It was in September 2009 that I read Pynchon’s Inherent Vice. The novel, which I enjoyed, was filmed by Paul Thomas Anderson. I didn’t get to the cinema to see it, but I have watched it several times on DVD. I watched it again last week when I had the house to myself for the evening.
The evening was a delight: Indian food from our local restaurant, beer, and DVDs. As well as Inherent Vice, I watched the excellent Anthem to Beauty, a “classic albums” documentary featuring the Grateful Dead commenting on Anthem of the Sun and American Beauty. The two films worked well with each other, sharing an era in common.
Also common to the two are narcotics. Inherent Vice deals with both Doc Sportello’s permanent residence in another consciousness and the emerging darkness around the hippy dream (Charles Manson is name checked twice), as well as the emergence of the narcotics industry. Anthem to Beauty covers similar ground (by implication rather than overtly): the band’s early gigs as part of the Acid tests and an openness to changed consciousness are important foundations, but the modern viewer is also aware of the consequences down the years. If Pynchon is exploring the mythology of the sixties, the Grateful Dead embody it.
Steal Your Face
Particularly poignant are interviews with the late Jerry Garcia as a young man, never far away from a chortling laugh at some ridiculous notion or situation, and the words unspoken as Bob Weir and Phil Lesh listen back to the studio master tapes, their faces pictures of reflection on what once was and what things became: hand-me downs, the thoughts broken.
More generally, I was reflecting over the weekend on what became of the counter-culture. In large part, of course, it was absorbed into and became part of the mainstream as time passed–Out on the road today I saw a Deadhead sticker on a Cadillac, said Don Henley. This became noticeable today when the death was announced of David Bowie: a freakish outsider in his early days, apparently a national treasure now, as competitive grieving sets in on social media.
Further to my last: after some listening on Spotify, I’ve concluded that I like the Grateful Dead’s albums that are more song based (say from Workingman’s Dead through to Blues for Allah), but don’t really get the extended jams, which don’t do much for me. Mind you, extended jams by just about anyone don’t do much for me. There may be other Dead albums I’d like, but I haven’t heard them yet.
The one that bugs me is Blues For Allah. I bought it on vinyl in the 70s but only played it a couple of times and eventually sold it. Right now it is barely off my cd player. This may be because my original copy had ropey dynamics because of dodgy vinyl quality, whereas the cd remaster is astonishing. Also, of course, I’ve changed in the intervening years.
I’m interested also that, although a lot of attention is paid to Jerry Garcia’s guitar stylings, the real revelation for me is the quality of Phil Lesh’s bass playing, which is consistently excellent.
In the course of listening around, I came across some interesting covers of Dead songs. This one is of Estimated Prophet from Terrapin Station, and is a current favourite:
Something odd has been happening to me lately: something unexpected, troubling almost. After 34 years of indifference I have been listening to the Grateful Dead. I say specifically 34 years because it was in September 1981 that I went to see the Dead play at Edinburgh Playhouse and came away feeling distinctly meh.
The Dead: Edinburgh, September 1981
I have always liked some of their songs, notably Ripple and Truckin’ as well as covers I’ve heard of Friend of the Devil. I also like American Beauty as an album. But overall I’ve always found them too ramshackle and approximate to pay them any mind.
But for some reason I’ve had the opening of Friend of the Devil running through my head as an earworm for a couple of days. To exorcise it, I opened up Wake of the Flood on Spotify, and found myself enjoying it, especially the Weather Report suite.
I still don’t care much for their extended cosmic jams, and I much prefer Jerry Garcia’s bluegrass stuff with Peter Rowan et al, but I’m obviously mellowing in my middle years.
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Kirstin and I had a pleasant walk this afternoon to start the New Year. We didn’t go far–just a round that took us from the house and back for 2.5-3 miles, but it was something I really must do more of this year: 2015 was entirely too desk-bound. In the same spirit, I have been pondering something that Melissa Harrison wrote on Twitter yesterday: “What you do with the days is what you do with the years. What you do with the years is what you do with your life.”
I think that sentiment is correct. Ironically, given where I read it, my first thought is to spend a lot less time checking social media–I haven’t looked at Twitter for 24 hours and am rethinking (again) the ways in which I engage with all my cyber-friends and acquaintances. The trick, I think, is to take Melissa’s aphorism in reverse–work out what I want to do and work backwards.
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