The time has come! The final edits have been made, the proofs have been proofed, and Mr. Miner’s Phish Thoughts: An Anthology By a Fan for the Fans is ready for pre-sale! As of right now, you can head over to the updated book site and place your order. Any orders placed by December 1st will be fulfilled in time for the holidays! When placing any order, you will find two shipping options that I want to clarify. USPS Priority Mail is 2-3 days guaranteed and USPS Media Mail is around 7 days, but no time frame is guaranteed. Any and all information about the book, its specs, and its unique format can be found at Phishthoughtsbook.com.
If you have already pre-reserved a copy on the book site with your email address, your copy is officially set aside! All you need to do is complete your online transaction before December 1st and you’ll have your book by the holidays! You will receive a reminder via email as well. Thank you for your support!
In addition, I am very proud to present the cover art for the hardback volume by AJ Masthay. In conjunction with the beginning of book pre-sales, AJ will be offering a limited edition run of 100 cover art prints (below) starting at 12 Noon EST today on his site! Be sure to act fast in order to grab one of the few available!
Limited Edition Cover Print – AJ Masthay
*****
In celebration of this personally momentous day, enjoy some of my favorite uplifting jams for the beginning of the week.
The time has come! The final edits have been made, the proofs have been proofed, and Mr. Miner’s Phish Thoughts: An Anthology By a Fan for the Fans is ready for pre-sale! As of right now, you can head over to the updated book site and place your order. Any orders placed by December 1st will …
This Friday’s playlist is comprised of many of my favorite MSG moments from Holiday Run history. While a comprehensive list would be exhausting, these pieces represent the creme de la creme from The Garden’s past Decembers. Each selection is an absolute five star gem, so enjoy the high quality Phish for the weekend!
This Friday’s playlist is comprised of many of my favorite MSG moments from Holiday Run history. While a comprehensive list would be exhausting, these pieces represent the creme de la creme from The Garden’s past Decembers. Each selection is an absolute five star gem, so enjoy the high quality Phish for the weekend! *** “Tube” …
Confirming what fans had been assuming for some time, yesterday, Phish officially announced a four-night New Year’s Run at Madison Square Garden to close out 2011 in style! All other rumors had died out in recent weeks and it became a foregone conclusion that the band would return to the Big Apple, upping their career tally to 23 shows—all but 5 on holiday runs—at “The World’s Most Famous Arena.”
Historically, Phish and MSG have made quite the combustible holiday combination. In 1994, the band first stopped at 33rd St and 8th Ave on December 30th, on their way to Boston for Tropical New Year’s Eve. The following year, 1995, Phish came back to The Garden for two nights to close the year, with 12.31.95 being the peak of an era and, arguably, the best show Phish has ever played in The Garden.
12.31.10 (G.Estreich)
Come 1996, Phish stopped at MSG for a two-night stand during the opening leg of Fall tour (10/21,10/22). Though the second show contained a well-crafted setlist and a couple legitimate highlights, the tour didn’t really pick up steam until after Halloween at The Omni. The band skipped The Garden on the Holiday Run in ’96, favoring two nights in both Philadelphia and Boston, before coming back for an unprecedented three nights to close out their stellar year of 1997.
Punctuating Phish’s transformational and creative year of ’97, these three shows—the first of which is one of the outstanding shows of the late ‘90s—made the bond between Phish and Madison Square Garden permanent and inseparable. But if three shows in one building set a new standard for a New Year’s Run, the following year the band returned to The Garden a four-night Holiday Run—a spectacular stand through and through, and the most accomplished Holiday Run since 1995. All four shows popped off in 1998, with the 30th lagging only a slight bit behind. For four straight nights, Phish ran shop at Madison Square Garden, finishing with 12.31.98—the band’s most impressive New Year’s Eve performance since ’95.
Madison Square Garden
Phish, however, wouldn’t return to the building in its last two years of pre-hiatus existence. But when they came back on New Year’s Eve in 2002, there was only one place to do it—The Garden. Though the show, musically, wasn’t all that special, the mere fact that Phish chose their New York home for their return added to the venue’s already storied legacy. But in their short second go-round, their comeback show would be the only 2.0 performance in the round room.
When the band returned for this era, they chose the only other venue that made any sense for the reunion—Hampton Coliseum. But it wouldn’t be long before Phish made it back to The Garden in 2009, for three high-quality shows in the Fall of ’09. Three more at the end of 2010 brings us to now.
It seems only fitting that Phish will return to MSG to celebrate the holidays at the end of their most accomplished year of this era. With no fall tour, these shows represent a standalone oasis amidst a lot of time off. The band has said that 2012 will be a light year of touring, thus nobody knows when the following shows will come. But with four nights in New York City to end the year, nothing could be finer in the world of Phish.
The ticket request period is now open until October 24th. Best of luck in the lottery!
I: 1999* > Mike’s Song > I Am Hydrogen > Weekapaug Groove, Ghost -> Ha Ha Ha > Cavern
12.31.98
II: NICU, Character Zero > Tweezer -> Cities > Wading in the Velvet Sea, Run Like an Antelope > Frankenstein
III: Runaway Jim -> Auld Lang Syne -> Simple, Harry Hood > Tweezer Reprise, Llama
E: While My Guitar Gently Weeps
*debut, Prince
Source: Schoeps mk41v’s(DIN)>kc5>m222>nt222>744t
Confirming what fans had been assuming for some time, yesterday, Phish officially announced a four-night New Year’s Run at Madison Square Garden to close out 2011 in style! All other rumors had died out in recent weeks and it became a foregone conclusion that the band would return to the Big Apple, upping their career …
After such an extensive summer of Phish music, I haven’t been keeping up with Trey tour as usual. I haven’t listened to a full show or many jams, but reports have been solid all around. The most interesting aspect of Trey tour for me, however, has always been its proving ground for new songs and the potential they may hold for Phish. Trey’s larger band slayed 33 shows over the summer while debuting exactly one new original, thus I would imagine that on the first tour of 2012—whenever that may be—we’ll hear a batch of new songs. With work on an album forthcoming as well, one has to wonder what new Trey debuts might crossover to the Phish stage. With more than half his tour left, we may see Trey unveil more pieces yet, but for now, lets look at his first four debuts.
Trey’s most recent debut, “The Land of Nod”—first played in the encore of the Myrtle Beach show—is my favorite and the most original of his new pieces. Written by Trey, alone, the song begins with a heavy, bass-driven groove and when the horns come in over this rhythm, the piece resembles genuine Israeli gyspy-dub (a la Balkan Beat Box.) With ridiculously danceable rhythms, Phish could slaughter this piece if they could adapt the horn lines to the quartet. The middle of the song moves into an uplifting and melodic passage with the refrain, “I was asleep for so long…”— a total juxtaposition of styles within the piece. When the song moves back into gypsy-dub stylings, TAB winds it down, though this is where Phish could just get going. Then again, this is one tune that could be tailor made for his solo project.
The first Anastasio/Marshall composition of tour was debuted late in the second set of Higher Ground’s opening show, and that is exactly where I can see it fitting in a Phish show as well. Though the piece has already been pegged as Trey cheese by many fans, but I actually enjoy it quite a bit. While the lyrics are bit over the top about the Winter Queen and the Prince of Music, the guitar melodies and sparse supporting textures are both ethereal and cerebral. Trey and Tom usually write songs for one band and one band only, so I wouldn’t be surprised “Glacier” in the bigger pond at some point.
Inspired by a dream had by the Dude of Life in which Trey’s thumb was a snake’s head, this debut came in the first set of the first show at Higher Ground. A slow and filthy groove, “Snake Head Thumb” illustrates how 2010’s Halloween cover of Little Feat has influenced Trey’s songwriting. Crafted in collaboration with the Dude of Life, the chorus makes way for a slow and infectious groove that methodically moves to dirtier and dirtier places. The only debut that had included a jam, Trey unleashed his compressed growl over heavy organ swells in this percussive piece. A jam that Phish could take to sinister realms, this could be the second new-school Anastasio/Pollack contribution to the rotation (with “Show of Life”).
Beginning with beautiful vocal harmonies, this song’s opening gives way to a minimalist and chilled out groove, allowing its focus to remain on Tom Marshall’s lyrics. “Frost,” the second Anastasio/Marshall debut of tour could easily translate to a powerful Phish ballad. Containing the refrain of “Maybe you could sail away,” this section seems tailor-made for big-time Phish catharsis. Though more straightforward than many of Trey and Tom’s playful numbers, the more I hear this one, the more I like it.
2.19.10 – Chicago (M.Stein)
======
DOWNLOAD OF THE DAY:
MINER’S PICKS: Summer 2011 – Denver/VT
Here are the final download links for the Summer 2011 Miner’s Picks series—all with the best sources available. Thanks again to Chris Keiner of Phish Listening Room for all the hard work!
After such an extensive summer of Phish music, I haven’t been keeping up with Trey tour as usual. I haven’t listened to a full show or many jams, but reports have been solid all around. The most interesting aspect of Trey tour for me, however, has always been its proving ground for new songs and …
For the end of the week, and with the help of Chris Keiner of Phish Listening Room, I have assembled downloads of all the Miner’s Picks that were posted last week. And here’s where Chris comes in. As audience sources of each current show are posted on etree, he reviews the same four songs from each and every source, honing in on—in his opinion—the best available recording for every show played. These installments of Miner’s Picks were assembled from Chris’ selected sources, thus feature the “best” sounding source for every single track! Also, for the first time in Miner’s Picks history, I am offering the compilations in both lossless and mp3 formats.
Below, you will find any link that you will need to download these summer compilations. The torrent links are listed first and are the easiest way to pull entire compilations at once. There are two sets of torrent links—one comprised of FLACs and one comprised of 320 kbps mp3s. Additionally, if torrenting isn’t your thing, there are also direct Megaupload links for the compilations as well. I had to keep each Megaupload file under a 1 gig, so there are multiple download links for the FLAC compilations, though the mp3s files all fit into a single download for each set of picks. Enjoy the summer highlights in any format you choose!
I want to also thank Eric Masters for organizing and re-uploading all the Leg I picks, by far the heartiest compilation of them all. In addition, download links for “Miner’s Picks: Denver” will be provided as soon as they are ready. Enjoy the weekend!
For the end of the week, and with the help of Chris Keiner of Phish Listening Room, I have assembled downloads of all the Miner’s Picks that were posted last week. And here’s where Chris comes in. As audience sources of each current show are posted on etree, he reviews the same four songs from …
