Dead & Company Sail Into The Sunset Of Inaugural Sphere Residency Weekend

Dead & Company wrapped the first three-night run of their 24-date Las Vegas Sphere Dead Forever residency on Saturday. The band loaded the setlist with Grateful Dead classics once again for the first weekend finale.

Dead & Company — Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir and drummer Mickey Hart, along with guitarist John Mayer, drummer Jay Lane, bassist Oteil Burbridge and keyboardist Jeff Chimenti — kicked off Saturday with a cover, Sam Cooke’s “Good Times.” The band then blasted off on American Beauty closer “Truckin’” for nearly 12 minutes before heading into the Howlin’ Wolf blues classic “Smokestack Lightning.”

Next, D&C delivered a massive “Sugaree,” stretching the song originally appearing on Jerry Garcia’s 1972 self-titled debut solo album out to nearly 24 minutes. Beloved ballad “Ship of Fools,” captained by Mayer and Burbridge, came next featuring a stealie and rose flying ship beneath a psychedelic sea.

From the Mars Hotel’s “Loose Lucy” went round and round next ahead of live favorite “Tennessee Jed” before the band wrapped up the first frame with “Casey Jones,” which saw the return of the early Dead ephemera motif.

Set two got underway with the classic pairing of “Scarlet Begonias” and “Fire On The Mountain,” the latter sung by Oteil and containing Mickey’s original rapped lyrics. From “Fire,” D&C jumped into a 19-minute “Eyes of the World,” which began with the disco ball visual before morphing into bands of the Dead’s iconography including skulls, dancing bears and Rick Griffin’s flying eyeballs.

Next, Dead & Company offered the epic “Terrapin Station” with Mayer at the helm for “Lady With a Fan,” which began visually with a breathtaking, snowy mountainous landscape as the sunset painted the sky in orange, red and purple hues. The song concluded with Stanley Mouse’s iconic “Skull and Roses” motif.

It was then time for “Drums” and a well-jammed “Space,” with the poignant “Stella Blue” emerging from the latter. “The Wheel” then turned around the great dome followed by the traditional, “Going Down the Road Feeling Bad.”

Bob Weir then took the reins for one of his signature songs, “Throwing Stones.” The visual began with a sort of psychedelic gyroscopic spaceship ahead of a zoom through the cosmos and fittingly a shot of a “bright blue ball” earth from space, descending back down to Haight Ashbury.

Dead & Company closed their inaugural Sphere run with Bobby Weir belting “One More Saturday Night.” Dead & Company return to the state-of-the-art venue on Friday, May 24.

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Audience Recording (Taped by Hunter S)

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