Bob Weir - 'ACE: 50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition'

 

Bobby "trippin' ballz"

Bob Weir was just 19 years old at the time of the Dead’s founding in 1965, he was the band’s youngest member, and spent its earliest years as a support player, adding a strumming accompaniment to Jerry Garcia’s liquid lead guitar lines.  Over time, he grew into a sort of second frontman: affable and workmanlike, the guy onto which the audience could project themselves, his easy relatable nature was a natural foil to Jerry Garcia’s cosmic mystique.

'ACE' marks Weir’s transition from mere rhythm guitarist to a full-fledged composer and driving force of the band.  Despite its origins as a receptacle for Bob's surplus material, all of its songs but one (Walk in the Sunshine) became beloved staples of the Dead’s live sets.  ACE also marked the beginning of Weir’s long-running collaboration with lyricist John Perry Barlow and includes early standouts "Cassidy" and "Looks Like Rain." Technically this is a solo album, but the backing is by the Grateful Dead minus "Pig Pen" who at the time was battling primary biliary cirrhosis (an autoimmune disease of the liver).

'ACE: 50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition' is a 2CD set. 

CD1 is a remastered new mix of Bobby’s solo debut, and makes for a nice upgrade. 

CD2 is new versions Bobby recorded at Radio City Music Hall on April 3, 2022 (I saw this show), with his Wolf Bros band (Don Was on double bass, and Jay Lane on drums) playing through Ace in its entirety, augmented by a horn section called The Wolfpack (Brian Switzer on trumpet, Adam Theis on tenor trombone, Sheldon Brown on tenor and alto saxophone), and guest vocals from Americana stars Tyler Childers and Brittney Spencer.

To myself and fellow "Deadheads" live tapes are more essential than studio albums, an inversion of the traditional structure that governs other bands' canons.  Before this release, I hadn't listened to the studio versions in years.  Reacquainting myself with the album, on the surface, it fits in with other West Coast folk and country-rock of its time.  But Bob, the Dead’s cutoff of jean shorts ("Jorts") wearing regular Joe, is a much stranger composer than he initially seems.  Melodic lines, and sometimes entire song sections, jut out crookedly from their surroundings.  Complex rhythms disguise themselves as simple, and vice versa. It might take you several listens to discern which part of a given tune is supposed to be the chorus, if it has one at all.

'ACE' holds up as a rare chance to hear the Dead throwing down in the studio during its most creatively vital era.  Sitting between the band’s stripped-down acoustic work of 1970 and the increasingly jazzy and progressive albums of ’73 through ’75, it comes as close to capturing their classic early ’70s sound as any other non-live recording.  The arrangements are tightly wound, but no one stays too close to the center for long, finding outside spaces for improvisatory flair.

For the freeload, tell us about some of your favorite "solo albums".