I notice the picture first. I'm looking at the arts section, New York Times, Jan. 6. The tiny attribution at the bottom of this garish illustration says "Grateful Dead Productions." It's a pen-and-ink drawing, colored in with orange and yellow, purple and blue. It shows a skeleton with roses around its head in some sort of giant tube, like from a sci-fi movie, what appears to be a rendition of a wall of video screens with a woman's face peering out of it and a mob of people with their arms in the air. That last part -- the arms in the air part -- immediately calls to mind two images: The way the scary speaking-in-tongues people outstretched their hands to god at the Pentecostal church I attended as a child and, of course, the Nazi "Heil Hitler" salute. The headline says, "Disneyland for Deadheads: Ultimate Nostalgia Trip," with smaller type proclaiming "Rock Group Lives in Memory and Master Plan."

Master Plan? As in Final Solution? The surviving members of the Grateful Dead -- which has always struck me as probably the most culturally destructive cult American popular music has produced -- are planning to build a museum to themselves in San Francisco. Called "Terrapin Station" in honor of the band's 1977 album of that name, the bunker -- I mean church, no, wait, I mean "entertainment and performance complex" -- will supposedly include exhibits, a restaurant, an archive and library, an auditorium called the "Jerry Garcia Theater," named for the band's late leader, and the all-important gift shop filled with Deadhead merch. Plus, according to the San Francisco Chronicle, there will be a space provided that would feature "percussion instruments for spontaneous jam sessions or drum circles by museum visitors," to be called the "Rhythm Devils Room." I think "Get a Life You Brainwashed Dummies" would be a more poetic title. Because as anyone who lives in San Francisco can tell you, nothing spoils a nice stroll through Golden Gate Park on a sunny day like an eyseore gathering of the great unwashed blocking the footpath with their bongs and bongos.

I asked my old San Francisco neighbor Gina Arnold, Salon contributor and music columnist for the East Bay Express, what she thought of the new intrusion. "If it's going to be in any town, it should be in my town," she says. "But I object to it in any town. Still, I'm happy, because it will bring the Grateful Dead's secret hypocrisy out in the open. There will never be any pretense of respect once they've done it. Remember their whole thing about how they were 'genuine musicians'? Nobody can pretend that anymore when this whole thing happens."

I don't live in San Francisco anymore. I live in Chicago, where people are crazy-cranked about guys who wear much better uniforms -- the Bulls. At least Michael Jordan, unlike Bob Weir & Co., isn't pretending he's not milking his fans for every cent they're worth. At least MJ's selling out on TV every two seconds nice and public-like in honest-to-God car commercials, instead of peddling skull-logoed, thousand-dollar watches in the name of peace and love.

Since I don't have to live in San Francisco anymore, since I won't have to walk past this Tower of Tie Dye on any kind of frequent basis, I almost enjoy imagining how this little "idea" will work. What if the Dead actually came clean? What if, instead of painting smiley faces on their image, they'd actually 'fess up to their true selves, accept their blame, as if on trial at Nuremberg, and make a monument to their folly? What if, instead of doling out the whole strange-trip-I-will-survive nonsense, they'd repent? What if, every day, Bob Weir would stand out front like a greeter at Wal-Mart and repeat, over and over, "We are responsible for inspiring two generations of American citizens to listen to dreadful 'songs' that went on too long and had no point, shell out millions of dollars for cheap, tie-dyed, teddy bear-stamped crap and dress not just badly, but badly and exactly alike! And, my fellow Americans, I'm standing here to tell you, all I can do is apologize and throw up. I. Am. Soooooooooo. Sorry."

Or maybe Weir shouldn't stand there. Those Berkeley punk kids beat up Jello Biafra for selling out, so there's no telling what could happen to Weir. The complex's exhibits and concessions could tell the story of the band's totalitarian spirit. For example, the cutesy parking lot planned for the entrance that's supposed to recall how all the sheep, er, fans would gather before shows could be entered through an arch inscribed "Faulheit Macht Frei" (laziness will set you free). Souvenirs would be purchased at a shop called "The Banality of Evil Bracelets 'n' Things" and the ubiquitous Cherry Garcia ice cream would be sold by the pint at the "Let the Dead Bury the Dead Cafe." There would be innovative carnival rides like the "Altamont-A-Whirl" or the "Lifelong Drug Habit Ferris Wheel." Exhibits such as "You Followed Around a Man Who Married Someone Named 'Mountain Girl' For 20 Years. What Were You Thinking?" or "The Pothead Years: You'll Never Get Them Back, Ya Sucker" would spark conversation and self-examination among former Deadheads. I say build the thing. And let the healing begin.
SALON | Jan. 9, 1998