Monday, March 15, 2010

Happy Birthday Phil!!!!!!


Furthur & Friends 2010-03-12

A Celebration of Phil Lesh's 70th Birthday
Bill Graham Civic Auditorium
San Francisco, CA


Wow. After a couple good shows, it's always hard to collect my thoughts and separate the memories from each other. But I'm going to try. Where to start? I guess I'll start with the weather. My trip down to the Bay Area was blessed with gorgeous weather - clear blue skies and temperatures hovering around 70 degrees. EXCEPT, of course, during Friday for Phil's 70th Birthday show, when it rained ALL day. Man was it wet outside, but the rain couldn't stop me from having a good time in line. Spirits seemed to be good, despite the massive number of ticketless people.

SET I
Ripple
Lazy River Road
Peggy-O
Two Souls in Communion
Brokedown Palace
A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall
They Love Each Other
Mountains of the Moon
Attics of My Life


Once inside, you could feel the energy building as the room became more and more full. A little over half an hour after the published showtime, the band took the stage. It was Furthur minus Joe Russo with Jay Lane taking solo duty on the drum set plus Chris Robinson (of Black Crowes fame) and Jackie Greene. Phil had the Ritter out, and everyone else was on acoustic instruments. Steve Molitz joined Jeff Chimenti on keys. Jay's drumming was unobtrusive and fit nicely with the acoustic set. This first set is what dreams are made of. I can't remember if I've ever seen a show open with Ripple, and doing so flipped me upside down. "Let there be songs, to fill the air."

Lazy River Road was short and sweet, and Peggy-O was awesome. I prefer to have Phil sing this one, but Chris Robinson did a great job imo. Next up was my personal highlight of the entire show - Two Souls in Communion. Man, oh, man did Chris Robinson NAIL this one. Such a great voice with so much soul. "Fly on those wings of love, fly up, fly home!" Next, Jackie did his typically superb rendition of Brokedown Palace. At this point, Phil and the boys are just hitting us with emotion left and right. It is like Church on the rail... Next up was Dylan's Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall. The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan was the first Dylan album I got, so those songs always have a special place in my heart. This particular version was good, not great. They Love Each Other ... wompy love song ... next (sorry to all you romantics).

Mountains of the Moon has always been one of my favorites to hear Phil play. This one was no different. JK switched to electric guitar here, and Phil played his heart out. "It's time to matter. The earth will see you on through this time." And then...Attics of my Life. OMG - always always a highlight. This one had seven part vocal harmonies I believe (JK, Bob, Phil, Jackie Greene, Chris Robinson, Sunshine, and Zoe) - just stunning. And...I got the whole thing on video so yall can see it too. Set break took a little digesting. The crowd started to get more schwilly where I was and it was tough to keep my personal space. After about 45 mins, the band came out for an electric set.

SET II
Scarlet Begonias
Minglewood Blues
Easy Wind >
New Speedway Boogie
Viola Lee Blues V1 >
High Time >
Viola Lee Blues V2 >
Hard To Handle >
Viola Lee Blues V3 >
Like A Rolling Stone >
Sugaree


The second set as a whole was a straight up rock show. The energy level remained high throughout, and there were not really any cool-down songs (save for High Time I suppose - hard to catch your breath during that one though). Phil strapped on the Modulus, and it was go time. Joe Russo was the only drummer during this set, and his playing was strong. Scarlet opener was good and felt very similar to the Portland second set opener, except Jackie sang it (Yes!). Minglewood was its average thing, oozing sexual energy - "Going to San Francisco, if I have to crawl." CR nailed Easy Wind, which is not an easy one to sing. His voice was lower than I've ever heard him sing, and he almost growled some of the lyrics. It segued nicely into New Speedway Boogie, which Jackie owned as usual. That is where the meat of the second set started imo.

Viola Lee Blues->High Time->Viola Lee Blues->Hard to Handle->Viola Lee Blues was as good as it looks. The transitions were a little sloppy, but Chris did a great job with the vocals in High Time. And, of course, he nailed Hard to Handle (Black Crowes are who turned me on to this song when I was a wee lad before I knew about Otis Redding). The third verse of Viola Lee jammed into Like a Rolling Stone. I had not seen Phil do this song since MCI Center, Washington DC Other Ones in November 02, and did not realize what I was missing. It was so good!! "How does it feel? To be out on your own?" Bob flubbed the beginning somehow and let out a few choice curse words. I remember when he would just play right on through - lately, he seemingly is being really hard on himself for even small mistakes. Lighten up Bob we love you! I couldn't believe the set hadn't ended yet when they segued into Sugaree. But...Chris Robinson sings it? Did not make much sense to me at all considering Jackie's reading of this song. I felt like Jackie got kind of snubbed, so I went into setbreak with a bad attitude, despite the fact that an hour and twenty minutes of an hour and a half long second set were spectacular.

SET III

Not Fade Away Jam (w/parade and balloon drop) >
Happy Birthday Phil! >
Not Fade Away Jam
short break
Playin in the Band >
St. Stephen >
Other One >
Elevator >
Unbroken Chain
Comes a Time >
Cream Puff War >
Franklin's Tower

Encore
Donor Rap
Johnny B. Goode


This set break was not as long as the first - seemingly only around 30 minutes. When the band returned to the stage (more Modulus), they kicked into Not Fade Away. Finally, the Lion King, the White Cloud, the God John Molo made his first appearance with Phil since NYE '08. Good to see you again Molo - you were definitely missed. They jammed the song out while the Birthday parade started. There were three big floats (Birthday present, Heart, and Stickman holding a cardboard cut-out custom Ritter) with people throwing goodies into the crowd. The skull from New Years Eve was stage left and menacing the crowd. We all sang Happy Birthday to Phil, and there was a balloon drop. No words to Not Fade Away were forthcoming, and the band seemed content to just jam on the Bo Diddley beat - with Phil THUMPING away. A short break (5 minutes? weird) followed before they came back out for Playing in the Band.

Playing was not as long or spacy as it can be and was quickly jammed into St. Stephen. St. Stephen was awesome (short Mountain Jam tease in the middle), but they did not do the William Tell ending (short Eleven-ish jam before finishing the song). Before starting into St. Stephen it sounded like they were jamming into the Other One, but they saved it and dropped it afterwards instead. I know I'm going to take a lot of flack for this, but I do not like the Other One. If you see Phil and Bob both multiple times each year, you will see multiple Other Ones. Needless to say, seeing a song too much can wear on my nerves. This version was average - I couldn't tell the difference between it and all the other ones (no pun intended) I have to sit through.

Molitz came out on stage during the jam out of the Other One, and I thought 'Sweet - he's about to add his electronic space to Unbroken Chain.' Unfortunately, they played the Particle song Elevator instead. I never really liked the song when Phil & Friends played it, and it did not really seem to have the desired effect of pumping the crowd up. Joe Russo was making funny faces during the song as if he was embarassed to play it. If that was the case, 'look dude - you play in the duo. nuff said.' Unbroken Chain is always a highlight of the show for me, but this one seemed a little off - certainly not as strong as the one I caught in January at the Throckmorton. The subtle transitions between the jams in the song were not that tight and it didn't switch directions the way a powerful Unbroken Chain does.

After Unbroken Chain, Chris Robinson sang Comes a Time. Again, amazing song and probably the highlight of the set. Although he did not have the emotion in his voice the way JK did when I caught it in Mill Valley a couple months ago, it was still Comes a Time - "ONLY LOVE CAN PHIL!!" Comes a Time made way for Cream Puff War, complete with go-go dancers (a la Warfield 08). These girls didn't seem as slutty as the last ones (@ the Warfield), and I think some of the effect might have been lost. They looked pretty young, and, at first, I thought they might be Bob's daughters! Probably not what they were going for... A quick segue into a short and very sweet Franklin's Tower and we get to bask in the glory of Phil's voice (split duties with Jackie was nice) for really only the third or fourth time of the night (what gives?). "In another time's forgotten space..."

Heartfelt Donor Rap and Johnny B. Goode encore sent us out in the streets at about 2AM. The show started shortly after 8, and by my estimate of about an hour and fifteen minutes of set break time, there was almost five hours of Grateful Dead music played. Even without standing in line all day, I think I still would have been pooped after that. And I was.

The theme of the show seemed to be: 1st set acoustic gooey heart soul love fest, 2nd set rock n' roll show, and 3rd set psychedelic melt down. I thought the first two sets worked marvelously, but the 3rd set fell a little flat. Still, despite not finishing as strong as we would have liked, I wouldn't have missed this show for the world. We are so incredibly lucky to have our lives cross paths with Phil's. Thank you for searching for the sound - I will never take it for granted. Love you PHIL!!!


OTHER THOUGHTS

JK was definitely to be seen but not heard. He didn't have many killer guitar solos that I remember. The acoustic guitar from him and Jackie was great though. Speaking of him and Jackie, seemingly Jackie did not interact or look at him much even though they were standing right next to each other. It kind of reminded me of the treatment Mark Karan gave Jackie at the Deadheads for Obama show - "Show me what you got, kid." Bob was also noticeably quiet, but was Bob at his finest at times. Phil was awesome all night long - he was more animated than I ever remember him - we got the smile face, the closed eyes face, the laughing face, the concentrating face, and, of course, the ROCK FACE!! Chris Robinson sang too much, though Sugaree is the only song where it really got on my nerves. Also, the fact that he was seemingly reading every line from his music stand before he sang it was a little weak. Who doesn't know these songs?

Jackie was massively underutilized, and I melt every time he sings - it's crazy what two years in Phil's band will do to my opinion of you. I guess the positive side of light JK and Jackie was no train wreck of too many musicians that is commonly found in a guest fest. Molo was awesome even though he was not centered behind Phil where we all know and love him. He seemed genuinely impressed with Russo's playing, and the two of them locked into a groove a couple times (NFA and Franklin's come to mind). I can only imagine what they'd sound like if they'd just finished a tour together. Though I'm still of the belief that Molo is obviously the man for the job, Russo is very good. The sound was not as tight as Furthur on Monday night in Portland, but was far from sloppy. In the end, I guess that makes me super excited for...

Not sure what comes next... Furthur Festival got announced, and I'm sure they will be tearing up stages all over this summer - though I'm not sure who will be in the band. Seemingly the ladies are out (bittersweet - thought as a whole they were very tasteful and added lots to the harmonies). And rumors abound regarding Jay Lane's future. Regardless of what happens, in Phil I trust.

"Going to plant a weeping willow.
On the banks green edge, it will grow, grow, grow"

1 comment:

  1. Very nice Michael :)
    Looking forward to keeping up with your blog!
    Hope to catch up with you soon
    Peace, A

    ReplyDelete