Any Phish Phans out there?

[Niven]

Anyone goto the Trey concert this summer? It's coming to Alpine Valley in July. Anyone going?
Niven

[Nagel]

Ahh! A fellow PHISH HEAD

I just got my tickets on saturday from mailorder. And I got ALL of em (BIG EAR TO EAR GRIN)

Gonna be catching the Jones Beach, NY, Tweeter Center, MA and Saratoga PAC,NY shows. Great three night run, and its friday, saturday and sunday to boot!@

Caught 55 Phish shows so far, all the biggies (from the Clifford Ball to Big Cypress) and a few Trey shows. My fav Trey show was this past Feb in Roseland Ballroom, NYC.

Now tell me this, once you hear SAND played with horns, could it ever be the same w/o em? NO WAY!!!!

Gonna be a fun summer, starting with Eric Clapton on my birthday in June!

I just WISH the boys would put on a few dates, but I can understand they need a break. But still, I need my Phish!!!

[Wolverine]

I have also been known to attend the occasional Phish concert. Of course, time and money limited me greatly the last few years they were touring (and being here, which wasn't exactly a big hotspot for concerts). Trey probably won't be coming this way either.

Unfortunately, when my car was broken in to last year, the jack-a$$es stole my cases of tapes, which included tapings of all of the concerts I had been to, plus a few others (and a ton of Led Zeppelin bootlegs as well).

But lately I haven't had much time to do much of anything music wise, so things like going to concert have had to jump to the back-burner for a while.

Clapton's shows for the "Nothing but the Blues" tour were fantastic.

Dave

[hcs3]

concerts haven't come close enough for me to attend, though i still like to call myself a phish phan.

i tend to get my fill of phish using the interent to track down concerts. lately a share ware software called "BearShare" (available via download.com) has produced some great results. tons of phish live cuts, including full shows, and guest appearances. nugs.net also has several full length phish shows.

any panic fans out there? i've gotten into widespread panic in recent years as well. several concerts of theirs can be located at nugs.net as well.

henry

[DedHed]

a also want to hear more Oysterhead!

Tray on Guitar/vocals
Les Claypool (yes, from Primus) on bass/vocals
and stewart Copeland from the police on drums.

that's one crazy sounding setup! they get a couple of grooves though!

i do like SOME panic, i can't get one the same plane as their guitar player. and that's what i relate to usually. they have a very good organ player though.

if you guys like all that i'm sure you would enjoy String Cheese Incident. they're CD sounds jazz but their shows sound Bluegrass/Jam. GO figure! i got their cd that cam out on tuesday, it's pretty good.

NOT TO FORGET the Dead! i still enjoy all my dead CD's and the other ones!


Dennis

[Nagel]

Funny you should mention panic.

A buddy of mine who I got into Phish has recently gotten ME into Panic. Prolly gonna check em out at the Beacon this summer, they definately got a nice groove goin. Interesting mix too, sometimes dragging electronica into the mix is a new twist.

Definately an alternative to Phish, but not a replacement!

and of course, Phish isn't a replacement to the Dead, they're just a supplement.

There's so many good jam bands out there, Medesky, Martin and Wood, Lake Trout, Foxtrot Zulu, I could name em forever.

Just check out the lot scene before a show, or the local clubs on show night. You'll find em....

hehe

[reefaddict]

I saw a bumber sticker a few years ago that this thread brought back to mind....


Jerry's Dead
Phish Sucks
Get a job!

[hcs3]

jerry may be dead, but his spirit lives on.

if phish really sucks, i wonder why some of the greatest artist of all-time play with them - the dead, santana, eddie vedder, pink floyd...

why work if you don't have to? :)

henry

[Nagel]

Well,

Phish must not suck so bad that they consistently sell out 30,000+ seat venues WITHOUT the benefit of radio. Not to mention the festivals of 80,000+ people (130,000 + in Big Cypress for New Years Eve 99-00). Interesting note too, Big Cypress was the LARGEST ticketed event WORLDWIDE for NYE 99-00. They must be doing something right!

I Can and WILL say this though. Going to 55 Phish shows has RUINED my perception other concerts. I LOVE the spur of the moment, unplanned jams, the lot scene is much different then other shows (and I've seen everything from anthrax to yanni), AND I get to travel. Without that I would have never known just how HORRIBLE continental airlines arena is. (personally I LOVE the old knickerbocker arena in Albany, AKA the pepsi arena)

It's a lifestyle, some of us love it, some will never understand it......

[Niven]

So what is the truth? They are still going to tour right? Phish is the best band to ever watch in concert. You'd think a 30 min song would get boring, but it just seems to fly by :D They are awesome and if you say any different....you're wrong;)
Niven

[Nagel]

The lowdown is:

Hiatus for now, not sure on plans for NYE, but no plans at all for a Fall tour 2001. They ARE NOT breaking up, not by a long shot. They just needed some time with the families. How do I know this? Hmm, well for starters I know Tom Marshall (lyricist) and Steve AKA the Dude of Life. Both of them are VERY good friends with Trey since he was a kid, so I trust the information I get from them.

Just sit tight, they will be back around, they get bored if they don't tour.

People always wondered how I could see them 7 nights in a row, well, not alot of repeats, and nothings ever the same. Anyone who says that they suck obviously have never been to a show.

[O'Man]

I know of them but know none of their stuff. Please suggest a decent Phish album or download. I used to enjoy GD shows, but we're going back 20 years:(
For the fans, by one heck of a poet....
"Lady Simplicity
Bright like a ribbon bow
Everything everywhere
Just for the show
Believe it it implicitly
Love is tranquility
If you don't know that
Then nothing is known." :)

...."give me five/I'm still alive":)
"we can share what we got of yours, cause we done shared all of mine":D

I mean it.......

[hcs3]

there are TONS of downlaods for phish. go to www.nugs.net. this place is great. they've got GD, phish, and panic, to name only a few. all live, complete concerts with good quality.

HTH

henry

[Nagel]

Okay, if you GOTTA buy it, then at least make it good. Get the 6 CD set from Hampton fall 98. Its called Hampton Comes Alive. Great two night run, that weekend REALLY cost me (truck motor blew on the way home from VA to NJ)

But in all honesty, there are plenty of great shows available on nugs or via napster / aimster / them sharing programs. Notables in my book include Big Cypress, NYE 99-00, the Great Woods shows in the summer of 99 (40 or so minute Bowie followed by lizards, I nearly cryed), hmm, the "Island Tour" thats 4/3 4/3 4/4 4/5 of 98 in Nassau and Providence, hmmm Albany fall tour 99, the night before thanksgiving, just a few of my favorites.

[hcs3]

hampton comes alive is avialable via "bearshare". you can downlaod bearshare at http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-1896420-100-5937476.html?tag=st.dl.1000

once on, do a search for phish. roughly 3000 matches come up :)

HTH

henry

[Nagel]

Originally posted by hcs3
hampton comes alive is avialable via "bearshare".

Thats the only no-no that I adhere to. The boys in the band are nice enough to let us tape shows and trade them freely, I never condone someone downloading a "ripped" CD of studio tracks or anything that the band has officially released on CD. This could ultimately lead to them banning taping, and we don't want that.

The hampton shows (11/20 11/21 1998)are more then most likely also available from a private taper, and seeing as nugs.net is HUGE, I'm sure its a private version, not the actual album released by Phish otherwise they would have heard from Phish already.

Just a pet peeve of mine, especially since ANY live 'boot is MUCH better then any studio album IMO. And I'd like to be able to get tapes for many more years from my taper friends.

One last note: On 11/20 they did a DROP DEAD FUNNY version of "Getting Jiggy with it", man, I was ROTFLMAO after that.

[Niven]

How long does it take you guys with cable modems or whatever you have to download songs?
I just tried with our lowly 56k conection and it said 26 min for a song :eek1:
Niven

[Nagel]

MAN o MAN I feel for ya!

56K can be painful. I went Cable in January, and WOW!

For starters, most of the people sharing Phish on napster and the likes have SLOW connections. If I d/l a top 40 tune from "john q. public" I get like 400K/sec, its done in 10 seconds. (avg 4 minute song)

If I download a phish tune from a GOOD server I get MAYBE 100k/sec, usually around 60-80k/sec. Still a lot easier to deal with when I'm crusing and it takes probably 1-2 minutes, sometimes the servers get hammered and drop throughput to a mere 1k/sec and then I say forget it. For me, the avg. show take about 30-45 mins to download both sets and the encore.

If I find a GREAT server (400k/sec throughput), that can be as short as 10-15 mins for the entire show.

One note: Lots of people are pushing SHN as the file format that doesn't lose quality. MP3's have done quite well if you ask me. And we (at the recording studio) have over $1000 in reference monitors and the quality of MP3 is damn near the same as SHN, just a much smaller file size. If you are gonna be one to ***** about quality loss from MP3, then dont talk to me about it, I fully expect those people to buy a DAT and record it DIRECT from another DAT. The less A/D and D/A conversion, the better. Too many idiots out there claim SHN is the best. Well, guess what. Most of them have taken the CD (that's recorded in 16 bit) and ripped it to SHN. Hmmm. Thats at least 3 A/D and D/A conversions.

Don't jump on the bandwagon, judge for yourself. I run a small recording studio, and couldnt be happier with my MP3 collection. I don't waste time with SHN files, which are, by the way, averaging 1.5-2 GIGS per show, compared to 200-500 megs for it in MP3 format.

MP3 is fine, after all, live shows are NOT recorded in the studio, and there is TONS of inherrent noise anyway.

just my .o2

[Niven]

Nagel,
Thanks. Were hoping to get DSL here soon, so hopefully it'll get faster:D
This is going to be a great chance to waste time at work again;)
Niven

[Wolverine]

While I very much enjoy Phish, I did think that it was time for them to take a break. I felt that in the last year before they stopped they seemed to be getting a little disinterested. The first time I took my wife to see them (I think it was my 5th or 6th show), they were definitely not on their game, and so she understandably wasn't very impressed. Then the next time I saw them, they seemed even less inspired; and the jams were really very much like the ones I had heard before. It seemed like they were just going through the motions. Then the next time I saw them, they were even worse, and it was down to the level where I ended up feeling like that last concert just wasn't worth it. I had to go listen to a few hours of my bootlegs (which, as I mentioned above, I no longer own) just to get the feeling out of my head.

After that I was glad to hear that they were doing this hiatus thing. That way when they go back on they can be back to their old selves.

The odd thing is that two groups of friends each with different sets of concerts that they went to felt the same way.

As for the free downloads, I agree that this band lets the fans get so much for free, the deserve to have people at least pay for their official albums. But that's just my opinion.

As mentioned above, the live albums are superior to the studio albums, but if you really want to get a studio album, I'll just say that Rift is my favorite.

Dave

[Nagel]

Ok, since I see we're getting into a little bit of history here, lemme share mine.

My first show was the Clifford Ball. Back then I didn't know that this was gonna end up being as big a thing, but today you're revered if you were at the ball, kinda cool, like a veteran. (I've seen 55 shows though I know alot of people over 100, and even a few up in the 200-350 show range). I actually got dragged to that show because all my friends screwed me on going to Bethel for a festival that weekend (Woodstock's original site has a small gathering every year on the anniversary of WS, 1995 was awesome, only natural I wanted to go in 1996). Well, I slept through the acoustic set (kicking myself in the /\ss for that now) but the first set hooked me (no phish/fish pun intended). Since then I have caught 55 shows, including all the big festivals (Ball, Went, Lemonwheel, Oswego and Big Cypress), a few NYE runs (1998 I had 2nd row the first night, 10th row the 2nd night, 11th row the 3rd night and on NYE they screwed me putting me WAY up in the upper levels, but hey, I GOT A NYE ticket so I wasnt b!tch!n.) I was at hampton for the taping of hampton comes alive. The most shows in a run that I have seen is 9 in 11 days, and avg about 7 shows in 9-10 days per tour. I'm an "east coast kid" if ya can still say that about me (I'm 28). I have an office job with a button down shirt and a tie, but usually use 1 of my 2 weeks a year vacation to tour with Phish in the northeast and I get down and into it with my patchie corduroy pants and patchwork hoodie, tevas and birkenstocks, camping all the way. I've seen shows in 13 states, and 22 different venues. Makes me glad too that they never play the NJ meadowlands cause the sound there is HORRIBLE. My favorite indoor venue is the Pepsi Arena in Albany, and outdoors its a toss-up between the VA beach amphitheatre and the Tweeter center in MA.

As far as their playing goes, I think its like this. I caught the last few of their great shows in 96 and 97. Free back then was like 40 minutes long, and they played it with a theremin! (wierd instrument) Well, they kinda got on a funk path in 97, and I think thats still going strong. This past summer wasn't that great of a tour, they weren't "together", it seemed more like it was Phish + Trey up on stage then it was just PHISH. Personally I think Trey was having some substance problems last summer, and hopefully they are using this time wisely. He was constantly spaced out, playing in his own little world and obviously not in a groove with the rest of the band. Last fall were some great shows ( I caught the first 7 shows of the tour, and the opener in albany ROCKED), but they were just great, not like GREAT or GODLY, but better then your average, and NO REPEATS for the first 5 of those shows. Now I saw trey this past february in the Roseland Ballroom in NYC, and WOW. He had his sh!t together! But it wasnt phish, nor anything like phish. They did do some phish tunes, and there were some good jams, but lack of keyboards kinda hurts. The horns filled in, and I'll never like Sand again unless I hear it with horns. Now I got tix to 3 shows this summer, Jones Beach, Tweeter and the SPAC in NY. REALLY lookin forward to my fri-sat-sun tour. hehe.

When phish DOES regroup, I think we're gonna be in for some DAMN good shows. As long as Trey plays WITH the band, and not on top of them.

just my .o2 and a grilled cheese

[Niven]

And I've only seen TWO:( Target Center in 96 (I think) and Alpine Valley in 2000. I haven't spoiled myself with great seats yet:D I'm happy enough just listening. It's just a completly different experience than any other band I've seen.
Keep on Phishin'
Niven

[Nagel]

I'll let you in on a little secret Niven.

MAILORDER

Yes, you can get tix EARLY, before ticketb/\stard puts em up for sale, and its first come first served. Check out http://www.phish.com to see when they do mailorder. Usually its over 3-5 days, orders MUST be placed then, and you get COOL tickets. I paid face value for EVERY SINGLE show that I ever saw, never used ticketb/\stard. and only a $8 svc charge on the entire order, whether its 1 ticket for 1 show, or 4 tickets for 20 shows, its still only $8. Thats how I got my trey tickets already, and ticketb/\stard puts em up for sale like june 8 and 9. At least you get 2 chances for tix then, once in mailorder, and if they dont come you still have time for the ticket rapers at ticketb/\stard.

And ALL tix through mailorder are ALWAYS face value.

HTH

[hcs3]

i gotta a question for you history buffs.

available via download (sorry :( ) is a version of "gin and juice," originally sung by snoop doggy dog. the downlaod says it's phish doing the cover. however, i have a buddy that swears up and down that it's string cheese incident. can anybody set this straight?

speaking of swearing, RC has in place a default program to "*" out any possibly offending language. please allow the program to do it's job :)

thanks

henry

[Nagel]

I would probably have to say that it is String Cheese. Check out this page:
http://www.ihoz.com/firstlast.html

There's no gin and juice on it, granted, it might not be 100% accurate, but its generally accepted as one of the better references on the web for phish shows.

Also check out the helping phriendly book

http://www.phish.net/hpb/

If you can't find it in either, chances are it was never played.

[wdt2000]

I think the bluegrass version of Gin & Juice was done by SCI or Leftover Salmon. But I know for a fact that Phish didn't play Gin&Juice. They have played Cali Love and Get Jiggy with it to name a few rap songs. Speaking of rap I meet Trey this year when he played in Asheville and he did what he called the Honey Nut Cheerios rap.

Will