The Deadheads have gathered in Hyde Park under the perfect blue skies of the Summer Solstice, a propitious prelude to Bobby Weir’s first UK gig in 22 years. While Weir and drummer Mickey Hart usually now maintain the legacy of the Grateful Dead as Dead & Company in residencies at the Vegas' high-tech Sphere, Weir’s Wolf Bros plot an alternate course, allowing the rhythm guitarist and deputy singer to perform to his own satisfaction. Tonight, this means making his debut at the Royal Albert Hall for the one-off spectacle of his first European orchestral show.
The Deadheads have gathered in Hyde Park under the perfect blue skies of the Summer Solstice, a propitious prelude to Bobby Weir’s first UK gig in 22 years. While Weir and drummer Mickey Hart usually now maintain the legacy of the Grateful Dead as Dead & Company in residencies at the Vegas’ high-tech Sphere, Weir’s Wolf Bros plot an alternate course, allowing the rhythm guitarist and deputy singer to perform to his own satisfaction. Tonight, this means making his debut at the Royal Albert Hall for the one-off spectacle of his first European orchestral show.
The Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra take the stage first for Giancarlo Aquilanti’s “A Grateful Overture”, which sets familiar Dead themes in the tradition of Aaron Copland’s early 20th century Americana, summoning images of Western vistas with plaintive pastoral passages and rock’n’roll punch. As the orchestra start “Truckin’”, Weir enters at the head of his Wolf Bros trio – pianist Jeff Chimenti, drummer Jay Lane and double-bassist Don Was, sporting dreads, shades and Stetson. Weir’s black poncho resembles a schoolmaster’s cape, thrown over crumpled grey-black threads and Cuban-heeled shoes, while his full-bodied white hair and grizzled beard could be that of an old-time prospector from one of Robert Hunter‘s songs, or an unreconstructed hippie idealist – which he and many of tonight’s audience remain.
“What a long, strange trip it’s been,” Weir reflects, as “Truckin’” hymns the Dead’s former, footloose life. His leonine head leans into the orchestral headwinds, till he finds a pocket of space for his guitar. The potentially knotty problem of integrating improvisational rock’n’roll with classical musicians is solved by alternating passages purely given to Aquilanti’s orchestral arrangements with sections where the band interweave with the RPCO. “These guys are nothing short of a national treasure,” Weir says, frequently turning to watch them, beaming at the treatment of this material.
“Black Peter” is set to cinematic strings. Weir plays sultry slide, inhabiting the role of the wounded loner facing down death, at ease with the fatalism which shadows the Dead’s songbook as he wails, “One more day!” “China Cat Sunflower” enters Hunter’s more lyrically baroque realms over symphonic funk, as the strings floating dreamily up and away. “Brokedown Palace” concludes the first set with another existential American saga sung with unfussy, direct feeling, Weir concluding: “I love you more than words can tell.”
“Sugar Magnolia” starts the second half in country mode with classical violinists converted to hoedown fiddles. As Weir sings of an old ‘70s girlfriend, he plucks individual, ringing notes. The multi-generational crowd have been boisterously out of their seats for most of the night and now spin with delight at the start of the “Terrapin Station” suite. “His job is to shed light, not to master,” sings Weir of the song’s storyteller, and that is also his modest way, his expansive vocal turning introspective as he explains a sailor’s doomed romantic bargain and heads towards the titular destination, forever just out of reach.
Then the Wolf Bros exit, the orchestra quieten and Weir puts down his guitar to sing “Days Between”, the last song written by Garcia before his death. Weir’s gruff, strong voice summons Hunter’s lyric’s combination of chivalrous nobility and sorrow, appropriate in the encroaching twilight of the Dead’s story, with Weir standing ever more alone. “Those were days,” he sings three times. “The brightest ever seen… still tender, young and green… soft as velveteen.” This is a taste of Weir’s own power, apart from but still in service to the Dead’s tale.
Weir windmills his guitar on the home strait and boils down “Hell In A Bucket” to a hedonistic sentiment fully embraced by the dancing crowd: “Might as well enjoy the ride!” Finally, the orchestra retire and the Wolf Bros dig into Weir’s solo songbook. His fuzzed-up guitar is loud and clear on “She Said”, by his ‘90s band RatDog. Then “One More Saturday Night” brings this Saturday night to a close in party mode. With ferocious attitude belying his 77 years, Weir is happily howling by the end. Stripped of the Dead’s weight, he still simply wants to play rock’n’roll.
Bobby Weir & The Wolf Bros set list at Royal Albert Hall, London, June 21, 2025:
SET ONE:
A Grateful Overture
Truckin’
Black Peter
China Cat Sunflower/I Know You Rider
Brokedown Palace
SET TWO:
Sugar Magnolia
Terrapin Station
Days Between
Jack Straw
Hell In A Bucket
Sunshine Daydream
She Says
One More Saturday Night
