The Grateful Dead should have performed a stadium tour and wrapped it up at Soldier’s Field, the five days we got, two in San Fran and three in Chicago, feels incomplete, and for sure, the show I watched last night, streaming on MLB, seemed very incomplete. “You know my loving, not fade away”, 71,000 Deadheads roared before the encore, and if you were there I am sure you agreed. From where I sat, the vibe of the audience came through and made it huge, but the “core four” Phil Lesh, Bill Kreutzmann, Mickey Hart and Bob Weir, plus uncore three Bruce Hornsby, Jeff Chimenti and Trey Anastasio, seemed a little slow. They needed more time, more rehearsal, this wasn’t it.
The 210 minute set, plus hour long intermission (I know), plus a late start at 730P central, meant for a long night, and while the night certainly had its moments, and while I should adhere to Phil Lesh’s admonishment to “Be kind” , by the third song I had gone from watching to listening and by the end, I was less touched and more relieved and this is DESPITE completing the show the next day. If I was there I am pretty sure the sheer energy level could’ve seen me through. On my laptop? Not so much.
There is much to admire about the Grateful Dead, but man do they go on. The show opened sublimely with “China Cat Sunflower” seguing into “I Know You Rider” with its “gonna miss me when I’m gone” refrain bringing a heart filled response from the faithful. Trey and Bruce singing the former, and the latter a pile on of singers, swapping verses and singing in harmony(ish). It was an emotional start to the evening.
But from there on in, the band failed to ignite. They didn’t get to the jam moments you live for. The third song of the night “Estimated Prophet” was a real noodlers lament and what should have been the first set highlight “Mountains On The Moon” didn’t happen either.
Never worse than “Drums/Space” towards the end, these were not the 20 year vets the Allman Brothers were last October, where the new kids on the block had been with em for decades, they were old timers giving a new kid a schooling. Trey is a talented fellow no doubt, and no Jerry Garcia and he never has been. Phish are all over the place but they are clueless about the blues, part of the Dead’s magic is the blues but not last night. Not for a second.
Where were the sparks, where did they drop it and pull it off? I didn’t hear it. What I heard was an audience giving a band more than enough rope because the Dead simply weren’t rehearsed enough, an audience piling on the love for this 50 years in the making farewell, even if they couldn’t hear what they were applauding.
I don’t believe for a moment these will be seen as Holy Grail recordings, I don’t believe there is the slightest chance it wasn’t a huge mistake for the band not to have toured for months before offering up a final night.
It wasn’t a disaster mind, it was only a comparative disaster, the first set closer “Throwing Stones” finally found Trey getting somewhere and “Not Fade Away” to end the second set was the anthem it deserved to be.
Perhaps the problem was just the set list, all we got off their best album, American Beauty, was “Truckin’” and nothing at all off their second best album Workingman’s Dead. And didn’t the Dead used to be a blues band some of the time, rock band mindfuckers? They sounded like Americana, tasteful country jams. This is all rural psychedelia. More magic mushrooms than LSD (or heroin for that matter). Bashful jams that tailed off because they couldn’t figure out where to go.
Be Kind? I’m trying…
Grade: B
