After a week off, the Mystery Jam returnes, tanned, rested and ready to notch its eigth victory... in just 132 tries. Sigh. As usual we will be playing for an MP3 download, courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. The rules haven't changed: you need to correctly identify the song and the date to win. Post your guess in the comments. One guess per person per day (with the second “day” starting after I post the hint). A hint will be posted on Tuesday (if necessary) and the answer will be posted on Wednesday. Good luck...

Wednesday Answer: Congrats to NickSalv for being the first to get the 6/19/97 "Caspian." The Blog will be back on Monday with another Mystery Jam...

There's more information on "Hands on a Hardbody" at their official website. As the opening nears, we hope to have more features and interviews on Phish.net about Trey and Amanda's collaboration in writing this musical.

Tickets are available at Ticketmaster at this link. We're pleased to announce that the producers are making a special discount code available at deeply discounted prices, ranging from $79 in the Orchestra and Front Mezzanine to $65 in the Rear Mezzanine (this being a small Broadway theatre, we're told there's not a bad seat in the house).

To get the special fan discount offer (valid until April 6th), select the date you want to see the show on from the Ticketmaster main event page here, enter the discount code "FAN1HH" in the offer code box (as shown below), and then choose open seats from the interactive seat map.

Welcome to the 131st running of the Mystery Jam here at Phish.net. As usual we will be playing for an MP3 download, courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. The rules haven't changed: you need to correctly identify the song and the date to win. Post your guess in the comments. One guess per person per day (with the second “day” starting after I post the hint). A hint will be posted on Tuesday (if necessary) and the answer will be posted on Wednesday. Good luck...

Wednesday Answer: Conrats to davarama for being the first to call the 6/24/95 "Bowie." The Blog will be back on Monday with another Mystery Jam for your listening pleasure.

Since we here at Phish.net dropped the ball in pulling together a NYE recap, I thought I’d make up for it (just one month later) by giving you one fan’s opinion on the best moments of 2012. These are not the opinions of Phish.net, just my own thoughts. If you agree or disagree, I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

Best Jam: 9/1/12 "Light." The last seven or so minutes of this jam aren't just best-of-2012 good, they rank among Phish's finest improvisational passages. To those who would criticize the first few minutes of this jam I'd point out that not every note of even the 12/29/94 "Bowie" is pure gold either and, more importantly, ask how you even remember that by the time this is over. You'd think a show with the best jam of the year, an "Antelope" opener, a first set "Tweezer," a 13-minute "Golden Age," a jammed out "Caspian" and a set closing "Mike's" > "No Quarter" > "Weekapaug" sequence would be a contender for best show of 2012, but it turns out it's not even the best show of the Dick's '12 run. In fact, it's not even close...

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It’s Super Bowl Sunday, which, as a football fan, is exciting and, as an Eagles fan, mildly depressing. Football, so they say, is a game of inches. A broken tackle, errant pass or missed field goal often is the difference between winning and losing a game. If Eli Manning doesn’t make two of the greatest/luckiest plays in Super Bowl history, Tom Brady has five Lombardi trophies. The flip side of that is that if Adam Vinatieri was never a Patriot maybe Mr. Bündchen has none.

So, what does this all have to do with Phish? Well, not terribly much, if I’m honest. But I was thinking this morning how most sports fans view football teams by how many championships they’ve won... who came through the most often in the big game. What if we viewed Phish songs that way?

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Welcome to the 130th installment of the Mystery Jam here at Phish.net. As usual we will be playing for an MP3 download, courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. The rules haven't changed: you need to correctly identify the song and the date to win. Post your guess in the comments. One guess per person per day (with the second “day” starting after I post the hint). A hint will be posted on Tuesday (if necessary) and the answer will be posted on Wednesday. Good luck...

Wednesday Answer: Congrats to docgonzo for being the "first" to get the 12/28/12 "Tweezer" with his first guess. It may be winning on a technicality, but it's winning just the same. The Blog will be back on Monday with another (most difficult) Mystery Jam...

The Lawn Boys, a New York City based Phish tribute band, will be playing Sulivan Hall at 214 Sullivan St., NYC tomorrow, January 25. More information on their Facebook page here. The Lawn Boys generously staged a benefit performance last November for the Mockingbird Foundation, raising almost $1,200 through door receipts and a table staffed by volunteers Katherine Weatherly and Kelly Lawson.

Above: The Lawn Boys at the Canal Room benefit for the Mockingbird Foundation. Pictured in their lineup for this benefit are musicians Darren Rodney (Guitar and Vocals), Brad Weiger (Bass and Vocals), Shoheen Owhady (Keyboards and Vocals), Andrew Mega (Drums and Vocals) and Indofunk Satish (Special Guest - Trumpet).

Photo courtesy The Lawn Boys and Mantner Photography.

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Welcome to the MLK MJ here at Phish.net, another prime time edition. As usual we will be playing for an MP3 download, courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. The rules haven't changed: you need to correctly identify the song and the date to win. Post your guess in the comments. One guess per person per day (with the second “day” starting after I post the hint). A hint will be posted on Tuesday (if necessary) and the answer will be posted on Wednesday. Good luck...

Tuesday Night Answer: Congrats to slaphappy for being the first to call the 9/18/00 "Halley's." See you all next week with MJ130.

Phish has released another gem from the archives, 5/3/93 New Brunswick, NJ as a benefit for victims of Hurricane Sandy. Download the mp3, FLAC, or ALAC version of the show here. Recorded by Paul Languedoc and remastered by Fred Kevorkian, this show is from the last days of a very strong spring tour by Phish, and includes a stellar 2nd set.

Phish has released high definition videos of all four band member's rig tours, as seen on recent webcasts. You can check them out on their official Vimeo site or as a playlist on their Youtube channel.

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Welcome to the 128th running of the Mystery Jam here at Phish.net. As usual we will be playing for an MP3 download, courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. The rules haven't changed: you need to correctly identify the song and the date to win. Post your guess in the comments. One guess per person per day (with the second “day” starting after I post the hint). A hint will be posted on Tuesday (if necessary) and the answer will be posted on Wednesday. Good luck...

Friday Answer: Friday already? Things kind of got away from the Blog this week. In any event, congrats to McGrupp81 for being the first to ID the 8/26/93 "Melt." The Blog will be back on Monday with a new Mystery Jam...

On January 7th, a friend of the entire Phish community was taken from this world much too early. Robert Eckhart (known by many as Barefoot Bob) found a small spot on his tongue. Sadly, it turned out to be cancer. He went through painful surgeries to have part of his tongue and the lymph nodes in his neck removed. This was followed by numerous, difficult radiation treatments. On Monday, January 7th, he lost his courageous battle and leaves a wife and two children. He was only 37.

Trey was on WXPN this afternoon, on the same day as Bob's services, extolling the virtues of Phish fans and proclaiming them the best fans anywhere.

Let's really prove this point as we have many times in the past and band together as a community and help Bob's family. It makes no difference if you knew him from Phish.net, from Twitter, from tour experiences together, a fleeting hello at one show, just knew his name or never heard of him at all. He is one of us. A fan. A husband, father, brother, son, and friend.

Many artists, Phish and gracious fans and friends have donated a few dozen fantastic items including posters and artwork. Please visit http://barefootbobmemorial.com/ for details on how you can participate. And remember- the most important thing is helping the family so make those donations and dig deep.

Share your thoughts and rememberances of Barefoot Bob in THIS thread.

We are lucky to be part of such a great community. Thank you for reading and contributing.

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For those of you not familiar with the Type II Cast, it is a Phish fan podcast that discusses current Phish shows with occasional special episodes dedicated to various Phishy topics. For this week's episode discussing Phish's New Year's run at Madison Square Garden, they invited me to be their guest alongside usual panel members Steve Olker, Josh Korin, and .Net's Chris Glushko. We gathered together virtually on Monday, January 7th, armed with a pile of great audio clips from the run, to share our thoughts on both individual songs and the shows as individual entities and as part of a run of shows. Two hours of quality Phish nerdery ensued. Chris was kind enough to put together rankings of these shows compared to the other multi-night NYE runs starting in 1995, which we discussed as well.

We dedicated this show to the memory of Robert Ekchart, aka Barefoot Bob, a beloved Phish fan who lost his battle with cancer earlier that day.

Click on over to the Type II Cast site to listen, or you can download the mp3 here (right click save as).

You can also subscribe to the podcast on iTunes by clicking here.

Enjoy!

Brian

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Happy New Year from Mystery Jam HQ here at Phish.net. For the 127th installment of the MJ, we've selected a jam that will delight and confound... or just be solved by 12:45. It really could go either way. As usual we will be playing for an MP3 download, courtesy of our friends at LivePhish.com / Nugs.Net. The rules haven't changed: you need to correctly identify the song and the date to win. Post your guess in the comments. One guess per person per day (with the second “day” starting after I post the hint). A hint will be posted on Tuesday (if necessary) and the answer will be posted on Wednesday. Good luck...

Wednesday Answer: Congrats to conradjohansen for being the first to identify the 12/28/03 "Frankie Says." The Blog will return on Monday with MJMCXXVIII.