Song Review(s): Billy & the Kids with Daniel Donato & Kanika Moore - “Foolish Heart” -> “Scarlet Begonias” (Live, Aug. 16, 2023)

Following the Dead & Company template of giving John Mayer the mic when Oteil Burbridge is on stage, Billy & the Kids ceded “Foolish Heart” to Tom Hamilton while singer Kanika Moore was guesting with the band.

Retaining the original composition’s guitar and keyboard lines and nearly coming apart on the jam as spiraling guitars get looser rather than tighter, this version is messy. Hamilton’s atonal vocals only add to the musical malaise, which ends only when the band locks into a segue based around “Third Stone from the Sun” and the “Scarlet Begonias” reprise. It’s dark, brooding transition that eventually leads to a proper version of the latter with Moore on the mic.

Bright and shiny and full of joy, this “Scarlet” is astonishing. Not only for the way former Grateful Dead drummer Bill Kreutzmann and his acolytes retain the song’s essence while expanding its sonic palette, but in the contrasting quality between it and “Foolish Heart” on just-released pro-shot video from Maryland on Aug. 16.

Same band.

Different results.

Grade card: Billy & the Kids with Daniel Donato & Kanika Moore - “Foolish Heart” -> “Scarlet Begonias” (Live - 8/16/23) - C+/A

Album Review: Electric Beethoven - Hear No Evil

Electric Beethoven’s Hear No Evil is to the German composer as Circles around the Sun’s Interludes for the Dead is to the Grateful Dead. Each are collections of hybridized compositions-improvisations based on important songs in the inspirations’ respective songbooks and taken for long walks in the proverbial woods.

The latest from Reed Mathis’ brainchild is 80-plus minutes of classical composition rearranged for rock ’n’ roll instrumentation with elements of trip-hop, reggae and jamband ethos tossed in via scratching, horns and synths accompanying the more traditional guitar, bass, drums and keys.

Written in the 19th century, rearranged in the 21st and recorded pre-quarantine with remixes and production done as the pandemic lingered - and it still does - the LP features the core band and guests including Karl Denson, members of RAQ, String Cheese Incident and others.

The melodies are familiar even to casual classical listeners as Mathis and company use well-known compositions such as “Für Elise,” the Fifth and Seventh symphonies, Piano Sonata No. 8 and “Moonlight Sonata” as springboards to new, still-instrumental sound collages that weave centuries-old themes inside the contemporary music they inspired.

The band wisely never breaches the 10-minute mark - and often leaves tracks to clock in in the four- to six-minute range - ensuring the players never get too fancy for their, or their listeners’, own good. Hear No Evil could just as easily be titled, or at least described as, hear no filler.

Grade card: Electric Beethoven - Hear No Evil - B

Bill Kreutzmann Hints at Post-COVID Activities with the Kids

- Billy & the Kids “Daze Between” webcast slated for Aug. 8

The year 2020 was supposed to be a big one for Billy & the Kids.

But COVID-19 squelched those plans.

“We were looking forward to more shows,” Bill Kreutzmann said in a Facebook post.

“What can we do about that? Hold that thought! And in the meantime, stay safe, be smart - and please, wear a mask.”

The former Grateful Dead drummer and eponymous band leader said he misses his on-stage camaraderie with keyboardist Aron Magner (the Disco Biscuits), guitarist Tom Hamilton (Joe Russo’s Almost Dead, Ghost Light) and bassist Reed Mathis (Electric Beethoven, Mickey Hart Band).

“There is simply no other band out there that sounds - or jams - quite like Billy & the Kids,” he said.

Fans can get a taste of that when the Kids’ Sept. 18, 2015, concert at Red Rocks is streamed at 11 p.m. Eastern, Aug. 8 as part of “Daze Between.”

I Told Them My Initials Were “BK”

“Thoughts on my Ass!”

Hey, Billy.

“Heard your dick fell off.”

No.

“That’s what I heard. That’s what everybody is saying.”

My dick did not fall off.

“That’s good. You need your dick, man. Your center of gravity’s all fucked up without it. You pitch forward all the time.”

I didn’t know that.

“But there’s something wrong with you. Worse than usual.”

I don’t wanna talk about it.

“You should do what…

Song Review: Billy & the Kids - “Shakedown Street” (Live - Dec. 13, 2014)

- Track previews The Benefit Concert Volume 16 from Warren Haynes

A Dead man, an American Baby, a Disco Biscuit and a Tea Leaf Green form a band, cover the Grateful Dead and sound pretty ragged doing so.

Billy & the Kids (Bill Kreutzmann, Tom Hamilton, Aron Magner and Reed Mathis) took their inaugural voyage Dec. 13, 2014, at Warren Haynes’ annual Christmas Jam and their first performance of “Shakedown Street” sounds like a band not yet ready for prime time.

The song was released on video to preview the Dec. 13 release of the live album/movie The Benefit Concert Volume 16, featuring performances by Gov’t Mule with Jackie Greene; Hard Working Americans; Jason Isbell & the 400 Unit; plus guest appearances from Jack Pearson, Col. Bruce Hampton, Otiel Burbridge and others.

There’s bound to be some fireworks in there. But the Kids’ “Shakedown” is a dud, with rough vocals and only slightly smoother playing, which betray a band playing its first gig.

Grade card: Billy & the Kids - “Shakedown Street” (Live - 12/13/14) - C-