Grateful Dead Trivia
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97 free Grateful Dead trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
46 free Grateful Dead trivia questions with answers. Grateful Dead trivia for Deadheads and the curious. The quiz starts in Palo Alto in 1965 with the Warlocks and Ken Kesey's Acid Tests, follows the band through Owsley Stanley's Wall of Sound, the folk-country turn of Workingman's Dead and American Beauty, the pyramids in 1978, Cornell '77 and the surprise Top 40 hit 'Touch of Grey', and ends with Fare Thee Well, Dead & Company at Sphere and the record for most Top 40 albums. Along the way it asks about the members (Garcia's missing finger, Pigpen's whiskey, Phil Lesh's six-string bass, Bob Weir's birth name), the iconography (dancing bears, Steal Your Face), the tapers, and guests from Branford Marsalis to Bruce Hornsby. Easy questions come first; the harder ones will separate the casual listener from someone who knows the setlists. Every answer has been checked against the Wikipedia articles on the band, its members, albums and songs, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 97 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which California city was the Grateful Dead formed in 1965?
Palo Alto
They grew out of a Palo Alto jug band called Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions.
Q 02What was the band's original name before they became the Grateful Dead?
The Warlocks
They began as the Warlocks in May 1965 and dropped the name late that year after learning another group had already recorded as the Warlocks.
Q 03Where did Jerry Garcia find the name 'Grateful Dead'?
In a dictionary
Garcia found the phrase 'grateful dead' while leafing through a dictionary at Phil Lesh's house; the entry describes a folktale motif of a soul repaying whoever arranged its burial.
Q 04The first show under the name Grateful Dead, in December 1965, was at one of whose Acid Tests?
Ken Kesey's
Kesey's Merry Pranksters staged the LSD-fuelled happenings; the Dead were the house band.
Q 05What are Grateful Dead fans called?
Deadheads
The name was made official by a notice inside the 1971 Skull and Roses album asking 'Dead Heads' to write in.
Q 06Which founding member played keyboards and harmonica and died in 1973?
Ron 'Pigpen' McKernan
Ron 'Pigpen' McKernan, the founding keyboardist and harmonica player, shunned psychedelics for whiskey and fortified wine; he died of a gastrointestinal haemorrhage linked to alcoholism in March 1973, aged 27.
Q 07Who was the Grateful Dead's non-performing lyricist from 1967, and Garcia's main writing partner?
Robert Hunter
Robert Hunter wrote the words to 'Ripple', 'Dark Star' and 'Uncle John's Band' to Garcia's music, and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame alongside the band as a non-performing member.
Q 08Which instrument did Phil Lesh play?
Bass guitar
Phil Lesh played bass guitar; a classically trained trumpeter who had never touched a bass, he was recruited by Garcia in 1965 and developed a melodic, counterpoint-driven style.
Q 09The Grateful Dead's only Top 40 single was which 1987 song?
Touch of Grey
'Touch of Grey' reached No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1987, the band's only Top 40 single, arriving 17 years after their first Hot 100 entry.
Q 10What did the MTV video for the Dead's only Top 40 hit famously feature?
Skeleton puppets of the group
Phil Lesh's skeleton catches a rose in its teeth and a dog runs off with Mickey Hart's lower leg.
Q 11Which 1987 album, the band's best-selling studio record, contained their only Top 40 hit?
In the Dark
In the Dark, released in July 1987, went double platinum as the band's best-selling studio album; it came a year after Garcia's diabetic coma and the same summer as their stadium dates with Bob Dylan.
Q 12Which two 1970 albums marked the band's turn toward folk and country songwriting?
Workingman's Dead / American Beauty
Workingman's Dead (June 1970) and American Beauty (November 1970) swapped psychedelic jams for acoustic, harmony-driven songs; Garcia had just taken up pedal steel and the Garcia-Hunter partnership was at its peak.
Q 13Which American Beauty song was released as a single, backed with 'Ripple'?
Q 21At which 1973 festival did the Dead play to their biggest crowd, an estimated 600,000?
Watkins Glen Summer Jam
The Summer Jam at Watkins Glen, held at the New York raceway on 28 July 1973, drew an estimated 600,000 people to see the Dead, the Allman Brothers Band and the Band.
Q 22In 1978 the Grateful Dead played three nights at which world monument?
The Great Pyramid of Giza
The Dead played 14–16 September 1978 at the Sound and Light Theatre beside the Great Pyramid of Giza; a total lunar eclipse fell on the final night, later released as Rocking the Cradle: Egypt 1978.
Q 23Which Grateful Dead concert recording was added to the National Recording Registry?
Truckin'
'Truckin'' was the album's single, with 'Ripple' on the B-side; it peaked at No. 64 on the Billboard Hot 100 and in 1997 the Library of Congress declared it a national treasure.
Q 14American Beauty was recorded after the band discovered their manager Lenny Hart had done what?
Skipped town with much of their money
He was drummer Mickey Hart's father, and had secretly renewed the Warner contract too.
Q 15What was the name of the enormous custom PA rig the Dead toured with in 1974?
The Wall of Sound
Alembic helped build it; the band's soundman Owsley Stanley had designed their earlier PA rigs.
Q 16Owsley 'Bear' Stanley, the band's early soundman, was also famous for what?
Being one of the largest LSD suppliers
He went to jail for manufacturing LSD in 1970 and the dancing bears are named after him.
Q 17Who was the only woman ever to be a full-time member of the Grateful Dead?
Donna Jean Godchaux
Donna Jean Godchaux, a former Muscle Shoals session singer heard on Elvis Presley's 'Suspicious Minds', sang with the Dead from 1972 to 1979 alongside her husband, keyboardist Keith Godchaux.
Q 18What is the name of the red, white and blue skull-and-lightning-bolt logo?
Steal Your Face
'Steal Your Face' was devised by Owsley Stanley and Bob Thomas in 1969 as a stencil to mark the band's road cases, and later became the cover of the 1976 live album of the same name.
Q 19What did the Grateful Dead famously permit that most bands forbade?
Fans taping their concerts
A dedicated 'tapers' section behind the soundboard eventually solved the forest of microphones.
Q 20Roughly how many concerts did the Grateful Dead play in their 30 years?
More than 2,300
The Dead played 2,318 concerts between 1965 and 1995, more than 2,300 in all, drawing an estimated 25 million people over their 30 years.
Cornell University, 8 May 1977
The 8 May 1977 show at Cornell University's Barton Hall, a bootleg favourite for decades, was added to the Library of Congress National Recording Registry in 2012 and officially released in 2017.
Q 24Where and when was the Grateful Dead's final concert?
Soldier Field, Chicago, 9 July 1995
The last Grateful Dead show was at Soldier Field in Chicago on 9 July 1995, ending with a 'Box of Rain' encore; Jerry Garcia died exactly a month later, on 9 August.
Q 25Where did Jerry Garcia die in August 1995?
A rehab centre in Forest Knolls
Garcia died of a heart attack in his sleep on 9 August 1995 at Serenity Knolls, a rehab centre in Forest Knolls, Marin County, days after a stay at the Betty Ford Center.
Q 26What happened to Jerry Garcia's right middle finger when he was four?
Most of it was cut off with an axe
His brother wielded the axe; Garcia later used the stump to hitchhike and unsettle strangers.
Q 27Which ice cream maker launched a Cherry Garcia flavour in 1987, the first named for a musician?
Ben & Jerry's
Ben & Jerry's of Vermont introduced Cherry Garcia in 1987 after fans suggested the name on a postcard; Garcia was alive and touring at the time.
Q 28Which pop-rock guitarist joined Weir, Hart and Kreutzmann to form Dead & Company in 2015?
John Mayer
John Mayer became a Deadhead after Pandora played him 'Althea' in 2011; Dead & Company debuted in October 2015 with Mayer on guitar beside Weir, Hart, Kreutzmann, Oteil Burbridge and Jeff Chimenti.
Q 29Dead & Company played a 30-show residency in 2024 at which Las Vegas venue?
Sphere
'Dead Forever: Live at Sphere' ran from May to August 2024.
Q 30Which pianist joined the Dead temporarily in 1990 to help new keyboardist Vince Welnick learn the songs?
Bruce Hornsby
Bruce Hornsby played piano with the Dead from September 1990 to March 1992 after Brent Mydland's death, easing in Vince Welnick, and later inducted the band into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.