My 1st show and it was a 15 yr gap til i heard life and mars? again til superball. Its a pretty average show and its not in the top 15 msg shows of all time but your first show is always the most meaningful one. Its the show that gets u hooked and the garden is always a special place to see them. The nite after this one was def a sicker show.

This was almost my first show. As sophomores in college, we had precious few friends with cars, and we basically had to beg a friend who hated Phish to go. We waited til after his last class and arrived just as they wound up the Star Spangled Banner...just in time to hear the opening notes of Sample.

This really was an average show. Set list wise, it was pretty much a best-of-fall-1996-greatest hits show. Nothing rare at the time. No truly stand out jams. But perhaps thats what makes this a great starter show. When I want to introduce a n00b, this is a great show to play them. The songs aren't really too long (I find long jams aren't good for introducing someone new to Phish), lots of lyric based songs (again ideal for newbs), some classic instrumental with pretty jams (Sample and Cars Trucks Buses are both great great songs to introduce the band with), some great intensity (Bowie, Chalkdust)...

But all is not lost on this show for the more experienced fan. While the song run times tell a tale of songs played as written with little script departure.... my face absolutely melted during Stash and Chalkdust. Chalkdust particularly....maybe it was the first show thing....but my jaw nearly hit the floor and I was left saying "whoa". I even had to sit down as the song climaxed for seemingly the 10th time in a 7 minute period. I looked over, my friend who hated Phish, bobbing his head. I look over the other way, 75 year old security guards with the meanest looks on their faces all night...bobbing.

A great show to keep in mind if wanting a greatest-hits show or to introduce to a newbie.

My first show. I remember being in the upper 400's. I barley remember much of the music - but wondered why they would open with the Star Spangled Banner - it dumbfounded me at the time. A few shows later I realized their scene of humor. I thought they were mad patriotic or something. The best part of MSG is you can feel the floor vibrate. I've been to over 15 MSG Phish shows since and seen Phish at every angle of the Garden that's round. Floor, 100's - 400's, skybox, suites - but the best is the floor, feels like you're riding upon the waves like Prince Caspian. Can't knock the best indoor venue suspended in the middle of Manhattan! Such found memories of NYC Phish. Thanks.

Part 1 of "Cosmic Adventures in Synchronic Time" by Steve Urban

My Mother, Father and Grandfather were all born on the same day: October 21st. My parents met at a discothèque on Long Island. About a week later my mom visited my dad whom was washing his car. He asked her, “What is your Birthday?” She said, “October 21st.” He said, “Me too! And my Father!” At first, she didn’t believe him. Just as many of you won’t believe me. But do you honestly believe that my Mother, Father and Grandfather all being born on the same day is just a mere coincidence? That the circumstances are just random and the dice fell that way? Mathematically the probabilities of such an event are astronomically incalculable.

Furthermore, 2 months into my freshman year another synchronistic event takes place. One of my best friends called me and asked if I could come see the rock band, Phish. It was on, his Birthday, on October 21st 1996 at Madison Square Garden. I remember the audience participated, chanting, “Wilson,” like the tennis company and clapping their hands to intricate Latin jazz instrumentals. Though they were already playing an important role in expanding consciousness, this was the first time Phish entered into my individual consciousness. So October 21st was also the birthday of Phish for me. The reason that Phish entered my world in such a synchronistic way connected to my parents I believe now to have great significance. Because of what would happen next. Something that I could never have imagined in my wildest dreams!

Madison Square Garden on New Year’s Eve 2002. Phish is about to take the stage after a hiatus. I just spent the night spun on 7th avenue family fluff. I’m swigging whiskey and hot cider to keep me warm. Then while waiting for the box office to open, thin strands of a cobweb-like substance cover the outside wall and quickly disappear. I recently discovered that in UFO research this phenomenon is known as “Angel Hair.” According to Wikipedia: “It is named for its similarity to fine hair, or spider webs… it disintegrates or evaporates within a short time of forming. One theory is that it is ‘ionized air sleeting off an electromagnetic field’ that surrounds a UFO.” Someone should have told the aliens that the show was sold out.

Later that afternoon among the ticketless throngs I met a man whom claimed to be “The Sloth” a character from, Gamehendge, Phish's rock opera. In his hands was the legendary helping friendly book! Gamehendge is a mythological world of fairy tale. It’s a parallel reality or possibly the story of Earth’s very distant past. Trey Anastasio wrote Gamehendge as his senior thesis. The story is that of a retired U.S. Colonel whom steps through a portal traveling through space and time. While in Gamehendge, Colonel Forbin discovers a race of lizard people, who have been enslaved by the evil King Wilson. He has stolen the helping friendly book from the lizards, which has all the knowledge inherent in the universe.

This is the book Sloth is holding. “Written by the great and knowledgeable Icculus.” Titled “Well You Can Imagine” by Sean O. Huigin. He found it in the children's section of a used bookstore in Canada. “Yeah! My children are old enough to read Icculus!” When you examine the book there are Phish lyrics and cartoon illustrations of Gamehendge characters like the mockingbird, the sloth and the lizards. The cover even dons the band members Trey and Page. But the author did not know Phish. The book was published in Canada the year Phish was formed. Sloth explained: ”Icculus means I is the accumulation of us.” Somehow the author and illustrator created this book from the chaotic sea of our collective unconscious. The book truly came from, Gamehendge, a place that transcends space and time, as we know it.

I stood underneath the marquee watching waves of energy flow over the bricks and between the windows of the Hotel Pennsylvania. The building was alive! My thoughts stopped in sheer wonder. Then out of the top left corner of my vision I saw a single eye was watching me from above. Pop! Another revealed itself! Pop! Another! Until this pattern of eyes filled the sky. They were geometrically precise lines and overlapping circles. All shapes were in perfect union. I looked away and the psychedelic vision was gone. That night I was introduced to someone in the Phish community who told me to read Drunvalo Melchizedek’s Ancient Secret of the Flower of Life, a book on sacred geometry. Months later, the same geometric pattern I saw in the sky was exactly the same symbol on the cover of the book. What I saw was the unity consciousness grid, naturally making a higher level of consciousness accessible to humanity. Well you can imagine.

Part 2: 11/24/09 Spectrum, Philadelphia, PA and 10/24/10 UMASS, Amherst, MA *Cosmic Adventures in Synchronic Time was Originally published in Surrender to the Flow