I'm writing this on the fourth anniversary of the show, which was my first Phish show, so I feel I have a good perspective now after having seen many more shows, and listened to much, much more Phish.

As a neophyte, I had songs one wanted to hear at my first show - some unreasonable, some valid. The person next to me on the lawn asked what I was hoping to hear. I remember uttering, "a PYITE opener would be cool, would love Divided Sky, Golgi...Dinner and a Movie would be great...off the new album, I'd like to hear Sugar Shack...in the 2nd set, if really like a Horse>Silent."

Go figure.

People around me wanted to know who I was, where I came from, and how I had come across this information. Seriously though...Dinner and a Movie? Pretty ridiculous, I know.

That being said, I felt this show had a really interesting first set. PYITE was fantastic, and Stash really got everyone going. If Dinner and a Movie wasn't a big enough of a surprise, Esther really blew everyone away. The ebb and flow of this set was fairly unique...very different vibes through Stash > Esther > Walk Away > Divided Sky, the last of which was truly beautiful. Unfortunately, I thought Alaska was a bit of a downer, especially since we had heard it's very close cousin, Ocelot, earlier.

Now I KNOW I asked for and received Horse > Silent...but as everyone else has noted, it was a horrible transition. Everyone was really locked into that Sand groove before Trey just started throwing the Horse riff into it, forcing the other guys to essentially stop.

That being said, Guyute brought spirits back on the lawn. Mike's Groove was a solid finish to the set, and I think the Shine a Light closer also fit very well in this show.

All in all, for my first show, one of the more unique first sets in 3.0, imo...in my estimation, despite Trey's pulling of the proverbial chute on Sand, the band seemed pretty locked in (despite a bit of a rough start to PYITE). Then again, if I had only been there a night later to see the Tweeprise Tweeprise...