@FACTSAREUSELESS said:

Yes, I've heard that quite a bit too. I think the band needs to adjust to Trey, not Trey to the band, in this issue.

It happened in the Gin at Bend, in the early part of Twist, and many other places as well. I believe that Trey found a fresh place in his soul during the sessions leading up to the Fare Thee Well shows. I would venture to guess that there haven't been too many times in the past 20 years when Trey has had the better part of a whole Spring/early Summer to play guitar alone in a studio for 5 hours a day, concentrating on material he didn't know. This had to have sharpened his skills (this seems obvious, really) but more to your point, I think the Dead's material has connected him to a musical place which was perhaps unknown to him, if I can say that. Not that he couldn't play it, but perhaps didn't know it. In a spiritual sense.

I think you are quite right in your observation of Trey's mental "pace" as it were....

There is a triumphant ring to his playing in these jams that has a major key celebratory vibe to it. I just think that he's in a place of pure victorious freedom. I mean he just played with his boyhood heroes and won the slam dunk contest. More importantly, he won the admiration of a fan base that generally didn't like him very much, but didn't know him. He carries the baton of kingship, and he's one of the few people in the Music Kingdom who can do so with grace and humility.

Just some thought on an interesting angle that you've brought up.

I think this is a glorious time for all.

In thinking about this more and re-listening to some of the past shows, there's really two issues there - pace and timing. We can agree Trey is working on a different pace - slower/mellower if you will... The timing issue is something else altogether which is what really confuses me. Yes, we are used to hearing flubs of the more complex written parts of Reba or DVD Sky or Fluffhead or what have you, but timing is independent of all that - regardless of what pace you're playing at, keeping everybody playing in the same time is its own thing. And in these first 4 shows, I have heard Fishman perhaps more than I have ever heard before sort of breaking and then re-gathering the beat to try to gather everyone together again, and often times its because Trey has fallen behind on the time. As prodigious and talented as they all are, that's what mystififes me so much - why they're struggling to keep things tight so often. It's not every song, no - but its been very noticeable at multiple points throughout each night.

Especially given Trey's practice sessions going into GD50 as you mention, I am a bit surprised that the same perfectionism isn't coming through as strong thus far on summer tour. They clearly have been rehearsing a lot of the new material, and I haven't heard the timing issues so much with those new tunes, but definitely on a lot of the classics. I dunno... maybe it will improve as the tour goes on.

Again, this is not to be a wet blanket for the sake of being one - moments like the LA Slave and YEM show that the band has the capacity to fire on all cylinders when everything gets dialed... Just surmising at the reason behind the feeling and time being noticeably off here and there.

Last note - I think Page has just been phenomenal thus far this tour... ridiculously good.