Grateful Dead : Skull & roses

"Signed to Warner Brothers with a "jazz rate" deal-meaning they were paid by song length, not number of tracks-the band conceded to nearly every label expectation, transforming themselves into something like a traditional garage rock band. In thirty-five minutes, they speed through the album's nine songs with an anxious energy, resulting in an endearing-but-muddy listen-something Phil Lesh would describe as "sound and fury buried in a cavern." Maybe it was the nerves of a group of young freaks trying to sell themselves for the first time, or maybe it was the massive amount of Ritalin they were all on, but the Grateful Dead sound more energetic here than they ever would. Which is to say, if the Dead's characteristic brand of sprawling experimentalism isn't your bag, then this might be the album for you".

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"What's most impressive when listening to this eponymously titled offering, with the benefit of half a century of hindsight, is how much it sounds like the Dead we have come to know. Half of these nine tunes remained active in their sets pretty much throughout the tenure of their history ... disc two unveils previously (officially) unreleased material from a Dead performance on July 29-30,1966, at Vancouver's P.N.E. Garden Auditorium. At this late stage, it's amazing there is anything of value left in the Dead's seemingly bottomless vaults. But this 17-song, hour and 20 minute show is captured in sparkling fidelity (especially for the era) and is a real find, even for those who don't consider themselves the Deadhead faithful. Three selections never appeared on later recordings; the group seems together and tight".

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"A new alt-country star takes flight ... A very good, if broadly conventional, slice of Americana ... Cilker clearly loves Gillian Welch and the Band, but she's not averse to throwing a Dixieland jazz band into the mix on "Tehachapi", too, An auspicious new singer-songwriter, not afraid to broaden her horizons".

"They'd lost Mickey Hart but hadn't yet welcomed Keith Godchaux, so the live recordings that make up the album, from April '71 shows (...), have the group playing as a stripped-back quintet. There are moments of longeurs - parts of the improvisations don't quite fall together (...) - but they introduce a bunch of Dead standards here, and it's worth it for the sublime, elemental depth-charge that is "Wharf Rat" alone".

"If 1969's "Live Dead" presented the Grateful Dead as psychedelic explorers, "Skull & Roses" is mostly a rowdy, hard-partying affair, drawn from spring '71 shows. Great fun, as ever, and a clutch of then-new-songs - especially a chiming, transcendent "Wharf Rat" - capture the band's intense creativity at the time. But even the addition of a July '71 gig, their last at the Fillmore West, can't detract from the feeling that "Skull & Roses" is ostensibly a trial run for the following year's magisterial "Europe '72"".

"If 1969's "Live Dead" presented the Grateful Dead as psychedelic explorers, "Skull & Roses" is mostly a rowdy, hard-partying affair, drawn from spring '71 shows. Great fun, as ever, and a clutch of then-new-songs - especially a chiming, transcendent "Wharf Rat" - capture the band's intense creativity at the time. But even the addition of a July '71 gig, their last at the Fillmore West, can't detract from the feeling that "Skull & Roses" is ostensibly a trial run for the following year's magisterial "Europe '72"".