After Over A Half A Decade Of Delays, Peter Shapiro Finally Gets To Unveil His Jerry Garcia Club To Chicago During A Sold Out Show With Grahame Lesh & Friends

Mar 23, 2025 admin_bitlc Features, Music News, Reviews 0

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By James Currie

Last night, a long lived dream came true for New York Entrepreneur Peter Shapiro. The man behind venues like Brooklyn Bowl, movies such as Tie-Died and a legendary concert festival Fare Thee Well The Grateful Dead celebration, was finally able to reveal his Jerry Garcia themed restaurant venue dubbed, Garcia’s Chicago, to the world.

The venue, a 300 capacity club with mixed seating and standing room space had been sold out for weeks. But this was something that almost didn’t happen and was nearly cancelled starting way back in 2019 when he first acquired the building and then a global pandemic shuttered its proposed debut a half a decade ago.

Shapiro has been working with the Garcia family for almost a decade to create this jam band mecca. First talking about it in 2015. Problems started almost immediately with COVID shutting down the live entertainment industry. Then costs mounted and no income to pay while resting in state. He almost threw in the towel but thankfully for a legion of Grateful Dead and Jerry Garcia fans, he soldiered on. Last night, all that work finally paid off as the grand opening took place and featured Grahame Lesh and Friends to kick it all off on an extended weekend extravaganza.

Opening night was finally here. The crowd gathered early in great expectation for what many are considering to be the new home for roots, bluegrass and Americana music. A place Shapiro describes as not a shrine but a dynamic and vibrant celebration.

Located in the old Wishbone restaurant in Chicago’s West Loop, a place the Shapiro visited and when he found out it was going up for sale fell in love with. He said during his opening announcement, “We went to lunch at Wishbone, the building was just unique as you can see there’s just no pillars anywhere to prevent obscured viewing and the acoustics are just incredible.” He went on with, “There’s some many reasons I should have just called it quits, but couldn’t.” He then thanked a long list of people for helping get the club up and running including his first person on the list. “The first person I want to thank is Trixie Garcia (Jerry’s daughter) for believing in us.” She was in the crowd and waved thanks.

This was just the start of a long line of appreciation thanking everyone from his team at Dayglo, Chicago partner Michael Berg and chef, Ivy Charthen for creating the food that Jerry loved. A place to gather, dance, eat, and be inspired.

And with that, Shapiro welcomes Grahame Lesh and Friends to the stage.

Grahame Lesh, son of the late Phil Lesh of the Grateful Dead, brought along some amazing musicians to join him on stage and rock out the opening night of a 3 night stay. Friends like Nicki Bluhm to help with vocals and Daniel Denoto on guitar. He also brought along regulars Damien Bluhm, Brian Rashap, Justin Mazer, Adam Minkoff and one of Lesh’s dad’s long time collaborators Marcus King. They played through some classics by his family and friends in the jam band community, especially the music of his dad’s legacy. They opened with a Dead song, “Help on the Way” which turned out to be a medley of Grateful Dead songs that included “Loser” and Slipknot!”

They kept the train rolling with songs by The Allman Brothers, Mickey Newbury and more Dead. Jamming through 8 tracks to round out set one. Each member taking turns at the wheel and several taking the lead on vocals.

Much like a typical Dead show, the second set continued the night on for hours. More jams came from tracks by Merle Haggard, David Crosby and Graham Nash, “Morning Dew” but Bonnie Dobson, “Sugaree” by Jerry Garcia and Bob Dylan’s Dead favorite cover, “Tangled Up In Blue” before coming back with an encore of the fan favorite, and the nights sing along, “Ripple”.

There was so much love in the air. Hugs from long lost friends reuniting, cheering for the song choices by the band and the appreciation of a new club these fans can call home.

This was just the first night of three scheduled for the band. GLAF will be back Saturday and Sunday as well to do the same thing, most likely switching some songs out like his fathers band would do as well.

For more on Garcia’s Chicago including show dates, tickets and check out their menu, click here

For more on Grahame Lesh and Friends, click here

For photos from the show, click here

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Setlist: Grahame Lesh and Friends at Garcia’s in Chicago March 21, 2025

Set 1:

1. Help On The Way
2. Slipknot!
3. Loser
4. Jessica
5. Why You Been Gone So Long
6. Dire Wolf
7. Black Muddy River
8. Franklin’s Tower

Set 2:

1. The Mountain Song
2. Sing Me Back Home
3. St. Stephen
4. The Wall Song
5. The One Other
6. Morning Dew
7. Sugaree
8. Tangled Up In Blue

Encore:

1. Ripple

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• 2025, Chicago, concert review, Garcia's Chicago, Grahame Lesh, Grahame Lesh and Friends, grand opening, New Nightclub, Peter Shapiro

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