HERE BESIDE THE RISING TIDE

A solid addition to the expanding Grateful Dead canon.

Political biographer Newton situates the Grateful Dead and its charismatic lead guitarist, Jerry Garcia, in their remarkable place and time. Focusing heavily on the first decade of the band’s 30-year run, which ended with Garcia’s death in 1995, Newton blends insights from earlier histories and biographies with his own extensive research. The book traces Garcia’s early interest in bluegrass and folk music to the improvisatory rock that became the Dead’s signature. It slows down around the band’s key performances and albums but otherwise keeps the tempo brisk. Above all, it blends the Dead’s story with the social movements, politics, literature, and journalism of that period. By innovating continuously and attending to its growing fan base, the band outlasted most of its peers. It also survived the War on Drugs waged by Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, whom Newton casts as Garcia’s foil. Even in the 1960s, he notes, Garcia “deplored the politics of war and Reagan, but also resisted the bossiness of the left.” By the time Reagan occupied the White House, Garcia’s drug addiction had isolated him from his fragmented family and the thriving musical community he helped sponsor. Yet Newton declines to portray Garcia as a slacker, victim, or tragic hero. Instead, he draws out the paradoxes, ironies, and complexities that piled up around the aging rock star, his band, and the Deadhead community. Newton closes with a surefooted and appreciative account of the counterculture and its durable spirit. “It doesn’t work for everyone, and it doesn’t always work even for those who come to accept it,” Newton writes. “It doesn’t have to. Like a Dead show, it works in moments. And it’s magnificent when it does.”

A deft portrait of a quintessential American artist.