The Dead — Rolling Stone’s Take On The Reunion

From Rolling Stone:

The first call came into Penn State’s Bryce Jordan Center in mid- summer: A concert promoter asked venue officials to hold some dates at the school’s indoor arena in the fall. The promoter wouldn’t identify the band — and didn’t until he called back to ask if October 13th would be available for a Barack Obama benefit with Bob Weir, Phil Lesh, Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzmann. “We went, ‘Wow,’ ” says Bernie Punt, director of sales at the venue. “We knew right then this was going to be unique.”

Within minutes of the announcement, Deadheads had snapped up all 15,000 tickets for the first show in four years by the surviving members of the Grateful Dead. On the night of the October 13th concert, which also included the Allman Brothers Band, fans from as far away as Stockholm whooped it up as the Dead launched into the trademark shuffle of “Truckin’.” Joined by Allmans and Gov’t Mule guitarist Warren Haynes and keyboardist Jeff Chimenti from Weir’s band Ratdog, the reunited Dead resurrected standards like “Touch of Grey” and “U.S. Blues,” as well as spaced-out jam classics “Dark Star” and “St. Stephen.” “It was great fun,” Weir says. “We speak a language no one else speaks, and we have intuitions about each other’s approaches that no one else can have. It’s there — it doesn’t go away.” (Continue Reading…)

November 3, 2008 | Categories: Grateful Dead | Tags: Bob Weir, Grateful Dead, Phil Lesh | Leave A Comment »