Project Introduction

I've always appreciated show recommendations from Dead Heads. The encyclopedic knowledge of show dates, setlists, and other information related to the that some people carry around inside their craniums just amazes me at times. While I may not be the world's most hard core Dead Head I do spend a lot of time listening to the band.

Primary Objective: Post about a particular version of a Grateful Dead song every day for the next year.

A few guidelines for the project:

1. Posts: The goal is to have 365 posts in a year's time. It may not be possible to post one per day for obvious reasons. Some catch-up may be inevitable. Regardless, the goal is for 365 over the next year. After that, we'll see what happens.
2. No repeats. As in the same version of the same song. I plan to keep a spreadsheet to track everything so this shouldn't be an issue. I'm interested to see how my listening habits evolve over the project. I will likely do something with this data, but that is TBD.
3. Try to stick to material that is commercially available. I know that stuff goes out of print all the time, but this should make it easier for anyone interested in a specific cut to track down the source. Yes, I know that pretty much everything is available for streaming on archive.org, but I like the idea of being able to procure a physical copy of a release. Plus, commercial releases have been remastered and polished and, therefore, generally sound better. That said, I will try to provide links to archive.org so interested parties have a point of reference if the album is out of print.
4. Primary consideration is for the Grateful Dead, but Dead related material is fair game too. This means solo projects, post-Jerry configurations, and covers, etc.

Of course, these guidelines are subject to revision, but I think it's good to have some type of framework at the outset.

My intention is to, when possible, address WHY a given song was chosen on a particular day. Whether it be weather, special occasion, my favorite sports team winning or losing, or whatever it may be. I'm interested in the way that Grateful Dead music affects and interacts with my life. My hope is that others may consider this question as well.

While I listen to a lot of Dead I do like a wide variety of other stuff. So I may include notes about what else I listened to on a given day. Again, nothing is set in stone and the primary goal is a Dead song per day. That should be sufficiently challenging. Everything else is (Wavy) gravy!

A bit about me:
I've been a fan of the Grateful Dead since 1995 when I was in middle school. I'm in my early 30s now, and I never saw the band with Jerry. I listened to the Dead a lot, but I didn't really get it for a number of years. (I remember buying Hundred Year Hall when it came out an skipping past the monster Other One on it. Now I would never think of doing such a thing.) It seems that a lot of heads have a preference for one era or another, and that oftentimes correlates to when they got on the bus. I certainly have my favorite years, but I like it all. I expect this little experiment will reveal more about my tastes in Dead music, however, so I'm interested to see how it goes.

I am a trained historian (PhD), a sports fanatic (primarily lacrosse and hockey), a husband, a father, and a published author. So some of these things, and perhaps other facets of my life may come through in these pages. I'm not in the business of baring my soul, but rather exploring the relationship between my life and Dead music. Thanks for reading and following along!

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