In our miniseries of shows on Super Fans, you just had to know there'd be a time when we focused on the ultimate Super Fans - that curious tribe of wandering fans known as Deadheads. For decades, two or even three generations of them crisscrossed the country in their beat up minivans, following the Grateful Dead on their tours, swapping or selling each other souvenirs and hallucinogens, and bathing each month, whether they needed to or not. (I kid - I have a cousin who was a Deadhead, and his hygeine was excellent. Still, there is that persistent image...)
Whatever you think of the Grateful Dead - great underrated songwriters who created a new sonic architecture around those songs, or aimless, drug-addled noodlers - the fact remains they were keenly aware of their fans and, in their embrace of fans taping and swapping their concerts, they were decades ahead of their time. Deadheads formed a farflung, partially mobile community, and the Dead themselves were a part of it. For bands today wrestling with the question of what to do about all the illegal downloads of their music, the Grateful Dead and their fans offer an instructive example - all those bootleg concert tapes, made with the band's okay, simply generated more intense interest in the band's records and tours. The fact that people could get these tapes for free didn't mean they would stint on the commercial release when it came out, or the concert tickets next time the band came to town.
Personally, I like the Grateful Dead's albums from the early 70s, when their songwriting seemed to me to really peak. And I've seen the band live, though it was a long time ago and my memory of it is pretty hazy now. (Okay, it was pretty hazy then too. It was a Dead concert, after all.) But I could never be a Deadhead, and here's why: the true obsessives - the ones who wonder about specific bootleg tapes and spend hours trying to determine which night's performance of "Dark Star" was best (or longest, a topic of unexpected controversy in the community) - must have developed some fine critical listening skills. Doesn't that make you want to listen to lots of other stuff too? And doesn't that make it harder to concentrate so much of your time and attention on a single band, even if it's your favorite? I don't understand how Deadheads can become some of the most analytical, attentive listeners in the music world and spend all that time listening to a single band - however variable and extensive its set list. Is it the drugs? Is it genuine obsession? Perhaps we'll find out today - or maybe, we'll just never know...
Tell us: What do you think of the Deadheads? Are they the ultimate Super Fans?
Leave a comment.
John Schaefer has hosted Soundcheck since the show’s inception in 2002. He has also hosted and produced WNYC’s radio series New Sounds since 1982 (“The No. 1 radio show for the Global Village” – Billboard) and the New Sounds Live concert series since 1986.
Comments [4]
I admit it. It's the drugs.
It's an obsession, but it's pleasin'! LOL
I think you would find that the subset of Deadheads who are "some of the most analytical, attentive listeners in the music world" spend a lot of time listening to music by other performers too. They may listen to an inordinate amount of Dead, but their Dead/non-Dead listening ratio is probably not too far off from the favorite-band/other-band listening ratios of attentive listeners who are superfans of other bands.
I "love" the dead..and saw them many times, but they were plain AWFUL far more than they were good,and this particular resurgence proves only that "the more things change the more they stay the same"!!
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