George Starostin's Reviews

 GRATEFUL DEAD

"Keep truckin', like the Doodah man"

General Rating: 2

Introduction

ALBUM REVIEWS:

Disclaimer: this page is not written by from the point of view of a Grateful Dead fanatic and is not generally intended for narrow-perspective Grateful Dead fanatics. If you are deeply offended by criticism, non-worshipping approach to your favourite artist, or opinions that do not match your own, do not read any further. If you are not, please consult the guidelines for sending your comments before doing so.

Introduction

This is gonna be one short introduction. If you want to see some profound and utterly true reflections on the band's essence, please go to Wilson & Alroy's page where they managed to squeeze into a couple of sentences the thing that I could probably rave upon for hours: basically, that the Grateful Dead were a superb professional band with very limited talents that carried on by just outliving everyone else. They're right, of course - it's really hard to get peculiarly moved by their studio output, that's nearly all decent and nearly all equally dismissable and mediocre. If anything, the Dead were the world's best and most stable mediocre band - and their mediocrity eventually helped them to break big and outlive all, or at least most of the competitors.
The only thing I should add is that the Dead have certainly carved themselves a niche of their own - a niche that's definitely unique and worth checking out, if you have at least a little bit of interest. They're not your average folk rock band, like an American analog of Fairport Convention; instead, their style could be defined as 'psychedelic roots-rock': what they usually go for on their albums (at least, their classic albums) is a reinterpretation of classic musical forms, such as country, folk and bluegrass according to Jerry Garcia's and others' trippy vision. Sometimes the results are deadly dull, sometimes they are entertaining, but most of the time they are at least interesting. I'm just saying this so that you wouldn't make the mistake of dismissing the Dead as just more of that 'drugged-out hippie crap', because the situation is much more complicated.
That said, there is one side of the Dead, and arguably their most important one, that I still know nothing of: their famous live reputation. I have none of their live albums (I'm looking for them), and have heard too little to make up an opinion about their famous spaced-out jams - this might yet affect their band rating, if, for instance, I discover that I like these jams (I doubt it, though). So what this page is trying to do is to cover some of their most important studio releases, which sound nothing like their live output. If you've come here in order to check out which of the innumerable Dick's Picks volumes you should buy first, go away. I'm not such a devoted Deadhead - you'd be well advised to visit one of the innumerable fan pages instead.
Lineup: Jerry 'Fuckin' Garcia on guitar, vocals and an occasional keyboard - the virtual leader of the band and the one whose death in the early Nineties finally ground the band to a halt; Phil Lesh - bass, vocals, an occasional guitar; Bob Weir - rhythm guitar, vocals. This Holy Trinity constituted the main songwriting motor of the band as well. Other members include Billy Kreutzmann and the world-famous Mickey Hart on drums (Mickey was added to the band only in 1968), and, for the first years, Ron McKernan (alias 'Pig Pen') on organ and harmonica. Ron certainly added a lot of style to their early records, and his death seriously affected the Dead sound - not necessarily for the worse, though. In 1972 the band added Donna Godchaux on vocals (mostly backup ones) and Keith Godchaux on keyboards, but dropped 'em later on, instead adding Brent Mydland on keyboards... man, I'm screwed. Go read a professional discography.

What do YOU think about the Grateful Dead? Mail your ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Colin Lazzaro-Smith <the_bus50@hotmail.com> (10.07.2000)

<WHDW@aol.com> (15.07.2000)

J. Scott Markowitz <Jeremy@Markowitz.com> (06.12.2000)

<Thought09@aol.com> (07.12.2000)

ALBUM REVIEWS
ANTHEM OF THE SUN

Year Of Release: 1968
Record rating = 6
Overall rating = 8

Throw on some points for potheads, but leave me out of this.
Best song: ALLIGATOR

The Dead's second album tipped them over the threshold in an instant - with a record like that behind their back, a devoted cult following was immediately guaranteed. Anthem Of The Sun, as far as I understand it, often draws comparisons with After Bathing At Baxter's, and I can justify the comparison - it's the second album I've heard that can definitely be enjoyed only while you're tripping. I suppose everything on here, at least, the studio side, has been definitely recorded while under the influence of pot or maybe something more serious - otherwise, romantically minded hippies wouldn't have too much of a ground to identify themselves with it. My personal "music reviewing paradigm", however, doesn't support pot smoking as one of its integral parts (even if I had reader comments provoking me to do you-know-what); so I just say no and try to review music from a standard point of view, which means that all you potheads might just skip this here review. Why don't you check out the Timothy Leary home page instead?
Anyway, Anthem Of The Sun (what a bloody pretentious name, too) is a 'double' experience: its first side consists of a bunch of sloppy studio jams, and the second side presents us with a sloppy live jam, recorded at the end of 1967 in some LA hole. Taken from a non-drug-influenced point of view, the studio side simply sucks - all of it. I can hardly distinguish 'That's It For The Other One' from 'New Potato Caboose', and that short bit at the end, the chaotic two-minute noisefest of 'Born Cross-Eyed', just violates every possible law of music, so I'm not amused. The most vicious thing to realize is that this is not even avantgarde - these guys just take what could be some potentially okayish melodies and jams and then brutally warp them through some hideous 'psychedelic' techniques of theirs, like randomly changing tempo, key, throwing in bits and pieces of riffs and solos that don't seem to belong anywhere, singing off-key and crowning it all with some very weak production. Sometimes it sounds as if they recorded one piece of the 'song' on one hand-held tape recorder, another one on another, and then spliced them together by playing these two at the same time and holding a third one ten feet away. Oh, and with all the tapes chewn, of course. I will admit that the main melody of 'That's It For The Other One' (in the first part, called 'Cryptical Envelopment') is a wee bit catchy and could have been worked into a pleasant, moving ballad, but they go ahead and bog it down with the usual cacophony instead. Pathetic. The liner notes actually say that for 'That's It', "overlays of several concert performances were mixed together to create a multi-dimensional song suite". Well, it ends up having so many dimensions that I feel like an astronaut thrown out in space without a spacesuit on...
Fortunately, the second side is much better, simply because it has 'Alligator' on it. Ooh, I like that one - at least, the main fast part when they really jam, not the ending part where they slow everything down and start playing random crap seguing into 'Caution' which sucks just as much as the rest of this stuff. 'Alligator' was the first officially released Dead jam, and while the recording is supposedly not up to the band's highest standards, it really showed the world what a masterful machine this band could be when they really locked themselves into a tight groove. They function ideally as a band - not just a collection of self-indulgent soloists, and the alchemy works. Mickey Hart's dexterous, swinging, paranoid drumming, "Pigpen"'s cute organ swirls, Garcia's frantic leads, all this entwined with wonderfully ridiculous kazoos, it really gets my blood flowing. I can't imagine any other American band at the time putting on a show like that. Okay, maybe Santana - but Santana weren't around yet. 'Alligator' really saves the record, dragging it up one or two points; unfortunately, as I said, the track then neatly segues into 'Caution (Do Not Stop On Tracks)' which bores you for two minutes with simplistic rhythms and then completely falls apart, degenerating into four minutes worth of feedback, scratching, hoarse grunts from instruments and silence. Also recorded live, but I wish I hadn't mentioned that...
All said, Anthem Of The Sun is still a key historical document of unbelievable significance - together with Baxter's, it is perhaps the best epitomy of 'psycho excesses' that San Francisco was so rich on those days. Calling this stuff "crap" in an open and uncompromised matter seems a bit of a stretch to me, as it would involve getting into the discussion about the ups and downs of hippie culture, the usefulness of acid substances, etc.; but certainly, the album has not dated well at all, and I'd be very surprised if I found out that it still finds its own particular fans after all these years. Me, I just don't buy into that aesthetics as a whole - and for the record, hippie philosophy and culture resulted in a lot of far more pleasant and truly enjoyable records than this one. Namely, give me Surrealistic Pillow or even Quicksilver Messenger Service over this c... er, sorry, over this outdated product any time of day. But if you're like me and you see this for ten cents lying somewhere in a used bin - give it a try. You need to hear it at least once to get a whiff of that culture. Hey, c'mon, it's not that bad. A whiff of hippie excess never really hurt anyone. And if you're particularly drawn to Live Dead performances, 'Alligator' might be a treat as well. Sure is for me.

That's it for the other one, now lemme hear your ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Fredrik Tydal <f_tydal@hotmail.com> (04.10.2000)

AOXOMOXOA

Year Of Release: 1969
Record rating = 6
Overall rating = 8

God, these guys really needed someone to teach them how to write good songs...
Best song: DOIN' THAT RAG

Every critic alive gracefully smiles at this record, dismissing it with the statement 'this is yet another attempt to put that famous live Dead sound on record', but I tell ya: either no critics really listened to this record, or, well, the live Dead pretty much sucked around 1969. The record isn't horrendous at all, nope, parts of it are even enjoyable (other parts are dreadful, though). But there's not a single trace of an instrumental jam on this record, the thing that the Dead were most famous for, after all, and some songs do not differ very much in mood from the assumingly 'classic' American Beauty. The funny thing is that, while all the band members are really good at their instruments, especially Jerry Garcia on guitar and Tom Constanten on keyboards, they almost never really know what to do with them. True, this time around the band had obviously decided to try their hand at something more 'conventional', drawing on all kinds of rootsy and folkish inspirations to help them in the process, but they were still too stoned to make anything decent. Indeed, I've rarely seen such a sloppy, uninspired, draggy bunch of songs all collected together on one record. The basic impression is that most of them are based on some rudimentary folk melody or other, which the band members effectively try to profanate by diluting it with rather bland instrumentation and a loose, almost 'stoned' style of playing. Even worse, some tracks are offensively spoiled by dated gimmicks, like electronic voice encoding ('Rosemary').
But never mind the spicing up: it's the heart of the tree that's rotten. When you finally take as much listens as you need to get to the musical essence of the songs, you'll see that it's usually plain banal. The opening tune, 'St Stephen', for instance, is built on a perfectly simple fast folk melody - it's just that the song is so stoned out that you don't notice it for a while. The ballads are totally uninspired and uninspiring, and no matter how convincingly Lesh or Garcia try to pull them off, it just doesn't work for me: I'm not aware of who actually gets the lead vocals on 'Mountains Of The Moon', but it doesn't matter - the song is plain dull, and the pretty harpsichord does nothing to save it in the long run. As for 'Rosemary', it's all plain atmosphere: slow, noodling acoustic guitar with those dreadful encoded vocals, thankfully lasting not more than two minutes.
The good news here is a couple of spooky country-western send-ups, complete with Robert Hunter lyrics that deal with the usual country-western topics (personal problems with the juridicial branch of power in 'Dupree's Diamond Blues', personal problems with maturing in 'Doin' That Rag'), but dress them up in pretentious and not very entertaining imagery. However, nobody listens to the Dead for the lyrics: I'm able to enjoy the former song because it has the closest thing to a solid melody on the album (one has only to close one's eyes to the fact that it's a generic country-western pattern), and able to enjoy the latter one because the chorus features a fast, nice, inviting, and at the same time somewhat ominous riff (Garcia's trademark style, eh? or is it Bob Weir? I'm not sure of their separate functions on the albums) that nicely intertwines with the organs. I'd say that the song presages the very similar (in mood, not in melody) 'Friend Of The Devil' on Beauty, but of course, this one is overlong and overall, still boring, at least when it comes to the regular verses.
Apart from these two acceptable numbers and some tasteful slide work on 'Cosmic Charlie' that more or less works as the album closer (it could have been shorter by a couple of minutes too, though), however, there's no real good news about the record. 'China Cat Sunflower', the best known song off the album, is plain stupid - a typical example of how crazy and pointless hippie music could be when it wanted to. Some say that it was a great live number, but I can't judge by the version on here. It's completely chaotic, with several guitars going in completely different directions and a complicated drum pattern that goes in a third one, while the 'nah-nah-nah' hippie backing vocals try to simulate a 'nice' vibe throughout. And, of course, the truly low point of the album, for which I refuse to even give it an overall rating of nine (these guys need to be punished), is a horrendous, eight-and-a-half minute long mantra ('What's Become Of The Baby?') that has no instrumental playing at all - just a lot of echoey, almost dissonant chanting that makes your ears burst and your patience explode. Whereas the liner notes call the song 'eerie', I just say that the 'song' is ridiculously bad and could have been recorded by just anybody. Typical hippie excess, you'll say? Well, might as well be - but that's just yet another sign of the record having dated badly.
Whatever. I mean, the main problem is very easy to see - the band's members were (still are, I guess, at least, the ones that are still alive) very unskilful songwriters. And what happens when a very unskilful (but very stoned) songwriter takes a handful of moderately decent folk/country melodies and performs them as if he were playing a Jefferson Airplane song? You're right - shit happens. Later on (actually, on the next album) they'd correct this mistake, outgrow this transitional phase and throw the 'psychedelic' elements out of their folkish rip-offs, but that would be later on. For the moment, forget about buying this album. Isn't it strange that a band that's always quoted as one of the main psychedelic ensembles and hippie gurus of the Sixties didn't really hit its stride until the Seventies? Well - like I said, shit happens...

Doin' that rag, don't forget to mail your ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Fredrik Tydal <f_tydal@hotmail.com> (02.08.2000)

Doug and Betsy Wheeler <dwheeler8@uswest.net> (07.10.2000)

WORKINGMAN'S DEAD

Year Of Release: 1970
Record rating = 9
Overall rating = 11

Hey, whoever said we're tripping, man? Look at us! We're doing country!
Best song: DIRE WOLF

A radical and completely unexpected change in style - once and for all, the Dead suddenly cut short all the attempts to annihilate the differences between their live and studio sound and go off pursuing a more laid-back, mainstreamish country-rock direction. General musical philosophy usually ascribes this change of the Dead's musical philosophy to the passing of an era: the Altamont Massacre (which, by the way, was an event that had a deep impact on the band indeed - 'New Speedway Boogie' is sometimes said to be dedicated to the event) and the fade-away of the hippie ideology made them leave all their psycho jams for the live shows and concentrate on more concise, rational work in the studio.
That said, Workingman's Dead certainly doesn't deserve the 'classic' status so readily appended on it by most musical critics. It's a fairly good and enjoyable record, for sure, but by all objective means, there ain't that much special about it. The eight tracks on here more or less exploit the same two or three vibes (slow rambling acoustic country shuffle; mid-tempo mellow acoustic country boogie; mid- or fast-tempo soft electric country rocker), and the melodies aren't all that outstanding, either. And still, after repeated listens, I find myself liking this stuff much more than I really should, even considering my general subjective musical tastes which certainly aren't all that tolerant towards this kind of music.
In the end, I suppose this is due not to some kind of hidden magic (actually, I never believe in 'hidden magic' - leave that crap for Trout Mask Replica lovers), but rather to a number of small details, each of which is not too significant on its own, but taken altogether they make the record really work. There's Garcia's soulful, gentle, emotional voice that's very inviting. There's the lyrics, more often interesting and intriguing than not (by the way, the absolute majority of songs on here were penned by the Garcia-Hunter team). There's the fact that the melodies, while not being exceedingly catchy, are almost always a wee bit untrivial - it looks like the Dead were taking generic patterns and always taking care to make a few twists here and there so that they wouldn't turn out generic in the end, thus not only making the album sound more surprising, but also more personal. There's the sparse, economic instrumentation which always allows the listener to concentrate on one or two instruments (very well placed in the mix) and enjoy the fullness of their sound instead of just having to swallow the whole 'package' like some tasteless medicine. And finally, there's the playing, particularly Jerry's tasteful slide work.
I mean, sure, one could always object and say that Garcia's voice can get monotonous, the lyrics don't mean a lot, the melodies are unmemorable, the sparse instrumentation isn't varying all that much, and there were tons of more professional musicians whose slide work was far more tasteful than Garcia's. But like I said, it's the combination of all this that matters; simply put, this is one of the most carefully crafted roots rock records that I've ever heard, and the most amazing thing is, even with all that immaculate craftsmanship, it still does not sound slick and lifeless, like some generic sterile country recording.
Well, I suppose I just put all that lengthy analysis because I couldn't say all that much about the actual songs, could I? More or less so. Okay, first of all, despite all the praise, I could still easily live without the two slow acoustic shuffles, each on one side ('High Time' and 'Black Peter', two excellent cures for insomnia, although nowhere near as appalling as 'Attics Of My Life' on the next record). I'm also not terribly impressed by the album opener, 'Uncle John's Band', even it does have a nice, intimate vibe about it and went on to become one of the band's stage favourites.
But the rest is good. The faster songs boogie along and make you tap your foot and revel in their subtle malevolence, particularly 'New Speedway Boogie' which is quite malevolent indeed; and the guitar interplay on 'Cumberland Blues' really gets me going as well. 'Easy Wind' overdoes the chaotic jamming section at the end a bit, but at least it's not that chaotic jamming that we usually associate with the Dead; otherwise, it's another good mid-tempo rocker. But the real highlights of the album are, without a doubt, 'Dire Wolf' and 'Casey Jones'. 'Dire Wolf', in fact, gives me the creeps - it's structured as a pleasant, laid-back soft country rocker with homely slide guitar homely sliding in the background, but the chorus? 'Don't murder me, I beg you, you don't murder me, please don't murder me', sung in Garcia's nicest tone ever. Woof, pretty scary, and a worthy predecessor to the even more grappling 'Friend Of The Devil' on American Beauty. And 'Casey Jones'? It tells the story of an engineer who's driving a train "under intoxication" and gets into a lethal accident, but that would be hard to guess from the playful, 'lightweight' melody (the catchiest refrain on the album, for sure). Imagine that.
Of course, their next album would seriously build on this foundation, with the Dead somewhat expanding their territory and drawing on more styles and moods, so anybody looking for this band's "studio wonders" should first look up American Beauty. But no fans of American Beauty will ever be disappointed in Workingman's Dead, that's for sure.

High time to mail your ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Fredrik Tydal <f_tydal@hotmail.com> (10.10.2000)

Glenn Wiener <Glenn.Wiener@Entex.com> (10.10.2000)

AMERICAN BEAUTY

Year Of Release: 1970
Record rating = 10
Overall rating = 12

'Roots rock' that's probably s'pposed to act upon your deepest senses, 'cause I can't rationally explain its appeal!!
Best song: FRIEND OF THE DEVIL

Indeed. What an appropriate title for a record that takes some of the eldest, bearded, most respectable American musical styles, strips them bare of everything that witty rock musicians have invented in the past two or three years and presents in their 'naked beauty'. On first listen, I hated this album. 'I can't believe it!' I was saying to myself. 'They call it a classic? This dead-ly bore with not a single original or memorable melody in sight?' But of course, this turned out to be one of those cunning records that are not melody-oriented at all, or at least, not hook-oriented...
Like Workingman's Dead, this record presents the Grateful Dead as a folk/country band, with no traces of a spaced-out jam anywhere in sight; unlike Workingman's Dead, though, the album is somewhat more diverse and the songs are somewhat more edgy, which is why most fans of the two records prefer the second one over the first one. There's just about, like, totally nothing revolutionary or revelatory about this album - all of this stuff was already done by the Byrds (whose output many of the numbers painfully recall, especially the more 'harmonized' ones) and other, less significant folk-rock bands before. However, once you take a somewhat deeper insight (and take a couple more listens, which also won't hurt), you'll discover that this style has little in common with the Byrds, harmonies excepted. In fact, the 'harmonized' numbers are eventually the worst on record - like the dreadful 'Attics Of My Life', a super-slow, lethargic lullaby that'll put a zombie back in the ground in a second's time. Of course, it's probably a fan favourite, but I've already offended so many fans' favourites on this site that one more will have little effect on the death sentence already carried out... But hey, my commentators tend to agree with me on that one, so at least I don't feel alone and deserted.
The biggest difference is, of course, that the Dead use their typical guitar sound that bears no resemblance to McGuinn's patented '12-string jangle'. Jerry Garcia and Bob Weir use their instruments with mastership - and, in this case, quite economically. Tasteful guitar licks abound - like the riff that holds together the pretty, fast-paced folkish ditty 'Sugar Magnolia', or the R'n'B elements on 'Truckin'. The production is also much more 'thin' than the Byrds' one, and the material is thus somewhat more 'accessible' - sometimes it sounds like the band are just having a groovy time in your living-room. And, of course, harmonies or no harmonies, the boys always do a great singing job each on his own (I'm just not a fan of singing in unison!).
Now the material here is really uneven, which is still my main complaint. Yet this is also an advantage - see, while the style of this record was never invented by the members of the Dead themselves, the actual melodies on here are hardly ripped-off: I hear plenty of ideas that I'd never heard before. I mean, I can often accuse Dylan of stealing folk melodies and passing them for his own, but I really couldn't say the same about the Dead. These songs, in contrast to the general marking 'traditional, arranged by so-and-so', should all be tagged: 'traditionally arranged, by the Grateful Dead' (now do you see the improtance of commas?).
So yeah, there are some hit and miss moments on the album, but that's gotta be forgiven. Like I said, 'Attics Of My Life' is a horrendous song, and I'll probably never change my opinion about that one. 'I-i-i-i-i-n the a-a-a-a-a-a-a-ttics o-o-o-o-o-f my-y-y-y-y-y li-i-i-i-i-i-ife...', boy, I feel this coma coming on again. Let's change subject and speak of Garcia's 'Friend Of The Devil', the song I like the most on here because it's probably your best bet for a heart-wrenching pessimistic ballad on the album, you know, of the type 'got-that-hound-on-my-trail-gotta-run-afore-it's-too-late' kinda stuff. It's got some great countryish guitar, too, but my main compliments are directed at the singing and lyrics. Out of the sad, whiny numbers there's also the opening 'Box Of Rain', a great multi-guitar song where, for once, the harmonies sound really really good. The message is a little unclear, although, but I don't mind.
Out of the fast numbers you're probably sure to know 'Truckin', with its great instrumentation and telling lyrics about the band's touring schedule and their, well, disappointment in True Love (a subject common in 1970, but to hear lines like 'Most of the cats you meet on the street speak of True Love/Most of the time they're sitting and crying at home' in a Grateful Dead is a little like hearing Richard Nixon advising American kids to drop out). 'What a long strange trip it's been' indeed. It also strikes you as pretty upbeat and even 'raving' as compared to the quiet atmosphere of the album - and the vocal melody style is definitely ripped-off of Chuck Berry's numbers such as 'No Particular Place To Go', with just a wee bit of speeding up. But I guess that's a conscious rip-off: after all, it was only natural for the band to end this 'roots tribute' with a Fifties' boogie sendup.
But if that's all you know from this record, don't you miss the already mentioned 'Sugar Magnolia' with that cool guitar riff, nor 'Operator', a sly slide-driven number with particularly 'attractive' (yeah, right) vocals by Pigpen, the harmonica player. Finally, I've even overcome myself to appreciate 'Candyman', a number that recalls Bob Dylan circa 1962: a lengthy, drooning folk number that nevertheless sounds inviting and very disposing - where 'Attics Of My Life' just invites you to lean on your pillow, 'Candyman' really invites you to lightly tap your foot and rock to and fro in harmony with the melody.
So, as you see, apart from the wretched 'Attics' and a couple of other minor misfires, I pretty much manage to dig this record. I almost find this strange, because I never really usually dig 'hardcore Americano' records (hell, I even expressed my displeasure towards Willy And The Poorboys), and yet, this album is likable for me, even if I can't name any original ideas on here. I guess I ought to put the blame on the band's high-heeled professionalism and, well, taste: sure, I know that accusing the Dead of having taste is pretty much an oxymoron, but what can one do if one is put in front of inescapable facts? Go buy this record and put it next to the American flag if you keep one in your house. Well, I don't suppose it's called American Beauty for nothing - here's a title that matches an album's content as perfectly as it ever gets.

Operator, connect me with my readers' ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Glenn Wiener <Glenn.Wiener@Entex.com> (31.08.99)

Mike DeFabio <defab4@earthlink.net> (06.11.99)

Fredrik Tydal <f_tydal@hotmail.com> (10.02.2000)

Doug and Betsy Wheeler <dwheeler8@uswest.net> (07.10.2000)

WAKE OF THE FLOOD

Year Of Release: 1973
Record rating = 8
Overall rating = 10

A very sleepy country-pop record, but you have to wait some time before its hypnotic charm gets into you.
Best song: EYES OF THE WORLD

'Pig Pen' was dead and gone by the time the Dead finally got around to recording this album, their first new studio release in three years. It hardly makes any serious difference, though: the record is a rather predictable successor to American Beauty, but a thoroughly inferior one. I admit that not too many rock'n'roll lovers will be able to get into it, and I myself hated it first two or three times around. There are seven lengthy sleep-fests on the record, all complete with hypnotizing female background voices (courtesy of new band member Donna Godchaux), soft, lethargic guitars and soothing, paralyzing sax and organ solos. The songs rarely even venture into mid-tempo - most of them are slow as hell, and this will send many a desperate rocker cursin' and sneerin' in search of some contemporary Stones or even some contemporary New York Dolls. The melodies are uninspiring, bogged-down rehashings of some old country songs, with next to no hooks or just anything to cling unto and scream, 'hey, that's at least entertaining!'
But eventually the record proves itself worthy - there's a certain hidden charm about most of these songs which you just don't notice at first. It's certainly due to the Dead's exclusive playing - there's no virtuosity here, but the instrumentation is tasteful, full and professional, and at least they know exactly what they're doing, unlike so many imitators. Once again, they go off in search of the 'American spirit' - but this time, with a little more pretention (that's the bad side) and a little more sensitivity (that's the good one). The important thing is that these numbers are not as generic as the tunes on Beauty - while on the latter the Dead were just proving themselves worthy imitators of the traditional folkie/country style, on Flood they certainly add a lot of their own ideas and spirit. So the arrangements are less stripped down - on most of the songs, there are at least several guitar parties, accompanied by moody keyboards and decent vocal harmonizing; and yet, there is no orchestration that would probably make all this seem as banal as possible.
The problem, of course, is whether you'll be able to stay awake while listening to this stuff. But if you do, don't miss such interesting mini-gems as the gentle pop anthem 'Eyes Of The World', with its Beach Boys-ey spirit married to a folkish vibe; it might not be the definite highlight on the album, but I still counted it as the best song because it's the most upbeat one - a jovial pop tune that almost seems to invite you to wake up after the previous lethargic numbers. I also quite enjoy 'Here Comes Sunshine', a groovy Beatlesque tune whose refrain is ripped off... nah, not from 'Here Comes The Sun', as you might have thought, but off of 'Sun King' - there's one amusing delusion for ya! And the jolly 'Let Me Sing Your Blues Away', with its boppy, catchy structure and mellow saxophone lines all over the place, will really do just what the title suggests.
Then there's the presumably deadly dull seven-minute crucifixion of the listener on 'Row Jimmy Row', a tune that's equally despisable and mesmerizing - just go ahead and tell me that the repetitive chorus 'I say row Jimmy row/Gonna get there I don't know' isn't brilliant! It is, and for those who are able to get into the mood the song will be a real treat - a soothing, embalming anthem about nothing (who knows what the hell these lyrics mean) that nevertheless really gives the impression of steady, slow rowing down the stream on a quiet, early evening. Man, these Dead really could create a suitable mood - let's score 'em one for the fact.
The two other 'short' songs don't thrill me as much, but are still moody as hell: the country waltz 'Mississipi Half-Step Uptown Toodeloo' has some sharp fiddle/guitar interplay and really tearful vocals. It's certainly the most 'generic' country excourse on the record, but that's also what makes it somewhat incompatible with the other tracks... on the other hand, maybe it's a plus. Whatever. I told you. You might love it the most, I dunno. It's nice. 'Stella Blue', on the other hand, is reminiscent of a lame imitation of a bad George Harrison solo song: it's pure atmosphere, and the vocals are nowhere near as impressive or sincere as George's. It's also the one song that's guaranteed to put you off to sleep even if you've just come out of a twelve-year coma. The guitars sound exactly like they've been taken off a lullaby, and the background vocals add to the nursery atmosphere. Ooh... my jaw is dropping already... sorry.
What really annoys me, though, and I ditched 'em a whole point for that, is the 'Weather Report Suite' that ends the album - twelve minutes of generic boredom. It's deemed to be some sort of 'times of year cycle' for the Dead, but Jerry Garcia is no Vivaldi, and the composition just drags on and on with no hints at a melody. Strange enough, it's also the least atmospheric song on record - maybe you just get so used to the sound that you don't appreciate yet another effort at the end, but... aarrgh, I friggin' hate that song. It has no jovial optimism of 'Eyes Of The World', no heartfelt romanticism of 'Here Comes Sunshine', no funny folkie feel of 'Toodeloo', and no successful imagery of 'Row Jimmy Row'. Not to mention that one of the parts is entitled 'Let It Grow' which was also the title of a contemporary Eric Clapton ballad that beats to hell every song on this album. It's just nothing - like some of the mid-Seventies Jethro Tull stuff. They play and play and play and there's just no sense to it.
Yet, if you switch your CD off before Garcia hits his first acoustic notes, the album is a perfect example of the mellowest side of the Dead: moody, atmospheric, professional and tasteful. Like I said, it just takes some (maybe a lot of) time to get used to this stuff, seeing as there's not even a single true rocker in sight.

Let me sing your blues away by posting your ideas

FROM THE MARS HOTEL

Year Of Release: 1974
Record rating = 7
Overall rating = 9

Most of these tunes are just your average pedestrian folk rock - who needs 'em?
Best song: U. S. BLUES

Well, it's not as bad as I originally envisaged it - but still, definitely not a stellar moment for the GD. The seemingly good news would be that this album is not as spaced out or lethargic as Wake Of The Flood; it has its share of more or less fast and upbeat numbers, like 'U. S. Blues' or 'Loose Lucy'. In fact, to some extent it is a conscious return to the stylistics of American Beauty: decently played self-penned roots-rock with a bit of intelligence and somewhat obscure lyrics to make things seem more exciting. However, good news turns out to be bad news at a closer look. The preceding album, not to mention Beauty, had a lot of personality going for it; this one has none at all. Sure, you can tell it's the Dead because of Garcia's voice, but apart from that, nothing interesting or idiosyncratic ever happens on here. For the most part, they stick to a routine, uninteresting folk-rock, hell, even folk-pop sound that's about as attention-attractive as a fly on the wall. No matter how much you listen to this swampy muck, it just refuses to stick in your head, and what's worse, you've already heard it all before in a better variant. A few bleak hooks do jump out at you on the n-th listen, but is it really worth the wait? Only about two or three of the eight tracks are at least somewhat emotionally resonant, and only about one or two of them make you wanna tap your feet. But there's no moody lethargic atmospherics either - just a bunch of... of... of songs. Yeah. These are songs. Songs, nothing more. Never an "experience".
That said, I was still a bit too harsh on these songs in my original review, because almost none of the material is offensive and with a little bit of concentration, you might at least moderately enjoy the songs while they're actually playing. Garcia still sticks with his usual soulful schtick, but this time around it just refuses to work properly - 'Ship Of Fools' is an updated version of 'Row Jimmy', but without the harmonies and the dreamy guitars that made it such a perfect lullaby. The guitar solo is good, though, and the classic 'melancholic blooze' is still in place if that's what you're looking for. He also gets in another ultra-slow, mantra-like ballad ('China Doll') that's guaranteed to cure an elephant of insomnia - it has something like two verses over the course of four minutes (yay, brother!) But then again, half of the Dead songs are perfect anthems to Morphaeus, aren't they? It's cool to fall asleep to the sounds of 'China Doll'.
Out of Jerry's three faster numbers, only one is somewhat noteworthy, the America-bashing 'U. S. Blues'. Could have been a hit in the anti-Vietnam era, but came out somewhat late - what a pity, because the song is worthy, it's fast, it's got a somewhat unusual melody for a generic blues and it's got the only decent set of lyrics on the entire record. The other two, however, are nothing but pleasant throwaways: 'Loose Lucy' is a (probably) misogynistic shuffle that's about as original or convincing as a Monkees' blues cover, and 'Scarlet Begonias' is utterly dull with its folkish groove that goes absolutely nowhere. There's just not an ounce of tension in these songs, and tension is essential for a folk-rocker if you're going to attract somebody but the most devoted. Maybe it's just the production that sucks so much - everything sounds so polished and slick, with not a note sticking out, almost as if they were taking lessons from the Carpenters in the production department. All of these songs therefore fall into the "ungrateful dead" category.
That's not all, though - Lesh makes two more contributions, and they're even worse, with not an ounce of memorability: one is a murky, melodyless toss-off with idiotic lyrics and again a jaw-dropping arrangement the most prominent part of which is sci-fi synth noises suddenly popping out of nowhere in the least expected places ('Unbroken Chain'), and the other is a generic country excourse with a nice, but totally predictable slide guitar part as the only redeeming factor ('Pride Of Cucamonga'). Again, hardly offensive, but never ever deviating from the standard "manual formula" of roots-rock.
Finally, Bob Weir gets in 'Money Money': the loudest song on the album, it's also the most atrocious - the repetitive chorus that consists of one phrase 'she wants money' can't help getting on my nerves all the time (and no, they didn't rip off ABBA's song because it hadn't yet been written at this point). Good Lord, it seems that all the band members have conjured to write as many forgettable songs as possible, each member trying to outdo the others. To be serious, though, they probably just wanted another American Beauty, deciding that the previous album was way too slow and pretentious. What they forgot to do was to come up with decent lyrics: most of the time I don't get even the slightest idea of what they're talking about, because Hunter goes for spontaneous, meaningless imagery that does nothing for nobody. Just as well, they forgot to come up with decent melodies: no interesting riffs, no tuneful acoustic numbers, no fascinating guitar interplay. Aw shucks, I'm repeating myself - why waste web space on such an insignificant album? It's not the Dead's weakest album, of course - they have certainly offended our ears to a far more hurting effect on some of their other albums; but out of the ones I heard, it turns out to be the most undistinctive. Come on, these songs could have been written by just about any American (or British, for that matter) band at the time.

Pride of Cucamonga, mail your ideas

Your worthy ideas:

<CliffinNY@aol.com> (28.10.2000)

BLUES FOR ALLAH

Year Of Release: 1975
Record rating = 8
Overall rating = 10

An essential Dead-style album with some soft-rock gems on here.
Best song: FRANKLIN'S TOWER

For the first time in six years, well, for the first time since Anthem Of The Sun, to be precise, the band has finally gotten its act together and gone into the studio to record something, well, more Dead-like. Yeah, the country-rock stylizations are still there, but this time, they're stylizations and that's that: loyal psycho Deadheads who'd probably already given up on the band's studio work, should have been pleased. Like everybody who's not too well used to their 'normal' sound, I hated the album at first: the sound was thoroughly reminiscent of the album cover, it was indeed like a white-haired skull fiddling its diddle for fourty damn minutes. But this is the kind of record that's able, at least partially, to grow upon you - because, unlike From The Mars Hotel that didn't feature even a single creative idea, there are some pretty and clever melodies here, and there's an atmosphere. An atmosphere totally different from Wake Of The Flood with its lethargic mood, but equally different from the earlier aimless chaos of Anthem. They're still going with their soft, 'lightweight' vibe, but this time it's a little bit more boppy and a trifle more fast - like your friendly soft rock band that doesn't want to spend its energy on roaring and tearing but instead spends it on making enjoyable, user-friendly background music with enough professionalism and taste to make it worth the while. Some of the parts are even jazzy, especially the jams on 'Slip Knot' and the instrumental suite 'King Solomon's Marbles', and even if they are in no way memorable, they're tolerable. Yup. Not that there's a ton of good songs, mind you. 'Franklin's Tower' is considered a Dead classic, and it is: some more whiny vocals from Garcia, the repetitive, but charming chorus 'Roll Away The Dew' and that wonderful bopping rhythm playing are enough to make it my favourite on here. Apart from that, however, the melodies are not exceedingly strong.
Apart from 'Tower', I enjoy the living hell out of 'Help On The Way', the pretentious, mystical album opener with some of the most incomprehensible lyrics Hunter ever wrote, but shucks, nobody listens to the Dead for their lyrics that are worthless anyway. I know I'm gonna get it from the Deadheads but I know what I'm talking about and I'm not afraid. On the other hand, the guitar workout there is beautiful, with these little gritty 'bursts' coming out of Jerry's guitar now and then. And then there's the little instrumental 'Sage & Spirit' with some cool flutework. Bob Weir's 'The Music Never Stopped', though, is a letdown, with its unsuccessful soul groove and Donna Godchaux's generic backing vocals completely ruining the song, but what the hell...
The most complex thing here, of course, and the real centerpiece, is the closing symphony - the title track and its 'derivative' parts. This is probably the most 'Dead' of the tracks on here, the quintessence of the band in audible form. Normal people should probably avoid these kinds of things, but I made a serious effort to 'get it' and I think I 'got it', at least partially. Out of the song's three parts, a conventional listener (alias Undeadhead) could probably enjoy only the third one, the little 'romantic mantra' where the band keeps chanting 'under eternity, under eternity', just because it's so really really pretty, with the cool harmonies and Donna adding more generic but, let's face it, very professional backing vocals. Of course, even this possibility is limited, because a mantra's got to do what a mantra's gotta do - that is, be as repetitive as can be, and this one is quite repetitive.
The big problem is with the first two parts. The title track itself is a gloomy chant with lyrics trying to feature Islamic motives (but failing to do so properly) that almost reminds me of 'What's Become Of The Baby' from Aoxomoxoa: a couple musical phrases repeated endlessly over the band's melancholical reciting. And later on, the song degenerates into a messy, rhythm-less psycho jam ('Sand Castles & Glass Camels') that sounds like it was recorded in Hell. The weirdest thing, though, is that when I got around to the third listen, I was hooked - I don't know what people are supposed to feel when they're listening to stuff like this, but I personally felt like I was stoned although I wasn't. This is sooooo damn trippy and atmospheric that it's possible to listen to. Gee, maybe I'm slowly becoming a Deadhead? Well, at least my skin is still firmly in place and I don't look like that dermally challenged dude on the front cover.
Oh, I just forgot to mention that the album's entirely written by Garcia and Hunter, except for Weir's 'Music Never Stopped', and it shows who was the real psycho leader in the band for all those years. I don't really know why I gave it such a high rating, but I guess the sentence had better be re-stated as 'I don't really know why I feel like recommending this record'. Apparently Jerry and the Deadmakers really had some inner magic of their own that attracts me and others to this stuff. What do you think, anyway? And by the way, this was the Dead's last 'epochal' studio record - and by 'epochal' I mean 'of any truly serious historic and artistic value'. I may be wrong, of course, but then again, I may be right! Did that idea ever occur to anybody?

Help on the way, but only in the form of your ideas

TERRAPIN STATION

Year Of Release: 1977
Record rating = 7
Overall rating = 9

A strange album - half-folk, half-progressive. Seems like the band was really lost for words - in the direct sense.
Best song: TERRAPIN STATION

This album marked the Dead' shift to Arista Records (the label that seemed to specialize on 'dinosaurs' at the time, by the way: around the same time they got the Kinks, the Allman Brothers Band and God knows who else. Unfortunately, they didn't think to buy them all at an earlier stage), and the period which is often dismissed even by fans as 'sold-out'. May well be, but then again, Terrapin Station does get quite a lot of respect, considered by some as the last great Dead album, and certainly the last great Dead album before their 'comeback' in the late Eighties.
Well, it ain't bad, that's for sure. But great? Man, weird times we're living in... Anyway, unlike most other Dead records, this one's clearly divided in two. The second side is dominated entirely by the lengthy sixteen-minute title track - the 'Terrapin Station Suite', most parts of which are credited to the trusty Garcia - Hunter couple. The first side, however, is the realm of other members of the band - Lesh, Weir, even Donna Godchaux, and there's an obvious difference in quality. After all, like it or not, but Garcia was the best songwriter in the band, and certainly the one who made the Grateful Dead what they were - the Grateful Dead! On the other hand, even Garcia was not God, and especially in the songwriting department. This here suite in particular can really get a tad lengthy and boring. But let us deal with it in due time, okay?
So, like I said, the first side is all given up to satisfy the ridiculous ambitions of Garcia's bandmates. There are five songs here, and only about two of them are worthy enough to be noticed. The opening track, Weir's 'Estimated Prophet', is a strange pretentious shuffle with reggae influences and a pathetic vocal spilling out sets of very important-sounding but nevertheless meaningless phrases, and even so, it would have been a total throwaway if not for the tasty bits of wah-wah guitar that give the song a strange, ominous echo. And Phil Lesh's country-rocker 'Passenger', while it would not even make a decent contribution to a Free record, is still the most energetic song on here, so if you wanna dance, go out and dance. But no 'Dancing In The Streets', no sir! The cover of that famous Martha & The Vandellas song blows, blows and blows again - dozens of acts did it better. 'Dying In The Streets' would be a better title, as everything in the song, including Donna Godchaux's vocals, sounds so muffled, quiet and passionless that one really begins to admire the Dead's talent for ruining good songs. Furthermore, their version of 'Samson & Delilah', a traditional folkie song based on you-know-what if you ever read the Bible, drags in an even more explicit way: for really good, careful and tasteful renditions of folk numbers please see your Fairport Convention. Hell, please see your Bob Dylan - he'll at least whine and gruff, not just mumble the lyrics in a toneless voice as is done by Weir (Is it really Weir who sings that? I'm not sure). Of course, though, the biggest offender is Donna's 'Sunrise'. Don't condemn me if it's not her song, I don't know the credits, but if it is, I have nothing but pity for poor Donna. Who wants to be a third-rate Aretha Franklin imitator? Her vocals are nice, but absolutely not special, and she has nothing, simply nothing to de-banalize the sappy orchestration or make the idiotic lyrics seem meaningful. Perhaps she just had better to stick to backup vocals after all.
And finally, we are left with 'Terrapin Station Part 1' (yes, that's the full name of the song; I wonder where has 'Part 2' gone to?) This is probably Garcia's magnum opus with the band, and, truthfully, it deserves the status of a classic, even if I'm not in love with it. It's divided into several parts, not all of which are orchestrated. Strangely, it's the mellower parts (you know, these typical Garcia-style whiny countryish shuffles) that usually go unaccompanied by strings; these appear later on, when the 'mellower' parts are replaced by little grumbling distorted riffs. So the overall feel is very funny - it's like you get orchestrated hard rock. Of course, the Dead never wrote true hard rock, but whatever be, this is probably the closest thing you'll ever find to a 'symph-hard-rock' piece.
Needless to say, the suite never varies enough to hold your interest for too long, despite a couple of moments being downright beautiful (the 'some rise, some fall' line, etc.), and a couple being weirdly Pink Floyd-ish - huh? Yeah, you heard right, but I'll let you figure these moments out for yourself. And, of course, the lyrics don't make even an ounce of sense, but that's okay. You just have to put up with the concept of a 'terrapin station', and besides, aren't the terrapins on the front cover downright lovely? Fat, green and dancing. I love terrapins! I like this album. Yeah, it's dumb as a daffodil, but all Grateful Dead albums are. At least, this one ain't nasty, and it ain't too generic. I could have even given it an 8, if that 'Sunrise' thing didn't suck so badly...

Dancin' in the streets, are you? Better mail your ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Glenn Wiener <Glenn.Wiener@Entex.com> (31.08.99)

GO TO HEAVEN

Year Of Release: 1980
Record rating = 6
Overall rating = 8

Finally, the Dead try to keep up with the times (a little), but that sure ain't no big advantage.
Best song: ALABAMA GETAWAY

For most Deadheads Go To Heaven, the last studio album the band recorded before taking a seven-year break, is their absolute nadir: and it's understandable, as it's perhaps the least Dead-styled Dead album in their entire catalog. The record is indeed quite weak; however, I suppose that my feelings about it will probably be more positive as I'm no Deadhead and I can simply appreciate some of the songs here without worrying about whether they suit the 'style' or not.
The big rub, probably, is related to the fact that the Dead go for a refined 'pop' sound on this record: it's almost never 'psychedelic' and dang never 'experimental'. The songs themselves can be grouped in three categories - the ones written or arranged by Garcia, the ones written by the new member - keyboardist Brent Mydland, and the ones written by Bob Weir; in fact, none of these groups sound anything like the others. And, unfortunately, the last group plainly sucks. I really don't know what kind of message old Bobby Weir was trying to communicate to us with his three lengthy, never ending 'epics', but whatever it be, the message never reaches the addressee. The worst is his disco/funk exercise 'Feel Like A Stranger', with cheesy backing vocals and annoying burps and bursts of synths all over the place; not only does this, indeed, sound nothing like the Dead of old, but it also shows that the Dead should stay as far away from 'modern' dance rhythms as possible. The song doesn't even have a melody, not to mention an overall sense. And on his two other numbers, Weir goes for a 'soulful' groove that might, perhaps, satisfy a long lost soul on a desert island, but would never satisfy such a selective wimp as your humble servant. Gee, and there was once a time when Bob used to write good songs! I mean - good songs, when the word 'melody', and, sometimes, even the word 'hook' didn't sound so annoyingly out of place! Honestly, I don't see how anybody could like, let alone love 'Lost Sailor' and 'Saint Of Circumstance'. Both overstay their welcome at at least twice the desired time (five and a half minutes of groundless wailing for each? Pleeeeaase!), and both abuse the same basic principles of 'soul' music like endless call-and-response sessions between lead and backing vocals, 'cute' harmonies, and 'heavenly' guitar/keyboards tones. However, it still seems to me that Bob didn't really bother to read the 'Soul Manual' further than the introductory chapter; otherwise, he would have probably learned that good 'soul' songs also need steam, aka energy, and passion, aka sincerity, not to mention hooks, aka memorability. As such - fifteen minutes of the record fade away to dust.
Mydland's two contributions are a little bit better - mainly because they are cute little ballads where he obviously tries to emulate Garcia's vocal style. They're also relatively short, and therefore inoffensive. However, that doesn't mean that they're memorable, either: sacchariney, yes, but memorable? They have nothing but atmosphere. They are nothing but atmosphere. Oh well. At least they aren't exactly pretentious, as would be the standard for Mydland's tunes on later Dead records, where he started emulating Dylan rather than Garcia. Wilson & Alroy dismissed the guy with the statement 'whitebread California soft-rock', and while I'm no 'labelist' (do they really think that whitebread California soft-rock has no right to exist on this planet?), I have to agree that this guy ranks among its weakest emulators. The Dead never had any luck with their keyboard players.
That leaves us with Garcia, and yes, damn well he's the saviour of this album. He is probably responsible for the contribution of the folk cover 'Don't Ease Me In', a jolly happy dance ditty that kinda relieves you from the boring as hell atmosphere of the previous cuts. He also contributes the two best original numbers, the ones that stand far, far ahead of everything Weir and Mydland have pumped out on here. There's 'Alabama Getaway', yet another fast song, a great country rock stylization with a steady, pulsating rhythm, a catchy chorus and superb, simply superb guitar licks all over the place. In fact, I absolutely admire Garcia's guitar playing on this album: either it was the production, or he was just in an exceptionally good storm, and he plays up a mini-thunderstorm on all of his tracks and on some of his companions', too. Country guitar can be heavenly - if it is played well, and Garcia demonstrates that he's far ahead of any Nashville competition. Hmm, maybe not far ahead. Once again, you caught me abusing superlatives - sorry. No more superlatives in this review. I promise. I'm just kinda excited.
Yup, I even like 'Althea', Jerry's lengthy seven-minute sonic exploration where he ponders questions of life and love in an imaginary dialogue with some gal of his with a mythic Greek name (at least, that's the best deal I can get out of Hunter's lyrics). It's slow, but it's soooo moody - and it's rhythmic, too, rhythmic, moody and heavy on the guitar (note: not guitar-heavy! That's a different thing). Probably the clos... sorry, I promised no superlatives. Anyway: it reminds me very much of the classic Grateful Dead style. Which I used to hate. 'Althea', however, is pretty cool.
Does that make sense to you?
Probably doesn't.
Never mind. Jerry's just a good lad. And notice how cool he looks on the front cover - you know, the one where they are prepared to go to heaven. Hardcore fans probably had nothing against the idea after spinning this record a couple of times, but I tell ya, if only they'd cut out Mydland's and Weir's tunes out and only left the three songs with Garcia's identity on 'em, the record would have been a blast. Would have gotten an easy ten, in fact. What? Oh, yeah, you want to tell me that it would only be fourteen minutes long? Well, since when do we count the album's lengthiness as a valid criterium for rating it?

Don't ease me in, just mail your ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Glenn Wiener <Glenn.Wiener@Entex.com> (15.10.99)

BUILT TO LAST

Year Of Release: 1989
Record rating = 5
Overall rating = 7

Bland, hookless, unmemorable and only pretending to rock - such was the Dead's musical testament.
Best song: STANDING ON THE MOON

The name of the album seems to hint at the Dead's cultural longevity and, in fact, would probably suggest that they would really stay and kick around for more and more years. Right? Wrong! What happened is that they probably missed the word 'be' in between the second and the third one, since this, indeed, was their last studio effort, and quite a weak effort this is, in all honesty.
After the Dead made such a triumphant comeback in 1987 with In The Dark, expectations were set pretty high - and everybody was disappointed. Me too. Now, to tell you the truth, nothing here is awful or offensive. Nothing is even boring - in that Dead-only sense of the word. I mean, the whole album is boring, but it's the normal kind of boredom, not the kind of stoned-away boredom where you just sit blandly staring at the ceiling while Garcia and Weir buzz in with their droning, lethargic studio jams. No, the record is pretty normal - your average soft-rock product, with a usual country and soul influence. But... but... that's exactly what I dislike. They have forgotten to insert the Grateful Dead Soul in this album.
Actually, this is not entirely true. The biggest problem with the record is that it is almost entirely dominated by keyboardist Brent Mydland - four of the nine tunes are his, and I suspect he sings lead vocals on a couple others, as well. And the guy finally turns out to be a worthless songwriter! Sure, he's trying to cope, and he's even trying to be diverse. There are a couple of fast-going rockers ('Just A Little Light', 'Blow Away'); an anthemic chant ('We Can Run'); and a soft, stripped-down piano/acoustic ballad ('I Will Take You Home'). But none of them manage to thrill me. First, he's got a truly awful voice - hoarse, gruff, frequently off-key; maybe he's trying to emulate Dylan, but he who tries to emulate Dylan is an asshole. Note to any occasional Mydland fan who happens to pass by: I'm only supposing he's trying to emulate Dylan. I have no ample proof. (But I wish I had). Anyway, Dylan or no Dylan, these songs suck. The 'rockers' turn out to be little more than over-emotion-alized synth-pop with a couple of distorted, very unusual for the Dead, crunchy guitar solos that nevertheless get lost in a sea of synths and different stuff. The 'anthemic chant' is rotten to the core, a soulful hymn that's a good find for church revivals. And the ballad is just unmemorable.
So it is up to the old war horses to save the album from utter ruin. Bob Weir comes to the rescue, but nearly screws it up even further, with a lengthy 'introspective' seven-minute epic ('Victim Or The Crime'); what could have been a normal, passable three-minute tune becomes unfairly pretentious and even grossly overblown at seven minutes. Fortunately, his other contribution to the album, 'Picasso Moon', is far better, the album's most substantial rocker that doesn't follow the synth-pop formula so closely. Sometimes I even sing along, before remembering that this is the Grateful Dead, geez, what am I doing.
The best stuff, however, comes from Garcia - which is even more strange, considering that he was still recovering from his drug-induced coma. Maybe that is why he's so relatively inactive, though. Together with Hunter, he's responsible for the title track, 'Foolish Heart' and 'Standing On The Moon' - the three best cuts on the whole record. And it's not that these are really good songs. Okay, 'Standing On The Moon' is a near-classic, with its steady beat, pretty lyrics (and I mean it) and a really soulful delivery from Jerry. And then there's the title track, which has that groovy chorus and a pretty good, jumpy, bouncy, rhythmic structure... cut the crap. It's impossible to describe a Grateful Dead song, they all sound so damn alike and undescribable. 'Foolish Heart' is a cute little ballad, but again, much too heavy on the cheesy synths. And overall, this whole thing simply waxes nostalgic - most of the charm in these songs comes when you realise they're being sung by a good old fart with a great musical legacy. Guess I just feel good towards Jerry's vocals - and when taken next to Mydland's, they are simply stunning. 'Show me something built to last...' Point taken.
It seems to me, now that I have become acquainted with a fairly large chunk of the Dead's studio albums, that they were simply cursed by the curse of 'fourth member'. While the 'core trio' of Garcia/Lesh/Weir could hardly do any serious wrong (well, actually, they could, but that's a different kind of wrong), all these obscure personalities like the Godchauxs or Mydland were there only to mess things up. Why the hell did they need all the synths on this album? I'd bet you anything that taken on a simple acoustic/electric guitar scale with an occasional piano thrown in, this album would have been hugley improved upon. Why, it might have even gotten a six!

We can run and mail our ideas

Your worthy ideas:

Glenn Wiener <Glenn.Wiener@Entex.com> (15.10.99)

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