Blues For Allah 50: Franklin’s Tower

Rich Mahan (0:00)

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The Good Ol Grateful Deadcast, the official podcast of The Grateful Dead. I'm Rich Mahan with Jesse Jarnow, exploring the music and legacy of The Grateful Dead for The Committed And The Curious. Ladies and gentlemen, fellow Deadheads, welcome to season 12 of The Good Ol Grateful Deadcast. I'm your co-host Rich Mahan. Thank you very much for tuning in. In this episode of The Good Ol Grateful Deadcast, we complete the song trio of Help Slip Frank by taking a good long look at the groover that is Franklin's Tower. Well folks, The Grateful Dead Blues For Allah 50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition arrives this Friday, September 12th. This three CD set features the newly remastered album with unreleased soundcheck and concert recordings. Check this out. The set features almost two hours of unreleased recordings. Among the highlights are rehearsals from the band's August 12th, 1975 soundcheck at the Great American Music Hall in San Francisco, including the album track Sage & Spirit, Help On The Way, Slipknot, and today's song, Franklin's Tower. The collection continues with performances from June 21st, 1976 show at the Tower Theater in Pennsylvania, spotlighting five blues for Allah songs alongside favorites like Eyes Of The World. Rounding out the set are selections from Bill Graham's Snack Benefit that students need athletics, culture, and kicks at Kizar Stadium in San Francisco on March 23rd, 1975 There are also vinyl variants of the original album available, including a picture disc, and a Midnight Fire red vinyl edition and 180 gram black vinyl edition. Very cool looking Blues For Allah 50th anniversary merch is now also available, and all of these are available at dead.net. And over at rhino.com, you can also pre-order the Dolby Atmos mixes of Blues For Allah on Blu-ray Disc. They were mixed by Stephen Wilson and are ready to blow your mind. All of these fine releases are out this Friday, September 12th at dead.net and rhino.com. Head on over to dead.net/deadcast and check out all of our past episodes, including the complete seasons 1 through 11 You can link from there to your favorite podcasting platform so you can listen how, when and where you like to listen. Please help the Good Ol Grateful Deadcast by subscribing, sharing us with your friends on social media, hitting that like button and leaving a review. Thank you very much. Do you have a great story about any of the songs from Blues For Allah? Were you lucky enough to catch the band at one of their very few shows in 1975? Then we need to hear from you. Head over to stories.dead.net and record yourself telling us all about it. You may just hear yourself on a future episode of the Deadcast.

We have transcripts from many of your favorite Deadcast episodes available for your reading pleasure. Head on over to dead.net/deadcastdashindex and check them out. Is there another song that feels as good when it hits as Franklin's Tower? The way it drops in after Help On The Way and Slep Not is like getting the biggest, warmest hug from a song that you could ever get. It's certainly a fan favorite and for good reason. It's just fun. Jesse's got the details about Franklin's Tower for you right here.

Jesse Jarnow (4:25)

With one notable exception, The Grateful Dead didn't really have hits. And in fact, the song we're talking about today was released as a single in January 1976 and didn't chart. But in the reality the Grateful Dead occupied, Franklin's Tower was a smash.

In the scope of Blues for Allah, Franklin's Tower doesn't have much competition in terms of catchy refrains, and it was one of the dead's catchiest yet. And not only was it catchy, but especially in the context of Blues For Allah, it was harmonically simple and easy for almost any guitarist just starting out. If you spent any regular time in a dead parking lot, you've probably heard people playing this one. On the album, it's nestled between two of the most complex songs the dead ever wrote and floating on a groove that earned drummer Billy Kreutzman a songwriting credit. But Franklin's Tower is the unusual dead song in that the chords go exactly where you'd expect them to go. But just because it's easy doesn't mean it's simple, especially when performed live. Grateful Dead archivist and legacy manager David Lemieux.