Skeleton Key: A Dictionary for Deadheads

From American Beauty to the Zone: American Beauty Album #6, released in November, 1970. David Grisman plays mandolin on "Ripple" and "Friend Of The Devil". Robert Hunter, lyricist, on American Beauty: "American Beauty shows the GD playing, singing and songwriting skills in full stride. We had the confidence of a successful record (Workingman's Dead) behind us, plus a shared sense of direction that was in tune with the times. The Band, The Byrds, Poco, CSNY & Dylan were all exploring traditional music augmented by the power of rock & roll. Psychedelia had had its moment (marking the GD forever in the public perception) and we were continuing to evolve what we believed to be the logical next step in American music, hence the title. There is an underlying tone of sadness to American Beauty (Phil's father had just passed away, Jerry's mother was dying in the hospital as the result of an auto accident) reflected in the colors of such tunes as "Box Of Rain," "Brokedown Palace," "Attics of My Life" and "Ripple." On the up side, "Sugar Magnolia/Sunshine Daydream" reaffirmed the important business of just getting stupid and being in love, while "Truckin'" announced, as early as 1970, what a long, strange trip it already seemed to have been. This didn't refer only to the GD, but to the ten years of bluegrass, old timey & jug band configurations leading up to the rock & roll departure. Grateful Dead Live '71 , Europe '72 & the Garcia solo release (also '72) staked out the GD's musical territory in a definitive way. It wouldn't be until 1975 and Blues for Allah that we would break with that feeling and extend the territory into less definable musical spaces, neither psychedelic nor tradition-based. This amorphous state of transition lasted until 1985, when In the Dark once again found us in command of our direction in a way comprehensible to the public. American Beauty remains the favorite studio record of many fans and members of the band, mustering, as it does, all the resources at our command in a futile but game response to the rising tide of commercially safe music which had already begun a counter mission to recover its monopoly of the American airwaves and record racks in the '70's." Cherry Garcia Ben & Jerry's salute to the Great One: a designer ice cream, infused with flakes of dark chocolate and bing cherry slivers soaked in amaretto, which made its debut in February, '87. "At least they didn't name a motor oil after me," Garcia is reported to have quipped when sent a sample to taste. Half of his royalties go to the band's in house charitable group, the Rex Foundation. "Nothing really rhymed with 'Grateful' or 'Dead,' explains Jane Williamson MacDonald, the 100-show veteran who came up with the idea in '84, in a Ben & Jerry's store on Exchange Street in Portland, Maine. "So I said, 'For me, Garcia is the heart of the band,' and within 15 seconds, out popped 'Cherry Garcia.' We wrote it down and laughed hysterically for ten minutes, and then put it up on the suggestion board." As luckwouldn'thave it, that store burned down soon afterwards, the idea literally going up in smoke. "So I sent them a postcard," MacDonald says. "But I didn't sign it. I just put a heart at the end. It was a political postcard that's what Ben liked most about it. It was aShenk, David is the author of 'Skeleton Key: A Dictionary for Deadheads' with ISBN 9780385474023 and ISBN 0385474024.