Zebra Records 44023-2

You can wander downtown in any major city on a Wednesday night and watch a
collective of good-hearted, well-intentioned devotees wank-wank-noodle their
way through a set of Grateful Dead originals and even hear a few covers of
covers the
Dead did. Barring that, you can meander down to your kindest local vendor
and pick up the newest Dead tribute album or collection of songs inspired
by the Dead or bluegrass tribute to the Dead or collection of original
tunes covered by the Dead or reggae tribute to the Dead or recently
unearthed rare four-track of Jerry and friends that fell into the hands of
the
Domino's guy or the freshest crispy soundboard release from the archives
or… and
so on and so on. If all this doesn't slake your thirst for all things Dead,
you can wait for the Illuminati to roll through and sink you teeth into an
well-charted Terrapin or hold out and play "Name That Dead Show" with
the
Dark Star Orchestra.

Can the market be saturated? Seemingly, no. So the question for each of
these offerings becomes, "Is this release simply juicing the Dead name
for a cheap buck, or is this a vital extension of the Dead legacy?" The
answer for "Great Sky River" is an equivocal "yes".

Sure, the track records of the players (T Lavitz, Alphonso Johnson, Rod
Morganstein, and Jimmy Herring) are solid enough, and the jams are extensive
and often fluid. But the setlist is staid, with only the briefest of
sojourns into Blues For Allah straying from the predictable. And all
the takes are straight — few clever stylistic reworkings or altered time
signatures here. Despite the title, the disc is no jazzier than the Dead
themselves. In fact, the live set – riddled with explosive and emotive,
hard-edged solos from Herring – is far more rock n' roll than jazz or even
the Dead themselves. Talent alone pegs this above your downtown devotees.

In short, this well-packaged release leeches off a legacy with its eye on
those loose bills in your wallet, adding to a long list of projects that
suskle the suckers who can't ever get enough Dead. None of that changes
the fact that my arm hairs stand on edge every time I hear Jimmy lead into
St. Stephen or flow into Morning Dew. Despite my theoretical
objections to the insidious practice, I am in there mucking in the mud, shoving suckers
aside and grappling for the teat.