Some tours are released all at once in an all-inclusive dates explosion listing every single stop from start-to-finish, while other tours come together over a period of weeks, adding a few dates here and there, until a completed routing is good to go.
For the upcoming Bob Weir & Ratdog summer run, it’s definitely been a case of the latter, as the schedule has slowly grown over the last few weeks until today’s announcement making all those individual dates a bona fide, official tour.
Weir and Ratdog has been touring every year since the group’s formation in 1995. This year is especially busy for Weir. He’s already performed 22 shows as a member of The Dead and will appear at that band’s Rothbury Music Festival gig in Michigan on July 4 – one day before the Ratdog tour launches with an appearance with The Black Crowes at the Lifestyle Communities Pavilion in Columbus, Ohio, on July 5.
Other stops include July 8 in Glen Allen, Va., when the band shares a stage with moe., July 10 at the All Good Music Festival & Campout in Masontown, WV, at Marvin’s Mountaintop; July 11 in Atlantic City at the Mark G. Etess Arena and July 12 in Rochester, N.Y., at Highland Bowl.
The band has also booked two nights in Jim Thorpe, Pa. – July 14 & 15 – at Penn’s Peak, two nights in Atlanta – July 17 & 18 – at Masquerade Music Park and two nights in Hampton Beach, N.H., at the Casino Ballroom – July 23 & 24.
But it doesn’t stop there. The tour keeps on keeping on, with dates all the way through Sept. 6 at the Pozo Saloon in Santa Margarita, Calif.
Fans will also be able to take the show home with them in the form of “Weir Hear” CDs – high fidelity three-disc sets available immediately after each night’s performance.
“My heart is on the road,” Weir said. “When I was a kid, like 8 or 9 years old, my brother taught me how to tune a radio and that was it for me. I knew I wasn’t going to be a fireman or an Indian chief … I was going to be a musician.”
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