The Deadheads have gathered in Hyde Park below the right blue skies of the Summer season Solstice, a propitious prelude to Bobby Weir’s first UK gig in 22 years. Whereas Weir and drummer Mickey Hart normally now preserve the legacy of the Grateful Useless as Useless & Firm in residencies on the Vegas’ high-tech Sphere, Weir’s Wolf Bros plot an alternate course, permitting the rhythm guitarist and deputy singer to carry out to his personal satisfaction. Tonight, this implies making his debut on the Royal Albert Corridor for the one-off spectacle of his first European orchestral present.
The Royal Philharmonic Live performance Orchestra take the stage first for Giancarlo Aquilanti’s “A Grateful Overture”, which units acquainted Useless themes within the custom of Aaron Copland’s early 20th century Americana, summoning photos of Western vistas with plaintive pastoral passages and rock’n’roll punch. Because the orchestra begin “Truckin’”, Weir enters on the head of his Wolf Bros trio – pianist Jeff Chimenti, drummer Jay Lane and double-bassist Don Was, sporting dreads, shades and Stetson. Weir’s black poncho resembles a schoolmaster’s cape, thrown over crumpled grey-black threads and Cuban-heeled footwear, whereas his full-bodied white hair and grizzled beard could possibly be that of an old-time prospector from one in all Robert Hunter‘s songs, or an unreconstructed hippie idealist – which he and lots of of tonight’s viewers stay.
“What an extended, unusual journey it’s been,” Weir displays, as “Truckin’” hymns the Useless’s former, footloose life. His leonine head leans into the orchestral headwinds, until he finds a pocket of house for his guitar. The possibly knotty downside of integrating improvisational rock’n’roll with classical musicians is solved by alternating passages purely given to Aquilanti’s orchestral preparations with sections the place the band interweave with the RPCO. “These guys are nothing in need of a nationwide treasure,” Weir says, ceaselessly turning to observe them, beaming on the remedy of this materials.
“Black Peter” is ready to cinematic strings. Weir performs sultry slide, inhabiting the position of the wounded loner dealing with down demise, comfortable with the fatalism which shadows the Useless’s songbook as he wails, “Yet another day!” “China Cat Sunflower” enters Hunter’s extra lyrically baroque realms over symphonic funk, because the strings floating dreamily up and away. “Brokedown Palace” concludes the primary set with one other existential American saga sung with unfussy, direct feeling, Weir concluding: “I like you greater than phrases can inform.”
“Sugar Magnolia” begins the second half in nation mode with classical violinists transformed to hoedown fiddles. As Weir sings of an outdated ‘70s girlfriend, he plucks particular person, ringing notes. The multi-generational crowd have been boisterously out of their seats for a lot of the evening and now spin with delight at the beginning of the “Terrapin Station” suite. “His job is to shed mild, to not grasp,” sings Weir of the track’s storyteller, and that’s additionally his modest method, his expansive vocal turning introspective as he explains a sailor’s doomed romantic discount and heads in direction of the titular vacation spot, perpetually simply out of attain.
Then the Wolf Bros exit, the orchestra quieten and Weir places down his guitar to sing “Days Between”, the final track written by Garcia earlier than his demise. Weir’s gruff, sturdy voice summons Hunter’s lyric’s mixture of chivalrous the Aristocracy and sorrow, acceptable within the encroaching twilight of the Useless’s story, with Weir standing ever extra alone. “These had been days,” he sings thrice. “The brightest ever seen… nonetheless tender, younger and inexperienced… comfortable as velveteen.” This can be a style of Weir’s personal energy, other than however nonetheless in service to the Useless’s story.
Weir windmills his guitar on the house strait and boils down “Hell In A Bucket” to a hedonistic sentiment absolutely embraced by the dancing crowd: “May as properly benefit from the journey!” Lastly, the orchestra retire and the Wolf Bros dig into Weir’s solo songbook. His fuzzed-up guitar is loud and clear on “She Mentioned”, by his ‘90s band RatDog. Then “One Extra Saturday Evening” brings this Saturday evening to an in depth in occasion mode. With ferocious angle belying his 77 years, Weir is fortunately howling by the tip. Stripped of the Useless’s weight, he nonetheless merely desires to play rock’n’roll.
Bobby Weir & The Wolf Bros set listing at Royal Albert Corridor, London, June 21, 2025:
SET ONE:
A Grateful Overture
Truckin’
Black Peter
China Cat Sunflower/I Know You Rider
Brokedown Palace
SET TWO:
Sugar Magnolia
Terrapin Station
Days Between
Jack Straw
Hell In A Bucket
Sunshine Daydream
She Says
One Extra Saturday Evening
