Phish is like skiing. You pray for powder. Constantly. Obsessively. Visions of the fluffy white stuff blowing everywhere as you effortlessly bounce between turns. Some seasons the powder is deep. Other seasons it is a bit dry. Sometimes, after a few weeks of no new snow, you wonder if it...
Very well should be in consideration, and at least in the dialogue, for best shows of 3.0
From the very beginning they were out in full force. Chalk Dust and Everything's Right raged. Tight Rift. Wolfman's was ridiculous! Type 2 already with a crazy atypical jam. Then Mike goes out and...
In lieu of an actual review (this is basically a 1992-1993 show, from the killer segues to the fun instrument-switching antics to Trey ripping up every solo to - lest we forget - not exactly the longest jams in the band's live catalog, so if 92-93 isn't your bag, I'd direct your attention back to...
This show was not good, I'm not going to lie. Anyhow...
FIRST SET:
Moma Dance opened, a Paul and Silas bustout, a flubtastic Stash and an above average Antelope to close the set.
SECOND SET:
Axilla opened the second set, before a noodly and frankly aimless Fuego was abandoned for Back on...
This may be one of the most underrated shows of Phish 2.0. It was incidentally also my first show of 2.0. The first set is quite solid, starting out with a topical pairing of My Sweet One (Valentine's Day) and Cover of the Rolling Stone (legend has it that the morning of this show they heard...
Redemption Songs!
After a less than stellar outing at the Forum in 2016, the boys from Vermont came out swinging on this magical night. No 20-minute jams, but when the songs are jammed this masterfully, who really cares about the time?
First set Chalkdust opener brought the heat early,...
If you look at the history of shows in LA they tend to be more straight ahead rock shows and less jam improve. That's what they did again. If you're able to recognize that, and stop searching for whatever you want them to do, it ends up being a really energized kind of show.
Disclaimer: This is my first Phish review. I was not there. I wrote the review in real time while listening to the show this morning. I do not play instruments and do not write for a living and my grammar sucks. But man, this was fun.
Saturday nights show blasts off with a trick and treat...
Couch toured from the east coast, yes this was worth staying up past 3 am for - this show is an absolute behemoth. I said in another review that this band sounded ready to go off these past few nights and well for what its worth I think they just went off.
Instead of going song by song which...
Let me begin with a preface.
I became a fan in 1994 when I was 12. I very quickly dove way in and began trading bootlegs with people on the very young internet and obsessed over everything I could get my hands on. By the time I was 15, I had about 50 tapes or so and had listened to thousands...
One of those "Writing about music is like dancing about architecture" versions, but here goes: A strong composed section cools and, wonderfully, in lieu of working through pleasant, but familiar space, Trey seems to toy with "The Little Drummer Boy" (11:02), a line which leads through a passage(s) of concerted, cerebral, full-band play. The jam becomes stately, and "Coil"-esque in nature. But this is no outro. More great soloing follows as Trey works the music to a perfectly balanced peak.
Trey, Page, and Mike weave in, out, and around each other harmoniously throughout this entire breathtaking jam, while Fish holds down the fort and leads them to a glorious peak. > "BDTNL" for CK5's birthday.
After extended and very pleasant "Type I" jamming, Mike and Trey drive the play down into some murky and atonal depths. Then this diseased ship gloriously resurfaces to a magnificent conclusion.
While Trey isn't perfect in the opening composed section, the BMGS, WUDMTF, and tramps sections are good, but the jam is awe-inspiring, with distinct sections. It begins in traditional YEM jam segment fashion, smooth and funky, but with more swing than usual. And when Trey begins soloing using the envelope filter, it builds to a sweet-yet-modest peak before mellifluously mellowing into a groove, an interlude that coasts along wondrously for several minutes before COOKING! You can't not dance in the concluding few mins of the jam, which segues masterfully into a SIIIIICK Mike and Fish, Bass and Drums, section before the vocal jam begins, and the VJ is delightfully short and segues into Moma Dance. MORE YEMS LIKE THIS PLEASE. (And yes Mike repeatedly teases the "Things That Make You Go Hmm" bass line in the first section of the jam, but we don't note him teasing that in the setlists, since he began doing it regularly in YEM in summer 1998.)
Page moves to the Wurlitzer roughly 7 minutes in and this signals the band to mellow out. Effects dominate guitar and bass while Fishman contributes wood block hits leading to deeply introspective space. An airy shift to bliss key is accentuated by Mike's use of the Eventide H9000 rack harmonizer. -> "Simple."
-> in from "L.A. Woman". Showing up as the meat of a "Tweezerfest," the longest version of the song to date turns from a raucous "S.A.N.T.O.S." jam into what, if you close your eyes and imagine hard enough, The Doors might have sounded like if they'd given being a jamband a try in the late 1960s. This eventually leads to heavy "L.A. Woman" teases. -> into "What's the Use?".
It's not every day that Tweezer features a full-blown jam on another song, so this version gets charted simply for its uniqueness, segueing into "L.A. Woman" only about eight measures after the start of the jam segment (don't miss the tease of "Walk This Way" at the end of the composed opening section too).
This version (which completes formation of this set's Tweezer "sandwich") begins the way any other version would though launches quickly into a jam that grooves along for a few minutes, jazziliciously yet with some melodic loops, before dissolving into a mellifluous haze, a serene code from which Birds erupts.
Lyrics begin -> from "Tweezer" and the performance initially retains some of that jam's character with the song proper more fully emerging later. After a "Tweezer" tease, the jamming opens up again and ultimately segues to -> "S.A.N.T.O.S.".
Flirts with major-key play early on, reverts back to minor with Trey employing an organ-like tone, and then breaks into some immensely upbeat jamming until the final chorus.
Breaks out with some brief funk and quickly evolves into a warmer groove with Page and Trey trading lead duties before guitar takes over as the jam gallops to a peak and dissolves into "Wingsuit".
One of the best versions in some time. > from "Suzy Greenberg," Trey, around the three-thirty mark, works a warm and melodic "Mountain Jam" tease, his play effortless and breezy - a perfect take given his tone. Page sounds grand on his concert G, and Fish's propulsive beat, offset with perfect fills, whips the version through powerhouse play, with Mike anchoring a jam which bends, but doesn't quite break. Trey drops those epic "Timber" licks and the song concludes properly -> some sonic soul shaking vamping.