Tuesday, January 29, 2019

Completely Conspicuous 503: Workingman's Dead

I'm joined by guest Phil Stacey as we discuss the Grateful Dead's 1970 album Workingman's Dead. Listen to the episode below or download directly.


Show notes:
- Recorded at CompCon world HQ
- First show of the new year
- Workingman's Dead is the band's 4th studio album
- First of two releases in '70
- Recorded in nine days
- Stripped down sound, less psychedelic
- Garcia and Robert Hunter wrote the whole album
- Folk, country, Americana elements
- Rock was moving away from psychedelia, toward singer-songwriters and acoustic sounds
- Bookended by two of the band's biggest songs
- More of an emphasis on vocals like Crosby, Stills and Nash
- "Suite Judy Blue Eyes" as a torture device
- Phil: Prefer live Dead, but still break out the studio albums on occasion
- Warm sounding record
- "New Speedway Boogie" is about Altamont
- Recently covered by Courtney Barnett
- Hunter's solo releases are all over the place
- Jay: Only heard two songs before
- Fairly concise album; not much jamming
- Moved away from acid blues into a new direction
- "Easy Wind," sung by Pigpen, was the outlier
- Like the Entwistle song on a Who album
- "Casey Jones" evolved in an interesting way over the years
- Talking about cocaine
- Next up: American Beauty

Completely Conspicuous is available through the iTunes podcast directory. Subscribe and write a review!

The opening and closing theme of Completely Conspicuous is "Theme to Big F'in Pants" by Jay Breitling. Voiceover work is courtesy of James Gralian.

No comments:

Stuck In Thee Garage #654: October 16, 2026

By the time Friday rolls around, the weight of the world can weigh heavy on your shoulders. Not that it goes away on the weekends, but at le...