Wednesday, November 29, 2006

New www.dead.net site!
Who forgot to tell me he has his own blog out there?
To find out Clicky here!
Sweet Bobby & fan pictures!

Monday, November 27, 2006

Saturday, November 25, 2006

Shrine on!

Article on Colorado's "Temples in the trees". There is a shrine for Jerry Garcia up in them thar hills.
Interestingly (or not), I found the article after I posted this mornings blog.
....................
How are you enjoying your Thanksgiving weekend?
Scott deep fried the turkey which we brought over to my folks house.
As gross as it may seem to be, the turkey tasted amazing!
Friday, I took BART to Oakland. My friend picked me up at the station and we
headed over to the Oakland Museum.
I don't think I had ever been there before despite having attended Art school in Oakland.
It's a cool little museum. We were there to see this dia de las muertes exhibit. Very cool and crafty . Laughing Bones and weeping hearts ...puts a more joyful spin on so many recent deaths in my family. Makes me want to find a nice corner somewhere -perhaps in the yard to create our own little shrine..I already have a small collection of decorated skulls and the little Mexican skeleton figures.

If you are unfamiliar with Dia de muerteos arts & crafts, one place to get a sample is at my space friend's webpage. She's got typical pix & some links over on Sacred Snatch.
...
Reminds me, I need to redesign my Bobby shrine- which hangs in my sewing closet.
I need to add a shelf or two for all the 3d stuff I have collected in my Ratdog travels.


I have a couple of drawers full of stuff from tours like this:

............
Happy Bertha Jared..We will always love and remember you!!

Friday, November 24, 2006

Alan sums it up for us!


Thursday, November 23, 2006

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Some Bobby content in this interview with Mike O'neil from over on Grateful Web.


Check out Jimbo's
Bobby vid
Yay! Deadhead news blog is back to work! The link is in that pile----->

Monday, November 20, 2006

Jon C.'s Fl Doggy review!!

Thanks Jon for permission to repost:


jon c. - Nov 20, 2006 2:48 pm (#10261 Total: 10264)




I suppose the first question is, did anyone have Rehab Island as their “first time played” pick? Sounds like my kind of place.

These guys are just getting better and better with every tour and I totally enjoyed every show I saw. Started in Jacksonville, where Ratdog played the wonderful, old Florida Theater. A beautiful venue in a nice location with very friendly staff – who could ask for more? Thanks to Ruby, I had a 2nd row seat which left me in a position to join FLJen and Patrick on the rail, Mark side. It was a rather deep stage that gave the performance a sort of living room feel from my vantage point. (Also allowed Bobby and Mark the space to come out to the front during a jam in a classic ‘pretending to be rock stars’ move that the audience just loved?. I can’t speak to the sound in the rest of the hall, but from my spot I was probably getting a mix of stage monitors and house sound that created a depth in the sound that I have not heretofore experienced. Every note seemed to go right through my body in a most delightful manner. How could I not have enjoyed the show? They opened with Playin’, which had for a time gotten a bit played, but it’s appearing much less often now and was great to hear. And hearing my first live Book of Rules brought a big old smile to my face. It’s hardly their best tune, but so much fun to hear live. They closed with great energy (you’ve all heard about Around and Around by now), which included an Althea that seemed significantly reworked. The playing throughout was stellar and everyone seemed to having a great time. Mark and Bobby were locking in together even more than I’ve seen in the past and played some great jams. And the rest of the boys were surely not falling behind. Kenny was in as good a form as I’ve heard him and although he really shined every night, this one may have been his best. He totally tore up his solo on Sugaree. Stuff is becoming a better and better segment and on this night was really outstanding (was that a Mystery Train riff they were working around?). I was grinning from ear to ear by night’s end. I think this one does go in my ‘top three’ ever ?.

(The downside of the evening was the woman who complimented my Kenny Brooks tee shirt. Then asked if perhaps I was his Dad. Ouch. And the damn thing is, I don’t think she was all that much younger than I am. If she wasn’t over 40, she had led a hard life.)

On to St. Pete, where my love/hate relationship with Jannus Landing continues. In many respects, it’s one of my favorite venues. Great location, mellow vibe with a notable absence of security, and just a wonderful feel under the moonlight. OTOH, the crowd is always noisy and unfocussed and that seems to translate to the band (or maybe it just seems that way as it’s harder for me to become fully absorbed). And the sound isn’t the best, in part because it’s a small stage in a narrow confine (JC had to leave his Steinway in the truck for this one). But it’s a very aesthetically appealing old courtyard and noisy though they may be, the crowd always has fun. It’s just a sort of ‘street festival’ atmosphere that doesn’t really allow one to become wholly immersed in the music (it’s a great place for rocking out, but less so for the ‘transportation’ phenomena that’s kept me coming back these many years). Of the 3 nights I saw, the setlist in St. Pete was most to my taste, yet it may have been my least favorite of the 3 shows I saw. Which is not to say it wasn’t a great show, but it failed to reach the transcendence that I might have garnered from the set in another location. The highlight for me was probably my first ever Ratdog Memphis Blues. Oh mama, it was sweet. And of course the full Terrapin is always a crowd favorite.

Last year’s Boca show was one of my all time favorites and I figured this year’s couldn’t match it. It didn’t, in part because the sets didn’t flow for me as well as the prior year, but it sure wasn’t far off the mark. In contract to St. Pete, I think one reason I enjoy shows here so much is because the sound is just superb. Not only is everything crystal clear, but the sound seems to be able to mute the crowd noise somewhat. (I first realized how good the sound is when it dawned on me that I was getting every little nuance of every note Jeff was playing on the new grand.) Here I got Just Like Mama Said, so in 3 shows I got all the new songs. Hearing them on disc, this was my least favorite, but it had occurred to me that it sounded like a song that really needs to be heard live. And that was surely correct as I absolutely loved this one in person. The crowd seemed to like it as well. At least it held their attention better than I might have expected. In a surprisingly eclectic set, this would prove a problem as he really began to lose them with TMK>Even So. But damn, the end of Even So was awesome. Bobby’s wails punctuated by Kenny riffs. I was in heaven. And the October Queen that followed was surely the best rendition of that one I’ve ever heard. She Says is a personal favorite and either they’ve worked on it or the sound system made it possible, but they had the neatest full stops in there that I’ve never heard them quite achieve before. It’s but an instant of silence, but it worked so well. The crowd didn’t fully ‘return’ until they hit the opening notes of Liberty. They still, more than anything, want to hear the Grateful Dead. And at any given show, somewhere between ¼ and ½ the fans don’t really know the non GD material. This show was not nearly as rocking as the other two and I suspect it left some disappointed, but it was rich in classic Bobstar stuff and he was doing many of those scatty take-outs that I’m a total sucker for. That and a lot of very quirky little interludes left me hanging on every note. In the end though, the show was really all about The Eleven. I’m a fool for this one anyone and they just played the heck out of it.


Thank You "Voice of Energy" Blog for the heads up on this

Saturday, November 18, 2006


Have your Jerry Garcia tea on a A Grateful Dead coffee table. Perhaps you might enjoy a baked good from Hippie chick bakerywith that.
After you tidy up, there's a sparkling new book out written by Blair Jackson on theGrateful Dead Gear, which would look nice on that table.
Don'tcha think?



.....................
Ratdog
November 18, 2006
Mizner Park Amphitheatre
Boca Raton, FL

jam>
help>
slip>
minglewood
she belongs to me
jus like mama said>
tomorrow never knows>
even so>
october queen>
the deep end>
she says>
liberty

lazy river rd@
victim@
FOTD@
st.stephen>
william tell>
the eleven>
stuff>rehab island>
the eleven
dear prudence
slip>
franklins
omsn

US BLUES
________


...............
Little vices!
Mmmm! Under the influence of chocolate

Meet the Deadhead Brew Goddess
and the Deadhead

Friday, November 17, 2006

Friday!!!!



Man, I just love Fridays! Don't you?
Good bye mellow - Hello Crazy nights!
Doggies & Bobby coming home- let the last minute concert pop ups & mad scrambles to venues begin (again!).
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Two weeks til Rex!
I actually did finish all those things I was making for Rex-

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Here's a nice article on GD photographer, Michael Mendleson by Paul Libratore Clickety here!
I think I missed posting a few setlists too- but those are always viewable either on Dot org or in the Bob Weir & Ratdog event discussion over on Deadnet.com.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Thursday, November 16, 2006

Just heard of this!:

World Financial Center Presents:
THE AMERICAN BEAUTY PROJECT
HONORS TWO GRATEFUL DEAD LANDMARK ALBUMS
American Beauty and Workingman's Dead
with
Jorma Kaukonen, Ollabelle, Toshi Reagon, The Holmes Brothers, Jen
Chapin,
Dar Williams, The Klezmatics, Tim O'Reagan, Mark Eitzel, Jim Lauderale,
Larry Campbell, Catherine Russell, Andy Statman, Tony Trischka
and more to be announced.

Workingman's Dead Saturday, January 20, at 8:00pm
&
American Beauty Sunday, January 21, at 8:00pm

Free
in the World Financial Center Winter Garden, New York

NEW YORK - Two of the Grateful Dead's greatest albums, American Beauty
and Workingman's Dead, both recorded in 1970, will each be honored with
its own evening when Arts>World Financial Center presents The American
Beauty Project free in the World Financial Center Winter Garden, 220
Vesey Street.

Workingman's Dead, which was recorded in March 1970, will be honored
Saturday, January 20, at 8:00pm by a distinctive roster of
singer-songwriters, bands and instrumentalists when each perform one of
the tracks on the classic album.

The next night, Sunday, January 21, at 8:00pm, another group of singers
and musicians will perform cuts from American Beauty which was recorded
in August and September 1970.

Performing their own arrangements of the Workingman's Dead and American
Beauty songs are Jorma Kaukonen (Hot Tuna, Jefferson Airplane),
Ollabelle, Toshi Reagon, The Holmes Brothers, Jen Chapin, Dar Williams,
The Klezmatics, Tim O'Reagan (The Jayhawks), Mark Eitzel (American
Music Club), Larry Campbell, Catherine Russell, Jim Lauderdale, Andy
Statman, Tony Trischka, and more names to be announced in the months
ahead.

Putting together The American Beauty Project to celebrate 35th
anniversary of these two landmark Grateful Dead albums is Artistic
Director and Producer David Spelman, who was responsible for similar
tributes to Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen. At last year's Nebraska
Project honoring Springsteen, The Boss himself spent the evening
standing unnoticed with the crowd before jumping on stage for the
finale.

"Both Workingman's Dead and American Beauty were ranked on Rolling
Stone magazine's list of the 500 greatest albums of all time, 258 and
262, respectively," said Mr. Spelman. "Each wasextremely innovative at
the time for their fusion of bluegrass, rock, folk and country music."

Workingman's Dead,the band's fourth studio album, was recorded in March
1970, and was voted by readers of Rolling Stone as the best album of
1970, in front of Crosby, Stills and Nash's Déjà Vu and Van Morrison's
Moondance.

American Beautywas recorded between August and September of 1970 and
was released inNovember of the same year. It included instant radio
favorites such as "Truckin'" "Sugar Magnolia" and"Friend of the Devil."

"The acoustic sound and folk/country tunes of Workingman's Dead would
come as quitea shock to many fans, and to the critics as a harbinger of
some sort of conscious movement (alongwith The Band, Dylan and the
Byrds) toward country," wrote Grateful Dead biographer Dennis McNally
in his program notes for the event. Mr. McNally went on to add that:
"as usual with the Grateful Dead, the album's origins were
serendipitous and synchronistic, involving no plan orprogram. Instead,
their swerve to include country songs in their work began quite
accidentally when their lyricist Robert Hunter moved in with the Garcia
family in January 1969 ... In March 1970, they went into the studio to
record Workingman's Dead . Hugely in debt to their record company, they
were forced to be simple and economize, thinking consciously of Buck
Owens' Bakersfield sound. The simplicity served the music perfectly,
and the result was a classic, although not the departure many thought
it was. They'd enlarged their vision, not changed it."

Arts>World Financial Centerserves as the leading showcase in Lower
Manhattan forvisual and performing arts - from the intimate to the
spectacular - by artists either emerging orestablished. Since 1988,
year-round and free to the public, it has presented interdisciplinary
artsprogramming with an emphasis on commissioned works, site-specific
installations and premieres.

All events are free! No tickets required. Seating is first come, first
served. For information,call (212) 945-0505 or click
www.worldfinancialcenter.com.

The American Beauty ProjectMySpace page:
CLICKY HERE


Nice Ratdog review over on this blog


TONIGHT!!


Thursday, November 16 - showtime 9:00 pm


Honky Tonk Hippies and Stevie Coyle (of the Waybacks)

Last Day Saloon
120 Fifth St. @ Davis St.
Santa Rosa CA

$7 at the door

707-545-2343

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

Sasha's birthday Terrapin
11/11/06 Newark
Sasha's birthday Terrapin

Monday, November 13, 2006

Review From the Lowell Sun:

Ratdog worth the long, strange trip
By JILLIAN LOCKE, Sun Correspondent
Article Last Updated:11/12/2006 06:41:21 AM EST

LOWELL -- As I drove toward Lowell Memorial Auditorium, so many people flooded the streets: young to old, gray hair to dreadlocks, tie-dyes to button-downs. There were the obligatory Jerry Garcia look-alikes, and teenagers paced up and down East Merrimack Street with pointer fingers raised high, signifying they were in need of tickets. Why all the commotion? A legend had come to town.

Ratdog, featuring the legendary Grateful Dead rhythm guitarist Bob Weir, made its way to Lowell Friday night to play a sold-out show.

I made my way through the mobbed floor to my seat, weaving through concert-goers as they danced and swayed and flailed in the aisles. Ratdog had just taken the stage and already had the crowd under its power. Bob Weir serenaded the onlookers while guitarist Mark Karan, bassist Robin Sylvester, keyboardist Jeff Chimenti and drummer Jay Lane launched into signature sounds; funk-laden, bluesy, country-spliced rock.

I was never a fan of the Dead, or any band that follows in the same vein, for that matter.

However, the style and grace with which Ratdog executed transitions, perfected the escalation and descent of climax and breakdown, and commanded the audience's attention and enthusiasm, caught me. They were enveloped in their self-made tunnel of sound and vibration and I could completely relate to and respect that.
In "Lazy River Road," a Dead cover, a slow tempo dominated the very lazy-sounding tune, making me feel as if I should be floating down the Mississippi rather than standing in a concert hall. The song was packed with twangy, country-influenced chords, with a hint of blues. I didn't even realize they had transitioned to the next song until I heard the familiar chords of Jimi Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower." They took a somewhat tame, funk-driven approach to the classic, jamming out until they dropped into an unexpected reggae breakdown, and picked back up with Weir and Karan wailing their dueling guitars.

"Might as Well," a Dead favorite, had a straight-up roadhouse rhythm, and was one of the biggest sing-alongs of the night. Weir led the crowd in a call-and- return of 'might was well,' over and over. They turned out another cover, jazz vocalist Peggy Lee's "Fever," then eased their way into my favorite selection of the night, "The Victim or the Crime," a song that emanates a darker, more seductive vibe. "He's Gone," another Dead cover, was delivered with passion and clarity as they continued to sing 'he's gone,' well after the music stopped.

As they busted out the last song, the Dead's "Franklin's Tower," a sea of people moved like a wave. There was a kid with long hair and a Grateful Dead shirt on in the row in front of me, and I sporadically asked him for song names throughout the night. A few times during the course of the show, he would turn around, scan the expanse of all the dancing, smiling people that filled the hall, and smiled the brightest, warmest smile, like he was home.

Sunday, November 12, 2006

11/11/06:
Ratdog in Newark'

I: Jam > The Golden Road to Unlimited Devotion > Jack Straw > Bird Song > Little Red Rooster, West L.A. Fadeaway, Maggie's Farm > Eyes of the World

II: Mule Skinner Blues@5, A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall@ > Even So > October Queen > The Deep End > Lady with a Fan > Terrapin > Stuff* > Stella Blue > At a Siding > Terrapin Flyer* > One More Saturday Night

E: Black Muddy River (first Mule skinner Blues!)
............
Always love the synchronicity.
Sasha's fave song (Terrapin) got played last night on her 15th birthday!
Going to have to get this show from Munckmix for her now.
Happy Sunday!

Thursday, November 09, 2006

A few Bobby & Ratdoggy articles out today!
................
The Year Of The RatDog

By Rick Koster
Published on 11/9/2006 in Entertainment » Music
from www.theday.com

When it comes to a performance by Bob Weir's RatDog, you always know what you're going to get — and you never know what you're going to get.
In the context of the former, you'll hear lots of jamming. Oh, yes. Tons of it. Sometimes this attains almost sublime levels. Sometimes it takes on the torturous characteristics of someone jabbing your tooth-roots with a fork covered in olive brine.

As far as not knowing what you're going to hear, consider this when you contemplate the RD show tonight at the Mohegan Sun Arena: they will play long two sets, choosing between about 70 Grateful Dead songs, a few Weir solo tunes and Bob Dylan tunes, and the 10 or so compositions from RatDog's one and only studio album. If you're keeping track of such things, you are far more likely to hear, for example, Weir's “Easy Answers” or the Dead's “St. Stephen” than GD obscurities such as “Here Comes Sunshine” — but you just never know.

Equally and perhaps more entertaining will be the crowd itself. There really are people who sustain themselves by traveling to each of these shows and that constitutes their lives. They will be in varying states of cleanliness and tie-dyed apparel, and if you can corner the patchouli market at the merchandise tent, you'll be rich.

Opening the show is Blues Traveler, and John Popper still plays the harmonica in a fashion that reminds me of sticking my head in one of those machines that crush abandoned cars.
................................


From WWW.CTNOW.COM
Eric R. Danton

Bob Weir Brings 'Amalgam' to Sun
November 9, 2006

For a guy who has long been considered a mainstay of rock music, Bob Weir has a pretty narrow definition of what rock 'n' roll actually is.

"If you listen to an old Chuck Berry record or a Little Richard record, that was rock 'n' roll," Weir says from his Bay Area home, before starting a tour with his band RatDog that plays tonight at Mohegan Sun. "They were playing a shuffle against straight time. That's what rock 'n' roll meant. It was new."

Fair enough, then. If that's the case, though, what does Weir calls the music he's been making for close to 40 years, first with various incarnations of the Grateful Dead and now as the leader of RatDog?

"It's an amalgam," the guitarist says. "Our sources of inspiration are pretty vast. We take a little from jazz, a little from blues, a little from country. Old forms, new forms, a little modern classical and anything else that pops up.

Every now and again we'll throw in elements we lifted from modern pop. We take all comers and try to mix them in."

That ecumenical approach, and the skill with which Weir mixes and matches styles, has made him a towering figure on the jam-band scene that originally sprung up around the Dead. It's a genre less reliant on studio records than on relentless touring and live performances.

RatDog has played more than 500 shows since getting together in 1995, yet the band has only released one studio album, 2000's "Evening Moods." That's not to say the band isn't writing new songs.

"We've got a bunch of new material, so we're trying to figure out what exactly we're going to do with it," Weir says. "I don't know if making a record is going to be the ticket for us, because we exist square in the middle of the file-sharing demographic, so going to the effort and expense of making a record doesn't have that big a payoff for us. But we write songs still, and we'll put them out in some manner, or we'll just play them."

He's spent a lot of years on the road, though. Any plans to scale back on touring?

"Maybe, but it was what I was born to do," Weir says.

"I don't think there can be much doubt of that, so as long as I'm looking for something to justify my existence, I'm going to keep at it."

Bob Weir & RatDog perform tonight at Mohegan Sun with Blues Traveler. Tickets are $35 for the 7 p.m. show. Information: 860-862-7163.

.................
aND ALSO THIS:
.....
Grateful Dead guitarist carries Garcia with him on stage with his band Ratdog

By DAVID PERRY, Sun Staff
Article Last Updated:11/09/2006 03:34:45 PM EST

It's been more than four decades since Bob Weir picked up a Lowell-born author's book and became forever changed.

"I read On The Road in 1964," says Weir by phone from his home in Mill Valley, CA. "That was my first year as a bohemian. I was still living with my parents, but I'd begun working with Jerry (Garcia) and Pigpen (Ron McKernan) in our jug band, and we were doing pretty well. But I picked up On The Road, put it in my back pocket and read it every chance I got. And it totally changed my life, that book."

He didn't know what he wanted from life before reading Jack Kerouac's most famous book, "but it told me the world is a wide-open place. Go get it."

As the Grateful Dead's rhythm guitarist and sometime lead singer, he did.

And like Kerouac's spontaneous prose, the Dead used recordings as reference points, taking flight in concert.

But like others in the band, Weir was restless to express himself, despite the Dead's success and touring schedule. Other means presented themselves. There were a couple

of solo albums under his own name, 1972's superb Ace, and Heaven Help the Fool in 1978. There were side bands, Kingfish, Bobby & The Midnites.
And then, there was Ratdog, the six-piece unit that plays Lowell Memorial Auditorium tomorrow night.

The band was born out of a longtime musical kinship with bassist Rob Wasserman. It blossomed into a full band just months before Garcia's death in August 1995. First, they added Jay Lane on drums, then keyboardist Jeff Chimenti. Guitarist Mark Karan has been there since the fall of 1998, and Kenny Brooks is on sax. When Wasserman left to concentrate on solo work, bassist Robin Sylvester signed on in 2003.

"I'm quite pleased with this band," says Weir, 59, who is thoughtful and personable in conversation. "The personnel has been stable for three to four years now, and most of us have been together longer than that. So the interplay can be pretty ferocious."

"Back in the days just after Jerry checked out, I wasn't ready to play with another lead guitarist. I just wasn't ready for that. So I had Matt Kelley playing harmonica and eventually, we decided to mix it up, bring in another lead."

He found Karan in The Other Ones, a reformation of Dead members with others. (Weir has also toured in 2002 and 2004 with The Dead.)

Weir describes a typical Ratdog set list as equal parts Dead tunes, Ratdog songs and covers of everyone from Bob Dylan to Willie Dixon and Chuck Berry.

"It's Ratdog, my back pages and a few covers. But the overall repertoire is pretty large at this point. And you know, the last couple of years, people have been charting this."

Ratdog has nailed down a repertoire of roughly 150 songs, "which gives us an opportunity to go for a while without repeating ourselves. "

It's a long way from the night 16-year-old Weir stumbled across the sound of banjo music in Palo Alto, CA. It was Garcia, in Dana Morgan's Music Store. They ended up playing together and formed Mother McCree's Uptown Jug Champions.

"At that point, in 64, I was a folkie," says Weir. "The big folk boom was going on and our jug band was getting real popular. Basically, jug bands were the city version of the minstrel bands that played on the river on the boats. Same guys playing the same instruments except we were on street corners instead of riverboats."

"It was fairly funky urban blues, pretty countrified, and I was totally enamored with that stuff. At one of my friends' house there was this collection of old 78s. And there were loads of told Bluebird records, the race records. And Garcia and I would listen and play. This was an amazing collection. Old jazz, Bessie Smith, and we did jug band versions. We learned that pretty thoroughly.

"Of course jug band music became funk music. It was just electrified. It was in the same cities Memphis, up and down the Mississippi and Ohio rivers."

Then came The Beatles.

"I listened to the radio, and they were all over it, as well as on TV. I saw these guys were having a lot of fun and it was real musical, melodic. I was working in the same music store at the time with Jerry. And those electric instruments started to look impossibly attractive to us."

And the jug band became the Warlocks and then the Grateful Dead.

Is it tough to lug around the legacy of The Dead?

"No, no, that's never a burden," says Weir. "It's really an MO for us, a modus operandi. It gives me a structure to work within. On a given night, a given concert, rather than play the same things. Something the Dead developed that was not about cranking out hits, but filling the evening with music in a way that comes out of interplay. Sometimes, we'll play a batch of songs real well and it still does not take off. And sometimes, we play the song maybe not A-plus, but it reaches that other level."

Weir is pleased with the dozens of Dead-inspired jam bands roaming the globe, a handful with large, faithful audiences.

"The thing that surprises me is ... I just do not understand how people can be satisfied with a road show where, like a lot of bands, it's played note-for-note. That'd just drive me out of it. I'd be firing guys right and left, or I'd be fired. I don't see how you can do that."

In the five years since he bought his first camera, Weir has become something of a photography buff. He listens to a wide array of music, "anything from rage metal to world music, and a lot of older jazz as well."

Some may be surprised to learn that one of the main influences in Weir's rhythm guitar playing is McCoy Tyner, the jazz bop pianist Weir discovered when he heard John Coltrane's Quartet at 17.

"It just blew my little mind," says Weir. "In particular, the chordal stuff Tyner was doing."

In the Grateful Dead, Weir was Tyner to Garcia's Coltrane.

Weir still carries Garcia with him, in a way.

"It was special. I can't say I miss him that much because he's still so much a part of what I do. He's still there with me. I can pretty much hear him on stage. 'Nah, don't go there.' Or, 'yeah, go there.' Jerry put a lot of life out there. So he's not really gone away."

David Perry's e-mail address is dperry@lowellsun.com.

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

Working in a house of blue light


............
Tonight's setlist
Ratdog in York


Set I

Jam
Stranger
She Belongs to Me
Crazy Fingers
Ramble on Rose
Fly Away
Bury Me Standing
Good Morning Little Schoolgirl
WRS Prelude/Part 1
Let It Grow

Set II

Big Iron@
Tuesday Blues@
Masterpiece@
Estimated
Other One Jam
Wheel
Stuff ("Robin is Rockin")
Wharf Rat
Throwing Stones

E: Touch


Use it or lose it

A few words from Dona Oxford on playing with Ratdog over on her my space blog.

Monday, November 06, 2006

Hipphoppy Bertha Kenny Brooks!

..................
Warren Hood the lad with the super sweet voice from the Waybacks has a blog.
..............
An e-vote from Bobby!

Friends:

I just want to remind you to make sure you vote tomorrow. Democracy is sacred, and every year it seems our democracy is slipping away. The only way we can protect it is to participate, and make sure we vote for candidates who represent our own particular views.

To get information on polling places, absentee ballots or any other voting-related questions, visit www.HeadCount.org

No excuses now. Get out and vote!

- Bob Weir
.........
setlist from tonight:

Set I

jam>stranger tease>
Music Never Stopped>
Minglewood
Señor
row jimmy
lucky enough
Friend of the Devil - electric
Sailor>
Saint
Don't Ease Me In

Set II

KC Moan
Deep Elem
LL RAIN
Mississippi half step
stuff
Ship of Fools
St Stephen
william tell
Eleven

Voter Rap "We have a democracy here, we might lose it if we don't Vote!"
E: US Blues

Sunday, November 05, 2006

HAPPY BERTHA Ellen!


Bay Area's Greatest Guitarists are listed here!. Of course, the Bobstar is on it!




11/04/06
Ratdog
Stanley Theater, Utica, New Yorkj
Set I:
Jam>>>>
Sakedown Street>>>
Maggies Farm>>>
Loser>>>
Josephine
Book Of Rules>>
Odessa
Shade Of Grey>>>
Hell In A Bucket>>>RaggaeHell chorus>>>.Hell Chorus>>>>
Deal

II:
Me and My Uncle@>>>
Candyman@>>>
Corrina>>>
Althea>>>
Ashes and Glass>>>
Stuff=Jeff and Mark on drumz....Jay Plays sticks on Robin's bass...Jay on Keys>>>>>
Sugaree>>>>(Guest Keys Female)
One More Saturday Night (Guest Keys)


e:
Johnny b. goode
Attics of my Life

Friday, November 03, 2006

Here's a great Rubber stamp store for all you grateful crafty types!
I'm talking Robert Crumb rubber stamps!

The Rock & Roll Bug
...............

Weir's RatDog passionate about music

Daily Record/Sunday News
Article Launched:11/02/2006 07:13:29 AM EST
From : http://www.flipsidepa.com/music/ci_4590413

Bob Weir is best known for his days as the rhythm guitarist for The Grateful Dead but... (SUBMITTED)
At bottom: · If you go
Nov 2, 2006 — Band: RatDog
Members: Bob Weir (vocals, guitar), Jay Lane (drums), Jeff Chimenti (keyboards), Mark Karan (guitar, vocals), Kenny Brooks (saxophone), Robin Sylvester (bass)

Who we talked to: Weir, 59

Where'd the name come from?
Stuff just comes to me.

Who are your influences?
The Beatles, of course. I listened to Miles Davis, John Coltrane. Back when I was 17, I was listening to a lot of modern classical music. At the same time, (I listened to) Chuck Berry and a lot of Everly Brothers, blues guys, Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, those kind of people.

Who is your biggest musical guilty pleasure?
I used to be a big fan of ABBA. I thought it was real well-conceived, the music was moving, all that kind of stuff.

What instrument that you have no experience with do you wish you could play?
Probably the piano. I just got a piano, so I'm going to try and learn to play it. We've got a piano player, but I just got it for my kids and for me.

What's the best movie you've seen recently?

I just saw "Capote." That was real good.

Who would play you in a movie about The Grateful Dead?
Brad Pitt, obviously.

Jerry (Garcia) had Cherry Garcia. If there was an ice cream made in your honor, what would it have?
It would be cinnamon ice cream.

If you could share the stage with any band or artist, who would it be and why?
I haven't thought about that. I wouldn't want to, actually, because all the bands that I would name are so good at what they do, I'm not sure I'd fit in there.

Who would win in a fight: The Dead or RatDog?
Well, RatDog is a fair bit younger.

There hasn't been a RatDog album in six years. When is the next coming?
We've got a bunch of tunes, but the problem is our audience is square in the middle of the file-sharing demographic, so it's almost pointless for us to put out a record. We have new material that will be played on the next tour.

What do you guys need to work on as a band?
I think we need to do a slightly shorter show.
It goes up to three-and-a-half hours, and I think that's too long for the human spirit to endure.

- JASON COX, FLIPSIDE STAFF

If you go

RatDog will perform at the Strand-Capitol Performing Arts Center at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday. Tickets are $35-$50 and can be purchased by calling the box office at 846-1111 or visiting http://www.strandcapitol.org.

Listen to the full interview with frontman Bob Weir by subscribing to the FlipSide podcast at
http://www.flipsidepa.com/goingout.



GDTS:


Rex Foundation Benefit at the Warfield, December 1.

Since none of us out here in California have seen the
Rhythm Devils play we would like to let you know that we have
received a lot of great reports from patrons who attended Rhythm
Devils shows across the nation.

Balcony tickets are still available.
Small amounts of 'Rhythm', 'Harmony' and 'Peace' tickets are
also still available.

We would strongly recommend that we send your
credentials for the Floor tickets by Fedex. We will not be
responsible for items lost in the mail. Please email
frankie@gdtstoo to confirm.

For show information please go to www.gdtstoo.com
=========
The RatDog Florida shows:
We will hopefully be able to mail out the last 2 Florida shows:
Jannus Landing and Mizner by this coming Monday.
Let us know if you'd prefer to have your tickets at will/call.

Tickets for Jacksonville and Orlando have been mailed
a few days go.

The Crew of GDTSTOO
11.3.2006

--

"The need for mystery is greater than the need for an answer."

Ken Kesey

5 years gone on November 10
the day of the Lowell RatDog show....

Thursday, November 02, 2006

Vroom into November!

FREE Tickets (well, kinda) for for Ratdog
I'm looking around to see what else is going on the weekend of Dec. 1st in the Bay Area for all the Weirfreaks
who are coming in for
the Benefit.
So far,

November 30th:
New Riders at GAMH

December 1st- Pre Rex benefit Grateful Graphic Field trip!
JB is willing to have folks tour the Grateful Graphics facilities. He will give a brief overview of the company and GD merchandising history. Folks can purchase goods at wholesale pricing!!!!!!
If interested, the group will go to The Connecticut Yankee for a light lunch given we are having dinner at The Warfield. Anybody interested should contact JB directly at jb@gratefulgraphics.com.


Saturday, December 2nd:
Primus at Berekely Community Theater
Robert Walter at The Independent
Ozomotli @ the Fillmore, SF
The Waybacks @ Sonoma County Fairgrounds' Grace Pavilion, Santa Rosa.

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

staging an encore


woooooooo!
Wow! a Dylan Cover blog

Thanks John M (Jammin John?) for the video:
Faux Bobby & all doing the Weirwolves of London from last night's show.