Six Weeks to 60: Episode VI

#60: 10/15/10 North Charleston Coliseum, North Charleston, SC

Looking at Friday night’s Charleston show on paper, it’s difficult to ascertain why it isn’t an Instant Classic (and who knows, maybe it will be the next 2.28.03). How can a show with such consistent heavy hitters as “Bathtub Gin”, “Stash”, “Run Like an Antelope”, “Down with Disease”, “Mike’s Groove” and “Slave to the Traffic Light” not be high in the running for Best Ever status?

Don’t get me wrong—tonight was good, and at times, great. The first set’s “Gin” (which might be the strongest Phish 3.0 version I’ve seen) and “Antelope” both exuded remarkable energy and execution; the first four songs of the second set: “Disease > Prince Caspian > Twist” and “Roses are Free” combined for an extremely strong opening to the second frame. All were well played and extremely well received by a boisterous South Carolina crowd.

The knock on last night’s show—and the knock against a number of 3.0 songs and shows—was the lack of jamming and the seeming reluctance to open the floodgates of Phish’s improvisational potential. Instead of the “Let’s see how many songs we can play” mentality, I’d like to see the band members re-hone their group interplay skills, transforming the mantra to “Let’s see how many songs we can play well.” Why bother playing “Tube” if it’s going to be truncated to three-and-a-half minutes? And yes, “Weekapaug Groove” should bookend “Mike’s Song”, but a five-minute “Weekapaug” so they can squeeze in played-out jokes like “Mexican Cousin”? I don’t get it.

Short can be OK, though, as evidenced by the mid-first set “Backwards Down the Number Line”. Reeling the song in from some of the second-set workouts it received last summer, this “Number Line” was smooth and sturdy from start to finish, clocking in near eight minutes and showcasing tight, focused playing. It was perfect.

At multiple points throughout the second set, however, it was clear that Trey’s patience seems to have dissipated from tenuous to non-existent. I understand and wholeheartedly applaud his enthusiasm—it’s great to see him hopping around and grinning wildly—but when he starts a song before the previous song has even finished, it feels forced and the dissonance grates. This eagerness showed most glaringly when he launched into the “Character Zero” encore before Mike had even strapped his bass on. What’s the rush?

I know I’m complaining a lot here (and I do have some legitimate gripes), but overall Friday’s show was better than many; while the highlights were indeed high, the lowlights weren’t really that bad—I’d still rather witness Phish run through a castrated “Tube” than hear most other bands play just about anything. I’ll take the safe, easy peaks of “Possum”, “Suzy Greenberg” and “Slave” over the best Nickelback show any day of the week. Phish still moves me, and when the band stops moving me, it’s when I’ll retire from seeing shows (which isn't happening anytime soon).

Not to belabor the point, but I feel that the beginning of the second set serves as excellent evidence of what happens when Phish—Trey, really—eases off the throttle. A healthy “Disease” ended with a beautiful, harmonious wash of ambience before leading into “Caspian”. At the point in “Caspian” where the song dips into quiet before the coda kicks in, Trey led the band smoothly into “Twist”, which featured marvelous groupthink interaction.

And so my 60th show is in the books. While it was definitely worth the trip, I’m hoping for a little more patience—and a “Harpua”—tomorrow night. Too much to ask?


Setlist:

I: Punch You in the Eye, Possum, Bathtub Gin, Bill Bailey Won’t You Please Come Home, Boogie On Reggae Woman, Destiny Unbound, Backwards Down the Number Line, Bouncing Around the Room, Stash, Joy, Buffalo Bill, Dog Faced Boy, Run Like an Antelope

II: Down with Disease > Prince Caspian > Twist, Roses are Free, My Friend My Friend, My Problem Right There, Tube, Mike’s Song > The Horse > Silent in the Morning, Mexican Cousin, Weekapaug Groove, Suzy Greenberg, Slave to the Traffic Light

E: Character Zero

Six Weeks to #60: By the Numbers

As my 60th Phish show approaches in Charleston tonight, I decided to conclude my six-week odyssey of reviewing the five “milestones” in my show-going career by listing 60 pertinent Phish facts. Unfortunately, I only came up with 34 (well, 39, if you count the ones on which I doubled up).

Most of these statistics are only worthwhile to me (and perhaps a handful of others whose fanaticism often rivals my own), but I hope you enjoy the fruits of my labors.

60: After tonight, the total number of times I’ve seen my favorite band, Phish.

57: Longest gap (in shows) for any Phish song from the first time I saw the band play it until now; the last time I saw Phish play “Crossroads” and “Dogs Stole Things” was 8.9.97 (show #2)

54: Length (in minutes) of the “Ambient Jam” that Phish played the first night of 1998's Lemonwheel (show #8), still one of my most memorable Phish experiences.

53: Number of Phish debuts I’ve seen. Ween's “Roses are Free” (12.11.97, show #4) and Prince's “1999” (12.31.98, show #14) are among my favorites.

52: Number of times I saw moe. (of my 71 moe. shows) while Phish was either on hiatus (22 shows from 2000 to ’02) or “broken up” (30 shows from ’04 to ’09)

50: Percentage of times I’ve seen Phish play Led Zeppelin’s “Misty Mountain Hop,” two of the four times its been played (7.20.99, show #17; and 10.10.99, show #25)

45: Number of shows between seeing The Beatles’ “A Day in the Life” (8.10.96, show #1, and 3.7.09, show #45)

42: Number of shows I’ve seen in the Eastern time zone (the most in any time zone by far)

38: Number of songs I’ve seen the only time they were played (including two Halloween shows). Favorites? Bob Marley’s “Trenchtown Rock” (8.11.98, show #6) and The Police's "So Lonely" (11.14.98, show #12)

37: Number of shows I attended before Phish’s 2000 hiatus

35: Length (in minutes) of the longest Phish song I’ve witnessed, a loose, rambling “Runaway Jim” (8.11.98, show #6)

34: Stretch (in months) between 9.15.00 (my last pre-hiatus show, #37) and 7.29.03 (my first post-hiatus show, #38)

33: Number of hours (approximate) it took to drive from Camden, New Jersey to Coventry, Vermont for Phish’s “farewell” festival in 2004. We even skipped out on Camden’s “Frankenstein” encore but still missed the first two sets on 8.14.04!

32: Most shows I’ve seen with my longtime tour buddy Rick (the most of any one person)

AND

Number of shows before I saw “The Lizards” (the Phish song I “chased” the most) on 7.14.00 (show #31)

30: My 30th show was 7.11.00, the infamous “Moby Dick” show at Deer Creek

25: Number of cities in which I’ve seen Phish
22: Number of shows I’ve seen since Phish's 2000-2002 hiatus

21: Average number of songs played per show (20.6) in the 59 I’ve attended

19: Percentage of shows (11 of 59) I’ve attended that have opened with either “Punch You in the Eye” or “Chalkdust Torture”

18: Times I’ve seen “Character Zero”, “Down with Disease”, “Ghost” and “Piper” (the four songs I’ve seen the most)

17: My age when I attended my first Phish show (8.10.96)

15: My age when my high school friend Matt gave me my first Phish tape (10.19.91)

AND

Number of shows (not counting the coming weekend) I’ve seen since the band’s 2009 reunion.

14: Number of shows I’ve seen in New York (the most of any state)

12: The most Phish shows I’ve seen in a calendar year (1999)

11: Times I’ve seen “Tweezer Reprise” as an encore (no complaints!)

10: Three-set shows I’ve attended

8: The first show I owned on CD-R, my eighth (8.15.98 Lemonwheel)

7: Times I’ve seen “Down with Disease” open a second set

AND

Number of Trey solo shows I attended while Phish was either on hiatus or broken up

6: Number of shows I’ve seen at Alpine Valley and Deer Creek (six each)

5: Number of venues where I’ve seen every Phish show (Empire Polo Club, Newport State Airport, Oswego County Airport, BlueCross Arena, Vernon Downs)

AND

Number of songs in my favorite set (12.30.98 Set II, show #13)

4: My favorite show (still) is my fourth (12.11.97)

AND

Number of Phish festivals I’ve attended (Lemonwheel, Oswego, Coventry, 8)

3: Number of t-shirts I bought at my first show (8.10.96): official tour shirt, bootleg tour shirt, Cat in the Hat shirt

2: Number of times I’ve slept in my own bed after a show (11.13.98, show #11; and 7.1.10, show #55)

1: Show I had a ticket for and didn’t attend (10.19.96); at the last minute my mom decided that at 17 years old I shouldn’t be spending the night in Buffalo.

I was aided greatly during my quest by those who witnessed most of the moments above by my side (in no particular order): Rick Mattison, Ben Althof, Matt Miehl, Jeff Miller, Alex Rose, Liam Gooley, Dave Simon and Bernard Levin.

Also, huge thanks to David “ZZYZX” Steinberg’s Phish Stats site.

Six Weeks to #60: Episode V

As my 60th Phish show approaches in Charleston next Friday, 10/15/10, I've decided to take a look back at the five other “milestone” shows I’ve seen over the last 14 years. Some were stellar, others were lacking, but they’re all a part of my history with the band.

Every Friday for the past five weeks, I’ve posted an essay/review of shows #10, 20, 30, 40 and 50. This is the penultimate entry, from Summer 2009.

#50: 6/21/09 Alpine Valley Music Theatre, East Troy, WI

When Phish announced the 2009 summer tour, choosing which shows I’d attend was a no-brainer—with 47 shows under my belt at that point, I couldn’t resist returning to two of my favorite venues: Deer Creek for #48 and Alpine Valley for #49 and #50. Considering the fact that I saw shows #1 and #2 (as well as #20 and #28) at Alpine, a sentimentality washed over me as I submitted my ticket requests.


12 years earlier, my cousins Peter and Sarah accompanied me to Alpine for my second show. I’d been listening to Phish non-stop for nearly three years at that point, and thought I knew everything there was to know about the band. On that August night in 1997, I realized how little I actually knew (“The Landlady” in the middle of “Punch You in the Eye”? No way!), but it only whet my appetite for more Phish.

47 shows later, I met Peter and three of his buddies from the University of Wisconsin in Lake Geneva for the two-night weekend stand. Saturday night featured a stellar “Maze” (good enough for inclusion as one of six tracks on the band’s Summer 2009 Sampler), and a “Makisupa Policeman” which saw Trey explicitly reference his 2006 arrest for the first time on stage (“Woke up this morning / Pissing in Jah cup / Woke up in the afternoon / Called my probation officer”).

Phish opened Sunday’s Father Day show (the last on the first leg of the tour) with the appropriate one-two familial combination of “Brother” and “Wolfman’s Brother”; the first “Brother” since 2003 featured all seven of the band member’s children frolicking in a huge metal tub at the front of the stage.



After “Wolfman’s”, Trey acknowledged a fan who’d been holding a sign all Friday night, and the first “Funky Bitch” of Phish 3.0 preceded a run of songs that fit the 3.0 mold—concise, not-so-jammy material like “Joy”, “Taste” and “Back on the Train”. My second “The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday > Avenu Malkenu > The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday” suite (the first was also at Alpine in 1999) was just as messy as the first.

The sweeping (and much-maligned) “Time Turns Elastic” finished the first frame, and while there’s a vocal group of fans who absolutely loathe Trey’s multi-segmented epic, citing its many movements as a momentum killer, I’m kinda partial to it and think it functions best as a first-set closer. Trey seems to have heard the criticism—Phish played “Elastic” at 25% of its shows in 2009 (12 of 47), the song has only appeared at 3% of 2010 shows (3 of 29). If it survives this fall, I’d like to see Phish tinker with its placement, perhaps as the middle of a “Mike’s Song > Time Turns Elastic > Weekapaug Groove” sandwich.

Although the first set started with a full head of steam, it lost focus relatively early and simply couldn’t regain it. The second set was a different animal completely, showcasing both originals and covers played with high energy in near-perfect placement. I’m not the only one who holds this opinion, though—when I interviewed Page for a Festival 8 preview two months after Alpine, he referenced this set specifically as a highlight of the tour.

While researching this essay, I was surprised to learn that Phish has covered the Talking Heads’ “Crosseyed & Painless” only 14 times since its Halloween 1996 debut. This “Crosseyed” spiraled around Trey’s fiery leads (which Page matched skillfully on the piano) before downshifting into a lush collage of sounds. These synth-heavy feedback symphonies became the norm for ending big jams in 2009, but the focus in 2010 has been an impatient Trey leaping into another song before the current song has wound its way down (often leaving his bandmates playing something contrary). I'd be more than content to see Phish return to the '09 endings as I've always loved the band's cool, ethereal work.

The end of the “Crosseyed” jam blended beautifully into the slippery, aquatic intro to “Down with Disease” (one of Phish’s heaviest hitters, played at 25% of shows since the comeback—only “Possum” has made more appearances). As “Disease” peaked around the 7:00 mark, Page hopped from the piano to clavinet to organ, escorting his bandmates into a beautiful few minutes of music as this jam also veered into a lush, mellow section before gliding into “Bug”.

Say what you will about Phish’s ballads (I love ‘em), but when they’re artfully placed in a set—as was the case here—they function just as well as “Harry Hood” or “David Bowie”. As much as fans may claim they clamor for them, neither band nor audience could withstand a full set of barnstorming epics.

After “Bug”, a feisty “Piper” contained Phish’s fallback two-chord chop-jam (it’s all over Summer 2009 and goes as far back as Summer 2004) that gives Mike plenty of room to showcase his chops; he didn’t disappoint here, switching on a flanger effect as Fish toyed with every different type of drum fill in his arsenal. A discordant jam reminiscent of more than one “Tweezer” from the mid-90s followed and segued into another poignant ballad, “Wading in the Velvet Sea”.

(I’ll admit that I wept along with Page during the “Velvet” at Coventry. This song has held a special place in my heart since its inclusion on The Story of the Ghost, and was pleased to hear another of my favorite of Phish’s slower numbers.)

The opening notes of Stevie Wonder’s “Boogie on Reggae Woman” drew enthusiastic applause although it didn’t stray very far from its traditional structure. “Slave to the Traffic Light” ended the set in ho-hum fashion—while I’ll never tire of hearing the song, it lacks the punch it once had. This was a good “Slave” (certainly better than no “Slave at all!), but the song’s true return to form wouldn’t come until the end of the tour’s second leg in Hartford a month later.

Even though the set clocked in at 75 minutes, for some reason I expected (hoped?) it would have been longer—I held out hope for a “Mike’s Groove” after “Slave”, but it was not to be. Instead, the band stepped toward the edge of the stage and delivered the jokey acapella “Grind”, then upped the comedy ante with a well-worn cover of Edgar Winter’s “Frankenstein”. Since Phish’s return to touring in March 2009, when “Frankenstein” rears its head Page dons an old-school Keytar, reportedly purchased from James Brown (no doubt on his least funky night). Tonight, Mike strapped on a flame-covered bass and Trey an over-the-top ridiculous five-necked guitar.



“Frankenstein” wasn’t the tightest it’s ever been, but the humor value was there, and we laughed all the way back to the car. Show #50 was in the books, and while it was uneven in spots, I was thankful that I took the opportunity to return to familiar ground (with familiar faces) for an ultimately memorable event. I was glad I made the trip (as I always am).


Setlist:

I: Brother, Wolfman's Brother, Funky Bitch, The Divided Sky, Joy, Back On The Train, Taste, Poor Heart, The Horse > Silent in the Morning, The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday > Avenu Malkenu > The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday, Time Turns Elastic

II: Crosseyed and Painless > Down with Disease > Bug, Piper > Wading in the Velvet Sea, Boogie On Reggae Woman, Slave to the Traffic Light

E: Grind, Frankenstein


Next time: 60 shows by the numbers