[Many thanks to Ryan Harrell for recapping Camden2 for the site. -Ed.]

The BB&T Pavilion in Camden, New Jersey, is storied not for its architecture or aesthetic, but rather for the high quality of shows Phish has brought to its stage over the years. This was my first run at this venue, and what struck me the most was the great sound quality one could find at almost any place on its large lawn. In particular, the drums and bass guitar sounded noticeably crisp and tight. I wondered if the individual band members have any venue-specific knowledge about how their instruments carry out to the crowd. While I have no idea if they have such knowledge, given the strong, confident performances by Mike and Fish last night, it wouldn't surprise me if they did.

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[Thanks very much to Dianna Hank for writing the recap of last night's show. -Ed.]

East Coast tour continued last night with yet another hot and humid show at Camden’s BB&T Pavilion. Phish opened with this year’s debut of “Crowd Control,” perhaps acknowledging all the "fools" staying on the hill who were about to get poured on by the incoming storm. Next up, synth-funk Page stepped up to bat to lead the band in a concise--albeit solid--“No Men In No Man's Land” groove, with Mike playing a heavy supporting role. In fact, this entire show saw Trey taking a bit of a back seat to this fiery Page/Mike combo, and some really incredible things were able to happen because of that. So thank you for that, Trey.

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[The following was submitted to the Phish.net Support Team from a User, "Sweet Caroline," who explicitly requested it be posted as a "rebuttal," presumably to the Alpharetta3 recap. -Ed.]

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Beyond the Pond is a bi-weekly podcast in which Brian Brinkman (@sufferingjuke) and David Goldstein (@daveg924) use the music of Phish as a gateway to introduce the listener to many other bands, the vast majority of which are not jambands. An episode generally begins with a deep dive into a designated portion of Phish improvisation, and then can spin off to any variety of musical themes and other acts, the overarching purpose being introducing the listener to as many new and different bands as possible.

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We’re 13 shows into an 18-show summer tour, and by this point in the arc of a campaign we would expect to see a band in firm command of its powers. It’s also Sunday, so we’d also expect to see Phish do what they so often do on Sundays: stretch out, bust out, and show out. Let’s plunge right in.

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Welcome to the 337th edition of Phish.Net's Mystery Jam Monday, the first and easiest of August. The winner will receive an MP3 two download codes courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. To win, be the first person to identify the song and date of the mystery clip. Each person gets one guess to start – if no one answers correctly in the first 24 hours, a hint will be posted. After the hint, everyone gets one more guess before Wednesday at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET. Good luck!

Reminder: For the first MJM of each month, only folks who have never won an MJM are allowed to answer before the hint. If you have never won an MJM, please answer as a blog comment below. If you have previously won an MJM, but you'd like to submit a guess beforethe hint, you may do so by PMing me; once the hint has been posted, everyone should answer on the blog. If that's confusing to you, check out the handy decision tree I threw together to help guide you. If you're not sure if you've won before, check in the MJM Results spreadsheet linked below.

Answer: Congrats to first-time winner @johnnyd, who was actually in attendance for this week's clip: the 7/12/96 "Jam" that precedes "NICU." As John points out in his comment (and as mentioned on the setlist), this jam came from audience members yelling out random chords, and the band jamming around the made-up progression. While that does sound unique and quite interesting, especially considering the show was played in Amsterdamn, 7/12/96 is known as one of the worst Phish shows of all time – people who think ripcords are bad in 3.0 should check out this second set. Per John's request, we'll float the prize to next week's MJM, meaning that the winner of MJM338 will take home THREE codes! See you Monday?

[Thanks to Brandy Davis, @smilercontrol, for recapping last night's show for the blog. -Ed.]

As I am sure you have heard by now, Phish started the east coast leg of the 2018 Summer Tour hot in Hotlanta on Friday night, leaving fans greatly satisfied, but also wondering what kind of Saturday night throw-down could top it. Before the show last night (the second of three shows at the Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre At Encore Park in Alpharetta, Georgia), fans basked in the afterglow of greatness, and Shakedown and the lot surrounding the venue were full of suspense and a definitive party vibe. The tailgating game was strong in the afternoon, with fans new and old coming together to celebrate a successful start to a historically great weekend for the Phish from Vermont.

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[We'd like to thank Dianna Hank, @Dianna_2Ns, for recapping last night's show - ed.]

Last night at the hot and humid Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre at Encore Park in Alpharetta, GA, Phish threw down an absolute scorcher of a show -- one that most fans will probably agree (Imagine? Phish fans agreeing on something??) is the show of the summer thus far.

Being my first time seeing “Southern” Phish (excluding Miami & New Orleans, because those aren’t really the South I’m talking about), I was unsure of what to expect from the whole experience. I knew from prior tours that, more often than not, the band seems to bring a certain special something to their 3-night runs down in Georgia, which is why I wanted to cross this trip off my list in the first place.Arriving on lot was a bit of a cluster, with long lines of traffic being directed into lots by disinterested high school kids in neon shirts who clearly had already had it up to here with this Grade A wookery the band had brought to town -- and this was just the first night! After parking, we wandered over to Shakedown and I quickly remembered what Summer Phish felt like in the pre-Baker’s Dozen years. The smell of pesto grilled cheese and veggie burritos frying up on flat top griddles wafted by as competing stereos blasted The Brothers Johnson’s “Strawberry Letter 23” and the Talking Heads’ “Life During Wartime.” Friends from all over the country bumped into each other and stopped to hug, causing sweaty, dusty wook traffic jams. Folks ambled by with pin boards and koozies, slanging their wares in hopes to pay for those insanely overpriced beers inside the venue. I felt the feeling I forgot. This is what New York City Summer Phish was missing.

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There's no real denying that, during the 3.0 years, Phish has had a tumultuous relationship with the state of Texas. 2010 had the one-off ACL festival set which, while a good festival set, wasn't anything to write home about. Fast forward five years later and there were two summer shows in 2015, one in Austin and one in Grand Prairie. The first two set shows that Texas had seen since 1999. Expectations were understandably high. Austin was incredibly song-focused, and GP was good but definitely not great. Fall 2016 had two shows, again in Grand Prairie. The first was a fun, high energy show, but the second had, in this attendee's opinion, a travesty of a second set. The old adage for Phish shows -- "At least you had fun"-- still held true for these shows, though. And as a 12-year native of Austin, I attended all of them. And I did have fun for all of them (even during a second set "Friday"!) but to try to paraphrase Orwell, "All shows are fun, but some shows are more fun than others." Enjoying being in the moment and witnessing a band that is still playing well after 35 years of concerts is one thing, but there hadn't been anything truly transcendent in any of these shows. Which set the stage for 2018.

Would the band play another "Texas show," or would the magic --that we all know can occur-- happen?

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Welcome to the 336th edition of Phish.Net's Mystery Jam Monday, the most difficult of July. The winner will receive an MP3 download code courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. To win, be the first person to identify the songs and dates of the four mystery clips, which are connected by a theme that needn't be part of the correct answer (but will certainly help!). Each person gets one guess to start – if no one answers correctly in the first 24 hours, a hint will be posted. After the hint, everyone gets one more guess before Wednesday at 10 AM PT / 1 PM ET. Good luck!

Hint:

Photo by Mark Sarfati

Answer: Pencils down! For only the 23rd time in history, the Blog is victorious! This week, folks figured out that the hint was a picture of Bill Graham, alluding to Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, where Phish recently completed a two night run. But what folks didn't realize is that BGCA wasn't the site of the four clips, but rather, the four songs in the clips spelled out "BGCA": 11/19/96 "Bathtub Gin," 11/28/03 "Ghost," 7/29/15 "Chalk Dust Torture," and 7/7/99 "Also Sprach Zarathustra." Stay tuned for MJM337 on Monday, where we'll give away two codes.

[we'd like to thank Willie Orbison, @twelvethousandmotherfker, for writing this recap for the blog - ed.]

When you think about the fact that this Soul Planet of ours has been around for about four and a half billion years, it’s nothing short of a gosh darn miracle that we’re living in the time of Phish. This wasn’t – and won’t always be – the case. So, perhaps it’s important to remember on nights like this, while we sift and scrutinize, that Phish shows aren’t inevitable. They don’t just happen. They are precious and rare events that deserve to be celebrated for the simple fact that they occur. We could have been living in the time of the ancient Egyptians. Or in the Dark Ages. Or in some future hellscape where the only music is made by computers.

Instead, we’re here. Now. And Phish is on tour. And that is a wonderful thing.

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Phish posted up today for a pair of shows that conclude tomorrow, in the shadow of the construction of a $4 trillion NFL stadium, for a team that three people in L.A. will ever really care about. Surprisingly, it’s the first multiple show run ever for Los Angeles, a city that has exchanged a lot of love with the band over the years, and tonight’s crowd greets the band with waves of encouragement as it slices into a nifty little “Chalk Dust Torture,” the second of the tour.

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IT’s not every day Phish offers a free webcast of a show to their fans. Their motives are unknown, but it’s possible they decided to thank their fans for their outpouring of love and support for the minority victims of violence at the Gorge over the weekend. It’s rare to see violence at Phish shows, at least in my experience of them (which admittedly only goes back THIRTY YEARS). And it’s unfortunate that such an extreme, vicious, attack was committed not against the drunk frat-hat who’d just vomited on your girlfriend, but rather fans simply enjoying themselves and the music like the rest of us. We’re also a homogeneous fan base; it’s heartbreaking to see such grotesque, racist assaults, when I'm certain the vast majority of us welcome greater diversity at shows.

In any event, on to the recap of BGCA2. I'd planned to offer you separate Noob, Vet, and JadedVet takes, since when I’ve done so a few times before, many of you were offended, but I don’t have the stomach right now for pandering to various audiences. I cannot pretend that my experience of Phish’s music in 2018 is even vaguely akin to what it was in 1989 or 1995 or 1998 or 2004 or 2009. Whether you first started seeing Phish recently or decades ago, we’ll see eye-to-eye on some things and not others about last night’s music, and your mileage should, and likely does or will, vary.

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Beyond the Pond is a bi-weekly podcast in which Brian Brinkman (@sufferingjuke) and David Goldstein (@daveg924) use the music of Phish as a gateway to introduce the listener to many other bands, the vast majority of which are not jambands. An episode generally begins with a deep dive into a designated portion of Phish improvisation, and then can spin off to any variety of musical themes and other acts, the overarching purpose being introducing the listener to as many new and different bands as possible.

Read more...

That’s not fog rolling through the San Francisco Bay, casual observer, that’s the aftermath of the inferno that swept through Bill Graham Civic Auditorium on Tuesday night. An easy mistake to make, as, perhaps, only 8,000 of us or so can tell the difference, for those of us in attendance last night might still be considered fire hazards, especially those four onstage. Don’t let the fire marshal get you.

Phish walks on stage, Trey, particularly, is all smiles. For those of us that have been around live Phish for a minute or two, Trey wears his emotions proudly and with intent when he takes the stage. His ear-to-ear smile is indicative of the set to follow, and he wastes, literally, no time as he picks up his guitar and starts riffing “46 Days” before his three bandmates settle into their battle stations. Bombs Away Trey! Fiery guitar outbursts of the Round Room tinderbox quickly relent into warped murk. Heavy, thick guitar tones slush through the jam and until the guitarist resets his tones into a final "46 Days" proper explosion. The song ends and Trey and Fish exchange laughs and smiles during a brief respite before “McGrupp and the Watchful Hosemasters.” Something must have clicked right there, as before “McGrupp” starts, Fish exclaims through his microphone, “Can we play that one again?!” Well, why not three times? I’ll try anything twice, especially that opener. Math was never my strong suit.

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