Oneida are Closet Deadheads?

As an appendix to my Oneida feature from last week and a nice little companion to the space-wonky intro-jam of the newly released Pre-Teen Weaponry - the boys from Brooklyn could do no better than release the Heads Ain't Ready 7" - as both a-side and b-side sport Grateful Dead covers.

Of course my own experience with the Dead is probably very similar to most of my peers who didn't have an older brother or sister who followed Jerry Garcia around the earth...or started ingesting psychedelics in junior high.....as such, I thought the group was mindless crud, and for some reason only reasonably enjoyed in the live setting, hence the boxes of tapes all the kids at Kenyon used to have -- meaning don't get anywhere near the studio recordings, as they were merely excercises to fullfill obligations. I sure did like "Touch of Grey" though, when MTV played it on repeat.

As Oneida can well attest to, anyone who slogged them off was dead wrong. Sure the tie-dyed fans and the parking-lot hippie-camp mystique turned off a generation of kids who were choking on grunge and hip-hop, but once drugs took part in our lives, so did albums like Anthem of the Sun and American Beauty, and eventually everything they did came into the fold -- save the later boots where Garcia was stoned unconcious on the guitar. Just heard Blues for Allah for the first time and boy did it blow me away.

On this extremely limited red and blue translusent vinyl, Oneida show that love in enthusiastic romps through "Cream Puff War" and "Cold Rain and Snow," both pulled from the Dead's 1967 s/t debut. You'd think it would be difficult to not play it by the book. Oneida are not book-smart -- as these two faithful covers are chugging little monsters, both with a head full of steam that hasn't been seen since the Enemy Hogs salad days. All's I can say is follow along, buy one of these soon, and continue to ride that wave, this band has a ton of perpelxing, genre-bashing, projects like this coming soon.