Deadheads used to say, "When Phil's on, the band's on," and I guess a similar sentiment holds true for Phish and Mike. Except in photo-negative.

Mike is definitely playing lots of wrong things during the Runaway Jim - I like-to-love every version of Jim, but this might be the least awesome Jim I've yet heard - and the Ya Mar is quite sloppy and untogether due to Mike's constant flubbing. It's clear Mike is not in good shape for whatever reason. All of which distracts the rest of the band, who are clearly concerned with Mike's condition.

After Ya Mar the mics on the SBD clearly pick up Trey saying to Mike, "If you can't play, I don't wanna play." Ugh.

People bag on Trey's performances in late 3.0, but to hear Mike struggle like this prior to that makes listening to Set I a bad vibes-riddled experience I'll likely never repeat. The pluses: the jam in Disease sounds competent enough but sadly it's a short First Set Appetizer version, the silent jam in Divided Sky is pretty together (lol) and I wish there were more versions of Discern, it's a really cool tune but it's also played carelessly here.

Okay - now that we're all bummed out, Set II is actually pretty great. Mike is in much better shape for the Ghost and Seven Below and the rest of the band sounds energized as a result. Just skip ahead to Set II to hear some damn fine 2.0 vintage Phish - and especially check out the clean, dry SBD mix of this show; this era of Phish SBDs (2.0) is my favorite because of the bone-dry soundpicture, which makes everyone sound extraordinarily clear and present