Grateful Dead

Few bands have made improvisation the main event quite like the Grateful Dead. Formed in Palo Alto, California, in 1965, they drew on rock, blues, jazz, folk, country, bluegrass, gospel, reggae and world music, and in the early years added space-music psychedelia to their sets. Their reputation rests on live performance and on a devoted following, the Deadheads, who grew by word of mouth and by swapping concert recordings that the band allowed them to tape. They are often called the godfathers of the jam band world.

They began as the Warlocks, playing Magoo's Pizza Parlor in Menlo Park on 5 May 1965, and changed name after learning another group had released a record under it. Their first show as the Grateful Dead came at one of Ken Kesey's Acid Tests in San Jose that December. Despite a single Top 40 hit, Touch of Grey in 1987, they remained among America's highest-grossing touring acts for decades. Jerry Garcia's death in August 1995 ended the band. A 1977 Cornell University show entered the National Recording Registry in 2012, and in 2024 they set a record for Top 40 albums on the Billboard 200.