Bob Weir Turns Up Unannounced at Joe Russo's Almost Dead's 10th Anniversary Show

Joe Russo’s Almost Dead played Brooklyn Bowl in Brooklyn, New York on January 26, 2023, ten years to the day after the band’s first show at the same venue. Bob Weir joined them, unannounced, late in the first set.

Weir played guitar and sang on “Jack Straw” and “The Music Never Stopped.” The set closed with “Let It Grow.”

Ten years from a one-off

The 2013 Brooklyn Bowl show that started all of this was part of the Freaks Ball and was intended as a single night, not the beginning of a decade.

Russo addressed that from the stage. “Two weeks ago today 10 years ago was people trying to convince me to play Grateful Dead songs with these guys at a party at the Freaks Ball,” he said.

The band is drummer Joe Russo, guitarists Scott Metzger and Tom Hamilton, bassist Dave Dreiwitz and keyboardist Marco Benevento.

The set

Set one ran “Tennessee Jed,” “Till the Morning Comes,” “Jack Straw” with Weir, “The Music Never Stopped” with Weir, and “Let It Grow.”

Saxophonist Stuart Bogie guested during the second set. The night also carried a debut of Led Zeppelin’s “Ten Years Gone,” and the encore was Bob Dylan’s “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues.”

Three more nights at The Capitol Theatre

The anniversary celebration does not end in Brooklyn. The band follows it with a three-night run at The Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, New York on January 27, 28 and 29, 2023.

Grateful Dead repertoire draws crowds elsewhere in New York this year as well. In July, Dark Star Orchestra recreates the band’s July 28, 1973 Watkins Glen set at Summer Jam 50 in LaFayette, on the exact 50th anniversary of the original show.

Sources: Relix, JamBase, JamBase.

Photo: Scu ba, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.