Dead Sky carried the torch of 60 years of Grateful Dead music to the Double R Ranch on Aug 9
The sun set over the Gravelly Mountains moments before the full sturgeon moon rose over the Madison Mountain Range in setting the mood for a celebration of community and all things Madison River at the Double R ranch on Friday, Aug. 9. The gathered crowd in the now annual event that was supposed to be a one-time deal was guided through the beautiful transition from day to night on the river by the seemingly timeless songs of the Grateful Dead, performed by arguably Montana’s most prolific Grateful Dead tribute band, Dead Sky.
The majestic scene led easily to the consideration of what made this music so popular and how is a band that is best known for their influence on the development of the hippy subculture and the Summer of Love in San Francisco translate to the rough ruggedly individual lifestyle that is so often associated with Montana.
“I think that the Grateful Dead’s music remains popular because it’s a species of Americana and
many of the songs have wiggled their way into the fabric of American life,” explained Dead Sky bassist Rich Robiscoe, who along with the band's front woman Kelly Nicholson, spent a few moments talking us through the nuances of being a Grateful Dead cover band in Montana.
“A good example of this is the number of cover versions recorded and released by a wide variety of bands, artists from bluegrass to aggressive metal, a capella and alt-rock have
recorded their take on their favorites,” he continued.
Over the years the Grateful Dead classics have been transformed into electronic, reggae, ska, punk and just about every other genre of music possible. Sublime’s ska-punk version of Scarlet Begonias in the 90s and Willie Nelson’s version of Stella Blue introduced the music to fans of different genres and generations and couldn’t help but increase the popularity of the music.
More ties to Americana music can be found in the songs the Grateful Dead chose to cover. Merle Haggard’s country staple Mama Tried was a regular in Grateful Dead setlists as early as 1969. Their cover of Marty Robbins El Paso was performed live 389 times over the touring career of the band. I know You Rider and Morning Dew were among the earliest covers adopted into the band’s repertoire and are taken from the roots of Americana. Nicholson captures the allure of the Grateful Dead catalog a bit more concisely.
“There’s something special about singing along to songs you love with friends and strangers alike,” she states.
Bluegrass virtuoso Billy Strings and alt-country icon Sturgill Simpson were among the opening acts at the recent 60th anniversary concerts for the Grateful Dead held in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, furthering the bonds between the Dead and modern Americana music. While that is great for the scene in San Francisco, how does it translate to Montana?
“There’s a really awesome community of Dead fans here in Montana, and
we continue to meet new folks at every show,” explains Nicholson. “We also enjoy going to see other local Dead bands, like 710 Ashbury out of Helena, and Roadrunner, the Jerry Garcia tribute band, also from Bozeman. The love of the Grateful Dead runs deep here, and it’s really fun to be a part of it.”
Dead Sky formed in 2019 after members of the Kelly Nicholson Band played a Grateful Dead Tribute at the Filling Station.
“That first night was a pleasantly surprising success, and we quickly realized that we had something special,” said Nicholson. Dead Sky has gone on to headline the Vigilante Music Festival in Virginia City and Halloween shows at the ELM in Bozeman. Their travels have taken them as far away as Salt Lake City to give their take on the iconic catalog of music.
It’s hard to imagine how the Dead’s association with the counter-culture movement of the late sixties has translated to increasing popularity among the modern day conservatism that is Montana, but Robiscoe has some ideas.
“The Dead were overtly famously apolitical,” he states. “The story goes that someone wanted to make a politically oriented speech during a break or as a prelude to a performance and one
band member said something along the lines of, ‘The mics are meant for singing, not speech making,’ when vetoing that request.”
“I think the GD realized they had enormous political influence even though they didn’t support a given political party or political stance,” Robiscoe continued.
“The Dead rejected a lot of the ideals of post-war America, challenging the status quo through art and community, and sometimes chaos,” added Nicholson.
“As someone who has always chosen my own path, I resonate with this deeply,” she continued. “I’m a little more bought-in these days, but for a while there I was living pretty wild and free and didn’t care what anyone thought about it.”
The Dead developed a traveling caravan of people who followed their shows around the country living outside of the constraints of societal norms and developing their own free-market and often lawless, markets in the parking lots of shows where they sold handmade goods, food and contraband to fund their journey. From this perspective it is not too far of a reach to see how the message could translate to the ruggedly individualistic “don’t tread on me” values that have been prevalent throughout the history of Montana.
As Dead Sky have traveled through the community experiencing the magic of the Grateful Dead “scene,” they have developed parallels between their path as a band and the path of the Dead themselves. The most painful being the passing of guitarist Joe Knapp in 2021 and the still recent passing of iconic keyboardist Joe Kirchner in 2024.
“Losing bandmates is a horrible experience, and unfortunately that’s something that the Grateful Dead and Dead Sky have in common,” said Nicholson.
“In the early days of the Grateful Dead, they were all about freedom and
impermanence and having fun, she continued. “Nothing lasted, so why take yourself seriously?
Eventually things did get serious for the band when they learned about impermanence
the hard way.”
In 1972 the band lost founder Ron “Pigpen” McKernan. In 1990 they lost another keyboardist, Brent Mydland. Even after the unofficial leader of the band Jerry Garcia passed away in 1995 and the surviving members of the band stopped touring as the Grateful Dead, they continued to play the musical catalog through their own projects and various tributes including Dead & Company who toured for a dozen years with original members Micky Hart, Bill Kruetzman (who eventually left the band) and Bob Weir.
“I don’t want to dwell on that here, but it is part of this band’s history now, and we are forever shaped by the friends we have lost,” Nicholson continued, paying homage to the influences that made the Dead and Dead Sky what they are today.
Over the last 60 years, the Dead have fueled the experience of a whole range of emotions in people through all walks of life.
“I think that it’s an important thing to remember when we talk about the Grateful Dead in any context: yeah, they created incredible music, but they also led the way for so many people to experiment with what their own lives could look like while building a global community of kind-hearted humans, and that’s a pretty epic lasting legacy,” says Nicholson.
“The ‘impact’ of our shows that I like to see is everyone up and dancing, singing along with big smiles,” said Robiscoe, who accomplished that at the Double R Ranch on that full moon night.
“What I hope is that everyone has a good time, and they wake up the next morning (or afternoon) with the thought ‘That was fun! Man, I’d like to see those guys again!’”
With Hart, Kruetzmann and Weir moving into the later years of their lives after 60 years on the road, many deadheads felt that the 60th anniversary concerts in San Francisco marked a passing of the torch to the likes of Dead and Company guitarist John Mayer as well as Strings and Simpson. Dead Sky and the myriad of tribute bands like them all over Montana and the country will also carry their little piece of the music to places like Ennis where they will undoubtedly light a fire in the next generation of Grateful Dead fans.
“It’s incredible to see that the Grateful Dead is still not only relevant 60 years later, but
that their music is still so important to so many people, even people like me who never
got to see Jerry (I was nine years old when he died,)” said Nicholson.
“When it comes down to it, the music is timeless, and the community is endless,” she concludes. More information about Dead Sky is available at deadskyband.net.
