Last night at Mesa, AZs Goat Head Saloon, parallel universes intersected when Kevin Gordon, a former member of Relix On the Verge band Mojo Farmers, guested on percussion with former Jambands.com New Groove of the Month Quactus. The quartet teased Phish’s ‘Fluffhead’ to open the show before launching into a potent two-set mixture of their debut album, Once a pond, a spine… and a handful of new, unreleased material. Quactus also teased ‘Sample in a Jar’ and the Grateful Dead’s ‘Dark Star,’ while covering full versions of Led Zeppelin’s ‘The Ocean,’ Pink Floyd’s ‘Have A Cigar’ and Rick James’ ‘Super Freak’ when they weren’t shuffling their setlist between tight rock songs, and more exploratory jam set pieces. For his part, Gordon emerged during the set to play percussion on Wine.

Quactus will head to Colorado this weekend for their first dates away from the West Coast (generally the group play shows in Los Angeles, San Diego and Arizona), supporting BRO featuring John Popper, Leo Nocentelli and CR Gruver. Both bands will play Owsley’s Golden Road on Friday and Saturday to help celebrate the Denver venue’s one-year anniversary. Saturday night’s BRO lineup also features Bobby Vega, Chris Kontos and Johnny Markowski. Reporting by Randy Ray