Circles Around The Sun Makes New York City Debut

Circles Around The Sun :: 11.23.16 :: Brooklyn Bowl :: NYC

“What music would Deadheads want to hear during extended intermissions at the last five shows four members of the band would play together?” This was the question put to guitarist Neal Casal in advance of 2015’s Fare Thee Well – Celebrating 50 Years Of Grateful Dead concerts. Casal responded by bringing together a handful of his musical friends to record lengthy grooves he composed, which would impress fans at the concerts enough that plans would be made to release the music and play live shows. Neal dubbed the project Circles Around The Sun and the foursome would make their New York City debut at Brooklyn Bowl on Thanksgiving Eve.

Circles Around The Sun finds Casal joined by a talented band of Mark Levy on drums, Adam MacDougall on keys and Dan Horne on bass. The quartet would play just seven songs over the course of more than two hours at the Bowl. Each groove was patiently and expertly explored with Chris Robinson Brotherhood band mates Casal and MacDougall showing off their harmonic talents throughout. Neal did a fantastic job of toying with the pace in each composition, while MacDougall is the master of wild, analog keyboard tones from the ’70s. Horne and Levy sounded as if they’ve been holding down the bottom end for Neal and Adam for years since they provided the perfect anchor for the music.

Through three performances (CATS first played at this year’s Lockn’ Festival and then in D.C. on Tuesday night), the quartet has stuck to the same set of songs with one exception. The “Shakedown”-esque “Gilbert’s Groove,” the “Scarlet Begonias”-like “Scarlotta’s Magnolias,” the slinky groove of “Saturday’s Children” and more airy “Farewell Franklins” thrived in the live setting. On Wednesday Circles Around The Sun unveiled “Hallucinate A Solution,” which was one of the more interesting and unusual compositions played in Brooklyn. CATS returned to end the evening with an encore of “Ginger Says” (think the early ’70s Dead jamming on “Tweezer”) and the gorgeous “Space Wheel.” Check out Stephen Olker’s photos from Wednesday night.