Posted in: News, Trivia Q & A | No Comments | Posted on March 31, 2022 by Mary Anne

Q.  What is the Grateful Dead logo?

A.  Most familiar is a SKULL

The Grateful Dead was an American rock band formed in 1965 in Palo Alto, California.  The band was known for its unique and eclectic style, which fused elements of rock, folk, bluegrass, blues, reggae, country, improvisational jazz, psychedelia, and space rock,  and for live performances of long musical improvisation.  “Their music,” writes Lenny Kaye, “touches on ground that most other groups don’t even know exists.”  These various influences were distilled into a diverse and psychedelic whole that made the Grateful Dead “the pioneering Godfathers of the jam band world”.  They were ranked 57th in the issue The Greatest Artists of all Time by Rolling Stone magazine.  They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994  and their Barton Hall Concert at Cornell University (May 8, 2022) was added to the Library of Congress’s National Recording Registry.  The Grateful Dead has sold more than 35 million albums worldwide.

The founding members of the Grateful Dead were Jerry Garcia (guitar, vocals), Bob Weir (guitar, vocals), Ron “Pigpen” McKernan (keyboards,harmonica, vocals), Phil Lesh (bass, vocals), and Bill Kreutzmann (drums).^[12] Members of the Grateful Dead had played together in various San Francisco bands, including Mother McCree’s Uptown Jug Champions and The Warlocks. Lesh was the last member to join the Warlocks before they became the Grateful Dead; he replaced Dana Morgan Jr., who had played bass for a few gigs. With the exception of McKernan, who died in 1973, the core of the band stayed together for its entire 30-year history.  Other longtime members of the band include Mickey Hart (drums 1967–1971, 1974–1995), Keith Godchaux (keyboards 1971–1979), Donna Godchaux (vocals 1972–1979), Brent Mydland (keyboards 1979–1990), and Vince Welnick(keyboards 1990–1995).

The fans of the Grateful Dead, some of whom followed the band from concert to concert for years, are known as “Deadheads” and are known for their dedication to the band’s music.

The band and its following (Deadheads) are closely associated with the hippie movement and were seen as a form of institution in the culture of America for many years. Former members of the Grateful Dead, along with other musicians, toured as The Dead in 2003, 2004, and 2009 after touring as The Other Ones in 1998, 2000, and 2002. There are many contemporary incarnations of the Dead, with the most prominent touring acts being Furthur and Phil Lesh & Friends.

Over the years, a number of iconic images have come to be associated with the Grateful Dead. Many of these images originated as artwork for concert posters or album covers.

Steal Your Face skull

Perhaps the best-known Grateful Dead art icon is a red, white, and blue skull with a lightning bolt through it. The lightning bolt skull can be found on the cover of the album Steal Your Face, and the image is sometimes known by that name, or as a “stealie”. It was designed by Owsley Stanley and artist Bob Thomas, and was originally used as a logo to mark the band’s equipment.

Dancing Bears A series of stylized marching bears was drawn by Bob Thomas as part of the back cover for the album History of the Grateful Dead, Volume One (Bear’s Choice). Thomas reported that he based the bears on a lead sort from an unknown font.  The bear is a reference to Owsley “Bear” Stanley, who recorded and produced the album. Bear himself wrote, “the bears on the album cover are not really ‘dancing’. I don’t know why people think they are; their positions are quite obviously those of a high-stepping march.”

Skull and roses

The skull and roses design was composed by Alton Kelley and Stanley Mouse, who added lettering and color, respectively, to a black and white drawing by Edmund Joseph Sullivan. Sullivan’s drawing was an illustration for a 1913 edition of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Earlier antecedents include the custom of exhibiting the relic skulls of Christian martyrs decorated with roses on their feast days. The rose is an attribute of Saint Valentine who according to one legend was martyred by decapitation. Accordingly, in Rome, at the church dedicated to him, the observance of his feast day included the display of his skull surrounded by roses.  This was discontinued in the late 1960s when Valentine was removed from the Roman Catholic canon along with other legendary saints whose lives and deeds could not be confirmed. Kelley and Mouse’s design originally appeared on a poster for the September 16 and 17, 1966 Dead shows at the Avalon Ballroom.  Later it was used as the cover for the album Grateful Dead. The album is sometimes referred to as Skull and Roses (or Bertha).

Dancing terrapins

The two dancing terrapins first appeared on the cover of the 1977 album Terrapin Station, which was drawn by Kelley and Mouse, but based on a drawing by Heinrich Kley. Since then these turtles have become one of the Grateful Dead’s most recognizable logos.

Uncle Sam skeleton

The Uncle Sam skeleton was devised by Gary Gutierrez as part of the animation for The Grateful Dead Movie. The image combines the Grateful Dead skeleton motif with the character of Uncle Sam, a reference to the then-recently written song “U.S. Blues”, which the Dead are seen performing near the beginning of the film.

 Jester

Another icon of the Dead is a skeleton dressed as a jester and holding a lute. This image was an airbrush painting done by Stanley Mouse in 1972. It was originally used for the cover of The Grateful Dead Songbook