"There's nothing like a Grateful Dead concert"

Some people I meet - Americans excepted - assume from the name that The Grateful Dead were a heavy metal band. And, fed up as I am with seeing eyes glaze over when I start to effuse about the band, I'm going to put the record straight for perhaps a couple of readers here. Bear with!

A band called the Warlocks, basically a little-known blues/R 'n' B covers band in the Bay area of California, were told that there was already a band with that name, and while looking for a new name, discovered the following folk tale.

A traveller comes across a funeral where the villagers are refusing to bury the body because the deceased owed money when he died. The traveller decides to pay off the debt and the funeral goes ahead. Later the dead man appears to his benefactor announcing he is the grateful dead.

So from mid-1965 the band adopted this as their name - a full 3 years before Led Zep even formed setting the ball rolling towards heavy metal. Around this time the band started evolving anyway; they were frequently the soundtrack to the acid-laced parties organised by Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters (famously depicted in Tom Wolf's book The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test). (This was before LSD was made illegal in California in 1966.)

At the Acid Tests people were there to party and the music was almost incidental which meant that there was no necessity to play 3-minute songs all night; the band started to stretch out. They were familiar with the great jazz improvisers like John Coltrane and knew there were other places to go; the Acid Tests gave them the chance to experiment, .

Before long they were writing songs, performing in dance halls, and developing musically.  Management and record-making took second place to performing and, for the next 30 years they were essentially a live band, playing a total of 2,317 gigs to dancing, twirling, tripping fans, some of whom would follow the band for complete tours, becoming full-time Deadheads.

"They aren't the best at what they do - they're the only ones who do what they do" - Bill Graham

Why were they unique? With a repertoire of some 200+ songs, and multiple opportunities for jamming, no two gigs were ever the same. The band probably couldn't have kept to a set list if they tried. And, fortunately, nearly all the gigs were recorded - often multiple times because not only would there be a soundboard version but in the "taper's section" there would be a little forest of microphones in the air. There was a thriving postal trade in cassettes in the years before the recordings started appearing online.

Secondly, with the emphasis on playing it would not be unusual for a second set to have no breaks between songs. One tune would segue into another, with the transition jams sometimes as interesting as the mid-song jams. It helped having one if the most accomplished electric guitar players ever and also one of the most innovative bass players. And some phenomenally good songs.

Next time ...why I like the Dead. (Bet you can't wait!)