How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Grateful Dead

If you’re like most people, I was once like you: I hated the Grateful Dead.

Even as a classic rock-loving teen in the 90s, I could not fathom the appeal. The studio albums (with a couple of exceptions) were goofy and uninspired. The badly-recorded tapes of thousands of live shows did nothing for me. The music struck me as aimless and dreary; the lyrics sounded like they were written by guys who were born old.

Indeed, the band’s “I’m so tired of the road” anthem, “Truckin,’” was released a mere five years into their career. (“What a long strange trip it’s been” is a truly odd, world-weary lament for a bunch of twenty-something California bohemians in 1970.)

Read more at The Daily Beast.