From: ajw@cbnews.cb.att.com (andrew.j.whitman)
Subject: Re: Opinions on the Grateful Dead? (no flames, please)
Organization: AT&T
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 1992 14:13:45 GMT

In article <1992Jul28.225208.16168@meaddata.com> mcr@meaddata.com (Mary Ries) writes:
>I have gotten a few comments from friends at church about the Grateful
>Dead sticker on my car conflicting with the fish sticker. The GD
>sticker was there before I got saved, but I still like their music,
>and haven't really felt convicted to scrape it off.  Plus, its a neat
>piece of artwork (long, skinny, flowery letters of the band's name).
>
>My friends don't really criticize, more of a concerned curiosity. I
>guess some people have an idea that the Grateful Dead are a bad
>influence.
>
>Does anyone know why the Grateful Dead has a kind of tarnished
>reputation, or what is behind their name, or why they use skeletons as
>a logo?  I haven't really analyzed their lyrics. Neither had the
>people who commented on my sticker, they are mainly curious about
>their name.  I've never really noticed a connection of the symbolism
>to their lyrics.  They seem pretty harmless to me.  Am I being totally
>naive? Does anybody know more about them?
>
>(BTW, I haven't been reading the secular vs. christian music thread...
>if there is one... I'm asking specifically about the Grateful Dead, I
>really want to know! No flames, please :-)

Well, I'm certainly not in a position to make authoritative statements
here, but I'll relate my experience.

I followed the Dead's music for a lot of years, and for a couple of
years I literally *followed* them - if not around the country, then
at least around the midwest.  I went to dozens of concerts, collected
lots of tapes, met a lot of really fine and really bizarre people.

I don't listen to the Dead at all these days.  I get bad vibes
when I even think about the band.  Anybody who's been reading my
postings at all over the last year or so knows that I don't have
problems, per se, with "secular" music, but I have problems with
the Grateful Dead.  

Now remember, this is me, and I'm not suggesting that my reaction
should be yours as well.  Objectively, when I think about the music
and the lyrics, there is little there that could be considered as
offensive or immoral.  Robert Hunter's lyrics tend to be so 
ambiguous that it's difficult to figure out just what *is* being
communicated.  My problems come more from what the band represents
and from the impact they had on my life.

Deadheads are a remarkable community in many ways.  There are obviously
exceptions to this, but in general the followers of the Grateful Dead
do a pretty good job of caring for one another, sharing their material
possessions with one another, accepting one another's differences, and
living together peacefully.  I appreciate their concern about the
environment.  I appreciate their refusal to let the ideals of the
sixties die away.  As Elvis Costello once sang, what's so funny
about peace, love, and understanding?  Nothin' that I can see.  The
church could learn some lessons there.

And that's the problem, at least for me.  The appeal of the Grateful
Dead is the idea of community that they represent.  It's attractive.
But, as a Christian, I should look for community within the body of
Christ.  And I should expect to see a qualitative difference in the
type of community that I find within the church versus what I find
outside the church.  The Grateful Dead offers a community without
a foundation.  When the band disintegrates/dies, the community will
disintegrate too.  I don't blame people for wanting to be accepted,
for wanting to be a part of a larger whole.  I just think it's
important that one derives one's identity from something that lasts.
And like all worldly hopes, the Grateful Dead is gonna let you 
down big time.  

I hope it's clear from this that I don't hate the Grateful Dead.  In
fact, my fears and reservations come because I *like* them.  But I
know that, in my own situation, there is too much of an appeal there
to embrace the scene, and that would be unhealthy for me.  So I 
stay as far away from it as I can.  The sixties are over, and no
amount of psychedelic improvisation and dope and acid and tie-dyed
T-shirts are going to bring them back again.  But I hope that the
ideals that the sixties represented can live on in the church, 
the original counterculture.  I still take the peace, love, and
understanding seriously.  It's just that now I'm trying to look
to Jesus Christ, and not Jerry Garcia, as the source of that 
peace, love, and understanding.

No flames intended toward you, Mary.  Keep on truckin', one way or
the other.  But I'm curious.  How can a fan of the Grateful Dead
appreciate misty-eyed, over-emoting soloists at church?  :-)

>Mary Ries | Die, v.: | Software Engineer mcr@meaddata.com | To stop
>sinning suddenly. | Mead Data Central ..uunet!meaddata!mcr | -- Elbert
>Hubbard | Dayton, Ohio

Andy Whitman
AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus, Ohio
att!cblpn!ajw  or
ajw@cblpn.att.com