Jorma Kaukonen and Jack Casady reconvened their seminal psychedelic offshoot Hot Tuna on Wednesday to open a fall tour in Boston. The show at The Cabot Theatre arrived as the former Jefferson Airplane bandmates’ first in a run of ten Northeastern concerts.
This tour comes amidst a flurry of activity for Casady and Kaukonen. Hot off a run of dates opening for Little Feat and Tedeschi Trucks Band, Jorma and Jack appeared alongside their former Airplane bandmate Grace Slick on October 13th to receive a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
“We’ve been in the business for a long time and we’ve gotten some accolades along the way,” Kaukonen told The Hudson Independent in an interview last week. “You don’t start out thinking about that stuff—it would have never crossed my mind. For example, I didn’t even know the Airplane got a Grammy nomination around the time of Surrealistic Pillow [1967, Best New Artist]. It didn’t concern me. I didn’t realize it until the Lifetime Grammy thing and I was like, ‘You’re kidding me!’”
Since emerging from pandemic livestreams at Jorma’s Fur Peace Ranch in southeast Ohio, Hot Tuna has taken a renewed approach to its expansive catalog. Recent performances have seen the revival of gems like “Highway Song” and “Song From The Stainless Cymbal” alongside classics like “Ode To Billy Dean”, “Sea Child”, “Water Song”, and many other longtime live favorites.
“During our [virtual] quarantine concerts, I started to bring back a lot of old songs that had sort of fallen by the wayside from a repertoire point of view,” Kaukonen told The Hudson Independent. “And so Jack and I now have a lot of new/old songs and a couple of new songs, too, but many that we are resuscitating. The audience will hear a wide spectrum of tunes that they haven’t heard in a while, but some old chestnuts, too—what would a night be without ‘Hesitation Blues?’”
Check out a gallery of images from Hot Tuna at The Cabot Theatre courtesy of photographer Joanna Gleason. The band’s tour continues with a two-night run at The Capitol Theatre in Port Chester, NY on December 2nd and 3rd. For tickets and a full list of dates head here.
