Who Needs 10 Fingers Anyway? Dead & Company ‘Let The Good Times Roll’ On Night 26 At Las Vegas Sphere

Dead & Company’s guitarist John Mayer has been using just nine of his 10 fingers at the band’s Dead Forever residency at the Las Vegas Sphere this weekend after injuring the index finger on his left hand. Mayer and bandmates Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir and drummer Mickey Hart with bassist Oteil Burbridge, keyboardist Jeff Chimenti and drummer Jay Lane didn’t allow the injury to prevent them from letting the good times roll on Friday, the 26th show of the 30-date residency.

The sextet dug in on Sam Cooke’s “Let The Good Times Roll” to kick off the second night of their penultimate weekend at the $2.3 billion venue. Dead & Company achieved liftoff and the scaffolding surrounding the stage parted as Bobby led them through “The Music Never Stopped.” Mayer then slayed his guitar on the successive “Bertha” in the same way he slayed his finger. The guitarist had a Telecaster-style axe in hand at points, perhaps to allow him to more easily work around the injury.

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Dead & Co. got back to “Tennessee Jed” next before Mayer shined on a slow and throbbing “They Love Each Other.” A massive stadium filled with skeletons featuring blimps hovering above, one of the fresh visuals unveiled this weekend, was displayed during the Hunter/Garcia classic. The band moved forward with just the second “New Speedway Boogie” of the residency as memorabilia and ephemera from Grateful Dead history that had a more dark tone than usual were shown on Spere’s massive screens. A potent “Deal” ended the middle set of the weekend with the motorcycle-riding skeleton from The Grateful Dead movie taking an animated joyride to accompany the music.

The start of the second set was the improvisational centerpiece of Night 26 in Vegas and featured a dream setlist. An exploratory “Dark Star” with matching visuals opened. D&C then revved into the oft-played “Estimated Prophet > Eyes Of The World” pairing, patiently taking time to jam adventurously. The band went on to take “St. Stephen” deep to close the outrageous beginning of the set.

Lane, Hart and Burbridge took Sphere attendees on a wild percussive trip for the evening’s “Drums” segment. The Rhythm Devils 3.0 pounded out one explosive beat after another while trippy visuals reigned supreme. Mickey moved over to the Beam for his portion of the sequence and triggered frenetic samples before the instrumentalists returned for a brief foray into “Space.”

The next portion of the show featured beloved ballads “Stella Blue” and “Brokedown Palace,” leaving few dry eyes in the house. An old newsreel documenting the early days of The Grateful Dead was displayed ahead of a rousing “Turn On Your Lovelight” finale.

Dead & Company returns to the Las Vegas Sphere on Saturday to wrap the next-to-last-weekend of the Dead Forever residency. The band closes out the run Thursday, August 8 – Saturday, August 10.

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