All we need, all we really need......

This version of Good Lovin was on Sirius XM this AM (or I think it was this version). It BLEW ME AWAY. All I can say is WOW.



This one is for you Furthur Flower. Comin right back at ya...

~Don't Stop., Never Stop

THANK YOU! Just what I need!!!! He's all i need!

Been listening to this one all morning....



And here's another great one!







I LOVE YOU PIGPEN!!!

Pig coping a feel on Janis

Remembering Pigpen

Tom Constanten:

“Pigpen’s father was a blues DJ who went by the name ‘Cool Breeze’. Pigpen had an encyclopedic knowledge of all the blues artists, and Pigpen was a remarkable blues singer. The world never got to see the full measure of Pigpen. He could do so many things – he was so deep, so broad. I used to room with him on the road and I shared a house with him in Novato.
I mean you’d look at him and see this Hell’s Angel sort of character who sings this narrow band of music, and he was really into so many more things. Pigpen had a different inner and outer image. While his outer image was kind of like Pirate Pete who would shoot his gun at your feet to make you dance, yet he was also the guy who brought a portable chess game along on the road because he liked to play.”
“He knew the archive of the blues as well as anyone I’d ever known. Pigpen went way back with the blues…he had absorbed it.”
“I think Jerry did some things to make Pigpen feel included, like featuring his songs and encouraging him. The perception I had was that Jerry was always encouraging him, and he felt that Pigpen’s thing should have a platform in the band’s context.”
“I hate to say it, but he was a pretty normal guy. We’d play music, listen to music, talk, hang out.”
“He was almost the exact opposite of his public image. He looked like a pirate who would run you through with a sword, but he was one of the sweetest gentlemen I’ve ever encountered.”

Mickey Hart:

“Pigpen was the musician in the Grateful Dead. When I first met the Grateful Dead, it was Pigpen and the boys. It was a blues band… Pigpen was a kind man. He looked so hard, but he was a kind, soft man. That’s why he had to look so tough, because he was so kind, he would get stepped on…
If there was one black chick in the audience, he’d always go home with her. Somehow he’d always have her up by his organ…by the end of the evening, she’d be up sitting on his stool. He just loved black women…
“Pigpen was a kind man. He looked so hard, but he was a kind, soft man. That’s why he had to look so tough, because he was so kind, he would get stepped on.”
“He was just living the blues life: singing the blues and drinking whiskey. That’s what all blues guys did… He was the blues: he lived it, and he believed it, and he got caught in that web and couldn’t break out. And it killed him.”

Robert Hunter:

“He was a real scuzzy teenage kid with a terrible complexion. He must’ve been 16 or 17 when he started hanging around the Chateau. He had a scuzzy beard and he drank Thunderbird, and wore a fatigue jacket. He was the sort of guy that one would ordinarily discourage from showing up at one’s parties, except that he played a hell of a harmonica, and that was his passport. There weren’t many people at that time playing the kind of music he was, and I didn’t know any harmonica players at all.”
“I had seen Pigpen play guitar and harmonica a bit at the Tangent and I was impressed with how good he was solo. Then he played with Mother McCree’s, of course, and he was seemingly the most professional of anybody in the group. He had his act down completely, very young… You could tell this was a guy who understood and could play blues.”
“Ron was ‘good folks.’ You’d stop in his room, watch television with him, hang out. He’d sit around in his shorts drinking whiskey.”

Wow FF, that picture you posted with the flag... I must have missed it earlier... It is a VERY powerful image. One of the most powerful I recall seeing on this site.

I suppose it's because I was too young to see Pigpen live, yet I've held and carried our flag from show to show. Somehow, that picture helps me connect more to Pig. It makes him feel more real to me. If that makes any sense.

Thanks for sharing that picture (again). And pardon my babbling folks.

Oh, and how about keeping this one alive with a daily dose of Pig, or I THOUGHT there was an older thread, I just couldn't find it.

~Believe it is you need it, if you don't just pass it on.

heres a nice dose of Pigpen!

archive.org/details/dead_air_20120408

I love that picture of Janis and Pigpen! I secretly wish that was me he was coping a feel of. And thanks sooo much for posting everyone's thought and comments on Pigpen. I loved reading them!

He is so special to me! He really is what drew me to the Grateful Dead. At first it was kinda hard to get into them. Then I remember our weekly dead hour on the radio in St. Louis had Pigpen night and I was just blown away by the emotion. I felt like he was really giving the songs meaning and life. And thats how I think my obession with the dead started.

And when I brought the flag to his resting spot last month I made sure he felt our love and how special the FFF are. The flag soaked up his energy and will forever be with it! He loves us!

[quote="FurthurFlower67" post=165565]
And when I brought the flag to his resting spot last month I made sure he felt our love and how special the FFF are. The flag soaked up his energy and will forever be with it! He loves us!

So well put FF .. and THANK YOU for adding Pigs energy and good vibes to our flag.

Two Souls in Communion, I am even more blown away by the song because Pig wrote both the lyrics and the music. I find it amazing that such a heavy blues guy, who was generally so rough around the edges on stage was able to compose such a deep and compassionate song. Guess he was letting his lovelight shine.

"The Stranger (Two Souls in Communion)"
Words and music by Ron McKernan [?]
Copyright Ice Nine Publishing; used by permission

What are they seeing, when they look in each other's eyes?
What are they feeling, when they see each other smile?
Is it love, I don't know - or an emotion that I've outgrown?

Did I take a wrong turn on life's winding road?
Won't somebody help me find the right way to go?
My life need some correction, alteration in [and?] direction.
Won't somebody stand by [comfort?] me - yes, I'm lost, yes, I'm lost,
Yes, I'm lost.

What is the secret of this tie that binds? [time of mine?]
Two souls in communion, both body and mind.
Is it special magic, or just the nature of things?
Conceived of [Come see the?] great spirit, not for beggars but for kings.

You who have found it please help me along.
I'm a man, I'm a man, - I'm not made out of stone.
My needs they are simple, I don't want anything,
but I surely want to fly on those wings, on the run, one more time.

All I wanna do, fly up, fly home.
Fly on those wings of love, fly up, fly home,
I'm a stranger [a staying?] in your town, fly up, fly home,
Help me somebody please! Fly up, fly home.

I wake up early in the morning, fly up, fly home,
you know I never saw you babe, fly up, fly home.

I just can't seem to understand,
can't seem to understand what's wrong, fly up, fly home.

What I wanna do is take a little ride with you, on the wings of love,
woh-oh one more time, one more time.

MushroomMan wrote:


Enjoying it so far. Thanks MM. I had a feeling a GD related show recorded 4-8-12 would contain some magic. And it does, right from the opening notes of that harmonica.

Another good podcost, Dead Air with Uncle John

scar1et_f1re wrote:


I was actually 5/7/72, if it was the one at a little before 10:00 east this AM. I was also blown away and wrote date on my hand