Texas Two Step

Status

On a big jet airplane heading towards Atlanta following the Texas two step. I spent a grand total of 45 hours and 55 minutes in Texas, not nearly enough time but this is the life (of a t00r rat) I have chosen. 

Activity Summary

As tour goes on and I drop in and out of cities with limited time to hang out one of the things that gets cut back is the ability to explore and be active. As such Tejas pretty much involved friends, food, travel, phish and (limited) sleep. I'm not complaining at all, just pointing out why this section (and your trip) is short. Although based on all of the TL;DR messages I get people are probably thankful for a short blog section. 

Grinds

The Grove Wine Bar downtown Austin. Went straight from the airport and met up with Aron, Wookie, Lauren, Eliza, Grant, Jen and mama Beavers. Had a nice bowl of spaghetti and meatballs (carb loading for my one meal of the day), all of the food was on point and the service was great. 

The Hibbs, Austin. On our way out of Austin Emily made us a delicious home cooked breakfast and the Whitsons provided these sausage and egg filled bread things called kolaches. Home cooked meal in a friend awesome home bonding with their dog = good living. 

For lunch the Whitson's picked up some delicious burgers from Jakes. We sat around at their kitchen table eating, drinking, talking and laughing. It wasn't anything special and yet it was so special. Breaking bread in the warm and welcoming home of some of your closest friends in the world with more of your closest friends in the world are the simple yet beautiful moments that give life meaning, purpose and joy and fulfillment. 

Tee Shirt Time 

I flew in my lockn 2014 shirt from San Diego to Austin. I had every intention to change shirts but two people on the plane commented on the shirt so I figured it was a sign to keep it on (so long as they didn't play free again). It was also sofa king hot any shirt that I put on was going to end up drenched regardless so I figured I might as well save a shirt. I am on the road for 3 weeks with only a carry on and a backpack. I am proud of my ability to travel light. Just don't take me anywhere nice shoes, jeans or a collared shirt is required. Clearly none of those things are required when phishing. 

For the Dallas show I wore my Brian Wilson pet shop sounds shirt...a nice way to pay homage to my host, one of my best buddies in the world and brother for life, Brian Whitson. Wookie actually wore a zia shirt (I was born and raised in New Mexico) so the symmetry there was pretty cool. 

Shenanigans

Austin and Dallas are two very different cities and I had two very different experiences. 

Austin: The blueberry in a bowl of tomato soup. Super liberal. No bras. Great music scene. Booming college town. Hip vibe. Unpretentious. Artistic people. Keep Austin weird. (Speaking of, in Portland they also say Keep Portland Weird. Does anybody know who said it first?). Austin is much more my style than Dallas. 

Dallas: The biggest city in the biggest state in the country. High and very expensive fashion. Big homes, big cars, big hats (I couldn't find a ten gallon yarmulke anywhere), big people, big egos, big personalities, big fake boobs. Not exactly my style but I actually think Dallas is a bit of an underrated city as I always have a good time there. 

The Whitson's did an amazing job coordinating everything to make the Texas shuffle super easy including getting us on busses to and from the shows for both venues. The busses are another example of the differences between my experiences...

Austin: We met up at a liquor store for the pick up. The bus was an old school bus with couches that faced towards the middle, no bath room and no air conditioning. We left 30 minutes late, the bus was oversold with at least 10 people standing, lots of fun people on the bus but everyone was getting super squiggly. When we arrived we were given no instructions on pick up, time, people count, etc. After the show we got dropped off and scrambled for ubers. Loose, drunk and sloppy. 

Dallas: We met at the Granada theatre where we had to check in and get a colored wristband coordinating to one of three specific motor coaches we were assigned to. Big, comfortable, bathroom, air conditioning for days. After the show the Granada hosted a dope after party with a live funk band downstairs, $5 jambalaya, dumb and dumber playing outside upstairs on two giant screens. This was an incredibly well organized and professional operation. 

Austin: Outdoor venue that is part of a race track. Where we parked it was far enough away that we actually took a Disneyland type of shuttle to will call. Shakedown was at least a mile away. Too hot, too far. 

Dallas: beautiful indoor arena, parked right outside the entrance, took me 30 seconds to get in the arena. Never made it to shakedown (did all my pre-gaming on the air conditioned bus). 

Phishing Report

7/28/15

Our first non festival phish show in Texas since 1999 was taking place in the best city in Texas. The tour was off to a great start. I was rolling with some of my best friends in the world, we were feeling great, life was good. There was no doubt this was going to be a great two show run. And then the show actually started...

The Austin show was outdoors in the sweltering heat. The band didn't hit the stage until very late - one theory was that they wanted to wait until the sun went down. Party time opened - perhaps a nod to the touch pants shenanigans the night before. According to various sources (Pauly) touchpants was a shitshow the night before and Fishman got really drunk. This was a very rough set with lots of noticeable flubs. Nothing was played very well in the first set. I heard a theory that dirt got trey and mike thinking about Harris and really added to the discombobulation. I don't know if it was the hungover Fishman, the emotions, the heat or what but the band wasn't on point in Austin during the first set. At all. To be fair, we are talking about levels of something pretty awesome here. The worst day phishing is better than the best day of just about anything else. But this was an off set. 

The second set opened with easily the highlight of the show, 46 dogs. Two songs that I enjoy mashed together and well played. I will listen to this again. Piper had a nice transition into ghost but otherwise not much in either of these songs or the rest of the set. Any set that includes a shade, wading and waiting is a phish grounding into a triple play. And to play these songs in the second set = you're out! Bowie was ok but wasted on this evening. The tweeprise return came at the end of the show instead of the beginning as most predicted. Standard Suzy and loving cup closed this well below average phish show.

7/29/15

How was phish going to rebound after the Austin show? This felt like a very crucial point in the tour...which direction was phish going to go?

My first pit show of the tour couldn't have happened at a better venue. Bend was all GA, shoreline didn't have a pit (and yet the rail crowd still managed to get some of the best seats in the house - go team!), the entire floor of the forum was GA and Austin's pit was sizeable as well. The Dallas venue was the smallest of tour (6,500) and the pit was really small. Chachi and Sharon went in early while we were on the bus and held down a dope spot second/third row. I joined them there for the first set with one of the better unobstructed and close views of Trey I have ever had. 

This was easily the best first set of the tour for me. Tube kicked off the show, most likely in honor of Harris. Once again it wasn't jammed out but still a fun number to start the proceedings. Right away you could tell the band was much more locked in than in Austin. After tube every song in the first set was played for the first time. A rare sighting of the papyrus followed next and then punch. I have had major problems with punch in 3.0 as for some reason trey hasn't been able to hit the notes. This wasn't perfect but was a much better and well executed version than most in 3.0. Trey's 15 hours of practice a day for gd50 has paid off in his ability to hit notes and shred.

Steam, I learned later played for the first time ever in the first set, was a definite highlight. Really enjoyed the sounds and energy coming from the band during this part of the evening's festivities. Some standard phish numbers were banged out in poor heart (our first bluegrass of the tour) and NICU. I didn't know was fun, after the Austin affair where trey and fish seemed to be off it was nice of trey to refer to fish as his best man. 

Stealing time was solid and well executed, divided sky showed up again indoors. I set the over/under at 90 seconds and as usual got the phone stopwatch out to record the pause. 91 seconds...Vegas like book making skillz. Trey was smiling and giggling the entire time. This was one of those sets where the there was no ability to control smilers for anyone...the band, the crowd, the staff, etc. I was predicting a melt set closer all day (last indoor show, due factor, was really feeling it). I thought I was wrong once but I was mistaken. Rather than go dark and dirty they went musically light and happy with coil closing out a fun set. Night and day vs Austin.

Second set I moved back and watched with Brian, Lauren, Kim and Crew. Was the CDT opener going to be the 45 minute version we have been anticipating? No but it still broke out of the standard pattern and was really trippy and enjoyable. Then came Simple. Simple really seems to be re-emerging as a go to jam vehicle. The last few versions have all been incredible and this was a solid double. I wish they had expanded it a bit more before trey started dropping lots of teases heading into silent. 

Our second set slow down song was silent, good for silent but a take it or leave it song for me. So after the slow down we were going to be rewarded with a huge number, right? Nope! We got the line. I'm over this song and it shouldn't ever appear in the second set. Silent/line was the only part of the show that really bored me. Birds now seems like it will always start with the They Attack, solid birds with trey shredding again and the band was back in business. Fuego was good, jammed out a bit at the end but still not back to it's early full on jam days. 

Julius started up and I frowned. Just not a fan of the song. However it was one of those nights where the band was so on that whatever Phish touched turned to gold and even the Julius was rocking out and turned my frown upside down. Always love me some hood, especially since I was wearing my new hood plastic necklace. This was a great version with Trey in full on rock god shred mode to close it out with some epic notes. 

Before the show started I was making my rounds and chatting up the people around us. I talked to a cat that was holding a sign and when I had a look of surprise after reading it he said everyone gives him shit for the sign and song but he doesn't care, he has never seen it live and gave me a history of every time it had been played and why it mattered to him. I told him I respected his dedication and to own his love of the song. We then talked about how not to get the song played - do what the idiots with the peaches sign did and hold it up the whole show. Phish has specifically said when brining a sign to a show, hold it up for them to see once and then put it down. If they want to play it, they will. Anyway I only saw this guy hold his CONNECTION sign up at the start of the show and never saw it again until he went apeshit holding up when phish dropped the tune from the undermind sessions for only the 4th time ever. You could tell they hadn't practiced it and made the call after second set but once they got going it was a pretty special moment, especially for connection sign guy. 

After the connection phish dropped bombs and crushed first tube, a nice bookend to the tube opener. Trey was again in full on rock star mode, shredding notes, bouncing around like a kid and then of course doing the jedi thing with his guitar. A perfect ending to an incredible night of phish. 

DJ Phink

Jerry Garcia Band, 2/28/80, Keane College. 

At this time JGB was much more interesting than the dead. This entire show is pretty special, however one of the greatest jams I have ever heard and listen to as much as anything ever done by the dead is the After Midnight -> Elenor Rigby -> After Midnight. Straight fire, incredible playing, beautiful music, a locked in band, dope incredible alligator mouth transitions. 

https://vimeo.com/13802581

Summary

The Texas two step was a great time, it was special to see and hang out with my Texas people. Musically Austin was tough, Dallas was awesome but overall Texas was great. Hope to see everyone in the peach state!