The "American metaphysical circus" of Joseph Byrd’s United States of America

Grateful Dead. Other songs, such as “The American Way of Love�? and “I Won’t Leave My Wooden Wife for You, Sugar,�? contain ironically pointed social commentary analogous to Frank Zappa’s Mothers of Invention, a group that used the term “psychedelic�? only as an epithet of derision. More significantly, the United States of America’s musical ambitions-largely the vision of composer Joseph Byrd-suggest that the group was an isolated, homegrown predecessor of the “progressive�? or “art rock�? style that became prominent, chiefly among British bands, in the early 1970s.