The Grateful Dead was founded in the San Francisco Bay Area amid the rise of the counterculture of the 1960s. The founding members were Jerry Garcia (lead guitar, vocals), Bob Weir (rhythm guitar, vocals), Ron "Pigpen" McKernan (keyboards, harmonica, vocals), Phil Lesh (bass, vocals), and Bill Kreutzmann (drums). Members of the Grateful Dead had played together in various San Francisco bands, including Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions and the Warlocks. Lesh was the last member to join the Warlocks before they became the Grateful Dead; he replaced Dana Morgan Jr., who had played bass for a few gigs. Drummer Mickey Hart and non-performing lyricist Robert Hunter joined in 1967. With the exception of McKernan, who died in 1973, and Hart, who took time off from 1971 to 1974, the core of the band stayed together for its entire 30-year history. The other official members of the band are Tom Constanten (keyboards; 1968–1970), John Perry Barlow (nonperforming lyricist; 1971–1995), Keith Godchaux (keyboards; 1971–1979), Donna Godchaux (vocals; 1972–1979), Brent Mydland (keyboards, vocals; 1979–1990), and Vince Welnick (keyboards, vocals; 1990–1995). Bruce Hornsby (accordion, piano, vocals) was a touring member from 1990 to 1992, as well as a guest with the band on occasion before and after the tours.
The name "Grateful Dead" was chosen from a dictionary. According to Phil Lesh, "[Jerry Garcia] picked up an old Britannica World Language Dictionary ... [and] ... In that silvery elf-voice he said to me, 'Hey, man, how about the Grateful Dead?'" The definition there was "the soul of a dead person, or his angel, showing gratitude to someone who, as an act of charity, arranged their burial". According to Alan Trist, director of the Grateful Dead's music publisher company Ice Nine, Garcia found the name in the Funk & Wagnalls Folklore Dictionary, when his finger landed on that phrase while playing a game of Fictionary. In the Garcia biography, Captain Trips, author Sandy Troy states that the band was smoking the psychedelic DMT at the time. The term "grateful dead" appears in folktales of a variety of cultures.
Live performances
The Grateful Dead toured constantly throughout their career, playing more than 2,300 concerts. They promoted a sense of community among their fans, who became known as "Deadheads", many of whom followed their tours for months or years on end. Around concert venues, an impromptu communal marketplace known as 'Shakedown Street' was created by Deadheads to serve as centers of activity where fans could buy and sell anything from grilled cheese sandwiches to home-made t-shirts and recordings of Grateful Dead concerts.
In their early career, the band also dedicated their time and talents to their community, the Haight-Ashbury area of San Francisco, making available free food, lodging, music, and health care to all. It has been said that the band performed "more free concerts than any band in the history of music".
With the exception of 1975, when the band was on hiatus and played only four concerts together, the Grateful Dead performed many concerts every year, from their formation in April 1965, until July 9, 1995. Initially all their shows were in California, principally in the San Francisco Bay Area and in or near Los Angeles. They also performed, in 1965 and 1966, with Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters, as the house band for the Acid Tests. They toured nationally starting in June 1967 (their first foray to New York), with a few detours to Canada, Europe and three nights at the Great Pyramid of Giza in Egypt in 1978. They appeared at the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, the Woodstock Festival in 1969 and the Festival Express train tour across Canada in 1970. They were scheduled to appear as the final act at the infamous Altamont Free Concert on December 6, 1969 after the Rolling Stones but withdrew after security concerns. "That's the way things went at Altamont—so badly that the Grateful Dead, prime organizers and movers of the festival, didn't even get to play", staff at Rolling Stone magazine wrote in a detailed narrative on the event.
Their first UK performance was at the Hollywood Music Festival in 1970. Their largest concert audience came in 1973 when they played, along with the Allman Brothers Band and the Band, before an estimated 600,000 people at the Summer Jam at Watkins Glen. They played to an estimated total of 25 million people, more than any other band, with audiences of up to 80,000 attending a single show. Many of these concerts were preserved in the band's tape vault, and several dozen have since been released on CD and as downloads. The Dead were known for the tremendous variation in their setlists from night to night—the list of songs documented to have been played by the band exceeds 500. The band has released four concert videos under the name View from the Vault.
In the 1990s, the Grateful Dead earned a total of $285 million in revenue from their concert tours, the second-highest during the 1990s, with the Rolling Stones earning the most. This figure is representative of tour revenue through 1995, as touring stopped after the death of Jerry Garcia. In a 1991 PBS documentary, segment host Buck Henry attended an August 1991 concert at Shoreline Amphitheatre and gleaned some information from some band members about the Grateful Dead phenomenon and its success. At the time, Jerry Garcia stated, "We didn't really invent the Grateful Dead, the crowd invented the Grateful Dead, you know what I mean? We were sort of standing in line, and uh, it's gone way past our expectations, way past, so it's, we've been going along with it to see what it's gonna do next." Furthermore, Mickey Hart stated, "This is one of the last places in America that you can really have this kind of fun, you know, considering the political climate and so forth." Hart also stated that "the transformative power of the Grateful Dead is really the essence of it; it's what it can do to your consciousness. We're more into transportation than we are into music, per se, I mean, the business of the Grateful Dead is transportation." One of the band's largest concerts took place just months before Garcia's death — at their outdoor show with Bob Dylan in Highgate, Vermont on June 15, 1995. The crowd was estimated to be over 90,000; overnight camping was allowed and about a third of the audience got in without having purchased a ticket.
Their numerous studio albums were generally collections of new songs that they had first played in concert. The band was also famous for its extended musical improvisations, having been described as having never played the same song the same way twice. Their concert sets often blended songs, one into the next, often for more than three songs at a time.
Tapes
Like several other bands during this time, the Grateful Dead allowed their fans to record their shows. For many years the tapers set up their microphones wherever they could, and the eventual forest of microphones became a problem for the sound crew. Eventually, this was solved by having a dedicated taping section located behind the soundboard, which required a special "tapers" ticket. The band allowed sharing of their shows, as long as no profits were made on the sale of the tapes.
Of the approximately 2,350 shows the Grateful Dead played, almost 2,200 were taped, and most of these are available online. The band began collecting and cataloging tapes early on and Dick Latvala was their keeper. "Dick's Picks" is named after Latvala. After his death in 1999, David Lemieux gradually took the post. Concert set lists from a subset of 1,590 Grateful Dead shows were used to perform a comparative analysis between how songs were played in concert and how they are listened online by Last.fm members. In their book Marketing Lessons from the Grateful Dead: What Every Business Can Learn From the Most Iconic Band in History, David Meerman Scott and Brian Halligan identify the taper section as a crucial contributor to increasing the Grateful Dead's fan base.
After the death of Garcia in 1995, former members of the band, along with other musicians, toured as the Other Ones in 1998, 2000, and 2002, and the Dead in 2003, 2004, and 2009. In 2015, the four surviving core members marked the band's 50th anniversary in a series of concerts that were billed as their last performances together. There have also been several spin-offs featuring one or more core members, such as Dead & Company, Furthur, the Rhythm Devils, Phil Lesh and Friends, RatDog, and Billy & the Kids.
Deal
Grateful Dead Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
And even more to lose
You and me bound to spend some time
Wondering what to choose
It goes to show you don't ever know
Watch each card you play and play it slow
Don't you let that deal go down
I been gambling hereabouts
For ten good solid years
If I told you all that went down
It would burn off both your ears
It goes to show you don't ever know
Watch each card you play and play it slow
Wait until your deal come round
Don't you let that deal go down
Since you poured the wine for me
And tightened up my shoes
I hate to leave you sitting there
Composing lonesome blues
It goes to show that you don't ever know
Watch each card you play and play it slow
Wait until your deal come round
Don't you let that deal go down
Don't you let that deal go down
Don't you let that deal go down
The Grateful Dead’s song “Deal” is a meditation on the nature of gambling, the fickleness of fate, and the importance of taking one’s time in life’s dealings. The opening lines underline the high stakes of the gambler’s existence: “Since it cost a lot to win / And even more to lose.” The singer and the listener are both “bound to spend some time / Wondering what to choose” - even after years of gambling, they are still uncertain which path to take.
The chorus, “Wait until your deal come round / Don't you let that deal go down,” urges the listener to take advantage of moments of opportunity in life, and not to squander them when they present themselves. The lines “I been gambling hereabouts / For ten good solid years / If I told you all that went down / It would burn off both your ears” suggest both the singer’s experience and something darker about his past, something that is better left unspoken.
The final verse features a personal note, with the mention of someone who has poured wine for the singer and “tightened up my shoes.” This image carries a sense of intimacy or familiarity, and the singer seems to regret having to leave this person behind, though he must move on in his life journey. The song ends with a repetition of the chorus, emphasizing that the important thing in life is to be ready for when opportunity, or the “deal,” inevitably comes around.
Line by Line Meaning
Since it cost a lot to win
Success is difficult, and requires a lot of effort, resources, and commitment.
And even more to lose
Failure is harder to accept and overcome, and may have long-lasting consequences.
You and me bound to spend some time
We must invest time and effort to make important decisions and face the outcomes of our actions.
Wondering what to choose
We may face difficult choices and uncertain outcomes, and must weigh the pros and cons of our options.
It goes to show you don't ever know
Life is unpredictable and full of surprises, and we cannot always anticipate what will happen next.
Watch each card you play
Be mindful of your choices and actions, and consider their potential consequences.
And play it slow
Take your time to make important decisions, and do not rush into anything without careful consideration.
Wait until your deal come round
Be patient and wait for opportunities to arise, and do not force things before their time.
Don't you let that deal go down
When opportunities arise, seize them and do not let them slip away.
I been gambling hereabouts
I have been taking risks and making decisions in this place and situation for some time.
For ten good solid years
For a long time, with dedication and persistence.
If I told you all that went down
If I shared with you all my experiences, successes, and failures, it would be overwhelming and shocking.
It would burn off both your ears
It would be too much for you to handle and process, and would leave you stunned and confused.
Since you poured the wine for me
Since you offered me hospitality and kindness.
And tightened up my shoes
And helped me prepare and get ready for the challenges ahead.
I hate to leave you sitting there
I feel sad and sorry to part ways with you.
Composing lonesome blues
Feeling lonely and melancholic, and expressing my emotions through music.
Lyrics © O/B/O APRA AMCOS
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind
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This was the best "Deal" I have ever heard or seen in person.
God, they were amazing. I'm so happy I'm so old at 64 that I've been a deadhead for so many years. And it's nothing but good, and good Karma.
And thanks to Robert Hunter for the lyrics which are really a cautionary poem that says don't just act based on the cards you think the other player has..
Robert Hosbein
Indeed, awesome, what a brilliant man Gerry to cover the whole neck of his Guitar, all the notes, in between the chords. When I listen to "The Looser" , and "Deal" he's talking about the same thing. It's so cool to have so much of the Bands music at hand, of almost all the shows here and now, only because they encouraged us to record unconditionally. How much more American music can one get then "The Greatful Dead",.,,,,,
K Strohl
Eee
Chuck William
@ogioful lol
Paul Pulcinello
I only got to see 2 GD shows, ‘deal ‘Was played both times .... at Rfk ... i was so happy when the intro started cuz they just slothed their war thru a 70 min ‘wharf rat’.. lol
InfamousMedia
When you really understand the dynamics all the members are extrapolating into this 3D realm from their musical reservoir it’s mind blowing. Phil thumping away, Mickey ritzing on the cymbals, Bobby rippling into eternity, etc. Jerry is beyond the doors of perception and throwing us gifts from eternity with his guitar. WOW what a sizzling performance 🥵🤩🤪
Joseph Cayer
IVE BEEN LISTENING TO A BUNCH OF PODCAST. I WASNT AWARE THAT THE LATE 80S EARLY 90S THEY PERFECTED LIGHTS AND MIDI TECH. I LISTEN TO THOSE SHOWS WAY MORE CLOSELY. JERRY WAS TALKING ABOUT DIGITAL ART AND DRAWING TABLETS IN 1990. I WISH I COULD SEE THE EARLY DEAD> SUCKS BEING BORN IN 1984.
LITGTWHY
Brent hammering home a sound that resembles the wind at the beach* would be the only thing you missed 😜
Dave Gene
Fuck yes
Sandoz53
I’m with you all the way on this!