by Jeff Waful

With a new Ratdog album just released and a tour to follow, Bob Weir has his hands full.  He spent the summer on the road with The Other Ones and joined Phish on stage at Shoreline Amphitheater on October 6th .  He recently took time out of his busy schedule to talk to Jambands.com about a variety of topics, including the new album, the song-writing process and Hanson. 

JW:  I wanted to start off by talking about the new album, Evening Moods.  It was the first time you were in the studio in quite some time. Is the recording process a lot different now because of technological advances?

BW:  It is but I tried to ignore that as much as possible.  We did use "Pro Tools" and all that kind of stuff, but there are facilities available these days that allow people to make a record that is not what they really did and I don't really know how I sit with that.

JW:  So it does change your approach even if it's on a subconscious level.

BW:  Yeah, I mean you can fix virtually anything with "Pro Tools," you know, if it's out of tune or out of time.  You can fix it, but then it becomes something else.  Maybe I just have to sort of warm up to the new tech'.

JW:  Can you talk a little bit about the song-writing process?  I know you had a number of different lyricists.  Which comes first, the music or the lyrics?

BW:  It happened in every conceivable way on this record.  The lyrics would come first.  The music would come first.  They'd come all together, at the same time.  It depended on who we had around.  I mean, everyone was involved on the writing of the music by and large, some of us more than others at a given time.  We just spent a lot of time together, kicking stuff around.  I think it's a better way, if you want to make a band and achieve a band sound, I think it's a better way to write.  It's also kind of a little more satisfying to me because I know what the song is amounting to, what it's going to sound like.  The song arises from the group.  I know what people are going to be playing and that's going to take me to a place that's going to maybe suggest a lyrical direction or I can bring a lyric in and say 'O.K., here's a lyric, what does that say to everybody?'  You get an ensemble response to that.  It's a fun way to do it and it's also a rewarding way to do it. 

JW:  How does this processs compare to what you did with the Grateful Dead?

BW:  That's what I finally arrived at with the Grateful Dead.  When I was writing the last few tunes, "Corrina" or "Easy Answers," I tried to involve as many people as I could in the process, so I knew what they were going to be up to.  The interpretation that I got was a little closer to what I had in mind when I was writing the song.

JW:  Can you talk a little bit about your philosophical approach to music?  I mean, you're certainly a unique individual in that you've been touring as a professional musician since you were a teenager.  You played with one of the biggest bands of all time and now you've done work with The Other Ones and Ratdog.  How do you prepare for a show psychologically?  How do you stay motivated on a night to night basis?

BW:  Well, I keep mixing it up as much as I possibly can so that I don't get bored, and I don't get bored.  That's the main thing, just keeping the surprise factory high, as high as it can be.

JW:  Surprising yourself or surprising the audience?

BW:  Both.  It's best when you can do both at the same time. 

JW:  Are there differences in how you approach improvisation between Ratdog and The Other Ones?

BW:  It's kind of methodical.  You take a theme and you develop it.  That's pretty much the way it's done.  Sometimes something will arise completely as a bolt out of the blue, a new line or a rhythmic overlay or something like that, but most often, I just try to follow my footsteps. 

JW:  If you're about to walk on stage with The Other Ones or with Ratdog, you're in the same mindset that anything can happen on a given night?

BW:  Right, and should.

JW:  Can you talk about how you came to use Mike McGinn as a producer on the album?

BW:  He's been working with me for a number of years and he started out as an engineer and I didn't even know for the longest time that he had musical abilities.  After a few years of getting to know each other, it came out that he's a musician as well, has musical sensibilities and has a little something to say.  When we started out this record, he was pretty much just the engineer, but it became evident that his input was amounting to more than that and that he was a budding producer. So we all recognized that and went with it.  It's nice to have someone in that position.  I mean, all of us had our hands in the production of the record, to a degree or a lesser degree.  

JW:  In the early days of Ratdog, it was just you and Rob Wasserman performing together.  How did you assemble the rest of the line-up?  Were there certain players that you had in mind of was it more of an organic process?

BW:  It just happened the way it wanted to.  Rob and I did a session and we needed a drummer because I was working on a musical theater piece.  I wanted to put down a tune that we had written for that and I needed a drummer.  Rob had just done a Levi's add I think, with Jay (Lane) and he said 'oh, I know a drummer.  He was pretty good.  We just did a session with him yesterday.'  So I said 'hell, call him up, you know, any old drummer will do.'  That session went well and so we wound upadding him and we had a trio.  Then Matthew (Kelly) came through town and he's an old friend of mine and I always loved playing with him, so we added him on harp and a little bit of guitar.  Then we were a quartet.  People came and went and it's hard to describe all of the ebbs and flows.  It's a long story, but we eventually ended up with a band whose personnel was by and large stabilized for long enough to direct our attention from teaching the new guys our old book.  Everybody knew all the old tunes, so it was a question of 'so what are we gonna do now?' and we decided 'well, let's get to work on some new ones.'  After about a year of that, we had a record.

JW:  How would you describe your relationship with Gerrit Graham?  How has it evolved over the years?

BW:  He's an old pal of mine.  I actually met him through a mutual friend of John Barlow, Andy Leonard, a guy that Barlow sent my way back in the late 60s, early 70s.  Andy introduced me in the early 70s to Gerrit Graham and we have just been friends for the longest time.  At some point in the early 80s, one night I was staying down in L.A. at Gerrit's place and a couple of beers in, we decided we were gonna try to write a song and it went kind of well.  I had a little piece of something that turned out to be the chorus for "Victim of the Crime," that I had written.  He sort of filled in the blanks and developed the music.  We wrote a song that's kind of singular both in its musical and lyrical expression.  We looked at that and kind of said 'O.K., well if we can do that, I guess we can do other stuff too.'  So, we went and chased other stuff.

JW:  That's kind of an interesting concept because as an artist, you're expressing yourself and coming from your heart.  Are there ever times when lyrics are submitted to you that you don't necessarily agree with or that need revising?

BW:  Oh, (laughs) yeah.  I'm legendarily difficult on that account.  Talk to Barlow sometime&I like to be fully involved.  You know, I generally will contribute, a third, a half or more of a the lyrics to a given song because otherwise I feel like someone's putting words in my mouth and I can't get there.  I can't get to that lofty place if there's something that's sticking in my throat.  So, writing lyrics for me, is the toughest part about writing songs.  You know, the music I just chase it where it wants to go.  That's kind of easy.  I can make it as difficult as I want.  Sometimes a song will present itself with sort of a ready-made challenge, like "Victim of the Crime," for example, which I kind of lifted from a Bartok piece.  In general, the music comes a lot more readily than the lyrics, though that's not always the case. 

JW:  It must create a certain kind of bond with Gerrit or Barlow, after you've finally finished a song and both exposed your soul like that. 

BW:  It does.

JW:  It must make for a stronger friendship.

BW:  Yeah, well we're trying to peel back the layers of the onion on our own selves or on what it is that we are and what it is that we're here to say.  There's always the question that you have to deal with 'does this need to be said?  What's the point here?'  The last thing I'm interested in doing is writing something because I think people want to hear it or because I think it will sell.  I'm way the hell past that.  It's a process of introspection.  The lyric-writing process is very much a process of introspection for me.  I'm trying to discover a character that lives inside of me and is telling his story.  That's generally where I'm going with that. 

JW:  So it's therapeutic in a way.

BW:  Yeah, it can be greatly therapeutic.  

JW:  Do you have a similar relationship with Robert Hunter in the way that you would construct a song?

BW:  Hunter has a great deal more resistance to my efforts to get involved in the lyrics.  He liked to hand a page and he liked to hear it recited intact in the song.  There is at least the ad-lib part that I can play with and stuff like that.  Otherwise, I can't personalize it or customize it to the point where I can get with the character that's singing the song.  You know, I've found ways to do that with Hunter. 

JW:  How did Jerry work with Hunter?  Would he sing the lyrics as they were written?

BW:  Yeah.  He'd do a little editing but Jerry&He might play this here and that there, but he pretty much read them off the page.  I never could do that so much, so Hunter gave up on my for a while and that's where Barlow came into the picture.  When I first started writing songs, back in the days of "Sugar Magnolia" and stuff like that, I was working with Hunter, but it was a difficult relationship.  We've gotten older, but back then I was just getting started.  Without trying, I guess I was being a bit of an enfant terrible. 

JW:  How close do you follow what's been called now the jam band scene?  Certainly the Grateful Dead would be considered the godfathers of the whole improvisational-psychedelic movement.   It certainly seems like there are a lot of jam bands out there that place more emphasis on musical chops, rather than expressing themselves through lyrics. 

BW:  As they grow up, they're going to find that that's more important.  To make a song, a song, in capital letters, it has to be words and music.  There has to be a compelling story there or some sort for me.  I think they're gonna find out too.  I mean, a lot of these guys are young and as they get older, they're gonna find it's more satisfying to make whatever effort it takes to have a lyric take you to a special place as well as the music.

JW:  Are there any up and coming bands that have caught your attention? 

BW:  A number of them actually, but I'd be leaving some of them out.  In all fairness, I haven't been listening to anything for the last year and a half, because I didn't want to be influenced by anything while we were doing the album.  When we went into the writing process, with the intent of making a record, I consciously stopped listening to the radio and stopped listening to any new records that were remotely in the neighborhood of what we're doing, because I didn't want to be influenced by anything that was currently going on in popular music.  I'd listen to jazz or classical.  Otherwise, something is bound to catch in my head and rattle around in there and I'd spit it back out and I didn't want to be doing that.  I wanted this body of work to have a purity about it that you can't have if you're influenced by other things. 

JW:  When the album was complete, did you finally sit down and raid your old rock and roll collection?  Were you missing listening to other bands that enjoy?

BW:  (laughs) No, I hit the road.  Since the record has been done, I've either been in rehearsal or on the road, so I haven't had a chance to really&it will be winter before I can start listening to stuff again.  I'm all ears by the way.

JW:  On the Furthur Tour this summer, I thought that Ziggy Marley and the Melody Makers was a great addition to the bill. 

BW:  He's great.

JW:  Did you have a relationship with is father, Bob?

BW: You know, I never met him.  I saw him and I was just knocked out just like anybody who ever saw him was.  He was purely amazing.  I don't know how to say that any other way.  By that I mean, truly amazing.  I don't know how to say it better.

JW:  You've shared the stage with so many great musicians over the years.  Do Ziggy and his brothers and sisters carry some of that same spirituality with them?

BW:  Absolutely.  Well, Ziggy's Mr. Good Vibe.  He's gonna be around for a long time.  He's a real good musician, a real good singer, he's got a good band, but there's something that he does that&he can manifest joy and it's palpable when he's performing.

JW:  I know you've collaborated with Hanson in the past, which I though was interesting.

BW:  Well, I'm not entirely sure it amounts to collaboration.  They sat in with Rob and me and Jay Lane a while back and then on this Other Ones tour they came and sat in with us. They're gonna be giants in American music if they continue their trajectory.  They have a couple of advantages that almost no one ever gets.  They've been playing together since they were tots and they have a sibling vocal blend that's just so tight and so great-sounding that it's just a joy to listen to .  They have a great deal of respect for American musical tradition and they ask all the right questions.  The last couple times I've met them, you know, they're all over me about this tune and that tune and where did it come from?  Who is Rev. Gary Davis  That kind of stuff,  They remind me of me when I was a kid.

JW:  That was going to be my next question.  Have you sort of taken them under your wing, because they're around the age that you were when you began playing with the Grateful Dead?

BW:  They don't need anyone to take them under their wing.  They're gonna find out what they need to find out because they're curious (laughs).  If they want any advice or any direction from me, they've got my number.

JW:  Speaking of which, Is there any advice that you'd like to offer to any young, aspiring bands?

BW:  The advice is really too obvious.  Just love what you're doing.  Make sure you love what you're doing.  Love where you're going, because it's going to be work to get over hurtles and humps and stuff like that, but loving what you're doing will see you through that easily. 

JW:  So what does the future hold for you?

BW:  More of the same. 

JW:  Just keep on lovin' what you're doing and doing what you love.

BW:  I've got nothin' else to do, believe me.  There's nothing I'd rather do.  

Jeff Waful is the Jambands.com daily news editor, host of the radio show Jam Nation and manages Uncle Sammy.