Grateful Dead Launches Play Dead App With 422 Shows and Weekly Vault Releases

The Grateful Dead unveiled the Play Dead app last Thursday. It includes 422 complete concerts from their vault in high-resolution audio. Fans get 20 previously unreleased shows, and two fresh vault recordings drop each week.

"This has been an incredibly exciting project to curate, from the initial batch of 20 unreleased shows that will appear on Play Dead at launch to the two complete unreleased shows that will be released weekly," said David Lemieux, according to USA TODAY. Lemieux works as the band's longtime archivist and legacy manager.

"Play Dead kicks off the largest tape transfer project in the history of rock 'n roll," said Brad Serling, founder and CEO of nugs.net. "We are pulling tapes off the shelf of the vault and transferring them at their highest resolution to date, and mastering in the studio for the first time."

Three groups built this project together: nugs.net, Grateful Dead Productions, and Rhino Entertainment. "What Play Dead allows us to do is create a consistent, ongoing flow of music directly to fans, with a focus first and foremost on performance quality," Lemieux said.

Users can search by year, song, album, or playlist. Downloads also work offline. CarPlay and Android Auto integration are included, and each recording comes with show notes.

"Rhino has been proud to steward the Grateful Dead's catalog for decades," said Mark Pinkus, president of Rhino Records, according to JamBase. "We're excited to help Grateful Dead bring the vault to life through nugs and Play Dead, giving fans an official new way to experience these legendary live recordings with the care and sound quality they deserve."

Play Dead works on iOS and Android, and on the web at playdead.app. A standalone subscription costs $9.99 monthly or $99.99 per year. Existing nugs.net subscribers can add it for $4.99 monthly or $49.99 per year. New customers can grab a bundle for $17.98 monthly or $169.98 per year.