Music In My Shoes
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Music In My Shoes
E76 Sphere Odyssey: Inside Dead & Company's Visual Spectacle
We transport listeners into the futuristic world of the Sphere in Las Vegas as Jim shares his whirlwind 24-hour trip to see Dead & Company in this revolutionary venue. Through vivid descriptions and personal anecdotes, we explore the cutting-edge technology that creates an unprecedented concert experience.
• Jim scores a last-minute ticket to Dead & Company at the Sphere
• The Sphere features 16K resolution LED screens surrounding the audience
• Dead & Company's setlist and the mind-blowing visual experiences that accompanied each song
• Tribute to legendary producer Roy Thomas Baker who died April 12, 2025, at age 78. Baker's production genius helped create some of rock's most iconic albums—Queen's first five records, The Cars' debut, Journey's breakthrough hits, and many more.
• 35th Anniversary of Social Distortion's self-titled album
• "Minute with Jimmy" segment featuring The Jam's accidental hit "Going Underground"
• Exploration of Pete Townshend's 1980 solo album "Empty Glass"
"Music in My Shoes" where music and memories intertwine.
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Please like and follow the Music in my Shoes Facebook and Instagram pages and share the podcast with your friends on social media. Contact us at musicinmyshoes@gmail.com.
He's got the feeling in his toe-toe.
Speaker 2:He's got the feeling and it's out there growing. Hey everybody, this is Jim Boge, and you're listening to Music In my Shoes. That was Vic Thrill kicking off episode 76. As always, I'm thrilled to be here with you. Let's learn something new or remember something old. So, Jimmy, over the weekend I got to do something that I've been wanting to do. I hopped on a plane Saturday. I flew out to Las Vegas. I went and saw Dead Company at the Sphere on Saturday night.
Speaker 1:Oh, I didn't realize that.
Speaker 2:And I flew back home Sunday morning.
Speaker 1:Okay, I literally Jet setter.
Speaker 2:Literally from the time my flight took off on Saturday till my flight landed on Sunday, 24 and a half hours.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I did that once I went to LA to see the Sex Pistols in like 2002.
Speaker 2:Really, 24 hours. It was everything I hoped it would be. It really was. I ended up getting a really great price on a flight from Atlanta to Las Vegas $235 round trip.
Speaker 1:Oh, that's a great price, yeah.
Speaker 2:And I bought the ticket. I bought the flight. I didn't have a ticket to the show and the tickets were kind of steep. But I was saying to myself I'm going to pay it because I have a flight, so I'm going to pay the ticket price. And the Friday night before I just sat at my computer and I kept refreshing, just looking to see, because maybe someone was like I need to get rid of my ticket because it's not selling.
Speaker 1:And you went to the show on Saturday night. Yes, oh, my gosh, okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I didn't get a ticket. It was about five minutes after nine on Friday night but the ticket prices were all around $400 minimum. In the section I was looking, somebody dropped it to $228. One ticket and I was on that ticket. Like you couldn't believe I could not get my credit card number in, type it fast. So, matter of fact, I was trying to type it so fast. I was making mistakes because I was like I can't believe this.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm glad it didn't time out on you or something.
Speaker 2:No, oh yeah, that would have been bad. So I was really excited to go. Now we've talked. We talked about the sphere, I think on the first show. I think we talked about it a few shows after, but this is show 76. So it's it's a long time.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was so cool. It was everything and more than what I expected. And I wanted to sit up at the top because, as you know, inside it's all a LED screen. You know everything. You know up above you everything, so I didn't want to sit low to see the band. I've seen the band many times. I wanted to sit high so I could see all of the screen and it was fantastic. The band yeah, they look like ants, I didn't care. The show, what they could do unbelievable. So there's about 18,000 seats in the arena, if you call it an arena, and then they have the floor, but the floor isn't like you know. I don't think that you could put like a hockey rink or a basketball court, like you couldn't do that. The way that they have it built is that the floor kind of looks minimal, and then they have all the seats that are very steep going up. Okay, all right, so that you can be close to everything, as close as close can be, and still enjoy it. It was fantastic. They have 160,000 speakers in this building.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've heard that. The sound is just unlike anything you've ever heard.
Speaker 2:It is they have roughly about 10,000 seats that the sound actually comes right to you. So if you're sitting in those 10,000 seats, no matter where you are, you think the sound is coming right at you and it's just super cool. I mean it is as cool as one could be. You know, I think people get excited for 4K TV. This is 16K resolution. You know LED, I mean it just wraps around you.
Speaker 2:It was just unbelievable and it was like every song. It was just unbelievable and it was like every song as they played it. They had you know all these things that were happening. So at times some songs you never saw the band unless you were on the floor. You know right up there, and you know Dead Company, an offshoot of the Grateful Dead, and you know the steely-faced skeletons, the bears. You know all the different things that are connected to the Grateful Dead they had as part of it. So the show begins and it's super cool and inside it kind of looks like scaffolding. It kind of looks very futuristic. It kind of looks like scaffolding. It kind of looks very futuristic. The second song was Truckin' and it opens up and it just goes all the way behind you to where now you see the screen and they show the house that the Grateful Dead were in back in the days in San Francisco.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And then, as they're playing trucking, it goes up, so it goes, and now you see San Francisco and the camera view just keeps going up. To now you're in space and listening to the song. It was insane. It was so cool. It really was. They did Lay Down Sally, which is an Eric Clapton song, right, but Jerry Garcia, when he would play with the Jerry Garcia band he would play that a lot. He loved the song. They did a really good version of it. Mare was on vocals. It was cool. The video, like what they did with it, was cool. Tennessee Jed, jack Straw Jack Straw was just so cool.
Speaker 2:So this one they have everything connected to the Grateful Dead in vibrant colors, starting all the way up at the top of the ceiling like this little tiny dot, but going around in circles, coming down the sphere walls until it's like it seems like a million different things are happening and they're singing the song and you're like this is just crazy. It really really was. Casey Jones. They played Scarlet Begonias, fire on the Mountain with drummer Mickey Hart. You know, sometimes he'll do a little rap that he has and it's funny hearing it from a guy that's like 80 years old. He did it on this one. It was really cool. He's Gone St Stephen, which is an old Grateful Dead song. It's always good to hear one of the super old ones from back in the day. And then they played Brown Eyed Women and it was absolutely insane. The video that they show is of the Fillmore in San Francisco and then they have they put like a screen on it to show the band playing dead and company playing and then the, the building turns around and now it's Radio City Music Hall from 1980 from their you know, sacred shows that they did in October of 80, and then it becomes Madison Square Garden and then it's Hampton Coliseum. Oh wow, it's like, so cool. I mean it was really really like and especially if you like the Grateful Dead, I mean they put a lot of stuff there that, knowing the band and liking the band that you got you just got all these things John Mayer, keyboardist, jeff Cimenti I mean they were playing off each other on Brown Eyed Women and at one point you could see like Jeff you know he's got some long hair and it's usually it was coming in front of his face he's playing and you could see the look in his face of trying to keep up with Mary. It was so good, it really really was.
Speaker 2:Hell in a bucket, grateful Dead, skeleton, uncle Sam. He comes out, he's kind of like dancing in a garden and he's like tremendous, you know, he's, you know, I don't know. He's 80 feet tall or something, hops on a motorcycle and now they have 4D, you don't wear glasses or anything, but that motorcycle. When it was coming towards me I thought the motorcycle was coming towards me, you know. And then you know he's just kind of driving in the road and going past like different things, and you could see him headed towards the sphere. It was just crazy.
Speaker 1:It really was. How do they do that with no glasses? That's amazing.
Speaker 2:I don't know, but it's just, you know, super duper thought process that goes into it so that you enjoy it. I mean, honestly, I could have just put headphones on and listened to the band and watched everything. The band was actually really good. I mean, they sounded great. I just told you about, you know, John Mayer and Jeff Bob Weir sounded good. I mean, everybody did. You know, everyone was good. Final two songs Broke Down Palace, which is on my funeral playlist, and One More Saturday Night because it was a Saturday night, so they always play One More Saturday Night. It was so cool. It was everything I had hoped for. I didn't want to be disappointed. You know, I didn't want to spend a lot of money and go out there and it just be like a money grab and I didn't think it was at all. I thought it was worth every penny that I spent and lack of sleep that I had. It was great.
Speaker 1:Did they play more hits than you would normally see at a dead-in-company show?
Speaker 2:No, no. So they actually, I think, played more. So they played three nights in a row. They normally play Thursday night, friday night, saturday night. The Friday night show not the night I went the night before was definitely more packed with some of the hits. But you know, I looked up like Truckin' I mentioned Truckin' it had been five shows since they played that song. Like they go the whole weekend. They never play the same song and they might go four, five, six shows without playing a song twice.
Speaker 1:I assume because it was the sphere that it was all choreographed and set listed, but no.
Speaker 2:No, no, and there's a lot. I met a lot of people that have gone to a lot of the shows, a lot of people that were there for all three nights and this was their second time there, or it was their first time, and they're going back in May.
Speaker 1:A ton of people, it was just really and they probably spent a lot more than you did.
Speaker 2:They did Because everyone was asking how much did you pay, how much you know? And people were just like they couldn't believe it. They're like you bought your ticket last night. I said, yeah, I sat for a couple of hours, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope.
Speaker 1:Nope, get lucky at all. No, that's what I'm saying. I always wait till the last minute to get tickets and it always works out, but that time it didn't, because there was just too many people that wanted to go to that game and the prices went up in the last 24 hours.
Speaker 2:They doubled, but in the end was it worth it. You know, I don't know everything you did.
Speaker 1:Oh, our trip was amazing. Yeah, it was worth going. But if you went to Vegas, if you had a 24-hour plane ticket like there was one thing you were planning to do you had to get that ticket. I had to get that ticket. We had the whole game day experience and seeing the town and things like that. That it made it still worth it.
Speaker 2:So, in my mind, not having the ticket when I went out like I had to have the ticket before I went there In my mind, going there without the ticket leads to going to the slot machines or the gaming tables way too early, because you're not a happy camper. So I did make a resolution with myself. I said I would not gamble anything until after the show. That was my plan. Wasn't going to do it in my mind. So I never thought twice about it and it's funny. I went to the Venetian, which is right down the street. It's actually, if you get hotel packages, you get them through the Venetian for the Sphere. It's all kind of connected, but it's a little bit of a walk to get to it. I ate at Panda Express. That's what I got for dinner at the food court at the Venetian. So before it became the Venetian, it was the Sands Hotel and Casino and that's what was at that spot starting in 1952. And the famous Copa room where I've talked about one of my favorite live albums, sinatra at the Sands, was recorded there. So as I'm in the Venetian, I'm walking around and, like Frank Sinatra, walked. Now it's not the same building and you know it was demolished, but. But I'm like frank, sinatra was probably right about here, and you know I'm thinking all this before I go to the the dead and company show. So the album sinatra at the sands was recordedoded, and while it's a sad thing to see anything go, the Venetian definitely is a top of the line place for sure. Jimmy.
Speaker 2:The man behind producing many classic albums and songs, roy Thomas Baker, died April 12, 2025, at the age of 78. Remember the 1970 song All Right Now by Free? I love that song. Yeah, he helped with the audio engineering. It was one of the you know first songs that he was part of. He produced the first five Queen albums Sheer Heart Attack, a Night at the Opera, jazz or among them, with songs like Killer Queen, bohemian Rhapsody, which everybody and their mother knows You're my Best Friend Bicycle Race and Fat Bottom Girls. I mean five albums with them. In 1978, besides Queen's Jazz, he produced the Cars' first album, one of the best debut albums by a band. We've talked about it multiple times Good Times Roll my Best Friend's Girl, just what I Needed. Don't Just Stop. He also produced Journey's Infinity album with Wheel in the Sky and Light. I do like the song Wheel in the Sky. I like that song. You know, in 79, he produced Journey's Evolution with the song Love and Touch and Squeezin'.
Speaker 1:Another good song.
Speaker 2:The Cars' Candio album. Let's Go. It's All I Can Do. Candio Got a Lot of my Head Dangerous Type. Are you feeling me, jimmy? Yes, I mean I can't believe he did all this and Far In His Head Games. I mean that's all in 1979. The Cars Panorama album in 1980. He also did Shake it Up in 1981. 82, he did one of my favorite albums of 82. Oh no, it's Devo. Okay, time Out for Fun. Peekaboo, that's Good, speed Racer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's a good record.
Speaker 2:I love that album. Now there's a song on there that actually john hinkley jr wrote. That we'll talk about at a different point in time. But they recorded it, they did the music, they added some words, changed the lyrics a little bit towards the end, but john hinkley jr was actually part of a song that's on that album. Okay, 1982, roy Thomas Baker remixes the Motley Crue album Too Fast for Love with the song Livewire, which is, like you know, their first big song that everybody knew they had released it on a like an independent label and then Elektra signed them and then he remixed it so that they could release it, you know, publicly, out to everybody. I could go on and I'm telling you, the amount of albums that he was part of is insane. It really, really is. But I'm going to stop here, which I usually don't do a very good job of, but I'm going to do that today. All right, he was a part of so many radio hits. Life's the same. I'm moving in stereo. Life's the same except for my shoes, and this is Music in my Shoes.
Speaker 2:Last episode we talked about the who sacking drummer Zach Starkey. Well, he's back in, according to Pete Townsend on the who website. We are a family. This blew up very quickly and got too much oxygen. It's over. We move forward now with optimism and fire in our bellies. I mean that's Pete Townsend's quote on the whole thing about Zach Starkey. He kind of admitted, I guess, that yeah, maybe he was overplaying a little bit. Roger Daltrey was struggling to hear things in his you know his ear monitors because all he could hear was the drumming they all kissed, they made up. Zach Starkey is back and I'll be honest with you, jimmy, it was amazing how much press it actually got Like on the internet. It was all over where I go and look things up. It was everywhere. Like it was a huge deal and I think maybe the who didn't realize people would care as much as they did. Also, on the last episode, jimmy mentioned a Fugazi album on minute with jimmy. Do you remember that, jimmy?
Speaker 2:of course repeater yes, can you do that again? Repeater you did. Thank you, I appreciate that. And don't you know? When I get home, I find out it was singer ian mckay's birthday, the actual day that we recorded, and you didn't know, that did you.
Speaker 2:I had no idea it was so funny that it happened to be his birthday. I also mentioned that Ian and his former band Minor Threat were in a documentary with the band Social Distortion and I couldn't remember the name of it. I looked it up because I wanted to kind of mention it but it was the 1984 film Another State of Mind highlighting Social Distortion and Youth Brigade's summer 1982 summer tour. And then, 35 years ago, in March 1990, social Distortion released their self-titled third album. What Three classic songs Ball and Chain, ring of Fire, story of my Life and those songs rock. I know Ring of Fire is a Johnny Cash song. I know Wall of Voodoo did it also.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but Social D made it their own.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, without a doubt. It is such a good rocking song. It really really is. So I had a friend, scott Pernido, who was a huge Social D fan. As a matter of fact, I would always say Social Distortion and he would be like Social D. He would always say that to me in January of 2015. And every time I hear a social distortion, social D, every time I hear one of those songs, I automatically think of him. It just brings me right back to him. So you know, it was kind of cool thinking about this and thinking about him, even 10 years later, after you know he's gone. Life goes by so fast. You only want to do what you think is right, close your eyes and then it's past Story of my life. Let's revisit some great music from the past, jimmy. You know what, jimmy? Not only are we going to revisit it, I'm ready for Minute with Jimmy. It's time for Minute with Jimmy. Minute with Jimmy. Minute with Jimmy. It's time for Minute with Jimmy. Minute with Jimmy.
Speaker 1:Minute with Jimmy. All right, I'm going back to 1980. The band the Jam, a British mod band that got kind of lumped in with punk because of the timing of their career. But really they weren't necessarily a punk band, they were power pop and they called themselves mods. But they had had a lot of success in England really not much in America, really not much in America. And in 1980, they put out a single and the song was called Dreams of Children, which is a good song. It's on their greatest hits. But the B side was one called Going Underground and the label messed up and they labeled Going Underground as the A side and Dreams of Children as the B side and radio started playing it. Going Underground went to number one on the British charts and so, you know, dreams of Children ended up getting some airplay as well. But because of that mislabeling they ended up with a number one hit.
Speaker 2:Isn't it funny how things like that happen. Yeah, no intention. Yet that's what happened, right?
Speaker 1:And it's one of my favorite jam songs. I can't believe they made it a B-side in the first place.
Speaker 2:Some people might say my life is in a rut.
Speaker 1:But I'm quite happy with what I got.
Speaker 2:You know what I'm quite happy too, and that was Minute with Jimmy, Minute with Jimmy. So, Jimmy, on April 21st 1980, staying there in 1980, Pete Townshend releases Empty Glass and it's kind of like the who album that was recorded by Pete Townshend and not the who that you thought was a who album, just not Roger Daltrey singing it. Like if you listen to it, and especially when it came out, it was kind of like this is a little crazy. I expect Roger to be singing these songs because it sounds just like what the who sounded like at that point in time.
Speaker 1:I know it's confusing, yeah, like Let my Love Open the Door, right? Yeah, and it sounds kind of like one of the the hits off of who are you right?
Speaker 2:yeah, like it's just crazy. And I know that roger daltrey you know I've read in many places was kind of upset for a long time like hey, why didn't you save this for us? And you know, pete, hey, listen, pete writes almost everything and you know he wanted to do this on his own and he had his reasons for wanting to do it. But when you listen to it and I listened to it the other day just to say to myself, hey, listen, you know, is this still how I feel all these years later? And without a doubt, it's the who album that Pete Townshend recorded, so you mentioned Let my Love Open the Door, that Pete Townsend recorded, so you mentioned Let my Love Open the Door. It entered the Billboard Hot 100 June 14th and it peaked at number nine on August 16th, 1980.
Speaker 2:The summer of 80, I remember that song all the time, right, you know, and it was one of those songs we talk about. That crosses over to all different types of music stations, whether it's pop or rock or whatever. Everybody was playing it. So the who 1981 album comes out a year later face dances. A lot of people say that that album wasn't that good. Yet they say this album should have been the who album, but the 81 album, seriously the who album you better. You bet, don't Let Go of the Coat Caché Caché, which is great song. Not many people listen to that Really really good song. The song you Another Tricky Day, I have it on my phone.
Speaker 2:It's one of my most listened to albums that I have on my phone and I think that album is a lot better than what people give it credit for.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Without a doubt. Without a doubt Moving to the fourth week of April 1985. U2, the Three Sunrises Screamer of the Week on WLIR, one of my favorite. U2, the Three Sunrises Screamer of the Week on WLIR One of my favorite U2 songs. It doesn't sound like a U2 song to me at all. It's kind of like a Just like a rock song, like a regular, just Straight up rock song, not a U2-ish type song. Edge plays rock and roll guitar on it. Are you familiar with it, jimmy?
Speaker 1:The song says sunshine, sunshine on me, yes, yeah, I don't know, that sounds like U2 to me.
Speaker 2:You know like he'll do some of that guitar, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that part.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it sounded like some mice came into the studio or something. I'm not sure what that was, but you know, I'm really glad that WLIR exposed me to songs that you wouldn't have heard. It was a B-side of Wide Awake in America. It was an EP Wide Awake in America, that's it that had come out and that was on it and they would play it, and it forced me to go buy it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it had a live version of Bad on it right?
Speaker 2:Yes, and a live version of Sword of Homecoming and Wide Awake in America. None of it was recorded in America.
Speaker 1:But so it had three sunrises, and what was the other song?
Speaker 2:Love Comes.
Speaker 1:Tumbling Love Comes Tumbling yeah.
Speaker 2:Which is a good song that really is. I do enjoy listening to that. But if you haven't listened to that and you want to hear something a little different, the Three Sunrises Three Sunrises, better Than Ezra. The song Good peaked on Billboard Modern Rock Tracks on April 29th 1995. Beginning of the song with the guitar chords and then it goes to the bass by itself and then they start singing and then the guitar chords and back to just the bass. It's a really catchy tune. I like that song. I saw them in 95, in May of 95, and great job. I mean, I really enjoy it. It's a good song, no pun intended. But enjoy it. It's a good song, no pun intended but it is, it's good.
Speaker 2:It's good. So Grateful Dead Go to Heaven. It came out April 28, 1980. An album release to fulfill a contract obligation.
Speaker 2:My favorite songs Alabama, getaway, feel Like a Stranger, don't Ease Me In which was a song that they had been playing live since they started and, like I said, this was an album for a contract obligation, so they recorded it. They needed another song hey, let's play that song that we always do. And Althea, and that is an absolutely fantastic song. The words, jerry singing. You know these little guitar solos he does between the verses just fantastic. In 2011, john Mayer heard Althea on a streaming music service, fell in love with the song and that kind of introduced him to the Grateful Dead. Oh, ten years ago, in 2015, while John was the interim host for CBS's the Late Late Show, he has Bob Weir on. They do Truckin' and Althea, and by the end of the year, dead Company is formed and they start touring. Oh, that's how it happened. That's how it happened.
Speaker 2:And this episode comes to a full circle. I told Althea I was feeling lost, lacking in some direction. Althea told me, upon scrutiny, that my back might need protection, and that is it for episode 76 of Music in my Shoes. I'd like to thank Jimmy Guthrie, show producer and owner of Arcade 160 Studios located here in Atlanta, georgia, and Vic Thrill for our podcast music. This is Jim Boge, and I hope you learned something new or remembered something old. We'll meet again on our next episode. Until then, live life and keep the music playing, thank you.
