As promised, the Furthur Festival will return this year, though this time around organizer Bob Weir is calling it So Many Roads, with his band Ratdog, Rusted Root and Karl Denson's Tiny Universe filling the bill.

The 18-date tour kicks off August 10 in Scranton, Pennsylvania, and runs through September 3 in Sun Valley, Idaho. Prior to So Many Roads, ex-Grateful Dead guitarist Weir and Ratdog will play seven dates with Phil Lesh & Friends (see [article id="1443355"]"Grateful Dead Members Go On The Road"[/article]).

Weir decided against using the Furthur moniker for this outing, since Dead percussionist Mickey Hart and keyboardist Bruce Hornsby — both of whom played with Weir and Lesh on the 1998 Furthur Festival — are unavailable this summer, according to a Grateful Dead Productions spokesperson.

Percussion-heavy rockers Rusted Root are in the studio working on their fifth album, the follow-up to their self-titled 1998 effort. The genre-defying Karl Denson's Tiny Universe just released Dance Lesson #2, which features appearances by DJ Logic, jazz guitarist Charlie Hunter and bassist Chris Wood of Medeski, Martin & Wood. Progressive bluegrass picker Keller Williams will also join the tour.

So Many Roads tour dates, according to the tour's publicist: