The real reason Anthony Bourdain hated the Grateful Dead: “I hate hippies”
Working in a kitchen is notoriously intense. Keeping up with a relentless service while experiencing the fearsome breath of a head chef down your neck, it’s not for the faint of heart. However, as an Anthony Bourdain fan, I’d be willing to argue that the intrigue of his personality would offset the dreaded intensity.
Of course, that’s likely untrue, but Bourdain was an enigmatic and compelling cultural character. His sellout book Kitchen Nightmares was more than just a culinary memoir, it was a view into the mind’s eye of an astute modern observer who viewed the world through the lens of food, art and comedy with equal measures.
As his star rose with every piece of media output, be it written or visual form, fans would hang on every word of his recommendation with excited curiosity. Who was he reading? What was he eating? And who, more importantly, was he listening to?
He was never shy about declaring his love for the likes of the Ramones and The Stooges. They faithfully depicted that sense of New York grit that he came up in as a budding chef. Not interested in the glitz and glamour of the city’s soaring skyscrapers, Bourdain could more likely be found dwelling in the shadows of the city’s downtown communities, running his finger on the pulse and gauging the more realistic mood of the people.
In fact, he typified the anti-establishment attitude of a true rocker, turning his nose up at the flamboyance of the city’s disco counterparts. He spoke of the disco dwellers, “Every douche bag in America who could buy a white suit or some heavily adulterated cocaine was suddenly empowered to show you his back fat and chest hair”.
It’s no surprise that a man who speaks as strongly about disco fans as that had some pretty strict rules when it comes to the listening habits of his staff. He famously outlined three musicians who were simply not allowed to make it onto the rotation of any of his staff.
“If you play Elton John, Billy Joel, or the Grateful Dead, you will be fired!” the chef exclaimed. The former two artists seem fairly on brand for Bourdain, who was known for disliking anything remotely mainstream or chirpy, but the fact that he wasn’t a Deadhead is somewhat surprising.
The reason? Well, it’s tardiness, which, given the fact that Bourdain is a chef, isn’t surprising after all. “You know what? I may be a lefty, but I hate hippies,” he said. “As a former employer, I learned very early to never hire a Dead fan because arrival time was always a problem with those guys. I hate four-hour guitar solos.”
Ultimately, Bourdain was a punk fan. He wanted energy in its most unrelenting form, be it music, conversation or cooking. Self-indulgence or performative behaviour was generally at the root cause of any of his disdain, and you could perhaps say, that’s what won him the hearts of culture heads all over.
