We got shown the light in the strangest of places this summer.

Dead and Company, the Grateful Dead legacy act, returned to the road for a barn-storming cross-country tour of 19 shows from Los Angeles to New York City which wrapped up on Saturday, July 16 at Citi Field in Queens.

Featuring the Grateful Dead's Bob Weir on guitar and vocals and drummers Mickey Hart and Bill Kretuzmann with singer/guitarist John Mayer, bassist Oteil Burbridge and keyboard player Jeff Chimenti, Dead and Company has been delivering its crowd-pleasing, sing-along-friendly approach to the Grateful Dead canon on stage since 2015.

This tour felt special. Last year was the band's grand return after the COVID-19 pause, and this summer picked up where that communal energy and musical curiosity left off. There was never a dull moment, and every show had its share of delights. And thanks to the livestreams on Nugs.net, fans from anywhere in the world could catch every single note.

Here are 13 high spots from this summer, listed in chronological order. Just as no two Dead shows and no two performances of the same song are ever identical, every Deadhead's list of highlights will surely be different. So read on, enjoy and remember, we're all enjoying the ride.

One of the guiding motifs running throughout the summer was a playful, irreverent approach to some sacred Dead cows, none more so than the tried-and-true coupling of “Scarlet Begonias” and “Fire on the Mountain.”

Conjoined on setlists for decades, “Scarlet” and “Fire” were never played in sequence this summer. The strategy paid off, giving the former fair play as a frisky piece of business and letting Burbridge’s rich vocal glide over the summertime groove of the latter.

By separating the longtime companions via another hallowed Dead tandem — “China Cat Sunflower” and the traditional “I Know You, Rider” — on the tour’s opening night, the band was making it clear from the jump that it would be far from business as usual out on the road this summer.

What a trip this was. “Dark Star,” the Dead’s landmark opus, was taken out for a contemplative, cosmic spin, one that seemed to bring the night sky a little closer to the ground at Shoreline.

Then, in the midst of all of the exploration, there was revelation: “El Paso,” the Marty Robbins country and western chestnut that’s lived in Weir’s wheelhouse since 1970, gave way to Dead and Company’s debut performance of Merle Haggard’s tender “Sing Me Back Home.”

It was Kreutzmann and Hart’s first time playing the Haggard tune since the early 1970s, and it was wonderfully delicate. The structure was similar to that deployed by the Grateful Dead at Woodstock in 1969 — where Haggard’s “Mama Tried” gave way to “Dark Star.”

Pairing the ultimate sonic spacecraft with a ditty fresh off the dusty trail will never not be wonderful, the musical equivalent of a “Star Trek” episode where Kirk and company pause their odyssey to visit an Old West-themed planet before once again taking to the stars.

In what turned out to be one of the biggest crowd-pleasers of the summer, Dead and Company took a page out of the Grateful Dead’s 1980s playbook for the rapturous classic rock extravaganza that is Traffic’s “Dear Mr. Fantasy” segued into the “na na na na” epilogue of the Beatles’ “Hey Jude.”

A frequent showcase for the impassioned vocals of late Dead keyboardist Brent Mydland, the “Fantasy” and “Jude” sequence first appeared at the Dodger Stadium tour opener, but by the time it opened the second set of the band’s second night in Boulder, it was rock-solid.

Dead and Company shows are often communal affairs, the band and audience joining together to celebrate the Grateful Dead’s legacy, and few things get a crowd singing along like the crescendo of “Hey Jude.”

On this night, the sequence started what may have been the strongest set of the tour, leading to an expert showing by the tricky trio of “Help on the Way,” “Slipknot!” and “Franklin’s Tower,” a fantastic “Drums” and “Space” interlude that featured a glance at Miles Davis’ “Milestones,” then a righteous rendition of Bob Dylan’s “All Along the Watchtower.”

Mayer brought the six-string fireworks on the apocalyptic rocker “Morning Dew,” and a rare encore performance of the “Terrapin Station” suite sealed the deal on this incredibly special evening.

One of the great Dead and Company delights is Mayer’s ability to deliver the Grateful Dead’s primordial blues-rock deep cuts that served as signature numbers for late singer and harmonica player Ron “Pigpen” McKernan.

Mayer’s affinity for the blues is comfortably in sync with McKernan’s, and hearing Pigpen’s songs back in rotation simply feels good for longtime fans.

“Mr. Charlie” hit hard in Boulder, as did “Big Boss Man” in Bethel, but the highlight was the Missouri performance of “Easy Wind,” with the song’s tempo shifted to a deliberate stomp allowing Mayer to get maximum mileage out of the “Workingman’s Dead” deep cut.

Back in 2016, in the early days of Dead and Company, Weir referred to Mayer as his "fire-breathing sidekick," and Mayer's guitar work has never been more combustible than it was this summer.

He called his shot on the opening night, quoting and then elaborating on John Coltrane's approach to "My Favorite Things" during "Feels Like a Stranger" at Dodger Stadium. He playfully passed through Duane Allman's iconic motifs for the Allman Brothers Band's "Mountain Jam" during "St. Stephen" in both Riverbend and Foxboro, Massachusetts, and in Boulder delivered a jaw-dropping "Morning Dew" solo that approached the highs of that song's instant-classic 2021 rendering in Philadelphia.

It was that big night in Riverbend that should have Mayer watchers abuzz for a long time. "Here Comes Sunshine," arriving late in the first set, really snuck up on you as Mayor's solo started sputtering and stacatto, before blossoming into psychedelic grandeur.

That revelation turned out to be just a warm-up for a proverbial mic-drop on "Deal," a blues-pop delight that Jerry Garcia spent decades playing with the Dead and his other musical endeavors.

Mayer took the song out like a high-test sports car doing laps around a speedway, tearing off notes with pure daredevil joy in an act of controlled abandon. It's a performance that deserves to be studied, proof that even the most well-worn material can still contain infinite surprises.

Dead and Company largely serves as a nostalgic ode to one of America’s greatest bands. But occasionally, this band uses its platform to speak to the current climate in its own way.

In June of 2021 in Dallas, the band addressed the fight over reproductive rights in Texas — that show’s first set started with the calypso classic “Man Smart (Woman Smarter),” followed by six songs named after women.

On June 24, the day the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, “Man Smart (Woman Smarter)” returned to open the show in Chicago. The real fire, however, came at the start of the second set, via the Grateful Dead political anthem “Throwing Stones.”

A dense Weir composition with lyrics by John Perry Barlow, the populist, anti-authoritarian statement — “The future's here, we are it, we are on our own” — was played with righteous fury, and its lyrics got an update from an impassioned Weir: “You can buy the whole (expletive) Supreme Court today.”

The second set of the band’s Pine Knob Music Theatre show was everything one could hope for from the best Dead and Company evening. “Playing in the Band” was pushed to bold jazz and funk heights when Burbridge and guestting drummer Jay Lane locked into a pocket, allowing the rest of the band to color in the groove. A delightful “Uncle John’s Band” segued to a debut appearance by “Supplication.” John Coltrane’s “A Love Supreme” was even nestled within the nooks and crannies of “Drums” and “Space.”

But Weir took command for the evening’s high point, “Wharf Rat.” Perhaps the finest and certainly most heartbreaking of Garcia and lyricist Robert Hunter’s plaintive ballads, the hard-luck saga of “Wharf Rat” was delivered with reliable, well-worn and deeply-felt grace by Weir before Mayer’s soaring guitar offered the eternal possibility of salvation.

When Weir sings Hunter’s immortal line of “I’ll get up and fly away,” Mayer’s guitar makes you believe that it’s possible.

This is what pure invention sounds like.

"Slipknot!" is an unpredictable musical beast, an instrumental concept meant to serve as the connective tissue between the halting jazz/funk of "Help on the Way" and the three-chord rhapsody of "Franklin's Tower." When the full suite from 1975's "Blues for Allah" is taken out for a spin, "Slipknot!" is where the question mark, or the exclamation point, can often be found.

In Bethel, that meant Mayer tapping out aggressively glitchy, brittle figures, eventually locking in with Chimenti and Lane as a rabid cerberus, hunting down the wildest sounds they could while the rest of the band gave them enough slack to run.

The segment inspired mid-song applause from the rapt crowd, and it served as the centerpiece of a bountiful second set built around a nesting doll structure for "Dark Star," "Help," "Slipknot!," "Franklin's," "Drums," "Space" and back to "Dark Star" again.

A secret weapon of Dead and Company's has long been the selective deployment of Burbrdige's lead vocals on the tenderest Garcia ballads, with his lush and sweet voice serving as a lovely vessel for the quieter corners of the Garcia/Hunter songbook.

The "Workingman's Dead" number "High Time" was a major bright spot of the band's 2021 tour, and it sounded even better this time around.

Dusted off for only the second time this tour, the number is a consistent stunner thanks to Burbridge's emphatic lead vocal that bloomed from gentle to soaring, buoyed by the band's backing harmonies and a tasteful yet evocative solo from Mayer.

Performing in Bristow, Virginia, just about 40 miles outside of our nation's capitol, the band let the music do the talking as it used much of its first set at Jiffy Lube Live to address the current state of affairs.

"Women Are Smarter" returned to open the show, and it was then followed by an incendiary rendition of the Grateful Dead's landmark 1970 protest anthem, "New Speedway Boogie."

Released on "Workingman's Dead," the song is an eternal ode to the exhaustion and resilience that accompany any fight for progress: "Who can deny? It's not just a change in style. One step done and another begun, and I wonder how many miles?"

Weir, in prime weathered bluesman mode, delivered the song with steely determination, bolstered by Mayer's razor-sharp leads as the rest of the band provided the steadiest of bedrock.

Even when they're winking and nudging with their setlists, Dead and Company still has the capacity for awe-inspiration. Take the band's return to Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia, where last year the show's structure had to be adjusted on the fly due to downpours.

For their triumphant return, they playfully nodded to last year's inclement weather with a first set coupling of "Here Comes Sunshine" and the lush "Looks Like Rain."

Arguably Weir's finest ballad, "Looks Like Rain" felt tinged with mortality and grace this summer, as the end of the tour gets closer with every show. When Weir sings of "turning grey and it looks like rain," band and listener alike can feel all the years and miles combine into a hard-earned American beauty.

One of the earliest Grateful Dead numbers to find its way into the Dead and Company repetoite, Noah Lewis' "Viola Lee Blues" often serves as an agent of controlled chaos in the band's setlists, ready to shake things up at a moment's notice.

When the band returned to Citi Field in Queens for its tour-closing two-night stand, "Viola" acted as the night one, set two bridge between the smoky blues rock of "Althea" and the epic grandeur of the "Terrapin Station" suite.

The band gave this most primordial jam a confidently fluid rendering, both gritty and relaxed as everyone had room to breathe. In particular, the number served as a fine late-tour showcase for Chimenti, whose combination of invention and consistency has made him the low-key glue of the band for the last seven years.

Sometimes, all you need is a good old rock 'n' roll song. "Brown-Eyed Women" is just such a delight, at once a mythologically rich dispatch by Hunter from what Greil Marcus would call the "old weird America" and a bouncing folk-rock offering that's been a pick-me-up for countless listeners over 50 years.

On closing night of the tour, there was a stellar meeting of musicians and material, with "Brown-Eyed Women" giving Mayer the opportunity to deliver what may have been the finest vocal performance of his time to date with Dead and Company, relishing every melodic detail of Hunter's Bigfoot County saga, as the band played with such ease that it sounded like they were simply tapping into the sonic groundwater that's flowed under America since time immemorial.

And that's what Dead and Company is in a nutshell, after all: a musical collective channeling the eternal, the ancient and the yet-to-come all at once and imparting it to us in the ever-present now.

Alex Biese has been writing about art, entertainment, culture and news on a local and national level for more than 15 years.