070710 Furthur, Ottawa, ON

I think 2010 was pretty much the pinnacle of the Ottawa Bluesfest.  With headliners like Iron Maiden, Rush, The B-52’s, Joan Jett, The Flaming Lips, Santana and so many more the only other Bluesfest season that comes close was the 2007 lineup that included both Van Morrison and Bob Dylan.  

And talk about a feather in their cap: on July 7th, 2010 the evening’s main act was none other than Furthur.  Taking their name from Ken Kesey’s magical bus, Furthur was the banner that Bob Weir and Phil Lesh of the Grateful Dead were touring under at the time.  Filling out the ensemble were jamband mainstays Jay Lane and Joe Russo on drums and percussion, Jeff Chimenti on keys, and John Kadlecik, who was making the jump from tribute act to the new originals, having been recruited from his Grateful Dead cover band Dark Star Orchestra to fill the role of “fake Jerry”.

The Ottawa jamband community was pumped.  For once we didn’t have to travel to see a show!  It’s astounding to imagine that this was the first and only time that the Grateful Dead or one of their offshoots ever – ever! – performed in Ottawa, but it’s true.  I mean, the Dead played some 2,300 live shows during their career and it always us going to them.  Finally they were coming to us!

Nevermind that the Ottawa jamband community is small enough that we can be counted by the dozen.  Bottom line is it was no problem to secure space along the rail after my time in the photo pit ran out*.

And man, it was a great show!  Possibly one of the best in the entire history of Bluesfest, and though a comment like that from a guy like me might best be taken with a touch of grey I suspect you’d find lots of people that agree with me (mostly Deadheads).  And you know, the show almost didn’t happen at all.

Turns out that the band had been pulled into the border on the way north for this, their only Canadian stop on the tour.  The problem had been specifically with Bobby, as he explained to me when I used my pass to scurry backstage  after the show and met him and Phil for the first time.  It seems that the Canadian border cops flagged a nearly 40-year-old arrest on Weir’s rap sheet, but in the ensuing decades the info on what exactly he had been charged with had been lost.  Thus began a twenty-hour ordeal that got cleared up just in time for the band to make it to Ottawa for the show (the band weren’t forced to wait at the border; they spent the time at a nearby hotel).  As he told me the tale it was clear that Bob was still pissed over the whole situation.  Or perhaps he was just annoyed to be unnecessarily accosted by a wide-eyed journalistic fanboy.  Either way, he soon signalled to his guy to get me out of there, so I’m guessing it was a 30-70 mix of the two. 

Regardless, the whole border hassle led to a set played with an angered fervour and peppered with legal references (“Busted down on Bourbon Street…”, “I spent twenty years in prison…”, “I heard your plea in the courthouse…”, etcetera).  For good or ill, the results were quite epic.  See for yourself:

Alabama Getaway

Don’t Ease Me In

Mama Tried

Dire Wolf

Hell in a Bucket

Bertha

Truckin’>

Smokestack Lightning>

Casey Jones

I Need a Miracle>

Help On the Way>

Caution>

New Speedway Boogie>

Wharf Rat>

I Fought the Law>

Liberty

donor rap

encore:

On the Road Again>

Touch of Grey

(For the uninitiated: the “>” symbol is used in setlists to indicate that one song was morphed into the next without a full stop in between.  The usual term is “into”, as in: “I Need a Miracle into Help On the Way into Caution into…”  And yes, there have been nights where every song goes “into” the next one, producing continuous sets without any song breaks whatsoever.)

This was a year before the Ottawa Bluesfest’s near-tragic stage collapse, which nearly crushed Cheap Trick in a freak wind gust.  Fortunately the band and their crew survived the incident mostly unscathed but the accident inflicted significant damage on the festival itself, causing a downgrade in their programming that has yet to bounce back.  But boy, those salad days of 2010 and 2007 make for some great memories.

*I was once again writing reviews for the festival in exchange for an all-access lanyard which I used to invade the photo pit as often as possible.  However, it’s industry standard to clear the pit of photographers (and pit-hogging scallywag journalistic wannabes) after the first couple of songs.