The album the Grateful Dead never got to make: “There’s not even a title”
Every band can only hope to close the book on their legacy as best as they can. Although not every band goes into a record thinking that it’s going to be the last time they are in the studio, artists like Leonard Cohen and David Bowie had the foresight to realise that they might not get an opportunity to work on another project and put everything they could into making sure they left their audience with one final thought to chew on before they graciously bowed out one last time. The Grateful Dead may have been able to say their piece throughout their career, but there will always be a question mark concerning their final album.
Because the album format was always where the Grateful Dead thrived. There was no use in them making their extended live jams accessible on radio, so listening to a record like Live Dead was the perfect way for someone to experience their music if they couldn’t manage to grab tickets to one of their concerts. Despite the lack of visuals, the wiggle room of two slabs of vinyl makes them sound like the music is dripping off of them half the time they’re playing onstage.
Even when they weren’t stretching out their songs to unheard-of lengths, their records could still be fairly accessible. Listening to an album like American Beauty is still a fantastic journey from beginning to end, but they never felt comfortable being in one place for too long. They were still looking to grow on every record, and by the time they reached their final albums, they seemed to be on the verge of something bigger.
Terrapin Station had seen them splitting up their pieces into different episodic movements, and Built to Last seemed to be building on that idea right before making a follow-up. With some of their songs even gaining traction on radio, it felt like the world was ready for the next phase of the group, but when Jerry Garcia passed away, there was no real point in them continuing on anymore.
Compared to most bands that move on after a core member leaves, like Pink Floyd or Genesis, Garcia was simply too essential to replace. He may have been the most unassuming celebrity in the world whenever someone talked to him, but he was the one responsible for steering that ship half the time, and when the band lost that momentum, there was no point in trying to have someone fill in for him.
While the band also tried their hardest to make something to follow up Built to Last, they knew there was no way of continuing on with the project, with spokesman Dennis McNally saying, “Only [Grateful Dead guitarist] Bobby [Weir] ever thought that anything could be done, but it can’t. Jerry didn’t contribute to it. Everyone else contributed to it, but Jerry just wasn’t with it. There’s not even a title, to my knowledge.”
Even though the band effectively ended the moment Garcia died, that didn’t mean that they couldn’t still go out and celebrate the music they made together. Even after playing their final shows, the reunion of the classic members with Dead and Co. was the best way that the group could have paid tribute to the man who shaped them as well as the fans who waited their whole lives to hear that music live.
But listening to the reunions of Grateful Dead members tends to feel like listening to the Allman Brothers Band in the era right after Duane Allman passed away. The band are still in top form and a knockout every time they play, but it’s always going to be bittersweet knowing the powerhouse they used to be.
