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Rating:  -
Simply put, this is the best book you can buy about Garcia & the Dead.
It is well written, enjoyable and well balanced between the artistical side and the dark side of the man and his friends of the road.
Buy it together with the book from Lesh (more on the music) and the one from Scully (more on the gossip) and you'll have a good picture of the whole history.
Rating:  -
I took to this book with a degree of hope given the position of Blair Jackson as a long time fan of the Grateful Dead, hoping that this biography would avoid the sensationalism of other books on the same subject and present the life of Garcia from the position of an informed, yet hardly disinterested, observer.
As I have turned the last few pages of the Epilogue I have to say that after a strong start the last few chapters of the book have left me rather dissatisfied.
This book offers a well researched, and somewhat detailed account of Jerry Garcia predominantly from the viewpoint of a man and his music. As to being a man there is no doubt, a man like the rest of us with his peculiarities and idiosyncracies, his strengths and his weaknesses. What comes across strongly throughout this lengthy account is a man who's love for music took him to great heights of virtuosity but who, in the process, suffered the fate of many in music, to become a celebrity drawing unwanted attention wherever he went whilst longing for the privacy to be that ordinary guy like everyone else.
Jackson's strengths in the book lie in the historical details of family life and upbringing, Garcia's life as a young man and the twists and turns of the musical developments. There is clearly a lot of factual and well documented material from a wide variety of sources from which we can derive some interesting perspectives of the general millieu of the life and times of the Grateful Dead and the larger community.
The people who knew the artist best of course, are those who were closest to him, the wives and the lovers but most importantly, the musicians who spent the most time with him. It is a sad reflection of our crazy corporate world today that we spend most of our lives at work and in the company of our colleagues and in the case of musicians that is probably truer than most. This however, points to, in my mind, the greates deficiency of the work altogether, the lack of insight into the mind of Garcia the man which can only be provided by those closest to him. To be sure the facts are there, especially the broad outlines but the intimate details are sadly lacking. One of the most telling moments in this regard lies in the epilogue where the lawyers for the last Mrs. Garcia argue that the marriage with Mountain Girl should not be considered a true marriage because of the couple living apart, only to fall flat when it is disclosed that this was the situation to with the last marriage. What insight into Jerry's mind can be gathered from those intimates who were close emotionally but separate physically. What is lacking are views from the bandmembers aside from the noticing of his health and well being.
The latter chapters of the book concerning around the last ten years of garcia's life are somwhat lighter than the earlier chapters signalling some loss of interest in the band by the author himself at that point?
The matter of fact treatment of the drug abuse issue is to be welcomed in stark contrast to the approaches of other books on the subject. It is better to be honest than to overlook or sensationalise and the truth of the matter is that many people in our society, for many reasons, have problems with some form of dependency and it is disingenuous for many to disappove without examining their own behaviour.
Overall I think that there is a place on the shelves for this book along with those of McNally and Lesh. It helps give us a broader picture of the life and times of Jerry Garcia and the Grateful Dead but in many ways it raises more questions than answers but it is well written and easy to read and in general the pros outweigh the cons.
Rating:  -
What a disappointment this book is. For one is very poorly written. Blair Jackson is simply too much of a fanboy and too little of a writer with this particular book. Its presents itself as a biography of Garcia and far too many times it drifts off into a simplistic Deadhead's review of Garcias various tunes. Way too many pretentious references to Hunters lyrics and really his put downs on Weir and other members (thinly veiled but non the less put downs) reek of Garcia worship. He finds no faults in any Garcia tunes and plays up his ballads (which were often low points of Dead shows) like they were the shimmering representation of all that is the Grateful Dead.
He also glosses over many aspects of Garcias personal life, which is silly for a biography. There are more reviews of Hunter and Garcia tunes then there are facts presented about the man the book is about. If its something that can be said without bringing up anything critical then Jackson carries on about it, but if its a low point then he will place a sentence or at most a paragraph. Garcia is a complex man and his biography should have been more complex. I dont want to read another book chiming in with English 101 poetry reviews, I wanted to read a book that chronicled Garcias life in an unobstructed manner. Jackson turned out to be way too much of a fanboy of Garcia to make an effective book.
Rating:  -
It turns out that writing books about The Grateful Dead is a lot like writing books about the Beatles; highly speculative, frequently pointless and ultimately frustrating, unless you're somebody like Ken Kesey or Ed McClanahan, writers who were there with the Dead from the start and speak the language. That said, Blair Jackson gets as close as anyone totally caught in the Dead's warp can to writing a definitive book on Garcia. Jackson's Deadhead banter sometimes gets in the way of, you know, communicating about why the rest of us should consider Jerry Garcia one of the greats. Mind you, I think he is, but the proof is ultimately in listening to one of the Dead's many live albums (and some of the studio ones as well) or Garcia's other records and HEARING why, not reading much of what's here. What IS worth the time is the extensive discography Jackson has at the end, which is a reliable signpost for what a non-Deadhead fan or a Dead newbie might find worth the time and money.
In sum, a good book for Deadheads or Dead admirers, not so great if you don't know what the fuss is/was about...but want to.
Rating: -
Recycled from when I was just a"reader":
For anyone who has been to a Grateful Dead show, the phrase, "there's nothing quite like a Dead concert" was as much a truism as "chances are pretty good that the sun will in fact rise tomorrow." Jackson's biography of the band leader (as this book makes clear, Jerry Garcia was the leader of the Group, as he was the leader of all of his side projects) explains clearly and insightfully the tremendous amount of energy that was put into their shows to ensure the uniqueness of each concert. Jackson also describes (but can't really explain) the almost bipolar nature of Jerry Garcia's personal life that led him to a life of drug abuse and heartless infidelity while at the same time being very lucid about his ideals. He was always clear about what he saw the band doing but was unable to envision a happy life for himself. The historical references are often interesting but there is an exhaustive discussion of his funeral at the end of the book and there's a lot of gossip that perhaps could have been deleted. I suppose there are people that like that kind of stuff.
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