Anyone skipping this show because of

a) well-documented and oft-lauded tour highlights (Hampton, Dayton, Auburn Hills, etc)

or

b) a terrible looking second set

is doing themselves a SERIOUS disservice.

The Ghost opener is 17 minutes of ferocious full-band communicado: Trey explores his wah pedal with comp-type chording for the first half of the jam, no direction given, no direction taken. It's REALLY relaxed, and the crowd erupts 12 minutes in for no apparent reason other than to say, "as an opener, this will do just fine." When Trey finally does solo proper, its in the hallmark '97 style, all serial-abduction Stevie Ray Vaugn riffs over a bed of chirping alien birds courtesy of the delay loop.

A pair of funk tunes to showcase the new direction, a short breather, and then a crazed Runaway Jim: around 8 min in, things get so heavy that I was convinced this was some sort of mountain-pass test, we were all climbing into thin air and only with some serious skill and a little (ok a LOT) trepidation would we make it down the other side. Ay 10:00, we clear the last pitch, and Trey quiets things down to begin a descent with eerie nimbled ease. The drone still pulses, we're not sure if the mountain has broken free from the glacier or not, it's ALMOST an actual segue into My Friend, Fish is playing a swing beat for chrissakes, down and down and then....

Then the segue to the first and only My Friend, My Friend of the tour! The first on US soil in a year! Not sure why these guys were able to get SO DARK during this tour, but man, this thing is spooky! Trey's laughing at the slowness of this version, but it loses none of its strange medieval-cum-heavy metal charm.

Fans of Limb by Limb should give this a spin, it's equally dark as the Jim and just as celebratory in it's resolution. During this tour (and a few others during the peak years) it seemed as though every song was an opportunity to make a grand musical statement. Whether the thing stated made any sense or was successful wasn't really the point, as we'd soon find out a few songs later. It really felt like the whole band was soloing in unison, drawing on a jazz heritage that often gets lost in the wake of recent shows.

Now, the second set. Stash as an opener was strange to me, even if it had been done once already on this tour. But as it unfolded, and I found a new spot illuminated atop the upper section stairway platform, I made the connection that this song (perhaps more than any other in the catalog) is the perfect synthesis of the phish sound: polyrhythmic, tension-filled, plumbing, a vehicle for top-flight improv. And so it was.

With Bouncing, then Julius, I began to worry about the quality of the song selection for what could have otherwise been a really strong show. Ah, but the band had other ideas for Julius on this frigid December night. Of all the songs that received a "treatment" in 1997, this was the one I would've never foreseen. And for good reason: it hadn't been hinted at before this show and it hasn't happened since. It's trite to say "best Julius ever", not because there are better performances but because fearless exploration and wide-ranging improvisation isn't everyone's cup of tea. Some will say it seems forced, that the gospel blues of Julius doesn't really lend itself to funk, or jazz, or reggae. But to iterate: this was a different time, when no song was sacred, when no basic building block of music couldn't be deconstructed or subverted in some way.

Julius proper ends some 7 min into the 18 minutes that make up this monster. Fish has been yelling his approval for the entire coda, and it's no wonder: he leads the band into a rag-time version of the song first, as an entry point into what becomes a multi-genre affair. A quick jump back to double time, a wall of noise, and a standard Trey eruption, the thing could end here and it would still be talked about in the various Phish nerd web forums. But it doesn't end. Trey picks it up with a staccato strumming, steps on the wah, and perhaps because Mike never strays from the walking bass line of Julius, this doesn't just become another in a litany of funk jams. Instead, it's a strange hybridized thing, with a reggae beat emerging 14 minutes in! Trey cuts everything out for some "Bring the Dude" action, Fish belts out his dancehall reggae yell, and things just get weirder. Scofield-esque blues, strange Page tones, another beat change, and they somehow bring things to a close with Slave.

It's worth noting that this Slave is also FAR from typical. Maybe because of the huge leap of faith everyone just took, this Slave is so patient, so far back in the pocket. Both its reggae rhythms and its bleak, technophobic breakdowns never sounded so raw. Trey really pushes his hollow-body, and these little mini-scapes are just hints of things to come. Once the jam rises up to its typical majestic conclusion, Page instigates a tidal wave of sound that really seemed like it was going to wash us all away. The truest incarnation of Trey's "My Bloody Valentine / Sonic Youth meets Brian Eno" influence, I didn't hear this kind of pure NOISE again until 12/30/98 (out of Coil, no less). The closest sonic analogy would be a shuttle lift-off.

So yeah, it's easy to forget this seemingly de rigueur show. It's far from conventional, and the only thing typical about it is that, like it's Fall '97 brethen, it's typically brilliant.

1) If you're going to skip one fall '97 show, it can be this one.

2) Don't skip any fall '97 shows.

I would not skip this show!

The Ghost was great and the whole 2nd set is great. You can hear that they were ready to
jam as soon as then stepped foot on the stage in the 2nd set. The Stash was a killer opener.
The Julius was so rocking! The jam is swinging so hard and it was nice to hear a song take
the spot light in 2nd set that normally wouldn't be there and the Slave is killer.

1. Do not skip this show.
2. do not skip any 97 shows.

(posted over 12 years ago, the morning after the show, to rec.music.phish)

12/5/97 Cleveland State University Convocation Center
Cleveland, OH

Times are in paranthesis.

Set I: Ghost (17) --> Wilson@ (5), Funky Bitch (6) Black-Eyed Katy (8),
Sparkle (4), Runaway Jim* (14) --> My Friend, My Friend+ (7), Ginseng
Sullivan (5), Limb by Limb (10), Character Zero (9)

Set II: %, Stash (13), Bouncnig Around the Room (3), Julius# (17), Slave
to the Traffic Light^ (16), Lizzards (11), Loving Cup (10), Chalkdust
Torture(8)

Encore: Axis: Bold as Love (7)

I: 85 min
II+E: 90 min

@ Someone held up a HUGE (12 foot) Wilson tennis ball flag during this
tune which Trey acknowledged.
* Runaway Jim included a Harry Hood Jam in the last minute and a half.
+ Trey motions to Fishman on "My friend, my friend, he's got a wife" and
Jon looks out at the crown with a big grin on his face.
% Fishman teased the opening drumbeat to Buffallo Bill, then he and Trey
shot each other a series ofdirty looks...all in jest of course.
# Makisupa-Like jam in the last 3-4 minutes of the Julius Jam.
^ Slave included a heavy-metal jam

I heard someone say that they heard 2 Camel Walk teases and a Mike's
teased in the first set. I think he was on crack... but the Hood tease
*is* there, though, I swear. If you happen to have the tapes already
check at about 12-13 minutes into the Jim Jam and please confirm my
sanity...

ROADTRIP:

We meant to leave Ann Arbor at noon, but it quickly became nearly 2 pm
before we got of town (you know how those things go...). The drive to
Cleveland went really quickly; I think we made it in just under 3 hours
listening to some Bela and the Flecktones. The stop for gas featured a
bizarre exit on US Route 420, and Reilly's Gatoraide and junk food purge
rang up to again the mysterious total of $4.20. Hmmmmm... We met up with
2 friends, Elizabeth and Elizabeth at their apartment in Cleveland.
Elizabeth #1 was an *excellent* cook, and made us a tasty dinner of beans
and rice and baked chicken. Elizabeth #2 had a pair of pet lizzards...was
this a sign?

PRESHOW:

It was butt-cold outside, but that didn't stop a good number of people
from setting up outside just across the street from the Convocation
Center. Snaps to whoever made that Meatball Sub...it was great! I met
Aaron outside of will call as I was waiting to drop off tickets to a
friend who never showed and I met Sauldude there, good to meet you
finally! But it was freezing and we had to get inside and warm up. The
Convocation Center itself is a really nice building, it seemed really
small but I overheard someone saying that it held 1,000 more than Assembly
Hall in Champaign. We found ourselves a good spot on the floor, about 20
feet directly in front of Fishman. We were sitting next to some nice
people from Notre Dame and, despite the rivalry, they were great people
after all. ;^) We chatted and listened to some nice Jazz and then
something with more of a clubby-bass feel to it. But at exactly 8:00 the
lights went down...

SET I:

GHOST: Bold opener, in the words of Steve Williams. I was happy to see
this right off the bat. No throw away here, just unadulterated jamming.
This Ghost was nice and funky, like they all are, a healthy 17 minutes.
Trey stareted doing the Digital Delay Loop stuff that he's been doing a
lot more of (see 8/9/97 Alpine Valley SOAMule and Mike's Jam) this
Summer/Fall and at about 14 minutes into the jam it turned really dark.
Like I said, it was a good jam. Nothing stellar, but a heckovalot nicer
than a lot of openers they could have done. This segued nicely into...

WILSON: Trey forgot to do the second verse right off, and went directly
into the "I must inquire..." section, but quickly recovered. Nothing
crazy here, but toward the end of the song Trey did acknowledge a couple
of people on the left side of the building that had one of those big
Wilson tennis ball flags that you would hang up at a baseball game or
something.

FUNKY BITCH: This tune was average at best. Mind you, average is a good,
rockin' Bitch, but having just heard this in Champaign and before at the
Went and before that at Darien, it didn't get me as pumped. No complaints
thus far, though...

BLACK-EYED KATY: This tune is as good as everyone has been saying. When
they first hit that rhythmic pattern of double stops, I got the famous
ear-to-ear show grin that happens when you just heard something you know
you liked. Katy is like a slice of a really good Ghost jam restructured
and given a better build and more room to experiment. Trey used the DDL
again here, and Page had a (new?) keyboard to the right of his Baby Grand
that he did some cool swells with. This might be (not counting Sampson,
which seems to have vanished like a Leprechaun) the first completely
instrumental funk jam tune. I think that this tune will be the one to
watch for the next, say Tweezer. Katy will go places...

SPARKLE: well, the lights were nice...

RUNAWAY JIM: This was a great first set Jim. Nothing like the 58 minute
Jim of a few days ago, I'm sure, but there was some solid playing
nonetheless. about 8 minutes into the jam it again turned really dark...I
was really conscious of the darm jamming today because on the way down
someone mentioned that Phish likes playing the dark, brooding jams more
that the happy, get-everyone-on-their-feet jams. Toward the end of the Jim
jam, though, it turned quickly back into a happy jam, and at about 12
minutes into Trey began the chording of the Hood jam. They played the
Hood jam for about 1.5 to two minutes before segueing (technically a > and
not a -->) into...

MY FRIEND, MY FRIEND: This is good tune to hear every once in a while.
Trey looked over at Fishman for the line "...he's got a wife" and Fish
kind of looked out at the audience and smiled. Fish was very active
tonight...a lot of little fills (more than usual, I think) and lots of
yelling (esp see Set II Julius) from him tonight. During the crazy build
section toward the end, Trey crouched down and played his guitar on the
mic stand. Trey was all over the place tonight, bopping and churning and
rocking hard. After MF^2 was done, they kind of hung back and talked for
a minute or so about what to do next. They ended up playing...

GINSENG SULLIVAN: well, the lights were kind of nice... Seriously, I
don't particularly care for this song anymore. It's a good blugrass tune,
but I think I've heard it too much. I could have used a My Soul, Beauty,
Uncle Pen, or Old Home Place. Oh well...

LIMB BY LIMB: This was a good version, not as good as Champaign, though.
I think they pulled out early at the end, and that they could have gone
elsewhere, but the jam stayed pretty basic. One *small* complaint as a
singer, though: when Fishman started his solo "Limb by Limb by limb by..."
on the outtro, he was a bit flat. Just an anal singer's thing, sorry.

CHARACTER ZERO: Our companion said it lacked the intensity of Hartford,
and it was definately not the most rocking version of Char0 I'd heard.
Chris did not seem "on," in sync with the band throughout most of the
first set. Of course it had it's moments, but the set was pretty weak,
IMO. There was too much "whatever" music...songs that you just say "huh?
Ok, whatever." when they start up. At setbreak Steve and I talked briefly
about being slightly dissapointed, but were were psyched to be hearing one
more set before going home.

Setbreak: 44 min

SET II:

Fish sat down and immediately played the opening beat to Buffallo Bill,
and Trey shot him a look-of-death (in jest, of course), to which Fishman
replied with his own look-of-death, and they went back and forth a couple
of time, it ended with both of them laughing and Trey saying "Stash" about
50 times.

STASH: Not bad for a second set opener, but it did not get very far out
there. This was a straightforward, good Stash.

BOUNCIN': Hmmm...the lights weren't even cool... ;^)

JULIUS: 17 minutes. This was a _very_ healthy Julius. Page had some
nice B-3 work throughout the song, in at least 2 different occasions.
About 15 minutes into the jam, everyone dropped out but Trey and he just
kept chording on the downbeats, while Fishman started screaming "yeah!"
with him. This jam had gone Makisupa-style a few minutes earlier, and I
was almost certain they were going to do it (even though they just did it
in Philly). This also had a nice segue into...

SLAVE: This was the highlight of Set II. This Slave was great. There
was a heavy metal jam starting at about 11 minutes in and lasting a good
5-6 minutes. Right at the end Trey again (for the fourth time??) used his
DDL to layer guitar effects, and the jam got a little spacy. But when
this jam was up, it was rocking. The spacey jam disolved into...

LIZARDS: Fun song, especially for the glitter laden twirler girls next to
us that decided that now would be a good time to flip their hair in my
face...actually, I was suprised and impressed that nobody screwed this
song up. Of course, they play it enough...

LOVING CUP: Yes. Now this song I'll take any day. Hard rocking and most
of the crowd gets into it. Trey was loving it up on stage, crouched over
his guitar and playing like a madman. I love this tune.

CHALKDUST: I was actually really impressed by this song this time around.
I had sarted to grow a little tired of it, but it had the energy of a '93
machine gun Trey, with the musical prowess of 1997. (aka Phish 2000 - for
Sauldude)

ENCORE: AXIS: Bold As Love: My first live, and I actually mistook it for
Amoreena from the 8/13/97 Pittsburg show...I don't know why. Oh, I forgot
to mention Page's beard...it's huge! I know know if anyone else has
mentioned it but he looks like a hippy now! Axis is a good tune. That's
about all I can say for it. It sort of seemed like they wanted us out of
there. Security was not very cool about letting us take our time getting
out...

Oh, one thing that was hysterical was when they were inbetween Set II and
the Encore, the guy infront of me said "Did you hear? Cleveland gets a
special treat of a really spectacular ending!" In case you didn't see,
Phish ran a series of "Phish destroys America" ads and for each city they
put a the bottom something like "A New show with a Spectacular ending in
[enter city] only!" Go Phish.

OVERALL:

I'm glad I went tonight, but I'm more glad that I am going to two more
shows this weekend. I would really have to give Set I a 4 on the Scott
Jordan Polls, I have heard much better from these guys. The Jim was
great, and I really liked Katy, but there was too much "whatever" music
like I said. Set II earns a good 6 from me. It was a decent set, and
solidly played. The Slave was just great, and will warrant (at least for
me) multiple listening when I get the tapes. The Julius is something
special, too, but nothing groundbreaking at this show. Hopefully,
tonight's show will be completely overshadowed by what's going to happen
in Detriot.

Take care, and I'll see you tomorrow!

- Mark

This show is a kind of testament to how good this show is. Mainly because you might call it a "lower tier night" for this tour. Now you hear that and say to yourself "this show must be terrible" quite on the contrary it is a great show! However not among the other heavy hitters from this tour.

Ghost starts off the show with a nice little mellow stretch with some great Trey hose. Wilson is a top notch version that is explosive and everything you would want in the song. Jim has a nice little stretch to it with some nice ambient work by Page. The rest of the set is fairly straight forward.

Stash in thunderous, it doesn't go the places that some of it's '97 brothers do but still pretty solid. Julius has a nice little stretch to it but the jam is basically directionless and straightforward. The star of the show IMO is slave. It is a transcendent masterpiece. It sucks you in with Fish's thunderous drums, Mike's rumbling bass, and Trey's noodly wankery. Just like the first set the rest of this set is fairly straightforward.

Good encore song, maybe a prelude to the famous Tweezabella the next night? Go Jimi!

Its funny because This venue is in a super bad run down neighborhood. I remember before the show there was this manhole cover that was loose and you fall into it. This chick was standing next to it yelling Danger zone! the whole time. This is burned into my memory every time I think of this Cleveland show.

Best Ghost I've ever heard! First set is NASTY!!!!!!!!

Greatest Slave ever. I'd say other than PH my favorite band is Sonic Youth, so listening to this Slave is as good as it gets for me.

alright, so this is not the greatest show of the tour, but on the flip side, if this show were played in the winter of '99, people would be singing its praises. the first set is pretty solid. ghost jams out a little bit. all in all though, this is just a nice sharp rocking set.

stash does not go too far back, and batr room makes one think that this set is heading into loser'ville. julius all but confirms it...but wait! the julius just takes off into a hellaciouos jam. this quickly leaves the julius theme and trey drives it into the stratosphere. without a doubt, easily the best julius ever. if finally dips into a lovely slave. the rest of this show is missable, but do not count out that julius. its not my favorite tune, but this version really blazes.

What I remember about this show, it was my 5th ph show and we were running late. We got inside during Ghost: good thing it was a long one and a kick ass one at that. Wilson rocked. 1st st was killer b/c of rare tunes b.e. katy and gingseng. Stash opener 2nd set was great. Stash should be an opener 1st or 2nd more often. cleveland rocked this night but 2nd set detroit and all of dayton sunday night was some of the best phish ever. Still seeing ph to this day but these wknd shows will rank as the best ever. 1997 rules

I like the show mainly cause me and buddy drove through an unreal snowstorm coming over from buffalo.

Set One Notes:
Ghost gets the funk flowing right off the bat. Sirens get fired up, the band crawling into the groove. Mike is dropping liquid bass hits, Fish getting assertive with the beats, Page hovering the synths over the crowd. The jam develops into fantastic, sparse, danceable groove. Trey starts getting assertive with his guitar work as Page fires up the baby grand. Fish starts playing with the groove, which eventually stretches and rises, getting airy, a great start to the show, a return to the opener jam piece trend. Wilson is straightforward, keeping the energy high. Funky Bitch completes the 1-2 punch after Wilson, keeping the Friday night crowd moving. Fish is prominent, Trey’s solo has some sauce on it. BEK hits, and it feels like it’s been a minute, though they just played it in Woostah. This version is competing to be my favorite alongside Winston-Salem, as it gets into this patient, wide, bottom of the canyon, towering yet subdued groove, pushing towards a soaring peak, thunderous rhythm pouring over the waterfall, with a clean return to the Katy coda. Sparkle gets fired up. What a creepy, kinda messed up song, truly horrendous descriptions, the manic-upbeat-grass musical pairing feels like dark sarcasm, “It’s just a joke, relax…” The reappearance of Jim after totally running away, never to come back in Woostah is welcome. This is a truly uplifting version, high elevation clarity and transcendence. The jam soon transforms into a ray of light parting the clouds, total Zen space, before Trey begins to lay bluesy licks on top of it. The jam becomes very Hydrogen-like, then Taste-intro-like, before rolling over the top into a molten peak, into MFMF. MFMF keeps the late-set energy up after that soaring Jim, with the craziness of its ending always welcome. Ginseng Sullivan remains my favorite “bluegrass” tune, but at this point, the bluegrass spot could use a little more diversity. LxL is a high reaching, triumphant peaking version, before Zero hits, a Hendrixian evocation, ground-pounding Mike near the peak, closing the set on a strong note.

Set Two Notes:
Stash gives a subdued start to Set 2, always holding promise. The jam gets of to an extremely quiet start, soon building and getting knotted, bursting open, before getting tangled again, it hits another peak, returns to Stash-proper, a relatively contained version. Bouncing is an interesting call, maybe some kinda weekend-crowd-vibe read or something. Julius appears to be another straightforward call, working its way into a solid rocking Trey solo jam as it usually does. Soon, though, they take it down-low, and I think, “Are they gonna jam Julius?” It sure sounds like that’s the case. It jumps back into the Julius jam, Page extending things with his organ solo, Rockstar Guitarman pulling it back into Julius, Fish yelling out in approval at the arrival of a thematic build-up into a shredding peak. The jam settles back down into a jazzy Julius vocal refrain. The groove gets jazzy-funky, low-slung, Fish 2K in full rhythm-machine mode down in this pit. The organ sends waves washing over liquid bass, Fishman giving more approval, the jam moving to clav and guitar raindrops onto rippling seas of rhythm. This is certainly the best and most jammed version of Julius I am aware of. Slave is always great in its role as an “arrival” song, this one being of the classic patient, slow-build Fall ’97 vintage. I start to drift out into the realms of abstract thoughts in the music’s warm embrace. Suddenly, I realize that Slave has totally gone Type-II, wow, this is awesome. Soaring Hendrixian playing by Trey surfing waves of sound on low pounding foundations, a beautiful outro into The Lizards. Lizards is its warm, friendly, storytelling self, a great vibe here in the late second set, the first time it had been played that fall. Loving Cup is a nice way to end the rock-focused Friday night set two, a solid Trey-lead outro jam, really raging. So, when Chalkdust starts up, it’s a definite shock to be getting one more. This is a rocket ship version, twisting and soaring upward, bursting through the atmosphere. Fish 2K is on fire, the Trey Wail in full effect to end the set. Bold as Love is a big cathartic ending as the hardest working band in rock and roll’s Friday night Cleveland Experience comes to an end.

I found this show, and especially its second set to be extremely engaging, well-within that upper 20% of Phish shows all of Fall ’97 sits in, even if it doesn’t quite hit the peaks of some of its cohort. Ghost, Jim, Julius, Slave, if you hear anything, hear those four. But listen to the whole show, as you listen to the whole tour. Best way to hear it.

Decent show. I remember the snowstorm. Drove from WVU

SET 1:

Ghost: Heavy synth, and a great loops to get this one started. Absolutely love that! Super cool and even keeled build for minutes on end and then they let it peak in the most subtle way at 12:30. It’s just so sick. The crowd responds in kind. More low key greatness at 12:46. Shift towards that crunchy summer 97 sound in the late 13’s – this is fairly brief though. Hard driving and rocking throughout the 14’s. Trey steps down at 15:30 and hands the keys over to Page and Fish. >

Wilson: Standard, but the place was already bursting at the seams ready to get rowdy on a Friday night and this did the trick. >

Funky Bitch: Pages solo is outstanding. Really good version all around, spirited for sure. >

Black-Eyed Katy: Red hot, Trey gives a good work out.

Sparkle: Great energy actually. Crowd is into it. >

Runaway Jim: Pretty solid jam here. Goes along as you might expect. The last couple of minutes have a sort of grungy, Hendrix feel to it. It was enjoyable in person those many years ago and still today. Decent segue into MFMF. ->

My Friend, My Friend: Standard.

Ginseng Sullivan: Standard.

Limb By Limb: Incredible guitar work from Trey. So beautiful. He is at the tippy top of his game here. >

Character Zero: Wank city.

SET 2:

Stash: Kind of an all over the place type of version. First peak is sort of harried and flaccid. There is a second peak that sort of sneaks in through the backdoor. A very understated version.

Bouncing Around the Room: Ouch. Terrible, terrible placement.

Julius: Bizarre placement. At this point I was definitely getting antsy at the show. But things were about to get really weird in the best way. In the late 7’s they start breaking away from the normal structure of Julius. Well sort of I guess. It’s still bluesy in nature and you can kind of still hear the theme so not really Type II. By the 9 minute mark though it does go Type II thanks to Trey, but this is only momentarily -very brief and then Trey brings it back around basically to what you would consider the hard rocking ending part of Julius. At the ten minute mark you can tell they are a ship without a rudder, not sure where to take this. Page is leaning hard on his organ. At 10:35 Trey comes back in heavily with that traditional Julius shredding. 12:30 Don’t take another step lyrics but basically whispered and then back into a quieter jam, Mike stomps his bell. Back into Type II and the funk. In the late 14’s they are taking this down low, getting quiet again. This is very interesting, sounds very cool. Page trying to funk it up, but the rest really aren’t going for it. By 16:40 you can tell Trey is angling for Slave. So, that Julius was interesting if nothing else. Definitely goes type II. Would recommend for the uniqueness of it and the willingness to take some risks. >

Slave to the Traffic Light: The two metal builds in the composed section are a little bit more evil, slow, and heavy than typical. Cool. I this point in my fandom I was head over heels with Slave from ALO. Had always loved when – in that version – that dude yells YEAH in the quiet section that happens right after the composed section ends. Thought I would try this at this show. We were way, way up in the rafters. But in the aud on the Relisten app at 4:01 you can hear my yell. It’s faint because it’s so far away from the tapers but it’s there. Getting goosebumps now listening and thinking about this moment and my buddy that was next to me that night that I still am close with all these years later. Good stuff. As a result of this yell, I lost my voice - quite literally - basically couldn't talk on Saturday and Sunday - attended both of those too. At 7:50 you can tell Trey has something up his sleeve. He takes it into a little heavier, edgier territory than what you would expect from a typical Slave, but it’s still within the confines of the normal jam. Crazy awesome trilling at 10:15. Ten seconds after that though is when this goes Type II. Heavy metal raging! By the 15 minute mark, things are just super weird and extremely intense. White knuckle stuff if you were in the right headspace like we were. Wowzers. An easy all timer and the most unique version every played. The segue into Lizards is out of nowhere. >

The Lizards: Perhaps not the most cohesive version you will ever hear but it’s good enough.

Loving Cup: Has some extra mustard. >

Chalk Dust Torture: Pretty normal version.

ENCORE:

Bold As Love: Awesome. Love this tune so much in this slot.

Summary: Really weird show and on the lower part of the fall 97 totem pole. Attended and had a lot of fun but even in the moment we knew it was up to snuff versus most of what had come before it on this tour. There are two very unique jams in this show and some nice bookends, but it doesn’t have that wow factor and the setlist construction is out there. That’s ok. We were about to get a bomb dropped on us the following night. I would rate this as a 4/5. Current rating on .net is 4.17/5 (182 ratings).

Replay Value: Ghost, Runaway Jim, Limb By Limb, Julius, Slave to the Traffic Light