Live Dead: The Grateful Dead

Half a lifetime in the making, Live Dead: The Grateful Dead is an impressive culminating achievement from famed rock photographer Bob Minkin. The 224-page hardcover coffee-table book provides an unprecedented through-the-lens history of the Grateful Dead and their extended family. The book also represents well the bands that have the re-energized the Dead-esque live music scene, particularly in Marin County, since Jerry Garcia's passing in 1995. With written contributions by three heavy hitters from the Dead family—preface by Tom Constanten, foreword by Steve Parish, and introduction by Blair Jackson—Live Dead also includes some fine on-the-road stories from Minkin, who can spin a yarn almost as well as he can record an image. The photographer, who moved from his native Brooklyn to Marin County in 1990, has had images appear in countless publications, including a 25-year relationship with Relix magazine, and has supplied CD cover art and package design for several Grateful Dead projects. Presented in astounding clarity thanks to spot-gloss varnish atop matte coated paper, Live Dead begins in the mid-1970s and chronicles concerts small and large—from New York to San Francisco, and from Amsterdam to Atlanta—and all the scenes and intimate moments along the way.