Grateful Dead Reader
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Overview
Arranged in chronological order, these pieces add up to nothing less than a full-scale history of the greatest tour band in the history of rock. From Tom Wolfe's account of the Dead's first performance as the Grateful Dead (at an Acid Test in 1965), to Ralph Gleason's 1967 interview with the 24-year-old Jerry Garcia, to Mary Eisenhart's obituary of the beloved leader of the band, these selections include not only outstanding writing on the band itself, but also superb pieces on music and pop culture generally. Fans will be fascinated by the poetry, fiction, drawings, and rare and revealing photographs featured in the book, as well as the anthology's many interviews and profiles, interpretations of lyrics, and concert and record reviews.Still, The Grateful Dead was more than a band--it was a cultural phenomenon. For three decades it remained on one unending tour, followed everywhere by a small army of nomadic fans. This phenomenon is both analyzed and celebrated here, in such pieces as Ed McClanahan's groundbreaking article in Playboy in 1972, fan-magazine editor Blair Jackson's 1990 essay on the seriousness of the drug situation at Dead concerts, and Steve Silberman's insightful essays on the music and its fans.
Synopsis
Arranged in chronological order, these pieces add up to nothing less than a full-scale history of the greatest tour band in the history of rock. From Tom Wolfe's account of the Dead's first performance as the Grateful Dead (at an Acid Test in 1965), to Ralph Gleason's 1967 interview with the 24-year-old Jerry Garcia, to Mary Eisenhart's obituary of the beloved leader of the band, these selections include not only outstanding writing on the band itself, but also superb pieces on music and pop culture generally. Fans will be fascinated by the poetry, fiction, drawings, and rare and revealing photographs featured in the book, as well as the anthology's many interviews and profiles, interpretations of lyrics, and concert and record reviews.
Still, The Grateful Dead was more than a band--it was a cultural phenomenon. For three decades it remained on one unending tour, followed everywhere by a small army of nomadic fans. This phenomenon is both analyzed and celebrated here, in such pieces as Ed McClanahan's groundbreaking article in Playboy in 1972, fan-magazine editor Blair Jackson's 1990 essay on the seriousness of the drug situation at Dead concerts, and Steve Silberman's insightful essays on the music and its fans.
Library Journal
Diehard Deadheads Dodd and Spaulding, a husband-and-wife editorial team, have compiled 41 short selections from the more than 4000 entries in The Grateful Dead and the Deadheads (Greenwood, 1997), the definitive Grateful Dead bibliography, gathered by Dodd and fellow collaborator Rob Weiner. With the exception of an excerpt from Tom Wolfe s landmark Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (1968), the editors favor more obscure extracts from fiction, interviews, record liner notes, poems, articles, and concert reviews. They divide the material into four sections, chronicling the band s Haight heyday (1967 75), the growth of the Deadhead legion (1976 86), commercial success (1987 94), and Jerry Garcia s death. Except for two revealing interviews with Garcia and lyricist Robert Hunter, the editors have resurrected Dead ephemera that adds little to the mounting Dead literature that already includes standards such as Robert Greenfield s Dark Star: An Oral Biography of Jerry Garcia (LJ 6/1/96) and Dead manager Rock Scully s Living with the Dead (LJ 12/95). Recommended for Deadheads only. Dave Szatmary, Univ. of Washington Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.