The Grateful Dead - Mindbender - Non-Album Tracks (1965-1966)

I've posted some Grateful Dead here, but I've got a lot more to post. This time, I want to go all the way back to the beginning, in 1965 and 1966. This is an album containing all original material, that has mostly been forgotten, even by most Deadheads.

I won't go into the history of the Grateful Dead's first years, except to say the band was formed in 1965, released an obscure single in 1966, and then put out their first album in 1967. I'd never paid attention to their music prior to that first album, probably because it hasn't been well served by official releases. There is an official album called "The Birth of the Grateful Dead," which is okay, but it misses a lot. Other official albums have come out here and there, including one called "Rare Cuts and Oddities," and some live material from 1966 has come out too.

But due to the scattershot nature of the releases, I'd had no idea that the band actually had composed an album's worth of original material in 1966 that basically never got released, except for some of the songs on some archival material many years later. This is especially surprising considering that the A and B sides of their 1966 single were cover songs, and only two songs on their 1967 album "The Grateful Dead" were originals.

But one has to remember that musical tastes were changing rapidly at that time. A song that sounded good in 1966 might have been seen as badly dated by 1967. That's what appears to have happened here. Only two of the band's 1966 originals survived to be officially recorded, as well as played after 1967: "Cream Puff War" and "Caution (Do Not Stop on Tracks)." Probably a key reason is that lyricist Robert Hunter didn't start writing lyrics for the band until 1967. (He first got involved with the classic song "Dark Star.") I'm not sure who actually wrote most of the 1966 songs, especially the lyrics, since they are generally just credited to the group as a whole.

That said, most of these are good songs, and even the lyrics are pretty good. No, these songs don't compare with the big run of classic songs the band would soon be making, but by 1966 standards these songs help explain why the Grateful Dead soared to become one of the most popular bands in the San Francisco Bay Area and soon got a nationwide record contract.

I've put all of them together on this 39 minute long album to show the band's early talent at songwriting.1966 was also a big year for the Grateful Dead covering many interesting songs. But I'm going to post two albums of all of those. Normally, I would mix originals and covers together if they're from the same time period, but I think it's more useful to do it this way, because  I've looked all over, and I haven't seen any such collection of 1966 originals.

The sound quality of these songs are surprisingly good, considering how they're from before the band got very popular. If you like the Grateful Dead at all, you should check this out. The songs are in rough chronological order.

01 Mindbender [Confusion's Prince] (Grateful Dead)
02 Caution [Do Not Stop On Tracks] (Grateful Dead)
03 The Only Time Is Now (Grateful Dead)
04 Can't Come Down (Grateful Dead)
05 You See a Broken Heart (Grateful Dead)
06 Cream Puff War (Grateful Dead)
07 You Don't Have to Ask (Grateful Dead)
08 Tastebud (Grateful Dead)
09 Standing on the Corner (Grateful Dead)
10 Cardboard Cowboy (Grateful Dead)
11 Down So Long (Grateful Dead)
12 Alice D. Millionaire (Grateful Dead)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15118584/TGratefulD_1965-1966_Mindbendr_atse.zip.html

The cover comes courtesy of Peter from the Albums I Wish Existed blog.