2009-07-30 Red Rocks I

There must be something in the water out west. I admit that after eight years of living in Washington state and loving it, I'm a little biased, but every time Phish 3.0 comes out and plays in Colorado or anywhere west of the Rockies, they blow anything they've done on the east coast away. '09 is no different: I'm two shows into the Red Rocks run, and the first show features a jam that blows away literally anything played during the first leg and the second show makes the first show look like a pile of shit. And apparently the third show is the highlight of the run, according to the internet. I can't wait. But first, here are my thoughts on night one.

While I don't really enjoy "Divided Sky" as an early-first-set block of composed music, I do quite like it as a show opener, especially to kick off a four-night run. This version is extra fiery, and hints at the energy that will run through the rest of the night. Trey absolutely shreds..."The Wedge" afterward; an odd choice for a fret-melting guitar workout, but subject-appropriate, considering the show's location. The next thing in my notes is the phrase "hot moma," so I'm going to guess this version of "Moma Dance" is first-set exceptional. "Horn" comes next, and while I can occasionally get sick of some of the band's oft-played shorter songs (like "Sample" and "Character Zero"), I never seem to get sick of "The Wedge" or "Horn." Go figure. In the following "Stash," the first real jam of the run, Trey starts working out some of the tension-y, circular riffs that have characterized a lot of the (very good) jamming at least throughout the first two shows. The jam starts a little subdued, with nice subtle interplay between Trey and Page, then there's a few minutes of what sounds like a major key switch-up before the song explodes into full-on bliss mode at 13:00. It's a decent warmup, but is pretty much nonessential when you consider what comes later. The set ends with a "Possum" that sees Trey launching himself into the jam with almost hilarious abandon, to great effect.

The second set starts off with an energetic Mike's Groove, but that doesn't matter because the "Ghost" that follows completely invalidates pretty much everything that's happened since March, including Alpine's transformative "Piper," and introduces a completely new improvisational direction (at least for 3.0) for the band. Admittedly expecting more the same when I kicked off this run, my jaw was on the floor at how fast things changed. First, I don't know if it's because I've been listening to the last few shows at home with the subwoofer turned up or what, but suddenly I can hear Mike and Fish a lot better than I could for most of early summer, and their work on the first few minutes of this "Ghost," even before the jam, hints at something exceptional coming. There's a space jam here, highlighted by Page's playing, a machine-gun Trey section, and then a bliss section that finally fades gently back into the funk that started the song. The switches between movements are a lot less turn-on-a-dime than earlier in the summer, which makes the entire jam seem a lot more organic, and gone is the ambient washout trick that they relied on a lot to transition between songs/jam sections regularly a month before. Near the end of the song, Page latches onto a riff that slowly morphs into a long "Windy City" tease. At the tail-end of a particularly amazing "Ghost" jam (one of my favorite songs), to get a "Windy City" tease (one of my favorite never-played-live songs) was just mind-blowing. Or, as I said in my notes: "i'm not sure what page started playing at 15:40, but it's fucking awesome. fucking windy city tease! this shit is just absolutely nuts. PERFECT page-only piano ending -> wolfman's. good christ."

"Wolfman's" is an above-average version that features some plinko-funk and later some Trey shredding, and while it's not on par with the "Ghost," it's a nice "outro."

Then, straight from my song-choice heaven comes "Billy Breathes." It's not exactly a perfect version, but I absolutely love the song, so it's nice to hear it played live.

The closing "Coil" > "Bowie" sandwich is also above-average: Page's outro on "Coil" gives him a chance to show off in a show that already has a lot of big Page moments, and the "Bowie" jam is a bit more patient and subtle than usual before building to the usual conclusion in an unexpected way. I'm often torn on "Bowie" jams (half the time they do nothing for me and half the time they're incredible), but this one is a keeper.

The highlight of this show (and likely one of the highlights of the year) is this "Ghost," but there's a lot of other good show here. If you like the song choice in the first set, it's a solid run, helped a lot by the guys' first-night energy. Pretty much everything in the second set except a pedestrian "Limb By Limb" is worth a listen...but for god's sake, at least listen to the "Ghost."

Oh, and someone has nicely uploaded the whole damn show to YouTube, so we're back to videos!