Halfway Home
| Originally Performed By | Ghosts of the Forest |
| Original Album | Ghosts of the Forest (2019) |
| Appears On |
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| Music/Lyrics | Anastasio |
| Vocals | Trey (lead), Mike, Page (backing) |
| Phish Debut | 2019-06-23 |
| Last Played | 2019-06-23 |
| Current Gap | 295 |
| Historian | brendandriscoll |
| Last Update | 2026-03-21 |
History
Ghosts of the Forest is Trey Anastasio’s “emotional journey” into the deep woods of loss, reflection and eventual renewal following the death of his close friend Chris Cottrell, among other bereavements. Appearing, fittingly, at the album’s midpoint, “Halfway Home” offers a wistful collage of memories and an acknowledgement of the void left following Cottrell’s loss.
Departing from the album’s overall tendency to describe grief in abstractions, “Halfway Home” is anchored in specific (if less than perfectly transparent) memories and insider nods in Cottrell’s direction. It may be the closest that Ghosts of the Forest comes to traditional eulogy. But the song’s title also connotes “halfway house,” and its lyrics hint at themes of addiction and recovery. Mourning is messy, and at this moment partway through Ghosts of the Forest, still incomplete.
Cottrell (or “C-Cott”) was Anastasio’s “tether to childhood and to a life before Phish happened,” his “blood brother,” confidant and fellow prankster. He was also very much along for the ride as Phish took off, a companion for late night walks, silly nicknames, and backstage levity. Among other things, C-Cott was directly involved in the circumstances leading to the “back of the worm” theme and “Wormtown” jam that define Amsterdam ‘97 for the ages. Later, Cottrell would co-produce TAB’s Plasma album. “C-Cott is a friend of mine / Chillin’ in the back lounge drinking wine,” Anastasio sings in “Push On ‘Til the Day,” TAB’s chronicle of hijinks during the “shoulder time” before or after a show.
“Halfway Home” begins with a simple two-chord progression, C to A♭, two major chords a minor sixth interval apart, followed by an E♭and a Dmin chord that introduce complexity into the song’s tonal center. Later, an F and a G will appear. The song hovers around a C, but it’s not a clean C major. Borrowing chords from the C minor and C mixolydian modes, the song hovers ambiguously in the space between the keys of C major and C minor.
A swelling, Hendrix-style “backward guitar” layers in, followed by an amplified choral accompaniment (Ah, ah…) that suggests profundity and revelation even before the song’s initial lyrics. The first verse sketches what we might assume to be a glimpse of a specific moment with Cottrell:
Driving downtown in that green Cadillac
Shuck a luck rock and the chills are backDoes “shuck a luck rock” refer to “boom-laka-laka-laka" from Sly and the Family Stone’s “I Want to Take You Higher”? Or “Boom Shack-a-Lack,” the 1993 reggae-pop hit by Apache Indian? (If anyone has any context here--did Cottrell have a green Cadillac?--please reach out and let me know.) Meanwhile, we segue into another memory:
Down at The Eldo on a Friday night
The room was spinnin' and the lights were brightC-Cott lived in Colorado in the 1990s. The reference to “The Eldo” likely refers to the Eldorado Cafe, today operated under the name “The Eldo Brewery & Taproom,” a concert venue and regional Mecca for jam band fans, where Phish played some memorable shows early in the 1.0 era. If the reference to “a Friday night” refers to a night when Phish played at The Eldo, that would be 4/6/1990, the first of three times Phish played at the venue, and the only show to fall on a Friday. (Another explanation, perhaps less likely, might be that the phrase refers to the El Dorado apartment building on New York’s Upper West Side in which Anastasio resided for many years). But, we don’t need to know the historical specifics to feel the wistful ache in Anastasio’s voice. That was a good night, and now it is gone.
It was beautiful till that house burned down
And fell apart just to be reborn
From the ashes now this place is too quiet without youMemory folds into feelings of loss, and happy moments of spinning rooms veer into the imagery of destruction, loss and emptiness. Commentator Keith Eaton @Midcoaster, has suggested that “Halfway Home” represents a venture into “the grit of an addiction, the burying of pain, the dissembling and disassembling of self.” Now in his fifties and sober since 2007, Anastasio grieves the loss of a friend with whom he shared decades of mind-altering and otherwise memorable experiences, but he also grieves the loss of his former self, the person who did all those crazy things. He’s been reborn, and is in a better place. But it’s quiet there, and lonely. And yet the two friends remain connected:
I can feel you here in the cold
Video by Trey Anastasio
And we can walk together
Cause you know you're not the only one halfway homeAnastasio then delivers a powerful solo that veers between major-key and minor-key scales before deploying Hendrix-esque warbles, trills and other flourishes as it winds into an exuberant outro. Played live, Anastasio gets even more Hendrix-like here, cranking up the tremolo and experimenting with chromatic scales behind sludgy fuzz effects. (See 4/20/19 from the Greek Theater in Los Angeles, for example.)
The result is more triumphant or indignant than mournful. It sounds like someone clinging fast to life, not fading away. If Hendrix’s Are You Experienced? marked “the sound of music changing,” “Halfway Home” and Ghosts of the Forest more broadly may mark the sound of Anastasio himself changing. The song trails off with a tremolo dive-bomb, the sound of something plummeting into silence.
“Halfway Home” has appeared on Phish/TAB/Ghosts of the Forest setlists fourteen times, mostly through the 2019 Ghosts of the Forest run. On the album, it sits between “About to Run” and “In Long Lines,” but on the Ghosts of the Forest tour, the song fits seamlessly between Phish’s “Sightless Escape” and TAB’s “If Again.”
Video by Gregory MLast significant update: 3/15/26
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