2009-06-04 Jones Beach II

Ah, a bit of redemption thanks to night two of Jones Beach after night one ran a flawless campaign for Worst Phish Show I've Listened To In Like Two Years.

Not only a breath of fresh air after two shitshows in a row, Jones Beach II is also the rare Phish show that has a better first set than a second set and yet still stands up as a great overall show that's worth a listen.

SO, HEY, THAT FIRST SET, HUH? "Grind" opener is always cute, especially when it runs right into a rip-roaring "Divided Sky" that even features a legitimately interesting mini-jam that rises above the "usual" outro treatment the band gives the song on most nights. "Ocelot" is, as I always say, just "Ocelot," but this version has a little extra fire, and this punch follows through into "Squirming Coil," which, like "Divided Sky" has an above-average outro jam. Trey (and everyone else) butchers "Punch You In the Eye," but they rumble through with aplomb and move on to a beautiful "Dirt," which is one of my favorite Phish songs. "NICU" is a bit of a mess, but the band is obviously having a great time, and so the flubs fly by with a smile this time. The ending combination of "Ghost" and "Antelope" is what really makes the set, though.

"Ghost" isn't, by any means, in the upper echelon of "Ghost"s, but it's probably the fourth best jam of 3.0 so far after the Hampton I "Tweezer," Hampton II "Ghost," and Hampton III "Disease" > "Seven Below." It starts off with pretty imaginative funk highlighted by Mike banging away in the background, and the funk gets spacey fast. After a few great minutes of space-funk, around the 7:00 mark the jam opens up into that more melodic, blissful register that the band so excels at. After some legit Trey-machine-gun-action, the space-funk re-rears its ugly (not ugly) head around 11:30, only to splash away into a gorgeous ambient washout with a psychedelically-powered Mike-bass underneath...and finally the song wraps up with a return to the opening riff. There are a lot of sections to this jam, stuffed into a short amount of time, but somehow they all work and the transitions between the movements (especially at 7:00) have that creepy, telepathic quality that all good Phish has. In fact, now that I'm writing more about it, I might like this better than the Hampton "Ghost."

I don't like "Antelope" as much as most Phish fans do, but Trey plays around with this intro in a really engaging way, and the energy from the "Ghost" bleeds over to make the rest of this version 1.0-intense.

There's not as much to say about set two. There's a nice, lazy "Water In The Sky," "Drowned" is one of my favorite Phish covers and this version features a drawn-out jam at the end. Though somewhat uninspired for the first few minutes, it eventually evolves into a play on the "Jumpin' Jack Flash" riff and then into a more ambient space, again highlighted by Mike's space-bass and some Trey wah-action...and then an AMAZING, patient segue in "Meatstick," of all things. The downfall of this set is that "TTE" and "YEM" pairing AGAIN, this time separated by only one song ("Waste"). After filling most of the previous 60 minutes with some pretty impressive improv, it's a bummer to hear these two (great but composed) songs back-to-back for nearly 40 minutes, and then the show ends.

The "Rock and Roll" encore, though a unique choice, really isn't anything exciting and things end with a thud.

I'll still take Hampton II and III over anything since, but now I'm looking forward to hearing Jones Beach III, at least.