Dead & Company Dust Off Wilson Pickett & Debut Bob Dylan Covers At Final July Las Vegas Sphere Concert

On Saturday, Dead & Company opened the 24th and final July show of their 30-date Dead Forever Residency at the Las Vegas Sphere with one of the biggest bust outs of the run. “In The Midnight Hour” was played for the first time since New Year’s Eve 2019 at a concert that also included the premiere Dead & Co. rendition of Bob Dylan‘s “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue.”

The group consisting of Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir and drummer Mickey Hart with guitarist John Mayer, bassist Oteil Burbridge, keyboardist Jeff Chimenti and drummer Jay Lane performed “In The Midnight Hour” as an image of scaffolding enveloped the stage. Dead & Co.’s first version of the Wilson Pickett classic in 111 shows was their fifth in their nine-year history and featured Weir on lead vocals. The Grateful Dead performed “Midnight Hour” occasionally from 1966 through 1971 and then again from 1982 until 1994.

The sextet gave the audience its first taste of Sphere’s capability following the surprise opener. “Lift Off” was provided with a trip to the famed Haight-Asbury district in San Francisco after the static graphic of the scaffolding parted. Dead & Co. then lit into “Mississippi Half-Step Uptown Toodeloo” while imagery zoomed out from the Dead’s famed 710 Ashbury home base to show visuals of San Francisco from the sky and eventually Earth from Space.

“Shakedown Street” came next and featured teases of Genesis’ “That’s All” initiated by John Mayer. The guitarist worked hints of the 1983 Genesis hit into other songs later in the evening. Last night’s first set rolled on with Mayer helming the traditional “Cold Rain & Snow” and Weir channeling Jerry on the Garcia/Hunter ballad “Loser.” Then “Sugaree” brought the frame to a close featuring a fiery solo by John Mayer.

Bobby Weir led his bandmates through the day-appropriate “One More Saturday Night” to get the second set underway. Next up was the pairing of “Help On The Way” and “Slipknot!” However, instead of landing on “Franklin’s Tower” to complete the oft-played trifecta, Dead & Co. launched “Althea.” John Mayer did not disappoint on the song that sent him down the Grateful Dead wormhole over a decade prior after hearing the tune on Pandora.

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The six-piece treated fans to a riotous “St. Stephen” before the evening’s “Drums”/”Space” sequence. Lane and Hart were joined by Burbridge on “Drums” in pounding out tribal beats while trippy imagery was displayed on the screens at the state-of-the-art venue. The instrumentalist’s “Space” excursion eventually bled into the Dead & Company debut of “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue.”

“One of the Grateful Dead’s earliest Bob Dylan covers, going back to a handful of performances in 1966, It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue was played primarily as an encore, in particular from 1981 onward,” GD archivist David Lemieux wrote of the GD’s history with the song.

The last surprise of the evening was followed by another Mayer showcase, “Bertha,” before Weir captained the group on the beloved “Sugar Magnolia.” An intensely beautiful “Brokedown Palace” was then followed by “Good Lovin'” to close the show with newsreel footage of the Grateful Dead displayed between the final two songs of the night.

Dead & Company will take next two weekends off. The Dead Forever Residency continues August 1 – 3 and concludes August 8 – 10.

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