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What’s up everyone? I hope you’re all having a nice week. I’m going to the Dead and Co. show tonight here in Raleigh, so I figured it’s a good time to write about my favorite Grateful Dead record, Reckoning. I know some people reading this newsletter probably hate the Grateful Dead’s music, and that’s okay. Some people don’t care for it, and some people really enjoy it, and I happen to fall in the latter category. I remember listening to some of the more popular stuff when I was like thirteen and I liked it, but didn’t think much more of it than that. Then probably about five or six years ago I was visiting my buddy out in Colorado and we went on a hike in the mountains and when we were driving back down, he put on Terrapin Station and it just clicked for me. I started listening to all the live stuff and just went down the rabbit hole from there. Diving deep into their music has been very integral on my musical journey and led me to so many other artists and music I love today. If I never had this deep dive, I probably wouldn’t have discovered Billy Strings and been to all the shows I’ve been to this past year and become obsessed with old folk and bluegrass music. Which leads me to the album I’d like to talk about today. My brothers got me this copy of Reckoning (from Sorry State!) for my birthday a couple years back. I remember when I got it, I was a little thrown off by the tracklist. What the hell were all these traditional songs on here I didn’t recognize? An acoustic set? It was all a little different from the stuff I’d heard before from them. I remember I listened to it and thought it was good, but nothing that really stood out to me and it kinda just sat on my shelf for a while while my other Dead records got more love. Fast forward to my revelation with folk music and I come back to this album. Hold up, they’re covering Dark Hollow, Been All Around This World AND Deep Elem Blues on here? Fuck yeah. I love this record so much now, sometimes some things just need a lil bit of time to grow on you and this album has aged like fine wine to me.