Melvin Seals and JGB in Beverly

We hadn't seen John Kadlecik for way too long, seeing how much we'd liked him with Furthur, etc.  And we'd always wanted to see Melvin Seals' attempt to keep alive the Jerry Garcia Band tradition.  Several times we'd come close but were derailed by incidents, such as COVID.  But they announced a show at The Cabot in Beverly and we got great seats, 4th row center, pretty much where we sat when we saw an excellent Los Lobos concert there several years ago.  So we were psyched!

Sally and friends had been visiting and we drove down from Maine on the morning of October 14th, and then met Dave at Gulu-Gulu in downtown Salem.  I've said it before and I'll say it again, do not go anywhere near Salem in October.  But we forgot and paid the price in ridiculous crowds and a bad meal from an overtaxed restaurant and staff.  Oh well, we drove from there the short way up to Beverly, parked in our normal spot, and were some of the first of the excited, practically packed crowd.  It's a really nice theater.

Unfortunately, the show didn't meet our expectations.  The sound system there is great, Seals himself played some excellent organ, and there were some mind-bending moments and the long, flowing leads that you'd expect from a R&B, "JGB" band.  But there were some not-great elements too.  For one, they only had 4 people on stage, organ, drums, bass, and guitar!  The real latter-day JGB sound includes excellent backup vocals and more of a big-band sound than these guys were putting out.  The bass player sang backup on some tunes, but was not that dynamic, and he and the drummer were not best.  John himself was a bit disappointing also.  Maybe we expected too much, but he'd start a great lead and then kind of peter out after a dozen or two measures.  He was far from sustaining the clarity and emotion the way Garcia used to.

The setlist was great though.  They opened with a fantastic cover of Stop That Train (unfortunately, one of the few peaks of the evening), did a couple of JRAD songs in Cats and then R&C, and had a couple of moments in the second set with covers of Clapton and Van Morrison, as well as an Oteil song (If I Had the World To Give).  They did Expressway To Your Heart, but it never really took off and then they followed it with tepid drum and bass solos.  I was excited to hear Sisters and Brothers, but again with just a couple of male voices on stage it wasn't that great.  Here's the setlist:

Set 1:

• Stop That Train
• Ain't No Bread in the Breadbox
• Cats Under the Stars
• The Wheel
• Tore Up Over You
• Scarlet Begonias
• Rubin and Cherise
• I Feel Like Dynamite

Set 2:

• Lay Down Sally
• And It Stoned Me
• Mystery Train
• Expressway to Your Heart
• Going Down the Road Feelin' Bad
• If I Had the World to Give
• My Sisters and Brothers
• Deal

Oh well, we had a great time, our seats were fantastic, and Seals was incredible!  Drove Dave home afterwards (lots of driving that day) and then got to bed by 1:00 or so.