SOUNDTRACK: BOB WEIR AND WOLF BROS.-Tiny Desk Concert #953 (March 2, 2020).
Bob Weir is, obviously, a founding member of Grateful Dead.
This set goes on much longer than a typical one (and they’re not rappers or R&B singers). I got a kick out of this comment in the blurb:
When I produce a Tiny Desk Concert, one of my most important jobs is to make sure they run on time and that the performance sticks to our set time limit (roughly 15-minutes). So when Bob Weir and Wolf Bros achieved lift-off during a pre-show sound-check, it was my unthinkable responsibility to tell the guy who practically invented the jam band to… stop jamming.
It also fell to me to keep looking at my watch during the performance, even as I realized that my favorite “Dark Star” jams alone lasted well beyond our fifteen-minute performance window.
I’ve never been a big fan of the Dead (despite how much I enjoy jam bands). Their music is a bit too slow for my tastes. But in the right mood (like a rainy Sunday), they can be right on.
These songs are slow and expansive and allow for a lot of jamming. There’s not a lot of opportunity for jamming here as this is just a trio, but Weir is very comfortable stretching things out.
The trio make an interesting look with drummer Jay Lane in a tie-dyed shirt and upright bassist Don Was in all black. Weir stand between them in a gray T-shirt and his gray hair.
The first song
“Only a River,” from Weir’s 2016 solo album Blue Mountain, feels like a memorial to Jerry Garcia, with a reference to the Shenandoah River, a body of water Garcia famously made reference to on the song, “A Shenandoah Lullaby.” Weir turns the chorus into a mantra and seems to evoke the spirit of his fallen bandmate.
This song references the melody of “Shenandoah” pretty directly n the middle, but the “hey hey hey” let’s you know that this is a very different song.
Before the second song, he says they just got clearance to play it. I didn’t realize that “When I Paint My Masterpiece” was a Bob Dylan song, but I guess maybe I should have.
And what would a Grateful Dead-related performance be without a Bob Dylan song? The intimacy of the Tiny Desk turns Weir into a sage Master Storyteller during a version of “When I Paint My Masterpiece” with its reference to Botticelli and a lonely Roman hotel room.
The set really comes to life when special guest, Mikaela Davis comes out to play harp.
The harp is always a magical-sounding instrument and amid the quietness of this trio, it really shines. Davis basically takes the lead on “Bird Song” including bending strings (I’ve never seen a harpist do that before).
Midway through the song, Weir waves his hand and allows Davis to take a solo while Weir puts down his acoustic guitar.
When Weir switches to electric guitar midway during “Bird Song,” I looked at my watch because I knew we were in for some time travel. And the band didn’t disappoint as the rhythmic interplay between Weir and Davis showed off his singular rhythm guitar style, honed from more than thirty years of playing alongside one the most idiosyncratic lead guitarists in modern music.
Davis does some more note bending in her solo, which is so interesting. When Weir joins in, their music melds really beautifully.
They jam the song out for 8 minutes and as the music fades Bob says, I’m pretty sure we’re over our time limit.
He says they were slated for 20 minutes and they’re at forty now (sadly we only get to see 26 minutes). Someone shouts “keep going” and they do one more.
They play “Ripple” Grateful Dead’s fifty-year-old sing-along from their album American Beauty. It demonstrates
the song’s celebration of hope and optimism, found in the spirit of all of the band’s music. Bob Weir continues to evoke that spirit every time he picks up a guitar; and as we all sang along at the end, we evoked that spirit too: “Let there be songs, to fill the air.”
I suppose it’s never too late to start enjoying a band, right?
[READ: March 25, 2020] “In the Cards”
This is exactly the kind of story I don’t like. It seemed to go nowhere and in an oblique fashion. Plus the narrator was really hard to relate to.
The point of the story seems to be the last line: “You’re crazy when you’re a good writer.”
It starts with a discussion of playing cards and moves on to tarot cards. Her friend Michel gave her a deck and she felt ill at ease just reading the directions. But what most disturbed her was the image of The Fool.
The narrator says she is unfamiliar with playing cards and yet later she says when she was a child they played Mistigri which is a card game. So go figure. (more…)
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SOUNDTRACK: see below.
GlobalFEST is an annual event, held in New York City, in which bands from all over the world have an opportunity to showcase their music to an American audience. I’ve never been, and it sounds a little exhausting, but it also sounds really fun.
SOUNDTRACK: LOS LOBOS-“Guantanamera” (1978).
I never listened to much Los Lobos, although their recent tiny Desk Concert opened my eyes to the,
