If John Mayer had any thoughts about Chris Robinson’s criticisms about him on the Howard Stern show yesterday, the Dead & Company guitarist is keeping them to himself. Instead, the guitarist is looking to the future and his summer tour with Dead & Company, which kicks off over Memorial Day Weekend at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas on May 27th. Mayer has recently been deep in a solo tour in promotion of his latest album The Search For Everything, and to switch gears, the guitarist announced via Twitter that he’d be sharing one his favorite Grateful Dead tracks each day until the start of the tour as way to “walk in” new fans.

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For his first selection, John Mayer shared “Sugaree” from the Grateful Dead’s performance on May 19th, 1977, at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia. The show is coming up on its 40th anniversary on Friday, as it was part of the fateful ’77 spring tour that also saw infamous shows like the Barton Hall show at Cornell University on May 8th, 1977. In keeping with the idea that these songs are supposed to help John Mayer fans unfamiliar with the Dead get acquainted with the legendary jam band, Mayer also explained what made the performance so special, noting that the song has a simple chord progression but “incredible FEEL” as well as “great solo phrasing and slow climb” to its peak.

The 5/19/77 Atlanta show was also released on Dick’s Picks Vol. 29 along with the Grateful Dead’s 5/21/77 show at Lakeland Civic Center Arena in Lakeland, Florida. You can listen to the single track of this performance of “Sugaree” on Spotify or the entire 5/19/77 show, courtesy of uploader Jonathan Aizen, below. 

 

 

[H/T Relix]