Hippie celebration! An in-depth documentary about legendary 60s psychedelic band The Grateful Dead is set to be released next year, coinciding with the 50th anniversary of band’s existence. Iconic director Martin Scorsese will be the executive producer, while Amir Bar-Lev will direct.
A blend of vintage interviews, live concerts and new interviews with surviving members will comprise the film. The film will call back to the band’s formation in the Bay Area as the rise of the psychedelic counterculture of the ’60s was taking root, providing a fertile consciousness for expansion and experimentation. Over the next three decades, the Dead continued to release albums, though their tours would serve a far more meaningful purpose. It was frequent for Deadhead fans to follow the band all over the country, a cultural movement around the band’s exploratory onstage jam sessions. Touring as The Grateful Dead stopped when bandleader Jerry Garcia died in 1995, though surviving members have done their best to carry on.
The surviving members of the band, made up of Bob Weir, Mickey Hart, Bill Kreutzmann, Phil Lesh (acting for the late Jerry Garcia), said in a statement that they are honored to have Scorsese on board. “From The Last Waltz to George Harrison: Living in the Material World, from Bob Dylan to the Rolling Stones, he has made some of the greatest music documentaries ever with some of our favorite artists,” they said.
Scorsese also released a statement expressing his honor in being a part of it. “The Grateful Dead were more than just a band,” he said. “They were their own planet, populated by millions of devoted fans.
