Phish 1/3/03

 

Before I get to the review, I wanted to apologize for the lack of posts. Without going into all the details, it’s been a rough month or so, including losing a longtime beloved pet just as I was starting to work on this review again. I know I don’t have to explain to anyone who has experienced these times in your life, that you simply can’t focus on endeavors like this, that don’t really matter and are read by like negative one people. Anyway.

 

[Prologue]

Without giving too much away ahead of time, I have to say that this show is the earliest example of the worst and best that 2.0 Phish has to offer. As the third in a series of four ‘reunion’ shows, you can deduce from the setlist and song lengths that the band were continuing to reignite their jamming skills. Hell, it’s a five song first set, and the encore is the only one this run of shows that is two songs instead of just one! But a setlist doesn’t tell the tale of the tape, and all is clearly not well in Phish…

 

[Set One]

Tweezer- OK, yeah, I’ll take a ‘Tweezer’ show opener! I mean, 11/17/97 has a five song first set that opens with ‘Tweezer’, I’m on board! There’s something a bit sluggish and slightly off about the composed section of this song. Trey does that weird riff-variance thing he does a lot during 2.0 where he kind of plays the main ‘Tweezer’ riff but he kind of plays a different riff at the same time. Anyway, jam starts off like a ‘99/’00 era version minus the Trey loops, with Mike taking commanding lead while Trey and Page comp in the background. Around 7:00 Trey starts some patient, restrained soloing. I don’t know about you, but I don’t always need my ‘Tweezer’ to be type II so I’m pretty happy with this one so far. Around 8:00 Trey lays down a loop but it gets a bit swallowed up in the rest of the sound going on. They start putting the pedal to the metal around 8:30, increasing the tempo from a crawl to….err, an amble. Big peaking jam feeling starting at 9:45, are we heading for a peak and cool-off? Heading out into type II? Trey and Page play responsive lines around each other for a minute or two, by 11:00 Trey has fully woken up and started cooking. Page stays on the organ to play chordal accompaniment as Trey hits an enjoyable but pretty standard peak and steps back with sustained notes. By 12:35 we’re cooling off, quieting down and possibly heading to an ending. Nope. Trey starts playing high register spacey guitar noodling and they feel stuck in place, unsure where to go next. Loops from Trey at 13:45ish but they’re quickly overwhelmed by Mike’s deep space bass sounds. Soon Trey starts a sluggish -> segue into the next song. All in all not a BAD ‘Tweezer’ but a very forgettable one. Another jam that feels like throwing things against the wall and waiting to strike gold that is never found.

Theme From The Bottom- Just as a jam being long doesn’t mean it’s good, a segue being a full -> doesn’t mean it’s a good -> segue. This one is both too drawn out and too clumsy. Not for the first and certainly not for the last time tonight it sounds like Trey is playing in the completely wrong key and his fingers are fumbling all over the place. To be fair, the jam portion is high energy and around 6:30 and forward Page is really saving the day with his playing. But I have to address this: there’s a big difference between ‘being rusty’ and just straight up fucking up, and this first set should be a key example of that difference. Look, I’m not here to judge anyone; I’ve had my own substance abuse issues and I don’t want to come off like I’m so much better than Trey. But I’m also not charging people money to listen to my band live. I’m glad he’s sober now and that we got the happy ending of the story, but it doesn’t excuse how embarrassing the flubs are during 2.0.

Foam- Oh boy…Was Fishman trolling Trey by starting this song? If you can’t hear that Trey is fucked up beyond control, you have no business calling yourself a fan of this band. I can excuse a mistake here or there but Jesus this first set is cringe inducing. As a hardcore fan I can and do try to look past these things to see the good parts of 2.0 but I would never play a show like this for my wife or around friends who are more casual fans. It’s no exaggeration to say it honestly sounds like the couple of times that I put on Phish or The Grateful Dead and tried to play along on guitar, just halting and off-time and hitting sour notes and so on. At least the rest of the band are on their game tonight, Page treats us to some lovely soloing like he always does. When it comes to Trey’s solo he seems eager to redeem himself, a thread that will run throughout this show and 2.0 as a whole. This ‘Foam’ nevertheless instilled a faint sadness and permeated the rest of the show the first time I listened to it, just like “oh, a song they used to play with effortlessness in ’94 is now a struggle to get through for the band and me”, such that when complicated songs came up later in the show I was bracing for impact. Oof the ending of this ‘Foam’ though…

Pebbles and Marbles- Sound of Trey tuning a string before this song. Despite this being a new song and its debut, so you’d assume it was practiced a lot recently, there’s still a roughness to Trey’s playing that cannot be put down to “well it’s been two years, they’re rusty.” No, Trey is just incapable of getting it together though I will say he does ok with the vocals. Maybe it’s just me but I can feel the rest of the band stepping up to help carry him through this song until he gets to the easier parts like the big rock jam breakdown at the end of the studio version. Sounds like we’re taking this one out for a spin. Around 7:45 still a standard jam on the song’s main theme. Page continues to carry the jam on his back by 8:30, trying to spur Trey on it feels like, who is starting to realize he can play guitar after all. At 9:15 Mike tries to introduce a bouncy bassline but Trey ignores it and starts doing his chorus pedal bliss jam peaking thing. Gotta say despite all the jams that look long and interesting on paper, this NYE run has been underwhelming. Like, a 15 minute ‘Pebbles and Marbles’ sounds amazing and intriguing in theory, but not when you realize it’s longer than the album version and is the same exact kind of jam yet I’d argue is less effective. My headcanon is that Trey keeps wanting to prove he isn’t fucked up on drugs so instead of doing dark/dissonant or spacey/ambient type II jams he wants to be like “look I can still do Machine Gun Trey and play fiery rock solos!” OK, great, good to know, but can we get something else? So far this first set is cringe inducing composed sections and ho-hum paint-by-numbers jams.

After the song ends on the official release I think it’s either the band or some audience members talking loud about it being “psychedelic” and “Xan’ing out on that drone” (as in Xanax I assume). A portent of things to immediately come. You can definitely hear someone saying Trey’s name.

You Enjoy Myself- This is like “school recital” levels of fucking up. Even though Trey stops the band and admits how ashamed he is, this is still one of the lowest of low points in all of Phish history. Look, at this point we all know he was in the depths of his addictions during 2.0, so his playing it off like “we” are “rusty after two years off” is a lie not even worth calling out. He continues to not play the best once they do restart the song and I’m remembering now why when I was listening to 2.0 in the past, I’d always skip past the composed sections of songs. I mean, the ambient section is cool I guess, but that’s the easiest part to play! Around 6:15 it’s particularly obvious Trey is lost and forgets what to play. Can we please get to the jam already? Mike and Page solo sections are decent enough. As Trey starts his solo Fishman introduces a funkier beat and Mike starts to drop bass bombs. At 12:25 though we’re back to a standard issue ‘You Enjoy Myself’ jam. At about 14:15 Trey starts a fun guitar line and the band picks up a bit. Twirl and release playing at 15:00 that is the most interesting thing he’s played all night. As with the running theme of 2.0, Trey really pushes himself to redeem the flubbed composed section with high octane soloing. I guess if you’re going to end a pretty wretched set like this one has been so far, this is the way to do it. I mean, sheesh, did somebody give Trey a bump at some point during the jam because he’s finally playing with drive and purpose! Around 18:13 I can hardly hear Mike or Page because Trey has overwhelmed the audio mix. Mike bass solo at 18:45 with this cool new gooey space bass effects. Someone starts the vocals back up before I think he was really done but eh, oh well. Vocal jam is the usual take-it-or-leave-it strangeness: a George Takei theme combined with a melody that vaguely sounds like ‘Tweezer’ or something, and an ending including groaning and moaning.

 

It's no hyperbole to say that this is the worst set I’ve ever heard Phish play. I’ve heard sets that were worse than this one in terms of being boring and forgettable, but they’re inoffensive. Despite being familiar with at least a dozen shows from the 2.0 era, I was shocked at how obviously fucked up Trey was during this set and how many mistakes there were. On paper this set looks like jam heaven but literally nothing about the improv in this set is noteworthy. Even for type I jams they aren’t notable or enjoyable. I understand this is all just my opinion but I’m concerned about anyone who can defend this set. Even with the 2.0 considerations, it doesn’t have any jams or playing that redeems the sloppy composed sections and off-feeling. It’s truly the worst of everything that 2.0 has to offer in one set, and I can only imagine how they felt backstage during set break.

 

[Setbreak]

I’ve been having the kind of weekend where you listen to seemingly random music as your mood changes. For some reason yesterday afternoon I was in a Lana mood and saw that my wife and I had never listened to Blue Bannisters on vinyl despite owning it for over a year. It was the right idea because I was reminded of how I admire this album’s musical consistency and blue/blues theme running throughout its lyrics. I can see some people not liking it as much as her other albums for this musical consistency though for me that’s part of the appeal. It’s kind of a long album and only had a couple songs I think really caught fire online, but trust me and give it a chance when you’re ready for its introspective, contemplative mood.

 

[Set Two]

Birds Of A Feather- Ok, Trey was still kind of off with his playing, but it’s nowhere near as egregious as the first set. Pretty decent but standard ‘Birds’ jam you’ve come to expect. You can just feel Trey willing this set to be better than the first by a Texas mile. Whatever he did during setbreak, it’s not my concern or place to judge, but it sure worked.

Wolfman’s Brother- If ever there’s a case of a band or a sports team coming back strong after half-time and salvaging the day, this show has to be it. I simply can’t in good conscience dismiss the first set just because they delivered a decent second set—because make no mistake, as strong and fun as this Wolfman’s turns out to be, this set would otherwise only enter the discussion in terms of best sets of the NYE reunion run. Everyone knows that the Winter tour is where 2.0 started to cook, but it’s fun revisiting this run to see the sparks starting to relight in the band. But I digress. The Wolfman’s jam has some fun sparse playing between all members around the 7:00 mark. Mike feels like he’s leading the jam, and throughout this set it feels like he’s also determined to step up and salvage the show after set one’s shit sandwich. Some “oooh, ooo” vocals around 7:45, I think from Trey and Page? It’s blink and you miss it. 9:00 has Trey using some raw, growly effects and a pitch shifter to make his guitar tone lower, which I feel is one of those hallmarks of this era and certain jam styles in general. 10:00 Page goes back to piano and the jam suddenly comes alive and sounds brighter, as if you opened the drapes and let the full sunshine in. Mike is still dropping bass goodness all over the place as Trey takes fire and treats us to a rocking, peaking Wolfman’s. I don’t know for sure if this is the first time a 10 minute plus Wolfman’s had this kind of bright rock jam and wasn’t a funky and/or spacey type II jam. I seem to recall really loving the first Wolfman’s they played at Hampton during the ’09 reunion NYE shows, and it following a similar funky to rocky jam journey. Am I crazy? Anyway. 13:00 is Trey remembering who he is, Lion King style. Locked in, hosing us all down with patient yet energetic Trey soloing his ass off. Almost before you realize it, though, he kills his guitar and starts doing funky rhythmic accents as Mike hits his kick ass cyber bass. Or is that Page on a synth? Maybe. Anyway, before you know it, a very abrupt and not at all -> full segue like some setlists say into…

Makisupa Policeman- Man was it good to hear them laughing again. I do wonder if anything Trey references was real. Again, knowing by this point he’s said in interviews he was already a full-blown addict, I unfortunately am the kind of person who is like “hmmm, was it a fatty joint, or…pills…?” Anyway, that’s shitty of me and let’s move on. This is a fun Makisupa! I love versions that take their time and get dubby with loops and stop/start dynamics, had me flashing back to some ’97 or ’00 versions I vaguely recall. As it should be, Mike is the force driving this Makisupa jam until Trey’s loops start to divide like cells and overwhelm the mix around 4:15 onward. Man this really sounds like a ’97 or ’00 version but I can’t remember which, maybe 11/19/97..which also followed a Wolfman’s (albeit a BEEFier version). Page gets NASTAY on the clav around 5:30, and this reminds me that while the other members were never slouches during 1.0, I really think 2.0 brought especially Page and Mike to the forefront. Sometimes to rescue Trey, mostly to add their own ideas and be more assertive more often. Things just kind of come to a stop and after a few seconds someone counts off…

Axilla I- I was a bit concerned about this one but I’m already sort of grading on a curve for the show at this point even after the mostly great preceding three songs, so let’s go! Actually Trey seems to have nailed the lyrics and I don’t think I noticed him screw up on guitar once. Not like this song is a super composed complex one but it requires a certain energy and focus, y’know? Sadly no Part II ending though they tease it. Overall, gotta give it to Trey. This was also really great song placement for the flow of the set, bit of a pick-me-up.

Twist- The opening of this, oof, not great but they pull it together before the lyrics. Speaking of, I wonder why they went back to the “substituting every sound” lyric from the pre-Farmhouse album version? Some lovely piano playing from Page at 3:35ish at the start of the jam. Really feels like he and Trey are locked in and Mike is right there with them. Twist has always been one of my favorite Phish songs, in terms of the song itself as well as how it can be used live. They can either keep a tight, blues-rocky jam like the Vegas ’00 version or have long type II odysseys or serve as a segue point/energy shifter between other songs in a set. This is another song in terms of this writing project I had heard very recently, during the 10/7/00 show. That version, while longer, also had a similar jam vibe and ended with a short spacey/ambient section before segueing into the next song. Hmmmm. Well, I don’t want to accuse a band of copying itself too much too close together so I’ll close this song by saying, I fucking LOVE the keyboard sound Page uses around 8:20. Well, I’ll also say, this is another part of a jam during the NYE run that I feel doesn’t quite get there but hints at the jam style that most people associate with 2.0 Phish.

Free- Why did it feel like Trey was laboring even more through this than he remotely was during Axila I? I’ve always had a so-so, mood-dependent opinion of this song. Not for nothing, but has there ever been a type II version? It’s like Undermind where it feels like such an obvious song for jam fodder but I don’t think they ever did, and they hardly even play Undermind (and when they do it doesn’t sound like the album version). So, yeah, it’s Free but played a little slower than usual and Trey sounds exhausted throughout it like he’s singing after running a mile in gym class.

All Of These Dreams- It’s not a perfect album but I really love Round Room and I was excited to see it towards the end of this set. Trey actually holds it together pretty well on vocals, too. Somebody—Page?!—accidentally starts to sing the chorus again around 2:14. Well I guess it’s not just Trey who can be off his game. Yeah? Yeah. Anywho, it’s a decent first version of this ballad, big pop from the crowd for Page’s piano solo! Browsing the LivePhish app it looks like this song became a bit of a rarity, that’s too bad!

Possum- I was never big into this song until it was part of the encore of my first show and everybody, even people who weren’t dancing before, seemed to suddenly be grooving and jamming to this song. As such, I now understand its power and what a fantastic choice to end the set. As so often happens with this song, it’s basically the same jam every single time, but like Antelope, Trey is able to just pop off and do his Jedi mind tricks. Since it’s just a bunch of wall of sound end rock song live vamp stuff, it was honestly kind of hard for me to tell but toward the end of this version of Possum, they do some instrument switching shenanigans. They seem to randomly bust out this gimmick like a sort of carny trick to pop the crowd. I guess live, seeing it in person or even visually, it would work, but on tape it’s just like…ok yeah, they do this at the end of most sets? I would never have known they were swapping instruments.

Contact- So we start the encore with a silly celebrity guest joke from Trey? Alright, I’m listening. This song is so dumb but so great, it’s pure Phish. We get a decently long, fun stop/start funk jam in the middle like it’s 1997 all over again. Ok, yeah, this second set and encore still don’t come close to offsetting the dumpster dive of set one, but I’ll give it to them, they’re sure fucking trying. For a hot minute this jam was starting to give me Dayton ’97 Tube/Dayton Jam vibes. This performance alone makes this the best encore of the batch of shows I’ve reviewed so far. Where was this in set one, lads?

Tweezer Reprise- Yeah, they’re probably always going to play this song during a show with Tweezer. But given the sad showing of set one, did they really earn this one? I guess that’s up to you to decide for yourself, but to me it feels a bit like a victory lap that was only earned at the very end, like sniping someone with a red shell just before the finish line in Mario Kart. In pro wrestling terms, this song can be cheap heat. Sure people will always react well to hearing it but it always feels the most appropriate if the show had a truly type II beast Tweezer (or even a Tweezerfest).

 

So, this set was more normal, right? I mean, it’s got some decent jam moments sprinkled in, and it’s actually competently played (mostly), so nothing to either greatly praise or criticize. The encore was a big highlight even if I didn’t personally feel they earned that Tweeprise.

 

[Final Verdict]

I was going to say that this was a tough call for me—set one is absolutely a 1 out of 5, no question, and set two is a 3 out of 5 because I was grading on a curve, so do I split the difference or…?—and spend multiple sentences hemming and hawing and possibly some mulling over for good measure. But re-reading my original description of what a 2 out of 5 show is, I feel like it’s all spelled out there and this show is that to a T. If they had rebounded with a second set that existed in the top tier of the best ’03 sets that were yet to come, I could maybe, maybe talk myself into considering a 3 out of 5. If the wind was in its favor and I had had an especially good nap that day. But damn if this isn’t one of the weakest shows I’ve heard from this band. After hearing the first set I literally—and I mean that word truly—couldn’t bring myself to listen to the second set for at least a week. It bummed me out so much it made me feel like I had seen a close friend get sloppy drunk and piss his pants while crying and apologizing to everyone. The second set at least reaffirmed that this writing project was worth continuing, not because it’s any great shakes but because they could pull it together and deliver a pretty good second set and excellent encore.

So, yeah, 2 out of 5.

[Highlights]

Set One: Nothing (no, not the song Nothing, literally nothing was remotely good)

Set Two: Trey was still alive, Wolfman’s > Makisupa, Possum was fire as always

Special Commendation: Contact! This song had one of the best jams of the night.

Phish 1/2/03

 

[Prologue]

After a most satisfactory reunion show, Phish took a day off to recover and travel to Virginia for a very rare post-NYE three show run at the venue perhaps most associated with them, Hampton Coliseum. Indeed, I wonder if some fans and/or the band saw these shows as the “real” reunion. The big pressure was off, the press attention was over (apparently some news outlets really thought Tom Hanks appeared on NYE), and it was time to have the first—for lack of a better term—normal show.

[Set One]

Chalk Dust Torture- You know, this is one of those utilitarian songs in Phish’s catalogue that they use as everything but a ballad: it can open a show or set, it can close a show or set, it can be a jam vehicle, it can be a setup for a great segue, it can help the energy level come up or go down…As it happens on this night, it’s a jam vehicle! Now, this wasn’t the first true jammed out, type II version of ‘Chalk Dust Torture’ but it does give us another dose of Phish finding their footing in group improvisation again. It’s a standard version until about 4:18 when you can start to feel they might be doing something a bit different. After returning to somewhat standard jam fare, around 5:00 there’s a big cheer from the audience—not sure what that’s about. At 5:22 Page starts playing some oblique piano notes, dancing in and out of the rest of the band, and Trey responds at 6:00 with guitar groans and noise as Mike starts to play some warped rhythmic lines. The band again tease going into type II and at 7:22 Trey steps back from the jam almost entirely for a few seconds—probably fiddling with pedals. Ah, yep, there’s the pitch shifter pedal. Mike is playing mostly as texture in the background here; Page jumps on the clavinet. By 9:00 they still haven’t hit upon something that everyone engages with, they start to feel like they’re all going in different directions and not in a fun way. At 9:53 we suddenly get quiet and ambient, as though a fog suddenly settled over the crowd and stage. Trey continues to play with his effects pedals and puts down a couple subtle loops. I think this ‘Chalk Dust Torture’ jam is one of those exemplars of the notion that just because a jam is long doesn’t mean it’s good. It’s also another time you can see them pushing to discover the 2.0 jam style; around 11:57 they almost get somewhere before Trey at 12:18 brings us suddenly back to the standard CDT ‘big rock jam’ ending. All in all it was an interesting jam and show opener but unlike NYE’s ‘Piper’, this one never really gels into something enjoyable and memorable.

Bathtub Gin- Setlists I see online say there’s a > segue into this from ‘CDT’ but that’s a bald-faced lie. Pedantic, I know, but it had to be said. ANYWAY. I guess we aren’t fucking around if they’re following an exploratory ‘CDT’ show opener with ‘Bathtub Gin.’ It’s worth noting that the unfairly derided Hampton ’04 show opens with a ‘CDT’/’Gin’ jammed out one-two punch show opener as well. I’m assuming it has to be intentional and something I never noticed until I listened to this show. ANYWAY! Who doesn’t love ‘Bathtub Gin’? It never disappoints and it’s never not one of the big jams of the night. It’s like when you hear a ‘Tweezer’ or ‘Ghost’ start up, it’s always like, oh fuck yes, here we GO! This ‘Gin’ starts off in typical upbeat, Trey swirling guitar lines-led style. Around 6:00 he steps back briefly as Page hits upon a pretty little filigree melodic lines. At 6:36 we get some funky, chunky sounds from Trey and Mike and Fishman keep the engine powered in the background. Page on funky organ at 7:08ish and it’s starting to feel like ’97 in Hampton Coliseum. 8:05 shows us why Mike is so damn good, with an amazing funky lead line. It starts to feel like they’re maybe jamming on a song or quoting something but I can’t tell what, if anything. Mike is still going strong at 10:00 while the rest of the band continues a fairly standard type I ‘Gin’ jam. Nothing wrong with that, though. It’s about the journey, not the destination, when it comes to ‘Gin’ and actual gin. Around 10:55 Trey plays around with the main ‘Gin’ melody, perhaps leading to an end to the song, but it turns out to be one of those ‘resetting’ revisits of the song’s melody or chorus to get the jam going in another direction. At 12:00 almost exactly, spiraling Trey guitar uplifting lines like he loves to do in the ’bliss’ jams of a ‘Ghost’ or ‘Weekapaug Groove.’ Around 13:00 Trey starts to really catch fire and play slide guitar-sounding lines with a chorus pedal or something going on and off as he jams. We enjoy this vibe for a few minutes until they break back into ‘Gin’ and bring it to a close. All in all, a decent if somewhat standard issue ‘Gin.’ It gets the job done but you wouldn’t serve it to your friends as your best stock.

It's Ice- Trey cracks a joke about the NYE Tom Hanks incident before the song begins. It’s pretty amusing but his clumsy playing of this song’s intro isn’t amusing. One of my unfortunate memories of the 2.0 era is how sometimes it feels like he either just stops playing or only plays the ‘easier’ parts of a song while the rest of the band have to make up for him. And it’s really a shame because I love ‘It’s Ice’—it’s one of those Phish songs that they seem to play just often enough that people know it but still rarely enough that nobody gets sick of it. Well, thankfully, Trey eventually recovers his skills after a few minutes. At 5:00ish we get the spacey/ambient section that is often a bit type II-y around the edges, though I’d have preferred it go on longer and not end with a jarring snare drum hit. A standard, somewhat short ‘It’s Ice’ that wasn’t particularly well played in the first few minutes. Hmmmph.

Back On The Train- Were I a fan going to shows in the ’03 era, I would’ve been looking forward to further performances of this song, since it seems like such a natural jam vehicle but has only occasionally been so. This version starts off with a loose, jammy intro until Trey counts off and they lock in to the groove. Big cheers at the first “took me a long time to get back on the train” lyric, as you might imagine. Trey’s solo around 2:15 is prime 2.0 wonkiness. His guitar tone is muffled and distorted, he seems to stumble at what he’s playing a couple times…it kind of sounds cool and it kind of doesn’t at the same time. Around 4:45 we start to head into a direction that brings to mind the beloved 6/14/00 and 2/28/03 versions, patient and mid-tempo grooves with Trey, Page, and Mike interweaving in a top flight type I jam. At just over 11 minutes this version is definitely a jammy one, though I have to say it’s still bested by the two I mentioned a bit ago. But it’s a case of those being 5s and this one by comparison is more like a 4. All of that said, I’m happy with how jam heavy this first set is so far. Even if none of them are among the best of all time or for the year even, the jams have been flowing steadily.

Round Room- They need to play this song more, god damnit. It’s such a fun song in and of itself, and I’m already going to bring up the fan-fucking-tastic 2/16/03 jammed out version, thankyouverymuch, and I’m really looking forward to seeing what they do with it in the 3.0/4.0 eras. Also I didn’t think about this until just now, but I think it says a lot that their new album was named after this Mike song. I’m trying to think if any of the others were named after a song by him? Feels like Trey and the guys were being really respectful of him as a fellow artist. Anyway, it’s well played and Page does a pretty good job reproducing the weird keyboard sounds at the end from the album version. Kinda like with ‘Fee’, which sometimes has a bright/calm melodic jam at the end, this one has that feel but with more spacey sounds from Trey and Page. Feels like they’re experimenting with how they want to end this one because Page keeps blasting away with different synth/keyboard sounds until they just all stop. Gotta say, a pretty cool version altogether even if 2/16/03 is my current GOAT.

The Horse- Can I yet again shock you with an opinion? I don’t really understand why this song and ‘Silent In The Morning’ are separated. “But it means they can potentially perform something else in between, or out of order!” you cry. Well, they could still do that, they’ve done it before with single songs. I know, it’s hugely unimportant but it’s always bugged me for some reason. Not much to say here. It’s well played.

Silent In The Morning- It’s well played. Crowd cheers and Page smiles as he sings “just last year!” I have to give the band credit, the vocals are well done. See, not all 2.0 era Phish has off-vocals or badly played composed sections. What I will say, though, is….again, I don’t think Trey’s new guitar tone works super well with the ballads. It’s too raspy and distorted sounding through some of ‘Silent’. Just a personal preference, though.

Stash- ‘Round Room’ through ‘Silent’ was a nicely played comedown after the jams. This takes us back to jam territory. I was a little nervous about hearing a 2.0 ‘Stash’ though I yet again have to give the band credit: I think they mostly nailed this one. Before I get to the jam I have to say, it was around this time in the set I thought “huh this must be the closer, this set is starting to feel a bit long.” Turns out set one of this show is a potent hour and a half, which is longer than any of the NYE sets by at least 20 minutes. And with a band like Phish, whether it’s in a good or bad way for you, dear individual, you really do feel when a set starts to get long. ANYWAY back to the jam. Some excellent type I ‘Stash’ jamming early on; around 6:44 Trey starts an amazing bit of guitar work. I’ll always say for the guy during 2.0, he may slop it up in the composed sections but his improvising abilities rarely wavered. I love how out of control really great ‘Stash’ type I jams can feel, with time and rhythm playing havoc with my ears, and this one adds in a dash of Trey effects pedal goodness. If I pay attention to certain times of the 2.0 era I can clearly hear the Kevin Shields/My Bloody Valentine influence that Trey has talked about. Much like the NYE ‘David Bowie’ this one doesn’t reinvent the wheel but is a satisfying ‘standard’ version. I always hope for a ‘Manteca’ with my ‘Stash’ but this time the crab was firmly not in my shoemouth.

Water In The Sky- Even on the LivePhish app version of this official release, there’s an audible fadeout/fade-in between ‘Stash’ and this song. I don’t really know why unless someone uploaded a 3 CD version of this show or something? ANYWAY I like this song. It’s refreshing and light, like drinking a wheat beer outside on a Summer afternoon.

Character Zero- I don’t know why it is but when I listened to this show for my initial blind listen not looking at the setlist, I thought they had just played this on NYE. But nope, they couldn’t have, they never do repeats. And they certainly wouldn’t repeat the same song also in the same slot, as a set closer. OH WAIT NO THEY FUCKING DID. I don’t even dislike this song but god damn that’s just lazy. Like did they forget they had played it last time, and it was in the same slot? Are they fucked up on drugs or trolling us? Am I overthinking this? I dunno. But I’ll be honest, if I was a fan at the time, I’d have been pissing and moaning about it to everybody at setbreak. It’s so hard to care about this song unless you’re really drunk or you haven’t heard it in awhile. It bores the piss out of me if it’s not a non-standard version. Actually, you know what? I’m putting a “fuck this song” sign up for now and will refuse to talk about this song in future shows with more than a sentence or a shrug. This is my own personal ‘Prince Caspian’ for the foreseeable future.

Set one of this show is sure something. It’s long, front-loaded with mostly jams. It has some flubby/bad playing at times. It ends with a repeat song from NYE, a song that sucks for me for now. But, overally, in pure musical terms this set was the best so far in 2.0. Some great playing and promising potential jams on the horizon, if it’s anything to go by.

[Setbreak]

I was struggling to think of what to write about for this one because I haven’t been focused on too much other than random YouTube content and Phish. Furthermore, a couple of the movies I watched for the first time were so excellent I want to possibly write a longform piece about them, someday, instead of the short blurbs I usually do for the setbreaks. Lucky for me a song randomly popped into my head on the drive to work today and I was reminded of an album I haven’t listened to in what feels like a decade, Casino Vs. Japan’s Go Hawaii. This record was introduced to me by someone I’m no longer friends with (long story, but aren’t they always?) based on my obsession with the first two Boards Of Canada albums. It’s totally in that wheelhouse, down to the oddly unnerving child vocal samples. Still, it’s a great little ambient-ish IDM album in the BoC style, and the opening track ‘Theme’ is a banger.

 

[Set Two]

46 Days- I was excited they played this song so early in the 2.0 run. It’s one of the songs that both band and audience really connect with, and when they do jam it out, it goes some interesting places. But it’s also the kind of song that can just be 7 to 9 minutes and serve as a rocking type I jam that Trey can go nuts on. Imagine my surprise when the very first version played goes for it! Jam starts in earnest around 8:12. Bit of a preview of the 2.0 ambient jamming style for a few seconds until Trey starts playing some twirling leads and the band is poised to go with him. For a few minutes we float in place, a spacey psychedelic jam complete with gooey Page keyboard sounds and Mike’s deep but foggy bass bubbling up and down in the background. Trey noodles around with some repetitive guitar phrases, unsure of what he really wants to do At 12:55 Fishman becomes more active and spurs the band forward, the tempo increasing a bit at a time. By 13:30 we’re cooking back into a rock jam, with Page taking lead on organ as Trey comps along on guitar. Mike is the secret weapon, keeping on the beat with Fishman but responding subtly to Page and Trey, too. Around 14:26 I start to think we’re about to segue into ‘Birds Of A Feather’ though instead Phish continue to hasten the pace and Trey coats his guitar in dirty, raw effects sounds. We keep chugging along on this distorted funky rock jam with Mike and Page taking the reins as Trey’s guitar continues to self-destruct. Round about 19:00 it starts to become clear we’re headed somewhere, whether it’s a segue into another song or the band bringing up the energy to finish the song. Around 19:47 excellent Fishman and Page interplay. Soon Trey is playing some big obvious chords as if trying to signal something to the band. They must sense what I’m not getting because the sort-of-segue into the next song, where everyone else stops playing and Trey starts up ‘Simple’, doesn’t sound as clumsy as I probably just made it out to be.

Simple- This song just gets better with time in terms of jamming vehicle. This performance though…Well, there’s a roughness to this performance that feels more like “we haven’t practiced this much recently” than it does the usual 2.0 sloppiness. Around 2:55 Page fucks up the lyrics, or maybe they all do, I can’t tell. It’s a mess. But at least musically they performed the song well! Around 7:10 we start to realize we may be getting a jam and not just the usual ending. Well, I guess it's more like an extended coda to ‘Simple’ than true jam. I hesitate to even label it a type I jam since it’s just a longer version of the 90s endings to this song. The crowd cheers for some reason around 9:09, not really sure why because it’s a pretty mundane ending to a ‘Simple’. Around 9:35 Mike starts to get spacey with his bass and Trey has laid down a few guitar loops. Well, maybe we are getting a jam after all! Just as I’m starting to get excited for a space/ambient jam Trey breaks into the next song. It’s a full -> segue but it’s just on this side of the line.

My Friend, My Friend- Of all the songs I thought I’d like hearing best in 2.0 with Trey’s new guitar tone, this song was high up on the list. Couldn’t you just hear a long 2.0 style jam on this song, dark and a bit abstract and psychedelic? Anyway, it’s a well-played standard version of ‘My Friend, My Friend.’ Until Trey flubs around 2:28, that is. Eh, that’s ok, it’s otherwise well played. I will say it feels as though this version is short compared to others I’ve heard. Maybe it’s just because the last one I would’ve heard was the jammed out one from a show on the Summer or Fall ’23 tours. Well, we got a MIFE ending at least!

Limb By Limb- Another obvious fadeout/fade-in between the last track and this one. ‘Limb By Limb’ I mostly like but eh…it reminds me of ‘Taste’ where it feels like a song the band really labored over to get it right, and I appreciate the rhythmic complexity of it and all…but much like ‘Taste’, at least in my listening experience with Phish, it never turned out to be the jam vehicle it felt intended/destined to become. Both songs rarely segue into or out of other songs, so on top of also not being jam vehicles they always feel a bit isolated from the rest of the set. That said, they play this just infrequently enough that if I heard it live I’d be digging the hell out of it. Hell, I’ll even say it: this song is like a better ‘Taste’ in some ways. Anyway, they actually do a great job playing it, and while the jam section is nothing to write home about, it’s still a fun time. Trey has a ball playing out-of-time with the rest of the band during the early part of the jam, and Mike and Page continue to give you plenty to love if your attention goes their way during any part of the jam. Reminds me a bit of the first set’s ‘Back On The Train’: a solid performance even if it is mostly unremarkable.

Thunderhead- I love how loose and noodly this debut performance is. The playing is a little rough here or there in the composed part but nothing as noticeable as some of the earlier ones. I’ve always wondered why they don’t play this song that often, it looks like they’ve only played it once since 2003. So another song that really defines the 2.0 era when you hear it.

Run Like An Antelope- Something about Trey felt way off during this song. It takes him awhile to really get cooking during the jam portion, too. But when he does finally catch fire it’s quality Machine Gun Trey with 2.0 guitar tones.

Cavern- I was dreading this one given 2.0 Trey’s penchant for forgetting lyrics. And of course he flubs several lines and laughs it off. OK, haha, it’s funny once in awhile but by this point of 2.0 this has already happened too many times. All I ask is some kind of jam to make it up to us but of course this isn’t that kind of show so we get a standard ‘Cavern’ ending.

Mexican Cousin- While I can still enjoy this song ironically, it’s kind of always been cringey otherwise. Looks like they resisted temptation and have only played it once in Mexico. Given Trey’s drug and alcohol addictions this song hasn’t aged well. And playing this throwaway as an encore really sucked the air out of the room. Especially as a one song encore. I get that set one went long so they probably were up against the venue’s curfew or something but eh…why not save ‘Cavern’ as part of the encore? ‘Antelope’ would’ve been a fine set closer.

Set two and the encore….hmm, well the encore sucked, let’s get that out of the way since we just talked about it anyway. As for set two, I thought it was mostly good to great—there was some shaky playing and flubbed lyrics, but there was mostly a feeling of fun and the band pushing themselves to play new songs and go down some exploratory jam moments. 2.0 still hasn’t had its first thoroughly great set or overall show but the post-NYE buzz is growing.

 

[Final Verdict]

When I look at the setlist and the length of some of the jams, I want to give this show a 4 out of 5. Yet in my heart of hearts I know this show is a 3 out of 5 because it’s a textbook case of “the setlist and song lengths don’t tell the full story.” While there were more and deeper jams than the NYE show largely featured, I found this show less satisfying overall because the 2.0 jamming was still being developed and it seems obvious to these ears that they’re learning how to improvise as a group again.

[Highlights]

Set One: A few decent jams, ‘Round Room’ debut

Set Two: A couple decent jams, ‘Thunderhead’ debut

Phish 12/31/02

 

[Prologue]

 

Given that Phish always referred to their plan as being on an indefinite hiatus, and not a break or even a break from touring, I wonder what fans were thinking during the short period between 10/7/00 and the band announcing on 8/14/02 that they were back for a ‘reunion’ show to take place on 12/31/02. That’s well over a year, and most of the band were busy with sideprojects/solo stuff so it seemed conceivable the hiatus may be a few years or more. Once the announcement was made it soon felt like Phish were back to life for good, and that hiatus wasn’t so bad after all, was it? They quickly recorded the Round Room album in October; December 10^th it was released. That’s already a hell of a lot of Phish activity to feed on already. Less than a week later they would be on Saturday Night Live (12/14/02) and a bit later appear on The Late Show With David Letterman (12/19/02). By then it was less than two weeks until the band were back on stage at Madison Square Garden, their perennial New Year’s Eve home. (Well..not always…)

Few could have predicted that this reunited band would last less time than they had just been gone, to the tune of 593 days of the post-hiatus/2.0 era vs 815 days of the hiatus itself. Maybe it was the jinx of not appearing at MSG for New Year’s Eve ’03? Who knows. It’s really wild to think that fans had more time to grieve the band’s absence the first time they were gone than they did to enjoy their presence the second time around before another, much (much) longer break-up.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s briefly talk about the Round Room album and jump into the show.

 

[Round Room Digression]

 

I know the production/mastering doesn’t hold up the best, since these were originally not intended to be fully finished studio tracks but rather sort of preliminary recordings to help rehearse for the NYE run of shows. So, yeah, the album does have a strangely artificial/digital and low-bitrate texture to it that’s hard to describe. The closest I can approximate is the weird instrument bleed and harsh cut-off at 4:42 on ‘Pebbles and Marbles’: hear how Fishman’s cymbals seem to bleed over into Trey’s vocals and then as soon as Trey’s vocal is faded down the cymbal-wash-bleedover abruptly stops and it sounds choppy and unfinished? There’s a few other times on the album issues like this crop up.

Yet in spite of this problem I have to say I’ve always loved how raw and ‘live in the studio’ the album does sound and feel; it’s almost like they’re being picked up by a couple room microphones, giving the music a true sense of space and natural room reverb. If I recall correctly, too, outside of ‘Union Federal’, a bonus ‘live’ track from Junta, this is the first studio album with full-on jams included—‘Seven Below’ and ’46 Days’ may not break the ten minute mark but they ‘feel’ like live Phish instead of studio Phish, if that makes sense. And ‘Waves’ is such a satisfying and epic journey of a closer, almost like ‘Piper’ and ‘Prince Caspian’ had a baby. I was tickled to see it got released on vinyl for the first time recently, I bet some of the digital/not-intended-for-release-initially audio quality issues would be masked by that format’s legendary/cliched “warm” sound.

 

[Set One]

Piper- I certainly wouldn’t have predicted this to be the song they’d end the hiatus with but here we are. The hype and energy in the building must’ve been insane there in person; it really comes across on the recording how continuously excited and surprised the crowd was. This ‘Piper’ ends up being a lengthy one, as if they were trying to prove a point—"we can still play, don’t worry!” On first listen this jam really surprised me and gave me flashes of the high energy Trey-led shredding of the post-‘Suzy’ jam from 9/14/00. While I think taken in isolation it’s a really good type I jam it’s never going to be in my top ten versions for this reason. It’s more the momentousness of the band choosing this as the first song back and jamming it out so long that makes it a potential for others’ lists. Still, easily one of the show’s highlights, in terms of what they played and what it represented.

Guyute- I think I’m in the minority on this one but I would treat this song as a piss break song if I ever caught it live. It’s just always been my least favorite of the proggy compositional songs and I feel like it shows up on an oddly high percentage of official live releases. Anyway, my grumbling aside, they mostly play this well. It isn’t as sharp as late 90s versions but it’s tighter than some of the future 2.0 versions I recall being painful. I’m happy it seems to have become a true rarity in modern times.

NICU- Perfect placement as a light comedown from the dense ‘Guyute.’ Trey sure enjoys yelling for Leo!

Horn- Good ballad placement for the most part. I’ve always felt like this song and ‘Sample In A Jar’ are the sort of songs I see on a setlist and I’m a little bummed but then when I experience them in the flow of a set/show, they always get me. ‘Horn’ is underrated!

Wilson- Some shenanigans involving Page’s brother and clips from the movie Castaway during this version. In person this was probably funny and perplexing; at home if you only have the audio it’s just perplexing unless you read the show notes. A fun version otherwise. Trey REALLY belts out “can you still have fun?!” part like a madman.

Mound- The older I get the more I appreciate Mike as a musician and a writer. It used to be I could take or leave ‘Mound’ but I was surprised how much I popped when it showed up in this show. (I do a blind listen of each show to start out). Not a perfectly tight version of ‘Mound’ but Mike is on point here and throughout the show. Apparently it hadn’t been played since 1996 so a huge bustout…but the biggest bustout of the year was yet to come, just not until February. Wink wink, nudge nudge, touch nose.

The Squirming Coil- It’s so very Phish that on the studio album this song is the first track but in most concert appearances it’s a set closer. I love how it’s sort of a mix of prog rock song and a ballad. As ever, Page is one of the most reliable soloists you’ll ever hear. No exaggeration, he nails this solo every version I’ve ever heard.

David Bowie- This ‘Bowie’ starts off pretty quiet during the spacey loop intro and it’s a bit abrupt compared to some ‘Bowie’ intros but eh, what’re you gunna do? Given the reputation of 2.0 I was on high alert to detect any flubs and I think they executed it pretty well. I have to grant that they were on hiatus and as such can be given a reset on repeats but, like…they just played ‘Bowie’ at the last show, 10/7/00. That said I think this one is better overall….so I retract my complaint. Around 6:45 it sounds like Trey is teasing ‘Dave’s Energy Guide’ though I see nobody else mention this online so maybe I’m hearing things. Around 8:30 another big tease of it, I could swear. They really crush the ending of this ‘Bowie’, too—you can tell they really missed playing together. No stage banter after the song, just straight into setbreak.

As the first set back after the hiatus, expectations were likely very high and very flexible depending on how rusty the band turned out to be after a couple songs. Trying to put myself in the shoes of a fan at the time, I think this set would’ve mostly delivered, giving us a bit of everything we love about the band other than segues or truly deep jams. Certain songs you could tell were rehearsed better than others but overall I think it was a decent opener for a three set show. Featuring no new songs, set one played to pleasing the hardcore fans and giving us a bit of improv goodness in the ‘Piper’ opener and ‘Bowie’ closer. It would be nice to get another couple jams, or even one big type II experience, though I’m expecting not to see much of that until the Winter tour proper in February ’03. NYE shows are generally more about the spectacle and celebrating the previous year, and in this case we’re also celebrating the return of the band, so it makes sense if that ends up being the focus of all the New Year’s run of shows.

 

[Setbreak One]

I’ve been casting about trying out a couple games recently but neither one truly hooked me. Figured I’d share my quick thoughts for both of these setbreaks just in case it interests anyone.

Cosmic Star Heroine looks and feels like someone put Phantasy Star IV and Chrono Trigger into a blender but for me the results are nowhere near as good as that formula suggests. I really wanted to love this game because I’ve been a fan of the Penny Arcade games the developer worked on in the past, and I think the writing/dialogue is better than the average retro-inspired RPG, yet I can’t shake the feeling that the gameplay depth comes purely from if you play on the harder difficulty and get really fiddly tinkery with the party build, equipment/skills, etc. In some games I enjoy this but in Cosmic Star Heroine I feel it’s not fun, like at all. The aesthetics don’t help the game’s case; the music is either ‘pretty good’ or ‘irritating and too ambient’, and the overall design style of the characters, the world, and the color palette choices mean it’s not only kind of ugly to look at but on the world map and dungeon areas it can be hard to see where you can and can’t go. Your mileage may vary. I gave it about seven hours and I was out.

 

[Set Two]

Waves- Ah, so here comes the new songs. I’m excited to hear another jammed out set opener even if it does stick to the type I template of the studio version until the final minute or two. This is the sort of performance of a song that if you see it in person you really enjoy it and immediately forget about it because just as the jam is entering type II territory it goes into the next song instead. However, this mini-type II jam provides a glimpse into Phish finding its new jam style. The use of effects and instruments and the overall ‘feel’ of this jam is halfway between the ‘99/’00 loop heavy ambient-groove style and what would come in ‘03/’04 with the dark, spacey, abstract jams. This 2.0 jam style feels as nascent as could be here, as if they’re throwing a lot of sounds at the wall and seeing what works together before Trey kills it and begins the next song. Still…you can sense some attempt to push into new territory and find a new way. Or ways.

Divided Sky- This is where I have to address Trey’s 2.0 guitar tone. Forgive me if I’ve said this before but I’m of mixed opinions, since I think it sounds great with the new material of 2003 and 2004, studio and otherwise, but with the older material which sometimes had more delicate/quiet sections, it sounds too raw and with too much distortion and ‘attack’ to it. By contrast Mike’s bass is also different yet just as good as the beloved ’97 to ’00 era; his tone still sounds full and bright and clear, with a fat bottom end, but this time it’s also got more of a bounce and borderline-vocal quality to it. Eh, maybe that’s all just me, though. Trey’s tone doesn’t really ruin these kind of songs with pretty composed elements, just not my preferred of his tones for them. The two minute pause is interesting both for its duration and the sounds I vaguely hear—is it just me or does anyone else hear what sounds like Page holding down an organ note for awhile in there with a softened sound that is swallowed up in the crowd roar? At any rate, I think this version is a good example of the ups and downs of 2.0 Phish. There’s a few obvious flubs by Trey in the post-pause section that take me out of it, but in-person I’d have to imagine the ending jam/solo section brought the house down because it is absolutely demolished by all four men.

Lawn Boy- Perfect placement for this song! Felt for a second like Page wasn’t sure if Mike was going to take the solo or not but he was definitely feeling it when he got going. Modern fans will always think of the Baker’s Dozen “is this still Lawn Boy?” jammed out version but for me I’ll always think of the Slip, Stitch and Pass version.

Carini- Now here’s an older song that sounds better with Trey’s new guitar tone…This is another of those songs that used to bug me because I found it too nonsense/in-jokey and predictable but I’ve come around to it. It helps that nowadays it’s graduated into a regular jam vehicle instead of a rare one. Around 4:00 Mike gets a bit active leading the jam. Trey throws on all kinds of swampy guitar effects as he and Page fill the foreground. Page in particular seems to be trying out some of his new gear during this jam, and simultaneously I’m noticing how Trey’s dominant “throw down some delay loops at the start of every jam” phase from ’98 to ’00 has started to come to a definitive end with this show. Around 7:15 Page starts to really cook on piano—hard to pick out in the mix however—while Fishman starts to hit those splash cymbals that to me always feel like he’s trying to get the attention of the rest of the band to either change tempo or get back to the main ‘body’ of a song. Like the ‘Piper’ and ‘Waves’ jams this didn’t go far out though I will say I enjoyed it more on subsequent listens than I did my first blind listen.

Rift- Hoo boy this was a rough one. It sounds like at least one or two guys are half a beat too early or late, and the vocals are top flight speak-sing Trey. Say what you will about Trey doing professional vocal training the last few years, I prefer the new approach over the sometimes half-hearted stuff of 2.0. Anyway, Page plays a lovely solo like usual and they get more in-sync as the song goes on but that ending is once again quite rough. Trey sounds like he’s playing in the wrong key or something, and Fishman or someone is rushing them a bit. They didn’t sound too rusty up til now so maybe they just hadn’t practiced this one much if at all and someone called this in the moment without consulting with the others.

Harry Hood- Another set, another two-in-a-row of songs that usually end sets. Regardless, how can you complain about this song no matter where it shows up? Phish obviously love it as much as we do and this version gets a lively, active intro/reggae sequence including some gnarly new-sounding guitar loops from Trey. It’s a minority opinion but I’ll address it now: I love audiences singing “Hood!” back to the band. I know that’s not how the original is “supposed” to sound but it’s weird to me when I hear early versions without the call-and-response. At 5:00 Mike turns on a new synth-bass effect that we’ll be hearing more of in the shows to come, and I will always love it. Otherwise, yeah, what else to say? It’s a good ‘Hood.’ Everytime I hear one I’m like “holy shit this version is fire!” and then the next one I get to I’m like “holy shit, this version is amazing!” and then the next one…you get the idea. It’s a never-fail song.

Character Zero- This song still has its haters but the era of it feeling like it ended every other set for years in a row has long been over. For me it’ll always be a mood dependent song. If I heard it live I’d probably get into it in the moment. On Billy Breathes it always works well for me. Listening to a show at home…eh, it depends. In this case it’s a little of a softened blow because it feels like a bit of a bonus song after the preceding ‘Hood.’ It sounds like Trey is playing the intro in the wrong key or something, something is definitely off and it feels like nobody is acknowledging it or correcting it. So maybe it’s just me? I dunno something weird going on. Some of the vocals seem a bit off and mistimed. Perhaps like ‘Rift’ another case of not practicing it or not practicing it enough?

Overall set two is more up and down than the first. I did appreciate the ‘Waves’ and ‘Carini’ jams, and most of the songs were played with passion and fire, but there were some obvious flubs and some awkward vocals sprinkled throughout to bring it down a notch or two. All that said, it’s still overall an enjoyable set even if it does have a touch of “set one part two” instead of the usual big moments/jams that we tend to associate with set two. NYE shows are a different beast, being three sets, so we’ll see what awaits later.

 

[Setbreak Two]

The other game I tried out was Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen. This was an experience that, for the first hour or two, I was convinced I was going to love the game. It has just the right mixture of ideas from other games and yet makes them all its own, and the janky-fun to janky-aggravating scale was firmly toward the former than the latter. But about five to seven hours in I began to experience more janky-aggravating things, and I wasn’t loving how combat “felt”—and no, I wasn’t expecting it to be like Dark Souls! Anyway, I got far enough to see what others were able to love about it, but nowadays I just don’t have the patience to give a game more than 10 hours of my time if I’m not feeling at least a little hooked.

 

[Set Three]

Sample In A Jar- What a weird choice for a set opener! The only thing I can think is somebody REALLY wanted to play it or they knew the timing for the NYE Countdown gag was going to be off so they had to play something short-ish to stall.

Seven Below- Another debut; happy to see right out of the gate they were mixing in new material in logical places. After spending the first two sets largely revisiting the past it was a good decision from a ‘shows as a storytelling device’ to do the NYE gag with this song. You can read about this gag online, but you’d have no clue anything was going on just from the audio—other than some of the ‘dancers’ who were on stage continually popping balloons through the next song or two. Anyway, this very first ‘Seven Below’ is a pretty good type I jam. Perhaps playing it a bit safe here, this song would definitely go on to be a jam vehicle in the not-too-distant future. It’s always kind of been an unpopular opinion of mine that having these NYE gags during songs kind of ruins the musical moment. In this instance it’s pretty clear if they didn’t need to suddenly do the countdown they’d have kept the jam going.

Auld Lang Syne- You know, they should play this just once at a non-NYE show just to fuck with people. Nothing else to say. Just as ‘Seven Below’ abruptly did a non-full-segue into this song, it in turn does an abrupt segue into…

Runaway Jim- I will preface this by saying I’m not too familiar with other big jam versions of this song, but this was probably my surprise of the night, beyond the jammed out ‘Piper’ show opener. Trey is clearly amused by the ‘dancers’ popping balloons since he drops a few lyrics here or there and chuckles audibly into the mic. Mike comes out strong early in this version, and yet again demonstrates that, I’d argue, more than any other member of the band his musicianship and overall confidence have taken another step forward with post-hiatus/2.0 Phish. As Trey messes around with some drones and his pedals Mike does this cool bubbling bassline that nobody else seems to pick up on, but I dug. It almost feels as if Trey is trying to do something along the lines of My Bloody Valentine with noisy guitar loops over each other. It starts to suffocate the jam and Mike keeps trying to hold down the forward movement and give us some kind of a melody to follow. Around 5:25 Trey finally relents and the clouds clear; Fishman starts to vary the beat and we head into type II weird jam territory for a bit. Fishman continues to play a lot of busy fills and tumbles in the background as Page doggedly stays on piano to try to center the jam. Around 7:30 Mike begins to insert himself again, adding a bouncey groove to the somewhat aimless Trey and Page textures. The latter finally switches to the clavinet or other keyboard around 8:20 and we get a bit funkier. Around 8:53 Trey puts down a few classic ‘99/’00 guitar delay loops and plays in the upper register with the pitch shifter pedal. Though this jam has more active and melodic presence from Mike, it really starts to sound like a classic ’00 space/ambient jam a la 6/14/00 at times. You can tell they’re still getting a feel for a new jam style as the jam winds down and we slowly do a full-on segue into…

Time Loves A Hero- This segment of Runaway Jim -> Time Loves A Hero is a clear highlight of the set, and the show as a whole. No, it’s not the tightest cover that Phish has done, but in the spirit of the moment and the band doing a classic Phish-style “big jam into unexpected cover” moment, it’s a fantastic, fun exemplar of the type. Some cool keyboard sounds from Page at the end. There’s dead air for a minute or two; you can faintly hear the band talking to each other on the LivePhish official tapes but I can’t make anything out.

Taste- Given how long it took the band to figure out the lyrics and arrangement for this song, I feel bad in saying that it’s one of those songs that I love on the album but live it never sounds quite precise enough and musically I find it sounds…labored over. This first 2.0 performance is a bit loose in places though it does come across that the band are excited to play this material for the first time in two years or more. I’m happy to be proven wrong about this next notion, but some of my blah attitude toward ‘Taste’ is that, on the surface it sounds and feels like a big jam vehicle, but I’ve never known it to be. At least all the 90s versions I’ve heard are the same thing over and over, like ‘Theme From The Bottom’ but with polyrhythms. 2.0 represents a unique time for Phish in that they were starting fresh in some ways, so they sometimes would take non-jam songs out for a ride. This ‘Taste’ isn’t really that, though in a couple moments it flirts with voyaging a bit out-there. Around the 8:30 mark is the sort of Phish jamming that I’d be digging if I was there seeing it live, dancing and going nuts with the crowd, but on tape it gets boring by the time you’ve heard it once during a show already, and will probably hear at least once more.

Strange Design- How can you not love a Page-sung ballad? Dude is just the most consistent member of Phish in so many ways. Pretty good set placement too. Give us a bit of a breather before a big rager of a set closer.

Walls Of The Cave- Just planting this here: my first show, 10/11/23, had a set one closer of this song and I could swear I heard a clear ‘Dave’s Energy Guide’ quote from Trey at one point but I don’t see anyone else saying this online. Want to make sure I remember when the time comes. Anyway! Another new song debut. I’ve always liked this song though on Round Room I feel its thunder is stolen by ‘Waves’ as the album closer. This song is absolutely one that helps define the 2.0 era—you can tell the crowd is digging it when they start clapping along in the intro. Despite what people seemed to say online at the time, crowds responded well to the new material, at least if the audience cheers and interaction from this show are anything to go by. Not necessarily musically but this song fills the same spots songs like ‘Harry Hood’ or ‘Slave To The Traffic Light’ do, often as set closers or close-to-set-closers, non-ballads but with some pretty parts in the composed intro sections. ‘Walls Of The Cave’ winds through a few sections before catapulting itself into a big guitar rock jam, and we get the first of many versions that stick to this template. Well, mostly this sticks to it. There is flirting with a type II, non-standard version of this song from 10:00 to 16:30 but during this jam section they either never fully commit to one idea for too long or they’re all kind of pulling in different directions. Feels like the ‘Waves’ jam from earlier, one of those “throw everything at the wall and see what sticks, switch between different keyboards and effects pedals and textures/rhythms arbitrarily” jams that doesn’t ever show up on lists of best versions. Anyway, they bring it back around and close out the song with a reprise of the chorus. Another good initial version that like the ‘Runaway Jim’ and ‘Seven Below’ jams hints at potential but didn’t deliver all of the goods.

Wading In The Velvet Sea- Certainly wasn’t expecting this for the encore and show closer. Really thought they’d play at least two songs, and no serious ballad songs at the very least. Someone—Trey?—comes in too early on vocals but quickly corrects himself. That said, hey, it’s another Page-sung ballad. And even though Coventry has always cast a shadow over this song, I will say that this performance was really well done and I won’t let Coventry psyche me out so early in this process.

Set three and the encore, while not lighting the world on fire, were quite enjoyable and mostly well played. During some of the jams there are clear hints of what was to come in the future, even if the jam style wasn’t quite formed yet. The Runaway Jim -> Time Loves A Hero is an early 2.0 highlight, and the ‘Walls Of The Cave’ debut surely hints at its potential in the future, as both a set closer/show closer and a possible jam vehicle—we’ll have to see on the latter, because at least in my memory it never is one. But I digress.

 

[Final Verdict]

Though I had some criticisms here or there over the course of the epic three set show, I mostly walked away from this show feeling good, like I had a good time. It feels like a very NYE show, focusing on the moment and having fun but not getting too deep into jams or rarities and whatnot. I think NYE ’02 has a little bit of everything that people love about Phish, and it is without question a historic show. For my final score, I’m going with a 4 out of 5. To tip the scale I feel I needed either one of the jams to truly have gone type II and gotten somewhere new or at least deep, or for there to have been a few more segments like the Runaway Jim -> Time Loves A Hero. All of that said, if I were a fan at the time, I’d have walked out of this show feeling intensely optimistic about the future. Overall it’s a better show than 10/7/00, I’ll say that much. If I was there in person as a fan after waiting more than two years for Phish, I’m sure it’d be a 5 out of 5.

[Highlights]

Set One: ‘Piper’ jammed out opener, rare bustout ‘Mound’, ‘David Bowie’ set closer

Set Two: ‘Waves’ had a promising debut, pretty good ‘Carini’

Set Three: ‘Seven Below’ had good jam until cutoff by NYE gag, Runaway Jim -> Time Loves A Hero is an early 2.0 highlight, ‘Walls Of The Cave’ had promising debut.