Long runs of fall concerts by Tedeschi Trucks Band at New York’s Beacon Theatre are nothing new—the Derek Trucks– and Susan Tedeshci-led outfit will notch its 50th Beacon show on Monday—but this year’s residency has been marked more by its new roads than its old traditions.
“The Beacon is always a place for us to stretch out and explore musical territory,” Trucks hinted when the run was announced. “We have an incredible amount of new material coming out this year with I Am The Moon and the Beacon shows will be some of the first where we’ll be able to draw from all of it and have the space to really dig in.”
Saturday’s showing, the third of the residency’s seven nights, opened with the first-ever complete performance of the band’s recent release, I Am The Moon: II. Ascension, one of four installments in the ambitious wave of material added to the group’s repertoire this year. The first two 2022 TTBeacon shows followed a similar format, with Thursday‘s gig featuring a full run through I Am The Moon: III. The Fall and Friday‘s coming complete with a reading of I Am The Moon: IV. Farewell in its entirety. With four nights remaining, I. Crescent seems bound to appear, as well.
Residencies like these often slip into “retrospective” patterns. Even when there is new material to present, the sheer amount of music it takes to fill a week’s worth of setlists ensures that a number of deep cuts, rarities, and the like make their way into shows. That reliably creates “special” performances that fete the band and its story to this point but in hindsight remain inherently incongruous with any “regular” night on tour. The grand presentation of this expansive project during the 2022 NYC residency, however, has effectively flipped that script. Instead of working a few new songs into a distillation of “the best so far,” this I Am The Moon Beacon run has expanded the band’s universe, creating a new world for the Tedeschi Trucks Band of the future to inhabit.
I Am The Moon is an ambitious document in many ways, from the volume of new music it encompasses (24 songs across four installments) to its mammoth thematic inspiration (a nearly 1,000-year-old epic poem examining weighty concepts like love and obsession) to its nuanced visual component (a seance at Pasaquan). It’s also a refreshed representation of a band that has undergone a series of notable personnel changes in the last few years. Keyboardist Gabe Dixon, who joined the group in 2019 following the death of Kofi Burbridge, wrote several songs on the project, and his onstage presence within the band has grown in kind. Brandon Boone, another 2019 recruit, brings a funk-facing groove to the mix where former bassist Tim Lefebvre tended to lean toward jazz. Isaac Eady, added to the roster in 2021, offers a new touch on drums alongside Tyler “Falcon” Greenwell.
Related: Tedeschi Trucks Band Delivers Modern Masterpiece With ‘I Am The Moon’ [Stream/Review]
Still, the new material sounds like Tedeschi Trucks Band, a crucial testament to the adaptability and forward-thinking creativity of the eclectic outfit. On Saturday, while much of the first set was occupied by I Am The Moon: II. Ascension, the lag in energy that often accompanies the introduction of new songs was notably absent. The lineup may have looked slightly different, the tunes may have been unfamiliar to many, but the intangible sense of significance that has long accompanied Tedeschi Trucks Band on its trips to the Beacon was as strong as ever.
After the Ascension-closing “Hold That Line”, Susan thanked the audience for the warm response to all the new songs and promised some “old ones” next. It came off with the self-aware humility of an artist who just tested longtime fans with something different, but the Beacon crowd was already convinced. Even alongside ensuing highlights like a fiery “Whiskey Legs” guitar duel, an emotional “Down In The Flood” for the victims of various recent floods, a dramatically dynamic “Midnight In Harlem”, blues barnburners like “How Blue Can You Get” and “Key To The Highway”, a pair of Derek and the Dominos classics, and a loving nod to the band’s contemporaries with The Wood Brothers‘ “Smoke Ring Halo”, the cohesive Ascension segment stood out as the highlight of the night—and the fact that this was just one piece of the I Am The Moon puzzle left the crowd craving more. Here’s to the new season of TTB.
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Click below to view a selection of crowd-shot videos and complete audio recording via edtyre. Tedeschi Trucks Band returns to the Beacon Theatre for the 50th time on Monday, October 3rd. For a complete list of upcoming TTB dates, head here.
Tedeschi Trucks Band – Beacon Theatre – 10/1/22 – Full Audio
Tedeschi Trucks Band – “Ain’t That Something” – 10/1/22
Setlist: Tedeschi Trucks Band | Beacon Theatre | New York, NY | 10/1/22
Set One: Playing With My Emotions^, Ain’t That Something^, All The Love^, So Long Savior^, Rainy Day^, La Di Da^, Hold That Line^, Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever (The Four Tops), Whiskey Legs
Set Two: Down In The Flood (Bob Dylan), Hard Case, Why Does Love Got To Be So Sad? (Derek and the Dominos), Smoke Ring Halo (The Wood Brothers), How Blue Can You Get? (Jack Clement), Anyhow, The Letter (The Box Tops), Midnight In Harlem*, Key To The Highway (Charles Segar), Bound For Glory
Encore: Tell The Truth
^Part of complete performance of I Am The Moon II: Ascension
*Featured “Little Martha” (Allman Brothers Band) tease in intro