How to go
Who: Dark Star Orchestra
When: 7 p.m. Wednesday, rain or shine
Where: Veterans Park, 250 Cliff Park Road, as part of the Summer Arts Festival
Cost: Free
SPRINGFIELD — It’s been almost 14 years since Papa Smurf was taken from his flock.
All these years later, though, they’re all still there in the forest, living in mushrooms, singing in unison.
La-la-la-la-la-la. (You know the tune.)
Maybe a couple have been picked off here and there by Gargamel’s cat, but the strangest thing has happened — young Smurfs who never even saw Papa Smurf have decided they, too, now want to live in little mushrooms in the forest.
Of course, there’s really no such thing as Smurfs.
There are, however, Deadheads.
And what you just read pretty much describes the Dead scene since the 1995 passing of Jerry Garcia (who could’ve passed for the bearded Papa Smurf, give or take 290 pounds).
“It’s evident the whole thing is very much alive,” said Dino English, one of two drummers for the Dark Star Orchestra, the beloved Grateful Dead tribute band.
The DSO will make its regular appearance at the Summer Arts Festival on Wednesday, July 15.
If the thought of several thousand mildly unwashed people dancing sort of awkwardly in the park frightens you, just stay away. Don’t be a Gargamel.
But if you want to be among the mushroom people, you won’t find a better opportunity for the price — the DSO is the band that serves up the Dead just like you remember them.
And if you’re too young to remember them, the DSO is like a gateway drug into the bigger phenomenon.
Tape traders for the MP3 generation, the band has emerged as a trusted favorite in jam band circles.
A recent MSNBC list of “summer jam bands to go see” placed the DSO on a short list that also included the Allman Brothers and Bob Weir’s Ratdog.
Thanks to the 2005 addition of keyboardist Rob Barraco — a former member of the Phil Lesh Quintet with Dead bassist Lesh and Allmans guitarist Warren Haynes — the DSO has all but transcended the “tribute band” tag.
“I don’t know if we expected it to last this long or not,” English said. “We were just doing what we loved.”
A little more than a decade in the making, the band’s identity rests almost solely on its one-of-a-kind shtick — playing real Dead set lists exactly like the Dead did.
That is, song-for-song, not note-for-note. The epic, marathon, are-we-there-yet jamming is all them.
So maybe you saw the original Dead at the Cincinnati Gardens clear back on Dec. 4, 1973.
At a gig last month in Massachusetts, the DSO revisited that Cincy show in its entirety, from the opening cover of “Johnny B. Goode” to the encore of “One More Saturday Night.”
But if that’s not obsessive enough, the DSO practically crosses over into the realm of Civil War re-enactors by setting up the stage exactly the way the Dead did that night, say, in Cincinnati in ’73.
“It’s another hint,” English said.
Part of the fun is trying to guess what show you’re at. The date and venue is announced at the end of each show (unless they’re breaking from style and playing a set list cobbled together from four different decades, which is becoming more common).
“It can be a little ridiculous at times,” English confessed. “There was a time in ’78 when the drums were off to the side. The drums were stage left and the band was stage right. It doesn’t make much sense to us.”
For the DSO, most of the set lists stem from the ’70s and ’80s.
“My favorite flow of shows is probably from 1977 to 1987,” English said. “I really like the way they were playing in the early ’70s, with one drummer, but their set lists were so random.
“They fell into a style. It felt like you had gone on a journey.”
Hard to believe English actually had to be dragged to his first Dead show in 1991.
“I had friends who tried to play me tapes,” he said, “but I didn’t get what all the hubbub was about.”
Then he went.
“I totally got it the first show,” he said. “I’ve been on the bus ever since.”
Part of the allure was the open minds of the fans.
“You could hear a country number, then a funk number, then a rock number,” English said. “They got their fans to tolerate these drastic changes in musical styles.”
English took in 20 Dead shows before Papa Smurf’s untimely end.
“It’s not the same without Garcia around,” he said, “but there’s still life left in these songs. We’re just playing our part to continue on the legacy of these songs.”
And, really, the world could still use a few more good hippies.
The first year the DSO played the Summer Arts Festival, organizers were shocked at what their fans did (and continue to do).
“They pick up every last piece of trash on the ground,” said Chris Moore, executive director of the Springfield Arts Council. “We stood there with our jaws on the ground watching them pick up.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 328-0352 or amcginn@coxohio.com.
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