Playing It Safe on Sunday

Bethel Woods - 5.29.11 (D.Lavery)

After two nights of psychedelic debauchery to open summer tour, Phish finished their three-night stand in Bethel with a show that was delivered with a razor-sharp tightness, but far less improvisational adventure than the previous couple. At several times throughout the show, the band seemed on the verge of diving into a musical abyss, but each time they took a turn out of creative waters and into the next song. When looking at Bethel as a three-show package, however, Sunday’s anthemic punctuation mark seemed just fine as we departed the blissful pastures of Woodstock for the grit of central Jersey.

5.28.11 (C.LaJaunie)

Though Sunday’s show carried a “Saturday night rock and roll” vibe throughout, it still contained legitimate highlights book-ending the second set in “Mike’s > Simple” and “2001 > Light > Slave.” But after rewriting the landscape of modern Phish over the previous two nights, the decision to stay within the box during all of these jams (less “Simple”), seemed like a strange move. Carrying an air-tight quality to many of these sequences, the band allowed only “Simple” to breathe, while pushing through their other improvisational passages with safe and linear interplay. They played with the same precision and fire we have seen over the first couple of nights, but for whatever reason, they decided not to take any musical risks last night. At the end of “46 Days,” “Meatstick” and “Light,” Phish seemed on the brink of oozing into creative and psychedelic waters, but in each case the jam was cut in favor of keeping the setlist moving. The most egregious case of this came in the middle of the second set during “Meatstick.”

 

5.28.11 (P. McGonigle)

After sparking the second half with a ferocious “Mike’s Song” and followed with a summery, ambient jaunt in “Simple,” they smoothly segued into an inexplicably short “Weekapaug.” But at this point in the game, the stage was set for the continuation of a legitimate Phish set. But when “Meatstick” was cut off awkwardly for “Fluffhead,” any musical momentum had been derailed. It’s one thing when “Fluffhead” follows a significant jam, but its a whole ‘nother thing when it cuts one off altogether. After a disconnected three-song, mid-set sequence, the band picked the show back up with the space grooves of “2001.” Featuring heavy-hitting dance patterns, Trey, again, showed off his precise and multi-note licks that have been so prevalent in the summer’s opening weekend. And finally, one of the set’s highest points came in its final song—a multi-tiered “Slave to the Traffic Light” which built slowly through beat-less textures before ending the weekend with a blissful peak.

5.28.11 (C.LaJaunie)

The opening set contained a true “first set” vibe for the first time this tour, and though everything was played sharply and with gusto, “Timber” represented the most engaging interplay of the set—and likely the show—as the band seethed white-hot psychedelia within the fourth song of the show. “Ocelot” and “Antelope” both featured contained jams with impresive full-band communication, and “Suzy” even boasted a shredding quasi-jam. But, all in all, other than “Timber,” the set amounted to a whole bunch of singles.

Regardless of its linear, song-based contour, Sunday night represented but one slice of a three-part pie that was Bethel Woods—the stand where Summer 2011 blasted off. Have a safe day off and I’ll see you in Jersey!

I: AC/DC Bag, Sample in a Jar, Rift, Ocelot, Ya Mar, Timber, The Oh Kee Pa Ceremony > Suzy Greenberg, 46 Days > Twenty Years Later, The Ballad of Curtis Loew, Run Like an Antelope

II: Mike’s Song > Simple > Weekapaug Groove, Meatstick > Fluffhead, Joy, Also Sprach Zarathustra > Light > Slave to the Traffic Light

E: Loving Cup, Tweezer Reprise

 

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385 Responses to “Playing It Safe on Sunday”

  1. DukeOfLizards Says:

    What’s up @BK

    Unpacking everything from tour while bumping the Bethel ALACs on the shiny new iPod dock the DuchessOfLizards hooked up for my birthday. Won’t need to get ready for another show for, oh, at least another seventeen hours :roll:.

    You have every note of Bethel memorized yet? 😉

  2. BrandonKayda Says:

    Ha, getting there. Hard to believe I’m seeing Phish in less than 2 weeks. However, I have SAT’s next Saturday. Lame 😉

  3. DukeOfLizards Says:

    Also – it’s about the 178th-most musically significant moment of the weekend (approximately), but Page absolutely SHREDS his Poor Heart solo.

    The Chairman of the Boards is back in big, big way.

  4. DukeOfLizards Says:

    Word @BK. The SATs measure nothing other than how good someone is at taking the SATs. I at least thankfully got to take them the last year before they added in the writing. I can’t imagine how mind-numbing that whole ordeal must be now.

    Is this your first run at it?

  5. BrandonKayda Says:

    @Duke

    I realize that, I really do. It doesn’t mean they suck any less and I think it’s strange that they judge intelligence off of test scores. Luckily I’m very good at writing/reading comprehension and critical reading and all that.

  6. DukeOfLizards Says:

    @BK

    Sounds like you’ll be fine.

    And yeah – for instance, I did pretty well on the reading comprehension sections, but I would always just skip straight to the questions and dig up the answers from there. Never once read any of the passages straight through.

    I’ve gotta run though – here’s to less than two weeks before MPP!

  7. BrandonKayda Says:

    Anybody up?

  8. voopa Says:

    Not for long.

  9. sluggo Says:

    typically contrarian take on Sunday by MM

  10. Michael "Nerd" G Says:

    Hi! I liked this review. I read many unsatisfying ones before this one. It seems you have a good perspective and were listening. Thanks for posting it!

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