Rick’s An Animal; Goose Is Phenomenal

I’ve been a Deadhead since 7th grade. Long story short, I got hooked on really shitty bootlegs that weren’t worth the cost of the below average cassettes they were recorded on even though they were worth more than their weight in gold to me. And while I was devouring untenable quality audio, the Grateful Dead were playing shows at the Nassau Coliseum (Oct 89 – Apr 90) that would later be memorialized as Without A Net (released Sep 90). I had long since memorized the words to “Althea” but Without A Net was an eye opener for me in terms of what the Grateful Dead actually sounded like in real time in terms of both era and quality.  

I would see my first live show a few months later, April 1991, and manage to see 84 more before Garcia’s passing on August 9, 1995, easily the most impactful celebrity death in my lifetime and one that literally altered the course of my life. From 7th grade until college, Jerry was the first to unlock my spiritual vault and it was he alone who piloted my emotional rollercoaster. From joy to tears and everything in between, he checked all my boxes in a way that no one had before and very few have since. 

Years later Pearl Jam and Eddie Vedder would barge their way into my heart but due to my myopic nearsightedness for the Grateful Dead it took longer than it should have. Ironically, just two days after I attended the Grateful Dead’s last show ever on July 9, 1995, Pearl Jam would play one of the most important shows in their history on the very same stage. From an excerpt in an unlikely article in Variety magazine titled “Pearl Jam’s Secret to 30 Years of Success? Follow the Grateful Dead Playbook”:

It wasn’t fully apparent at the time, but a cosmic bit of torch-passing between the two bands took place in July 1995 at Chicago’s Soldier Field. Jerry Garcia’s final concert with the Dead happened there on July 9; he died a month later at a California rehab facility. On July 11, Pearl Jam played the longest show of its career (30 songs, 155 minutes) at Soldier Field, with local native Vedder joking that there were still remnants of joints on the stage from two nights earlier.

The Grateful Dead and Pearl Jam are connected in other ways than by the opposite ends of a plume of marijuana smoke, from pioneering efforts to make readily available their live catalog to emphasizing the value of concert attendance by changing setlists on the daily, but that’s just an aside and someone else’s article to boot. The first takeaway here is that Pearl Jam is my living number one. The real point of emphasis, however, is that Eddie Vedder, like Jerry Garcia before him, is the one who’s colored more space on my emotional rainbow than any other living human. He’s the most engaging rock star with the most irresistible animal magnetism of any performer I’ve ever seen or perhaps ever will see. In what is arguably the world’s most popular rock and roll band, Vedder is unarguably *the* guy. Seeing a pattern here?

You’re familiar with the old saying, “Three’s a crowd.” Well I’ve been seeing Phish since 1993 but as previously stated I was myopic and loyal and saw a good 50 Phish shows in the mid 90s with a chip on my shoulder because they were not an equal swap for the Grateful Dead. Truth is–and I say this with the benefit of hindsight even though I missed it in real time–not only were they not an equal swap but they were flat out better during the years from 1991-95 when I saw all my live Grateful Dead, especially as currently evidenced by the countless hours of mid to late 90’s Phish I relisten to on a regular basis in direct comparison to the hours of 90’s Dead that are actually worth revisiting (nil). I got over it quickly and saw buckets of Phish shows between then and now (I was too cool to care back then so actual stats don’t exist; best guess is 150-200) but in the early days I was there for fun and nothing more and thus I didn’t make myself available for spiritual connection. 

It would be a full two decades after my first Phish show that I finally allowed space in both my mind and my heart for Trey and Phish and I have no regrets insofar as that’s concerned other than being too closed-minded to be fully present a couple times in the early days. Just as they have long since been sewn into the fabric of my life, the Vermont quartet and their fearless leader are long time residents on my personal Mt. Rushmore, the mid 90’s chip on my shoulder notwithstanding. For those keeping score, whether we’re counting bands or individual musicians, mine is a two-sided mountain and three of Mt. Rushmore’s four spaces are now accounted for with the Grateful Dead, Pearl Jam, and Phish on one side and Jerry Garcia, Eddie Vedder, and Trey Ansastasio, respectively, on the other. 

What’s the point? I’m getting there. 

My love for Goose is well documented and I’m just going to go ahead and say that no matter what else happens, I haven’t put as much time, energy, or other resources into a band in such a short period of time since I first laid eyes on Garcia and the Grateful Dead in 1991. It’s now roughly three-and-a-half years since I saw my first Goose show (10/31/19 @ The Mercury Lounge, NYC), a show that I attended sight unseen, or note unheard as it were. Interestingly, I gave up tickets to what would have been my first ever Dead & Company show at MSG that night and have still never –nor will I likely ever– see them play live. Confused? I know what I know and I like what I like but that’s a story for a different day.

I’ve now seen 41 Goose shows to date while publishing an equal number of show, album, and year-in-reviews and that doesn’t even account for another dozen or so Goose-adjacent side projects and related publications. When Goose opens their spring tour next week, I’ll catch seven–all 8 if I’m lucky–of the first eight shows on tour which includes all of the band’s first ever five-night run at The Capitol Theatre. Fuck. Yeah.

The tl;dr ship sailed long ago but the long and the short of is… they had me at hello. 

Goose is on a wild ride, of that there is little disagreement. Just three years removed from playing 200-cap clubs or smaller and five years removed from playing local CT pizza parlors, Goose has already been permanently etched onto the Mt. Rushmore of my heart which puts them in heady company. Please understand, however,  that I’m not drawing comparisons. But just as I, an eighteen-year old Deadhead was at first threatened by Phish, so, too, do some modern folk take umbrage with Goose’s rapid rise. Goose’s drummer Ben Atkind addressed that issue best when he said, “The internet’s gonna internet.” 

Again, I’m not making comparisons. I am, however, talking about art and artists that make me feel feelings. I’m talking about bands that stole my heart. I’m talking about generationally talented performers. I’m talking about music that raises the hair on my arms while eliciting smiles and tears in equal measure. I am talking about how that makes me respond as a fan and voracious consumer of live music. And I’m talking about being 100% sold. 

So if you’re paying close attention to the narrative then you might realize that this story is not about the Grateful Dead or Phish or Pearl Jam and it’s only partially about Goose. It’s not about Jerry Garcia or Eddie Vedder or Trey Anastasio. It’s a modern tale about how one guy–*the* guy–Rick Mitarotonda, stole my heart. Like Garcia, Vedder, and Anastasio before him, it’s his music that elicits an undeniable emotional response and that runs the gamut from his poetry to his songwriting, from his best-in-jamband class vocals to his guitar play. Rick’s voice is unique and angelic and it touches my heart strings; he plays guitar with equal parts ferocity and tenderness and his speed and dexterity on the fretboard are nothing short of awe inspiring. He may still be working on developing a uniquely unmistakable tone–a prerequisite for admission to the Guitar Hero Hall of Fame–but his otherworldly ability to improvise while listening, reacting, and often leading his bandmates is already becoming the stuff of legend. 

At just 32 years young, Rick Mitarotonda now takes permanent residence on the Mt. Rushmore of my heart alongside Jerry Garcia (53 years old at the time of his death), Eddie Vedder (57), and Trey Anastasio (58) before him.

Evidently I’m not the only one to have taken notice. Last June, Trey Anastasio joined Goose on stage for the first time ever at Radio City Music Hall, an act that was initiated and put together solely by Anastasio and his camp. Goose was obviously all too happy to make space for him, not just for a song or two mind you but for what turned out to be a full set, one that went well past curfew and whose unionized overtime dues were paid by none other than Big Red himself which is an unsubstantiated but credible rumor. Unfuckingbelievable, all of it, yet still the biggest endorsement to come of that night was not that singular set of collaborative magic that happened on June 25, 2022 but the entire Taboose tour (!) that followed several months later as Goose and the Trey Anastasio Band shared both headlines and guest spots with each other’s bands on a nightly basis. 

After decades of successful touring and playing, never before has Trey “Obi Wan”astasio taken a band or student under his wing the way he did Goose and Rick “Luke” Mitarotonda. Watch Goose’ Day Of Tour Episode 12 for behind the scenes footage that shows Trey giving Rick pointers on tone as the two huddle over an amp manual while they laugh and carry on backstage. To the casual observer, Obi Wan and Luke seemed to be inseparable. For further evidence of their shared spirit, pick-a-show-any-show from that tour, choose any song where the two collaborate, and listen for evidence of the Jedi mindmeld by way of the dual guitarmonies that quite simply just shouldn’t have been possible for two different humans playing improvised music. 

Not yet convinced? Just one week prior to the Taboose tour, Rick was invited to play lead guitar and sing in Phil Lesh’s band. Yeah, that Phil Lesh, octogenarian founding member of the Grateful Dead. Point of fact, Rick has the sweetest voice since Jerry Garcia and the guitar chops to match and seeing him slide into Phil’s band in the very role once occupied by the man himself was almost beyond the scope of words. Almost. Garcia’s shoes are impossible to fill and Rick is too smart to try, but he does deserve credit for sliding into his shadow with the otherworldly grace and majestic carriage of no one else before him. For as long as Phil has had this project alive, Rick standing to Phil’s right (even though Jerry used to stand to his left) was easily my favorite iteration of Phil & Friends ever. YMMV.

And just like Trey before him who played with Rick once and then came back to drink from the fountain of youth again and again, after his first three-show run with Phil, Rick was invited back for two more and then two more after that and now there are four more coming after that, too. Still not convinced?

In 2020, Goose played a pool set and an opening set for Dead & Company at Playing In The Sand in Mexico. Some bullshit called COVID happened, the world shut down, many bands cried boohoo and couldn’t figure out a way to do their work, and with a gluttony of grit and creativity Goose somehow found a way to do what very few others could. The undeniable result of that gumption saw them get invited back to play a full headlining show on the big stage on D&C’s off night just three years later. Oh yeah, and Bob Weir sat in with the band–yeah, that Bob Weir– kicking things off with an acoustic duet of Peggy-O with, yep, you guessed it, Rick, before joining the full band for a few more. Fast forward a month or so and Bob Weir & Wolf Bros visited the Capitol Theatre. Guess who was invited to join them? Peter Anspach … and Rick.

There’s another theme developing here that’s equally important: everywhere these guys go they get invited back … again … and again … and again. In a musical space created by the Grateful Dead and perpetuated by Phish, Goose seems to be the heir apparent, even if they’d rather call themselves an indie groove quintet than a jamband. Well I got news for ya, any band who has a 64-entry jam-of-the-year bracket is a jamband and Goose is the biggest band to enter the scene since Phish and neither of those statements should be divisive in any way. Nobody is replacing anybody. It’s a big sandbox and there’s room aplenty in it for everyone.

Yet still Goose’s trajectory raises some hackles. I know, they’re not selling out arenas from coast to coast 80-100 nights a year … yet … but there’s a bunch of dudes in bands like Umphrey’s and .moe surely scratching their heads and saying why not us? There are a lot of answers to that question but one of them centers around the singular generational talent standing center stage. 

When Goose invited percussionist, drummer, bassist, saxophonist, and local funny guy Jeff Arevalo to join the band, it altered their stage set up and thrust Rick into a more central role visually, one that he has and continues to grow into every day. Ironically I started writing this article after the first show with Trey at Radio City but before the ensuing Taboose tour. For some reason I just felt like putting my adoration for Rick on paper. At that time, Rick had not yet played a show with Phil Lesh or Bob Weir, two guys who shared a stage with Jerry Garcia, facts which have since emerged as more fuel for my fire. Really though they’re just supporting evidence for what I’ve known since I first laid eyes and ears on him: Rick. Is. It.

With just a few days to go before their Capitol Theatre run, I am more certain than ever of my adoration for Rick Mitarotonda, not only as a musician but as a quality human being. Here’s a quick story: a very close friend has a daughter with FOXG1 syndrome and started a foundation to help find a cure for this genetic disorder. She had the opportunity to meet and chat with Rick online a few years back and he immediately offered to “help any way he could.” Long story short, this coming Saturday night, before playing a verrrry sold-out show at The Cap, Rick and Goose will play a private invite-only benefit set to raise awareness and funds for FOXG1 while celebrating the longtime supporters of their fight for a cure and the whole thing incubated with an online conversation with Rick. He gets it, of that there is little doubt.

(To donate or learn more about FOXG1 click here. Or click here to enter a raffle to win a Fender guitar signed by Goose! )

This may not or may not be the place for these words but I think it fits so I’ll plow right ahead and say that Rick and Goose also had a hand in unlocking my marriage. Before Goose, music was always something I did alone. Enter Rick and Goose and now my wife of eighteen years shares equally in my passion and is ready to hop on a plane to see Goose about one out of every six times I suggest it. (Hey, someone’s gotta keep me in check.) Okay, maybe no one’s as whooped as I am but within our marriage her lady crush on Rick and my man crush have (almost) equal footing. For two people whose divine sparks were already intertwined, a shared passion for Goose has allowed that fire to burn higher and brighter than ever before and I simply cannot overstate the personal importance of this last paragraph.

Music has the power to move communities and mountains and Rick seems to understand that his calling and his responsibility are to more than just his guitar and his band. That’s not meant to put any undue pressure on him, but Rick is spiritually grounded and a student of life and obviously tall to the task. 

With every heart and mind and soul that has been unlocked on the back of these musical notes, the most beautiful community has grown in, around, and through this band and *that* is what Goose is all about. Being present and available for these friendships is a high point of my life and no doubt where the the magic resides for the many of us so connected. If you’ve not yet experienced the infinite and reciprocal flow of love and energy that are tangibly omnipresent at a live Goose show, then please accept my invitation to join me and share in mine. 

If Rick or anyone in the band ever stumbles upon these words, I’ll end with a simple and heartfelt THANK YOU. See you at the next show!