It may be odd to begin this final part with the epilogue of the essay, but it feels like the right way to approach an introduction to the final installment of this saga. First, I want to give my appreciation and a big thankful shout-out to @OrangeSox for his assistance and contributions to this essay. He’s been pushing me to keep plugging away for the past couple of years every time the topic has come up, and it’s unlikely it would have ever been completed without his help. The four parts of this essay will next be combined into one and move to a new permanent home within phish.net, just one part of a large push for new content for the site to celebrate the band’s coming Ruby Anniversary year.

There have been many endings to this essay as a result of the uncertainty accompanying the ongoing public health emergency. The first ending came with the postponement of the Summer 2020 tour, following the excitement of Sigma Oasis and the first few Dinner and a Movie episodes. The next ending followed the Beacon Jams when we could almost taste the eventual return to live concerts. Again, I attempted to end it just before the Summer tour of 2021, but the Delta variant, rising cases, and more uncertainty made me decide to wait and see. When I returned to the office, my computer still had the web page showing the news from March 2020, discussing what may happen “if it hit America.” I got chills going back in time. Then, after the end of the Fall Tour, Omicron emerged, and even though we had vaccines and the new variant seemed less dangerous, it was clear the essay would not end yet.

Here we are now, finally making a conclusion to the work, even while we are still getting ill, variants give way to subvariants, long COVID continues for people that got the virus in the months past, many countries still lack access to a vaccine, and it seems masks may be here to stay. The pandemic is over inasmuch as it seems to have become endemic, but it’s clear our world has finally been functioning “normally” again. So, following the second post-pandemic Summer Phish tour and the recent announcement for another run of shows for New Year’s at MSG, we feel like the April Earth Day run is the right place to mark the end of the era.

When me and my “best Phish friend” Aaron saw Phish again after the postponement, in Atlantic City 2021, I was amazed that we were all back together. It had been a few weeks before when Phish finally hit the road again. I personally always said COVID will be over when Phish hits the stage. Boy, man, god, shit was I wrong. I have come full circle in making this all evolve around Phish. Today, It doesn’t really feel “over” exactly. For me, the quarantine days will always be linked to the Black Lives Matter protest, the public health crisis posed by the novel virus, and a general new shift for America and the world, in what direction I can’t specifically say. Clearly, there is and will likely always be much more to be done on all these fronts.

Despite all that is wrong, we still have art, the beauty of music, and the hilarity of life. Idealistic lyrics and protest songs may not change anything, but the vibration of music, the heartbeat of the drum, and the community of a live show do. We write our own songs woven into our lives together with our friends and families. Despite all the tragedies and difficulties of the last two years we remain, together on a great big boat in this one big ocean...and the ocean is Love.

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Our four-part series continues with Part III. Indeed, we had hoped to publish the last piece as one, but it turns out to be too long for the blog. Please check out Part I here and Part II here and look for Part IV soon!

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As a band whose success and even identity have always been bound to their live performances, the pandemic challenged Phish to continue to reach their audience at a time when many would benefit the most from the distraction of chasing tour rumors, planning trips, and following setlists. Fortunately, Phish found engaging ways to keep us tuned. And when the time came, their commitment to return to the road as safely and quickly as possible likely reflects their passion to play together as much as their awareness of how much we would appreciate it.

The challenges and responses that would continue to arise through 2021 and even again this year display the persistence of the band and fans to find some way back to the shows. Since Phish’s first unaffected tour since 2019 recently concluded at the eleventh Labor Day run at Dick's Sporting Goods Park, it seems like an appropriate time to finally share a chronicle of all that has occurred with Phish during COVID-19.

Part II of this ongoing series follows last week's first installment. The final part will be published soon.

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“Its [sic] like the whole world getting Curveballed”
- @thequietone, Phantasy Tour/Phish Message Boards User

That thread title made me smile when I first saw it on March 11, 2020, as the pandemic first began to affect travel. I heard it as though from a character where you know it’s a joke, but the actor plays the part so well, the chance that he was serious is what makes it gold. How could one be so narrow-minded to compare the beginning of a global pandemic caused by a novel coronavirus to a single rock band festival cancellation? After all, following the Curveball announcement, we just had to find something else to do for the weekend, get our refunds, and blaze on to Dick's in a couple of weeks. This one-liner from PT is an appropriate place to begin because it's not lost on me that writing a history of these recent times, which have been so hard on so many, in the context of one band may seem indulgent.

That said, the pandemic affected live music perhaps as much as any other industry outside health care and education - essentially shutting down all concerts with an audience month after month beginning in March 2020. Musicians and production crews that worked on the road and in the venues would be severely impacted, and the future of the industry always felt uncertain. Even though it would be hard to find anyone who doesn’t appreciate the arts, for many fans of live music—and especially Phish—the experience offers more than just musicians on stage in the centerpiece of a big swirling production. It provides much-needed respite, camaraderie, and even catharsis when we’re lucky. Furthermore, the industry generates billions of dollars with wide-ranging effects on millions of lives.

The loss of livelihoods and outlets for joy for many was a small but significant part of the broader economic fallout from the response to the exponential spread of the virus known as SARS-CoV-2 in the last two years. In the broadest sense, the pandemic changed everything about the world we had come to take for granted. This piece has been rewritten for months and months, just getting longer as the story continued to unfold and the pandemic dragged on. After all, we are still in the midst of a constant threat of (fortunately milder) infection from ever more contagious variants (BA.5 at the time of publication). Thankfully though, much of life has readjusted to living with the virus thanks to easily available vaccines, including the concert industry.

As a band whose success and even identity have always been bound to their live performances, the pandemic challenged Phish to continue to reach their audience at a time when many would benefit the most from the distraction of chasing tour rumors, planning trips, and following setlists. Fortunately, Phish found engaging ways to keep us tuned. And when the time came, their commitment to return to the road as safely and quickly as possible likely reflects their passion to play together as much as their awareness of how much we would appreciate it.

The challenges and responses that would continue to arise through 2021 and even again this year display the persistence of the band and fans to find some way back to the shows. Since Phish’s first unaffected tour since 2019 just concluded at the eleventh Labor Day run at Dick's Sporting Goods Park, it seems like an appropriate time to finally share a chronicle of all that has occurred with Phish during COVID-19.

Read more...