Touch of Grey? It's funny you say that, because in the Dead community, it's a lightening rod song, and that's being generous. A lot of people loathe it as their solitary, fleeting attempt at commercial music (which is actually unfair). I don't think you will find a legitimate fan of the band that would call it their best song. Most wouldn't put it top 25 or 50 tbh. I don't judge anyone, music is a highly subjective thing, and I certainly have my favorites, but it's generally an instant way to discern whether someone really knows anything about the band and it's music. Touch of Grey barely registers with Deadheads.
So if you go back to the origins of Touch of Grey, they played it live for
years before they even bothered to go into the studio to record and release it, let alone shoot that wacky video. It debuted in 1982, became a live staple, and wasn't even recorded and released until 1987 where it became their biggest commercial radio hit.
That's a key thing that uninformed people who are ignorant to the band's history don't know. Most bands record an album in the studio, multi-track it, dub it, get it fully produced, and then go try to replicate it as best they can on the road. Or ****, they even write it in the studio.
The Dead are a live band, period. They wrote their songs, and worked them out in real time, live on the road with their audience, not in the studio. You can even often hear the songs change a great bit over the first year or two they played them. Their music is meant to be heard live, especially since there is so much improvisation. Contrary to ignorant opinion, they don't as much "stretch out" a studio song on the road with exploratory improvisational jams sometimes, no, that's what the songs ARE, they have to simplify them to fit on the record! It's in reverse. You have no idea how influential they've been, to so many famous artists across all genres. Their ability to go out on a high-wire with no net each night, often without a set list, and bring it home is legendary, and they've been compared to great historical jazz musicians many times because of it. They will play 4-5 shows without repeating a song. Here is Don Was (musician and famous producer of The Rolling Stones, Iggy Pop, Jackson Brown, STP, Van Morrison, Ziggy Marley, etc etc) and Taylor Hawkins (drummer for the Foo Fighters, of course) talking about their influence for example:
The Dead were a terrible fit for the studio, and they've all said as much, they tried to avoid the studio as much as possible, didn't care that much about releasing studio records, but did it anyway, because its what you do. I don't know a single legitimate fan of their music who ever bothers to play one of their studio records. Ever. I sure don't. They hated the studio. I play the live shows. The albums are really only used as ways for new people to maybe get introduced, before they quickly move on.
Back to Touch of Grey - it was a really nice little catchy sentimental song that played well live. Then once it got MTV'd, Heads started to roll their eyes at it and dismiss it. Interestingly enough, as it's aged, and the band has aged, and ****, I'm not even of that generation, but I am sure aging like all of us too, it's kind of circled back to being that nice little song with some relevant sentimentality, telling us it's going to be ok and it's ok even when it's not, especially the way the last few decades have gone here on Earth, with not just the band, but maybe most of us experiencing adversity and also losing people.
"We will get by. We will survive."
"Every silver lining's got a touch of grey."
Music Moments with CE, every Tuesday morning. Tell your friends.
