2009-12-05 Charlottesville

Alright, so the final show review of fall tour '09 continues two trends that have both begun rather recently. First, this is the third review in a row that I'm writing while badly distracted in some way. I wrote 12/3's review while listening to 12/4, wrote 12/4's review while I was falling asleep at my desk, and this time 'round I'm listening to Jeff Tweedy, which makes it difficult to get in the mindset of reviewing a jam band. So yeah. This review will probably suck.

However, I can say, for the second night in a row, that the show I'm reviewing definitely does not suck. 12/5 is another show in the vein of 12/4; that is, it's well-played all the way through, the energy level is consistent, the song choice is excellent, and though there's not much jamming to speak of, the little that there is is reminiscent of some of the better (though longer) megajams of late summer.

At the start, the band's playing could best be described as "gamely." "Bag" isn't anything special, and "Chalkdust" takes a huge Trey-nosedive at the climax, but rather than getting rattled, the guys take it in stride and recover with a hot "KDF" and a standard-but-solid "Divided Sky." 

Then comes the streaker, which seems to liven things up not just for the crowd, but also for the band. "Ya Mar" features some brilliant work from Mike, including lyrics that reference the streaker, after Trey's comment that "That took a lot of balls," And Mike continues to hold the reins for an energetic take on "Sneakin' Sally," including a closing vocal jam. "Old Home Place" is next, reinstating the bluegrass part of set one for the first time since 11/29.

"Cavern" and "Funky Bitch" keep the Mike train rolling, and this really lifts up the second half of the set. Mike's been the one consistently good band member since 12/2 or so, so getting to hear him take over the set like this is pretty appropriate since this is the last show of the tour. Things get a little more egalitarian with "Bowie," which is a standard-but-satisfying rock take, much like 12/4's "Reba." Then, right when it seems like the set should be over, Trey takes over with "The Wedge" and "Bold As Love," which put the exclamation point on strong set one showing.

Set two starts off with one of the deeper explorations of fall '09. Now this isn't saying much in some ways, but this "Tweezer" -> "Light" > "Piper" -> "Free" run is pretty great even if it won't be on any "...Of The Year" lists. The "Tweezer" jam is two balls-out rock sections led by some melodic leads from Trey sandwiching a neat little plinko space, and the segue into "Light" is clever and builds (seemingly) naturally out of the end of Trey's guitar pyrotechnics.

"Light," again, is the centerpiece here. It's standard Type 1 Trey up until about the 8:00 mark, and it honestly starts to get really repetitive until all of a sudden Page starts playing some ascending scales on the piano and Trey drops back into some chording. Just as those two mellow out, Fishman starts some seriously sinister drumming, and suddenly there's a really interesting dissonance going on. Things get sparser and sparser with Mike dropping some really high bass runs (to continue the dissonance) until we splinter into another loop-filled ambient space that, much like the one at the end of 12/3's "Disease," has more meat on its bones that what we've become accustomed to at this point in 2009.

This resolves into another nice segue into "Piper," which, despite revving up way too fast, features a brilliant two minutes or so of jamming between 4:30 and 6:30, oddly sandwiched between some pretty pedestrian soloing on each side. The song transitions roughly but, again, interestingly into "Free," which is (surprise!) a Mike-heavy version instead of a Trey-heavy one.

"Sweet Virginia" is the (geographically appropriate) setlist surprise. "Hood" features a poignant and patient build that climaxes brilliantly, but not really in the usual way...it's a bit more...umm...democratic than usual. "Golgi" includes some fun antics from Trey when Mike's bass temporarily goes out, with an explanation that this is the "trio version" as well as later shouts of "Cactus!" and "Bass!" "Antelope" does justice to the song in a way we haven't heard since some of the amazing versions of early- and mid-summer, as well as involving the ending vocals "Run like a naked guy, out of control!" from Trey and then the whole band as everyone catches on.

The "Loving Cup" > "Tweeprise" encore is the perfect exclamation point on what has been, at least at the end of the tour here, two great shows in a row. 

While I was pleasantly surprised as the variety and nuance of much of the band's playing throughout the summer and up through Festival 8, I've honestly had a really hard time maintaining interest in every single show through much of fall. While there were a few moments I absolutely loved (with 11/28's "Seven Below" > "Ghost" quite likely being my favorite part of the whole year so far), for the most part things are starting to sound a bit stale. Here's hoping NYE ends the year on a high note before we move into 2010. Once I finish reviewing the Miami run, I'll also be putting up a fall highlights list, which might be a bit of a challenge. But I'll do my best.

2009-12-04 MSG III

Well, 12/4 is the show I've been waiting for since fall tour began. I guess.

My complaint throughout, other than that the shows just haven't been as good as summer '09 by pretty much any metric, has been that there haven't been any real "full" shows. That is, there have definitely been a lot of good single jams, and a few really good second sets (11/20 and 11/28, as I've mentioned before). But there haven't been any shows that have been consistently good throughout, let alone consistently great or consistently amazing. The third show of the MSG run, and the penultimate show of the entire tour, falls into the "consistently good" category.

The show starts with a rare "Heavy Things" opener that, despite the lack of a guitar loop, is an above-average version thanks to an excellent solo from Trey. "Possum," "Wilson," and "KDF" continue in a similar vein, and it quickly becomes clear that this is one of those shows that, for better or worse, is going to be Trey-centric. None of these first few songs are anything special on their own, but it's a four-song sustained peak of energy to open the show, which we haven't seen for awhile.

The first real bright spot for me in the first set is hearing "Glide." Trey butchers the rarity a bit, but hey, it's "Glide," so who cares? It's a fun song that manages to keep the momentum going while introducing some novelty. "46 Days" is a guitar assault that picks up right where "KDF" left off, and "Bouncin'" is another low-tempo but cleverly-placed song that segues into "Reba." This "Reba" is a weird one. The composed section is well-played, and the jam is yet more Trey-fire, but it's surprisingly short. At 10:33, in fact, it's one of the shortest "Reba"s I've listened to. It's sort of a novelty in the sense that you rarely hear a "Reba" jam that is this straightforwardly and unabashedly rocked-out, but it's not going to be on your "best-of" list by any means.

"Dinner and a Movie" is another nice rarity, though it seems cut a bit short, and "Guyute," with its extra-grungy and distorted ending would make for a great closer on a well-constructed, high-energy set...if the set actually ended there. Instead, we get a "Maze" featuring some extra-dissonant chording from Trey over a staccato-heavy Page solo and a "First Tube" that's surprisingly slow, muddy, and loud.

"Scents and Subtle Sounds" is, fairly or not, inextricably linked in my mind to Phish 2.0 space jamming. I know, logically, that there will probably never be another "Scents" jam like those again, but whenever the song starts up these days, I can't help but get my hopes up. That was definitely the case here, as the song kicked off the last set at MSG '09. But no joy. Or rather, a little joy: it's always nice to hear "Scents," but this seven-minute version is nothing but Type 1 Trey-action. The "Rock and Roll" jam starts off the same way, but then moves into more interesting territory, with Mike taking a melodic lead on bass while Trey, flashing back to "Maze," adds some more arrhythmic chording in an "ASIHTOS"-like guitar tone. This evolves into a rolling, burbling jam space that recalls the "Light" from 12/2 but doesn't last nearly as long; however, it ends with a great segue into "Seven Below."

After some standard Type 1 action after the song proper, the jam winds down into a quiet space at around the 7:00 mark. Trey and Page play off each other to beautiful effect, and then we move back into more sinister, distorted territory at 9:00. Trey kicks off another great segue into "Twist" from here, and the "Twist" jam immediately goes funky. It's a unusual direction for the song nowadays, but it works. That is, until Trey decides to build a tension-and-release solo into the proceedings. This goes a bit awry, but the band recovers immediately by launching into "Mike's."

The "Mike's" is definitely a 3.0 version, but it's a really good 3.0 version. The Trey-shredding that carried a lot of the first set is back in full effect here, and it's excellent. The rest of the Groove is pretty standard, and then again we get what seems like a set-closer in "The Horse" > "Silent," but then "YEM" kicks off.

And man, what a "YEM" this is. The composed section rolls along with a level of energy that sounds more like it's from the first hour of a show instead of the third. The jam kicks off with a really oddly ethereal-sounding funk section that recalls "Shafty" at one point. Then we move into a great plinko section before Trey rips loose with one final, skull-crushing guitar solo. After the solo, the entire band slides back into the plinko space as slickly as if it was pre-planned. Just amazing stuff, and precise on a level that really should be heard to be appreciated. "Shine A Light" is a great way to wrap up the run, and after an especially good "YEM" and a well-built, energetic show all the way around, it left me feeling like the entire run had been better than it actually is. Which I guess is a convoluted way of saying that I really enjoyed MSG III, though I wouldn't go so far to call it a great show. At the same time, I think it goes a long way toward redeeming this spotty, mostly lackluster run and gives me high hopes for the tour closing show in Charlottesville. Roll on!

2009-12-03 MSG II

Well, the boys' second night at MSG starts off with the fire that the first night's opening duo lacked. It's always a good thing when "PYITE" opens a show, and it's even better when it's a particularly on-point, fiery version that's immediately followed by a "Number Line" that's noodled to perfection. After the band's mostly in-the-box performance on 12/2, I took this as a sign that things would be different on 12/3. I was both right and wrong.

The high-energy opening to set one continues through "Axila I" > "Taste," the latter featuring some great action from Mike and a better-than-average solo from Page. Mike's enthusiasm seems to get him the call next as the band goes into "Boogie On" and slays a short version, and then we move on to "Stash," which seems like a great, somewhat exploratory vehicle to keep this train moving...right? Right?

Well, something happens in this "Stash." There are some Phish jams that are bad because I'm just not "getting it." These jams might be someone else's Best Of All Time, but to me they sound like the mindless noodling parodies of the band always reference. There are some Phish jams that are bad because they're just executed poorly; the ideas are their but the hands aren't. And then there are the Phish jams that are bad because everyone's trying to do something potentially interesting at once, but nobody is jelling. I don't profess to frequently know what the band is thinking, obviously, but there are some times when they're synced up so poorly that it's just obvious. This "Stash" is one of those times. At the very least, Trey and Fish try to do interesting but opposing things during the jam at roughly the same time and the result is just flat. We wrap up shortly after, with this version weighing in well below the many excellent "Stash"s of '09.

Set one never really recovers. "Lawn Boy" is "Lawn Boy," then there's "Time Turns Elastic" (no comment), followed by slightly-above-average takes on "BOTT" and "Julius." This is one of those rare shows where I like the first half of the first set better than the second half.

The second set is more of what's becoming the standard Phish 3.0 template at this point: one long jam, one nice segue, and then a bunch of standards to end the show. We start with "Disease," which is 100% Grade A Trey Shredz up through the 9:30 mark before slowly creeping its way into a typical space-funk breakdown. It's creepy to me how frequently these long '09 jams depart for Weird Space between the 9:00 and 9:30 mark. Do they have a clock up on stage or something that tells the band when to stop functioning as a foundation for a Trey solo and start actually jamming? Because you can almost set your watch to it.

Anyway, the jam itself gets interesting at around the 12:30 mark, when Trey, Trey's looped guitar, and Page and start crashing together in a wonderful wall of sound. Things splinter into ambient space a few minutes later, but it's not the typical minimalist ambient dissolve of summer '09: instead, it's something more purposeful and haltingly melodic. Near the end of the jam, it gets more drone-like (think 12/2's "Slave" build) before melting into "Piper." The segue is great, though "Piper" itself is a pretty standard, Type 1 affair. There's a small "Birds"-esque funk space near the end that culminates in a bass outro that, in retrospect, sort of prefigures the rest of the show.

"Fluffhead" is your average version, but it leads into an energetic reading of "Cities" featuring some vocal vamping from Trey and a goddamn bass explosion from Mike. Again.

From "Cities" on, this is basically the Mike Show, in both good and bad ways. Good, in the sense that Mike ripping every song to shreds is awesome to hear, but bad, in the sense that he stands out partially because the rest of the band can't seem to get their shit together. "Free" is totally empty except for the bass, "Halley's" is a mess, and the rest of the show (including "Bowie") is just rolling up to a stop sign.

So, in the context of fall tour, this is honestly one of the better shows, if only for the high-energy run of songs in set one and the "Disease" > "Piper" in set two. In the context of '09 in general, it's another of those "listen to these two songs and skip the rest" shows, which seem to be becoming more and more prevalent as the year goes on. Aside from a solid jam here and there (like this "Disease" or last night's "Light"), I can still only really point to two or three half-shows as worth a listen in their entirety (11/20's and 11/28's second sets). Well, there's always MSG III! Fingers crossed.

Blatant Self-Promotion!

When I first started this blog, I was typing up show notes in Wordpad or Gedit while I listened to each show. Lately, I've started doing the same thing using Twitter instead. Unfortunately, this seems to have confused my Twitter followers, 90% of whom are academics who could care less about live music.

So, it seemed like a good plan for a number of reasons to create a second Twitter account, just to post my review notes and other Phish-related thoughts on. If you're interested in following, you can find my profile at www.twitter.com/saxscraper. My username is just @saxcraper.

2009-12-2 MSG I

Well, after the nuclear detonation that was the second set of 11/28, fall tour '09 has mostly settled back into its "groove," a jukebox-style approach to the band's catalog that I described earlier today on Twitter as "aggressively underwhelming." It's not that there's anything wrong with the band taking a fun, by-the-book victory lap at the end of their comeback tour, of course. As I've said before, I'm sure if I'd been in attendance for these shows, I'd have been perfectly happy with most of this fall tour. But on tape, four years later, and especially just after fall tour '13, it's hard to listen to this much "just-so"-ness.

Anyway, 12/2 is the first show of three at the Garden, pre-NYE for once. With that in mind, Trey comes out of the gates blazing...or at least trying to blaze. All three of the first trio of songs end in peak-y, trilling madness, but only "Wolfman's" really carries it off at all well. The middle of the set, honestly, is just flat. Good song selection for sure, and it's good to hear a (flubby) "Peaches," but there's not much that can be said about this set beyond a neat little funk space in "Wolfman's" and a solid-but-inessential version of "Divided Sky."

I feel like I'm failing to do my due diligence as a reviewer in only giving that many words to the first set, but that's sort of the space I'm in currently with this fall tour. Hopefully there's a reason for change soon. The first half of the second set makes me hopeful, in that it features some of what made the end of summer '09 so amazing, as well as at least one really unique soundscape.

The band rips into the second set with an energetic and perfectly-played "Golgi," which is followed by a monster "Light." Now, I'm not talking Dick's '12 "monster 'Light'" here, but it's still pretty great when you consider that at this point the most abstract reading the song has gotten so far in '09 was during the Gorge run. Trey starts off the jam with some strong leads, and the band follows along until a space reminiscent of "Timber" results. This unfortunately dissolves too soon into whale-pedal theatrics, which eat up the middle section of the jam. In the last few minutes, however, things get really interesting.

There's a dark, melodic section that kicks off at around 13:00, and it seems like the guys are headed for a spacey, minimalist sound similar to the end jam of the Blossom '10 "Number Line." Instead, though, things get darker and angrier. Trey and Mike double up on a deep, burbling effect, and there might have been a guitar loop in there during this section as well. Things stay murky for a few minutes before splintering apart (in a distinctly different way than the trademark '09 Ambient Dissolve) and then reforming into "Slave." This "Slave" is a worthy follow-up to the interesting "Light," as it features a really patient build and then an interesting and perfectly executed (how often can you use that phrase to describe an '09 jam?) drone-like build to the peak. And as if that wasn't enough, we get a quick segue into "Tweezer" next!

With all the weird, complex, and downright jaw-dropping "Tweezer"s of '13, this one might seem a little simplistic by comparison. But really, it's Type 1 "Tweezer" shredding of the highest caliber, invoking some serious mid-90s Trey licks at its peak, and featuring a funky, spacey breakdown near the end that hints at a greater jam to come before "Joy" rears its pretty, but frustrating head.

The rest of the show is by the book: standard versions of admittedly well-chosen songs, especially the closing "Day In the Life"/"Tweeprise" combo. "Velvet Sea" features an interesting solo, but the song proper is badly botched by a few band members, and "Antelope" is a solid jolt of energy that nonetheless fails to compare to any of the excellent summer '09 versions.

In the end, this show's really just about the "Light" > "Slave" > "Tweezer" sequence, and everything else you've seen before. But that's really enough, at least by fall '09 standards. At this point, I'm happy to have a standard show with one major jam feature, but I don't actually know if that's because I've lowered the bar due to fall tour in general being disappointing, or because the first half of 12/2's second set is really that good. It's probably a little of both.

I suppose it doesn't actually matter because I'm moving on to 12/3 tomorrow regardless. That's the spirit!