On Sunday, May 24, Alabama Shakes and fellow Southern rockers JJ Grey & Mofro took the Red Rocks audience on a swampy adventure before conjuring a communal reverie that transported the venue into a heavenly daydream. The over nine-thousand capacity amphitheater was sold out for this first night in a romping two-night run.
The most wonderful and vivid dreams usually come after a venturesome, exciting, tiring activity, not unlike the mile-high hoedown that openers JJ Grey & Mofro led the crowd in. Kicking off the hootenanny, Grey took the stage huffin’ on his harmonica, his backup singers in tow, replete with cowboy boots, as the sun glowingly beamed down on everyone in the place.
Playing the part of a mystical ceremony leader, Grey asked the two colossal 300-foot-tall, hundred-million-year-old red sandstone rocks, named Ship Rock and Creation Rock, which flank the space and give it its name, to “recharge” him after his journey from home, i.e., sea level Florida. Grey subsequently carried this charge into the crowd, galvanizing the place with electric licks on his guitar. Having created a boisterous atmosphere, the set expertly sprinkled in ballads, which at times took a soulful turn, and the backing singers seemed to call down the very sky, bringing everyone even closer to the heavens than Red Rocks already does. The band took us to church, the type of Southern church where rhythmic clapping and stomping shake you to the core, flailing and dancing convey an uncontainable inner joy, and the aromatic fragrance of hot comfort foods fills your very soul.
That’s when something truly magical happened, and the audience entered hypnagogia. Thoroughly tuckered by the opening set, a state of pre-slumber was entered as massive clouds moved in behind the stage, looking as if they might shower us all and put a stop to the celebration. Unperturbed, or maybe peering into the future, JJ Grey and Mofro, supplemented by a heartwarming horn line, launched into their final song, a tear-jerking rendition of “The Sun Is Shining Down”. The massive grey clouds floated closer and closer until they were caught in the almost setting sun, suddenly reflecting the yellow glow in every direction and encasing the entire venue in gold, as Grey and the band sang: “Glory, Glory – Hallelujah / The sun is shining, shining down / Glory, Glory – Hallelujah / I’m alive, and I’m feeling, feeling fine,”
People froze in awe, then thawed under the sun and started looking around to exchange embraces with those they came with and swap warm smiles with strangers turned neighbors. As the openers ended their set, the clouds felt as if they were surrounding the Rocks entirely, slowly turning from yellowish gold to orange and red over the course of the set break. As if signaling the nobility of Alabama Shakes, the clouds reflected the final color of sunset, a royal purple, just as Brittany Howard took the stage. Hypnagogia was being exited, and a dream was being entered, as the sky turned to pure darkness.
Like most artists, they took the stage under the cover of blackness, but when the lights hit, it felt like the moment of becoming conscious within a reverie. The set opened perfectly with “Rise to the Sun”, the opening line of which is: “All I believe in is a dream”, while a few bars later Howard croons “Well, I got to get off this rock somehow”. Faced with a set design featuring clouds turning every color imaginable, the entire amphitheater was beginning to transcend into a nighttime fantasy.
Howard, alongside her high school friends Zac Cockrell and Heath Fogg, both playing bass, assumed the role of soothingly musical guardians, murmuring lullabies over a crib of roughly ten thousand. “Hang Loose” was next up, with Howard singing “Don’t worry, sweet baby /
Don’t you ever worry ’bout a thing”. Her signature vocal runs, accompanied by what can only be described as dream rock driven by soft bass and tinkling keyboards, made the atmosphere a bit blurrier, brighter, and softer. Draped in a silvery white, wildly textured robe with her hair blowing gently in the mile-high breeze, she looked like an angel guiding everyone skyward.
During a short monologue between songs, Howard says that dreams really do come true and that she wrote the next song, “This Feeling” (a rendition for putting a child to bed if there ever was one), to capture that feeling forever.
Just like the ebb and flow of a good dream that vacillates and swells from soothing to energizing, yet always mesmerizing, the vibe was turned up a bit during “I Found You” and “Hold On,” then brought back to relaxation with “Gemini” and “Sound & Color”.
As the adventure with the soft glow around the edges wound down, the alarm clock suddenly went off, waking up the dream-induced spectators. Rather than groggily rising, you are jolted by the alarm set to your favorite tune (megahit “Don’t Wanna Fight”), which has you excited to attack the day after a refreshing, revitalizing slumber. Howard belts beautifully during “Gimme All Your Love” before exiting with the band, followed by an encore starting with “American Dream”, a political anthem during which she sings: “Mmm, it’s enough to make you wanna go back to sleep / I wanna go back to sleep now / I can’t keep dreaming / Keep dreaming / Keep dreaming”. Between songs, she tells the crowd, “I hope all your wildest dreams come true, ” and afterward dives into a rousing rendition of “Always Right” to cap the night.
All photos by Sam Hovsepian (IG: SamSirann)
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