Hard to believe we've been at this for 90 weeks, but welcome to Mystery Jam Monday Part 90 at Phish.net. As usual, we will be playing for a free 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 Hint: THE USERS NEED A HINT!! It's a pretty exciting day at Blog HQ. The correct song has been named.

Wednesday Answer: Welcome back, Rabeldy and nice call on the 6/10/00 "Piper," which (as Rabeldy notes) is not even the jamming highlight of that show. Nevertheless, the Blog will call this one a moral victory and comply with his request make next week an double MJ.

In April 2000, Charlie Dirksen interviewed Carl "Gears'" Gerhard, longtime Phish guest and member of the Giant Country Horns. The following exerpts from that interview were published in the first edition of The Phish Companion.

Charlie Dirksen: What are your greatest musical influences?

Carl Gerhard: I grew up in a family that totally supported my music. I used to sit in my living room at home for hours and try to play along with every song that came on the radio. That really helped me develop my ear, and from that, I was able to recognize and memorize tunes. I had a great band director in high school (Norris Birnbaum), who loved quality music, regardless of idiom or genre. Our band was always performing the most challenging pieces. He pushed me to be a more well rounded player. I've been a Navy musician for 14 years, and I've played with some super-talented people who have influenced how I play today. I mean, some really hot musicians. I can't say enough about Phish. You can't help but be positively influenced and motivated by their music and their musicianship. No doubt about it, they are the best at what they do.

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The following foreword to the second edition of The Phish Companion was written by Lois Harris, who taught Page, Trey, and Fish at Goddard College.

I suppose this little contribution to The Phish Companion should be called a Backward rather than a Foreword, but I guess Foreword will do, given that we will all seem to go that direction without requiring any declaration of the fact. Backward is a different business altogether. In music it’s called retrograde – taking the melody and playing it backwards – in life it is simply memory.

So here are some memories of Phish, as individuals and as a band. First, you have to imagine Vermont: multiple small buildings covered in snow – not always snow, but just to keep this thing rustic, let’s say snow. One building, large by Vermont standards, covered in brown shingle and punctuated by two former hay silos at the far end of the two corridors is the so-called Community Center. The other end of the hall gives access to the Haybarn Theater, wood paneled and multi-functional – a far cry from the massive performance venues the Band would later fill.

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Welcome to Mystery Jam Monday Part 89 at Phish.net. As usual, we will be playing for a free 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 Hint: No hint needed this week.

Wednesday Answer: Congrats to FunkyCFunkyDo for being first in line with the 8/10/11 "Runaway Jim." Mystery Jam #90 coming next week...

In July 2000, Ellis Godard interviewed Ben "Junta" Hunter, the band's first manager/agent, for whom the double-CD Junta is named. The following exerpts from that interview were published in the second edition of The Phish Companion. Additionally of note, this is the 500th blog post on the site!

EG: How did your association with Phish begin?

BH: My “official” association with the band began when we rented a nightclub called Molly’s in Allston, Massachusetts, on 11/3/88. It was the kind of place that had live music only one night a week. If memory serves, they had Dead cover bands and the like on Sundays, and the rest of the time it was a rather, if you’ll excuse the expression, “Euro-trashy” type of dance club.

I would say my primary strength was my ability to proselytize – to spread the good Phish word amongst my friends – and act as sort of a “Johnny Appleseed.” The band’s name was on my lips in nearly every conversation I had during the several years in which I was affiliated with them. I was friendly with the band Ninja Custodian and promoted a gig for them at the Paradise in Boston (with not such terrific results), in late 1990 or early 1991. In fact, it was their drummer, Mike Billington (he of the permanent antic disposition), who first turned John Paluska and myself onto Phish.

EG: What interested you about them so early on?

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Through my years of seeing and listening to Phish, I've always enjoyed hearing songs teased in the middle of what the band was playing. The 2nd Edition of The Phish Companion took this information and put it to print, resulting in a four page Teases Chart. As I compiled my collection of Phish shows, I would actively seek out certain versions of songs to hear specific teases - something that enriched my experience of exploring the band's vast musical history. Upon joining the Phish.Net crew in 2009 and becoming involved in the setlist team, I would constantly add new teases to the database, partially from my own listening finds and often from Phish.Net user submissions.

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The following foreword to the second edition of The Phish Companion was written by Jane Ambrose, Trey's music teacher at the University of Vermont.

I read in the paper this morning that Phish had the second largest box office gross per city in North America. Bon Jovi was first, but the average ticket price was so much higher, that without an adjustment, Phish would no doubt have been number one. So I thought again why it might be that this band that started here at our little University was so popular. After all, 70,000 people made their way to The Great Went in Limestone, Maine, not exactly one of the population centers of the Northeast. Recently I watched the DVD of Bittersweet Motel and was struck by the absolute joy of the audience-joy in each others’ company and joy communicated by the music of Phish. Regardless of their enormous success, the guys haven’t changed very much. I love the picture on the cover of the March, 2003 Rolling Stone - Phish on ice skates, dressed like drag queens, with my friend Trey in a tutu over his jeans and with a bare chest. Happy people make other people happy.

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It's time for the 88th installment of the Mystery Jam Monday series here at Phish.net. As usual, we will be playing for a free 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 Hint: No hint needed this week...

Wednesday Answer: Pauly7917 gets his fifth win with the 11/14/94 "Bowie." Congrats. The Blog will be back on Monday with another Mystery Jam.

In August 2000, Jay Kahn (RIP) and Ellis Godard interviewed Aaron Wolfe. The following exerpts were published in the first edition of The Phish Companion.

EG & JK: What do you remember most about Princeton Day School and the folks you went to school with?

Aaron Wolfe: Princeton was a pretty quiet, homogeneous place. But even then we knew that the suburbs created the best rock and roll. That's why we all took up the air guitar with such dedication.

Tom and I formed an air guitar band called, unbelievably, "A Dot Tom" – decades before the Internet and the assault of the "dot.coms." The songs were mostly adaptations of other people's songs. Neil Young's “Cinnamon Girl” was remade – without reason whatsoever – as “Michaelson Girl.” Some were inspired by things we saw outside the windows of our Latin class.

EG & JK: What's your first memory of Tom Marshall?

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The Phish.net API is a system for using Phish.net data across the internet on other websites or in mobile apps. There are several dozen websites that use the Phish.net API, sites like Phishvids, where the data is all served up by the Phish.net setlists database. Today, I'm excited to announce some changes to the Phish.net API. Read on for the details.

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