I first heard of the Grateful Dead a couple of years ago when I decided that there was no finer genre than psychedelic rock. Seeking out the trippy sounds of the Dead I raided my dad's CD collection for American Beauty and stuck it on the stereo expecting to be blown away by the mindblowing far-out psych rock nonsense. Then they played a load of snoozy country shit and I listened to some other band instead.
Of course, American Beauty is the Dead's finest studio album. Everyone knows this. Workingman's Dead might be a contender if about a quarter of it wasn't by-numbers rustic bullshit. In fact, all their '70s albums are good. Anthem Of the Sun, their second record, is an enjoyable one but a messy one (REAL PSYCH ROCK), and I'm not even going to attempt to spell the name of the one that came after that. There are some good albums, but none as good as American Beauty, a masterclass in songcraft that holds Box Of Rain, Sugar Magnolia, Ripple, Candyman, Truckin' and various other earth-shaking classics.
Herein lines the dichotomy of listening to the Grateful Dead's enormous body of work; there are two different bands and neither are perfect.
LIVE DEAD: The Grateful Dead in a live setting were a wondrous spectacle, jamming out their rootsy hippy rock for many hours at a time with seriously kickass instrumental dynamics, not least the fantastic playing of lead guitarist Jerry Garcia. At least, this was the case throughout their earlier career; in later years they had a tendency to turn even the most fantastic composition into dull, meandering crap. And believe me, they had a lot of fantastic compositions; their live arsenal of songs was always incredible. Unfortunately, a few years on the road and it turned out that everyone in the band was an absolutely fucking AWFUL singer, apart from Jerry himself, and even his voice was paper-thin. Seriously, sitting through a live vocal by Phil Lesh makes me want to tear my dick off and mail it to him in an explosives-filled envelope.
Best records: Europe '72, Fillmore West 1969 boxset, Grateful Dead (1971, partly studio), Live/Dead (1969), Reckoning (1981)
Note: On some "live albums" there are studio overdubs, especially of vocals. This is good, as you DO NOT want to hear the Dead sing in "harmony" (lol) most of the time.
STUDIO DEAD: People overlook what a wonderful group of songwriters the band were. Get together every Garcia/Hunter original, all the Weir/Barlow songs, the various other combos within the group, and that is a hell of a lot of FINE ASS jams. Not actual jams, though, because the Dead saw no point in trying to emulate their instrumental-crazy live show on record, instead crafting tight and accessible song-based things for the most part. In the late 1970s, however, tight and accessible started to mean DISCO and that is why every Dead record from Shakedown Street onwards are worthless pieces of shit.
Best Records: American Beauty (1970), Workingman's Dead (1970), Wake Of The Flood (1973), Grateful Dead From the Mars Hotel (1974), Anthem Of The Sun (1968)
Note: Blues For Allah can fuck off. If I wanted to listen to Steely Dan, I'd ram a breadknife through my head.
Basically you're best off with Europe '72, because it combines the epic rawk jamz of the Dead at their live peak with the countless wonderful songs of the Dead at their studio peak AND, because they overdubbed the vocals, they don't suck! Looky here; some Dead songs that kick ass;
Ripple (a beautiful track that makes me want to both laugh and cry)
Dark Star (the ultimate Dead jam)
Wharf Rat (more jamzxxxx)
Tennessee Jed (fun hicky BS, good harmonies!)
Sugaree (from Jerry's first solo record, great song)
Candyman (there's an even more kickass version on the expanded edition of American Beauty)
Stella Blue (intense jam)
Uncle John's Band (absolutely lovely and fantastic...just listen when the instruments all drop out)
in short the Grateful Dead are sikkkkkkkkk and better than you.
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