Phish owns jacked-up diehards and newbies
Published in Berkshire Eagle, 10/26/10
Photo by Brantley Gutierrez © Phish 2010
By Jeremy D. Goodwin
AMHERST—With a very jacked-up capacity crowd in attendance, Phish delivered a well-performed, high-energy show at UMASS’s Mullins Center on Saturday, complete with a generous setlist designed to please the diehard and the new fan alike.
Phish can walk into a basketball arena and totally own it, building upon a shared sense of intimacy with the fans that can lead a the smallest little wrinkle in a jam to send a spontaneous ripple of cheers through the crowd, as happened in the first set "Tweezer." When the band comes out and opens with “Meatstick,” as it did Saturday, the onstage action functions at several levels. First, it was a fun, goofy song that started things off on a light note. It also has special importance to longtime fans due to its prominent placement in Phish's legendary midnight-to-sunrise set in the Florida Everglades to ring in the new millennium. Plus, it has never opened a show before, so the trainspotters jotting down the setlist in little notebooks got to use their asterisks while the newbies danced blissfully to its chunky rhythms.
The band's repertoire is deep enough, its chops fresh enough, and the energy between those on stage and those on the stands intense enough, that it can deliver shows like this seemingly at will. It was very well played, included a healthy sampling of the many genres the band mixes and matches from—the vaguely tropical rhythm of "Meatstick," the 70's rock and roll of "Kill Devil Falls," the hardcore goof "Big Black Furry Creatures From Mars.” The result is about ten thousand happy funs jumping up and down for about three hours. Laced throughout the show were just enough gestures toward spontaneity and open improvisation to keep the hardcore fans listening closely for the next clue, or half-clue, that Phish will recapture more of the improvisational abandon it brandished before its 2004 dissolution, which turned out to be an extended break rather than a break-up.
AMHERST—With a very jacked-up capacity crowd in attendance, Phish delivered a well-performed, high-energy show at UMASS’s Mullins Center on Saturday, complete with a generous setlist designed to please the diehard and the new fan alike.
Phish can walk into a basketball arena and totally own it, building upon a shared sense of intimacy with the fans that can lead a the smallest little wrinkle in a jam to send a spontaneous ripple of cheers through the crowd, as happened in the first set "Tweezer." When the band comes out and opens with “Meatstick,” as it did Saturday, the onstage action functions at several levels. First, it was a fun, goofy song that started things off on a light note. It also has special importance to longtime fans due to its prominent placement in Phish's legendary midnight-to-sunrise set in the Florida Everglades to ring in the new millennium. Plus, it has never opened a show before, so the trainspotters jotting down the setlist in little notebooks got to use their asterisks while the newbies danced blissfully to its chunky rhythms.
The band's repertoire is deep enough, its chops fresh enough, and the energy between those on stage and those on the stands intense enough, that it can deliver shows like this seemingly at will. It was very well played, included a healthy sampling of the many genres the band mixes and matches from—the vaguely tropical rhythm of "Meatstick," the 70's rock and roll of "Kill Devil Falls," the hardcore goof "Big Black Furry Creatures From Mars.” The result is about ten thousand happy funs jumping up and down for about three hours. Laced throughout the show were just enough gestures toward spontaneity and open improvisation to keep the hardcore fans listening closely for the next clue, or half-clue, that Phish will recapture more of the improvisational abandon it brandished before its 2004 dissolution, which turned out to be an extended break rather than a break-up.
Photo by Dave Vann © Phish 2010
A catalog of those little clues would include a few minutes of relaxed jamming in the first-set “Tweezer,” a raging jam segment in the "Down with Disease" second-set opener that seemed to flirt with the Rolling Stones' "Jumping Jack Flash," and a series of excellent transitions in the second set—the arena rock ballad "Prince Caspian" morphed dramatically into the moody new song "Halfway to the Moon," which then took a nifty left turn into Steve Wonder's "Boogie On Reggae Woman" with help from bassist Mike Gordon, who excelled all night. Then there were the cool-because-it's-weird flourishes, like guitarist Trey Anastasio calling for the band to reprise the lyrics of "Meatstick" during the tightly wound rave-up "Tweezer Reprise," or calling out drummer Jon Fishman to sing Syd Barrett's "Love You" before playing a solo by blowing into a vacuum cleaner attachment.
Phish’s current alchemy of well-practiced stagecraft and a few dollops of in-the-moment openness adds up to a show that is a unique composition. This one had bombastic rock gestures that filled every corner of the place, alongside subtle touches that caused their own waves of excitement. And with only one song repeated from the similarly showy performance the day before, it provided yet another fresh experience, fit to be collected in fans’ memories like precious baseball cards.
These types of shows are Phish’s bread-and-butter right now. For all the lazy misconceptions about endless jams that still pollute mainstream discussion of the band, it is not regularly venturing a tremendous amount in the way of musical risk—but it is delivering mightily as a well-oiled, entertaining juggernaut that feels at all times like it is achieving exactly what it sets out to do. When it comes to rocking arenas, Phish has an easy confidence and a subtle swagger, born from years of experience, that still place it near the best in show.
Phish’s current alchemy of well-practiced stagecraft and a few dollops of in-the-moment openness adds up to a show that is a unique composition. This one had bombastic rock gestures that filled every corner of the place, alongside subtle touches that caused their own waves of excitement. And with only one song repeated from the similarly showy performance the day before, it provided yet another fresh experience, fit to be collected in fans’ memories like precious baseball cards.
These types of shows are Phish’s bread-and-butter right now. For all the lazy misconceptions about endless jams that still pollute mainstream discussion of the band, it is not regularly venturing a tremendous amount in the way of musical risk—but it is delivering mightily as a well-oiled, entertaining juggernaut that feels at all times like it is achieving exactly what it sets out to do. When it comes to rocking arenas, Phish has an easy confidence and a subtle swagger, born from years of experience, that still place it near the best in show.
