“You have to get past the idea that music has to be one thing.”

What a long strange trip it’s been.

Hunter can write a melody and stuff like that, but his forte is lyrics. He can write a serviceable melody to hang his lyrics on, and sometimes he comes up with something really nice.

You need music, I don’t know why. It’s probably one of those Joe Campbell questions, why we need ritual.

I think that the important changes have already happened, changes in consciousness. It’s mostly a matter of everything else catching up to that.

Partly. Part Of The Way You Can Tell You’re Alive Is By How Much Pain You’re Experiencing, Or How Little.

The nature of what we’re doing is something, which is by its very nature, is non-formulaic.

American society has gone completely into denial.

Done time in the lock-up, done time on the streets. Done time on the upswing, and time in defeat.

I think The Grateful Dead kind of represents the spirit of being able to go out and have an adventure in America at large.

Run faster, jump higher, reach farther, and you’ll always win! live life expecting the worst, hoping for the best, and living for the future!

We play at the religious services of the new age. Everybody gets high, and that’s what it’s all about really.

People may need something to celebrate. They need a context in which to celebrate things. They need something that fills the void that’s left by the bankruptcy of religion and so forth.

I think the Muslim religious is a little too tight. It doesn’t fit humans. Humans can’t possibly fit into it, so there are a lot of really unhappy people, terribly repressed.

I mean, just because you’re a musician doesn’t mean all your ideas are about music.

We were very fortunate to have a a little time in history when LSD was still legal and were able to experiment with drugs just like we were doing with music.

What we’re thinking about is a peaceful planet. We’re not thinking about anything else.