Tuesday, April 19, 2005
Over at "Follow Me Here" Eliot addresses Seth Mnookin's NYTimes Book Review essay on Phil Lesh's memoir, and makes a good point that explains why I have never understood the appeal of this band: "There was never anything very important about their songs; most Deadheads lived for the stretches of their music, chiefly in the second sets of their concerts, that came when they voyaged far away from the songs that served as launch points, deep into the space between, untethered and (no matter where they started from and ended up) never the same twice." Having never been to a Dead show, all I have to go on are the records, and the records document a group that sang poorly, seldom displayed any lyrical wit, and seemed posesed of a peculiar high-pitched whinning sound that never seemed appealing to me. There are exceptions, I suppose. "Box of Rain", the first side of "Mars Hotel"-- but the truth is that although there are Dead songs that I don't mind hearing when they come on, there aren't really any that I'd play myself. Now come to find out that this is because I was never privy to the necessary Dead experience. I can live with that.
// posted by Bill @ 8:48 AM 
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