Three hours-plus (including intermission) is kind of a lot for any band — man were there a lot of guitar solos. But it was also a show with plenty of twists, which explains [Phish's] enduring appeal. "

Go figure. Phish plays a solid show last night with songs many fans, in many eras, longed for - NICU, Carini, 2001, Mike's & Weekapaug, Funky Bitch, Fluffhead, Loving Cup. But many fans, particularly a number of the lot of you here within our (multiple and overlapping, but ultimately notable if not distinct) bubble of Phish veteranism, complain that it lacked anything notable, and didn't justify Miner-level praise (all due respect to his vocabulary and skillful phrasing).

Sure, I'm a fan of the weirdness, too. I'm honored to have been at the 2/20/93 Roxy, for example, among others. (Not that last night was that. The Roxy was miles, and locked smiles, beyond last night.) And I've of course made sure to hear everything from the early embarrassing-in-retrospect bar shows to the later embarrassing-in-most-ways Coventry shows. But I've aggressively cut back on what I listen, particularly, post-breakup, to perhaps only a show or two each tour that I didn't actually attend, because the jadedness was ruining it for me. And it may be ruining it for you.

By the "breakup", I'd stopped going for the music. I was going to see friends, and to experience the aura - and those, too, were of course changing. The music's now back for me, and not just because it's gotten better, but because I'm not mired in it.When I head to AC next week, it won't just be exciting because of the imminent Halloween show, or the 120-seat Phamily Poker Classic at the Tropicana. It'll be because friggin' PHISH is playing. And they play great shows. Like Providence, last night.

The reliable stuff, the solid stuff, the strings of good songs with no flubs or meanders or distractions or oddities, the straight-ahead "this is our stuff" Phish? That's the show last night, getting 2 of 5 stars because it came too soon after Uttica, and verged too little from the compositions.

Mike just loves doing weird little projects that fall below the radar. First there was the "Joey Arkenstat" album Bane (and if you don't own that, you really should. It's a weird 50 minute continuous track that ventures into interesting places), then there was the "Birth of the Universe" track, and now there's a new one on Live Phish: Moss Remixes.

A 24 minute selection of (mostly) instrumentals that build off of aspects of songs onMoss, this is pretty interesting. It's melodic, dark at times, pretty at others and is a perfect little spin for a quiet morning. Not only that, but it's absolutely free! I can't promise everyone will love it, but if you're a fan of Mike, what's the downside?

http://www.livephish.com/music/0,586/Mike-Gordon-mp3-flac-download-Moss--The-Remixes.html

For this album we wanted to something new and somebody closer to our age. There's always this feeling with each album that, what have we done before and what's a direction that we haven't gone in? The album before Hoist [Rift] was really conceptual. It was kind of a concept album, and the whole thing was strung together. We wanted to just go swing to a whole different direction, and [Hoist producer] Paul Fox is somebody who... I think the biggest thing that appealed to us was that his records sounded so good.

It was a hell of a night! I was pretty interested in Phish before seeing them live, but hooked solid well before the end of the first set.

To my somewhat eternal dismay, I skipped the following night, also at the GAMH and the show at the Catalyst in Santa Cruz later that weekend as I was preparing for my A exam in grad school on 11/1/91. I also skipped most of the 10/31/91 GD run that year.

Being that responsible was silly. I still failed the exam! I might as well have had fun :-) "

So we're two weeks out now and people are starting to look for clues. There's no album game to play this year, so here's what people are speculating about. Since I don't know anything, I can just play along.

Rumor: The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway/Selling England by the Pound - Genesis

Source: The image of a Halloween ticket really looks a lot like a random poster for a Philly Genesis poster

Case For: Those are rather similar images. Remember how they had a banana image for the calendar when they did Loaded? There was a hint! Also TLLDoB has been rumored for 98 and was a finalist last year.

Case Against: The Dog Faced Boy is also very similar to a standard image of the guy. Also it's not exactly an image associated with Genesis; few people knew about that random poster before a week ago. Musically, it has the issue of being an unknown entity for the fans whereas they usually try to have one or two songs that everyone would know.

Rumor: A Night at the Opera - Queen

Read more...

In observance of my own neglect, the Monday Mystery Jam will again be postponed until Tuesday this week.

The earliest scrawlings on the walls of Phish's online cave date to 1990, when just a dozen fans started a regular email CC-list to keep in touch. By summer of that year, about 50 people were using a mailing list (or "reflector") at "phish@world.std.com" to talk about the band. The assemblage of fans, although swelling, was small enough that most of these folks knew each other, and all about each other's offline lives - something that would change dramatically over the years.

All the same, the hallmarks of online Phish traffic certainly emerged in these nascent communities: trading of the recordings, swapping of setlists and show reviews, plans to meet up, gossip, rumors, recommendations for other bands, and general celebration of a band that was very much a celebration of music...Indeed, Phish's initial online energy was particularly instrumental in the geographical expansion of their fan base, allowing the band to take otherwise premature tours westward with the assurance that fans would fill venues far from their native New England soil.

"My biggest concern was they were going to trash the place up," said Tiger, who had a change of heart when Great Northeast promised a rigorous cleanup and numerous announcements for concertgoers to respect the land. "They didn't leave a cigarette butt," he said.

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A mobile phone app to stream and download Phish concerts after they happen received the Best Touring App award during the Billboard Music App Awards at the Billboard Mobile Entertainment Live! conference today in San Francisco. Up against Bonnaroo’s festival app by Aloompa and the R5 music venue app from Ticketfly, Live Phish clinched the award with a series of key features that’s driving sales.

Brad Serling, CEO of Live Phish builder Nugs.net said more than 10,000 fans of the touring jam band downloaded the app during its first week, and 17% of those downloaders went on to purchase concert audio as well as Phish back catalog items through the app. “

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