Rating: 
Summary: The Ultimate All Access Pass
Review: Writing about such a lengthy and complex subject as The Greatful Dead cannot be easy. Making the story both understandable and interesting is all-the-more difficult. Discussing characters, who are -- in real life -- your best friends, must test anyone's ability to tell the truth. Now, ... all the above through the psychedelic fog that surrounded the band, and a biography seems impossible.Mr. McNally should win every award this year for biographies, if there's any God looking over the literary world. He generously succeeds on all accounts, providing readers and fans (many of whom possibly will be reading this as their first book in some time) the ultimate All Access pass. We readers are there for the entire Long Strange Trip. I actually re-read many chapters as soon as I finished them. The stories were so well told, and the up-close perspectives were so vivid. I know I'll read this book periodically many times through the years. Even if you're not a Deadhead, this story tells of the entire San Francisco rise to music's summit, the bands, the artists, the shows, the songs. Not to be overlooked, not to be read carelessly, but rather this book is be savored.
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