Rocky Mountain Folks Festival Day One: Heat, Humor, Protest Songs and Jesse Welles
Day one of the 36th annual Rocky Mountain Folks Festival in Lyons was a marathon…
Arthur Lee Land was waiting there. Arthur is one of those musicians who seems inseparable from Lyons and the Planet Bluegrass community. I’ve seen him around this area many times, and he remains one of those genuinely warm people who seems to have a smile ready whenever you see him. He mentioned Friday that this was something like his 24th appearance on the Wildflower stage. Whether anyone other than Arthur has kept exact count, his long history here is unquestionable. He recalled playing the Main Stage with songwriter Steve Seskin back in 2002 and has been appearing around Folks Fest and Lyons for decades. Land also talked about collaborating with his wife, comparing their creative relationship loosely to Jerry Garcia and Robert Hunter—one providing the musical vehicle and the other helping supply the words. “In the Perfect Groove” was among the songs I caught, and the title pretty well describes Arthur himself. After dealing with prostate cancer several years ago, seeing him continuing to make music with such obvious gratitude and enthusiasm makes his appearances even more enjoyable. He also mentioned that he was looking forward to Jesse Welles later that evening. A friend had apparently shown Arthur an older video of Welles playing with a trio, and Land remembered being struck by just how much the group rocked. That comment would prove prophetic.
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At a moment when the Trump administration, ICE, Pete Hegseth, health-care companies, corporations and virtually every other institution in America seem to be generating songwriting material by the hour, Welles has found an audience hungry for somebody willing to say something. That willingness matters to me. I wish more musicians would use the enormous platforms they have to speak about what is happening around them. I love Phish, but politics rarely enters their shows. Jerry Garcia generally avoided political pronouncements as well, although Bob Weir became much more outspoken and Phil Lesh certainly made his own political leanings known. Artists don’t have an obligation to become political commentators. But music has always had the ability to say things that speeches can’t, and right now I personally think we need more musicians willing to take that chance. Welles is certainly taking it. His acoustic portion included songs such as “Walmart,” “Fat,” “Philanthropist,” “Fentanyl,” “United Health” and “The Poor,” each taking aim at a different piece of modern American life.
Then the evening changed completely. The band walked on, and suddenly the Woody Guthrie comparison didn’t tell even half the story. Welles strapped on an electric guitar, and what had been a topical folk set became a legitimate rock-and-roll show. His band—guitars, bass, keyboards and drums—was extremely good, and Welles himself demonstrated that he can do considerably more than stand under a tree with an acoustic guitar and sing protest songs. The full-band portion moved through originals including “Join ICE,” “Red” and “Domestic Error,” but the covers showed just how hard this group can play. Black Sabbath’s “War Pigs” absolutely raged. They also tackled Nirvana’s “Come as You Are” and the Beatles’ “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.” I’m admittedly not the world’s biggest Nirvana fan—I’ve always considered them more than a little overrated—but I’ll give Welles and the band credit for taking the song on their own terms. “War Pigs,” however, was another matter entirely. That thing rocked.
Arthur Lee Land had been right. Anyone who knows Jesse Welles only from the solo acoustic videos circulating online might be surprised by what happens when he plugs in. There’s a very real rock guitarist hiding underneath the folk-singer exterior. The currently posted setlist also shows that S.G. Goodman later joined Welles for Bob Dylan’s “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” before Welles moved through another solo section and eventually returned to full-band material. It was quite a way to finish a very long Friday…
https://www.gratefulweb.com/articles/rocky-mountain-folks-festival-day-one-heat-humor-protest-songs-and-jesse-welles/
