7 Walkers Hitting The Road

The band, which also features bassist Reed Mathis and multi-instrumentalist Matt Hubbard, recently collaborated with Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter on a number of songs that will appear on the group’s album scheduled to be released this year. The album will also feature a few Dead favorites as well as Mali originals.

Kreutzmann recently talked about how he met up with bluesman Mali when both artists were playing the Oregon Country Fair last year.

“He was the headliner on the main stage, and I sat there and watched him and went, ‘This guy’s for real man, I like this guy.’ Then we met, after that he came over to my trailer that was staying in and you couldn’t separate us, we talked for hours,” Kreutzmann said. “it was just one of those natural things, you know? You can’t plan it; you can’t make it happen. And then we started playing together.”

The tour, which will feature bass-man George Porter Jr. in place of Mathis, begins in Chico, Calif., at the Sierra Nevada Brewing Company’s Big Room April 6, moves to Eureka’s Red Fox April 7 and plays Crystal Bay, Nev., at the Club Crown Room April 8.

Other cities, venues and dates include San Francisco at Great American Music Hall April 9; Santa Cruz at Moe’s Alley April 10; Live Oak, Fla., and the Wanee Festival at the Spirit of Suwannee Music Park April 16; New Orleans at the Mahalia Jackson Theatre April 30 and the Wakarusa Festival in Ozark, Ark., June 3 before wrapping up in Santa Rosa, Calif., at Sonoma County Fairgrounds June 11.

There are also live recordings by 7 Walkers available at Kreutzmann’s newly re-launched Web site.

Kreutzmann has also been helping the folks at UC Santa Cruz in building the Grateful Dead archive at the university.

“I am incredibly happy that the kind archivists at UC Santa Cruz understand the social value of [the Grateful Dead’s] priceless archive, and its hallowed meaning to our most beloved ‘Dead Heads,’ Kreutzmann said. “Without the care it is now going to receive, these treasures would be lost.”

For more information on 7 Walkers’ upcoming tour as well as everything in the Bill Kreutzmann universe, click here for the legendary drummer’s Web site.