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Eric Burdon and the Animals
Gratefully Dead
This track “Gratefully Dead” only appears as a B‑side to the Animals UK release of “San Franciscan Nights” 45, and as far as I know has not been re-issued yet.
In fact most of The “New” Animals work is sadly forgotten. The new psychedelic lineup was based in the States and played many of the west coast freakout venues and were actually pretty big here.
“San Franciscan Nights” was a massive hit, being Burdon’s tribute to his new psychedelic home base. Oddly enough “Gratefully Dead” was skipped for the USA release and appeared as flip to the UK single as mentioned earlier.
You will want to track this 45 down because “Gratefully Dead” is a mind-numbing psychedelic blues workout. Burdon is at his chest beating best and delivers a totally dosed set of cosmic slop words and grunts. Guitarists John Weider and Vic Briggs take turns at trying to out-Hendrix each other and the whole piece does a wierd stop start at the end, Whew!!!! You can find this single for about a fiver too!!