Long Live LIVE Music!
There is NOTHING in the world more enjoyable to me than live music. Over the past few weeks I have had the pleasure of attending 10 concerts - 9 Dead & Company shows and 1 Goose show. I’ve got 7 more shows this summer - 5 Phish shows, 1 Dave Matthews Band, and the Outlaw Festival. It’s why I’ve been absent from the blog for a few weeks. I live for live music. But why?
Aside from all of the recreational activities that surround the actual event, including tailgaiting in the parking lot with friends, I LOVE the moment when the lights go down, the musicians walk out on stage, they start to tune and soundcheck their instruments, then the count off, and then the magic downbeat happens. I have been attending concerts my whole life - including hundreds of Dead-related shows (Grateful Dead, Jerry Garcia Band The Other Ones, Rat Dog, Furthur, Phil & Friends, Weir & Wolf Brothers, and of course, Dead & Company) - and it never gets old. The sense of community is very real and I love belonging to it.
Meet any Deadhead and you can instantly spark up a deep conversation. We all LOVE the band and know WAY too much information. One of my favorite activities during the show is guessing the songs they might play - including Set One opener and closer and whether we will be treated to my absolute favorite song combination - Help On The Way>Slipknot>Franklins Tower (Help>Slip>Franklins). My fellow Deadheads and I can usually figure out the song that they will be playing next by one or two notes - sometimes even the guitar tone that is being tested. Most of us are pretty good statisticians as far as song choices go. I can tell you whether a song has ever been played as a set closer, what songs haven’t been played in a long time, when the last time a sequence of songs was played, etc. So can most of the folks around me at shows. After thousands of shows, they have never played the same setlist twice. Every show is a NEW musical experience. Half brilliant marketing, half not wanting to be a musical “act”, the Grateful Dead area truly special band.
I dance the entire show. Always. And so does everyone else. There is something truly amazing about having everyone in a venue dancing together - in time. It is a uniquely human experience. You’ll also catch everyone around you singing every word with a giant smile on their faces. While some of that happiness may be induced or enhanced by chemicals, it’s mostly the love of the music, and the musicians. The cheers at the end of each song are overwhelming. I hope that the musicians hear us and appreciate our open display of affection - I’m sure they do.
Another ingredient of live music is the light show. Over the 40+ years I have been going to concerts this element has improved tremendously. I personally believe that the lighting operator is a band member - often perfectly synchronizing the lights with accents, lyrics, build ups, etc. I LOVE the lights. At a Dead & Company show in Boulder, CO I witnessed something brand new - DRONES. The photo below is actually hundreds of small drones - each equipped with lights - that danced around the sky and created images (like the Steal Yer Face below). Incredible.
The improvisation aspect of the OG jam band - the Grateful Dead and now the reincarnation Dead & Company, is perhaps the very best part of the music experience for me. As a musician, I KNOW how difficult and scary it is to improvise as much as these musicians do. They are effectively out there on a tightrope, drawing on their artistry for all to see and hear. Sometimes it doesn’t work, but most of the time it does. Little song quotes here and there make us all smile. Bob Weir - the original rhythm guitar player of the Grateful Dead - has played almost 5,000 live shows - WAY more than anyone else. I will be in the audience as long as he keeps playing.
Dead & Company have said that this is their final tour. I am really hoping it’s not the last time I’ll get to see them, as they’ve never sounded better. I am looking forward to following some new bands (and not so new). Very interested in Phish - I saw them 5 times last summer and caught the bug for sure. Goose is incredible - I’ve seen them 3 times now and have loved every minute. Bluegrass and Newgrass - including Billy Strings, The Infamous Stringdusters, Yonder Mountain String Band, and Greensky Bluegrass are also keeping me busy.
Hopefully I’ll get to see some of you at shows sometime soon. Let me know what/when and where you’re headed. It would be great to share the live music experience with a fellow music educator. As the lyric goes, It’s an obsession, but it’s pleasing.