Phish
New Year's Eve, 1995
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Phish
New Year's Eve, 1995
Rhino, 2005
RiYL: Phish |
Truly, not much. By this point you probably know whether or not you like the group. Yet…this is what Phish did best. They played unburdened sets, unreal jams, un-recreate-able shows that each captured a moment in time. And on their best nights, they made memorable music unlike any they’d made before.
December 31, 1995, was one of those nights. The band was on top of its game – advanced enough to ably append an 25-minute orchestrated epic with a mutating, improvisational “vocal jam” and to make repeated allusions to its already decade-old musical fantasy theme Gamehendge, but relaxed and not yet exhausted by the relentless touring and writing schedule that would eventually lead to the group’s demise.
Phish was always on for special occasions, and this was no exception. From moment one (on disc one of three), the group settles in to a tight groove on “Punch You In The Eye,” one of the best tracks they never released on a studio album. A rollicking, rumbling “The Sloth” follows, and then “Reba,” a live favorite here elevated to its full potential.
Later on Disc One, Phish reaches back into the world of Gamehendge for “Colonel Forbin’s Ascent” and “Fly Famous Mockingbird,” during which frontman Trey Anastasio digresses and riffs on the concept of time: explaining to the audience that the time they’re so used to – which allows us to pass into the next year – is actually created by Phish when they’re not on tour, in their Time Laboratory. If they stopped creating time, it would stay 1995 Forever, and never cross over into 1996. To illustrate how devastating this would be, the band breaks into a note-perfect version of that year’s nostalgically grating alterna-radio hit “Shine” by Collective Soul.
Disc Two opens up with an announcement that the band has conceded to the audience in round two of their ongoing chess game, which had lasted most of the preceding tour. “Band 1, Audience 1,” the announcer intones over the PA to rousing applause. Then, as if to ratchet the rock level up further from nerdness, Phish breaks into the Who classic “Drowned,” which joined the band’s repertoire in earnest the previous Halloween, when Phish had donned the “musical costume” of Quadrophenia. The rest of Disc Two continues the rocking mood, with versions of “Axilla (Part II),” “Runaway Jim” and “Mike’s Song.”
Disc Three is the 1996 portion of the show, with “Gamehendge Time Factory” completing the ruse of earlier with a psychedelic noise-fest and “Auld Lang Syne” crossing over. Then comes a “Weekapaug Groove” which symbolizes all that’s good and bad about the group. At its core, it’s kind of a stupid song, I have to admit – a simple riff supports inane lyrics (“try to make a woman, that’s your move / and I’m sharing in the weekapaug groove” ad infinitum), but yet somehow the band works it out and evolves it into not only a decent song, but an intense, epic, smile-inducing jam. Another Who tune, “Sea And Sand,” precedes the aforementioned “You Enjoy Myself,” the band’s signature tune, which doesn’t disappoint here in an extended version topped with a vocal jam. Just when that reaches the level of insanity, here comes “Sanity” to restore order, and then two rocking covers – Edgar Winter’s “Frankenstein” and Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” – to close things out.
I guess it’s just another tape in the Phish show collector’s closet, one perhaps forgotten in the fog and haze until a full decade later when Rhino gussied up a soundboard tape with pretty packaging. But it’s another clue to the nature of this band that came and went, showing that on a good night, in the right situation, they were not just another “jam band,” but one of the best live music experiences you could ever hope to have.
TROY CARPENTER | Troy Carpenter founded NATN from a Chicago apartment during the ambitious winter of 1998 with co-conspirators Ben French and Jonathan Cohen. After a five-year stint in New York, he and wife Lourdes have recently relocated to Indianapolis, where he spends days listening to music and nights in the kitchen at Elements restaurant. Musical heroes: Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley, Super Furry Animals. What else makes life worth living: Sushi, Phucty, runs in the park, and the Atlanta Braves.