POLL away the dew... Best Grateful Dead recurring live jam/transition piece

I haven't listened to much jrad but their guitarist's sets with kruetzmann & billy strings at red rocks definitely piqued my interest.

Yep guitarist (Tom Hamilton) is great, and Joe Russo (drums) and Marco Benevento (keys) have been playing together in various configurations for 20 years or more, I think, and are both masters. Benevento has a lot of tricks up his sleeve that I haven't heard in other Dead-adjacent projects. They can get very jazzy.

Yeah I first saw Russo and Benevento when they toured as GRAB with Trey and Mike from Phish about fifteen years ago, they were pretty good then but I've grown to like them even more since.

Between Billy & The Kids and the Dead & Co tour, 2021 was a great summer of new shows for old deadheads, I only made it to Pine Knob for Dead & Co, but listened to almost every show of this tour when it came up on the archive and I watched most of the free set openers on nugs to get a feel for the scenes. I went to Wrigley in '17 and '19 so I didn't mind missing that so much, but I really wish I'd gone to Blossom and Deer Creek on this truly special tour. Oh well, summertime done come and gone my oh my!

I get that Wrigley may not be the ideal setting for a show, but I've grown to like it and appreciate it - easy access, plenty of food and drink options nearby for before and after a show. As opposed to Alpine Valley with no convenient non-venue places to meet up, sitting in a parking lot for two hours after a show and either springing for overpriced hotels (which still aren't even within walking distance of the venue, so you still need to either drive or arrange for transportation) or making sure you have a sober group member to drive every back home late in the night.

I loved seeing them at Wrigley, as a Cubs fan it was amazing to dance in the stands and go out onto the field, to experience the friendly confines with a extra dose of kindness. But Deer Creek was the only place I got to see Jerry ('93) so I was thinking it would be cool to go back there again, I was just too worried about Covid - but I would've risked it for that second set had I known: Sugaree>Dark Star>St. Stephen>Eleven>Drums>Space>Dark Star>Death Don't Have No Mercy!