Robert Hunter on Grateful Dead’s Early Days, Wild Tours, ‘Sacred’ Songs
How about “Ripple”? ?
We were in Canada on that train trip [the Festival Express, 1970] and one morning the train stopped and Jerry was sitting out on the tracks not too far off, in the sunrise, setting “Ripple” to music. That’s a good memory. That was one of the happy times, going on that train trip. Janis [Joplin] was the queen of that trip. One of my greatest memories is having breakfast with her on the train. She was having Southern Comfort and scotch, and she asked me if I heard that song by Kristofferson, “Sunday Morning Comin’ Down,” and she sang it in my ear. Can you imagine?
“Truckin'” also was completed on the road with the Dead, wasn’t it?
Yeah, I think it was in Florida, and I had been writing it for some time. I think I finished it there — it was not a song I just dashed off. And then I gave it to them. They were all sitting around the swimming pool, the guitars there, and they did a good job on it. I wrote all the lyric. “Sometimes the light’s all shinin’ on me” — I think that’s Phil. It took me a couple of months to write and it maybe took ’em about half an hour to put it together.
Did you know Phil’s dad was seriously ill when you wrote the lyrics for “Box of Rain”?
Yeah, a song for Phil’s dad. It wasn’t about dying in particular; it’s about being alive. I wrote “Playing in the Band” to the sound of the pump on Mickey’s ranch. We put chords on that rhythm. The rhythm was provided by nature. “Fire on the Mountain” was right around the same time, also at Mickey’s ranch. There was a fire on the mountain and it looked like it was going to endanger the ranch. So what did I do about it? I sat there and wrote a song about it while the smoke was pouring out. A good starting point.
When it comes to working with the band, do you have a favorite era?
Well, I think the most fun was down in L.A. doing Anthem of the Sun, which was way back in the beginning for me — just hangin’ around being great friends and all that kind of stuff. Weir’s famous quote to the producer, Dave Hassinger, at that time: “We’re looking for the sound of thick air!” [Laughs] I was there when that was said.
How about a favorite lyric or line you wrote?
“Let it be known there is a fountain that was not made by the hands of men” [from “Ripple”]. That’s pretty much my favorite line I ever wrote, that’s ever popped into my head. And I believe it, you know?
To prepare for your recent tours, you’ve said you listened back to Dead albums again. What was that like for you?
Some of the versions sound better almost than I can believe, and Jerry’s guitar playing and his knowledge of the modes and stuff is overwhelming. And sometimes, somebody in the band is just singing flat [laughs]! Which, as a lyricist, tends to ruin a song for me. Sometimes it’s phenomenal, though. “Casey Jones” didn’t start out as a song, it just suddenly popped into my mind: “driving that train, high on cocaine, Casey Jones, you better watch your speed.” I just wrote that down and I went on to whatever else I was doing, and some time later I came across it and thought, “That’s the germ of a pretty good song.” The remixes on some of those albums sound so brilliant you can’t believe it, you know. They sound like what they should’ve sounded like back then.