Photo Credit: Erik Kabik

Widespread Panic closed out its three-night St. Augustine run on Sunday night, bringing its highly-anticipated second series of 2024 to a thrilling culmination. In the final pair of shows from the weekend, the band continued to show love for Northern Florida with tasteful treatments and nods to the region’s rock greats, scattered throughout sets that balanced new material against the band’s legendary originals and classic covers. Among the highlights from the St. Augustine Amphitheatre residency were new cuts and three Tom Petty cover encores, including the band’s live debut of “Room at the Top.”

On Saturday, March 23, Widespread Panic returned to the stage with an explosive entree of 2008’s Free Somehow album closer “Up All Night,” featuring a brief Allman Brothers Band tease from the newly returned Dave Schools in tribute to the band’s original stomping grounds of Jacksonville, Fla. The band continued to stoke this red-hot energy with classics like “Ain’t Life Grand” and “Big Wooly Mammoth,” before diving into a second act emphasizing the group’s new material. “Little By Little” kicked off the next set, with “Blue Carousel” following shortly after; taken together with Friday’s studio release and live staging of “Tackle Box Hero,” the nearly 40-year group seems to be ramping up live experiments with its new material in advance of a new album. After the second set, which also included a cover of Funkadelic’s “Red Hot Mama,” the band moved on to its encore, featuring “We Walk Each Other Home,” yet another new entry, and “Honey Bee,” a second Tom Petty cover following Friday’s “Running Down a Dream.”

Come Sunday, WSP’s inimitable groove was in full swing as it presented a thrilling final performance that built on the themes and established on the first two nights. To ring in the final performance in its St. Augustine series, the group staged the certified live standard “Rebirtha,” followed by 2001’s “Little Lilly” and the starkly contemplative fan-favorite “Henry Parsons Died.” Further standards in the first frame included “Bear’s Gone Fishin’” and “C. Brown,” before the band performed the relative rarity “Halloween Face” as a set-closer. The band shifted from its canon as they entered the evening’s second set, sprinkling in covers of Traffic’s “Dear Mr. Fantasy” and Talking Heads’ “City of Dreams” and filling the space between them with a treatment of “Surprise Valley,” segued into “Drums” and back to a “Surprise Valley” reprise. During the encore, the group debuted Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ “Room at the Top,” then finally closed out its series with the beloved 1988 standard “Porch Song.”

Widespread Panic will return on April 14 for its annual Panic en la Playa concert getaway, which will bring the band and its fans to Riviera Maya, Mexico through April 17. For tickets and more information on this celebration and further concerts from WSP, visit widespreadpanic.com/shows.

Read on for the complete setlists from Saturday and Sunday and watch a fan-recorded video of Widespread Panic’s “Room at the Top” debut below. Read about the group’s series opener on Friday, March 22 here.

Widespread Panic
St. Augustine – St. Augustine Amphitheatre
3/23/24

Set I: Up All Night, Ain’t Life Grand > Big Wooly Mammoth > Hatfield, Sleepy Monkey > Blue Indian, Space Wrangler
Set II: Little By Little, Tie Your Shoes > Jamais Vu > Diner > Red Hot Mama*, Saint Ex, Blue Carousel > Papa’s Home, Pigeons
Encore: We Walk Each Other Home, Honey Bee# > Climb To Safety^

Notes:
* w/ Allman Brothers Band tease
+ Funkadelic cover
# Tom Petty cover
^ Jerry Joseph and Glenn Esparza cover

Widespread Panic
St. Augustine – St. Augustine Amphitheatre
3/23/24

Set I: Rebirtha, Little Lilly, Henry Parsons Died, Cotton Was King, B of D, Bear’s Gone Fishin’, C. Brown, Halloween Face
Set II: Chilly Water, Greta, Dear Mr. Fantasy*, Surprise Valley > Drums > Surprise Valley, Party at Your Mama’s House, Ribs and Whiskey, City of Dreams+, Fishing, Tall Boy
Encore: Room at the Top#, Porch Song

Notes:
* Traffic cover
+ Talking Heads cover
# Live debut of Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ “Rom at the Top”