Dead and Company at Wrigley Field
photo by James Richards IV

Dead & Co played Wrigley Field & Citi Field (pics, videos, setlists)

UPDATE: Dead & Company announced an extensive 2021 tour.

PREVIOUSLY:

The long-standing game of guessing the show opener was on the tongues of many before the 7:30 downbeat and, regardless of incorrect guesses, “Dancing In The Streets” (which debuted earlier this tour) got the Queens crowd moving to the pace of the night. The relaxed but fun set continued on with the likes of “Jack Straw,” Tennesse Jed” and “Cold Rain and Snow” among others. Dead and Company jumped the gun by capping off the set with the party-rousing “One More Saturday Night,” more often seen in the second set of a Dead show.

As the second set rolled onward from the beautiful “Scarlet Begonias” opener, they let Oteil sing, as some t-shirts have said. Burbridge has been making more of a vocal appearance on this tour and took the lead on singing “Comes a Time,” making for a spectacular performance of the song coupled with Mayer’s atmospheric noodling on Dead and Company’s debut of that song. Mickey Hart and Bill Kreutzman put on a unique rhythmic soundscape for the drums/space break which was integrative of acoustic and electronic sounds and instruments including Hart’s multi-string, one-note Beam. [NYS Music]

Dead & Company — the band with classic-era Grateful Dead members Bob Weir, Bill Kreutzmann, and Mickey Hart, plus John Mayer, Oteil Burbridge, and Jeff Chimenti — wrapped up their spring/summer tour with two nights at Wrigley Field (home of the Chicago Cubs), not long after they played NYC’s Citi Field (home of the New York Mets). During the encore at the Citi Field show, the Empire State Building’s lights were synchronized live with Dead & Co playing “Touch of Grey” (video below), similar to the GD50 Fare Thee Well shows in Chicago in 2015, when the Empire State Building was synced up with “U.S. Blues” on July 4th. Dead & Co also played Jerry’s “Comes A Time” for their first time at the show, with Oteil singing, as the review quoted above points out (video of that below too).

As PageSix points out, Bob Weir also officiated a wedding backstage at the Citi Field show:

Grateful Dead founding member Bob Weir officiated the nuptials of longtime friend and real estate investor William “Billy” Procida backstage before Saturday’s Dead & Company show at Citi Field.

“Seventeen years ago I jumped on stage and did an encore with [Weir] and we became great friends,” Procida told Page Six on Monday, adding he’s been in with the band ever since.

The ceremony took place in a “VIP room” where the legendary rocker “came in and said a poem and the ‘I do’s,’” another attendee recalled, adding, “He said beautiful things.”

The Wrigley Field shows also included “Comes A Time” (on night 2), and both nights at Wrigley Field got “Dark Star” (they played verse 1 on night 1 and verse 2 on night 2). Like in New York, they played “Scarlet Begonias” at night 2 in Chicago, but this time they did do the classic “Scarlet Begonias > Fire on the Mountain” segue (in New York they took “Scarlet” into “Viola Lee Blues”). Between the two Chicago shows, fans also got “Sugaree,” “Shakedown Street,” “St. Stephen,” “Terrapin Station,” “Franklin’s Tower,” “Ripple,” “Friend of the Devil,” “Casey Jones,” “Brokedown Palace,” and more. Night 2 at Wrigley Field ended with fireworks. Pictures of night 1 at Wrigley Field, and setlists and videos for both Wrigley Field shows and Citi Field are below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrE5_kfFJCY

photos by James Richards IV