CONNECTICUT LIBRARIES
May 2006, Vol. 48, No. 5
I am not a "Dead head." I have enjoyed the mellow sounds of the Grateful Dead for many years, but I have never been a raving fan. While I was interested in learning more about the legendary group's musical lyrics, what brought my attention to this large and attractive volume was that it was the work of a fellow librarian!That's right, it was written by one of our own colleagues, someone who shares our fascination with information, our research skills, our appreciation of the educational value of the Internet, and our compulsion for finding answers. David Dodd spent ten years collecting, verifying, and organizing information that sheds light on the song lyrics of his favorite band. His project started out in cyberspace in 1995. His Web site benefited from the collective wisdom of Dead heads from all over the world. Ten years later, the product of Dodd's efforts, were it not for the non-traditional subject matter, fits in nicely with the works of annotation, concordance, and citation that one expects to find in any large reference collection.
Like other reference volumes, this is not a book that you read cover to cover. Instead, you consult it to uncover facts and connections. I dug out two Grateful Dead albums, "Skeletons from the Closet" and "In the Dark." I wanted to enjoy the music while I read the lyrics, notes, and commentary for those eighteen songs. It was a lot of fun! Here are some of Dodd's interesting tidbits.
Along with the lyrics to the Dead's song "Casey Jones," we learn that the group included the well-known "Ballad of Casey Jones" in their shows back in 1970. We are informed that the famous engineer was really named John Luther Jones. He was nicknamed "Casey" because he hailed from Cayce, Kentucky. Despite the wording of the Dead song, Dodd informs us that Casey was a teetotaler who almost certainly was not high on anything the day of the fateful accident.
"One More Saturday Night" contains a line that the Dead had a little fun with. First performed in 1971, the Dead sang:
"I turn on Channel Six, the President comes on the news
Says I got no satisfaction, that's why I sing the blues.
His wife says don't get crazy, Lord, you know what to do."
When Ronald Reagan was President, the Dead changed the line to:
"...Nancy says don't get crazy, Ron, you know what to do."
The Dead know something about musical history. "The Golden Road to Unlimited Devotion" makes reference to the earliest recorded song in the history of the English language with the line "Summer's comin' in and it's goin' outa style." The "Cuckoo Song" appeared around 1250. Throughout his book, Dodd points out numerous such references by the Dead to other songs.
I was always a little curious about the song "Saint Stephen." The music reminds me of Jefferson Airplane's "Volunteers of America," but the two songs differ greatly in spirit. "Volunteers" is a call to arms, while "Stephen" sounds playful. I wondered what the song had to do with the patron saint of Hungary. Well, it turns out that there are at least six or eight saints named Stephen, and that songwriter Robert Hunter did not particularly have any of them in mind when he wrote the lyrics. The line "Bucket hanging clear to Hell" from this song was resurrected for use in another tune, "Hell in a Bucket."
With the exception of some well-known choruses, I rarely understand the words to most rock songs. It often comes as a big surprise to me when I see the lyrics in print. It is nice to know that I am not alone. The song "Hell in a Bucket" includes the words "I may be going to hell in a bucket, babe, But at least I'm enjoying the ride." One reviewer heard the line wrong and referred to the song as "Police on a joyride."
The book contained a surprise or two. As I flipped through it, the title "Not Fade Away" popped out at me. "Hey," I said to myself, "that's an old Buddy Holly tune! What's that doing here?" I remembered well that the Rolling Stones had made the song a hit in the early sixties, but I had not known that the Dead had played it in live performances in the late sixties or that they had recorded it. I made a note to find and listen to their version!
Illustrations by Jim Carpenter are sprinkled generously throughout the volume, adding to the fun. As I admitted earlier, I am not a Dead head. So, I could not fully appreciate everything in Dodd's book. Still, to paraphrase the Grateful Dead, at least I enjoyed the ride.
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