Life lessons on two wheels to the tunes of the
Grateful Dead
This Week in Grateful Dead History
Week 1
I wish I was a headlight on a northbound train.
Even the most cursory examination of the lyrics of Grateful Dead songs quickly uncovers one of the most fundamental aspects of the band’s identity: This is an American band, rooted in American culture, and built around easily recognizable locales and deeply American principles and history.
Other Posts
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 11 - March 9-10, 1981
A little bit further than you gone before
The 1968 Otis Redding tune, Hard To Handle, famously covered by the Grateful Dead in the late ’60s and early ’70s (and twice in 1981 with Etta James on lead vocals), featured the lyric, “Actions speak louder than words.” This contention is supported by researchers and scholars, dating back to Charles Darwin’s 1872 work of evolutionary theory, “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals,” in 1872. In the present tense, conventional wisdom suggests that NVC (Non-Verbal Communication) accounts for as much as 70-percent of human communication.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 51 – December 15, 1986
We will survive
The irony is inescapable. The very song that became nothing less than an anthem for the entire Grateful Dead community also represented the beginning of the end for the band. Touch of Grey reached #9 on the Billboard “Hot 100” chart in September, 1987, the only time the Dead cracked the top 10 in the entire history of the band. A distant second, Truckin’ reached #64 in December, 1971, and only 4 other songs ever ranked in the top 100.
This Week in Grateful Dead History: Week 2 – January 10, 1978
I’ll get a new start
As we established last week, our essential human nature as storytellers is one coin with two sides to select from. On the “tails” side are the stories we must beware of for their harmful potential: those that are tainted with negative judgments and deceptions that infect our beliefs in ways that lead us to act wrongfully. Fortunately, on the “heads” side is a clean slate upon which we can write stories of inspiration that can shepherd us in the direction of our highest selves. Choosing wisely on which side to pitch your tent is as much a key to success in this life as any I have found.
All Material Copyright 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023 by Stewart Sallo