SAN FRANCISCO--SATURDAY'S 22nd annual presentation of the Bammies at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium didn't just bridge the north and south of California, it spanned generations.

Perennial performers Paul Kantner and Joan Baez were joined by a new generation of Los Angeles flash musicians, including Harvard-educated guitarist Tom Morello from Rage Against the Machine, Slayer's tattooed wild man Kerry King, and ska-punks 22 Jacks.

This was the second year the awards were expanded to include the whole state. While this watered down the local feel for some, the result was a varied mix of styles, backgrounds and ages.

The success of the merger was highlighted in the final jam, which last year was an abysmal affair led by Smashmouth's Steve Harwell and No Doubt's Gwen Stefani.

This time, people who could really play stepped forward and meshed, not moshed.

A former Grateful Dead crew led by Bob Weir and jam-mates Rob Wasserman on bass, Merl Saunders on keyboards and Dave Ellis on sax hooked up with the Long Beach Dub All-Stars, whose former leader, Bradley Nowell, died of a drug overdose.

They combined on the Dead's ``Scarlet Begonias,'' into Sublime's ``Doin' Time,'' a masterful, musical Golden Gate Bridge between lifestyles and generations that should have gone on longer.

Bonnie Raitt won the Arthur M. Sohcot award for public service, and in keeping with her ways, promised to give the award to the woman who has been perched in a tree for a year to save the redwoods, Julia ``Butterfly'' Hill. Always one to go above and beyond, Raitt said she would climb up the tree to give it to Hill.

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Last updated March 20, 1999

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