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Meet the Man Preserving 60 Years of Grateful Dead History

Since 1999, David Lemieux has been the official keeper of the keys to the Grateful Dead’s vaults. For the band’s 60th anniversary, he has some surprises ready.

By Jim Allen

Meet the Man Preserving 60 Years of Grateful Dead History

the Grateful Dead canon forever.” He adds, to the surprise of no one, “It’s a great gig.”

As the Dead’s archivist and legacy manager, Ottawa-born Lemieux has been overseeing the band’s massive audio and visual archives since 1999, when original vault master Dave’s Picks. (For stats junkies, in 2024, the Dead broke the record for the most Top 40 albums by any artist; the vast majority of those are Dave’s Picks releases.)

Europe ’72: The Complete Recordings
Grateful Dead
2011
Folk Rock, Rock & Roll, Psychedelic Rock, Country Rock
Box Set, Limited Edition
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But once in a great while when all the stars align and there’s something extra special to share — something that can’t be contained within the Dave’s Picks format — Lemieux will unleash a box set of massive proportions. In 2011, for example, he shepherded the release of the mighty 73-disc 30 Trips Around The Sun arrived in time to celebrate the band’s 50th anniversary. So, the Dead’s dedicated tape whisperer wasn’t about to sit on his hands and let the 60th without throwing a proper party.

That party takes the shape of the project, Enjoying the Ride. “We wanted this to be about The Grateful Dead’s journey,” says Lemieux, “seeing the Dead in power places, the places the Dead played particularly well. So, we decided to do this 60 CD box set — 60 CDs for 60 years. The way to do it, we decided, was to choose 20 important venues and choose one complete show for the most part from each one, three CDs each. Places that Deadheads used to feel you didn’t want to miss a show there.”

For those who want to wet their beaks without making such a deep dive, there’s the three-CD (or six-LP) highlights collection, The Music Never Stopped.

Grateful Dead at Red Rocks Amphitheatre on August 12th, 1979. Photo Credit: ©James R. Anderson

Grateful Dead at Red Rocks Amphitheatre on August 12th, 1979. Photo Credit: ©James R. Anderson

In 2006, the band moved the archives from a Dead-owned Bay Area building to a fireproof, climate-controlled Warner facility in L.A, where they bear a deceptively ominous-sounding nickname. “Within this giant facility, there’s a small vault caged off for The Grateful Dead collection,” says Lemieux.“We call it ‘The Cage’.”

According to Lemieux, The Cage contains roughly 15,000 analog tapes as well as thousands of pieces of film and video, organized in long rows. It’s all categorized chronologically by format. These days, there’s a crew there that fields Lemieux’s requests, locates the material, and ships it off. But from ‘99 to ‘06, his office was the vault. He was in there seven days a week.

“I know every physical piece of media in there,” he attests.

Lemieux filled Enjoying The Ride with shows from 1969 to 1994 that took place in San Francisco, New York City, and plenty of stops in between, assembling a dazzling cornucopia of unreleased material. “Of the, I think, 460 tracks,” he reports, “maybe 457 are unreleased.” And he’s bursting with excitement over some of the selections.

“The Shoreline show from May 12, ‘91,” he enthuses, “is the Bruce Hornsby iteration of the band. Bruce is on piano and a little bit of accordion, and Vince is on keyboards. From the beginning of this show, it’s one of the most high-energy shows of the last possibly 10 years of the band’s touring. I think Bruce pushed the band to new heights on a lot of nights, and this was one of them.”

Lemieux cites a 7/15/89 show at Noblesville, Indiana’s Deer Creek Music Center as “another one of these monumental shows from the summer of ‘89, which was the beginning of nine months of excellence for the Dead. That one blew my mind.”

Dick’s Picks 32: 8/7/82 Alpine Valley Music Theatre, East Troy, WI
The Grateful Dead
2004
Folk Rock, Country Rock, Psychedelic Rock
HDCD, Album
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“We’ve got the first ever Dead show at Alpine Valley,” he says, “and the Dead played Alpine from ‘80 to ‘89; it was their kind of Midwest summer home. The first show there was incredible.” 

Naturally, there’s plenty of ‘70s action as well. “We cover the mid ‘70s with a great Winterland show,” Lemieux says, “a show that probably would have come out as a Dave’s Picks. Likewise, a year later, the Philly Spectrum show from May of ‘78. The Spectrum brought out a certain energy in the band, and you can hear it on this one.”

And while there’s not a ton of ‘60s material, the quality trumps the quantity. “We’ve got a compilation of shows from June of ‘69 at the Fillmore West,” Lemieux states. “June of ‘69 was a very transitional time for the Dead. They were starting to add some of the Aoxomoxoa.

But Lemieux stands just as proudly behind the last couple of shows in the set. “I think that kind of ‘93-’95 era gets a bit of a hard rap sometimes,” he says, “and I think the shows maybe weren’t as consistently great as they might have been…but there are incredible nights. I could grab a handful of shows from every tour that are really top-notch Dead.”

The Dead always prioritized performance and the snaring of the spirit in the moment over capturing lightning in a recording studio bottle. Accordingly, they evolved in front of their audiences. And with a set spanning 25 years’ worth of shows, you can hear it happen all across Enjoying The Ride. 

“I can hear this stuff and know within 10 seconds what year it is and, for the most part, what part of that year. I can’t think of any other band [like that]. With the Dead, some of the changes are very obvious — keyboard player, one drummer versus two, Donna [Godchaux, harmony singer] is in the band, things like that, but it’s the nuanced changes, and the sound of the recordings are very distinct year to year. It’s the Dead growing, I don’t think ever being satisfied with where they are.”

The change in keyboardists that came with each era was a major indicator of where the band was headed. “I feel that the keyboards inspire the band to change direction,” concurs Lemieux. “With [co-founder] Brent [Mydland] came in, what I hear on the tapes is that organ sound. That sound could fill every inch of those arenas and bring the energy up. When Vince ed [in the ‘90s], it was a whole new direction vocally and instrumentally, because Vince wasn’t playing organ. Shortly after Vince ed, the Dead debuted a lot of new songs. So, much of that new material, Vince got to find his place in it and find it well.”

Whether we’re talking about the psychedelic tempest of a ‘69 Fillmore blowout, the sun-dappled, roots-rocking sparkle of a 1973 set, or a wildly eclectic ‘89 show where subtly honed songcraft and off-the-hook jamming receive equal weight, it’s the Dead from the top down. And it’s a ride that many on the bus have been enjoying for decades. 

Lemieux’s in-person exposure to the Dead’s ineffable brand of mojo began with his first show back in 1987 (Hartford Civic Center, 3/26/87 for those keeping score). And for the ever-increasing generations of fans who never had that kind of opportunity (as well as the many who did), keeping the spirit alive is his mission. 

“I do it for Deadheads because I’m a Deadhead,” he declares. “It’s a ton of fun.”

Jim Allen has contributed to MOJO, Uncut, Billboard, The Village Voice, Rolling Stone, Record Collector, Bandcamp Daily, NPR, Rock & Roll Globe, and many more, and written liner notes for reissues on Sundazed Records, Shout! Factory, and others. He’s also a veteran singer/songwriter with several albums to his credit.

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