Interview | Team Behind Webby Nominated Jerry Garcia Website
By Andy Kahn Apr 13, 2015 • 10:40 am PDT
Guitarist Jerry Garcia’s official website JerryGarcia.com was recently nominated for a Webby Award in the General Website: Music category. Launched just over one year ago, the Grateful Dead guitarist’s new official web home was developed by the Critical Mass digital design agency. Fellow nominees include music media outlets Pitchfork and VICE Magazine’s Noisey, Internet radio platform Pandora and the interactive album-creating platform The DNA Project.
Founded in 1996 and presented by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, the 19th Annual The Webby Awards will be hosted by comedian Hannibal Buress and take place Monday, May 18 at Cipriani Wall Street in New York City. In each category two awards are granted: a Webby Award voted on by the over 1,000 member IADAS as well as a publicly voted on Webby People’s Voice Award. The full list of 19th Annual The Webby Awards categories and nominees is available here. People’s Voice voting in the General Website: Music is currently open via this link until Thursday, April 23 at 11:59 p.m. PT. Winners will be announced Monday, April 27.
JamBase reached out to the design team behind JerryGarcia.com at Critical Mass for a look into the development and launch of the Webby Award nominated website.
How did idea to develop the new Jerry Garcia official website come about?
The redesign of JerryGarcia.com began as a passion project within the walls of the digital experience design agency, Critical Mass (www.criticalmass.com). Feeling that the breadth of Garcia’s biography and musical legacy was not being well-represented online, Critical Mass Strategy Director Mark Silverman, who spent a significant amount of time in his youth on tour following the Jerry Garcia Band and Grateful Dead, reached out to [Jerry’s daughter] Trixie Garcia in early 2012 to see what he could do to help. The two quickly developed a friendship via email as they began envisioning some of the early ideas for what the website could become. With amazing support from the agency’s global executive team, the leadership and artistic vision of Creative Director Amy Haiar, and with the voluntary support of some of the agency’s top creative and technology talent, the team at Critical Mass set out to architect, design and build the extraordinary experience you see today. This project was a true labor of love, enveloping every individual that took part in the project from conception through to development.
What was the timeline from when work began on the new website to when it was officially launched?
As mentioned, Mark and Trixie began discussing plans for the website as early as April 2012. However, the real work did not officially begin until January 2013 with the development of early creative concepts, basic site architecture and content strategy. The work evolved over several months, and each member of the team put in extraordinary time and effort bringing the various site sections to life. And in order to design a brilliant audio-visual-historical experience, a lot of invisible, behind the scenes design work had to take place. Site content had to be sourced, checked and double-checked for accuracy. Permissions and rights for use of site imagery had to be obtained from dozens of photographers (who were all incredibly generous with their work – we are eternally grateful for their invaluable support). Code development began in late August and continued for several months as developers began working in tandem with the creative team. Together, they refined the designs, content and code right up until site launch. The site officially went live in March of 2014, almost two years after the initial contact between Mark and Trixie.
The Jerry’s Story biographical section of the website is particularly enlightening with a series of images and milestones from throughout Jerry’s life. What was the process for determining the images and events included in Jerry’s Story?
Jerry’s story and the milestones therein were researched and compiled from multiple sources, including several well-known biographies and other public and historical records. Our one mandate from Trixie in telling Jerry’s story was to not hold back or sugar coat things. We were to stay as true as we could to Jerry’s voice, and show both the light and the dark side of his life. Of course, we still had to make choices along the way. By the time we finished compiling all the milestones, we had an excel spreadsheet with literally hundreds of dates, and even with that we knew we were just scratching the surface. Knowing we couldn’t possibly cover everything without the page scrolling infinitely, we began whittling away and refining the copy — narrowing things down to what you see today. We still get questions from the particularly knowledgeable fans (there are many), asking why we chose to omit this date or that fact. However, it really came down to us telling the story as concisely as we could, all while strongly considering the spatial limitations that are involved in delivering a fantastic user experience to the broadest audience of fans.
Another impressive aspect of the website is the Shows section which includes information on nearly 4,000 concerts Garcia was involved in. How was that data, particularly the shows from early in his career, vetted and compiled?
The Shows section, and the creation of the database, is really one of the most remarkable stories behind the development effort. We began with a solid base thanks to a generous donation of data from Ryan Shriver, owner and curator of a fan site called thejerrysite (www.thejerrysite.com). Ryan spent many years compiling and refining as much show data as he could get his hands on, focused entirely on Jerry’s performing career beyond the Grateful Dead. We certainly couldn’t have done it without him, and we owe him and all the fans who contributed to his site an enormous debt of gratitude. Grateful Dead show data was largely compiled and fact checked by Colin Parsons, a personal friend and old touring buddy of Mark Silverman’s. Colin has an encyclopaedic level of knowledge when it comes to all things Jerry. His tape collection is probably rivalled only by Grateful Dead Archivist David Lemieux, and his collection of show facts and details is the product of decades of collecting. Once everything was compiled and arranged into a single database, Colin worked around the clock, checking each date for accuracy and feeding edits to Mark who would make the appropriate changes in the database. The effort took months, and often required listening back on the actual recordings to make sure the database would be “just exactly perfect.” Is it 100% perfect now? No. There still remain plenty of gaps where collective memory (and recording equipment) failed. Edits continue to this day. However, we are confident that what we have produced is the most up-to-date and accurate collection of Jerry Garcia show data that exists digitally anywhere in the world today. We hope fans will now continue to contribute to the process by submitting any long-lost setlists that might exist, and by continuing to fact check and submit corrections as they find them. In that way, the site conveys a history, but it continuously writes and reshapes that history, too — thanks to the collective memory of Jerry’s fans.
What’s in store for the future of www.JerryGarcia.com, are there any new projects in the works?
As with all agency projects, things eventually had to wind down as the team moved onto other client work. In that respect, Critical Mass’s official role in the development of the website is now complete. It is now the official property of Trixie Garcia and the Jerry Garcia Family LLC and is under the daily direction of the incredibly knowledgeable and talented folks over at Redlight Management. However, new content (photos, ticket stubs, posters etc) are constantly being added to the database.
Founded in 1996 and presented by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences, the 19th Annual The Webby Awards will be hosted by comedian Hannibal Buress and take place Monday, May 18 at Cipriani Wall Street in New York City. In each category two awards are granted: a Webby Award voted on by the over 1,000 member IADAS as well as a publicly voted on Webby People’s Voice Award. The full list of 19th Annual The Webby Awards categories and nominees is available here. People’s Voice voting in the General Website: Music is currently open via this link until Thursday, April 23 at 11:59 p.m. PT. Winners will be announced Monday, April 27.
JamBase reached out to the design team behind JerryGarcia.com at Critical Mass for a look into the development and launch of the Webby Award nominated website.
How did idea to develop the new Jerry Garcia official website come about?
The redesign of JerryGarcia.com began as a passion project within the walls of the digital experience design agency, Critical Mass (www.criticalmass.com). Feeling that the breadth of Garcia’s biography and musical legacy was not being well-represented online, Critical Mass Strategy Director Mark Silverman, who spent a significant amount of time in his youth on tour following the Jerry Garcia Band and Grateful Dead, reached out to [Jerry’s daughter] Trixie Garcia in early 2012 to see what he could do to help. The two quickly developed a friendship via email as they began envisioning some of the early ideas for what the website could become. With amazing support from the agency’s global executive team, the leadership and artistic vision of Creative Director Amy Haiar, and with the voluntary support of some of the agency’s top creative and technology talent, the team at Critical Mass set out to architect, design and build the extraordinary experience you see today. This project was a true labor of love, enveloping every individual that took part in the project from conception through to development.
What was the timeline from when work began on the new website to when it was officially launched?
As mentioned, Mark and Trixie began discussing plans for the website as early as April 2012. However, the real work did not officially begin until January 2013 with the development of early creative concepts, basic site architecture and content strategy. The work evolved over several months, and each member of the team put in extraordinary time and effort bringing the various site sections to life. And in order to design a brilliant audio-visual-historical experience, a lot of invisible, behind the scenes design work had to take place. Site content had to be sourced, checked and double-checked for accuracy. Permissions and rights for use of site imagery had to be obtained from dozens of photographers (who were all incredibly generous with their work – we are eternally grateful for their invaluable support). Code development began in late August and continued for several months as developers began working in tandem with the creative team. Together, they refined the designs, content and code right up until site launch. The site officially went live in March of 2014, almost two years after the initial contact between Mark and Trixie.
The Jerry’s Story biographical section of the website is particularly enlightening with a series of images and milestones from throughout Jerry’s life. What was the process for determining the images and events included in Jerry’s Story?
Jerry’s story and the milestones therein were researched and compiled from multiple sources, including several well-known biographies and other public and historical records. Our one mandate from Trixie in telling Jerry’s story was to not hold back or sugar coat things. We were to stay as true as we could to Jerry’s voice, and show both the light and the dark side of his life. Of course, we still had to make choices along the way. By the time we finished compiling all the milestones, we had an excel spreadsheet with literally hundreds of dates, and even with that we knew we were just scratching the surface. Knowing we couldn’t possibly cover everything without the page scrolling infinitely, we began whittling away and refining the copy — narrowing things down to what you see today. We still get questions from the particularly knowledgeable fans (there are many), asking why we chose to omit this date or that fact. However, it really came down to us telling the story as concisely as we could, all while strongly considering the spatial limitations that are involved in delivering a fantastic user experience to the broadest audience of fans.
Another impressive aspect of the website is the Shows section which includes information on nearly 4,000 concerts Garcia was involved in. How was that data, particularly the shows from early in his career, vetted and compiled?
The Shows section, and the creation of the database, is really one of the most remarkable stories behind the development effort. We began with a solid base thanks to a generous donation of data from Ryan Shriver, owner and curator of a fan site called thejerrysite (www.thejerrysite.com). Ryan spent many years compiling and refining as much show data as he could get his hands on, focused entirely on Jerry’s performing career beyond the Grateful Dead. We certainly couldn’t have done it without him, and we owe him and all the fans who contributed to his site an enormous debt of gratitude. Grateful Dead show data was largely compiled and fact checked by Colin Parsons, a personal friend and old touring buddy of Mark Silverman’s. Colin has an encyclopaedic level of knowledge when it comes to all things Jerry. His tape collection is probably rivalled only by Grateful Dead Archivist David Lemieux, and his collection of show facts and details is the product of decades of collecting. Once everything was compiled and arranged into a single database, Colin worked around the clock, checking each date for accuracy and feeding edits to Mark who would make the appropriate changes in the database. The effort took months, and often required listening back on the actual recordings to make sure the database would be “just exactly perfect.” Is it 100% perfect now? No. There still remain plenty of gaps where collective memory (and recording equipment) failed. Edits continue to this day. However, we are confident that what we have produced is the most up-to-date and accurate collection of Jerry Garcia show data that exists digitally anywhere in the world today. We hope fans will now continue to contribute to the process by submitting any long-lost setlists that might exist, and by continuing to fact check and submit corrections as they find them. In that way, the site conveys a history, but it continuously writes and reshapes that history, too — thanks to the collective memory of Jerry’s fans.
What’s in store for the future of www.JerryGarcia.com, are there any new projects in the works?
As with all agency projects, things eventually had to wind down as the team moved onto other client work. In that respect, Critical Mass’s official role in the development of the website is now complete. It is now the official property of Trixie Garcia and the Jerry Garcia Family LLC and is under the daily direction of the incredibly knowledgeable and talented folks over at Redlight Management. However, new content (photos, ticket stubs, posters etc) are constantly being added to the database.
