Furthur On Up The Road At Radio City Music Hall

The Furthur bus, driven by the Grateful Dead's Phil Lesh and Bob Weir, pulled in to Times Square's Radio City Music Hall for a two night party in the middle of their mammoth Winter Tour. These were highly anticipated shows for me and I thoroughly enjoyed them. Furthur consists of Weir and Lesh joined by Ratdog alumni Jeff Chimenti on keyboards and Jay Lane on Drums, Joe Russo (Trey Anastasio Band, Russo Benavento) also on drums, Jerry Garcia sound alike John Kadlecik (Dark Star Orchestra) playing Garcia's part on guitar and vocals, and backup singers Sunshine Garcia Becker and Zoe Ellis.


Let me start out by saying that, as usual, I've been downloading and listening to this whole tour, as well as catching those two shows at the Hammerstein Ballroom back in December, and this band is indisputably the closest sounding band to the Grateful Dead since Jerry's untimely exit from this world in 1995. Kadlecik definitely brings that big Garcia sound to Furthur and alongside the authentic Grateful Dead members of Weir and Lesh and the other great musicians who are more than familiar with the repertoire you've got an incredibly potent dose on your tongue of the Grateful Dead. Kadlecik isn't the second coming of Garcia but he does play with a Jerry kind of sensitivity and his voice sounds uncannily like Garcia's. And by the looks of things, Furthur is built to last, with more shows recently announced for this summer at festivals (Nateva Music and Arts Festival, All Good Festival) and on their own at amphitheaters and minor league baseball parks like what Bob Dylan did last summer. After this winter tour and the summer tour under their belt Furthur will continue to develop, which is something that never happened with 2009's The Dead with Warren Haynes and the GD's core four; they only played that one spring tour and couldn't get anything back together because Haynes is too busy with the Allman Brothers Band and Govt Mule, differences with Mickey Hart, and Bill Kreutzmann wanting to go back to stay in Hawaii. Bobby and Phil seem to get along really well now, at least musically. They're clearly the leaders of this band and Furthur just really sounds great. It's a reflection of them and the seasoned professionals they are, and hopefully this lasts a while so Deadheads new and old can enjoy the great American experience that is The Grateful Dead.



The two Furthur shows February 23rd and 24th, 2010 at Radio City Music Hall were both great shows. In the next couple of posts I'll review each show. If you were at these Furthur shows or downloaded them and want to share your opinion please leave a comment. I'm really enjoying listening to this tour and am looking forward to the two shows coming up this June at Coney Island.

Download the Furthur Shows Here

Furthur Rehearsals and Furthurmore

Recently the Furthur rehearsals from January 2010 surfaced on bt.etree.org. I downloaded four of them and since have been checking out the Furthur Winter Tour shows from bt.etree.org as well. Grate stuff! Phil Lesh, Bob Weir and the guys opened up their rehearsals for the public at The 142 Throckmorton Theatre in Mill Valley, CA, in no other than Bob Weir's neighborhood. The Throckmorton Theatre has a long history in Mill Valley dating back to 1915 when it was known as The Hub Theatre and showed Charlie Chaplin movies and live vaudeville. I couldn't find how many it seats on their website but am assuming it's quite small. This must have been very cool to see these rehearsals which really were more like shows when you listen to them. Each was about two hours long and are a compact "show". They worked up songs that they hadn't previously done like Comes A Time, Ryan Adam's Magnolia Mountain, Ratdog's Two Djin and Dylan's Silvio penned with Robert Hunter as well as Hurricane. The energy is great on these rehearsals and I recommend downloading them here.


142 Throckmorton Theatre
I've downloaded the whole Furthur tour so far up to Hampton, Va 2/12/10. I've only had a chance to listen to the Thomas Wolfe Auditorium Asheville NC 2/09/10 show. I was able to abscond with a soundboard of this show and that's why I skipped right to it. I don't have a hell of allot of time to listen to my music these days and basically listen in my car to and from work every day (maybe an hour) and sometimes at home when my Wii playing, homework doing, violin playing 9 year old girl and my wife are not around; which isn't often. So it takes me a long time to delve through a whole tour like that. Like last years Dead Spring Tour which I downloaded the whole tour. It took me till like mid-July to listen to all that music! It's allot of stuff to go through. Anyway, the one show I have listened to sounds so good. This band really eerily sounds so much like - dare I say it - The Grateful Dead. There I said it. John Kadlecik's playing in this band has become more confident and he's exploring places with his band mates which are fresh yet reminiscent of times past. His voice is so perfect for Jerry Garcia's songs it's uncanny. And Furthur is really starting to gel. Like anything Phil Lesh and Bob Weir do; Furthur is a quality product with great players and is developing into something very special indeed. Deadheads should be happy we have this band to go see. Let's enjoy it while it lasts. Thank You Phil and Bobby for a real good time!

I can't wait for my two Furthur shows at New York's Radio City Music Hall. Check back here for my reviews of them. In the mean time I hope to see ya there! You got to try and see a little Furthur.

Download the Furthur Shows Here