substitutions that he does. I even coined a term called “taking the subway.” If I play a G major chord, I can make four different chords out of it. So I can change it, but whoever’s soloing over it or singing over it, can sing the exact same thing and I’m not going to get in the way. Phil does that stuff all the time. Sometimes I’d be like, “Damn, that was a bold choice!”

Phil didn’t begin on the bass, just as you didn’t start on the instrument. Do you hear something in his playing that reflects that journey?

I was just talking with Al Evans about this. It’s one thing for a person to learn an instrument and get good on it. It’s another thing when someone already has the sound in their head and they just have to find it on that instrument. I’m a drummer and I also played bass clarinet, piano and violin, so I understood harmony. From all the records my dad had, I could hear what I wanted to play in my head, I just had to f ind it on the bass.

That’s what Phil was doing. Phil already heard the harmony. He could hear what he wanted to do on the low end of it, instead of the top end, which was the trumpet.

I think the trumpet really informed his style. Look how melodic it is. Traditional bass players weren’t influencing his style. He’s a trumpet player, he’s thinking of melodies, and the bass becomes another melody, a counterpoint. Then when they were going to improv, he was totally free to change like the clouds change—“As long as we’re in the tempo. Unless we decide we’re going to be free of tempo. Or free of key.”

What a huge playground in which to be free and it didn’t matter what instrument it was. I love it that it was the bass, though, the unlikeliest one for that approach.

You recently spent some time with Phil. What can you share from that experience?

I’ve got to say, “Jason Crosby, my brother, thank you so much.” I was doing a project with Jason that we just announced, the Crosby Collective, and he said, “Hey, why don’t you come down and play drums on ‘Dark Star’ with Phil?” I was like, “Sweet!”

So we played, we got to hang out, we drove him home and then he invited us into the house. We had some very meaningful discussions on so many things. Almost all of them circled back around to this philosophy, this way of living—whether it’s music or life or cooking or whatever—about being bold and also egoless. It always comes back to that where it’s your duty to put yourself out beyond where you’re comfortable, beyond where you know what to do. Then you try to respond with the right intention, and if it feels right, then keep responding that way. If it doesn’t feel right, then adjust it and search for something that feels good and not at the expense of others.

What are your thoughts on Phil’s legacy, however that occurs to you?

When he passed, so many people were pouring their hearts out on social media—not just fans but musicians that I know personally, and reading what Phil meant to them was really, really heavy.

What I told people is that of course there are all these legacy things as a bassist, composer and artist. But one of the most loving parts of his legacy was opening the corral and letting all of us other horses in to run around with him. That was a gift.

Also, he didn’t want you to play like whoever’s spot you were in. He wanted to hear how it would sound with you playing it. He gave so many people that permission and it was all intentional.

I think that’s why future generations are going to get this music even beyond what we can envision, because the current generation of musicians is going to influence younger people. I find that incredibly beautiful. You’re talking about something that’s going to last as long as classic American art forms like Delta blues, Chicago blues, gospel, bluegrass and country. I was one year old when they started and I know it’s going to be here a hundred years from now, in the same way that I know Charlie Parker will be here.