{"id":6610,"date":"2015-06-26T11:38:00","date_gmt":"2015-06-26T18:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/BigJimIndustries.com\/wordpress\/?p=6610"},"modified":"2015-07-19T11:43:16","modified_gmt":"2015-07-19T18:43:16","slug":"grateful-mess","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2015\/06\/26\/grateful-mess\/","title":{"rendered":"Grateful Mess"},"content":{"rendered":"

from The New Yorker<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The Glorious Inconsistency of the Grateful Dead<\/h1>\n

By Nick Paumgarten<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n

\"\"Photograph by Michael Putland\/Getty<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

A few of us here at The New Yorker<\/em> recently recorded a podcast about the Grateful Dead<\/a>, on the occasion of a series of five farewell performances (this weekend in Santa Clara, California, and next weekend in Chicago) by the band\u2019s four surviving members. Afterwards, the segment\u2019s producer, hoping to amplify a remark one of us had made about the Dead\u2019s infamous inconsistency, asked if I could point him toward any performances that were \u201cparticularly terrible.\u201d Could I ever. With relish! Any Deadhead worth his stash is a connoisseur not just of the good stuff but also of the bad\u2014blown choruses, mangled leads, laryngitis, amnesia. Their improvisational approach to live performance had something to do with this. If you play by the seat of your pants, you are occasionally going to fall on your face. Toss in copious drug use, an aversion to rehearsal, and a genuine anarchic streak, and you have a band that may have stumbled as often as it soared. (If you\u2019re one of the millions who believe that the Dead only ever stumbled, so be it. I\u2019ll spare you the special pleading. If you believe that they only ever soared, well . . . de gustibus<\/em>.)<\/p>\n

We enthusiasts, apologists all, maintain that the uncertainty\u2014the chance at musical transcendence amid a tendency toward something less\u2014was what kept us coming back. This argument is a little like the East Coaster\u2019s on behalf of his weather: the nice days are nicer when there are crappy ones in between. And you come to savor the misty mornings, the squalls, the blizzards, and the cold snaps that freeze the ponds. Transcendence, though, was always heavily contingent on the performance of Jerry Garcia, who, in addition to being the Dead\u2019s (quoting myself here<\/a>) \u201cmost accomplished songwriter, most soulful singer, most charismatic figure, most eloquent interviewee, most recognizable icon, most splendid thaumaturge,\u201d was the one who provided the iridescent guitar leads that transported the band\u2019s fans. When he had a bad night, you knew it. The others, when they were off, could sort of hide. The waning of Garcia\u2019s health, technique, and enthusiasm was a kind of meta-performance. In some respects, listening through the band\u2019s thirty-year touring career is a study in decline. By the end, you hardly ever saw the sun.<\/p>\n

[ click to continue reading at The New Yorker<\/a> ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from The New Yorker The Glorious Inconsistency of the Grateful Dead By Nick Paumgarten Photograph by Michael Putland\/Getty A few of us here at The New Yorker recently recorded a podcast about the Grateful Dead, on the occasion of a series of five farewell performances (this weekend in Santa Clara, California, and next weekend in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6610","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture-art"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6610","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6610"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6610\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6610"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6610"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6610"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}