Grateful Dead: Chuckin', Got Their Chips Cashed In...
Rock shoes are fun for everyone, yeah? No. OK yeah, fun for blogging. The unexpectedly fertile field of rock/shoe tie-ins adds another photo set for the world of internet comments today, with new images of the Dead's very own line of Converse. This makes 100 years of the shoe brand, a centennial celebration that's already under way via the Cobain edition. Which pairs well with the Ramones' edition, see because these are artists that had publicly proclaimed their affinity for the footwear. But for the Dancing Bears? From my limited Dead show experience (I turned 17 at the first show with an "Unbroken Chain," which my hippie friends deemed highly auspicious) a Birkenstock or Teeva or barefoot-and-stoned line of footwear would be more fitting. But the press release we received this morning has its own ideas. Click that pic up there to see a bigger version of the shoe, and here's another Dead design:
You can buy these American beauties through the Converse site and Journeys stores nationwide. According to TheDailySwarm, the Dead Chucks join the Cobains and the yet-to-be-seen Doors and Beatles editions as part of Converse's celebration of countercultural musical icons that were ripe for corporate appropriation.
All of these obviously need taglines for sales. Our proposal for the Dead's is in that post header (use it, Converse). For the Beatles? All you need is Chucks. I'm retiring from blogging for a career in advertising.
UPDATE: According to Converse, there will NOT be a Beatles-themed line of Chucks. Apologies for the misreporting. Although if they change their mind, they should still totally use our tagline.
Posted at 1:07 PM by amrit in Rock Shoes
Tags: Grateful Dead | The Doors
this almost annoys me as much as jerry and bobby’s live vocals due - dissonant garbage.
Score = 0
You knew that when Nike purchased Converse that eventually Nike's marketing machine would come up with about a bazillion ways to f^ck up the iconic Chucks . . .
Score = 1
If you hate this shoe so much, why did you blog about it and give it that much more exposure? Less ads and back to the music, please.
Score = -3
Way to define an entire fan base by your well informed cliche stereotypes - yes all dead fans wear berkenstocks, I have mine on right now as I read your quaint little blog. Also, all indie rock kids appreciate live music by standing straight as a corpse, nautical star tattoed hands in their tight little thrift store pockets nodding their teagan and sara barber school drop out self righteous heads. Your a donkey, an infertile corss-bred bastard child. Stupid self righteous hipster blogger dink
Score = -3
grammar police. spell-czech.
Score = 1
you APOSTROPHE re
Score = 1
I was at that Unbroken Chain show. PIty that was your first. While the occasion was auspicious, the playing was not. Jerry was barely alive and Bobby looked pretty pissed of most of the night.
Score = 0
It was a really memorable way to celebrate a birthday! I got to see them once more a few months later at Giants Stadium, Dylan opened. Jerry looked even less alive there (it was his last summer), and it was pretty sad: he was goofing lyrics even with the teleprompter, and nobody in the nosebleeds seemed to notice/care. And it wasn't like "Jerry's hanging by a thread but we're partying to celebrate him." It was like, "dude good call on sneaking in the whippits."
Score = 0
I don't find this terribly surprising, given that the corporate entity of Grateful Dead Productions has already, in the Grateful Dead Almanac sales pages and elsewhere, slapped various of its logos and icons onto everything from baby onesies to golf-club head covers. And as one of the "one in ten thousand that come for the show" ("Greatest Story Ever Wrote"), I'm likelier to spend money on Three From The Vault or whatever Dick's Picks release they're up to.
But goddamnit, I want a pair of the white ones in the Skull & Roses design.
Score = 0
Amrit - that makes you old buddy - I was at that show too - with Mac and G-money. . . Gotta love Philly.
That song put such a magical spin on the 2nd set - I think most people forgot about everything else in life for a couple of moments and just reveled in the pure awesomeness of seeing something never been seen before by a band that had already seen and done everything.
Score = 1
What bums me out is that the shoes actually look pretty cool. But having the whole thing be so "corporate" takes everything out of it for me.
Score = 0
Damn Hipsters always complaining. If you don't want em don't buy em. There must be a market for these(meaning some people actually want them) hence the production.
Score = 0
Fuck the Grateful Dead and anyone who likes them. Ditto for Nike shoes.
Score = -1
'Fuck The Grateful Dead and anyone who likes them"? What kind of stupid close-minded comment is that? Also, they're not Nike shoes, they're Converse, you moron!
Score = 1
'Fuck The Grateful Dead and anyone who likes them"? What kind of stupid close-minded comment is that? Also, they're not Nike shoes, they're Converse, you moron!
Score = 1