Well, I was there, too, and 20 years later, I don't recall any musical complaints and it was great to be able to just walk down to the front row and dance. They were great fun and had the trampolines out.
However, I do remember that Santana came out and just blew Phish away...no comparison on who had the better chops on that day, Trey vs. Carlos.
And the latinos there for Santana seemed rather amused by Phish's showmanship.
It was fun to return to Merriweather for a Phish show in 2010 and have some young lass look at this old man and ask if this was my first Phish show, and I could say, "yeah, but, oh, I did see them open for Santana here back in '92"

This was the first time I saw Phish live. I recall having seats in the pavilion that were very close, maybe 15 rows back in the center. This was when MPP had seats right up to the front row instead of that crazy, overcrowded pit of our modern times. Anyway, drank a lot on the ride over to Columbia without eating after a long day at work. Not good. I was pretty drunk, but I remember they played a brief show filled with all the greatest hits I was familiar with from my first tapes. I don't remember the quality of the jams. Santana was great, as usual. This was before he entered into his "collaboration era."

After leaving the show, I fell down in the parking lot and busted my knee open. Ouch! I had a vague recollection of offending several people in the audience due to my sloppy actions during the show. Ah, the folly of youth. Not my finest moment.

I would have to wait for the Spring 1993 show at the Bob Carpenter Center for a proper introduction to the live Phish experience. That was a much better show!

Anyway, that's my experience; hope yours was better!

(Published in the second edition of The Phish Companion...)

Ugh. You heard me. Ugh.

Whenever anyone starts a thread in a discussion forum about what the worst Phish show was, I bring up this one. It seems kind of odd that this is the case. They were coming off of a rather good three show Interstate 64 mini tour and I was excited to hear what they would do playing for a brand new crowd in a huge ampitheatre. This was the first show where they were an opening band for a major act (Santana). What would they do?

My hopes rose even higher as I walked to the venue. Phish was clearly sound checking with "Shaggy Dog". Maybe they'd take this chance to play all sorts of interesting stuff without having to worry about their usual fanbase.

Maybe that was the plan, but that sure isn't what we got. We got forty four minutes of the most obvious songs, played poorly. Was this what opening for a band meant? Play the pop songs and don't jam at all. We had nothing else to judge what these sets were like and my inner fanboy was offended, so much so that when I saw Fishman standing by a fence looking at the crowd, I started to question him.

These were the results of my interrogation: No, this wasn't a trend. Yes, they might play different songs later in the tour. The jams weren't good because they couldn't hear each other in the monitors. "No, we didn't sell out," he finally said and walked away.

Looking back at my reaction eleven years later, I'm embarrassed at my younger self. Why did all of my band interactions have to come during my jaded stage? But this does say a lot about the quality of the show. This was the show that was so bad that I felt compelled to find a band member and register my complaint. Worst. Show. Ever. Just be thankful that there aren't any tapes.

Well, no recording found on the spreadsheet or the usual sites. But from what I read in the other review, I'm not missing much. It looks like a heavy hitting set though. Their best songs at the time.

Moving on...

Munch said: "However, I do remember that Santana came out and just blew Phish away...no comparison on who had the better chops on that day, Trey vs. Carlos."

I clearly remember that, too.