Anthem of the Sun

Anthem of the Sun is the second studio album by the Grateful Dead, released in 1968. It is the first album to feature second drummer Mickey Hart, who joined the band in September 1967. In 2003, the album was ranked number 287 on Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

Making of the album

The band had entered the American Studios in North Hollywood with the same producer, David Hassinger, as their eponymous debut album, in November 1967. However, the Dead were determined to make a more complicated recorded work than their debut release, as well as attempt to translate their live sound into the studio.

The band and Hassinger then changed locations to New York City in December of that year, where they found themselves going through two other studios, Century Sound and Olmstead Studios (both “highly regarded eight-track studios”). Eventually, Hassinger grew frustrated with the group’s slow recording pace and quit the project entirely while the band was at Century Sound, with only a third of the album completed so far. It has been reported that he left after Guitarist Bob Weir requested to create the illusion of “thick air” in the studio. Hassinger commented that “Nobody could sing , and at that point they were experimenting too much in my opinion. They didn’t know what the hell they were looking for.” Garcia noted that “we want to learn how the studio work. We [didn’t] want somebody else doing it. It’s our music, we want to do it.”

The band then recruited their soundman, Dan Healy, to assist them in the studio for the rest of the album and they headed back to San Francisco’s Coast Recorders studio.