Taking Sides: Workingman's Dead vs American Beauty

I can't imagine a greatest anything that doesn't have something from AB or WD, or a DS>SS, CC>IKYR, H>S>F or S>F, but that's just me. I'd keep

- Wharf Rat
- Deal
- Bird Song
- The Wheel (maybe)
- He's Gone
- Jack Straw

and lose the rest

the Dead aren't the only 'jam band' to write good songs, btw, tho they get more style and authenticity points

wishing they were genuinely psychedelic

I always have to lol at stuff like this

Workingman's is shorter and therefore more suited to my attention span

I was gonna say, WD is the album for r0ck fans who might not be otherwise inclined. AB is for folkies.

aoxomoxoa uber alles for studio dead

otm

Right now I prefer American Beauty, and it's "Box of Rain" that tips the scales, because otherwise they're both just full of great songs, but "Box of Rain" is more than just great.

On other Dead material of the time: I've said it before on ILM, but the 8/27/72 show at the Veneta Fairgrounds in Oregon is killer. Firstly, it totally has that arc from folk to space back to folk...and in the comedown from "Dark Star" it segues into a goofy "El Paso", back into "Dark Star", and then into a cathartic "Sing Me Back Home" (which you can here on the So Many Roads box set, but trust me, it's better in context). It's simply incredible.

I can't imagine a greatest anything that doesn't have something from AB or WD

It's not suppose to be a greatest hits album; it's basically the track list for the studio album Hunter always wanted the Dead to make after AB.

someone YSI that shit, i don't have time to sift through boots and odds n ends.

xp - ok, i can read. isn't there supposed to be great stuff on ACE?

apologies, if you thought i was getting uppity. I wasn't. I was just pointing that out.

i totally want to cover friend of the devil.

-- ian, Monday, April 7, 2008 4:05 PM (4 hours ago) Bookmark Link

haha i totally have a grateful dead tabs book from 9th grade if you need those chord progressions dude

xp - no, dude, i was being self-deprecating

yes lindsay please!!!!! i would love a grateful dead tabs book.

i have 2. unless my mom has thrown them out by now.

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gotcha!

What's the relationship between "Ripple" and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat's "Any Dream Will Do"?

^Andrew Lloyd Webber was a deadhead?

yikes if there's overlap between deadheads & music theatre geeks

American Beauty by a long shot: better songs, better pacing, more diverse instrumentation.

was looking for a Europe '72 thread fwiw

No way dude
Workingman's is stranger and less predictable

Like the chords of / high time / and the misery of / black Peter /

Guess Scott's right, come to think of it; I still haven't heard that many country, folk etc. covers of these songs----but here's a good "Ripple" from Hot Club of Cowtown's singer-fiddle Elana James, on her second solo album---nice steel guitar too: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GYPlm0iVDMI

Also performed by my cousin's bros at his memorial; that was good too.

Some timd ago I was listening to 60s retro radio show on an area college station. They accidentally played two cuts in a row from AB ("Friend of The Devil" and "Sugar Magnolia"), and afterwards the DJ remarked that it was one of the only albums they could think of from a group with multiple singers where each of the first four songs has a different lead (Phil, Jerry, Bob, Pigpen). Found that interesting.

Lol flappy's revive pretty much sums up my Dead semi-fandom

I need to track down that 'lost' album

Both are great, but if I had to pick just one it would be WD, with "Dire Wolf" being by favorite track.

Cumberland Blues is probably my favorite Dead track, and it's on Workingman's Dead. Then again, Ripple is probably my second favorite Dead track...

I like the version of CB on Europe 72 better though

Who can name all the personages on the WD cover?

err, isn't it just the band + Robert Hunter?

Workingman's is stranger and less predictable

this and especially

Like the chords of / high time / and the misery of / black Peter /

this

are otm

this is a really arbitrary decision but i'd have to go with workingman's bc of how much i love "dire wolf" and "casey jones"

I think my favorite is whichever one is playing RIGHT NOW

this is the lamest possible way to get into the grateful dead but i remember i bought american beauty in college just bc of how much i loved the counting crows cover of "friend of the devil." took me a while to adjust tbh

there is no bad way

love those seasick chord changes in "high time"

Freaks and Geeks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRHZr3VlpgE

(Ends with the two lead female characters setting out for a summer--or a lifetime--as Deadheads.)

Agreed that I prefer Workingman's Dead, not just because Cumberland Blues is my fav Dead song. Beauty has some transcendent classics sitting beside mediocrities (Ripple is incredible, Candyman not so much), but Workingman's Dead stays at a fairly high level throughout.

candyman is so good! that pedal steel solo!

i think as much as i associate both albums with each other they have very distinct moods for me, american beauty is kinda this shining shimmering thing and workingman's is pretty ghostly and introverted throughout. at the moment i think i prefer the second mood but i also feel like it could easily switch back in the next 5-10 years

Back to the cover, I guess bill is on the stairs, Mickey is talking to pigpen, and hunter’s on the far left. Those were the three I wasn’t sure about

Here is more info about that cover than you ever wanted to know:

http://www.popspotsnyc.com/workingmans_dead/