Stanley Jordan Gets In On Phil Lesh & Friends’ ‘Darkstarathon’ Action

Guitarist Stanley Jordan swung by the Terrapin Clubhouse last month one day after performing with Phil Lesh & Friends at the Sunday Daydream Vol. 3 event at McNears Beach Park in San Rafael, California. Jordan was part of the Grateful Dead bassist’s band featured in the latest installment of Terrapin Clubhouse’s Darkstarathon video series.

The seventh episode of the series presenting an infinite “Dark Star” features Phil Lesh, Stanley Jordan, Lebo (Dan Lebowitz) on pedal steel, keyboardist Jason Crosby, drummer John Molo and the bassist’s son Grahame Lesh. Darkstarathon Episode 7 includes no vocals as the band focused solely on the psychedelic era gem that gives the series its name outside of an instrumental run through “I Know You Rider.”

Phil Lesh explained the Darkstarathon concept last fall, noting:

“Hey now! Welcome to the ‘Darkstarathon!’ What is a ‘Darkstarathon,’ you may ask? I will be collaborating with many musical friends to create a “Dark Star” that pauses but never ends. Each band will pick up where the last band left off and it will be a living breathing infinite piece of music. If you’re as crazy about this sort of thing as I am, please subscribe to the channel and join us on this journey. I promise to make it weird.”

The sextet fit the main “Dark Star” theme into the mix multiple times over the course of the 27-minute jam session. Phil Lesh & Friends move between tempos constantly exploring intense, ambient and rollicking spaces.

All six musicians sat for a chat featured at the end of the video. Phil Lesh asked Stanley Jordan about their unusual approach to guitar. “I do find that playing with you and playing the Grateful Dead music, I feel that this technique comes through especially well. Because you have a lot of people all doing different things. So when I try to find a niche inside the whole texture, it’s easy for me to find that because with this technique my tone is so pure it doesn’t fight with other instruments,” Jordan said of his inventive style.

Stanley Jordan also revealed they started on piano before getting “socio-economically downgraded” to guitar. The episode concludes with a discussion of how loud the “Big Bang” was with Grahame quipping perhaps it should be referred to as “The Bang” in the future.

Check out the seventh episode of Terrapin Crossroads’ Darkstarathon series below: