Grateful Dead – Ripple
2020 · Directed by T. Nakayama (lead animator)
67K Likes
Best comments
1.“During my first LSD trip, I listened to this and posted 'I finally understand Grateful Dead' on Facebook – and my grandpa liked it. I still wonder to this day if he knew what I was talking about... lol”
More comments
- 2.“This was my gateway song to get my youngest daughter into the Grateful Dead. She was halfway to being a hippie anyway, so I feel I have succeeded as a parent.”
- 3.“I used to softly sing this song to my first daughter after the 2 a.m. feeding. At her wedding, 22 years later, this is the song she chose for the father-daughter dance. When it started, the table of my old college friends in the back cheered and began to sing along... the rest of the room was mystified. My daughter and I shared huge smiles and tears as we danced in the middle of the floor.”
The story
Fifty years late, Ripple finally got a music video. The Grateful Dead released this animated one in December 2020 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of American Beauty, and it plays out as a tarot reading come to life. A spread of cards on a table opens into a mystical world, and The Fool wanders through it, guided by The Star, The Moon and The Sun, running into The Devil, The Magician and The Empress along the way. The band said it hid Easter eggs from Dead songs and lore throughout.
T. Nakayama was the lead animator and Actuality Films did the animation.
The song itself goes back to 1970. Robert Hunter wrote the words in London on the same afternoon he wrote Brokedown Palace and To Lay Me Down (not a bad afternoon), and Jerry Garcia wrote the melody. It came out as the B-side to Truckin' and has turned into a kind of hymn for people who don't go to church, played at weddings and funerals alike. Rolling Stone put it on its 500 greatest songs list in 2024. A cartoon tarot deck is a fitting home for it. Fifty years on, the cards say it holds up.
