Interview with Grateful Dead's Bill Kreutzmann - Part 1

Of all the individuals who passed through the ranks of the Grateful Dead, drummer Bill Kreutzmann certainly stands out, but not in a flashy, promotional way.

In the public eye, it may be that others in the Dead — certainly Jerry Garcia, along with Phil Lesh, Bob Weir and Mickey Hart — have a higher profile. Yet, when it comes down to who was integral to the music, attitude and spirit of the Grateful Dead, Kreutzmann’s contributions are undeniable.

  From the Acid Tests and Woodstock to  "Touch Of Grey," Kreutzmann firmly held down the floor and provided the heartbeat. The spotlight on him and Hart (aka the Rhythm Devils) as the percussive undertow of the Grateful Dead became more intense with each passing year. But after Jerry Garcia’s passing in 1995, the drummer left the music scene to enjoy a Dead-free life in Hawaii.

Today, he still calls Hawaii home, but music has circled back around to his court. Only now Kreutzmann likes to mix it up with a variety of different musicians. During 2009, even as he joined Lesh, Weir and Hart for another Dead tour, he also ventured out to play gigs with BK3, a power trio he formed with bassist James “Hutch” Hutchinson and guitarist Scott Murawski. And it still isn’t enough to fill his plate.

During the course of this exclusive interview, we look to the future and back on the past. For this installment, however, it was more about the present, meaning the upcoming Hawaii Blue Moon New Year’s Eve Tour (three shows on three islands), as well as BK3.

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Tell me about the Hawaii Blue Moon New Year’s Eve Tour you have coming up.

Yeah, with Chris Berry (from Panjea).

What are you guys going to play?

We’re going to be doing a lot of his music, I hope. And maybe a few Dead tunes. I’m not really into playing a lot of Dead tunes with these new bands I’ve been playing with. It’s so much fun to play different music. I don’t know what Chris wants to do. We’re not going to rehearse until the 29th. I have a little studio here — literally a garage studio. Everyone who comes in there is in the best garage band ever (laughs). So we’re going to practice for a couple of days. He’s bringing over his bass player (Patrice Blanchard). He’s a French fellow.

You also have Michael Kang from String Cheese Incident joining you for these shows.

Yeah, he and Chris have done some gigs together. I think it’s going to be a really excellent band. I have a CD here and I’ve been listening and practicing along with it. The music is really up and I love that. It’s fun to play, Caribbean kind of music.

You also have your own band BK3 (with bassist James “Hutch” Hutchinson and guitarist Scott Murawski). I know you guys played some gigs over the summer. Anything coming up?

We have one date in February that’s coming up. We have some more coming along. And we have some music we want to release. We want to get in the studio and do that.

I understand Robert Hunter wrote some of the lyrics for the new BK3 music.

He wrote all of it, except for one, which is really cool with a gospel feel to it. The rest are all Hunter songs and they’re all wildly different from each other, but really cool. We’re having fun putting music to them.

I read in an interview you did where you said playing with Scott Murawski is like playing with Jerry Garcia.

It is because he’s a total bright light. He’s totally fluent in his playing and he plays all different styles. He builds and builds and builds. He’s like a painter painting in oil. You gotta paint for what you’re gonna do later. You start with a color, which is opaque, and you put something on top of it that is opaque…and that’s how Scott plays guitar. He’ll play some lines and just keep building it. A lot of guitar players you think, “Ok, they’re done with their solo,” but he’s just getting going. I really enjoy that aspect. That’s how I related him to Jerry — they both have great imaginations and know how to stretch out, which I find to be the most interesting music. You don’t know where it’s gonna go, you just know it’s gonna go (laughs).

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For the second installment of our exclusive interview with Bill Kreutzmann, the drummer discusses his work with Papa Mali and fills us in on how the 2009 Dead tour came together.