Considering the Grateful Dead’s connection with Ken Kesey and his famed Merry Pranksters, it’s no surprise that prank phone calls were a pastime for members of the band and their associates.
However, one prank call in particular really resonated with the Dead aficionados at OFfBeat (which is to say, me). It involved the band’s fearless leader Jerry Garcia and versatile keyboardist/frequent Dead collaborator Bruce Hornsby, who were both apparently huge fans of Ernie K-Doe’s show on WWOZ.
Jerry Garcia’s Facebook page recently shared Hornsby’s take on the hilarious phone call. There’s no telling when the “The Way It Is” songwriter told this story, but it has to have been many years ago.
I used to phone-prank him a lot. I used to mess with him on the phone all the time. My favorite was this one time when I had him thinking he was live on the air on New Orleans radio with Ernie K. Doe [best known as the singer of the song “Mother-in-Law”]. He used to have this incredible radio show: ‘Ernie K. Doe, K-DOE, live over the baddest motor scooter from New Orleans! Whatcha say Crescent City?’ Anyway, Garcia and I would listen to tapes of these shows; we played the hell out of them, so I knew this schtick pretty well. Maybe two or three years ago I called up Garcia around Christmas time and I used that voice: “‘Jerry Gah-cia? Ernie K. Doe! Live! WWOZ, 90.7 on yo’ radio dial, live from New Orleans! Whatchu got to say to New Orleans, Gah-cia?’ And Garcia says, ‘Um, well, I’d like to wish everybody happy holidays …’ and I’m thinkin’, ‘Oh man, I’ve got him!’ I said, ‘Gah-cia, Grateful Dead don’t play New Orleans. When Grateful Dead gonna come to New Orleans, Gah-cia?’ And he says, ‘Well, man, I really feel bad about that. We want to come sometime …’ So I kept winding him up: I said, ‘Ernie K. Doe and the Grateful Dead gonna jam, Gah-cia! When Grateful Dead gonna play ‘Mother-In-Law’? I never heard Grateful Dead play no ‘Mother-in-Law,’ Gah-cia!’ Finally I couldn’t take it anymore: ‘Hey Garcia, it’s me — Bruce!’ He goes, ‘You weasel!’ and he cracked up.
As Hornsby noted in his story, the Grateful Dead—quite unfortunately—didn’t make it down to Louisiana that often. Of course, their distaste for playing Big Easy was mostly the result of a run-in with the NOPD in 1970, an incident that was famously immortalized by their hit song “Truckin'”(“Busted, down on Bourbon Street/ Set up, like a bowling pin/ Knocked down, it gets to wearin’ thin / They just won’t let you be”).
It may only be a dream, but I like to think the Dead would have nailed “Mother-In-Law” if they ever got the chance to play it with K-Doe. They managed to work in an “Iko Iko” with the Neville Brothers after all, so it’s not too farfetched of an idea. But like I said, only a dream…
In any case, the spirit of the Dead lives on in New Orleans to this day, and it’s particularly prevalent during Jazz Fest season. As previously reported, Grateful Dead tribute acts Joe Russo’s Almost Dead and Dark Star Orchestra both announced two-night runs around next year’s edition of the festival.
