The Dark and Dirty South

Status

1:00 am on I-80, Chachi at the wheel, Sharon riding shotgun, Fink (I'm going to experiment with the 3rd person a bit) in the back. We just left Blossum and have an 8 hour drive to tomorrow's show at Alpine Valley. Once again no thanks to phish for the rough tour routing. The things we do for this band... but wow have they made it worth our while this summer. 

Tonight (Blossum) was such a fresh, fun, playful, tight and hard charging show. I don't have a good enough vocabulary to describe this show. So glad they mixed up the rotation and gave us so many old school songs - only 2 songs younger than 17! Phish continues to Destroy not only America but Everything in their path. Do not sleep on any opportunity at all to see Phish. They are at the top of their game, truly next level phish. The exact hallway point of summer 2015 tour is at set break of tonight's (alpine valley 1) show. We are right in the middle of the best tour I have ever experienced...acknowledging as always ones personal experience can be at least as important as the musical experience. More on Blossum in a later blog, but for now more tales from the dirty south...

Update: that's all I finished last night so most of this was actually written from Toledo to alpine. 

Tee shirt time 

I wore my blue ballast point opah shirt. I can not believe how big ballast point ha gotten. For years this has been my favorite home town brewery and it has officially blown the fuck up. I know the brother of the guy that started ballast in his garage so it's crazy to see their beer every single stop this tour this far. Ballast points names all of their products after fish (except for the pale ale, originally named yellow tail but had to be changed due to copy write infringement) and the spirits are no exception: Opah is their herbal liqueur. 

8/2/15. Roll Phish

Following the next level Atlanta (Tomahawk) Chop, Phish headed deeper south into Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Valerie and I were in a two car caravan with Jayme, Elliot and some friends of friends of theirs following who were hitching a ride to Tuscaloosa via Beijing (love the dedication of our community). Third show in a row, especially on a travel day, takes some stamina. Good thing we are seasoned pros. 

One of Jaclyn's many responsibilities is accommodations and she kicks ass and takes names on that front. She set us up at a dope brand new (too new to handle the phish crush in some ways) embassy suites. From our room we could see the venue and shakedown; conveniently located on our way to the venue. Considering the small size of the town and venue, this was one of the best shakedowns I have seen on tour. It was located right under the highway and surrounded by big grass fields and rolling hills with appropriate mood lighting.

I am also fan of the venue. Small, cool look, good sound. We got a spot in the pit first set with some room but bailed to the back of the venue pavs; you could feel the second set pit crush coming. By all accounts the pit was way too crowded. It seemed like the bama pit ticket was the easiest or on tour - guessing it was oversold by the venue.

After the Atlanta Chop I was anticipating a fairly mellow show. First set opens with Sample. Common opener lately but always makes me smile thinking of my best buddy in San Diego JAR. For my birthday Jar gave me the ballast point shirt I was wearing. Miss you buddy. 

Rare first set Chalkdust shows why it belongs in the second set. I enjoyed hearing train song and the sunset roggae which due to some weird brain block I can never pronounce correctly despite the fact there are two ways to pronounce it. Maze has been a consistent performer in 3.0, once again the boys weren't afraid to go dark with the MFMF (which apparently contained very long fuse teases that I didn't hear - more chilling please and thank you). Overall it was a standard 3.0 first set, well played but nothing special.

Second set opens with the obvious DWD. Disease is always a safe jam vehicle and this one featured some dark and dirty jamming. I probably sound like a broken (sabbath) record but I love the heavy metal jamming phish has been exploring this tour. Always dig me some camel walk, great placement. Seven below is a joy and pleasure to hear... Very much an underplayed phish song at once a year so always really enjoyable to get a -7. 

One of the major disadvantages of going to the back of the venue is the talking. I am crowd control, talking division, however when you post in the back of the venue you have to show a bit more leniency. It got so bad Valerie and I bounced to a new spot that was markedly better. However based on the stream feedback and two bama phish show experiences last year, Alabama is just a talkers paradise. It's a panic buzz (whiskey and blow) at a phish show. 

Next up was Fuego, again. Even I think it's time to shelf this tune for a spell. Would be much better as a rarity. Hearing the high hat of 2001 always brings joy and pleasure because you know its time to get the funk down. Nothing to speak of from this hood and a standard possum close out the set. 

When A Day in the Life started a guy my age and a silver haired gentlemen started jumping up and down with pure emotional bliss, smiles for miles, a couple of who-hoos, plenty of high fives and a few hugs between them. After the show I chatted them up, turns out they are father (Dean) and son (Travis) both seeing phish for the first time together. I pulled a common fink move and asked them for their phone to take a picture. The son said his phone was out of juice so I took a pic on my phone and sent it to the father. The text from the dad back - few days later was really touching:

"Thanks dude, please forgive me, I can't remember names.  I finally got the picture.  It is the best one of the trip.  Means more to me than I can tell you.  We have two boys.  My wife is jealous she wasn't there. Not sure how many more road trips I have left in me, but this was a good one.  Your photo sums it up." 

Cool symmetry side bar:  Bama had six tour debuts and of those camel walk, seven below and a day in the life all had the same LTP (last time played) date: 10/27/14. That also happens to be the first and only time I brought my dad to phish. The universe!

DJ Phink

I drove all of the southern leg and Valerie was a great DJ... We listened to a lot of string cheese (some high quality shows we sampled below) and a hodgepodge of some awesome electronic chill music. 

SCI Shows:
2/5/2000 house of blues, LA
8/6/2001 mt.shasta
08/03/2007 camp Zoe, Salem, MO
11/26/2011 fox theater, atl

Summary 

Overall a fun night of phish but average show compared to others on this tour. However at this point we simply talking about different levels of  greatness by a band at the next level, absolute masters of their craft. I for one am having the time of my life.

Nashville to come in a later blog. Safe travels and hope to hug you on the road. 











Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Love Letter to My Sister

Image
I have been really struggling with what to get Kira for her birthday.  I have asked and hinted and prodded and the only response I seem to get is something along the lines of “Nothing…. make a donation to charity in my name.” I know she means it however I would really like to get her something nice, unique, special, one of a kind and beautiful because she is nice, unique, special, one of a kind and beautiful. Historically I have given my sister some pretty awesome gifts.  Watches from Switzerland, jewelry from Tiffany, a tempur-pedic mattress, framed photos of the dogs, a Kate Spade purse, etc. Last year I gave her the greatest gift of all…I skipped Magnaball for her birthday party.  Granted it was her 40 th , the entire family was in town and she threw a dope roller-skating party. However what gift would be better than to show her I loved her more than Phish by missing Magnball for her birthday?  I obviously love her more than Phish – if you read this letter you...
Read more

Phish Riviera Maya vs Panic en la Playa

In early 2016 Phish and Widespread Panic hosted separate destination concerts along Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. I was fortunate enough to have gone to both. A few people have asked me to compare and contrast the events so here are my thoughts. As always, I apologize in advance for the lack of brevity.  The Music Music is very subjective and circumstantial. People have different tastes in music. I really dislike the competition between bands in the jam band scene. There is a group of people in each fan base that feels part of their devotion to their preferred band includes hating other jam bands. I really don't like the negativity towards different bands or fan bases because people like different music than you. I'm happy that both fan bases have found a community that speaks to them, music that moves them and fills their souls. I think one of the reasons for the "rivalry" between Phish and Panic is because of how similar the communities actually are....
Read more

Suns Out, Bust Outs

Woop Woop!  I'm going to attempt to do some writing this tour, sharing my experiences and reviewing a couple of shows. As tour goes on the regularity (and length - got a little carried away here) of posts will likely drop off. So while this is my initial post of summer tour 2016, there is a chance it's also the last.  As always these posts share a lot of personal experiences and stories geared towards friends and phamily. If you don't know or don't care about the non phish part of my tour and want my thoughts on the show skip down to the "Phishing Report" section. Or if the opposite is true do what my sister does and skip only that section.  Status We are on the road, Destiny Unbound, from St. Paul to Chicago. Tour bro Gormley at the wheel, new friend Ana in the back. We will be doing a lot of driving this tour so he rented a nice SUV. Great driver, good buddy, but we disagree on tour music. Gormley = all Phish all the time. Fink = prefers to not listen to Phi...
Read more