Keller Williams made his inaugural visit to The Homestead in Morristown, NJ last week where he was joined by The HillBenders dobro player Chad Graves for a couple sit-ins. Williams regularly collaborates with The HillBenders for his Grateful Grass sets featuring bluegrass interpretations of the Grateful Dead catalog.
The barefooted bard played two sets of looping funky folky jams for the Wednesday night crowd in New Jersey, toggling from acoustic guitar to electric bass to drum pad. Toward the end of the first set, as Keller smoothly transitioned into a “Fire on the Mountain”-reminiscent groove, Chad “Gravy” Graves joined Williams on the relatively barren stage. Rather than taking on the Grateful Dead classic, Williams and Graves instead ran through the similar-sounding Keller live staple “Freakshow” written by Ani DiFranco—with the guitarist quipping, “bassline by Phil Lesh and words by Ani DiFranco.” To close out the set, Williams and Gravy honored the late Tom Petty with a rocking “Even the Losers” cover.
After another solid hour of solo performing in the second set, Keller brought the Gravy back out for the singer-songwriter’s classic “Doobie in My Pocket”. Though the situation Williams recounts in the semi-spoken word diddy is no longer quite the stoner nightmare it was when he recorded it 15 years ago, that didn’t stop The Homestead from passionately singing along as if it was them in the TSA line. To close the set, an instrumental percussive jam led into Keller’s trademark “Freaker by the Speaker” where Keller played the audience with a call-and-response section, proving his instrumentation isn’t just limited to his tools onstage.
Check out a gallery of images from Keller Williams at The Homestead courtesy of photographer Ken Spielman and full-show video from Cosmic Howie. Williams’ tour continues on Thursday with a free show in Norwich, NY before heading to Denver for a Phish after-party with Grateful Grass at Cervantes’ Masterpiece Ballroom on Friday. Find tickets and a full list of tour dates on his website.
Keller Williams — The Homestead — Morristown, NJ — 8/21/24 — Full Video
The post Keller Williams Welcomes The HillBenders’ Chad Graves To The “Freakshow” In New Jersey [Photos/Full Video] appeared first on L4LM.
