[2 articles]
Try your hand at Grateful Dead-opoly
http://www.mercurynews.com/entertainment/ci_13995114
By Jim Harrington
[email protected]
Posted: 12/17/2009
Greetings! I just landed at Madison Square Garden. Guess what was the
first thing I did upon arrival? I bought the joint.
It felt great to add New York City's most famous venue to my
collection, which also currently includes Chicago's Soldier Field and
Colorado's Red Rocks. By nightfall, I'm hoping to buy a private jet
or, maybe, hire a road crew just for the heck of it.
Now, I'll share with you the secret to my extravagant success: I play
Grateful Dead-opoly.
Grateful Dead-opoly, as one might suspect, is a fresh take on the
well-known Monopoly game, one that honors the legendary Bay Area jam
band. Basically, all the standard Monopoly moves apply you roll
dice and make your way around the board but the game itself is
designed with a cool Dead motif.
In general, I despise board games, which probably has something to do
with how soundly my dad used to kick my butt in Chutes and Ladders.
Yet, being a major music fan (and Deadhead), I really love Grateful
Dead-opoly. I dig using my "Dead Bucks" (i.e., money with Jerry
Garcia, Pigpen and other GD members on it) to buy cool concert venues
and master recordings (at just $60, "Terrapin Station" is a real bargain).
It's a hoot, and one that I'm sure the Deadhead on your holiday
shopping list would enjoy. For more information, visit
www.discoverybaygames.com.
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PLAYING DEAD
In a new Grateful Dead board game, it's as if the music never stopped
http://www.registerguard.com/csp/cms/sites/web/entertainment/24258509-44/game-dead-grateful-gold-harrison.csp
By Serena Markstrom
The Register-Guard
Dec 18, 2009
This story begins as might countless others involving the Grateful
Dead, with the opening of a colorful box and fingers pinching for
goods in little plastic Baggies.
Only here, the box contains a new board game. And the storage bags
are full of motels and other playing pieces needed to take the long,
strange trip of playing Grateful Dead-Opoly, the first Monopoly-style
game dedicated to the band beloved by so many in this community.
New York resident Debbie Gold created the game, drawing on plenty of
advice from people close to the band. After getting the initial idea,
she worked with guitarist and singer Bob Weir and roadie Steve Parish
on fine-tuning the game's content, along with artist Timothy Truman.
Gold also enlisted Truman to give Grateful Dead-Opoly an appearance
consistent with the band's aesthetic.
"I put so much thought and planning into this," Gold said. "The first
time we (with Truman) played was at Weir's house. …
"We spent a good portion of the time laughing."
As a teenager in the 1970s, Gold spent a year working for the band,
and she said she has since stayed in touch with friends from those
days. She later spent a career in the music business including many
years working with Bob Dylan, including producing two of his albums.
"The truth is, I have no idea where the idea came from," she said of
the game. "My whole thing in doing this game was I wanted it to be
authentic on every level. I made sure I did it from the inside out."
The game could never have been completed and released without full
band approval, she said.
What Gold really was concerned about was how fans would react. She
was delighted to learn that a group of four Eugene Deadheads who
assembled to give the game a test-drive gave it a passing grade.
The players said to tell readers, "Thank you for a real good time."
Then they assured this reporter, (I was 17 when Jerry Garcia died and
the group disbanded), that Deadheads would get the reference.
Friends of the devil
Our gracious guinea pigs agreed to test out the game at host Jeff
Harrison's Eugene home . Other than Jan Simmons, 59, and her husband
Mark Portman, 58, none of the gamers (who included Lew Judd, 57) knew
each other prior to getting together.
Their charge: Give our readers their true impressions of the game.
Each player is a self-described Deadhead with no involvement in the
creation of the game.
We set up on a card table in Harrison's office, which was packed with
cassette recordings of Grateful Dead concerts. The shelves were full
of vinyl studio and live recordings, plus just about every book
published about the band.
The players broke the ice by sharing stories of their first Dead
shows, in the late '60 and early '70s. As players landed on various
properties on the board and read from Rex Foundation and Karma cards,
they traded more memories than properties; at times, the focus
drifted away from the faux cash transactions and into real life.
Harrison, 57, played the part of the Manager (banker), and he slipped
the All Access VIP pass over his head. That meant he was never "off
the bus," or its equivalent in the original Monopoly, in jail.
The VIP pass also gives its wearer the privilege of never paying for
shows at such venues as Red Rocks and Soldier Field.
"I could have brought the real thing for all of us," said Judd. He
spent many years building stages and working behind the scenes at
Dead shows, wearing just such a coveted VIP pass.
"So could have I," offered Simmons, who from 1990 to '95 was one of
the group's assistant tour managers. She also worked for 12 years for
Bill Graham Presents.
Step 3 of the game setup is the sound check.
"Put on your favorite Dead album or concert tape. Now," the instructions read.
Harrison already had been playing a May 9, 1977, recording of a
concert from Memorial Auditorium in Buffalo. Simmons landed on the
music venue Winterland, and the whole table related stories before
the game proceeded.
And that was how the whole evening went.
Someone without as many Dead-related associations still could play
the game, but the experience will be richer to folks who understand
the inside references.
Others might care to learn, upon purchase of the classic
"Workingman's Dead," that it beat out Van Morrison's "Moon Dance" in
1970 as the choice of Rolling Stone readers for "best album of the year."
Recording masters, and their associated album art, are the properties
on which players can build luxury hotels and cheap motels. The
players agreed "Workingman's Dead" and "American Beauty" were
appropriate substitutes for Park Place and Boardwalk as premium properties.
Drug references are subtle enough for the game to be family-friendly,
but obvious enough to get a chuckle or two from adults. Jokes such as
the Karma card that says, "Be-in at Golden Gate Park: Lose all
inhibitions and roll again" are about as far as that trend goes.
References are present to the parking lot commerce scene known as
Shakedown Street, but they are not prominent.
At some point, Harrison changed the tunes to a May 7, 1972, recording
from the Bickershaw Festival, and the game started to wind down. A
few properties remained and no one had yet gone broke, but it was
approaching 9 p.m. and some of the players were ready for bed.
Contestants decided on a stopping time and agreed to crown a winner
based on the amount of wealth accrued to that point.
With $3,562 in assets, Portman came out on top.
"It's kind of an oxymoron," he said of the game. "Which Deadhead is
the most capitalistic?"
Skeletons in the closet
Grateful Dead-Opoly, which retails for $35, is available through
several online retailers, including www.dead.net. Barnes & Noble also
carries the game.
Or if you like the idea of playing, but can't abide the commercial
aspect that survived the Grateful Dead after its live music trip
ended, you could become a fan of the game on Facebook. In fact, leave
a comment on the social media site and on Christmas Eve, you could
win a Weir-autographed copy of the game.
Our local game testers said Grateful Dead-Opoly was fun, even if the
concept for it was not original. They said they enjoyed the social
aspect and the framework it provides for prompting recollections and
discussions.
"It evokes stories and memories," Simmons said. "That's its real value."
Gold, the game's creator, said the same thing happened for her,
especially while developing the product. For example, a story Weir
told of having to hitchhike to a gig after the limo broke down
inspired one of the game cards.
There were stories that came out of those meetings at Weir's house
that she had never heard before, Gold said. She often would have to
remind her collaborators, "Listen guys, we are making a family game.
"Don't go there."
--
Call Serena Markstrom at 338-2371 or e-mail her at serena .markstrom@
registerguard.com.
.
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