The Verdict:
Happily, the second Bethel show is just as good, if not better than, the first. "Theme" is another weird/fun opener, and the rest of the set continues with interesting song choices, including an extended rock jam in "Cities," a twelve-minute Type I "Halley's" (!) and a plinko-infused "Jim." The highlight of this very-2015-seeming opening set, though, is by far the propulsive rock-jammed "Gin" that segues into a heavy version of "Manteca" and then back into "Gin" to close the set. It's for real.
The second set begins with an excellent "Disease" that first recalls the just-finished "Gin" jam and then, later, the delicate, melodic outros of both recent versions of "Waves." "Number Line" gets one of those Type I jams that are so energetic that you almost prefer it to a deeper jam: Trey guides the band into and then back out of a tension-and-release segment pretty much perfectly. The "Makisupa" that follows prefigures the "Page's house" joke that will pop up now and again for the rest of the summer, and though the "Hood" and "Bowie" that round out the second set don't go anywhere new, they're both longish, satisfying versions.
In short, damn. The band is two for two so far this year. Excited for night three.
The Live Review:
5/28/11: Theme opener. That's fun.
5/28/11: Hard-rocking Theme outro > NICU.
5/28/11: Slow-tempoed but busy-sounding Cities is next. Loving Fish's beat.
5/28/11: Great straight-up rock solo from Trey in this one.
5/28/11: Rarely does Cities seem to just get rocked the hell out. Today is that day.
5/28/11: HELL IS COMIN
5/28/11: Ripping lead in the Halley's solo, and then Fish changes the beat COULD THIS BE A REAL HALLEY'S JAM?!
5/28/11: Mike droning on the bass, Trey and Page skedaddling over top of it.
5/28/11: Type 1.5-style Halley's jam tops out at about 12 minutes (!) > Jim.
5/28/11: Jim featuring a plinko-style jam during the build to the second verse. Awesome.
5/28/11: Gumbo is next. Not only are many of these songs going in interesting places, I'm loving the song choices.
5/28/11: Extended jazzy outro from Page.
5/28/11: Quinn!
5/28/11: Whoa. Trey is exploding. It's been a good set for him.
5/28/11: Butt-slammed into Limb By Limb. Not really a segue, Trey just started LxL while there was thirty seconds or so of Quinn left.
5/28/11: Trey shreds the end of LxL > Horn.
5/28/11: Gin as the set closer. Page starts us off with a bang, and now, entering the jam, Fish is laying down a mellow beat.
5/28/11: Trey leading a bit build-up now.
5/28/11: So this definitely isn't going way Out There, but it's still the real deal. Exciting jam.
5/28/11: 'Crab in my shoe mouth' lyrics now over the jam.
5/28/11: Grungy-style Manteca jam.
5/28/11: That was great. End set.
5/28/11: Disease opens the second set. Trey rips right into it.
5/28/11: Momentum of this new jam section actually reminds of the Gin we just heard.
5/28/11: Going back to a muted soundscape a lot like the end of the Waves soundcheck and 5/27's Waves jam.
5/28/11: If this is where a lot of jams are going to land in 2011, I'm not going to complain.
5/28/11: Maybe if they're still doing it in August I'll complain :)
5/28/11: -> Free. Nice segue.
5/28/11: Loud-but-short Free > Number Line.
5/28/11: Sort of circular jam happening now.
5/28/11: Tension-y, almost evil Number Line jam here.
5/28/11: It's no Blossom '10 Number Line, but damn.
5/28/11: 2011 Trey is actually a bit better at leading the band into hairy territory and then leading them back out smoothly.
5/28/11: Case in point, this goddamn Number Line, which is incredible.
5/28/11: The move out of the tension jam into a reprise of the Number Line outro was like melted butter.
5/28/11: Makisupa is a great cool-down song. Nice choice.
5/28/11: Trey throws the improvised lyrics over to Page and Page 'smokes a big spliff.'
5/28/11: Now it's Fish's turn. I'm pretty sure he just said 'Corn.'
5/28/11: Trey was watching 'House.' In his house.
5/28/11: Everyone screaming 'MIKE'S HOUSE!' while Mike takes a bass solo.
5/28/11: Okay, now we're all screaming about Page house. Page solo.
5/28/11: 'This is what it sounds like...in Fish's house...' > Hood.
5/28/11: Trey struggles a bit with the heavy-metal composed part, but the jam starts off in a really interesting direction.
5/28/11: After a long, patient stay in mellowland, the jam is starting to build up a bit now.
5/28/11: Nice Hood peak > Cavern. This set just ain't letting up.
5/28/11: The hits just keep coming. Cavern > Bowie.
5/28/11: Starting off mellow, similar to the Hood.
5/28/11: Good extended but guitar-led version of Bowie to close the second set.
5/28/11: A Day in the Life encore.
5/28/11: That was a great show. Sure, the jams were necessarily as deep as a top-tier 2015 show, but man.
5/28/11: Both well-constructed sets, Cities and Halley's got extended in S1, and a legit jam in Gin -> Manteca -> Gin to close.
5/28/11: S2 had a strong Disease jam with a cool segue and extended takes on Number Line, Hood, and Bowie, not to mention the 'House' bit.
5/28/11: The first two 2011 shows have been better than almost all of 2010, and that makes me happy.
Feb 24, 2016
2011-05-27 Bethel I
The Verdict:
Jumping back to 2011 after 2015 has been...interesting. As I mentioned a few times during the live reviews, I've been surprised by how tight and high-energy the playing is, easily moreso and more consistently so than 2015 Phish. On the other hand, there's little to no sign of that full-band, four-headed deep space exploration that has so characterized the last few great years of 3.0. That said, 2011 so far is a definitely improvement over the ~50 show doldrums that were 2010. Where some of the hallmarks of 2010 are still in place (technically precise, high-speed first sets and excellent song choices all show long), there are is more of a tendency to stretch songs during the first two shows this year that didn't exist during the previous year. We're not quite to 2015 levels of jamming yet, but, for the first time since I started this project, I'm seeing how we get there.
The first night of the tour opens with "Tweezer," which is a mission statement if I've ever heard one. It's balls-out rock instead of a deep jam, but the quick > "My Friend, My Friend" makes up a bit for that. Trey plays around with an odd scale for awhile in "Wolfman's" before a vocal jam and then a long, patient segue into "Walk Away," making up the biggest highlight from the opening frame. "Stash" is a close second, with an ominous jam in the middle and a peak the likes of which we haven't seen in awhile at the end.
S2 starts with "Carini," but it stays totally in the box, as do the next few songs. It's not really until nearly the end of "Boogie On" when the band lets loose, absolutely deconstructing the song in classic experimental-Phish fashion and then seguing into a "Waves" that admittedly fails to reach the depths of its soundcheck counterpart, but revisits similarly beautiful territory during its outro nonetheless. The last legit highlight from the set comes in "Crosseyed," which goes to a dark, almost metal place for a few minutes before hitting on what sounds suspiciously like the outro to "Twenty Years Later." The rest of the set trades in the kind of precision and energy that the first set did, but there's not much else there to remark on. That said, there are some legitimate highlights from both sets in this tour opener, especially the "Boogie On" > "Waves," which I'll be replaying sooner rather than later.
The Live Review:
5/27/11: So the tour opener is...Tweezer?!
5/27/11: That's just awesome and hilarious. Crowd LOSING it.
5/27/11: Awesome descending piano riff from Page during the Tweezer jam.
5/27/11: Trey is bringing this one home, full-on rock solo style.
5/27/11: Rock-jam starting to peter out, Trey pulls out a quick > MFMF.
5/27/11: Super high-tempo version of MFMF, Fish is losing his mind.
5/27/11: Poor Heart!
5/27/11: Roses is next. So far, a lot more energy and speed in S1 than most of 2015.
5/27/11: Of course, we sort of knew that considering how readily they ripped up every song for all of 2010...
5/27/11: ...but then proceeded to play, like, 2-3 jams the entire year.
5/27/11: Hopefully the Waves soundcheck jam is an indication that there will be more exploration this year.
5/27/11: Hot version of Roses > Funky Bitch.
5/27/11: Page just BLEW UP that Funky Bitch.
5/27/11: Wolfman's Brother's getting a bit of vocal jam outro.
5/27/11: Trey laying down a Wolfman's solo in...a...different...scale? I think?
5/27/11: Well, that wasn't exactly Type II, but it was interesting.
5/27/11: -> Walk Away!! Nice!
5/27/11: Great segue, and Trey is ready to rip it up.
5/27/11: This has been one of my favorite Phish cover songs since the 8/5/11 Roggae > Walk Away.
5/27/11: Never does anything interesting, but just some straight-up quality rock and roll.
5/27/11: Long break after Walk Away. Trey playing some harmonics and saying something to Fish. Then, Stash.
5/27/11: It *almost* sounded like the intro to TTE, but I'm not sure.
5/27/11: MAYBE SO MAYBE NOT
5/27/11: Pretty ominous little jam in the middle of Stash from Trey and Page.
5/27/11: Impressive peak after that. It seems like it's been awhile since there was a peak in Stash.
5/27/11: Bouncin'! It's rare enough these days that I'm happy to hear it :)
5/27/11: Propulsive version of KDF is next. Fish is hulking up.
5/27/11: Trey adding some loops. Page to electric piano.
5/27/11: Difference between 2011 and 2015: Trey is driving pretty much ALL THE TIME in 2011.
5/27/11: In a way, it's nice because he's way more assertive and plays more leads. In a way, it's not nice because jams are one dimensional.
5/27/11: That's a long way of saying Trey just soloed for 11 minutes over the KDF progression and now the song is over.
5/27/11: Bold As Love. Probably the set closer.
5/27/11: S2 starts with someone (Trey?) shouting 'Aw, what the fuck' and then Carini.
5/27/11: Compact Carini and now BOTT. Feeling more like a second first set so far.
5/27/11: Trey and Page bring BOTT up to a pretty satisfying boil.
5/27/11: Boogie On keeps the first set vibe in place.
5/27/11: That sounds like a complaint, but honestly it's hard to knock a show that has both Funky Bitch and Boogie On.
5/27/11: Plinko-style jam. Mike is getting NASTY.
5/27/11: DO NOT STOP DOING THIS FOR AT LEAST 15 MINUTES
5/27/11: Deconstructing jam now. Bass line disappears and plinko-loop jamming filling the space.
5/27/11: Trey drops tempo and pitch. Super weird.
5/27/11: Rest of the band following. Moving up and down between keys and changing tempos.
5/27/11: Jam is totally broken down now. Arrhythmic. Did not expect this.
5/27/11: Synth from Page.
5/27/11: Pretty sure Trey is slowly bringing Waves in.
5/27/11: Yup. -> Waves.
5/27/11: First Waves jam (to lyrics reprise) is pretty standard stuff.
5/27/11: Mike and Page are leading a broken-down, circular jam now.
5/27/11: Really interesting, delicate little jam emerging now. Could easily go into a 2015-style build, but they're being patient with it.
5/27/11: Sort of similar to the end of the soundcheck Waves. Probably not an accident, huh?
5/27/11: 'Ethereal' is a good word here.
5/27/11: > Caspian.
5/27/11: https://t.co/HKtBCVAYH5
5/27/11: Pretty standard take on Caspian. Noise-loop ending. > Crosseyed!
5/27/11: I didn't think Crosseyed really happened in 2011. Shows how much I know about this year.
5/27/11: LOST MY SHAPE
5/27/11: Strong Type I solo into a vocal reprise.
5/27/11: Mike and Trey take the song's main riff into almost a metal place immediately after the vocals.
5/27/11: Jam reminds me a bit of the Twenty Years Later outro.
5/27/11: Jam winding down now.
5/27/11: Trey singing the lyrics to Velvet Sea over the roil. > Velvet Sea.
5/27/11: Mike laying down a really driving bass riff in Wading. It's weird, I don't usually even hear him during this song.
5/27/11: Possum seems like a weird choice here.
5/27/11: I COME FROM TACO MOUNTAIN, BABY
5/27/11: Squirming Coil, possibly to send the second set?
5/27/11: Page adding a bit of jazz flair to his outro solo. Crowd clapping along now.
5/27/11: Julius encore.
5/27/11: Pretty rowdy Julius dere.
5/27/11: After one show of 2011, I can safely say that it sits somewhere between 2010 and 2015 in quality so far.
5/27/11: The high energy and rapid-fire playing of 2010 is there, and the expansive, full-band improv of later 3.0 isn't.
5/27/11: Yet, there's a little more...'extending' of songs here that seems to indicate an interest in exploration...
5/27/11: ...that was missing for almost all of 2010.
5/27/11: That said, the Boogie On -> Waves is a legitimate highlight for any year and you should listen to it.
Jumping back to 2011 after 2015 has been...interesting. As I mentioned a few times during the live reviews, I've been surprised by how tight and high-energy the playing is, easily moreso and more consistently so than 2015 Phish. On the other hand, there's little to no sign of that full-band, four-headed deep space exploration that has so characterized the last few great years of 3.0. That said, 2011 so far is a definitely improvement over the ~50 show doldrums that were 2010. Where some of the hallmarks of 2010 are still in place (technically precise, high-speed first sets and excellent song choices all show long), there are is more of a tendency to stretch songs during the first two shows this year that didn't exist during the previous year. We're not quite to 2015 levels of jamming yet, but, for the first time since I started this project, I'm seeing how we get there.
The first night of the tour opens with "Tweezer," which is a mission statement if I've ever heard one. It's balls-out rock instead of a deep jam, but the quick > "My Friend, My Friend" makes up a bit for that. Trey plays around with an odd scale for awhile in "Wolfman's" before a vocal jam and then a long, patient segue into "Walk Away," making up the biggest highlight from the opening frame. "Stash" is a close second, with an ominous jam in the middle and a peak the likes of which we haven't seen in awhile at the end.
S2 starts with "Carini," but it stays totally in the box, as do the next few songs. It's not really until nearly the end of "Boogie On" when the band lets loose, absolutely deconstructing the song in classic experimental-Phish fashion and then seguing into a "Waves" that admittedly fails to reach the depths of its soundcheck counterpart, but revisits similarly beautiful territory during its outro nonetheless. The last legit highlight from the set comes in "Crosseyed," which goes to a dark, almost metal place for a few minutes before hitting on what sounds suspiciously like the outro to "Twenty Years Later." The rest of the set trades in the kind of precision and energy that the first set did, but there's not much else there to remark on. That said, there are some legitimate highlights from both sets in this tour opener, especially the "Boogie On" > "Waves," which I'll be replaying sooner rather than later.
The Live Review:
5/27/11: So the tour opener is...Tweezer?!
5/27/11: That's just awesome and hilarious. Crowd LOSING it.
5/27/11: Awesome descending piano riff from Page during the Tweezer jam.
5/27/11: Trey is bringing this one home, full-on rock solo style.
5/27/11: Rock-jam starting to peter out, Trey pulls out a quick > MFMF.
5/27/11: Super high-tempo version of MFMF, Fish is losing his mind.
5/27/11: Poor Heart!
5/27/11: Roses is next. So far, a lot more energy and speed in S1 than most of 2015.
5/27/11: Of course, we sort of knew that considering how readily they ripped up every song for all of 2010...
5/27/11: ...but then proceeded to play, like, 2-3 jams the entire year.
5/27/11: Hopefully the Waves soundcheck jam is an indication that there will be more exploration this year.
5/27/11: Hot version of Roses > Funky Bitch.
5/27/11: Page just BLEW UP that Funky Bitch.
5/27/11: Wolfman's Brother's getting a bit of vocal jam outro.
5/27/11: Trey laying down a Wolfman's solo in...a...different...scale? I think?
5/27/11: Well, that wasn't exactly Type II, but it was interesting.
5/27/11: -> Walk Away!! Nice!
5/27/11: Great segue, and Trey is ready to rip it up.
5/27/11: This has been one of my favorite Phish cover songs since the 8/5/11 Roggae > Walk Away.
5/27/11: Never does anything interesting, but just some straight-up quality rock and roll.
5/27/11: Long break after Walk Away. Trey playing some harmonics and saying something to Fish. Then, Stash.
5/27/11: It *almost* sounded like the intro to TTE, but I'm not sure.
5/27/11: MAYBE SO MAYBE NOT
5/27/11: Pretty ominous little jam in the middle of Stash from Trey and Page.
5/27/11: Impressive peak after that. It seems like it's been awhile since there was a peak in Stash.
5/27/11: Bouncin'! It's rare enough these days that I'm happy to hear it :)
5/27/11: Propulsive version of KDF is next. Fish is hulking up.
5/27/11: Trey adding some loops. Page to electric piano.
5/27/11: Difference between 2011 and 2015: Trey is driving pretty much ALL THE TIME in 2011.
5/27/11: In a way, it's nice because he's way more assertive and plays more leads. In a way, it's not nice because jams are one dimensional.
5/27/11: That's a long way of saying Trey just soloed for 11 minutes over the KDF progression and now the song is over.
5/27/11: Bold As Love. Probably the set closer.
5/27/11: S2 starts with someone (Trey?) shouting 'Aw, what the fuck' and then Carini.
5/27/11: Compact Carini and now BOTT. Feeling more like a second first set so far.
5/27/11: Trey and Page bring BOTT up to a pretty satisfying boil.
5/27/11: Boogie On keeps the first set vibe in place.
5/27/11: That sounds like a complaint, but honestly it's hard to knock a show that has both Funky Bitch and Boogie On.
5/27/11: Plinko-style jam. Mike is getting NASTY.
5/27/11: DO NOT STOP DOING THIS FOR AT LEAST 15 MINUTES
5/27/11: Deconstructing jam now. Bass line disappears and plinko-loop jamming filling the space.
5/27/11: Trey drops tempo and pitch. Super weird.
5/27/11: Rest of the band following. Moving up and down between keys and changing tempos.
5/27/11: Jam is totally broken down now. Arrhythmic. Did not expect this.
5/27/11: Synth from Page.
5/27/11: Pretty sure Trey is slowly bringing Waves in.
5/27/11: Yup. -> Waves.
5/27/11: First Waves jam (to lyrics reprise) is pretty standard stuff.
5/27/11: Mike and Page are leading a broken-down, circular jam now.
5/27/11: Really interesting, delicate little jam emerging now. Could easily go into a 2015-style build, but they're being patient with it.
5/27/11: Sort of similar to the end of the soundcheck Waves. Probably not an accident, huh?
5/27/11: 'Ethereal' is a good word here.
5/27/11: > Caspian.
5/27/11: https://t.co/HKtBCVAYH5
5/27/11: Pretty standard take on Caspian. Noise-loop ending. > Crosseyed!
5/27/11: I didn't think Crosseyed really happened in 2011. Shows how much I know about this year.
5/27/11: LOST MY SHAPE
5/27/11: Strong Type I solo into a vocal reprise.
5/27/11: Mike and Trey take the song's main riff into almost a metal place immediately after the vocals.
5/27/11: Jam reminds me a bit of the Twenty Years Later outro.
5/27/11: Jam winding down now.
5/27/11: Trey singing the lyrics to Velvet Sea over the roil. > Velvet Sea.
5/27/11: Mike laying down a really driving bass riff in Wading. It's weird, I don't usually even hear him during this song.
5/27/11: Possum seems like a weird choice here.
5/27/11: I COME FROM TACO MOUNTAIN, BABY
5/27/11: Squirming Coil, possibly to send the second set?
5/27/11: Page adding a bit of jazz flair to his outro solo. Crowd clapping along now.
5/27/11: Julius encore.
5/27/11: Pretty rowdy Julius dere.
5/27/11: After one show of 2011, I can safely say that it sits somewhere between 2010 and 2015 in quality so far.
5/27/11: The high energy and rapid-fire playing of 2010 is there, and the expansive, full-band improv of later 3.0 isn't.
5/27/11: Yet, there's a little more...'extending' of songs here that seems to indicate an interest in exploration...
5/27/11: ...that was missing for almost all of 2010.
5/27/11: That said, the Boogie On -> Waves is a legitimate highlight for any year and you should listen to it.
2011-05-26 Bethel Waves Soundcheck
The Verdict:
Well, it didn't feel right to start off 2011 without first listening to and tweeting about the Bethel Waves jam. The review is below, and here's the audio in case you need to listen for what I assume is at least the fifteenth time:
The Live Review:
5/26/11: Obviously inappropriate of me to start reviewing summer 2011 without reviewing the Bethel Waves first. So here we go.
5/26/11: Nice, propulsive start to the jam, with some 2.0-style soloing from Trey.
5/26/11: 2011 Trey doesn't have the melodic touch that 2015 Trey has, but he's playing a lot more notes, which is good in a different way.
5/26/11: Departing Type I shores at around 8:00.
5/26/11: After an interesting bit of circular riffing, Trey switches to a more distorted tone, and now we've moved to jazz-rock land.
5/26/11: A lot of grungy Trey/Mike interplay going on now.
5/26/11: Never realized what a big role Fish's drumming plays in this jam. He never lets up.
5/26/11: Brief ambient break and then some great melodic riffing from Trey over a murky soundscape.
5/26/11: This picking riff is super-excellent.
5/26/11: The last seven or so minutes of that jam were absolutely gorgeous. Wow.
5/26/11: Great ending, too. Double wow.
Well, it didn't feel right to start off 2011 without first listening to and tweeting about the Bethel Waves jam. The review is below, and here's the audio in case you need to listen for what I assume is at least the fifteenth time:
The Live Review:
5/26/11: Obviously inappropriate of me to start reviewing summer 2011 without reviewing the Bethel Waves first. So here we go.
5/26/11: Nice, propulsive start to the jam, with some 2.0-style soloing from Trey.
5/26/11: 2011 Trey doesn't have the melodic touch that 2015 Trey has, but he's playing a lot more notes, which is good in a different way.
5/26/11: Departing Type I shores at around 8:00.
5/26/11: After an interesting bit of circular riffing, Trey switches to a more distorted tone, and now we've moved to jazz-rock land.
5/26/11: A lot of grungy Trey/Mike interplay going on now.
5/26/11: Never realized what a big role Fish's drumming plays in this jam. He never lets up.
5/26/11: Brief ambient break and then some great melodic riffing from Trey over a murky soundscape.
5/26/11: This picking riff is super-excellent.
5/26/11: The last seven or so minutes of that jam were absolutely gorgeous. Wow.
5/26/11: Great ending, too. Double wow.
2016-01-17 Riviera Maya III
The Verdict:
So, the final night of the Mexico run continues the trend of delivering solid-but-poorly-received-2015-style shows begun by N1 and N2.
The first half of the first set doesn't do anything new, but like the previous two nights' opening frames, it's high on energy and the song selection and flow are miles above any S1 since at least Magnaball. The second half of the set gets satisfyingly weird, with an extra spicy "KDF," an extended "Gin," and a "Moma" that actually, finally changes the script a little with a surprise vocal jam and ambient hum that leads perfectly into "Saw It Again."
Set two is all about the "Shipwreck" teases. The use of "Shipwreck" samples in the "Disease" jam takes what can frankly be a tired jam vehicle these days and injects it with new life, making up easily one of the more interesting, if not necessarily the most flawless jams of the year. "Roggae" is its usual excellent self, and then "Crosseyed" returns to "Shipwreck" jamming and some ghost-howling vocals (that's literally the only way to describe it) from the band. The effect is super eerie, which makes it even more head-scratching when then segue into "Farmhouse." Oh well.
That's really the meat of the second set, as the "Mike's Groove" that wraps things up is a little underwhelming save for the second return of "Shipwreck" samples during the "Weekapaug." A typical "Slave" and then a first-ever-but-rough take on "The Ocean" end the show, and the run.
For the first three-fourths of this show at least I found myself asking the question I've been asking about this run all along: why all the hate? There's a lot to like here, and I feel like Magnaball is casting an unreasonably long shadow. Sure, it was a great festival with some fantastic performances, and an easy all-timer in 8/22, but it certainly isn't the be-all end-all of Phish 2015. This run, MSG, and even Dick's have comparable highlights, if not as many, and it's sad to see the tour often characterized as an amazing year until Magnaball and then a bunch of shitty runs in a row when that's obviously not what these are. There's a few jams from Mexico and a lot of the MSG run that stands up to anything from earlier in the year, and to miss out on that by putting a particular run of shows on a pedestal is dumb.
Oh well. I listened to them all, anyway, and I had fun.
There's not really much video on YouTube from this show and no recordings up on phishtracks yet, so the best I can do is linking to the whole webcast for highlights. Sorry!
The Live Review:
1/17/16: Showtime again!
1/17/16: Mexican Cousin opener!
1/17/16: The Curtain With at #2.
1/17/16: FOLLOW THE LINES GOING SOUTH!
1/17/16: I jumped the gun the bit on the With there, but I was right.
1/17/16: Sample is third. Nice, slow-burning The Curtain With there.
1/17/16: Great (and surprising!) use of bass bombs in Sample from Mike.
1/17/16: Trey takes a minute after Sample to thank the road crew and tell the crowd that Phish is TOTALLY BREAKING UP, GUYS until summer.
1/17/16: Yarmouth Road! Great S1 tune lately.
1/17/16: The Landlady?! Great to see that staying in sets!
1/17/16: Hahaha...Army of One is basically the funniest song Phish could sing on a beach in Mexico. Thanks, Page.
1/17/16: Trey struggling a bit there.
1/17/16: Kill Devil Falls is next. They certainly aren't reinventing the wheel here, but like the rest of the Mexico S1s...
1/17/16: ...it's way more fun than any of the opening Dick's or MSG frames.
1/17/16: Extra-hot KDF (and I don't say that lightly).
1/17/16: Now Gin, and Trey's taking some nasty leads as it moves from a slow jam to a rolling boil.
1/17/16: Type I Gin, but an impressive version. Immediately heads into Funky Bitch.
1/17/16: Keeping up the momentum with Moma Dance.
1/17/16: Impromptu vocal jam initiated by Fish in Moma Dance! Very cool.
1/17/16: Okay, things just got interesting with an echo-funk jam out of Moma Dance -> Saw It Again.
1/17/16: After a great segue, Saw It Again closes the first set.
1/17/16: Some synth swells at the end of Saw It Again gives it that end-of-set-peak feeling.
1/17/16: S2 starts with some Trey noodling and then Mike starting up Disease. Last monster jam of the year?
1/17/16: Some typical Type I action until Mike takes control around the 8:00 mark. Trey filling in the spaces with some looping.
1/17/16: Shipwreck samples from Page while Trey and Mike trill underneath.
1/17/16: Page is doing some super-cool stuff with the samples. Jam building.
1/17/16: That was really awesome. Now the jam is moving toward a more typical rock-funk space. Mike has got a great bassline going.
1/17/16: After the sample jam, the rest was a pretty tasty, momentum-filled 2015-style-chord jam. Neat stuff.
1/17/16: Trey tries to -> Roggae but biffs the intro riff. More like a > Roggae. Eventually.
1/17/16: Extra-minimal beginning to the jam on Roggae. Mike and Trey sort of trading licks for a bit.
1/17/16: Still builds up to a pretty fantastic peak by the end.
1/17/16: Crosseyed!!!
1/17/16: Nice up-tempo version of one of my favorite Phish covers so far.
1/17/16: Big ol' rock jam so far. At 9:00 mark now.
1/17/16: Oh hell yes, the Shipwreck samples are back. Dark space jam developing.
1/17/16: 'I Don't Live Today' vocal tease from Fish (?).
1/17/16: This jam doesn't have the flow of the Disease, but it's eerie.
1/17/16: Creepy ghost voices now from Page. So awesome.
1/17/16: Too bad they already played Ghost.
1/17/16: > Farmhouse might be the weirdest setlist call EVAR
1/17/16: I'd be lying if I said I didn't groan a little there. And I LIKE Farmhouse.
1/17/16: Above-average solo from Trey in Farmhouse, but nobody's going to listen to it anyway. Mike's Song is next.
1/17/16: Looks like Mike's might be headed into echo-funk territory again.
1/17/16: Trey laying down a solo in a weird, atypical mode. Short, but strange version of Mike's.
1/17/16: Seamless drop into Bug. Another strange setlist choice, but okay.
1/17/16: Synth coming back at the beginning of Groove.
1/17/16: Shipwreck samples coming back again.
1/17/16: Slow-tempo Slave coming next.
1/17/16: Love the early bit of this Slave jam.
1/17/16: And, of course, The Ocean closer.
1/17/16: 2/4ths of this band did NOT practice the outro to The Ocean.
1/17/16: And that's that! After writing the blog reviews, I'll be back with 5/27/11 next, believe it or not!
So, the final night of the Mexico run continues the trend of delivering solid-but-poorly-received-2015-style shows begun by N1 and N2.
The first half of the first set doesn't do anything new, but like the previous two nights' opening frames, it's high on energy and the song selection and flow are miles above any S1 since at least Magnaball. The second half of the set gets satisfyingly weird, with an extra spicy "KDF," an extended "Gin," and a "Moma" that actually, finally changes the script a little with a surprise vocal jam and ambient hum that leads perfectly into "Saw It Again."
Set two is all about the "Shipwreck" teases. The use of "Shipwreck" samples in the "Disease" jam takes what can frankly be a tired jam vehicle these days and injects it with new life, making up easily one of the more interesting, if not necessarily the most flawless jams of the year. "Roggae" is its usual excellent self, and then "Crosseyed" returns to "Shipwreck" jamming and some ghost-howling vocals (that's literally the only way to describe it) from the band. The effect is super eerie, which makes it even more head-scratching when then segue into "Farmhouse." Oh well.
That's really the meat of the second set, as the "Mike's Groove" that wraps things up is a little underwhelming save for the second return of "Shipwreck" samples during the "Weekapaug." A typical "Slave" and then a first-ever-but-rough take on "The Ocean" end the show, and the run.
For the first three-fourths of this show at least I found myself asking the question I've been asking about this run all along: why all the hate? There's a lot to like here, and I feel like Magnaball is casting an unreasonably long shadow. Sure, it was a great festival with some fantastic performances, and an easy all-timer in 8/22, but it certainly isn't the be-all end-all of Phish 2015. This run, MSG, and even Dick's have comparable highlights, if not as many, and it's sad to see the tour often characterized as an amazing year until Magnaball and then a bunch of shitty runs in a row when that's obviously not what these are. There's a few jams from Mexico and a lot of the MSG run that stands up to anything from earlier in the year, and to miss out on that by putting a particular run of shows on a pedestal is dumb.
Oh well. I listened to them all, anyway, and I had fun.
There's not really much video on YouTube from this show and no recordings up on phishtracks yet, so the best I can do is linking to the whole webcast for highlights. Sorry!
The Live Review:
1/17/16: Showtime again!
1/17/16: Mexican Cousin opener!
1/17/16: The Curtain With at #2.
1/17/16: FOLLOW THE LINES GOING SOUTH!
1/17/16: I jumped the gun the bit on the With there, but I was right.
1/17/16: Sample is third. Nice, slow-burning The Curtain With there.
1/17/16: Great (and surprising!) use of bass bombs in Sample from Mike.
1/17/16: Trey takes a minute after Sample to thank the road crew and tell the crowd that Phish is TOTALLY BREAKING UP, GUYS until summer.
1/17/16: Yarmouth Road! Great S1 tune lately.
1/17/16: The Landlady?! Great to see that staying in sets!
1/17/16: Hahaha...Army of One is basically the funniest song Phish could sing on a beach in Mexico. Thanks, Page.
1/17/16: Trey struggling a bit there.
1/17/16: Kill Devil Falls is next. They certainly aren't reinventing the wheel here, but like the rest of the Mexico S1s...
1/17/16: ...it's way more fun than any of the opening Dick's or MSG frames.
1/17/16: Extra-hot KDF (and I don't say that lightly).
1/17/16: Now Gin, and Trey's taking some nasty leads as it moves from a slow jam to a rolling boil.
1/17/16: Type I Gin, but an impressive version. Immediately heads into Funky Bitch.
1/17/16: Keeping up the momentum with Moma Dance.
1/17/16: Impromptu vocal jam initiated by Fish in Moma Dance! Very cool.
1/17/16: Okay, things just got interesting with an echo-funk jam out of Moma Dance -> Saw It Again.
1/17/16: After a great segue, Saw It Again closes the first set.
1/17/16: Some synth swells at the end of Saw It Again gives it that end-of-set-peak feeling.
1/17/16: S2 starts with some Trey noodling and then Mike starting up Disease. Last monster jam of the year?
1/17/16: Some typical Type I action until Mike takes control around the 8:00 mark. Trey filling in the spaces with some looping.
1/17/16: Shipwreck samples from Page while Trey and Mike trill underneath.
1/17/16: Page is doing some super-cool stuff with the samples. Jam building.
1/17/16: That was really awesome. Now the jam is moving toward a more typical rock-funk space. Mike has got a great bassline going.
1/17/16: After the sample jam, the rest was a pretty tasty, momentum-filled 2015-style-chord jam. Neat stuff.
1/17/16: Trey tries to -> Roggae but biffs the intro riff. More like a > Roggae. Eventually.
1/17/16: Extra-minimal beginning to the jam on Roggae. Mike and Trey sort of trading licks for a bit.
1/17/16: Still builds up to a pretty fantastic peak by the end.
1/17/16: Crosseyed!!!
1/17/16: Nice up-tempo version of one of my favorite Phish covers so far.
1/17/16: Big ol' rock jam so far. At 9:00 mark now.
1/17/16: Oh hell yes, the Shipwreck samples are back. Dark space jam developing.
1/17/16: 'I Don't Live Today' vocal tease from Fish (?).
1/17/16: This jam doesn't have the flow of the Disease, but it's eerie.
1/17/16: Creepy ghost voices now from Page. So awesome.
1/17/16: Too bad they already played Ghost.
1/17/16: > Farmhouse might be the weirdest setlist call EVAR
1/17/16: I'd be lying if I said I didn't groan a little there. And I LIKE Farmhouse.
1/17/16: Above-average solo from Trey in Farmhouse, but nobody's going to listen to it anyway. Mike's Song is next.
1/17/16: Looks like Mike's might be headed into echo-funk territory again.
1/17/16: Trey laying down a solo in a weird, atypical mode. Short, but strange version of Mike's.
1/17/16: Seamless drop into Bug. Another strange setlist choice, but okay.
1/17/16: Synth coming back at the beginning of Groove.
1/17/16: Shipwreck samples coming back again.
1/17/16: Slow-tempo Slave coming next.
1/17/16: Love the early bit of this Slave jam.
1/17/16: And, of course, The Ocean closer.
1/17/16: 2/4ths of this band did NOT practice the outro to The Ocean.
1/17/16: And that's that! After writing the blog reviews, I'll be back with 5/27/11 next, believe it or not!
Feb 11, 2016
2016-01-16 Riviera Maya II
The Verdict:
So, the second night of the Riviera Maya run is even more poorly reviewed than the first. It probably deserves a bit of this because it's definitely a slight step back in quality, but it doesn't deserve most of it because, like the first night, it's quite a good show.
Like the first night, the opening set is an improvement over pretty much every S1 from MSG, Dick's, and even probably Magnaball. It starts off in swanky style with the gooiest version of "Camel Walk" I've ever heard (and consequently now my new favorite version), follows it with an equally languid "555," and then kicks up the energy a bit with a well-performed "Rift."
The next bit is one for the ages, with a jam emerging from the mid-set "Cities" that gets there quick, and explores a number of spaces over thirteen minutes with a confidence and thoroughness that puts some of the best jams of the year to shame. That it shows up where it does in the show makes it even more jaw-dropping. Trey tries to orchestrate a -> "Light" from the conclusion of the jam, but the rest of the band sort of drops the ball. Nonetheless, the first S1 "Light" since 2010 gets to some interesting places, and suddenly, in the middle of the first set, we have a ball game.
The fire continues to come with a great "Simple" and an echo-funk take on "Timber," of all songs. Page pulls off the now-routine solo piano -> "Wading" at the end of the "Timber" jam, and then, refusing to coast to the end of the set, the guys lay down a solid 2015-style "Reba" and a non-jammed "Chalkdust" that features some of my favorite straight-up Trey shredding in awhile. And that's just the first set.
I say that as if the second set gets better...honestly, it really doesn't. But that's okay, because it doesn't get any worse, either. "Golden Age" follows in the footsteps of the deep-sea Dick's version, minus the gigantic gaffes in the composed section, and it lands in a "Caspian" that ends up somewhere between the typical version and the "Tweezerpants" version from Magnaball: the jam here isn't quite as ecstatic, but there is a serious jam, and it does get pretty abstract and almost ambient in the way that a lot of the bigger Mexico jams have so far.
The middle of the set sags a bit, but picks right back up with a strong "46 Days" that legitimately does go to a dark, ambient place and then continues that vibe into a surprise "Twenty Years Later" that's even more foreboding and pulsing than usual. Lest the "Julius" make you think that's all she wrote, don't worry because there's a fifteen-minute 2014-style "Hood" to close the set. I'm left with the same question I ended the previous review with. Sure, neither Mexico show thus far reaches up there to the highest echelon of 2015 Phish, but these two shows certainly are 2015-quality Phish. I'm looking forward to the third show, which supposedly is "better."
Second set starts at 2:02:00:
The Live Review:
1/16/16: Slow-burn Camel Walk opener. Nice choice.
1/16/16: Really neat, broken-down version of Camel Walk.
1/16/16: Languid 555 is next. I imagine playing at night on the beach lends itself to low-tempo sets.
1/16/16: Mike going to town on 555 outro jam.
1/16/16: Well, Rift ought to pick up the tempo, eh?
1/16/16: Rift is one of those many songs that's super fun to just listen to Fish on and ignore everyone else.
1/16/16: Now a slower, shuffly Cities. I'm liking this laid-back vibe so far.
1/16/16: Clav-and-space-funk jam is building.
1/16/16: Rather than ending the song after the funk jam, Trey hits the mutron. We're entering the Type II zone four songs in, folks!
1/16/16: Surprisingly moody jamming for the first set, here.
1/16/16: Building toward Bliss Land now.
1/16/16: Definitely a tease of the lick from the Dick's Disease/MSG Tweezer jams in there.
1/16/16: Aww, Trey actually built a good -> Light up there, but the rest of the band missed it and had to reset before going into the song.
1/16/16: Fantastic Cities jam tho
1/16/16: Long time since Light was played in the first set, I bet.
1/16/16: Austin 2010, according to @phishnet
1/16/16: Light jam gets away from arpeggios early. Page to electric piano.
1/16/16: Awesome solo bit from Page now.
1/16/16: Trey is playing a riff that actually sounds a bit like Cities now. I wonder if that's on purpose. Probably.
1/16/16: Trey pushes a quick transition into Simple.
1/16/16: One of the great things about 1/15 was the frequency with which the band turned on a dime together to start new songs.
1/16/16: Seems like Trey is trying to do that again tonight but the rest of the band isn't picking up on it.
1/16/16: Pretty typical Simple jam ends in an angry drone. Timber!
1/16/16: Echo-funk jamming in Timber. Interesting.
1/16/16: Echo-funk -> Loop Drone -> Piano outro -> Wading. Nice.
1/16/16: Would have been wild getting to hear this song while IN the ocean.
1/16/16: That's the most pumped I've heard a Phish crowd about hearing Wading in a long time.
1/16/16: Reba!
1/16/16: Typically strong 2015-type version of Reba here.
1/16/16: Chalkdust is next. Trey whistles the Reba outro over the beginning of Chalkdust.
1/16/16: Great 90s-style peak in Chalkdust.
1/16/16: Holy cow.
1/16/16: No jam at the end dere. End set.
1/16/16: S2 starts with a low-tempo Golden Age.
1/16/16: I sort of wish they'd play this song a half-step or a step lower. Trey's voice always sounds strained trying to sing the verse.
1/16/16: Typical Golden Age solo comes to an end with a sudden, crashing chord. Page adding piano accents to a dark space now.
1/16/16: Super ominous jam now. Loving the rhythm section here.
1/16/16: Almost like an Evil Plinko jam going on now.
1/16/16: Really cool, noise-rock sort of build at the end of the jam. > Caspian.
1/16/16: Halfway into Caspian, we've left the usual solo and transitioned into a droning sort of rock-haze area.
1/16/16: That wasn't really a Magnaball Caspian, but it was still pretty interesting.
1/16/16: Halfway To the Moon is next.
1/16/16: Halfway > Joy is sort of underwhelming setlist call.
1/16/16: 46 Days might make up for it, though.
1/16/16: Weird, pulsating ambient jam to end 46 Days.
1/16/16: Fish keeps up a weird woodblock (?) beat through. Nice transition into Twenty Years Later.
1/16/16: Extra angry, rolling synth boil for the outro jam.
1/16/16: I really like this song a lot. Not necessarily this version in particular, but just in general.
1/16/16: Wind-down ending.
1/16/16: Julius. How's that for a complete tonal 180?
1/16/16: Harry Hood!
1/16/16: Trey sounding a little tentative in the early composed section.
1/16/16: Nice, patient delivery in the jam so far.
1/16/16: Oh damn, this is good.
1/16/16: Mike doing more steering than usual so far.
1/16/16: Whenever I think of summer 2016 tour, I first imagine being in the dark on a lawn somewhere listening to a Hood jam.
1/16/16: In short, Hood = Phish.
1/16/16: Huge peak at the end. The hugest.
1/16/16: Trey: 'Can we do this next year, please?'
1/16/16: Zero encore.
1/16/16: Compact and punchy version of Zero. Even more so than usual.
1/16/16: Once again, a little confused as to how this is a 'bad' show.
1/16/16: Great Cities -> Light in the first set, swanky Camel Walk, Simple > Timber -> Wading, solid Reba, HUGE Chalkdust.
1/16/16: Second set had a great Golden Age > Caspian jam, sagged a bit in the middle, but 46 Days -> 20 Years and Hood were fantastic.
1/16/16: Sure, the 'best' jam came in the first set, but should that be exciting instead of an occasion to bitch?
1/16/16: *shouldn't
1/16/16: Anyway, back Tuesday for the last new show before I roll things back to summer 2011!
So, the second night of the Riviera Maya run is even more poorly reviewed than the first. It probably deserves a bit of this because it's definitely a slight step back in quality, but it doesn't deserve most of it because, like the first night, it's quite a good show.
Like the first night, the opening set is an improvement over pretty much every S1 from MSG, Dick's, and even probably Magnaball. It starts off in swanky style with the gooiest version of "Camel Walk" I've ever heard (and consequently now my new favorite version), follows it with an equally languid "555," and then kicks up the energy a bit with a well-performed "Rift."
The next bit is one for the ages, with a jam emerging from the mid-set "Cities" that gets there quick, and explores a number of spaces over thirteen minutes with a confidence and thoroughness that puts some of the best jams of the year to shame. That it shows up where it does in the show makes it even more jaw-dropping. Trey tries to orchestrate a -> "Light" from the conclusion of the jam, but the rest of the band sort of drops the ball. Nonetheless, the first S1 "Light" since 2010 gets to some interesting places, and suddenly, in the middle of the first set, we have a ball game.
The fire continues to come with a great "Simple" and an echo-funk take on "Timber," of all songs. Page pulls off the now-routine solo piano -> "Wading" at the end of the "Timber" jam, and then, refusing to coast to the end of the set, the guys lay down a solid 2015-style "Reba" and a non-jammed "Chalkdust" that features some of my favorite straight-up Trey shredding in awhile. And that's just the first set.
I say that as if the second set gets better...honestly, it really doesn't. But that's okay, because it doesn't get any worse, either. "Golden Age" follows in the footsteps of the deep-sea Dick's version, minus the gigantic gaffes in the composed section, and it lands in a "Caspian" that ends up somewhere between the typical version and the "Tweezerpants" version from Magnaball: the jam here isn't quite as ecstatic, but there is a serious jam, and it does get pretty abstract and almost ambient in the way that a lot of the bigger Mexico jams have so far.
The middle of the set sags a bit, but picks right back up with a strong "46 Days" that legitimately does go to a dark, ambient place and then continues that vibe into a surprise "Twenty Years Later" that's even more foreboding and pulsing than usual. Lest the "Julius" make you think that's all she wrote, don't worry because there's a fifteen-minute 2014-style "Hood" to close the set. I'm left with the same question I ended the previous review with. Sure, neither Mexico show thus far reaches up there to the highest echelon of 2015 Phish, but these two shows certainly are 2015-quality Phish. I'm looking forward to the third show, which supposedly is "better."
Second set starts at 2:02:00:
The Live Review:
1/16/16: Slow-burn Camel Walk opener. Nice choice.
1/16/16: Really neat, broken-down version of Camel Walk.
1/16/16: Languid 555 is next. I imagine playing at night on the beach lends itself to low-tempo sets.
1/16/16: Mike going to town on 555 outro jam.
1/16/16: Well, Rift ought to pick up the tempo, eh?
1/16/16: Rift is one of those many songs that's super fun to just listen to Fish on and ignore everyone else.
1/16/16: Now a slower, shuffly Cities. I'm liking this laid-back vibe so far.
1/16/16: Clav-and-space-funk jam is building.
1/16/16: Rather than ending the song after the funk jam, Trey hits the mutron. We're entering the Type II zone four songs in, folks!
1/16/16: Surprisingly moody jamming for the first set, here.
1/16/16: Building toward Bliss Land now.
1/16/16: Definitely a tease of the lick from the Dick's Disease/MSG Tweezer jams in there.
1/16/16: Aww, Trey actually built a good -> Light up there, but the rest of the band missed it and had to reset before going into the song.
1/16/16: Fantastic Cities jam tho
1/16/16: Long time since Light was played in the first set, I bet.
1/16/16: Austin 2010, according to @phishnet
1/16/16: Light jam gets away from arpeggios early. Page to electric piano.
1/16/16: Awesome solo bit from Page now.
1/16/16: Trey is playing a riff that actually sounds a bit like Cities now. I wonder if that's on purpose. Probably.
1/16/16: Trey pushes a quick transition into Simple.
1/16/16: One of the great things about 1/15 was the frequency with which the band turned on a dime together to start new songs.
1/16/16: Seems like Trey is trying to do that again tonight but the rest of the band isn't picking up on it.
1/16/16: Pretty typical Simple jam ends in an angry drone. Timber!
1/16/16: Echo-funk jamming in Timber. Interesting.
1/16/16: Echo-funk -> Loop Drone -> Piano outro -> Wading. Nice.
1/16/16: Would have been wild getting to hear this song while IN the ocean.
1/16/16: That's the most pumped I've heard a Phish crowd about hearing Wading in a long time.
1/16/16: Reba!
1/16/16: Typically strong 2015-type version of Reba here.
1/16/16: Chalkdust is next. Trey whistles the Reba outro over the beginning of Chalkdust.
1/16/16: Great 90s-style peak in Chalkdust.
1/16/16: Holy cow.
1/16/16: No jam at the end dere. End set.
1/16/16: S2 starts with a low-tempo Golden Age.
1/16/16: I sort of wish they'd play this song a half-step or a step lower. Trey's voice always sounds strained trying to sing the verse.
1/16/16: Typical Golden Age solo comes to an end with a sudden, crashing chord. Page adding piano accents to a dark space now.
1/16/16: Super ominous jam now. Loving the rhythm section here.
1/16/16: Almost like an Evil Plinko jam going on now.
1/16/16: Really cool, noise-rock sort of build at the end of the jam. > Caspian.
1/16/16: Halfway into Caspian, we've left the usual solo and transitioned into a droning sort of rock-haze area.
1/16/16: That wasn't really a Magnaball Caspian, but it was still pretty interesting.
1/16/16: Halfway To the Moon is next.
1/16/16: Halfway > Joy is sort of underwhelming setlist call.
1/16/16: 46 Days might make up for it, though.
1/16/16: Weird, pulsating ambient jam to end 46 Days.
1/16/16: Fish keeps up a weird woodblock (?) beat through. Nice transition into Twenty Years Later.
1/16/16: Extra angry, rolling synth boil for the outro jam.
1/16/16: I really like this song a lot. Not necessarily this version in particular, but just in general.
1/16/16: Wind-down ending.
1/16/16: Julius. How's that for a complete tonal 180?
1/16/16: Harry Hood!
1/16/16: Trey sounding a little tentative in the early composed section.
1/16/16: Nice, patient delivery in the jam so far.
1/16/16: Oh damn, this is good.
1/16/16: Mike doing more steering than usual so far.
1/16/16: Whenever I think of summer 2016 tour, I first imagine being in the dark on a lawn somewhere listening to a Hood jam.
1/16/16: In short, Hood = Phish.
1/16/16: Huge peak at the end. The hugest.
1/16/16: Trey: 'Can we do this next year, please?'
1/16/16: Zero encore.
1/16/16: Compact and punchy version of Zero. Even more so than usual.
1/16/16: Once again, a little confused as to how this is a 'bad' show.
1/16/16: Great Cities -> Light in the first set, swanky Camel Walk, Simple > Timber -> Wading, solid Reba, HUGE Chalkdust.
1/16/16: Second set had a great Golden Age > Caspian jam, sagged a bit in the middle, but 46 Days -> 20 Years and Hood were fantastic.
1/16/16: Sure, the 'best' jam came in the first set, but should that be exciting instead of an occasion to bitch?
1/16/16: *shouldn't
1/16/16: Anyway, back Tuesday for the last new show before I roll things back to summer 2011!
2016-01-15 Riviera Maya I
The Verdict:
So, the reviews and comments about the Riviera Maya run that I've seen online have generally been...pretty...bad. Fortunately for me, the first two shows at least have turned out to be far better than I was led to believe. I have yet to listen to the third one, so maybe it sucks, but so far, the only real problem with the run seems to be the age-old "This show sucks because there wasn't a twenty minute jam or three!" complaint. For more on why that doesn't really matter that much in this case, keep reading.
It's true that there aren't any real highlights in the opening set on night one, I'll admit that. However, it's the first opening set that the band has played with serious verve since...Magnaball? Since before Magnaball? There are a few on-a-dime song transitions, the energy never really lets up beginning with "Ya Mar," and there's a first-set "Fuego" with a few minutes of tasty space jamming.
Set two doesn't follow with a redemption jam monster a la MSG, but what's here is pretty friggin' awesome. "Drowned" kicks off the set, awesomely, and the evil jam that results segues effortlessly into another "WTU?" This version follows in the footsteps of the dynamically varied MSG version, and it's great. Immediately after, "Sand" goes deep, visits some familiar (funk) and some unfamiliar (stop/start) territory before a long, patient "Ghost" segue. "Ghost" goes in a rare, eerie, minimalist direction, led by loops and synths before yet another perfect segue into "2001."
The set ends on a strong note, too, with "Wolfman's" making a rare second set appearance, "Possum"'s new organ-led style in the penultimate slot, and "Shine A Light" closing.
This second set has a "Drowned" -> "What's the Use?" and a "Sand" -> "Ghost" -> "2001," both of which are even better than they look on paper, and somehow it's still one of the lowest-rated 2015-2016 shows on phish.net. What the hell do you people want?!
Second set starts at 1:53:00:
The Live Review:
1/15/16: Okay, this is going to fucking shock you, but they open the Riviera Maya run with ASIHTOS.
1/15/16: Trey gets in a few good bends, and just like that, the shortest version of ASIHTOS in the universe is over.
1/15/16: That last tweet was #7,500. I'm 3/4ths of the way to 10,000 tweets about @phish. Huh.
1/15/16: My Soul is the second song of the night! Love this one. Doesn't get played enough.
1/15/16: BECAUSE OF THE INCREDIBLE SPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED
1/15/16: YOUR TRAP IS SHUT
1/15/16: (Martian Monster is song #3)
1/15/16: Martian Monster is also super-short.
1/15/16: Ya Mar is next, to much crowd appreciation.
1/15/16: Ya Mar gets extended a little. Now Halley's.
1/15/16: I think Halley's might be the most fun @phish song.
1/15/16: Halley's jam starts and instantaneously drops into Fuego. Impressive transition, actually. On a dime.
1/15/16: Neat little jamlet gets tacked on to Fuego, which is nice in the middle of an otherwise rote first set. The Wedge is next.
1/15/16: Nice Trey-and-Page peak to The Wedge.
1/15/16: After The Wedge, Trey: 'Well, this doesn't suck.'
1/15/16: A little banter about swimmers in the ocean, and then Trey dedicates Theme to them.
1/15/16: I think he wants them to die. That's Trey for you, always playing the dangerously insane, murderous psychopath.
1/15/16: Immediate segue from Theme > Free. Energy really seemed to pick up around Ya Mar/Halley's.
1/15/16: Free is similar to most 3.0 versions, but Trey's loop-backed, mega-solo near the end gives a bit of that ol' guitar oomph, too.
1/15/16: The hits just keep coming. No break between Free and Bowie.
1/15/16: Decent, 3.0-standard take on Bowie to close the first set.
1/15/16: I'll be back in 15 minutes :)
Okay, so that was a bit longer than 15 minutes. I blame Trey for my skewed sense of time.
1/15/16: I'm going to be working all goddamn night, so here's S2 while I'm at it.
1/15/16: DROWNED
1/15/16: So far, they're ripping up Drowned like they play it every other night.
1/15/16: Bass bomb from Mike and loops from Trey are sending us in a darker direction now.
1/15/16: A grinding mess of looping, angry sounds now (in a good way).
1/15/16: And the jam just sort of fell apart. Fish isn't ready to give up yet, though!
1/15/16: Whoa! Fish's save just turned into -> What's The Use?
1/15/16: Really mellow middle section, like the MSG version.
1/15/16: Seamless drop into Sand. Say what you will about the lack of jams in this show (so far), but the flow is spot-on.
1/15/16: Great Type I take on Sand. Excellent solo. Clav outro jam, now.
1/15/16: Stop/start jamming now out of the clav section.
1/15/16: Mostly rhythm jam now. Sounds a bit like the intro to Wilson.
1/15/16: Oh shit. It's morphing into a great -> Ghost.
1/15/16: If Trey misses this transition, I'm personally firing him.
1/15/16: There it is!
1/15/16: Song starts off a bit tepid, but picks up momentum after the drop.
1/15/16: Alright, we're all going to school and Trey is driving the bus.
1/15/16: Awesome, spacey loop action now. Fish is a monster. Looks like the band is getting soaked by rain.
1/15/16: Great spacey, synthy jam winds down into > 2001.
1/15/16: Some serious old-school funk in this version.
1/15/16: This is how you play a REAL 2001.
1/15/16: Wolfman's is next. It's all wet and stuff.
1/15/16: Heard so much negative crap about this show. Drowned -> WTU? and Sand -> Ghost > 2001 were both fantastic.
1/15/16: Nice little vocal jam, Sally-style, forming now.
1/15/16: Trey is wailing away in bluesland now.
1/15/16: Trey leads a nice > Possum out of the rock peak.
1/15/16: Organ solo from Page again in Possum. I hope this becomes a thing.
1/15/16: Shine A Light!
1/15/16: End set, Rock and Roll encore.
1/15/16: Some Phish shows are 'interesting,' and some are 'fun.' Most are a balance of both.
1/15/16: This one was both, but I can see why a lot of people would see it falling more toward 'fun' than 'interesting' and write it off.
1/15/16: But you shouldn't! Even Phish 2015 has rarely played that hard during the not-'interesting' parts of a show.
1/15/16: And damn, lots to like, *still* in the 'interesting' category during that second set.
So, the reviews and comments about the Riviera Maya run that I've seen online have generally been...pretty...bad. Fortunately for me, the first two shows at least have turned out to be far better than I was led to believe. I have yet to listen to the third one, so maybe it sucks, but so far, the only real problem with the run seems to be the age-old "This show sucks because there wasn't a twenty minute jam or three!" complaint. For more on why that doesn't really matter that much in this case, keep reading.
It's true that there aren't any real highlights in the opening set on night one, I'll admit that. However, it's the first opening set that the band has played with serious verve since...Magnaball? Since before Magnaball? There are a few on-a-dime song transitions, the energy never really lets up beginning with "Ya Mar," and there's a first-set "Fuego" with a few minutes of tasty space jamming.
Set two doesn't follow with a redemption jam monster a la MSG, but what's here is pretty friggin' awesome. "Drowned" kicks off the set, awesomely, and the evil jam that results segues effortlessly into another "WTU?" This version follows in the footsteps of the dynamically varied MSG version, and it's great. Immediately after, "Sand" goes deep, visits some familiar (funk) and some unfamiliar (stop/start) territory before a long, patient "Ghost" segue. "Ghost" goes in a rare, eerie, minimalist direction, led by loops and synths before yet another perfect segue into "2001."
The set ends on a strong note, too, with "Wolfman's" making a rare second set appearance, "Possum"'s new organ-led style in the penultimate slot, and "Shine A Light" closing.
This second set has a "Drowned" -> "What's the Use?" and a "Sand" -> "Ghost" -> "2001," both of which are even better than they look on paper, and somehow it's still one of the lowest-rated 2015-2016 shows on phish.net. What the hell do you people want?!
Second set starts at 1:53:00:
The Live Review:
1/15/16: Okay, this is going to fucking shock you, but they open the Riviera Maya run with ASIHTOS.
1/15/16: Trey gets in a few good bends, and just like that, the shortest version of ASIHTOS in the universe is over.
1/15/16: That last tweet was #7,500. I'm 3/4ths of the way to 10,000 tweets about @phish. Huh.
1/15/16: My Soul is the second song of the night! Love this one. Doesn't get played enough.
1/15/16: BECAUSE OF THE INCREDIBLE SPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED
1/15/16: YOUR TRAP IS SHUT
1/15/16: (Martian Monster is song #3)
1/15/16: Martian Monster is also super-short.
1/15/16: Ya Mar is next, to much crowd appreciation.
1/15/16: Ya Mar gets extended a little. Now Halley's.
1/15/16: I think Halley's might be the most fun @phish song.
1/15/16: Halley's jam starts and instantaneously drops into Fuego. Impressive transition, actually. On a dime.
1/15/16: Neat little jamlet gets tacked on to Fuego, which is nice in the middle of an otherwise rote first set. The Wedge is next.
1/15/16: Nice Trey-and-Page peak to The Wedge.
1/15/16: After The Wedge, Trey: 'Well, this doesn't suck.'
1/15/16: A little banter about swimmers in the ocean, and then Trey dedicates Theme to them.
1/15/16: I think he wants them to die. That's Trey for you, always playing the dangerously insane, murderous psychopath.
1/15/16: Immediate segue from Theme > Free. Energy really seemed to pick up around Ya Mar/Halley's.
1/15/16: Free is similar to most 3.0 versions, but Trey's loop-backed, mega-solo near the end gives a bit of that ol' guitar oomph, too.
1/15/16: The hits just keep coming. No break between Free and Bowie.
1/15/16: Decent, 3.0-standard take on Bowie to close the first set.
1/15/16: I'll be back in 15 minutes :)
Okay, so that was a bit longer than 15 minutes. I blame Trey for my skewed sense of time.
1/15/16: I'm going to be working all goddamn night, so here's S2 while I'm at it.
1/15/16: DROWNED
1/15/16: So far, they're ripping up Drowned like they play it every other night.
1/15/16: Bass bomb from Mike and loops from Trey are sending us in a darker direction now.
1/15/16: A grinding mess of looping, angry sounds now (in a good way).
1/15/16: And the jam just sort of fell apart. Fish isn't ready to give up yet, though!
1/15/16: Whoa! Fish's save just turned into -> What's The Use?
1/15/16: Really mellow middle section, like the MSG version.
1/15/16: Seamless drop into Sand. Say what you will about the lack of jams in this show (so far), but the flow is spot-on.
1/15/16: Great Type I take on Sand. Excellent solo. Clav outro jam, now.
1/15/16: Stop/start jamming now out of the clav section.
1/15/16: Mostly rhythm jam now. Sounds a bit like the intro to Wilson.
1/15/16: Oh shit. It's morphing into a great -> Ghost.
1/15/16: If Trey misses this transition, I'm personally firing him.
1/15/16: There it is!
1/15/16: Song starts off a bit tepid, but picks up momentum after the drop.
1/15/16: Alright, we're all going to school and Trey is driving the bus.
1/15/16: Awesome, spacey loop action now. Fish is a monster. Looks like the band is getting soaked by rain.
1/15/16: Great spacey, synthy jam winds down into > 2001.
1/15/16: Some serious old-school funk in this version.
1/15/16: This is how you play a REAL 2001.
1/15/16: Wolfman's is next. It's all wet and stuff.
1/15/16: Heard so much negative crap about this show. Drowned -> WTU? and Sand -> Ghost > 2001 were both fantastic.
1/15/16: Nice little vocal jam, Sally-style, forming now.
1/15/16: Trey is wailing away in bluesland now.
1/15/16: Trey leads a nice > Possum out of the rock peak.
1/15/16: Organ solo from Page again in Possum. I hope this becomes a thing.
1/15/16: Shine A Light!
1/15/16: End set, Rock and Roll encore.
1/15/16: Some Phish shows are 'interesting,' and some are 'fun.' Most are a balance of both.
1/15/16: This one was both, but I can see why a lot of people would see it falling more toward 'fun' than 'interesting' and write it off.
1/15/16: But you shouldn't! Even Phish 2015 has rarely played that hard during the not-'interesting' parts of a show.
1/15/16: And damn, lots to like, *still* in the 'interesting' category during that second set.
2016-01-02 MSG IV
The Verdict:
Alright, so the fourth and final MSG show reprises the pattern of the first three nights in that there's a pretty unremarkable first set, and some less-than-ideal moments in the second set, but all of this is potentially redeemed by some of the best (if not the best) jamming of the year.
This night it's the "Tweezer" that bails out a performance that otherwise lags a bit, but I'm getting ahead of myself. The first set is well-played but doesn't really contain anything notable, except for the fact that the entire set with the exception of the "Your Pet Cat" opener could have come straight out of the mid-90s. If you're into that sort of thing (and I am, at least a little bit), then you might get more mileage out of this set than others will. I'll confess that it was neat to feel like I was listening to an old Phish show, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that the set was arranged that way on purpose.
Structurally, the second set is remarkably like a certain second set that took place in Tahoe last time the band was there, but frankly is a bit more effective as a whole than that set. The "Tweezer" here isn't quite as stupefying as the Tahoe version, but the difference isn't as pronounced as you might think. After one listen, I'm ready in an admittedly kneejerk way to call this "Tweezer" my favorite jam of the year. It's extremely good. And then, unlike the rest of the Tahoe "Tweezer" set, which sort of fades into the background of the massive jam, this set offers up some more (smaller) gems: a "Sand" that deconstructs itself impressively after some catchy funk, a "Hood" that is compact but moves effortlessly from blues-rock Type II jamming to a raucous peak, and the obligatory "YEM" that sounds anything but obligatory.
It's a great closing set for a run that, for my money, has offered up the highest highs of the year, albeit while otherwise being less consistent than, say, your Magnaballs.
On to Mexico and glory!
The Live Review:
1/2/16: Your Pet Cat opener. Trey's sounding mighty limber for night four.
1/2/16: ACDC Bag. I feel like I haven't heard this one for a long time.
1/2/16: Fish is playing a harder beat, I think, than usual. Less shuffle, more rock.
1/2/16: Laid-back soloing from Trey regardless. Typical build ends on a loop that segues into NICU.
1/2/16: It's Ice!
1/2/16: And...yes. Funk-breakdown time.
1/2/16: Solid version of It's Ice, followed by Horn.
1/2/16: In keeping with the other three opening sets at MSG this year, this is a pretty pedestrian outing so far.
1/2/16: Lots of jukebox songs, though I guess it's worth mentioning that they're slightly rarer jukebox songs.
1/2/16: It's also worth mentioning that TWEEZER IS LOOMING
1/2/16: Divided Sky! I did *not* see that coming. Have they even played DSky at all this year yet?!
1/2/16: Nope, they've played it a few times this year.
1/2/16; Nice version. Ending jam was a little all over the place at first, but Trey eventually brings it up to a boil.
1/2/16: Axila I, now. Minus YPC, this almost seems like a mid-90s setlist. It's weird. I'm not complaining...I don't think?
1/2/16: Butt-slammed into Maze.
1/2/16: Fantastic Trey/Page tension build in Maze. I mean, I know they do that every time, but this time was extra hot.
1/2/16: Train Song! This is seriously a mid-90s set.
1/2/16: Page actually biffed a part there. That's a new one!
1/2/16: Julius closer. Yep. After this I'm going to listen to my Collective Soul and Pearl Jam cassette tapes.
1/2/16: But which will I listen to first? I HAVEN'T DECIDED
1/2/16: I SEE WHAT I DID THERE
1/2/16: Julius is Julius, albeit with some excellent 90sish fills thrown in there.
1/2/16: End set. Was that 2016, or 1996?
1/2/16: HERE'S DAT TWEEZ
1/2/16: Trey abandoning the Tweezer riff early to jam between verses. That's got to be a good sign.
1/2/16: Blast back into the riff after the bridge. Crowd is LOSING IT ALREADY
1/2/16: I have a good feeling about this one.
1/2/16: Trey is laying down a solid melody, but it doesn't matter because Mike is absolutely lifting off.
1/2/16: Mike and Fish are giving this thing a totally insane momentum.
1/2/16: Now Trey is just exploding.
1/2/16: Natural move toward Evil Loop Land.
1/2/16: Page and Trey trading quick arpeggios now. Clav and pitch-shifter.
1/2/16: Now the rest of the band has a sort of proggy-sounding background going and Trey's laying down a melody over it.
1/2/16: THIS SOLO
1/2/16: Trey has seriously been playing 3-4 minutes straight of something that sounds completely composed. Now moving to funk chords.
1/2/16: Build now, sort of reminiscent of the Dick's Disease.
1/2/16: Trey starts up Sand somewhat suddenly after the build.
1/2/16: Does it matter if it's a ripcord if he's ripcording what was already the best jam of the year?
1/2/16: 'That could have gone on for ten more minutes, Trey! But I also might have died from a brain aneurysm...so...thanks?'
1/2/16: Great Sand jam here. Sounds absolutely effortless after that Tweezer.
1/2/16: There are an above-average amount of guitar notes in this song.
1/2/16: A drop into...plinko? Sort of?
1/2/16: Sand is wrapping up with a sort-of 2001 jam and then a transition back into the Sand riff.
1/2/16: LxL.
1/2/16: Weird placement for LxL. Strong version, though, > Suzy.
1/2/16: Hood!
1/2/16: Really interesting blues jam forming in the middle of Hood.
1/2/16: This jam officially does not resemble Hood at all, now.
1/2/16: Really quick build and peak. That was interesting.
1/2/16: Weird loop drawn out for thirty seconds or so, then > YEM.
1/2/16: Groove-heavy, Mike-and-Fish led jam early on in YEM.
1/2/16: Page on what I think is a synth jamming with Mike now.
1/2/16: The Lizards encore!
1/2/16: Tweeprise to close.
Alright, so the fourth and final MSG show reprises the pattern of the first three nights in that there's a pretty unremarkable first set, and some less-than-ideal moments in the second set, but all of this is potentially redeemed by some of the best (if not the best) jamming of the year.
This night it's the "Tweezer" that bails out a performance that otherwise lags a bit, but I'm getting ahead of myself. The first set is well-played but doesn't really contain anything notable, except for the fact that the entire set with the exception of the "Your Pet Cat" opener could have come straight out of the mid-90s. If you're into that sort of thing (and I am, at least a little bit), then you might get more mileage out of this set than others will. I'll confess that it was neat to feel like I was listening to an old Phish show, and I wouldn't be surprised to find out that the set was arranged that way on purpose.
Structurally, the second set is remarkably like a certain second set that took place in Tahoe last time the band was there, but frankly is a bit more effective as a whole than that set. The "Tweezer" here isn't quite as stupefying as the Tahoe version, but the difference isn't as pronounced as you might think. After one listen, I'm ready in an admittedly kneejerk way to call this "Tweezer" my favorite jam of the year. It's extremely good. And then, unlike the rest of the Tahoe "Tweezer" set, which sort of fades into the background of the massive jam, this set offers up some more (smaller) gems: a "Sand" that deconstructs itself impressively after some catchy funk, a "Hood" that is compact but moves effortlessly from blues-rock Type II jamming to a raucous peak, and the obligatory "YEM" that sounds anything but obligatory.
It's a great closing set for a run that, for my money, has offered up the highest highs of the year, albeit while otherwise being less consistent than, say, your Magnaballs.
On to Mexico and glory!
The Live Review:
1/2/16: Your Pet Cat opener. Trey's sounding mighty limber for night four.
1/2/16: ACDC Bag. I feel like I haven't heard this one for a long time.
1/2/16: Fish is playing a harder beat, I think, than usual. Less shuffle, more rock.
1/2/16: Laid-back soloing from Trey regardless. Typical build ends on a loop that segues into NICU.
1/2/16: It's Ice!
1/2/16: And...yes. Funk-breakdown time.
1/2/16: Solid version of It's Ice, followed by Horn.
1/2/16: In keeping with the other three opening sets at MSG this year, this is a pretty pedestrian outing so far.
1/2/16: Lots of jukebox songs, though I guess it's worth mentioning that they're slightly rarer jukebox songs.
1/2/16: It's also worth mentioning that TWEEZER IS LOOMING
1/2/16: Divided Sky! I did *not* see that coming. Have they even played DSky at all this year yet?!
1/2/16: Nope, they've played it a few times this year.
1/2/16; Nice version. Ending jam was a little all over the place at first, but Trey eventually brings it up to a boil.
1/2/16: Axila I, now. Minus YPC, this almost seems like a mid-90s setlist. It's weird. I'm not complaining...I don't think?
1/2/16: Butt-slammed into Maze.
1/2/16: Fantastic Trey/Page tension build in Maze. I mean, I know they do that every time, but this time was extra hot.
1/2/16: Train Song! This is seriously a mid-90s set.
1/2/16: Page actually biffed a part there. That's a new one!
1/2/16: Julius closer. Yep. After this I'm going to listen to my Collective Soul and Pearl Jam cassette tapes.
1/2/16: But which will I listen to first? I HAVEN'T DECIDED
1/2/16: I SEE WHAT I DID THERE
1/2/16: Julius is Julius, albeit with some excellent 90sish fills thrown in there.
1/2/16: End set. Was that 2016, or 1996?
1/2/16: HERE'S DAT TWEEZ
1/2/16: Trey abandoning the Tweezer riff early to jam between verses. That's got to be a good sign.
1/2/16: Blast back into the riff after the bridge. Crowd is LOSING IT ALREADY
1/2/16: I have a good feeling about this one.
1/2/16: Trey is laying down a solid melody, but it doesn't matter because Mike is absolutely lifting off.
1/2/16: Mike and Fish are giving this thing a totally insane momentum.
1/2/16: Now Trey is just exploding.
1/2/16: Natural move toward Evil Loop Land.
1/2/16: Page and Trey trading quick arpeggios now. Clav and pitch-shifter.
1/2/16: Now the rest of the band has a sort of proggy-sounding background going and Trey's laying down a melody over it.
1/2/16: THIS SOLO
1/2/16: Trey has seriously been playing 3-4 minutes straight of something that sounds completely composed. Now moving to funk chords.
1/2/16: Build now, sort of reminiscent of the Dick's Disease.
1/2/16: Trey starts up Sand somewhat suddenly after the build.
1/2/16: Does it matter if it's a ripcord if he's ripcording what was already the best jam of the year?
1/2/16: 'That could have gone on for ten more minutes, Trey! But I also might have died from a brain aneurysm...so...thanks?'
1/2/16: Great Sand jam here. Sounds absolutely effortless after that Tweezer.
1/2/16: There are an above-average amount of guitar notes in this song.
1/2/16: A drop into...plinko? Sort of?
1/2/16: Sand is wrapping up with a sort-of 2001 jam and then a transition back into the Sand riff.
1/2/16: LxL.
1/2/16: Weird placement for LxL. Strong version, though, > Suzy.
1/2/16: Hood!
1/2/16: Really interesting blues jam forming in the middle of Hood.
1/2/16: This jam officially does not resemble Hood at all, now.
1/2/16: Really quick build and peak. That was interesting.
1/2/16: Weird loop drawn out for thirty seconds or so, then > YEM.
1/2/16: Groove-heavy, Mike-and-Fish led jam early on in YEM.
1/2/16: Page on what I think is a synth jamming with Mike now.
1/2/16: The Lizards encore!
1/2/16: Tweeprise to close.
Feb 4, 2016
2016-01-01 MSG III
The Verdict:
The third night of MSG is definitely a step down from the first two nights, but it's still a solid show in the pattern of this run. That is to say that there are a few serious highlights sprinkled around in a show that's otherwise pretty average-great straightforward.
The difference in quality between the first two nights and this show, then, is really down how average the average-great parts are. Where the first two nights' jukebox-y sections get by somewhat with great song selection, consistent flow, and strong playing, this night's first set (and much of the second) is lacking the first two of those three qualities. There are a lot of mood-killing setlist calls, making this show overall a skip-everything-but-the-highlights affair.
All that said, the sole highlight of S1 is "Undermind," which might actually be my favorite part of the show. The middle of the jam gets extra weird, and a strong solo from Trey follows, before he proceeds to tease almost every other song played during the first set to that point.
The second set is pretty much completely a head-scratcher except for "Disease" and "Light," both of which are the epitome of 2015-style jamming. Neither is anything you haven't heard before if you've been listening to this tour, but it almost feels as if the guys have successfully and perfectly distilled the year's work into these two "greatest hits"-style jams. They're both legitimately great. It's also worth a mention that Trey thoroughly deconstructs the usual "Fuego" jam to extend the tune a little before wrapping up the set with a completely by-the-book "Slave."
The Live Review:
1/1/16: Early start today! Stealing Time opener. Probably my least favorite opener after KDF.
1/1/16: Pretty sure Trey just called for a Leo solo using his bedroom voice.
1/1/16: Oh, this is Heavy Things, by the way. Organ solo.
1/1/16: Okay, organ solo and some old-school Trey soloing makes that a better-than-average Heavy Things.
1/1/16: Happy to see How Many People staying in the rotation. Would love to see this song open a S2 next summer.
1/1/16: Mid-set Stash.
1/1/16: Nicely done Stash. Stays within the normal boundaries, but features some great melody playing by Trey.
1/1/16: Undermind starts up, and Trey is immediately on the echo. This is probably going to be a good version.
1/1/16: Really bizarro loop-based solo from Trey. Very cool.
1/1/16: Undermind 'second jam' after the vocal outro.
1/1/16: Extended Stash tease, then Stealing Time, then How Many People? How cool is that? Back into Undermind outro. Crowd goes nuts.
1/1/16: > Rift.
1/1/16: That was an old-school Rift. Especially for Page, who absolutely caught fire and blew up.
1/1/16: TIME to PUT your WINGSUIT on
1/1/16: Ocelot is next.
1/1/16: Wingsuit had a pretty great build at the end, but still. Wingsuit > Ocelot is less a one-two punch than a one-two light tap.
1/1/16: Lawn Boy is nice, but doesn't do a lot to jack up the energy level.
1/1/16: Antelope set closer.
1/1/16: If there's one thing that this run can't get right, it's S1s. Decent song choices, but really all throwaways except for Undermind.
1/1/16: Pretty awesome tension-y bit mid-jam by Page and Trey.
1/1/16: Huge peak in Antelope. Crowd explodes. Now echo-chord jamming.
1/1/16: Stealing Time, Stash teases.
1/1/16: End set.
1/1/16: Disease starts the second frame.
1/1/16: Trey is lighting it up early on in the jam.
1/1/16: We're in freaking serious office-air-guitar territory right now.
1/1/16: Good thing I wore my 'Real Outcasty' hoodie to work today.
1/1/16: Mellowing now, but maintaining momentum.
1/1/16: Mike taking over on the robot bass.
1/1/16: He and Page trading bluesy licks.
1/1/16: Loving the Mike-centrism of the back half of this jam.
1/1/16: Quasi ripcord into Dirt. Admittedly, the jam had been in a holding pattern for a bit.
1/1/16: And Dirt is a neat choice for a segue song.
1/1/16: Buuuut...Mike threw down a monster riff right before Trey yanked the cord, which makes it a little harder to swallow.
1/1/16: Awesome build in Dirt. Yeah, you read that right.
1/1/16: Really weird choice in putting Halfway next.
1/1/16: Theme now. Such a weird setlist so far.
1/1/16: Well, the band seems to have suddenly remembered how to play Theme with some freaking verve.
1/1/16: Light! The perennial S2 'What the Hell Do We Do Next?' song!
1/1/16: I actually really like Light when they just dive right into it. I just hate the usually-obligatory few minutes of arpeggios after.
1/1/16: This version is a bit heavier on Page and Mike early on, so maybe we'll skip that part.
1/1/16: Things getting murkier and funkier now.
1/1/16: Mike's driving toward a build now.
1/1/16: Moving toward a Manteca-sounding rock peak now. Crowd roaring.
1/1/16: Winding down now. Great beat from Fish.
1/1/16: Ambient drone...
1/1/16: Nice Page-only landing in Fuego.
1/1/16: Neither DWD or Light jams will change the way you feel about Phish jams, but...
1/1/16: ...they are both quintessential 2015-era improv, with absolutely no letup, for 15 and 17 minutes, respectively.
1/1/16: Really grungy, loopy outro solo.
1/1/16: Trey reprising the Fuego riff using the pitch-shifter. Very cool.
1/1/16: > Slave.
1/1/16: Pretty standard Slave. End set.
1/1/16: I'd love to see them work over Slave this coming year like they did Hood in '14.
1/1/16: Welp, Farmhouse encore is in keeping with how weird this show has been.
1/1/16: The first two shows had their fair share of low-tempo and jukebox tunes, but balanced them with monster jams.
1/1/16: The balance felt a bit off to me in N3. Undermind, Disease, and Light were all excellent, though.
1/1/16: Also, the Fuego is worth a mention, for sure.
The third night of MSG is definitely a step down from the first two nights, but it's still a solid show in the pattern of this run. That is to say that there are a few serious highlights sprinkled around in a show that's otherwise pretty average-great straightforward.
The difference in quality between the first two nights and this show, then, is really down how average the average-great parts are. Where the first two nights' jukebox-y sections get by somewhat with great song selection, consistent flow, and strong playing, this night's first set (and much of the second) is lacking the first two of those three qualities. There are a lot of mood-killing setlist calls, making this show overall a skip-everything-but-the-highlights affair.
All that said, the sole highlight of S1 is "Undermind," which might actually be my favorite part of the show. The middle of the jam gets extra weird, and a strong solo from Trey follows, before he proceeds to tease almost every other song played during the first set to that point.
The second set is pretty much completely a head-scratcher except for "Disease" and "Light," both of which are the epitome of 2015-style jamming. Neither is anything you haven't heard before if you've been listening to this tour, but it almost feels as if the guys have successfully and perfectly distilled the year's work into these two "greatest hits"-style jams. They're both legitimately great. It's also worth a mention that Trey thoroughly deconstructs the usual "Fuego" jam to extend the tune a little before wrapping up the set with a completely by-the-book "Slave."
The Live Review:
1/1/16: Early start today! Stealing Time opener. Probably my least favorite opener after KDF.
1/1/16: Pretty sure Trey just called for a Leo solo using his bedroom voice.
1/1/16: Oh, this is Heavy Things, by the way. Organ solo.
1/1/16: Okay, organ solo and some old-school Trey soloing makes that a better-than-average Heavy Things.
1/1/16: Happy to see How Many People staying in the rotation. Would love to see this song open a S2 next summer.
1/1/16: Mid-set Stash.
1/1/16: Nicely done Stash. Stays within the normal boundaries, but features some great melody playing by Trey.
1/1/16: Undermind starts up, and Trey is immediately on the echo. This is probably going to be a good version.
1/1/16: Really bizarro loop-based solo from Trey. Very cool.
1/1/16: Undermind 'second jam' after the vocal outro.
1/1/16: Extended Stash tease, then Stealing Time, then How Many People? How cool is that? Back into Undermind outro. Crowd goes nuts.
1/1/16: > Rift.
1/1/16: That was an old-school Rift. Especially for Page, who absolutely caught fire and blew up.
1/1/16: TIME to PUT your WINGSUIT on
1/1/16: Ocelot is next.
1/1/16: Wingsuit had a pretty great build at the end, but still. Wingsuit > Ocelot is less a one-two punch than a one-two light tap.
1/1/16: Lawn Boy is nice, but doesn't do a lot to jack up the energy level.
1/1/16: Antelope set closer.
1/1/16: If there's one thing that this run can't get right, it's S1s. Decent song choices, but really all throwaways except for Undermind.
1/1/16: Pretty awesome tension-y bit mid-jam by Page and Trey.
1/1/16: Huge peak in Antelope. Crowd explodes. Now echo-chord jamming.
1/1/16: Stealing Time, Stash teases.
1/1/16: End set.
1/1/16: Disease starts the second frame.
1/1/16: Trey is lighting it up early on in the jam.
1/1/16: We're in freaking serious office-air-guitar territory right now.
1/1/16: Good thing I wore my 'Real Outcasty' hoodie to work today.
1/1/16: Mellowing now, but maintaining momentum.
1/1/16: Mike taking over on the robot bass.
1/1/16: He and Page trading bluesy licks.
1/1/16: Loving the Mike-centrism of the back half of this jam.
1/1/16: Quasi ripcord into Dirt. Admittedly, the jam had been in a holding pattern for a bit.
1/1/16: And Dirt is a neat choice for a segue song.
1/1/16: Buuuut...Mike threw down a monster riff right before Trey yanked the cord, which makes it a little harder to swallow.
1/1/16: Awesome build in Dirt. Yeah, you read that right.
1/1/16: Really weird choice in putting Halfway next.
1/1/16: Theme now. Such a weird setlist so far.
1/1/16: Well, the band seems to have suddenly remembered how to play Theme with some freaking verve.
1/1/16: Light! The perennial S2 'What the Hell Do We Do Next?' song!
1/1/16: I actually really like Light when they just dive right into it. I just hate the usually-obligatory few minutes of arpeggios after.
1/1/16: This version is a bit heavier on Page and Mike early on, so maybe we'll skip that part.
1/1/16: Things getting murkier and funkier now.
1/1/16: Mike's driving toward a build now.
1/1/16: Moving toward a Manteca-sounding rock peak now. Crowd roaring.
1/1/16: Winding down now. Great beat from Fish.
1/1/16: Ambient drone...
1/1/16: Nice Page-only landing in Fuego.
1/1/16: Neither DWD or Light jams will change the way you feel about Phish jams, but...
1/1/16: ...they are both quintessential 2015-era improv, with absolutely no letup, for 15 and 17 minutes, respectively.
1/1/16: Really grungy, loopy outro solo.
1/1/16: Trey reprising the Fuego riff using the pitch-shifter. Very cool.
1/1/16: > Slave.
1/1/16: Pretty standard Slave. End set.
1/1/16: I'd love to see them work over Slave this coming year like they did Hood in '14.
1/1/16: Welp, Farmhouse encore is in keeping with how weird this show has been.
1/1/16: The first two shows had their fair share of low-tempo and jukebox tunes, but balanced them with monster jams.
1/1/16: The balance felt a bit off to me in N3. Undermind, Disease, and Light were all excellent, though.
1/1/16: Also, the Fuego is worth a mention, for sure.
2015-12-31 MSG II
The Verdict:
The three-set NYE show proper magnifies all the good and the bad about 12/30. Again, the first set is rote, though it's rote while also being played with an intense amount of energy. There are some neat moments, like the crowd sing-along on "I Didn't Know" and the "Reba," but in general there's not much to write home about. Don't get me wrong, it's about as great as average-great gets, but there's not a lot of relisten potential.
For the first half of the second set, oddly, this trend continues. Essentially, we've got 1.5 opening sets here. But then "KDF" heads into murky, ambient territory and all hell breaks loose. The "KDF" jam is one of the weirdest in quite some time, as it swerves into Drive-In territory and then departs for parts unknown. It's sewn to "Twist" by a short-but-wacky "Piper," and then "Twist" goes on to move through mutron-powered funk and a "The Dogs"-like peak that's on a level with the previous night's "Gin." It's that good. And this is just the second set.
The third set's meat is near the front, as it opens with a twenty-one-minute "No Men's" that goes totally off the Drive-In end and stays there for a long, long, satisfying time. A brief interlude for the year to end and then there's also a fifteen-minute "Blaze On" jam that gets all clavvy and such (as is typical) before moving into an atypical space where Trey takes over lead and lays down a gorgeous melody solo to close out the song.
Everything after that is back in the greatest-average-great territory, but it's nice to hear a "Bowie" with some teeth and a "Horse" where Trey actually plays his guitar. And, man, this show has four contenders for top-tier-2015 jams...even if the rest of the show was just "Jennifer Dances" over and over again, it would be a tour highlight.
The Live Review:
12/31/15: Probably will not get through this entire show today, but I'll at least get started.
12/31/15: Moma Dance opens. Fish getting flashy with the beat already. Good sign.
12/31/15: A FROTHING CAP
12/31/15: Early Possum, and Trey be sprayin' notes all over the place.
12/31/15: Mike sounds great on this mix. Pumped. It's a good @phish day. Summer tour dates now, please?
12/31/15: Page takes an awesome organ solo in Possum.
12/31/15: Super-hot Possum > Wolfman's.
12/31/15: Another massive Type I jam here. These guys are serious tonight.
12/31/15: Birds is next.
12/31/15: Short take there, but way more interesting than the usual 3.0-filler style.
12/31/15: I Didn't Know!
12/31/15: AWESOME. Crowd singing in place of band. Singing all the parts.
12/31/15: Fish wants to sing one more song with the audience.
12/31/15: Fish and crowd singing Happy Birthday to his daughter.
12/31/15: Martian Monster!
12/31/15: More crowd participation w/ a MM stop-start woo jam.
12/31/15: Reba is an interesting call, here.
12/31/15: Rebas have been really good this year and this one's no exception. Fantastic solo.
12/31/15: Walls, presumably to close S1.
12/31/15: No serious jam in the first set, but the first four songs were all super-hot. Sing-a-long shenanigans after. Strong Reba + Walls.
12/31/15: Second set opens with The Wedge, weirdly enough.
12/31/15: The Wedge gets butt-slammed into Wilson.
12/31/15: Wilson sounding a little more heavy-metal than usual.
12/31/15: ASIHTOS is next. Standard Type I action so far.
12/31/15: Like many of the S1 songs, ASIHTOS doesn't go deep, but definitely brings the heat.
12/31/15: Yarmouth Road at high tempo.
12/31/15: This is starting to seem like the second part of a really solid, but straightforward first set.
12/31/15: Your mileage might vary according to your appreciation for that sort of thing.
12/31/15: Trey hangs back a bit and lets Mike lead the Yarmouth jam.
12/31/15: Now KDF.
12/31/15: Weird S2 so far.
12/31/15: Early on in the solo, Trey is getting a little atonal. Might be headed somewhere interesting.
12/31/15: Really spacey, Birds-like jam taking shape now.
12/31/15: Just drone, piano, and drums now.
12/31/15: Super minimalist yet groovy jam.
12/31/15: I really dig this. Different than pretty much all the big jams so far this year.
12/31/15: Maybe a little Drive-In Jam flavor in there, though.
12/31/15: That was one of the coolest jams I've heard from Phish in a long time. Weirdly minimal and spooky, but still melodic.
12/31/15: Slow segue into Piper.
12/31/15: Piper is really just an interlude, but it's about as good as you could ask for in a six-minute version.
12/31/15: Slow, grungy segue into Twist.
12/31/15: Awesome latin-infused vibe to the beginning of the Twist jam.
12/31/15: Return to the typical Twist riff now, but continuing past it into a second jam.
12/31/15: Mutron and funk action now.
12/31/15: Sounds a hell of a lot like a low-tempo The Dogs now.
12/31/15: Huge build, fantastic Trey solo, and then a return to the Twist riff. That was amazing.
12/31/15: Two of my easy-favorite jams of 2015 (and that's saying something) now on 12/30 and 12/31.
12/31/15: Super-short S2, but the back end was AWESOME.
12/31/15: Low-tempo, funky No Men's to start S3.
12/31/15: Solo gets weird early on, segues into a No Quarter/ASIHTOS-type jam.
12/31/15: Piano accents in the darkness.
12/31/15: Organic turn toward a more blissful, though still low-key space now. Trey putting down a melody.
12/31/15: Great beat from Fish is the foundation for synth and all sort of weird stuff for the next few minutes. This is amazing.
12/31/15: Ambient wash suddenly at about 11:00.
12/31/15: Sort of back to where we left off before the ambient bit now.
12/31/15: Extremely patient jam is going into deeeeep space here.
12/31/15: So glad I'm not high right now because I'd be shitting myself.
12/31/15: The Carinval of the Damned Jamming.
12/31/15: Now '99-era anthemic space rock.
12/31/15: This is absolutely nuts. How is this not everyone's favorite jam of ever?
12/31/15: Perfect > countdown > Auld Lang Syne
12/31/15: > Blaze On, crowd loses it.
12/31/15: Great straightforward solo to start the Blaze On jam.
12/31/15: Loops and clav now.
12/31/15: Neat, mellow chording now, over a bass drone.
12/31/15: Another fantastic solo from Trey now. Wow.
12/31/15: This is just beautiful.
12/31/15: Wrap back to Blaze On vocal outro. Then butt-slammed into Carini!
12/31/15: Holy hell, brilliant Trey solo AGAIN in Carini. Slinky as all hell.
12/31/15: Mike taking over now as the jam mellows out.
12/31/15: Great -> Bowie from Fish.
12/31/15: Bowie doesn't deviate massively from the typical mode, but Trey's suddenly astonishing soloing skills kick in here again.
12/31/15: Brief break after Bowie before The Horse.
12/31/15: Trey playing this time instead of Page.
12/31/15: I'm disappointed with the crowd's lack of reaction to the 'I think this exact thing happened to me...' line.
12/31/15: Number Line is next.
12/31/15: Somehow, that was the ugliest version of Number Line in pretty much forever.
12/31/15: Tube encore? Ooookay.
12/31/15: Tube > Cavern. Weird encore.
12/31/15: That said, everything from KDF to Bowie was absolutely brilliant.
12/31/15: There's arguably a lot of (well-played) filler in this show, but when you get a chunk of Phish music like that in the middle...
12/31/15: ...who cares?
The three-set NYE show proper magnifies all the good and the bad about 12/30. Again, the first set is rote, though it's rote while also being played with an intense amount of energy. There are some neat moments, like the crowd sing-along on "I Didn't Know" and the "Reba," but in general there's not much to write home about. Don't get me wrong, it's about as great as average-great gets, but there's not a lot of relisten potential.
For the first half of the second set, oddly, this trend continues. Essentially, we've got 1.5 opening sets here. But then "KDF" heads into murky, ambient territory and all hell breaks loose. The "KDF" jam is one of the weirdest in quite some time, as it swerves into Drive-In territory and then departs for parts unknown. It's sewn to "Twist" by a short-but-wacky "Piper," and then "Twist" goes on to move through mutron-powered funk and a "The Dogs"-like peak that's on a level with the previous night's "Gin." It's that good. And this is just the second set.
The third set's meat is near the front, as it opens with a twenty-one-minute "No Men's" that goes totally off the Drive-In end and stays there for a long, long, satisfying time. A brief interlude for the year to end and then there's also a fifteen-minute "Blaze On" jam that gets all clavvy and such (as is typical) before moving into an atypical space where Trey takes over lead and lays down a gorgeous melody solo to close out the song.
Everything after that is back in the greatest-average-great territory, but it's nice to hear a "Bowie" with some teeth and a "Horse" where Trey actually plays his guitar. And, man, this show has four contenders for top-tier-2015 jams...even if the rest of the show was just "Jennifer Dances" over and over again, it would be a tour highlight.
The Live Review:
12/31/15: Probably will not get through this entire show today, but I'll at least get started.
12/31/15: Moma Dance opens. Fish getting flashy with the beat already. Good sign.
12/31/15: A FROTHING CAP
12/31/15: Early Possum, and Trey be sprayin' notes all over the place.
12/31/15: Mike sounds great on this mix. Pumped. It's a good @phish day. Summer tour dates now, please?
12/31/15: Page takes an awesome organ solo in Possum.
12/31/15: Super-hot Possum > Wolfman's.
12/31/15: Another massive Type I jam here. These guys are serious tonight.
12/31/15: Birds is next.
12/31/15: Short take there, but way more interesting than the usual 3.0-filler style.
12/31/15: I Didn't Know!
12/31/15: AWESOME. Crowd singing in place of band. Singing all the parts.
12/31/15: Fish wants to sing one more song with the audience.
12/31/15: Fish and crowd singing Happy Birthday to his daughter.
12/31/15: Martian Monster!
12/31/15: More crowd participation w/ a MM stop-start woo jam.
12/31/15: Reba is an interesting call, here.
12/31/15: Rebas have been really good this year and this one's no exception. Fantastic solo.
12/31/15: Walls, presumably to close S1.
12/31/15: No serious jam in the first set, but the first four songs were all super-hot. Sing-a-long shenanigans after. Strong Reba + Walls.
12/31/15: Second set opens with The Wedge, weirdly enough.
12/31/15: The Wedge gets butt-slammed into Wilson.
12/31/15: Wilson sounding a little more heavy-metal than usual.
12/31/15: ASIHTOS is next. Standard Type I action so far.
12/31/15: Like many of the S1 songs, ASIHTOS doesn't go deep, but definitely brings the heat.
12/31/15: Yarmouth Road at high tempo.
12/31/15: This is starting to seem like the second part of a really solid, but straightforward first set.
12/31/15: Your mileage might vary according to your appreciation for that sort of thing.
12/31/15: Trey hangs back a bit and lets Mike lead the Yarmouth jam.
12/31/15: Now KDF.
12/31/15: Weird S2 so far.
12/31/15: Early on in the solo, Trey is getting a little atonal. Might be headed somewhere interesting.
12/31/15: Really spacey, Birds-like jam taking shape now.
12/31/15: Just drone, piano, and drums now.
12/31/15: Super minimalist yet groovy jam.
12/31/15: I really dig this. Different than pretty much all the big jams so far this year.
12/31/15: Maybe a little Drive-In Jam flavor in there, though.
12/31/15: That was one of the coolest jams I've heard from Phish in a long time. Weirdly minimal and spooky, but still melodic.
12/31/15: Slow segue into Piper.
12/31/15: Piper is really just an interlude, but it's about as good as you could ask for in a six-minute version.
12/31/15: Slow, grungy segue into Twist.
12/31/15: Awesome latin-infused vibe to the beginning of the Twist jam.
12/31/15: Return to the typical Twist riff now, but continuing past it into a second jam.
12/31/15: Mutron and funk action now.
12/31/15: Sounds a hell of a lot like a low-tempo The Dogs now.
12/31/15: Huge build, fantastic Trey solo, and then a return to the Twist riff. That was amazing.
12/31/15: Two of my easy-favorite jams of 2015 (and that's saying something) now on 12/30 and 12/31.
12/31/15: Super-short S2, but the back end was AWESOME.
12/31/15: Low-tempo, funky No Men's to start S3.
12/31/15: Solo gets weird early on, segues into a No Quarter/ASIHTOS-type jam.
12/31/15: Piano accents in the darkness.
12/31/15: Organic turn toward a more blissful, though still low-key space now. Trey putting down a melody.
12/31/15: Great beat from Fish is the foundation for synth and all sort of weird stuff for the next few minutes. This is amazing.
12/31/15: Ambient wash suddenly at about 11:00.
12/31/15: Sort of back to where we left off before the ambient bit now.
12/31/15: Extremely patient jam is going into deeeeep space here.
12/31/15: So glad I'm not high right now because I'd be shitting myself.
12/31/15: The Carinval of the Damned Jamming.
12/31/15: Now '99-era anthemic space rock.
12/31/15: This is absolutely nuts. How is this not everyone's favorite jam of ever?
12/31/15: Perfect > countdown > Auld Lang Syne
12/31/15: > Blaze On, crowd loses it.
12/31/15: Great straightforward solo to start the Blaze On jam.
12/31/15: Loops and clav now.
12/31/15: Neat, mellow chording now, over a bass drone.
12/31/15: Another fantastic solo from Trey now. Wow.
12/31/15: This is just beautiful.
12/31/15: Wrap back to Blaze On vocal outro. Then butt-slammed into Carini!
12/31/15: Holy hell, brilliant Trey solo AGAIN in Carini. Slinky as all hell.
12/31/15: Mike taking over now as the jam mellows out.
12/31/15: Great -> Bowie from Fish.
12/31/15: Bowie doesn't deviate massively from the typical mode, but Trey's suddenly astonishing soloing skills kick in here again.
12/31/15: Brief break after Bowie before The Horse.
12/31/15: Trey playing this time instead of Page.
12/31/15: I'm disappointed with the crowd's lack of reaction to the 'I think this exact thing happened to me...' line.
12/31/15: Number Line is next.
12/31/15: Somehow, that was the ugliest version of Number Line in pretty much forever.
12/31/15: Tube encore? Ooookay.
12/31/15: Tube > Cavern. Weird encore.
12/31/15: That said, everything from KDF to Bowie was absolutely brilliant.
12/31/15: There's arguably a lot of (well-played) filler in this show, but when you get a chunk of Phish music like that in the middle...
12/31/15: ...who cares?
2015-12-30 MSG I
The Verdict:
The first MSG show starts a trend that's run for at least the first three shows of the run (I haven't listened to the fourth one yet); that is, the first half-ish of the show is a pretty pedestrian outing by 2015 standards, but then there are a few absolutely gobsmacking jams in the second set, leaving to wonder by the end if the jamming redeemed the mediocrity or not.
N1's opening frame seems a bit short to me, and though it opens strong and the energy stays high throughout, there's nothing here that you haven't seen before. The "Roggae" peak is a high point, and the crowd howling along with "The Dogs" shows how much energy is in the room, but the audience ultimately seems more excited than the band is.
Fortunately, a completely different Phish comes out for the second set, and blows...well, everything...away. The "Chalkdust" is 22 minutes of pure momentum, the "Ghost" sandwiches in a brand new song, "Waves" contains some ambient goodness, and the "Gin"...well, the "Gin" might be my favorite jam of the year. No shit.
As if that isn't enough, the "Mike's Groove" that ends the set contains a gorgeous "Groove" -> "What's the Use?" -> "Groove," the best part of which is an incredibly dynamic version of "WTU?". Then they encore with "Zero," because the universe has a sense of humor.
Anyway, it would be hard to convince me that there's a better second set out there from this year, though there might be some ties. You should just watch the whole thing.
The Live Review:
12/30/15: MSG run starts off with Sample.
12/30/15: Vocals seem super-quiet. Have the usual EQ settings. Weird.
12/30/15: Free is #2. Standard take until nearly the end, when Machine Gun Trey makes a weird appearance.
12/30/15: Simple is the typical outro jam until the very end, when Trey starts up some loops and then transitions immediately into BOTT.
12/30/15: Neat transition, but almost seemed like a head-fake toward a 'real' jam.
12/30/15: Pretty swanky solo in BOTT.
12/30/15: High-tempo version of WAN leads into 555.
12/30/15: Standard 555 > a Roggae with a serious peak. That was intense.
12/30/15: Standalone version of The Dogs. Crowd howling. Awesome.
12/30/15: 46 Days...whoa, and that's it for the first set? That seemed short.
12/30/15: S1 had a few neat song choices and two huge peaks (Free and Roggae), but is definitely in the No Reason To Relisten category.
12/30/15: S2 kicks off with Chalkdust.
12/30/15: Pretty great Type I jam/solo developing early on here.
12/30/15: Jam comes out of the coda of the song, as per 2015 style.
12/30/15: The beginning of the jam sounds a bit like a spacier version of The Dogs.
12/30/15: I don't have words to describe this jam at the moment because I'm tired as hell, but it's really good.
12/30/15: Save for the middle section, this jam doesn't have the trajectory of some of the best 2015 jams, but it's 22 minutes of momentum.
12/30/15: That, in and of itself, is pretty amazing.
12/30/15: Nice landing in Ghost.
12/30/15: Grungy funk riff to start the Ghost jam.
12/30/15: Sort of forced segue into new song. I knew there was a new song in there, was hoping it'd be funk-oriented.
12/30/15: More like No Men's. But it's not.
12/30/15: Kind of a neat blues-rock style song, though. Page getting in some piano licks.
12/30/15: Back into Ghost!
12/30/15: Very short, straightforward bit of Ghost jamming before Trey whips out Waves.
12/30/15: Waves goes super-ambient after a few minutes. Really mellow and weird.
12/30/15: > Gin.
12/30/15: Arrhythmic vocal jam with Mike leading in Gin.
12/30/15: Okay, I'm just standing here in my office cracking up.
12/30/15: That was well done.
12/30/15: Smooth move into a chordy bliss jam. Page over to electric piano.
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12/30/15: Perfectly timed Mike bass bomb. Crowd erupts.
12/30/15: This is fucking awesome.
12/30/15: Oh shit, Trey is building up. If he peaks this sucker, look out.
12/30/15: jgtiaeopjgdigjdfp'ibraopj'rOPGIAFJK'EAL F'KAOP
12/30/15: OH SHIT. I might have just peed a little.
12/30/15: I haven't enjoyed an I-Wasn't-There jam like that in a long time. https://t.co/VgQuII84kQ
12/30/15: Mike's.
12/30/15: Mike's is going the chords-and-clav route almost immediately.
12/30/15: Reminded me a bit of a grungier version of the Dick's '14 Mike's.
12/30/15: Bouncin' is weird meat for the Mike's sandwich.
12/30/15: Speaking of which, I wonder if they've ever done Mike's > Meat > Groove. Obviously should happen if not, @phish.
12/30/15: HOOOOOOOOO SLOW SEGUE INTO WHAT'S THE USE
12/30/15: TREY STOP WE'VE HAD ENOUGH FOR ONE NIGHT
12/30/15: Super mellow version of WTU? with bluesy licks from...Mike?
12/30/15: Slow but powerful build back up to the end of the song.
12/30/15: -> Groove, w/ Auld Lang Syne tease.
12/30/15: End fantastic set.
12/30/15: Zero encore because lol
12/30/15: Excellent second set. No real letup, unless you count the new tune for the few minutes of Waves that wasn't weird.
12/30/15: Can't ask for more than that.
The first MSG show starts a trend that's run for at least the first three shows of the run (I haven't listened to the fourth one yet); that is, the first half-ish of the show is a pretty pedestrian outing by 2015 standards, but then there are a few absolutely gobsmacking jams in the second set, leaving to wonder by the end if the jamming redeemed the mediocrity or not.
N1's opening frame seems a bit short to me, and though it opens strong and the energy stays high throughout, there's nothing here that you haven't seen before. The "Roggae" peak is a high point, and the crowd howling along with "The Dogs" shows how much energy is in the room, but the audience ultimately seems more excited than the band is.
Fortunately, a completely different Phish comes out for the second set, and blows...well, everything...away. The "Chalkdust" is 22 minutes of pure momentum, the "Ghost" sandwiches in a brand new song, "Waves" contains some ambient goodness, and the "Gin"...well, the "Gin" might be my favorite jam of the year. No shit.
As if that isn't enough, the "Mike's Groove" that ends the set contains a gorgeous "Groove" -> "What's the Use?" -> "Groove," the best part of which is an incredibly dynamic version of "WTU?". Then they encore with "Zero," because the universe has a sense of humor.
Anyway, it would be hard to convince me that there's a better second set out there from this year, though there might be some ties. You should just watch the whole thing.
The Live Review:
12/30/15: MSG run starts off with Sample.
12/30/15: Vocals seem super-quiet. Have the usual EQ settings. Weird.
12/30/15: Free is #2. Standard take until nearly the end, when Machine Gun Trey makes a weird appearance.
12/30/15: Simple is the typical outro jam until the very end, when Trey starts up some loops and then transitions immediately into BOTT.
12/30/15: Neat transition, but almost seemed like a head-fake toward a 'real' jam.
12/30/15: Pretty swanky solo in BOTT.
12/30/15: High-tempo version of WAN leads into 555.
12/30/15: Standard 555 > a Roggae with a serious peak. That was intense.
12/30/15: Standalone version of The Dogs. Crowd howling. Awesome.
12/30/15: 46 Days...whoa, and that's it for the first set? That seemed short.
12/30/15: S1 had a few neat song choices and two huge peaks (Free and Roggae), but is definitely in the No Reason To Relisten category.
12/30/15: S2 kicks off with Chalkdust.
12/30/15: Pretty great Type I jam/solo developing early on here.
12/30/15: Jam comes out of the coda of the song, as per 2015 style.
12/30/15: The beginning of the jam sounds a bit like a spacier version of The Dogs.
12/30/15: I don't have words to describe this jam at the moment because I'm tired as hell, but it's really good.
12/30/15: Save for the middle section, this jam doesn't have the trajectory of some of the best 2015 jams, but it's 22 minutes of momentum.
12/30/15: That, in and of itself, is pretty amazing.
12/30/15: Nice landing in Ghost.
12/30/15: Grungy funk riff to start the Ghost jam.
12/30/15: Sort of forced segue into new song. I knew there was a new song in there, was hoping it'd be funk-oriented.
12/30/15: More like No Men's. But it's not.
12/30/15: Kind of a neat blues-rock style song, though. Page getting in some piano licks.
12/30/15: Back into Ghost!
12/30/15: Very short, straightforward bit of Ghost jamming before Trey whips out Waves.
12/30/15: Waves goes super-ambient after a few minutes. Really mellow and weird.
12/30/15: > Gin.
12/30/15: Arrhythmic vocal jam with Mike leading in Gin.
12/30/15: Okay, I'm just standing here in my office cracking up.
12/30/15: That was well done.
12/30/15: Smooth move into a chordy bliss jam. Page over to electric piano.
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12/30/15: Perfectly timed Mike bass bomb. Crowd erupts.
12/30/15: This is fucking awesome.
12/30/15: Oh shit, Trey is building up. If he peaks this sucker, look out.
12/30/15: jgtiaeopjgdigjdfp'ibraopj'rOPGIAFJK'EAL F'KAOP
12/30/15: OH SHIT. I might have just peed a little.
12/30/15: I haven't enjoyed an I-Wasn't-There jam like that in a long time. https://t.co/VgQuII84kQ
12/30/15: Mike's.
12/30/15: Mike's is going the chords-and-clav route almost immediately.
12/30/15: Reminded me a bit of a grungier version of the Dick's '14 Mike's.
12/30/15: Bouncin' is weird meat for the Mike's sandwich.
12/30/15: Speaking of which, I wonder if they've ever done Mike's > Meat > Groove. Obviously should happen if not, @phish.
12/30/15: HOOOOOOOOO SLOW SEGUE INTO WHAT'S THE USE
12/30/15: TREY STOP WE'VE HAD ENOUGH FOR ONE NIGHT
12/30/15: Super mellow version of WTU? with bluesy licks from...Mike?
12/30/15: Slow but powerful build back up to the end of the song.
12/30/15: -> Groove, w/ Auld Lang Syne tease.
12/30/15: End fantastic set.
12/30/15: Zero encore because lol
12/30/15: Excellent second set. No real letup, unless you count the new tune for the few minutes of Waves that wasn't weird.
12/30/15: Can't ask for more than that.
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