Billy Strings Launches Spring Tour with New Music, Gillian Welch & David Rawlings Talk Grateful Dead
Inside Mike Gordon’s Stone Pony Show
Relix Daily
April 03, 2026
April 3, 2026
RECAP
Billy Strings stepped into the spotlight in St. Augustine, Fla. last night to kick off his spring tour. With the first of three nights at the St. Augustine Amphitheater, the bluegrass firebrand blazed through two sets of genre standards and his own beloved catalog, ornamented by a few unexpected track resurrections and a pair of new originals.
FEATURE
“It’s a big old mountain that I’ve been contemplating for something like 40 years. I’m almost speechless,” Gillian Welch acknowledges, just before she and David Rawlings will take to the road for a series of shows in which they will set their sights on the Grateful Dead’s colossal catalog. In particular, the pair will focus on Reckoning, the Dead’s double album that was released 45 years ago this week.
This auction, presented by ANALOGr in partnership with Relix, gathers legendary hardware, and much more, into a single historic sale. Each lot carries direct, documented provenance traced to the band's inner circle, their personal estates, and their storage lockers. For those who believe that history lives in objects, this is where to look.
LISTEN
Every Friday, Relix surveys the wealth of new music released over the past seven days and selects standouts for the Relix Staff Picks playlist. Read on for the highlights from this week’s batch, presented by Qobuz: experience the difference with high-quality music streaming and human-curated selections from the platform that puts artists first.
Dogs In A Pile, featuring Jimmy Law and Brian Murray on guitars, Jeremy Kaplan on keyboards, Sam Lucid on bass, and Joey Babick on drums, deliver the latest entry in the Relix Sessions Vinyl Series, recorded live at Garcia's Chicago during their six-night November 2025 residency. Their first run at the newly opened Chicago venue, these performances capture the band in full flight: unspooling originals through long improvisational arcs and building room-wide momentum, which only deepened as the nights went on.
REVIEW
While the boardwalk in Asbury Park was hushed by a lingering seasonal chill on the evening of March 14, 2026, the vibe inside the Stone Pony was rich with the kinetic energy of watching Mike Gordon gel with his new band. Over the last 25 or so years, Mike’s solo tours have become essential laboratories for his evolving musical curiosity, and on the heels of a highly discussed tour opener in Bearsville, this show felt like a deliberate mission statement: a fresh, well-rounded, and cohesive survey of a forty-year creative arc.
NEWS
Paul Simon appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert last night. In his latest spot on the CBS talk show he’s frequented for years, the icon reflected on his early career and his return to the stage and offered a tender treatment of “Something So Right,” a cut from 1973’s There Goes Rhymin’ Simon that he hadn’t performed since an October 1993 show at Madison Square Garden.
NEWS
Phish will return to Mexico in early 2027 for the 10th anniversary celebration of Phish: Riviera Maya. Presented by 100x Hospitality, the destination event will take place at Mexico’s Moon Palace Cancún from January 27-30, 2027.
WATCH
Derek Trucks playing “Dark Star” at the Martyrs’ in Chicago with Terrapin Flyer 🌹 Video by P. Shapiro
Derek Trucks joins Terrapin Flyer for a powerful take on the Grateful Dead classic “Dark Star” at Martyrs’ in Chicago, channeling Jerry Garcia’s spirit while playing his iconic Tiger guitar.
NEWS
Gov’t Mule have formally unveiled their summer tour plans. As the storied electric blues and Southern rock quartet helmed by Warren Haynes keep trucking across the country with their spring run, they’ve packed their touring calendar tighter with ten new confirmed performances and two save-the-dates in July and August.
REVIEW
Despite The Black Crowes’ 2024 release, Happiness Bastards, earning a Best Rock Album Grammy nomination—they lost to the Stones—and potential Rock Hall accreditation—they were not voted in—the band played it smart with their newest studio album. A Pound of Feathers, their 10th overall release, largely follows the course set by its predecessor, which found brothers Rich and Chris Robinson looping back to the approach that worked so well for them earlier in their four-decade career.
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NEWS
Montreux Jazz Festival has released the programming for its 2026 presentation. Returning to the Lake Geneva shoreline in Montreux, Switzerland from July 3–18, the legendary music festival’s 60th anniversary staging will once again showcase a genre-colliding lineup of celebrated artists from around the world, including icons like Van Morrison, James Taylor, Sting, Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds and Deep Purple.