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- Michael Gallucci
- 'Live / Dead' (1969) Because the Dead were best known as a live act, and because they indeed often did their best work onstage, their breakthrough 1969 concert record remains their greatest and most representative album.
- 'American Beauty' (1970) Sparked by the creative and commercial successes of 'Workingman's Dead,' the Grateful Dead wasted no time returning to the studio to record 'American Beauty,' an even deeper and richer exploration of Americana music.
- 'Workingman's Dead' (1970) The Dead, and their record company, were so fed up by the money and time spent on 'Aoxomoxoa' that they went in and recorded the stripped-down 'Workingman's Dead' in nine days.
- 'Aoxomoxoa' (1969) The group followed up 'Anthem of the Sun' with another experimental work, this time sticking strictly to studio recordings that reflected its growth during this heady period.
- Go to Heaven
- Shakedown Street
- Built to Last
- In The Dark
- From The Mars Hotel
- Aoxomoxoa
- Wake of The Flood
- The Grateful Dead
- Workingman’s Dead
- Anthem of The Sun
- GeneratedCaptionsTabForHeroSec
Coming in at Dead last is 1980’s Go To Heaven. With a cover that smells of more baby laxative than a maternity ward, this album epitomized a pronounced mainstream tilt from the countercultural icons that many could not bear. But plenty of great albums have terrible covers, including many by the Dead. The true casualty of this album, besides the ero...
While it does contain some heavy-hitting classics like the title track, “Fire On The Mountain”, “I Need A Miracle”, and the easily-overlooked “If I Had The World To Give”, most of the Dead’s 1978 album Shakedown Street is a snooze (there’s a reason the band never played “France” live). Then there’re other dusters like “Serengetti” and, lest we forg...
Coming in at third-to-last is Built To Last from 1989, which would prove to be the band’s final studio record. It’s a shame that Built to Last has to go up against such stiff competition, because it really is a pretty good record. Unfortunately, it’s inherently compared to a bunch of really good records in the Dead’s catalog. In a bit of poetic for...
The band’s commercial and mainstream pinnacle. A lot of people would put this much further toward the bottom, ignorantly shining upon Go To Heaven for the simple sake that it doesn’t include “Touch Of Grey”. Then, there are the intellectuals who know that In The Dark still contains classic Grateful Dead songwriting, despite the time at which it was...
Released just prior to the band’s touring hiatus from 1974–75, From The Mars Hotel shows a band that had finally gotten comfortable being themselves in the studio. Granted, on other albums like Workingman’s Dead, they had been able to perform without the live feedback of an audience, but this shows the Dead really being themselves on record. With p...
The last album before the Dead embarked on their two-album Country/Western movement, Aoxomoxoa effectively marked the end of the truly psychedelic era of the Grateful Dead studio albums. Sure, the acid-soaked essence of the band’s early days would never wash away, but it also would never again truly be the focal point of their studio output. They g...
If there was a middle-of-the-road Grateful Dead album, it would be Wake of the Flood. There’s none of the roaring psych sounds of the first few albums, and they’re still a few years down the road from anything too advanced in the studio. Coming on the heels of three live albums (Grateful Dead aka Skull & Roses, Europe ’72, and History of the Gratef...
The one that started it all. There is, and rightfully should be, a heavy emphasis placed on a band’s debut record. The Grateful Deadfeatures a large amount of covers that would become paramount to the group’s live concerts for years to come, including “Beat It On Down The Line”, “Cold Rain And Snow”, “Viola Lee Blues”, and, of course “Morning Dew”....
The band’s fourth studio album kicked off what would prove to be a two-record deep dive into the themes of Americana music. This is where the Dead developed a new facet to their music, beyond the blues band that they started out as and beyond the psychedelic, new wave acid jazz cats they had become. This album is full of instant classics from front...
While Anthem of the Sun might not be loaded with as many classics as Wake of the Flood, From the Mars Hotel, or American Beauty, it best encapsulates what the Dead were truly about. First off, there’s (technically) only five songs on the entire record, with “That’s It For the Other One” containing three separate parts. There’s also the revolutionar...
A subjective ranking of the 13 Grateful Dead studio albums, from the lackluster Go To Heaven to the classic Workingman's Dead. See how the band's musical evolution, live legacy, and personnel changes influenced their studio output.
- Jon Dolan
- ‘Live/Dead’ (1969) The definitive document of the Dead onstage in the Sixties, designed to communicate the essence of the band in their most comfortable setting.
- ‘Grateful Dead’ (1971) Often overshadowed by the empyrean heights of Europe ’72, this live double-LP is still one of the most concisely enjoyable documents of the Dead in the early Seventies.
- ‘Europe ’72’ The band’s third live album documented their tour of Western Europe, ambitiously released as a triple LP in hopes that Warner would recoup the money spent overseas (more than 40 people came along for the ride).
- ‘Jerry Garcia’ (1972) With only Bill Kreutzmann accompanying him, Garcia conjures both the singing-gambler and mad-musical-scientist sides of the Dead on what is arguably the best outside-mothership project.
Nov 8, 2023 · This list of the top Grateful Dead albums features their entire discography and is ranked from best to worst, with the order decided by fans worldwide. To make voting for your favorite records easier, we haven't included singles, EPs, or compilations; only studio LPs.
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Aug 9, 2023 · The Grateful Dead's best albums are a kaleidoscopic, loose-limbed, ever-adventurous alchemy of psychedelia, country, folk and blues
Aug 6, 2021 · How do you rank the Dead's thirteen studio albums that tried to capture their improvisational magic? Find out the order of greatness, from Built to Last to Workingman's Dead, with analysis and criticism.
Sep 21, 2019 · A comprehensive overview of the band's studio and live albums, from psychedelic experiments to country-rock classics. Find out which LPs are must-haves and which ones are worth exploring further.
