Althouse: "[The Grateful Dead's] Bob Weir sat in with Lukas Nelson... one of Willie Nelson’s sons..."

February 9, 2012

"[The Grateful Dead's] Bob Weir sat in with Lukas Nelson... one of Willie Nelson’s sons..."

"... for Bob Dylan's 'Maggie’s Farm' and 'I Shall Be Released.' Ruby Stewart — Rod Stewart’s daughter — also added background vocals...."

12 comments:

traditionalguy said...: The next generation takes over.

I guess it is a compliment to be imitated; 2/9/12, 1:49 PM
Anonymous said...: Can't wait for a dub step remix of the recording...; 2/9/12, 2:08 PM
Amexpat said...: Best Lukas Nelson can hope for is to join the list of sons of great singers who have had limited success but never came close to reaching their fathers' stature:
Arlo Guthrie
Frank Sinatra Jr
Hank Williams Jr
Julian Lennon
Jakob Dylan

Seems daughters fare better. Nancy Sinatra enjoyed more success than than Jr. and Hanna Montana (forgot her real name) has probably sold more records than her dad (forgot his name too).

Only mother-daughter combo that comes to mind is Judy Garland and Liza, and Liza is roughly in the same league as her mom.; 2/9/12, 2:18 PM
Anonymous said...: Bob Weir sings flat. I like Europe '72 - other than that it's all the same. Garcia should have just stayed in bluegrass with David Grisman.; 2/9/12, 2:22 PM
Michael said...: As I slog along towards the inevitable I have found myself listening to Bloomberg Radio in my car about half the time. The other half I am tuned in to the Grateful Dead channel. I never liked the GD when I was younger and living in the Bay area but as Joseph Heller said "something happened." Odd.; 2/9/12, 3:28 PM
Wince said...: Lots of fun, fond memories working with the Grateful Dead since the late 1980s. Most poignant was being with Bob Weir the day Jerry Garcia died. Ratdog was playing New Hampshire, and Weir felt Jerry would want the show to go on.

Club show became international media event. Amazing vibe, huge overflow crowd with speakers set up outside. The audience wouldn't leave and kept the beat of "Not Fade Away" with their chairs against the floor at the end. Weir was scheduled to appear by satellite on hour-long ABC Nightline special from the dressing room after the show, but declined last minute and drank a couple of bottles of wine instead. We literally carried him to his bed.

Anyway, what I found most interesting about the story was the link to Weir's Tamalpais Research Institute and cool introductory video (scroll down).

Tamalpais Research Institute is the vision of Bob Weir, a founding member of the Grateful Dead. Weir and his team have built a state-of-the-art performance studio for broadcasting live HD video and audio streams directly to the Internet.

TRI is a virtual venue where fans can gather and enjoy the performances in the comfort of their own homes, or anywhere they have Internet access.

The main performance space at TRI houses a Meyer Sound Constellation System - a revolutionary acoustic modeling technology which has the ability to dramatically change the acoustical properties of the room. With the touch of a button, an artist can instantly change the sonic environment from that of a small intimate club to sounding like a theater, an arena or even a cathedral.

Each show will be directed, filmed, and mixed live in real time. Every care will be taken to provide the highest possible upstream bandwidth to transmit high quality HD video and audio to the end user. The live stream will be accessible by and tailored to a variety of viewing equipment such as mobile devices, streaming players, game consoles, computers, Internet ready HDTV's as well as home theaters.

All of this will take place in a small intimate setting in front of a live studio audience. The musicians may be playing in the domain of Mount Tamalpais, but their music will be beaming out to the entire free world.; 2/9/12, 5:19 PM
Crimso said...: EDH:
Mind elaborating a bit on that? Sounds like you were something of an insider. I'm curious if only because between 90 and 95 I saw them 25 times, including Vince's first 2 shows and the "riot show" at Deer Creek some weeks before Jerry died. I'd imagine working with them must have been pretty cool (they all seem(ed) like great guys).; 2/9/12, 5:36 PM
Penny said...: Just doesn't seem right to me that Althouse couldn't swing a tag for Jerry Garcia?

Rod Stewart and Willie Nelson have their own tags. And that's a good thing. We have a place to autoslot their kids.

Yet, no "Jerry" tag?

He WAS the Grateful Dead. No need for brackets in your heading up there if it were Jerry who sat in with Lukas Nelson.

Jerry Garcia was to The Grateful Dead as Steve Jobs was to Apple.; 2/9/12, 9:54 PM
Penny said...: And yes, eventually... we can expect that, in their future business ventures, Apple Computer will follow the same trajectory as the Grateful Dead.

[bracketed]

It's a right bitch when "gurus" take a permanent time out.; 2/9/12, 10:18 PM
Wince said...: Crimso,

Not a tour insider, but worked with all of them (Taylor, Parish, Ram Rod, Viola, McNally...) in close proximity to the band. New England dates only, which became annual week long stays at the old Boston Garden in the early 1990s right up to Jerry's death. Familiarity over the years bred trust, but you had to earn it and stay on your toes to keep it. Band was laid back, but crew was very protective and exacting. Get too comfortable, overstep your bounds or fuck up in any one of a million other ways -- and you were out like shit through a goose. So it was a fun as long as things went well, which it usually did, but you did breathe a sigh of relief when it was over.

Called to the Ratdog club show early afternoon by the Dead office after Jerry's death and the tribes were already gathering. The Ratdog club tour crew was lean, and I was their contact nearest the venue.; 2/9/12, 10:36 PM
Crimso said...: EDH:
Thanks for that info. You were very fortunate.; 2/10/12, 7:31 AM
Dfrankjazz said...: I invite you folks to a slammin master class on the Deads' original Dark star -you will LUV this! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rs_4TQLycQI; 2/21/12, 12:41 AM