the book of the dead, 5

As much as I admire and enjoy hearing Workingman’s Dead and American Beauty, there’s a melancholy that hangs over the listening experience for me. Both albums are largely unplugged, all the better to underscore a new rustic direction. The rough-and-tumble 60s are over and the hippies have gone back to the land.  Robert Hunter’s words become increasingly organic and naturalistic, but he remains a remarkable lyricist.  American Beauty is the brighter of the two records, a little more accessible, but Workingman’s is the one that sinks more deeply into your bloodstream over time.  Together they mark a transition to an identity that maintains some continuity with the past but is also something different, more wedded to archetypes of the American West, and more country-flavored as a result.  Candyman is my favorite tune from this period.  The wildness of the 60s may be in the rearview mirror, but this is one of the druggiest songs I can think of.  Garcia’s weepy, sleepy lap steel is like a soft landing from the lysergic odyssey of the previous decade, a passage into some kind of prophylactic downer meant to shield the listener from the postpartum blues... Who is the candyman meant to be?  Is he simply a bringer of good things – love, healing, peace of mind, shelter from the storm?  Perhaps, but why then does he have a murderous streak?