PERFORMING ARTS

Fare Thee Well: The Final Chapter of the Grateful Dead's Long, Strange Trip

by Joel Selvin
with Pamela Turley. De Capo. Jun. 2018. 304p. photos. bibliog. index. ISBN 9780306903052. $27; ebk. ISBN 9780306903045. MUSIC
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This well-written if pedestrian account of the Grateful Dead's post-Jerry Garcia years starts with Garcia's death in 1995 and finishes with the Fare Thee Well reunion concerts in 2015. Selvin (Altamont; Summer of Love), a longtime journalist for the San Francisco Chronicle, has covered the Dead nearly since their inception and did extensive research and interviewing for this book. The contributions of coauthor Turley are unclear. Perhaps the biggest drawback of the tale told here is that the story of the Dead after Garcia is less interesting than the story of the Dead with Garcia. This account is more about scattered individuals and a corporation dealing with a new business model than the evolution of a band.
VERDICT For Deadheads only and not all will be interested. Better starting points would be Dennis McNally's definitive A Long Strange Trip, David Browne's So Many Roads; or Blair Jackson and David Gans's This Is All a Dream We Dreamed.
Reviewed by Derek Sanderson, Mount Saint Mary Coll. Lib., Newburgh, NY , May 15, 2018
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