"Truckin'"first appeared on their 1970 album American Beauty. It was recognized by the United States Library of Congress in 1997 as a national treasure.Written by band members Jerry Garcia, Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, and lyricist Robert Hunter, "Truckin'" molds classic Grateful Dead rhythms and instrumentation with lyrics that use the band's misfortunes on the road as a metaphor for getting through the constant changes in life. Its climactic refrain, "What a long, strange trip it's been," has achieved widespread cultural use in the years since the song's release.
"Truckin'" was considered a "catchy shuffle" by the band members. Garcia himself commented that "the early stuff we wrote that we tried to set to music was stiff because it wasn't really meant to be sung ... the result of [lyricist Robert Hunter getting into our touring world], the better he could write ... and the better we could create music around it."The communal, shared-group-experience feel of the song is brought home by the participation of all four of the group's chief songwriters (Garcia, Weir, Lesh, and Hunter), since, in Phil Lesh's words, "we took our experiences on the road and made it poetry," lyrically and musically. He goes on to say that "the last chorus defines the band itself."
Over the band's long concert career, "Truckin'" was performed 520 times, making it the eighth-most performed Dead song
1974-05-19
Memorial Coliseum
Portland, Oregon
Disc 1
1. Mississippi Half-Step (cut in)
2. Mexicali Blues
3. Big RR Blues
4. Black Throated Wind
5. Scarlet Begonias
6. Beat It On Down The Line
7. Tennessee Jed
8. Bobby McGee
9. Sugaree
10.Jack Straw
11.It Must Have Been The Roses
12.El Paso
13.Loose Lucy
Disc 2
1. Money Money
2. China Cat Sunflower
3. I Know You Rider
4. Promised Land
5. Bertha
6. Greatest Story Ever Told
7. Ship of Fools
8. Weather Report Suite Prelude
9. Part 1
10.Let It Grow
11.Wharf Rat
Disc 3
1. Big River
2. Peggy O
3. Truckin'
4. Jam
5. Mind Left Body Jam
6. Not fade Away
7. Goin' Down The Road Feelin' Bad
8. One More Saturday Night
9. US Blues
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