‘Box of Rain’: The remarkable moment Phil Lesh returned to the microphone
Bustouts were one of the most exciting parts of a Grateful Dead concert. For the first decade of their career, the Dead built up a sprawling catalogue of music, including classic original songs and a wide array of covers. By the late 1970s, the band began to greatly expand their concert repertoire, often including songs that had long been forgotten about. For the late Phil Lesh, resurrecting ‘Box of Rain’ meant more than just singing an old song.
Originally written for 1970’s American Beauty, ‘Box of Rain’ became Lesh’s first lead vocal on a Grateful Dead original. After having written the song’s chord changes and melody line, Lesh, who recently passed away at the age of 84, handed over the lyric writing responsibilities to Robert Hunter, the Dead’s in-house lyric writer who was best known for working with Jerry Garcia. Hunter had collaborated with both Bob Weir and Ron ‘Pigpen’ McKernan by that point, so he was the only person that Lesh trusted with the task.
“He’d just written these lovely changes and put them on a tape for me,” Hunter recalled in the Classic Albums documentary From Anthem to Beauty. “So the phrasing was all there. I think I went through it two or three times writing as fast as I could. That song was written, and I guess it was written for a young man whose father was dying.”
During the recording of American Beauty, Lesh would make trips up north to visit his father, who was dying of cancer. The emotional weight behind the song belonged to Lesh, but that same feeling was translated by Hunter. ‘Box of Rain’ featured a reconfigured lineup of the Dead, with Jerry Garcia playing keyboard and New Riders of the Purple Sage members David Nelson and Dave Torbert contributing guitar and bass, respectively, as Lesh played acoustic guitar.
With a strange alternative lineup and a massive emotional connection to Lesh’s personal life, ‘Box of Rain’ wasn’t the easiest song to replicate in the live setting. The track was played only once in 1970, after which it sat on the shelf for exactly two years before the Dead busted it out again in 1972. Over the next year, Lesh continued to sing ’Box of Rain’ on a frequent basis, but the song was nowhere to be found in 1974 and disappeared from the band’s sets after their 1975 road hiatus.
Lesh himself had largely stopped singing after 1974. Donna Jean Godchaux took over the high harmony parts that Lesh handled during the band’s first decade, and Brent Mydland stepped into that role when he joined the band in 1979. Lesh had damaged his vocal cords sometime in the 1970s, and his ongoing alcoholism did nothing to help keep his voice in pristine condition. Lesh would occasionally join in on the group vocals for ‘Truckin’, but he stayed away from the microphone for a number of years.
But when the Dead made their way to the Hampton Coliseum on March 20th, 1986, Lesh was feeling inspired. With his birthday being just five days prior, Lesh was determined to celebrate. At the end of the band’s first set came a surprise: after more than 780 concerts, Lesh stepped up to the microphone to sing ‘Box of Rain’ for the first time in 13 years.
While it’s audible from the soundboard recording, the true spirit of jubilation felt throughout the crowd can best be heard on audience tapes from the time. In-the-know Deadheads quickly informed some of their more casual brethren, and soon enough, the entire crowd was repeating the words to ‘Box of Rain’ as Lesh revived the song’s heartfelt lyrics. It was one of those magical moments that truly lends credence to the maxim “There is nothing like a Grateful Dead concert”.
From that point on, Lesh would sing ‘Box of Rain’ every year that the band performed all the way up to their final year in 1995. In fact, ‘Box of Rain’ is now forever a part of Deadhead lore as the final song that the band played in their lifetime. At their final concert on July 9th, 1995, ‘Box of Rain’ was the final encore song, making it the last song that the Grateful Dead ever performed to a live audience.
Watch the bust out of ‘Box of Rain’ from ’86 down below.
