Jackie Greene
Grateful Dead Appreciation Night
Brooklyn Bowl: 10.26.2016

Closing out a two-night stand at Brooklyn Bowl, Jackie Greene’s “Grateful Dead Appreciation Night” was a high-energy celebration of familiar tunes that just get better with age. Sprinkled among standards such as “Bertha,” “He’s Gone” and “Scarlet Begonias” were some Jackie originals — “Now I Can See for Miles” and “A Moment of Temporary Color” — as well as fresh takes on the Dead’s trademark segues that blend incongruous songs into seamless wholes.

Kicking off the second set with the wah-wah of “Shakedown Street,” Jackie and the band — Nathan Dale on guitar, Jon Cornell on bass, Jason Crosby on keyboards and Fitz Harris on drums — slipped imperceptibly into Pink Floyd’s “Just Another Brick in the Wall.” By the time the crowd realized what was happening, everyone was instinctively chanting the chorus and rocking in double-time. “Dark Star,” the song the Dead made famous by rarely playing, worked its way into two separate jams. There was “China Cat Sunflower” into “I Know You Rider” to close the second set, and encores of “Jack Straw” and the Beatles’ “Don’t Let Me Down” to send fans home.

We’re told Jackie Greene now lives in Brooklyn, so presumably he didn’t have far to go. He appeared at Brooklyn Bowl last month, sitting in with the Terrapin Family Band, so we can only hope we’ll be seeing lots more of him in his new home town.