John Mayer Talks Dead & Company Summer Tour On ‘Tales From The Golden Road’

Back on Sunday, Dead & Company guitarist John Mayer made an appearance on the SiriusXM radio program Tales From The Golden Road. Mayer called in from Denver, where he had surprised attendees at Red Rocks on Saturday by performing before comedian Dave Chappelle took the stage, to talk about Dead & Company’s recently completed Summer Tour. In other news, John Mayer revealed he will play an intimate venue in Los Angeles on July 26 as part of Bud Light’s Dive Bar Tour.

The guitarist was supposed to appear in person at SiriusXM’s New York City studios, but when Chappelle asked him to appear at Red Rocks he took the comedian up on his offer. Mayer kept his promise to hosts David Gans and Gary Lambert by phoning into the show for a lengthy appearance. The Connecticut native was effusive about just how well Dead & Company’s tour went throughout his visit which spanned the entire two-hour episode.

“So many discoveries took place this tour. This is the tour we became a band and not a project. Oteil [Burbridge] and I clicked in a way we never had before,” Mayer said. John felt Oteil really came into his own both as an instrumentalist and singer during the run. “He almost sings like a horn player, he’s languid. We’re all listening to each other play now like it’s the best seat in the house.”

Mayer thought one of the key moments of the tour came on the final night, when Oteil Burbridge led Dead & Company through “Fire On The Mountain” at Wrigley Field in Chicago. “There was a moment where Oteil took ‘Fire On The Mountain’ and it became Oteil’s ‘Fire On The Mountain.’ It was almost like a glimpse at what will be the full second generation version of the Dead with Oteil’s infusion of his DNA into ‘Fire On The Mountain,'” John said. “He took it and made it into something that was so perfect unlike anything we ever played before.”

[Wrigley Fire On The Mountain]

“When [Oteil] took initiative on ‘Fire On The Mountain’ that was the ‘coming soon reel’ in terms of the next version of what we do when we go out again it’s going to start there,” John Mayer added. The guitarist made many mentions of Dead & Company continuing without ever going into specifics. “Everyone in the band agrees that this was a great tour,” the guitarist said adding that the members continue to text each other since the end of the run. He feels they have come a far way since playing their first show in October of 2015. “It’s all basically a science experiment that everyone can watch get refined. The ethos of this band so far is ‘look at what’s you’ve done so far, compare it to your intention and keep making changes on the fly.'” He exclaimed, “If you take Wrigley Night Two and compare it to Albany in 2015 nothing can prepare you for where you end up.”

John Mayer spent over an hour taking calls from listeners. He talked about how he’s more comfortable now that he knows he “has the gig” and discussed his tabloid history. Mayer also said he’s not sure if he wants to enter the studio with Dead & Company as there’s been talk of the band recording old Dead tunes. That said, “If there was a stack of Robert Hunter lyrics that came in, I wouldn’t be able to help myself” the guitarist added in regards to the potential of recording new material with the six-piece. Sunday’s Tales From The Golden Road will be re-broadcast tonight (or more accurately Wednesday morning) at 1 a.m. ET on SiriusXM’s Grateful Dead channel.

Tonight, the guitarist kicks off the next leg of his solo tour in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He revealed he will play an intimate venue in Los Angeles on Wednesday, July 26 as part of Bud Light’s Dive Bar Tour. Look for the performance to be streamed via Facebook Live. Watch a preview of the gig: