Grateful Dead Keyboardists: Keith, Brent, or Vince?

Cafe Society
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As some of you may be aware, the Grateful Dead had more keyboard players than Spinal Tap had drummers. As Bob Weir said, “That piano bench is something of a hotseat.” He also asked Vince Welnick, the last person to play keyboards with the band, if his insurance was current - that Weir, ever the kidder.

The question, for those of you who have an opinion, is - which of the keyboard players did you prefer? Why? I’ve left Pigpen, TC, and Bruce Hornsby off the list because Pigpen, while credited as playing the organ on a few tracks was really much more the vocalist; TC, while having a tremendous influence on the band’s direction at the time, only played with the band for a little over a year before moving on, and Bruce Hornsby was more of an extra added attraction than a full time member. Ned Lagin, Merle Saunders, and Melvin Seals have also all played with the band in various combinations, but have never been core members of the ensemble.

Keith Godchaux In the early years of his tenure with the band, Keith was a wonderful player. He could play a variety of styles and, at least during the time that the band had only one drummer, added a nice percussive touch. Light and spare when the music called for light and spare, loud and pounding when the band shifted gears. Some of Keith’s work from 1972-1974 is just magical. After the 1975 hiatis he started to play Fender Rhodes almost exclusively, and that, IMHO, signaled the beginning of a downward slide. In the end he was largely a non-person and non-player. A former room-mate of mine saw the band in Blacksburg in 1978 and said that someone actually walked Keith out to the piano at the beginning of the show, put his hands on teh keys, and walked off. Keith pretty much sat there the entire night and didn’t move a muscle. Killed in a car accident in 1980 (after leaving or being fired from the band - it depends on who you ask), Keith was a first rate player who, unfortunately, burned out and wasted a tremendous talent. His peak performances were during 1972-1974.

Brent Mydland With the addition of Brent, the band got not only a piano player, but an aggressive Hammond B-3 organ player, a synth player, AND someone to handle the vocal harmonies (I always thought he sounded a helluva lot like Michael McDonald of the Doobie Bros.). Brent’s effect on the band was evident from the get go. Most tapes from 1978 (Keith’s last year with the band) present a band that can never seem to get over the hump and get started - the music is weak to my ears. Brent, once he found his feet, added a punch to the sound. New textures are added (a harpsichord synth part to China Doll, the B-3 scream to New Minglewood Blues), vocals get a little less shaky, and new songs added to the set list. Once again, however, a monkey on the back of the keyboard player takes a toll - Mydland dies of a heroin/cocaine overdose. He always seemed pissed off everytime I saw the band during his last year or two. An angry man who maybe hoped he could get rid of his demons by playing the hell out of his music. It could be both exciting and scary to see - all at the same time. Garcia said, “Brent never got over being the ‘new guy,’ even though he played with us longer than any other keyboard player. He was also from the East Bay, and that place is ‘anti-culture.’ He didn’t have much of a grounding in anything deeper that he could draw on.” My favorite years are 1981-83 and 1987-1988.

Vince Welnick I remember attending the Ohio show when Vince was introduced and thinking “Who in the hell is this clown?” He did look a lot like Bozo, and his sound was very, very thin (at least as compared to Brent’s setup). Coming from the The Tubes, I couldn’t for the life of me figure out how Vince was going to work - and I don’t believe it ever did gel. To my ears, his sound was always thin, electronic, processed, and weak. Even when augemented by Bruce Hornsby, the keyboard element never could kick the music in the seat of the pants and provide the spark to get it up and running. Vince’s contribution, IMHO, was his convincing the band to try a whole slew of new cover songs - Rain, Baba O’Reilly, Tomorrow Never Knows, Lucy in the Sky - all of those additions came about as the result of Vince’s push. He also brought a couple of his own songs to the set - Way to Go Home and Samba in the Rain (which I thought was a terrific number).

My vote goes to Brent. The music during his tenure had such variety and a terrific energy to it. The pounding entry into “The Other One,” the big, big orchestral sweep of “Wharf Rat,” and the the rollicking boogie woogie of “Big River” were all the result of Brent’s keyboard playing.

I know that many, many people could never see the appeal of the band. “They play too long,” “They’re sloppy,” etc.etc. etc. That’s true. Sometimes they did play too long and they could be notoriously sloppy. But sometimes they could dial it in just right. It was wasn’t too long - it was too short. It wasn’t sloppy - it was as if they all had sheet music set out in front of them and they were playing a chamber piece. As the song says, there was “nothing left to do but smile, smile, smile.”

“The folks that like our music are alot like the people who like licorice. Not everyone likes licorice, but the folks that do like licorice REALLY like licorice.”

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I better add a little something to this thread title, or no one will EVER open this baby up.

Tossup for me…I appreciated Brent’s vocal harmonies, but HATED the original songs he brought to the band, and the space they’d take up in the shows. Also not happy about synthesizers.

My tastes lean more towards the funky Hammond organ sound that Pig got…even though he wasn’t much of a keyboardist, as you say…and the wonderful honky-tonk that Keith could lay out in the early 1970s, when he was using an acoustic grand instead of that crappy electric piano.

Was it Vince who started playing the accordian during the covers of “The Weight” and other Band tunes? Or was that Hornsby? I loved that, too.

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Thanks for the cleanup. I figured that anyone that had any interest would recognize the names and chime in.

Bruce added the accordion parts. Vince added the cheese.

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You’re giving us too much credit. I looked at the thread title and even I didn’t make the connection immediately.

This looks like it might end up as one of those two-man conversational threads, anyway. I think the cribbage board is on the shelf over there, next to the cigar box with Dick’s Picks Nos. 17-24. You wanna cut for first deal?

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Screw it, let’s go grab a beer.

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Brent is my vote but I was often troubled by his angry intensity.

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Each had something to give the band’s sound. Each had problems associated with them.

Brent provided an animal intensity like no other. Problem was he was hot and cold. You could see the Dead on Friday night and have them hotter than a $2.00 pistol and on Saturday they’d be dead fish. Sunday could be luc warm or hot, toss-up.

Keith brought imagination to the songs. He brought a level of, I dunno, sophistication? to the songs. Give Europe '72 another listen. Problem was (and I’m really gonna get pimp-slapped for this) he brought Donna to the songs. Sorry, I just hadta say it.

Vince brought a fresh new sound that kind of lead to a “revival” of the Dead. Problem was he just sort of plodded along through most every show I saw with him.

My fave? I’ll have to go off the board and say Bruce Hornsby. He brought technical merit and soul to the keyboard parts, along with loads of originality. But he ain’t one of the choices.

I guess I’ll revert to Keith. Good, steady, reliable (until 1975- when, as stated above, he began to bring the band down.)

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First time I ever saw them was with Keith, and what I’d heard before on vinyl and tape as well, so everything afterward was always just ‘different’. However, everytime I saw them post Keith, I was never in any condition to make critical judgements. So one vote for Keith.

I’d have to say that Bruce did bring something good as an added attraction.
Dave

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We’ll have no Donna Jean-bashing in the thread. We can always move that over to Great Debates as I’m getting very, very tired of all the Jesus and Mid-East related threads.

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Sorry, plnnr, but you gotta admit that Terrapin Station would have been so much better without her! (OK, maybe you don’t.) I mean, sure, Sunrise has a great story behind it and all that, but, damn that song stinks on ice. Same with Dancin’ in the Streets and Passenger. The Greatful Dead are sucked into pre-Disco!

I guess Donna Jean is like licorice…

Maybe that’ll be my next Cafe Society/IMHO thread.

Donna Jean Godchaux: Estimated Prophet or Delilah?

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Oooog. I’m not sure WHAT could have saved Terrapin. The whole first side is a terrible waste. One album I never bothered to replace with the CD.

Matter of fact, I’m not sure I even owned in on vinyl.

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My take on Terrapin Station:

The band decides that recording by committee is just too damn much work so they hire an outside producer for the first time since their first album. The guy made Fleetwood Mac a household name, maybe he can work some magic for us. It wasn’t as if they had never performed Dancin’ In The Streets (and live versions from the era are very funky) - still, it didn’t quite work. I believe that Mickey Hart threatened to kill the guy for adding the strings to Terrapin Flyer.

The music, by and large, hadn’t been performed on stage yet. As Weir pointed out, they had never performed Estimated Prophet on stage before they tried and record it. They go to So. Cal and play it at a show, come back and lay it down in pretty much one take. “We ought to make a blanket policy to never record something we haven’t played on stage.” Oddly enough, I heard Estimated Prophet being played Muzak-style in Food Lion just last week.

Passenger was Phil’s attempt to get the guitarists to play with some raunch. I agree that it didn’t work too well on vinyl, and didn’t really hit it until Brent joined (the slightly doctored version on Dead Set works well). There was some talk at bringing it back to rotation during the '95 tour but time and Jerry’s heart ran out. Phil and Friends do a blistering version.

Sunrise - Like “Rain,” from CUTS, Donna’s solo cuts usually don’t “fit,” even though I think that Rain fit much better in its context - CUTS is one of my favorite band-related discs. Donna’s shortcomings may have more to do with perception than reality (you have to admit that she was a good vocalist in the studio). Folks have decided that they can’t stand the catterwauling during a live “Playin’” or “Scarlet Begonias” so they dismiss her out of hand on vinyl. Understandable.

Ike - I have Terrapin on vinyl and deep inside the little bands at the center of the disc, between the final grooves of Terrapiin and the label, someone wrote “Where do you keep your stereo, Jer?” I assume it is on all copies pressed from the master. If you still have the vinyl, check yours out and see. Like you, I didn’t get the CD. The '77 Spring Tour tapes I have far surpass anything they could have put on vinyl that year (the Mosque and “The Stellar Cornell” shows come to mind). The album I never bothered to purchase at all was Shakedown Street. That album just reeks. You can practically hear the cocaine. I never purchased “Steal Your Face,” either. To quote Phil, “Trying to salvage Steal Your Money was like trying to get shit out of a jar of peanut butter.”

My ranking (with favorite song):

Anthem of the Sun - This defines it for me. The whole first side is incredible music (Cryptical Suite>New Potato>Born Cross Eyed)
Live/Dead - An unintended winner. TURN ON YOUR LOVELIGHT - AND LEAVE IT ON!
Mars Hotel - Underated by many (most?). Unbroken Chain
Wake of the Flood - Grateful Dead chamber music. Here Comes Sunshine.
Workingman’s Dead - What a shift in gears. Black Peter
American Beauty - Hunter’s fascination with America keeps showing. Brokedown Palace
Europe '72 - I always look at this as part and parcel of American Beauty. China-Rider. In-fucking-credible. I don’t care if they did fix it all up in the studio.
Reckoning - China Doll. When they hit that harmony on “Just a little nervous from the fall” the hair on the back of my neck stands up. They nailed the hell out of that moment.
Aoxomoxoa - The Jerry and Phil show. Cosmis Charlie because it contains a line that I feel transfers so well to many areas of life - “I wonder if you shouldn’t feel less concern about the great unreal.”
Built to Last - Great sonically, iffy material. Just a Little Light - said Jerry, “I wanted to play guitar like that guy in Edie Brickell thinks I play guitar.”
Terrapin Station - See above. Terrapin Station (strings and all).
Dead Set - A doctored version of the Warfield and Radio City shows in 1980. Fire on the Mountain - Jerry plays guitar like the guy in Edie Brickell thinks he plays guitar.
Grateful Dead (Skullfuck) - Not Fade Away/GDTRFB. The tapes of the Port Chester and Manattan Center shows what didn’t get inculded and probably should have.
In the Dark - They played American Bandstand, didn’t they? West L.A. Fadeaway because it is the only song I’ve heard that uses the word “copasetic.”
Bear’s Choice - Don’t we owe Warner Bros. a record? Katie Mae. RIP Pigpen.
Go to Heaven - Don’t we owe Arista a record? Feel Like A Stranger, which worked great as a live show opener.
Grateful Dead - The hashish and ritalin sound. Unlistenable.
Shakedown Street - The cocaine and more cocaine, with a heavy dose of cocaine thrown in for good measure sound. Even worse than Grateful Dead (at least with the first album they had an excuse).

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im gonna go off the board also and say Pigpen. As crazy as this sounds, i don’t think the Dead would have become the Dead as we know them now without him. I think they owe alot to his contributions in the early, formative years.

i conceed you folks know much more about it than i do, but thats just my take.

be kind!

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Based strictly on his keyboard playing, you gotta hand it to Brent. The B-3 made all of the bluesy numbers bluesier and he could really fill in the jams sweetly. Plus, I like the way he used to swear during Little Red Rooster and Never Trust a Woman. The band sounded sweet during the later 80’s, but I have always felt the sound was a little to tinny in the 81-82-83 era. But by the late 80’s, the band energized, the shows were great and the music very rich again, think Eyes, Stranger, Cassidy.etc… The addition of the MIDI to Jerry’s sound really helped, and I think Brent got off on that exciting instrumentation.

Keith is more enigmatic. I always felt that the Dead songs sounded more like the Dead with a cool sounding piano (i.e. Brown Eyed Women, He’s Gone, Loser, etc…). Plus, I like the instruments and the sound system the band was using during the mid 70’s. Really nice fat groovin sound, but Keith didn’t really develop, and, as mentioned, just sort of petered out. BTW, I love Donna’s off-key caterwauling

Vince, well, what can we say. We know that by the early 90’s the band had sort of hit a creative and developmental funk. There were still some great new tunes (Lazy River Road, Eternity, So Many Roads), but the band kind of seemed less interested in testing new limits and more wiling to just commit to standard concert formulas. I doubt that this is Vince’s fault, BUT, he certainly didn’t have the ability to revitalize the boys.

Hornsby’s playing always seemed to fit right in, kind of like a well placed chair in the corner of a nice room. Not something that is the centerpiece, but kind of pulls the room together. I don’t think Vince had that sort of charm to his sound.

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I’m also going to say Pigpen.
I first saw them in '69 with Pigpen and I don’t think you can write off his keyboard contributions so cavalierly.
Just curious, but those of you who don’t feel the need to include him, were you into the Dead & did you see them when he was alive? Or is he just some prehistoric figure to you that you have no way to actually compare?

As far as Brent and Vince, I always viewed them as someone just filling the chair.

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While Pig’s influence was great, it wasn’t from his keyboard playing. It was from his personality and his very being. But you’re right, he was the catalyst that helped the band cook in the early days (as Phil once said, “LSD helped a little, too.”)

Oddly enough, both Pigpen and Weir almost got the boot (and Pigpen did actually quit the band) in 1969 because they didn’t have the musical chops (orin Pig’s case, the interest) to take the band in the direction Lesh and Garcia wanted to go (Aoxomoxoa).

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Well I know what I’m gonna be doing tomorrw. I’m taking my sherpas down to the depths of Mum’s basement in search of my vinyl Terrapin.

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You never forget your first keyboardist. For me, that’s Brent. I prefer his “Dear Mr. Fantasy” over the original. Much more heartfelt.

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I never got the opportunity to see Pigpen perform, but I believe I have listened to enough hours of tape, attended enough shows, and read enough interviews with the members to form an opinion (and anyone is certainly free to disagree with me on any point).

Pigpen’s forte’ seems to have been energizing the band and crowd with his vocals and stage presentation. His raps during Good Lovin’, the soul he brought to Hard to Handle or It’s a Man’s World, and the flat out funk he gave to Lovelight always far outweighed whatever his organ vamping brought to the music. I’ll dig through some material I’ve got and I’ll find a couple of quotes from band members acknowledging his contributions - I don’t recall any of them saying that Pig’s keyboard skills were what he was about. I have a 15 or 20 page interview with Phil somewhere and he discusses Pigpen in depth. I’d be happy to share it with anyone that wants to learn more about him. He was a very complex character and worth discovering.

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I dug up the article I was talking about. It appeared in the 1993 issue of “Golden Road” and isn’t just an interview with Phil. It is a 40 page article called “Pigpen Forever: The Life and Times of Ron McKernan.” In it are interviews with Garcia, Weir, Hunter, Phil, Rifkin, Scully, Jon McIntire, Laird Grant, Sue Swanson, Bob mathews, Eileen Law, Kesey, Bab, Laird Grant, David Nelson, Peter Albin, Wavy Gravy, Alan Trist, and portions of in interview with Veronica Grant (Pigpen’s longtime girlfriend). I’d be happy to send it to anyone that would like a copy. Just email me your address. It is well worth the read.

Everybody’s got to have something to be a geek about.