The Grateful Dead‘s self-titled 1971 live album is getting a remastered expanded edition for its 50th anniversary. Known by fans as Skull & Roses due to its iconic cover art (and as Skull Fuck, the band’s proposed title, which was promptly rejected by the record company), the eponymous live LP contains material recorded in New York and the band’s native San Francisco during March and April 1971.
The expanded set includes remastered versions of its 11 original tracks and a bonus disc of 10 previously unreleased tracks that were recorded during the band’s final show at the Fillmore West on July 2, 1971. The collection comes out on June 25.
The band previewed the Skull & Roses expanded edition with a previously unreleased version of “The Other One” from the July 2 Fillmore show.
You can listen to it below.
Skull & Roses marked the Grateful Dead’s second live album after 1969’s Live/Dead and became their first album to receive a gold certification from the RIAA. It remained their best-selling album until the 1974 compilation Skeletons From the Closet.
Originally packaged as a double LP, the Skull & Roses set comprised mostly covers—from Kris Kristofferson’s “Me and Bobby McGee” to Chuck Berry‘s “Johnny B. Goode”—and a handful of brand new originals. No material from the group’s two 1970 studio efforts, Workingman’s Dead and American Beauty, appeared on the record.
Skull & Roses further established the Dead as an incendiary, freewheeling live act, and the ensuing years would see them prioritize touring over releasing new studio material. It was a risky move that paid off in spades, as the Grateful Dead remain one of the most popular touring acts of all time.
Grateful Dead (Skull & Roses): Expanded Edition will be available digitally, as a two-CD set, as a double-LP black vinyl and as a limited black-and-white propeller vinyl.
You can see the Skull & Roses expanded track listing below.
‘Grateful Dead (Skull & Roses): Expanded Edition’ Track Listing
Disc One: Original Album Remastered
1. “Bertha”
2. “Mama Tried”
3. “Big Railroad Blues”
4. “Playing In The Band”
5. “The Other One”
6. “Me & My Uncle”
7. “Big Boss Man”
8. “Me & Bobby McGee”
9. “Johnny B. Goode”
10. “Wharf Rat”
11. “Not Fade Away/Goin’ Down The Road Feeling Bad”
Disc Two: Fillmore West, San Francisco (7/2/71)
1. “Good Lovin’”
2. “Sing Me Back Home”
3. “Mama Tried”
4. “Cryptical Envelopment”
5. Drums
6. “The Other One”
7. “Big Boss Man”
8. “Not Fade Away”
9. “Goin’ Down The Road Feeling Bad”
10. “Not Fade Away”