I don't take much notice of those lists in magazines, there has been that many now it becomes a bit dire. Comparing music across all the boards and genres is almost impossible at times.
If we were to compare Big Pink to in my opinion the Grateful Dead's finest hour in the studio...American Beauty(my favourite album by the Dead). I think American Beauty is far superior all round, more depth in the original material, stronger lyrically, more expressive vocal work and more intresting instrumentation and it hasn't dated one bit, a new-comer listens to American Beauty and they couldn't put an age on it. Big Pink seems to be as much a Bob Dylan appreciation album than the Bands own vehicle. Perhaps their other albums are better I don't know. I do love the Weight(one of my very favourite songs) and I think alot of Robbie Robertson as a guitarist and composer. I know it was an imoportant album in it's influence. But not on the likes of the dead, Jerry Garcia was already a serious roots-rock, folk musician with an immense knowledge of roots music, and CSN were more of an influence around that time on the Dead. The Band were more southern in their roots. I think alot of the hype and aura that surrounded the Band was due to their involvemeant with Bob Dylan, a luxury many other bands never had. I do feel they come across as a little precious at times, almost too arty. But I agree they were a powerful band that deserve there place in history but history and the events surrounding are often fickle due to certain details of the time, and sometimes other, just as impressive and expressive moments or artists get overlooked.
Phil Lesh is a very avant-garde musician, he plays the bass as if he invented it! His compositions were often complex and dense. But always different. I compare his songs to Stanley Kubrick movies, you might have to wait a long time for one but when it comes you know it's something special and offering something different.
The transition the Grateful Dead went through from 65 to 70 with their styles, their first album through to Anthem and Live Dead and Aoxomoxoa was nothing short of phenomenal, had the Dead been more mainstream they would have been treated like musical gods and geniuses. There was not one band in the world that was playing as dense, far out music that was as fiery, expressive and totaly original than the dead were around Anthem of the Sun. No guitarist on earth was playing like Garcia was around that period, it was stuff that the most complex and advanced areas of jazz would only dare reach. Listen to how he floats in and out on Anthem of the Sun's New Potato Caboose, his comand of the songs tempo and route is sheer brilliance on his part. In those days the Dead put alot into their albums, Garcia loved being in the studio, toiling away day and night learning as he went. Once the album was out he always dissmissed it as nothing special and as the years went by making albums became less appealing to him. The buck stopped with jerry, he was the force behind everything. While Bobby Weir became a very inventive guitarist in his own right, something he simply had to do due to the nature of the dead's style. He also became a great songwriter, if a little obtuse at times. His songs took time to grow on stage and often didn't come out too good in the studio and again it was Garcia's licks and solo's that made most of these songs.
When the Grateful Dead played their roots-rock/americana/country-rock hand I believe they did it better than anyone else in the game. Their greatest music cannot be traced back to a time, only the feeling of a time within that listener, the deads best music is there for us not matter how we feel and it will take us where ever we need to go. Publicity and world-wide acclaim may have eluded them but they never went looking for that, no...these guys were the peoples band. The Peoples champions, a band championed by real music lovers, real people.
