The Verdict:
The second show of the year I got to see live was in Charlotte, and at the time I came away a bit more satisfied than I'd been with the DTE show. On relisten, I found more to like about the DTE show, and was curious if something similar would happen here.
Well, the first set is one of those where nothing terribly exciting happens, but the song choice is solid enough to keep things interesting. Had it not been for the band's tendency to toss out some S1 curveballs earlier in the year, this would have been a solid warm-up set; as it is, it's a little disappointing. That said, this is by far the best "Winterqueen" yet, with a stretched-out jazz-jam. The "Tube" is its usually-short self, but there's some interestingly weird chord-chopping action from Trey that makes it a standout modern-era version for me.
The second set is remarkably similar to the DTE show, actually, in the way it delivers its thrills. One big jam, and a lot of little jamlets connected by some great segues. Only this time around, the big jam is bigger and the great segues are greater. "CDT" is once again the highlight jam here, and it stays in a cohesively dark space throughout without losing momentum, changing and modulating without the distinct and sometimes jarring "Hey! It's funk!" > "Hey! It's rock!" jam style the band ends up in from time to time. It's one of the better (if not the best) non-Randall's "CDT" of the summer for me. And there's no video on YouTube because apparently nobody on earth was at this show but me.
Anyway, "Fuego" gets a short-but-sweet outro jam that dissolves beautifully into "Twist," and then there's the segue-of-the-summer -> "Circus." "Piper" is ultra-short, but moves organically into a surprise late-set "Rift," and then the guys land in "Waiting All Night" for a great take on the song, and a necessary cool-off. "Reba" is a late-set surprise as well, but this version is pretty standard.
The Live Review:
7/25/14: Relistening to my 2nd show of the summer now. Like 7/16 quite a bit more after, let's see if I find more to appreciate about 7/25.
7/25/14: Mike's Song opener is a great choice. Remember thinking that if they went into a 'second jam' my brain would bust.
7/25/14: Mike's B> BOTT to start.
7/25/14: Seriously sexy work from Fishman on this BOTT.
7/25/14: Good chords 'n' piano jam in Groove.
7/25/14: Good Wingsuit placement.
7/25/14: Wingsuit outro solo is a little shaky, until it dives back into the Dark and Down style.
7/25/14: Pretty mellow, chord-driven Possum instead of a shred-driven one.
7/25/14: TUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUBE
7/25/14: Neat little Ghost-like funk jam here, a little darker than usual. Trey distorting notes now.
7/25/14: MFMF is next. Except for Tube, everything's been played straight. Song choice is keeping it interesting, though.
7/25/14: Winterqueen! this tune is really growing on me live.
7/25/14: Extended Winterqueen jazz-jam > Beauty of a Broken Heart. Love hearing Page songs live, just wish Trey would play something decent.
7/25/14: Bowie to close the set. Page teasing the Bowie riff on his talkbox-thing at the beginning of the song.
7/25/14: Surprisingly purposeful Bowie jamming so far from Trey.
7/25/14: Slow to commit to the peak at the end of Bowie. Good version, though. Better than most recent ones.
7/25/14: Set's not done. Golgi.
7/25/14: Surprised me the first time, and just surprised me again. Because I'm stupid.
7/25/14: Major Trey flops on Golgi riff.
7/25/14: Someone in the audience is having a long, one-person conversation about how #phish should 'Play whatever they want.' #crowdbanter
7/25/14: 555 opener. Was bummed when this didn't go deep. But it's a solid version. Looking forward to hearing the CDT in SBD quality.
7/25/14: Trey trying to push things into the Weird Zone early in this CDT (< 4 minutes). Rest of the band is catching on now at 5:30.
7/25/14: Space-Darkness-Woos commence.
7/25/14: Loops and echoes abound early.
7/25/14: Weird. I remember thinking at the time that this CDT was a bit prone to jumping around. It sounds pretty consistent to me now.
7/25/14: Really dark and spacey. Of course I love it.
7/25/14: I'm not sure what Mike is doing right now but EVERYTHING IS AWESOME
7/25/14: That was a much better and more cohesive jam than I remembered. Nice > Fuego.
7/25/14: Had a proper Fuego jam come next, then BOOM! But, alas. StudioFuego it is.
7/25/14: Neat jamlet at the end of Fuego here, over a guitar loop that sort of approximates the song's main riff.
7/25/14: Actually, on relisten, totally sounds like they were trying to jam this Fuego and it just didn't work.
7/25/14: Really clever -> Twist to make up for it, though.
7/25/14: Page is owning the electric piano underneath Trey's chording here.
7/25/14: Oh yeah, that AWESOME segue into Circus!!
7/25/14: One of my favorite #phish things is when they segue brilliantly into a new song but not exactly that song... (1/2)
7/25/14: ...and then continue to play the whole song in the 'new' style instead of forcing a full transition. (2/2)
7/25/14: Anyway, Circus > Piper. My second hope for a jammed-out Piper this summer = SHORTEST PIPER EVER (srsly, 4:56 on LP).
7/25/14: A whole 30 seconds longer than the studio version!
7/25/14: At the tail of this Piper, Trey can't seem to decide if he's going for Rift or Scent of a Mule, but Rift wins out.
7/25/14: Frankly, though, that was a pretty natural ->. Despite truncated jams in this set, no official ripcords yet, according to my RCI.
7/25/14: Really solid Waiting All Night after the seguefest ends.
7/25/14: Forgot about the late-set Reba, too.
7/25/14: Trey teasing the Fuego theme a bit here.
7/25/14: Really mellow jam now, bolstered by huge Mike bombs.
7/25/14: Zero'd. Again.
7/25/14: End set with Page teasing Fuego.
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