Bob Weir & RatDog

Bob Weir already has a secure place in rock history as the Grateful Dead's co-vocalist and what Andrew Clarke (in one of England's leading newspapers, "The Independent") called the genre's "greatest, if most eccentric rhythm guitarist." When you have a modest, anti-promotional personality - and when you spend 30 years next to an icon - it's easy to fall under the radar.

There's a second reason he doesn't always get quite the attention he deserves. Although always a gentleman, Bob Weir can be...contrary. This is the man who, when his muse required that he go study music, chose McCoy Tyner - not exactly a rock rhythm guitarist - as his model. And just as his personality has a discriminating antiauthoritarian streak that leads him down his own road, his composing is just as distinctive and impossible to classify. So that in "Lazy Lightnin'" he combined r & b/disco chords and a time signature in 7. His go-your-own-way point of view is perfectly articulated in John Barlow's lyrics for "Throwin' Stones," which Weir called an "anarchist diatribe." And the dry, offbeat humor of so many of his songs lets you know - his is a nuanced, special voice. Bob Weir was born in San Francisco in 1947 and grew up in the suburb of Atherton. After less-than-popular-with-the-family-and-neighbors experiences with piano and trumpet, he glommed onto the guitar at the age of 13, and hasn't let go since. He soon became the most-junior member of a folk scene that centered on a Palo Alto, California, club called the Tangent, which hosted such future legends as Jerry Garcia, Jorma Kaukonen, and Janis Joplin. Kaukonen was his guitar-picking role model (Garcia, at that time, was a banjo player), and Weir soon became a full-fledged, if young, folkie, listening to Lightnin' Hopkins, Joan Baez, and the Greenbriar Boys, as well as the Everly Brothers and Chuck Berry.

After adding legendary songs like "Truckin'" and "Sugar Magnolia" (written with Robert Hunter) to the 1970 Grateful Dead masterpiece "American Beauty," in 1971 Weir proposed to do his first solo album, which would be called "Ace." For various reasons, his backup band turned out to be, for the most part, the Dead. The album was a classic, and it's no surprise that five songs from it made it on to the "Weir Here" list, including "Playing in the Band," "Cassidy," and "Mexicali Blues."

In 1974, the Dead took a nearly two-year vacation (their only lengthy break in 30 years), and during that period Weir took up with a band called Kingfish, really his first side effort from the Dead. Weir took from Kingfish - aside from a massive amount of fun - the songs "Lazy Lightnin'" and "Supplication," and a huge dose of encouragement for the idea that, in order to be a creative contributor to the Dead, he needed to do things for himself.

As a result, the year after the "Kingfish" album was released (1976), he began a solo project with producer Keith Olsen that would come to be called "Heaven Help the Fool." A brief tour to support that album brought him in contact with various session players, including, eventually, Brent Mydland (who would join the Dead in 1979), Bobby Cochran, Alphonso Johnson, and Billy Cobham. This was the genesis for Bobby and the Midnites, who would tour in the early 1980s and produce two albums, including the eponymous debut album, here represented by "(I Want to) Fly Away."

Later in the '80s, Weir hooked up with the talented multi-genre bassist Rob Wasserman at a benefit, forging a partnership that would last 15 years. They began as a duo. Working on Rob's album "Trios," they joined forces with Neil Young to produce "Easy Answers," and then in the period after Jerry Garcia's death in 1995, added drummer Jay Lane and ex-Kingfish harmonica/guitar player Matthew Kelly to become a blues band called the Ratdog Review.

Eventually, Rob moved on, and a settled lineup featuring Lane, keyboardist Jeff Chimenti, lead guitarist Mark Karan, reeds man Kenny Brooks, and bassist Robin Sylvester was RatDog.

Although his life has been consumed by music, Weir has spent a good deal of time as a social activist. His work on behalf of Seva (which fights blindness in Asia and South America - he's a member of the Board) and as an environmental activist (with Greenpeace and the Rainforest Action Network, among others) have been his primary focus as an individual, along with his work with the Dead's own Rex Foundation. He's not only performed at a zillion benefits but also given deeply of his time, including lobbying Congress on various forestry issues.

He turned his love for vegetarian cookery into a fund-raiser for various nonprofits, selling various cooking sauces (go to www.dead.net for more info) on their behalf.

He is married to the former Natascha Muenter; they have two young daughters, Monet and Chloe.

A long, strange, and very creative trip. And not remotely over.

• http://www.rat-dog.com//

The Tragically Hip

Recorded in 2008’s year of continental excess and governmental Spending Gone Wild, The Tragically Hip’s latest album, We Are the Same, brings its listeners something beyond the unexpected: actual hope. Gord Downie’s lyrics—backed by a band ripe with confidence and skill—tackle what we might assume had passed far under the bridge. Should a first listen be given to a person recently hatched from a time capsule, or a pod sent from beyond Mars, she might believe that our essential uniting tenet, faith in humanity, still exists. We are, indeed, the Same, and when this is recognized, a bit of that space between us all shrinks.

We Are the Same isn’t only levity and light, though. The band exposes our black eyes and our crushes, the struggle of the worker in places as far flung as New Orleans and Athabaska or as close as a Lake Ontario shore is to the shore of Chicago. A trio of “Depression Suites” examines people trapped in menial jobs. Part of the magic, however, is that The Tragically Hip has never lost its working man’s roots; from their start in the tiny clubs of Kingston and Toronto and Halifax and Vancouver to the world stage, Gordon, Paul, Rob, Gord, and Johnny continue to sweat hard, and the triumphant and often chilling trilogy is an ode to those who keep the rest of us content.

Several of the tracks address a desire for escape, possible or not, and most take a look at our sense of self worth, both as individuals and as a larger community. We’re asked, point blank: Don’t our First Peoples deserve reconciliation? The Hip is neither apologetic nor afraid to question the state of our natural environment, and our internal environments don’t escape unexamined either. The inability to undo time and the idea of reflection also appear again and again: how we reflect one another, how the moon bounces back the light of the sun onto our communal view and our communal problems, how mirrors give us more than just ourselves.

There’s melancholy and anger here, driving guitar, and absolutely unforgettable melody. The Hip, with songs like “Morning Moon” and “The Last Recluse,” could even have somebody like Stephen Harper humming along in the back of the limo. The powerhouse legend Bob Rock, once more on the dials, tunes the words and music of one of our country’s great enigmas and talents into something completely new and yet immediately recognizable. This band, a dozen albums and 26 years in the making, shows us once again not only why they are but who they are, snowshoeing through new land while sowing seeds for all of us secret musicians and poets and citizens hungry for a chance. And a change.

They’re comfortable in their own skin, but the men of The Tragically Hip are still hungry to explore. With the same heart of the boys who penned and played “38 Years Old,” the band shows us 20 years later that wisdom indeed comes with age, and that Heart doesn’t change. Finally, the album’s cumulative effect is one of genuine comfort—or maybe much needed consolation. This iconic band, at the peak of its powers, rests a warm hand on its listeners’ shoulders. Downie speaks to each of us, individually, and the effect is uncanny. This song is for me. This song speaks to what I’m going through. I’m actually not alone.

Under the pillow I can hear you whisperin’ are you going through something?
Well honey are you going through something?
Are you going through something?
Then I – I – I – I I am too
Then I – I – I – I I am too

It’s all in here, grinding stadium anthems and love songs you want to sing to your newborn baby. The Hip isn’t afraid to show a soft side, and we’re all the better for it. This release is a cry for understanding, a whisper and scream to our world, our country, or communities, and our families. From the gorgeous and crafted first track to the bold and elegiac last, The Tragically Hip’s latest gem is something prophetic, nurturing, and essential. Every listen brings further understanding—nothing new for a band with decades of depth—but The Tragically Hip couldn’t have predicted a race’s dream fulfilled, a choking environment’s gasp at fresh air, a world’s reconsideration of a continent, without a full measure of faith and hope. It’s for these reasons this album is bread, water, love.

• http://www.thehip.com/