@OnlinePhishTour said:

i go to shows for the experience, i relisten to shows for the insane music.

exactly, and the confluence of the two: great environment/crowd/sound at venue coupled with an extraordinary couple sets of music top to bottom is what I seek out and cross my fingers too. Been to a ton of shows, but this perfecta (or really trifecta: show/ Set I/ Set II) is a treasured event. Makes all the shitty sets and shows and venues worth it. Never know when that's all going to happen, and obviously happens for different people at different shows, but when it does: MAGIC!

A handful of shows that I would say I had the best time at and were the most fun, I've never re-listened to. There's no dichotomy. The two are separate. Though many have a hard time divorcing the experience from the music. And there's nothing wrong with that either. You can enjoy your Phish anyway you want to. With 128K MP3's with $3 earbuds, with 24Bit Lossless FLACs over a $10,000 home theater system, from an iPhone stream from a dude taking a shit and ordering a burger, solitary at a show in the back of the lawn, with a group of 12 DFC 6th row, doesn't matter: it's all enjoyable for someone. Just like the dude listening to Crosseyed on YouTube.