If anyone thinks this show is weak they're entitled to opinions, but I have to heartily disagree! Say what you will about Set I, but they closed with Fluffhead! And if you don't like the new songs, maybe it's time to move on...most people I've talked to love them. The lyrics actually mean something now, check it out! :)

Hour and a half setbreak due to rain delay brought excitement to a fever pitch. If other reviewers missed the raw energy of this Set II, I am sorry, but I went to both Alpines as well and this Set II pwned all over any of the alpine Sets this year. "Ocean" has always been my fav off Undermind, and if you complain about Drowned then you're just lame and I can't help you. Twist was a semi-forced transition, as Page was going off on the piano and Trey just kinda started it. But the jam was interesting. With this new incarnation of Phish, the guys are stripping away the endless loops and layers that comprised the late 90s and also 03-04 period and just playing the shit out of stuff. When a jam comes to its natural conclusion (i.e. this Tweezer) instead of spacing for 15 minutes, they hit another tune. This 2001 is the best of the year (better than Festival 8, which I just saw in person). Suzy was pure energy and Possum provided a somewhat odd, quiet jam.

Monkey is always a treat. Getting totally soaked and dancing in the vending areas during "Tweeprise" will forever be etched in my momeory. :) Again, everyone's entitled to opinions, but as my 53rd show, I found the Set II material here better than almost anything since 10-7-00.

LOVED IT.

All I can say is Mother Nature became an unofficial member of the band this evening! The lightning during Fluffhead will forever be committed to my muscle-memory, its retina-scorching display forever imbedded deep within the catacombs of my brain! Outside of that, the first set is 'eh.' Moma Dance provides a sweltering funk dance-a-thon, but then again, when does it not? Ocelot was breezy, groovy and flowing, but Fluffhead truly saved this set.

Set 2, cautionary advice from Page and all, is the glory of this show! The Song>Drowned is beautiful, calling to memory hints of '98 era Phish, before embarking on the much-heralded Noblesville Jam after Drowned. Twist was ok, as are most 3.0 Twists. Let Me Lie was the relax and burn one down portion of this rain-soaked show (if you could successfully use a lighter at that point!)Tweezer>2001>Suzy was absolutely great! My first Tweezer (and Fluffhead) in 10 years was a royal treat, and not just a failed attempt at a truly epic Phish song. 2001 provided as the ritual disco-party segment of the evening, and everyone was all-smiles. Possum was interesting; its gradual build in intensity from the 'quiet' portion of its jam is worth noting. Definitely have not heard a Possum quite like this one before! Sleeping Monkey>Tweeprise for the encore was solid, leaving the masses at Deer Creek happy to traverse the muddy course back to their respectful tents and autos. It is worth noting that at some point during the 2nd set it did briefly stop raining, but as soon as the encore was finished, it began absolutely POARING harder than it had been all night!

Best lightning ever!!!!!

To those of you listening to the recordings, this show is all about the Second Set. To those who were there, this show is all about the lightning! When people talk about 6/19/09 years from now, they will talk about the lightning. First set highlights were AC/DC Bag (a personal favorite) and Fluffhead. Fluffhead with the oncoming storm and the glowsticks made for a memorable Phish experience. The Second Set, in my opinion, was phenomenal. As with most Second Sets, mostly songs with jamming potential. A Song I Heard the Ocean Sing featured a great jam that got a little out there and left Page to segue beautifully into Drowned. Tweezer->2001 was the absolute highlight. I honestly thought the set was over with Suzy Greenberg but the segue into Possum set the crowd on fire. The Suzy/Possum closer could not be more definitively Phish.
Like others, I was disappointed in the weak First Set and the amount of new songs. Going into the show I was really hoping for "It's Ice" and a "Cavern," so obviously I was a little let down by the likes of BDTNL and Ocelot. But the weather and the good jams that were played made this show a memorable one!

this show landed exactly 15 years after phish's first show at deer creek back in 1995. that show was also mine and most of my friends that i was with's first show, so need less to say, we were hoping some of that 1995 mojo would creep back in tonight.

i had just driven in that morning from a relatively hot but straight forward burgettestown show. while the previous night was good, we were really hoping hoping they would get weird...

the first set never really got too weird. I was happy to bdntl out of the way early in the show. i knew that was going to pop up either at deer creek or alpine, and being one of my least favorite of the new songs, i wanted it early... like pulling a band aid. ac/dc bag was welcome, and i was surprised to see limb by limb so early in the set. the moma dance keep the crowd rocking as clouds started to move in. water in the sky was a touch premature, but not by much. now, this melt just fell apart. this jam was very disjointed, and i kept waiting for them to pull it together, but that moment never came. i figured lawn boy would be an alpine valley song, but it's good to catch this page crooner at the creek. this wedge seemed to stretch out a little bit longer than normal. this was a particularly strong version. i really like faulty plan. like many songs in the repertoire, i was not too stoked on this tne until i saw them play it. i could've done without the connection, but ocelot got the crowd back into it. then, oh sweet jesus, fluff head! there were some flubs scattered in this fluff, but all in all, it was very well executed. the real story here is the lightning show that went along with the fluff head. i had some pavillion seats for this and i spent about 1/3 of this song turned around looking at the sky. trey really buried the end of this song, and despite the shit storm looming and a mediocre first set, fluff head sent everyone into set break jazzed!

this was one long set break. deer creek has a 11pm curfew, and usually that is pretty strict. as the set break reached 10:30-11, i was seriously wondering how much more show we were going to get. finally the guys came out and blasted into song i heard the ocean sing. i was really thinking ghost here, but maybe that was just some columbus '99/rainy ghost memories. anyway, the crowd quickly got into asihtos. the jam on this one had a nice dark, dreary, percussive sound. i don't know if it was just where i was sitting, but trey was really really loud this whole set. i was having a littl trouble hearing gordon due to trey's volume. i have never had trouble hearing a member of the band at deer creek, but gadzoots, trey was loud. luckily, trey was also on fire, so it was not a terrible problem to have.

anyway, after rocking this ocean jam for a few minutes, they began to space out a bit. out of a no where, page starts a piano solo that quickly turns a corner and leads to drowned. this drowned was a real barn burner. trey was so wailing away on this one. fishman also was pretty damn hot on this jam. they kind of forced the transition to twist, but hey, after that drowned, who cares? i am not really a big twist fan, but this one was pretty interesting. it had a santana'esque jam toward the end. let me lie was a good chance to burn one. the tweezer was phenomenal. page and trey were in the zone, and they really soared on this take of tweezer. i really feel that now a days they are trying to keep their tweezer relatively short but very focused, and I felt this was exactly what they were striving for all suummer. this jam finally gave way to 2001. page was all of this one, and the rain gave the disco funky feel a little twist. i really thought suzy would close this one out, but they tacked on a nice little possum before sending us up to alpine valley. the encore was a little anticlimatic but hell, good set!

highlights:

set 1:

the wedge,fluff head

set 2:
ocean sing>drowned, tweezer>2001

As Dickens may have said… “It was the best of shows, it was the worst of shows”

It was my first show since the 1999/2000 New Years event at Big Cypress in Florida and it was also show number 25 for me. Since 25 is somewhat of a milestone (25 is also my lucky number, and the day of my birthday), my expectations were high. The last four times I had seen the boys at Deer Creek (I will NEVER call it by its corporate name), they tore the roof off the place. And while the music has always seemed to have that little something extra at Deer Creek, the venue itself has always had a “walking-on-eggshells” vibe. Ever since the Grateful Dead gate-crashing incident in ’95, security has always seems a little more uptight at Deer Creek. If the Comic Book Guy were here he might have called it Bizarro-World, because tonight would be something different…

Musically speaking, I was disappointed. I have the entire summer tour on my iTunes, and I feel it was the worst show of the tour! Looking through the setlists, there is no other show that they played so many of the new songs (five this night). Now, if the new songs rocked… I would have been geeked. Unfortunately… in this guy’s opinion… the new songs are awful! They are weak, slow-paced, lack energy, etc… and we got stuck with five of them. On top of that, they played AC/DC Bag, Water in the Sky, Tweezer (with the always-present Reprise), Twist, and Sleeping Monkey. These are all songs I could go another 10 years without hearing live. Not that they are bad songs, but I have either heard them at half of the shows I have been to or feel that they are slow, boring, etc… While there were a few high points (Wedge, Suzy, Possum), the show just never seemed to “get going”.

Now for the flip side of the coin. While Deer Creek has traditionally been a pretty strict venue, they let their guard down tonight. It began raining during the first set (probably around Water in the Sky, Split Open and Melt – appropriate), and then the storm approached. It was getting dark by this point and the lightning show was AMAZING! It is one of the coolest things I have ever seen at a show… ANY SHOW! By the time the first set ended, the storm was right on top of us, and the lightning was pretty intense. After the boys left the stage, a guy came out and announced that they were going to let the people sitting on the hill actually leave the venue to sit in the safety of their cars in the parking lot. He said the storm should blow through by 11:00 and that the band would be out for their second set at 11:00 sharp. So we headed out. We went to the car, had a few beers, changed our wet clothes and relaxed! By about 10:30 it did in fact stop raining, so we headed back in. No one was even checking tickets. The boys did start right at 11:00 and played a full set, with an encore (a good 90-100 minutes of music past the venue’s curfew). By the end of the encore, it had begun pouring again.

Overall, it was good to see Phish again! The setlist was weak, but I guess that happens (I am just disappointed that the weakest show of the tour was the only show of the tour that I was able to attend). On the bright side of things, Mother Nature was ON that night. I saw one of the most amazing lightning shows, and actually witnessed Deer Creek being civilized. They were concerned about the safety of the people on the lawn and allowed us to see a full two-set show (despite going until almost 1:00 AM).

Looking forward to Fall Tour!

The first set here at the one-night installment of Deer Creek Phish was mellow and the highlights for me were Lawn Boy, the Wedge, and Fluffhead. I will say that the ASIHTOS jam was breathtaking to start the stormy second set. Tweezer > 2001 is a dream connection that all heads hope for, and this one was rockin', and the Suzy > Possum ended things right. Sleeping was a treat. Can't wait for two nights after a thorough tour to get things primed in 2010!