[We would like to thank @thewatchfulhosemaker for recapping last night’s show. The Watchfulhosemaker plays in local Chicago bands, Lunar Ticks & Beat The Meatles, and started a festival in Irving Park called Indie Park Fest. -Ed.]

Phish settled into the brand new Coca Cola Amphitheatre in Birmingham, Alabama for the 2nd show of a brief late summer tour. The three month old venue has that new car smell - with a fun lot scene, not a bad sight line in the space, ample common space out front, clean and modern accommodations, plenty of food and drink options abound, and a sleek wooden look throughout. Despite some bottleneck traffic after the show, overall this is a really nice and small (for Phish) venue that I hope they continue to keep on their radar. [Question for the hive mind- when’s the last time they played an under 10k venue on a Saturday night?]

“Back on the Train” eased us nicely into set one. A pleasing Southern Rock twanger to get the crowd bobbing on what many of our neighbors implied was Widespread Panic’s home turf.

“Cities” was great in the two-spot, especially with the Birmingham callout in the lyrics. As I looked over there for the dry ice factory, I noticed a very pretty view of the hilly city in the background, as the sun had set completely, and the temperature had finally cooled off. The jamming right out of the gate on this one was unique, and moved through multiple territories. If you like murky synth-octave jams, this one’s for you. Page, Trey, and Mike all transmogrified into one mechanical mass of sound, indistinguishable in the best of ways.

Maybe the jam of the set to start out the night, morphed into a nice cherry-on-top, with the sing-along rocker of “Sample in a Jar.” This outro went over the top, courtesy of some nice voicings by Mike at the peak of the guitar solo.

One of the phishiest Phish songs came next in “Theme From the Bottom.” Seriously, imagine any other artist playing a song as bizarre. To me, this was an especially good rendition of this jam, and off the top of my head, the strongest version I’ve ever heard, with Trey really masterfully playing the changes. Trey latched on to a perhaps throwaway Page lick, that inspired him for a couple minutes to keep reinventing the melodic fragment. It's truly impressive work for any instrumentalist to repeat such a short theme without it getting stale, so kudos to Trey, and maybe more so the other three members for embellishing just enough to keep things interesting. Just a marvelous version for fans of the tune.

There wasn’t a hater in the crowd for the ‘cooldown’ song, if you will, in “The Old Home Place”. The well placed bluegrass ditty, may have perhaps been a nod to Oak Mountain Amphitheater that was recently demolished, which was a local favorite venue of the regional phans near us, and home to at least a couple classic Phish shows between 1994-2021.

Up next was the staple, “Bathtub Gin,” and as I’ve mentioned recently, one of–if not the most– reliable jam vehicle in the Phish catalog of recent years. Unfortunately, I missed the start of the jam, thinking I was slick and would make it back from the bathroom in time, but many people had the same idea and the line was very long for such a loved tune. When I returned to my seat it sounded a lot to me like ‘98-’99 style ambient jamming, with Page laying into the psychedelic swirls, Mike enjoying drone territory, and Fish, of course, laying the foundation for all, with his repetitive trance-grooving. A darker eastern turn to the improv towards the end signaled Trey to wrap it up with the Gin lick, in a 20+ min version, great for all fans of long and patient jamming.

“Runaway Jim” closed out set 1 with another deep improvisation. Trey really hammered home some more simplistic lines, which usually gives space for the other members to step out more, but it really felt like there was more listening happening than exploring. This, to my ear, didn’t quite have the variation and intrigue in repetition like “Theme”, or multiple movements of the “Cities”, or the atmospheric meditation of “Gin”, so while fun and well played as ever, did not quite stand up to the other improvisational highlights of set one.

On paper, set two might not be much to write home about, but luckily, I was there in person, and can hopefully convince you that there's plenty worth relistening.

“Sigma Oasis” is now loved, by the band at least, as a set opener and jam vehicle. There is something about these new tunes that really puts Trey at ease, and allows him to play with a nimbleness and fluidity that should make even the most jaded vet raise their brow in approval. After the usual Trey melodic outro, pointillism was introduced by Page, and became a theme for a couple of exciting minutes. As the intensity grew, Mike made a bold decision to push towards Lydian mode, which Trey immediately locked in on, allowing the high energy to take on a more elusive, mysterious, longing quality.

After a murky transition, “Down With Disease” came next. Trey employed his leslie effect to kick off the improv section, while Fish commanded this soft-spoken, pretty section to enter into some stop-start breaks. It was a ton of fun to watch them build in a lower dynamic for a while, and was notably like ‘Maple Syrup’ or so said my show partner. Trey began playing around with something similar to “‘Im a Man”, but with the help of the others, this became particularly sludgy. Evil, almost demonic mush, which blurred into “Life Saving Gun,” but was only a tiny taste of the insanity we were about to see.

“LSG” was the Improv of the night if you are a fan of truly far out, psychedelic, mind-melting jams. Frequently heard in “Split open and Melt” jams of recent years, this demented wash of bleeps and bloops, managed somehow to be disjointed from normal music harmony, but connected through its rhythmic insistence. Blending atmospheric space with off-kilter Fish fuckery, and dark insect synthetic funk, this freakshow was only made stranger when the broken robots entered the battleground. I’ve heard Phish get weird, but man, this was WEIRD stuff. I don’t believe I’ve ever heard them sustain such out-there music for so long, with it still sounding so locked in and intentional, moving symbiotically through actual movements, that wasn’t just nonsense for nonsense sake.

The best way I could describe the culmination of this jam was an AI cyborg having an existential nightmare, eventually malfunctioning over the contradictions of its newfound consciousness, and completely exploding, with gears and springs and chunks of hot metal flying everywhere. If there are weirder Phish jams out there, please let me know, because I wanted this one to go on forever.

A lilting, sway-in-the-breeze, Introspective moment was the only way that the madness could end, so a mini cool down jam segment moved into “Pillow Jets”. The song itself kept that vibe going, with lots of open space from Mike, but the floating grew heavier and heavier as a majestic peak built up in “What’s The Use” fashion.The wall of sound took over again with a thick loop, this time missing malevolent over/undertones- more curious and childlike innocence in its noisescape.

Our actual chill out song, or ‘Pissbreak Song’ if you want to be a dick about it, cut through the noise with, ”Mountains in the Mist.” I’m really pleased that this has come back into favor with the band in recent years. I think it’s now become one of if not my favorite ballad of theirs. Lyrically, it’s just moving to hear Trey sing about being “worn and bruised, but here at least” and “on the road again.” I love them digging into their free-for-all, Grateful Dead-esque lower volume jams. Somewhere between “Morning Dew” and “Bird Song” by the Dead, and touched on in the Phish song book with “Roggae,” I love to hear Trey and Mike chase each other around the fretboard with tons of air between every note and instrument. Maybe noodly or sucking the energy out of the room for some, but to me, a well placed and meaningful ballad really ties the room together.

“Blaze On” brought the energy back in the latter half of the show. A well played, if not fairly standard version here, this may be most notable for the connections to the UAB football game that happened just a block away, where you could literally see the scoreboard from our seats (the Blazers beat the Zips btw), and the “chemtrails raining down on you” line. Multiple planes flew overhead throughout the show, always eliciting great cheers from the crowd, but no cheer more raucous then for the plane that went by during the second set's penultimate song.

“Ghost” closed things out with some bright,“celebration of music” type peaking that might be atypical to a usual “Ghost” jam but is fairly common to Phish jam playbook these days, and often is a style they like to close out an evening with. Trey really leaned into guitar trilling and looped/effect laden buildups to pop the champagne on a phenomenal evening.

I somehow sensed a Rolling Stones song coming this weekend, although I’d have loved to see them bring back “Torn and Frayed,” “Tumbling Dice,” or “Let It Loose,” Trey clearly loves to sing “Shine a Light,” on brand lyrically with many of his songs of the past decade.

The finale of night one was “Say It To Me S.A.N.T.O.S.” Acting as a closer in nearly every performance, this seven (!!!) year old song serves its purpose of giving the crowd one more chance to belt out some silly words, and the four old guys from Vermont a chance to shred like only they can.

Trey thanked the crowd a few times last night, maybe a bit more comfortable and happier to be back surrounded by 10,000 familiar faces than 50,000 skeptically curious music lovers at Bourbon and Beyond. Let’s hope that the playing, energy, and vibe rolls over into night two, and the rest of this little bonus summer we’ve been given. Blaze on!

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