The Grateful Dead Were Discussing a Reunion With Phil Lesh Before His Death

The Grateful Dead were discussing the possibility of a reunion with Phil Lesh before the band’s co-founder and bassist died last month at the age of 84.

The surviving members of the Dead — Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, and Mickey Hart — revealed Lesh’s desire to play with the group again on CBS Mornings. The interview was conducted five days after Lesh’s death, and the bassist was originally set to join them for the chat, which was to mark their upcoming Kennedy Center Honors prize. 

“I was hoping that we could play with him again one more,” Kreutzmann said, “That was my sadness on that one. Because I know he wanted to play with us again, too.”

When asked if that was being planned, all three members of the Dead responded, “Yeah,” with Weir adding: “We were kicking it around. In fact, we were going to get together and kick some songs around.”

The last time Lesh played with the Grateful Dead was in 2015 when the band celebrated their 50th anniversary with a run of “Fare Thee Well” shows (Phish’s Trey Anastasio filled in for Jerry Garcia). To that end, the reunion discussions with Lesh were centered around possibly commemorating the band’s 60th anniversary next year. Weir even said of the tentative plan: “We were just gonna play the four of us.” 

It’s possible the Dead might still do something next year to mark the occasion, though it wouldn’t just be Weir, Hart, and Kreutzmann on stage. “We’d have to have other musicians join us,” Kreutzmann said.

After the “Fare Thee Well” shows, Weir, Kreutzmann, and Hart went on to form Dead and Co. with John Mayer, while Lesh continued to tour regularly with Phil Lesh and Friends. Lesh and Weir did do one short tour together in 2018, too.

Elsewhere in the CBS Mornings interview, the surviving members of the Dead spoke about how Lesh joined the band and what they learned from the bassist. “We developed this language that only we spoke, really,” Weir said before Kreutzmann added: “He taught us, basically, how to be free. How to play free and not have to play in any set, fixed way.”