From cdirksen@earthlink.net Sat Sep 12 23:35:40 1998
Date: Wed, 08 Jul 1998 02:42:11 GMT
From: cdirksen@earthlink.net
To: dan@netspace.org
Newsgroups: rec.music.phish
Subject: 8/6/97 Missouri YEM

8/6/97 Riverport Amphitheater, Maryland Heights, MO

YEM opens well.  The pre-Nirvana section is beautiful and spacey as
usual, too.. it's also long.  Nirvana at 4:15 or so. Mike's solo
section sounds kinda dour. Pre-charge is tight.. crowd goes nuts,
which suggests that Sandsio brought out the tramps.  At 6:40 Trey
teases the Also Sprach theme briefly.  He sustains the second shot at
the Note but it isn't as in tune as it could be.

"Boy" at 7:45 after an AWESOME scream.  Good WUDMTF segment.. but
nothing particularly fired up (this YEM closes the first set btw).
Everyone doesn't come in together on the second pass at the WUDMTF
lyrics.. unusually sloppy.  Tramps jam at around 10 mins.  Nice fills
from Fish.. Page is pretty laid back, though.  Signals from Mike for
the moves.  Trey comes back in on rhythm guitar around 11 mins.
Jam segment hasn't really started yet.. they are just screwing around,
it seems.  No real direction until about

12:30 when Trey finds a theme to repeat for a little while.  Can't
really place an opening to the jam segment, but at 13 minutes the jam
seems to have found a niche.  Interesting full-band semi-mellifluous
groove in the lower octaves.. Flashy fills from Fish.  Great interplay
between Mike, Trey and Page.. Trey's employing what I believe is the
Leslie in here (on a setting different from the one he often used in
earlier years).  Interesting effect.

Finally, around 14:40, the jam begins to sound like a real YEM jam
segment.  Trey begins to solo in the upper octaves, and the groove
increases in intensity.  Still nothing INCREDIBLE for YEM or
anything, as I hear it.  Strong jam around 15:50.. looks like another
awesome close to a YEM jam segment!! =^]  I LOVE THIS SONG!  This
closing jam could still be a lot tighter.. Trey seems to get pissed
off around 17:30.. lots of NASTY, dark chords played in a ripping,
frightening manner.  OUCH!!  What the !@(^&*#%@^#.. very unusual.
WTF!?!?  This YEM jam just got eaten up by some evil being..

Around 18:10 Mike becomes a bit more prominent (Trey was swallowed up 
by a heinous beast)... but there's not really a B&D in here (18:48). 
Some interesting effects around 18:55, which I can't recall ever 
hearing in YEM before. I'm told that Mike had run back to his rig 
around this time and pulled out "a really strange looking 
bass-guitar-thingy.  It was really small and narrow, but still had 
four or five strings like a regular bass.  He strapped it on and 
started making all these outlandish spacy noises."

Weird.  This groove just farts around, in my opinion.  It isn't very 
exciting at all.  This might be another one of them N/R versions at 
this rate.

Mike or Trey starts singing along to the bass lick that Mike had been
repeating, at about 20 mins.. Page and Fish join in.. and the jam just
dies out.  Around 21 mins the crowd decides to clap along, and the
singing segues into Vocal Jamming.  Again, no closing WUDMTF lyrics,
which is very unusual in Phishtory, but apparently more common in
summer 1997.  The vocal jam is good... Total time: approx 24:45.

This YEM ain't shit compared with 7/31/97 imo, or even many from the
last year.  Still, avg awesome over the course of YEM history imo..
there's a really wild jam in it, though.. a heinous beast appeared.
But I don't need to hear this version again. B rating.

two cents
charlie

p.s. Check out http://www.phish.net/hpb/yem for more YEM reviews.