According to Grateful Dead biographer Dennis McNally, the song "Blow Away" came about in part because lyricist John Barlow was furious with Bob Weir for writing the song "Victim Or The Crime" with another lyricist (scorned lovers . . .). McNally calls the song fairly conventional in its approach to the theme of lost love. Perhaps, although the thought that if we "give it just a minute, it'll blow away" is an interesting, if frightening thought. Brent Mydland's approach to this song, reflecting his own inner turmoil, makes more of this song than McNally's somewhat dismissive tone would seem to indicate.
What's interesting is to wonder what might have happened had the band's label, Arista, been able to arouse enough enthusiasm to put this song out as a single and promote it the way they had "Touch of Gray" a couple years before. It is a very pop-oriented song, built around a very simple riff and just a couple chords. Who knows? It might have been another Top Ten single for the Dead. It might also have given Mydland more confidence, a sense of no longer being "the new guy" after ten years with the band.
