Greatest Story Ever Told - Bob Weir
3:43
Ace, 1972
Written by Robert Hunter, Bob Weir, and Mickey Hart
Bob Weir died today, of cancer, at the age of 78. This one hits me oddly hard. I was never really a Deadhead, nor ever into their druggy, itinerant lifestyle, and as I got older I found that the Dead have a great deal of dross among their gold. And yet, the Grateful Dead were one of the bands that formed my musical education when I was 15 and my friends all sang along to "Ripple" and "Truckin'" and "Sugar Magnolia." The Dead are in my DNA whether I like it or not. And Weir was a huge part of their success, turning them from Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions to the juggernaut they became. "Estimated Prophet" alone makes Weir a titan. Anyway, this song, off Weir's first solo album, features that inimitable, lived-in, gritty Weir vocal, his unmistakable guitar lines, and some of Robert Hunter's patented stoner-philosopher nonsense: "Gideon come in with his eyes on the floor / Says, 'you ain't got a hinge, you can't close the door' / Moses stood up a full six foot ten / Said 'you can't close the door when the wall's caved in.'" Bless you, Bob.
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