the show

Quick Synopsis: Good show, But they 'jammed' a bit too much between and during songs. Joan Osborne hasn't quite found her niche yet with the band, but added a great vocal diversity to the music. Bob Dylan was a bit of a disapointment, Robert Hunter was very cool.
The two best songs? Franklins Tower and Drums (especially Mickey Harts cool-ass drum thingy).

More detail:

Bob Dylan - came out to play in a black Satin Cowboy outfit. His band was tight and played very well, too bad nobody could understand Bob. He's getting worse and worse we couldn't understand a sentance he said. When he introduced his backup band it was like this ..

herm ha buzzit way -- Druuuum
too gdufar -- Guiiitarrr

I kid you not. He only played for about an hour and fifteen minutes. Since he only sang ONE song anyone could recognize, I'd have to say he sang about an hour too long.

He could have let his band play by themselves they were great. Kinda like he had grabbed members of Steve Ray Vaughns band, added some members of the Fabulous Thunderbirds (I know, another Vaughn) and then said 'yaa blaahg bo eep' (translation - ya'll play backup for me).

Robert Hunter - He Popped up on stage between sets and wowed the audience. I doubt many people had every heard him sing (I know I haven't), and many really didn't know who he was. But by the end of his set, everyone in audience loved him. He was Jerry's Partner and wrote Lyrics to some of the great tunes (Truckin, Franklins Tower, Darkstar). It was just him and the guitar up on stage and it was fun. I'd love to get a tape of his set.

The Dead - The first set of the Dead show was lots of fun, we had seats up on the side, very close to the stage and could see them very well, They were really enjoying themselves up there.

They started out with "Help on the way" and then went into "Friend of the Devil" for about 30 seconds until I saw one of the roadies waving at Bob Weir. He acknowledged the wave and nodded to the rest of the band and they segewayed into "Blackbird" instead, he and Joan sang it together and it was a nice piece.

The roadie showed up again and we found out why ... here came Bob Dylan, and together with the Dead they played "Friend of the Devil", "Gotta Serve Somebody" and "Like a rolling stone".

He hung out on stage for a bit and wanted to chat with Bob and Phil it seemed. I think it threw the rest of that set off balance, they never quite got their groove back on after that.

The Dead set two was a strange one. They did a very long and stretched out (lots of too long jams) "Jack Straw". I'd have to say that the best Jack Straw I have ever seen was when Bruce Hornsby made that his own, one year up in Atlanta for a Grateful Dead show.

They then went into "Mountains on the Moon" With Phil and Joan. Funny thing was we had just heard Robert Hunter sing that song onstage in-between sets.

Joan Osbornes little 'thing' she did in the middle of space went on way too long. She lost the crowd and never got them back. She kept repeating herself and I really think that she skipped a few parts of the song. It was a disjointed mess.

Drums was great as usual, Bill and Mickey always put on a good show and this time was no exception. They compliment each other so well and seem to push each others boundaries during "their turn".

Mickey had this instrument that was set on the horizontal and must have been 8 feet long. At the very end of Drums he donned surgical garb and played this 'thing'. I swear he had somehow trapped a deamon inside this thing and was tickling it when he played. I could feel the sound vibrating my sternum and the sound that came out of it shocked the everyone around me into compleat silence when we first heard it. I looked over and Dan was sitting stock still completely enraptured. I looked at Tiff and she had the biggest goofiest smile on her face. It was great.

They ended the set with a powerful version of "Franklins Tower", that really capped the show well. The band put their heart and soul into it and the audience did too.


All in All, I believe a fun time was had by all. I know I enjoyed it and really wish I was in Atlanta right now walking out of the Omni after listening to them again tonight.

Here is the setlist.

Dave ...