'Skull and Roses,' Grateful Dead - 1971

The original lineup of the Grateful Dead is shown inside the gatefold of "Skull and Roses."

No rock band was more synonymous with live performances than the Grateful Dead.

By 1971 when the group’s self-titled second live album and seventh overall was released, the Dead had already created a powerful reputation as the flag bearers, the soundtrack of the psychedelic and counterculture movements.

Coming to be unofficially known as “Skull and Roses” because of its iconic cover art that later became one of the band’s most recognized symbols, the record almost perfectly represents the band’s live shows of the time in the early 70s when its sound really came together, and the Dead hit its peak.

“Skull and Roses” saw the band performing many songs that became classics of their live repertoire for decades until the death of lead guitarist Jerry Garcia in 1995. Months later in the spring of 1972, the Grateful Dead took many of these same songs across the Atlantic Ocean for the Europe ’72 tour. It was that 22-show tour and the subsequent live albums that is widely considered as the Dead at their best, bringing in a wider assortment of musicians, longer and more improvisational arrangements of fan favorites like “The Other One” and “Playing in the Band,” and truly ushering the group beyond the archetype blue-tinged rock band to become icons or the era unlike any band before or after.

But it started with “Skull and Roses” recorded over several days in April 1971, mostly at the Filmore East in New York City.

The guitar-driven sound, filled with meandering solos and feedback distortions of the Dead’s first live album “Live/Dead” give way to a stronger emphasis on songwriting on “Skull and Roses.” The group is at their psychedelic best, with Garcia opting instead of going on long, intricate solos, to sit back a bit more in the pocket and give his group and the song structure more prominence.

Background vocals are more prominent as rhythm guitarist Bob Weir joins Garcia at the mic, and the two often play off each other both vocally and through their instruments. But the conversational relationship between the guitarists largely takes a back seat to the group’s cohesiveness on three-to-four-minute versions of classics like “Bertha” and “Mama Tried” on the first side.

That pattern of a more mellow, song-oriented Grateful Dead holds true for all four trades on Side 1.

And then you flip it over to side two and things begin to change.

The Skull and Roses design became synonymous with the Grateful Dead years after the album came out.

There is only one track on Side 2 of “Skull in Roses”: an 18-minute version of “The Other One” that opens with a massive drum solo as percussionist Bill Kreutzmann rolls back and forth across his tom drums to create an almost tribal opening that goes on for several minutes before the well-known bass line comes chugging in from bassist Phil Lesh. When the track was recorded, the audience would have had no idea what song was coming during the drum solo, until the few bass notes came in signaling the beginning of one the Dead’s longest-played, iconic songs.

The recognizable riff and Weir’s vocals fade in and out amid Lesh’s famed bass noodlings, while Garcia seems to wander from the staccato guitar licks, allowing his high-pitched yet delicate guitar playing to drip down over a rhythm section that at times seems to be considering musically which direction to take next.

That feeling of a live performance and a song being a living, breathing thing is truly what makes the Grateful Dead probably the most unique and intriguing group to come out of the ’60s and ‘70s rock and roll movement. It’s on display in “Skull in Roses” as strong as any other Dead concert, but more than the others the spacey improvs are balanced perfectly with catchy, dreamy rock songs.

They were mere months from the biggest international tour of their careers, but on “Skull and Roses” Garcia and his bandmates were sculpting the music they would bring to the world and continue to cultivate for the next 25 years.

Personnel:

Jerry Garcia -- lead guitar and vocals

Bob Weir -- Rhythm guitar and vocals

Phil Lesh -- bass and vocals

Bill Kreutzmann -- drums

Ron "Pig Pen" McKernan -- organ, harmonica and vocals