There’s a short period when a teenager is learning to drive where they describe the sensation as the world rushing at them and admit, in a very un-teenager like way, that driving is harder than it seems.
Of course, this admission is never repeated. The human brain, it is said, may be best at filtering out unnecessary information rather than gathering it or even processing it.
Within minutes, the overwhelming onrush of data gets filtered down into a managable stream of only the most pertinent bits.
For me, jumping into the Grateful Dead with both feet at this late date in their career and in my extended adolescence has felt much like the young driver feels at first.
The sheer volume, thousands of shows, over four decades, often three hours long, over several dozen songs typically played at each, never a repeated set-list, nearly every show available online for downloading or streaming, in various incarnations, soundboards, audience and matrix, from various sources (board mixes from Betty Cantor, Bear, Dan Healy and others), it’s just total overload.
There’s just no way to stick to an organized dive through the pile, and no fun in resisting the natural urges to follow hunches and personal peccadilloes. I tend to like repetition. If I like a song or a specific performance, I want to play it to death before moving on.
Having struck a rich vein in the May 1977 shows, I have moved laterally amongst them.
Urges abound, such as to become a reviewer, a teacher, a polemicist, a scold. Urges to be resisted.
In retrospect, I think my fear as a teenager — that my personality would not allow me to be a reasonable part-time Grateful Dead fan while maintaining other passions — was well-founded. My decision to defer exploring was a wise one, if only from the perspective of a guy now listening to the Dead the entire 18 hours he is awake, whether by iPod, computer, car or sometimes computer and laptop simultaneously (playing a download while surfing the Internet Archive for specific points of comparison).
Since it is impossible to be unaware of the archivist’s dream that is the Grateful Dead live canon, I wonder whether those coming to the band post-Jerry (and post-Internet age) are all self-selecting obsessive-compulsive completists?
In other words, are we attracted by the data structure or by the music? Not to say the music isn’t keeping me here, it is way beyond my expectations and brings repeated and great joy, but is the obsession fueled by the fact that the music is there in such overwhelming volume to be surmounted?
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June 22, 2009 at 05:13
igorjazz
As someone with a tendency to hoard information and music (and, of course, information about music), I can definitely say that, as you so ably put it, “the obsession [is] fueled by the fact that the music is there in such overwhelming volume to be surmounted.”
I sometimes step back and wonder how strong my interest in the Dead would be if, like virtually all other bands of its vintage, only a handful of their live recordings were officially released and distribution of unofficial live recordings (soundboard, audience, or otherwise) was at least frowned upon if not completely outlawed. I think I would have only a passing interest in the band and would wonder why, given the quality of the official live recordings (assuming Live/Dead would one of the few in that scenario), more were not released.
It’s the music, to be sure, but it’s especially the dizzying variety of the music; that is, at least for me, it’s the improvisation and the copious documentation of it. I guarantee that if live recordings of any of the jazz masters (Coltrane, Parker, Monk, etc.) were available to the same extent as live Dead recordings, the followings of those artists would be even greater than they already are. Imagine sorting through a particular month of live performances by one of the jazz masters and comparing them with one another (a la the Dead in May 1977); the level of knowledge and devotion to that music would be much greater.
However, the trick—and admittedly, one I have yet to master—is to find stuff I enjoy listening to without hoarding everything I might enjoy regardless of whether I can reasonably expect to listen to it anytime soon. Given the low cost of digital storage and the incredible availability of free digital Dead recordings, that’s a challenge; but I know myself well enough to know that if I actually tried to amass a complete Dead collection I would not enjoy the music as much. The completist would steal joy from the devoted listener and fan.
Thanks for providing a venue for these types of discussions.