Phish @ Bill Graham Civic Aud., SF, CA, Weds July 25, 2018

Somebody tell the BGCA management to turn on the AC tonight.

Late night phishin...

Gimme a sneakin sally tonite....

Never miss a wednesday show...

Scent of a Mule up in heeya.

Good looking out, Noodler, bring it!

Very, very rarely, Druba

You ll get harpua tonite....thought it was comin as encore last. Night

Again, played during donut tour...but, they had to, right?

Only few times since 2013  i think

pretty dope so far

band is onstage... starting now

Roggae

Wow...third repeat of tour to open....

Tube

NICU

Runaway Jim

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU

Runaway Jim

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Keepin' It Reel

Is this new?

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Keepin' It Reel

Driver

Is this new?

New mike tune....now driver, not quite the first set they played last two nights...so far

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Keepin' It Reel **First Time Played

Driver

Saw it Again

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Keepin' It Reel **First Time Played

Driver

Saw It Again

Ocelot

There was recently a thread on this board talking about Phish songs that had essentially been retired, including Runaway Jim and Sparkle which have both shown up in the last couple of shows.

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Keepin' It Reel   **First Time Played**

Driver

Saw It Again

Ocelot

Waking Up Dead

Runaway Jim was only played 2 times last year.

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Keepin' It Reel   **First Time Played**

Driver

Saw It Again

Ocelot

Waking Up Dead

Backwards Down The Number Line

Set 1

Roggae

Tube >

NICU >

Runaway Jim

The Horse >

Silent in the Morning 

Keepin' It Reel   **First Time Played**

Driver

Saw It Again

Ocelot

Waking Up Dead

Backwards Down The Number Line

More

Someone else take Set 2.

Enjoy the rest of the show.

Goodnight!

Set two is gonna jaboo

Bank on it

SET 1: Roggae, Tube > NICU > Runaway Jim, The Horse > Silent in the Morning, Keeping it Reel[1], Driver, Saw It Again, Ocelot, Waking Up Dead, Backwards Down the Number Line > More

[1] Debut

https://phish.net/setlists/phish/

Refresh link for updates during set, these fuckers are on it!

The lights are the best thing about Phish.  Page sounds good, but the rest is just so boring

This was a show that wasn't working for me. I figured it was a personal low energy thing along with odd song selection and at least to me not the most energetic playing.

Then they went out to the deep end right away in the second set and they stayed out quite a while. It was good, not rushed improvisation that flowed but there was nothing to me that really went over the top. Makisupa Policeman was fine but that song is just sort of there, a breather for everyone, but then suddenly from the jam exiting Scents on to the end of the show it was all fucking unbelievable. They just shifted into another gear and I went from bored to entertained to shredded.

At one point during that last half-hour I turned to my friend and said, "They could be playing chopsticks right now and they would be killing it." When they went into Possum I was slightly bummed because I thought they were in such a deep place and Possum is such a goofy party song, but they simply destroyed that Possum. They would have destroyed whatever they chose to play at that point.

These guys are fucking great, and after all the years and everything they've gone through it's all the more satisfying when they play like this at this point in their long career.

And there is nothing like the Bill Graham Civic when it's rocking like that. The sound both nights all along the lower balcony was incredibly good; rich, deep, clear, powerful & loud. Gordon in particular was blasting & bombing, and I could hear & feel every note he played.

And IMO the lights are too much, pandering, too busy and just lights for lights sake, but watching the amazing rig moving around over the band's heads all night was pretty entertaining, far more than the shallow end "Ooooh, look at the lights" overkill.

These guys are in a really good place right now. They're playing relaxed and free, which is allowing the music to breath, flow, dig deep and rock. If you have a ticket to see them soon you should be looking forward to it. The four shows I just saw were all excellent, and lots of it was better than that. and they're just getting started.

Far out.

Sound issues all night...even mentioned during treys "day" in makisupa...

Always love The Lizards to close...

Dbl trbl

I dig your honest review Lance.

Thanks man.

2nd time only to open the show with Roggae.

I was at the first time at Deer Creek 8/2/98.

Set your soul free rocks.

Lance is a bit of a Phish fluffer. 

TWIST!

Morning replay

http://mixlr.com/terrapinsummercouch5/

Dig me some Twist.   

Phish's venue selection is interesting to me, back when the dead toured there was always the one clear venue not to miss on tour.  This tour it seems like there are so many hot spots.    Hard to pick and choose if you are a fan.   

>>>Dbl trbl

Miss me some Stevie Ray

Listened / watched  all of Set i last night before falling asleep.  Not the best set from Phish this tour.  7/24 much much better.

Listening to set ii today,  much better effort than set i.

But I liked the sound in the livePhish / youTube mix better than whatever mix I'm hearing today.  Also fun seeing the pro-shot viddy.  Trey seems to have broken out one of his older Languedocs.  Fishman is getting a bit tubby.

It's funny, after listening to that set 1 again it's almost like (after the old school 4 song beginning) they are intentionally filling the set with comedown songs, obscure non-favorites and new songs, perhaps as a way to highlight the new ones. Was well played though. So very very different than night one, which is the key to this band's greatness. 

Agree with Tom's comments.  I wanted last night to work but my energy dipped after the Silent.  New time was fine but couldn't get my footing for the rest of the set.  Set two was better, I like the Scents.  Wedge>Possum was good but most of us were in Tahoe...

I enjoyed last night’s show. It was the only one I could make so I had no repeat issues or anything like that. First set was an odd mix of songs, Tube and Runaway Jim stood out for me. I always dig NICU. Second set from Twist on was killer.....

What a Possum!
(Carini kicked butt too - night B4!)

-It was good to see Harry Perry still making the rounds with his guitar last night. 

-No Men in No Man’s land  was the Best set opener of the 4 shows I went too. Night 1 Set 2 Tahoe.

-Phil should try to reserve the Bill Graham for NYE again. 

I wish Phish played the west coast more. 

Good times

the first nights second set was easily the high point of all four sets across both shows.

there were some killer jams in the next night's second set, and some decent moments in each nights first sets, but overall i found alot of this pretty tough to sit through and spent alot of time wandering the halls.

first nights first set there was dogs, some other song and david bowie that was pretty solid, and the second nights first set had a few moments too, but these two first sets really drove home for me how great a band phish is, and how absolutely terrible their songs are. well over half of them are these weird flowery, silly, totally pussified hippie music. they have some good stuff, i love down w disease, carini, saw it again, harry hood, scents and subtle sounds, etc, but jesus christ most of this shit is terrible. every song mike sang was perplexingly bad. some had great jams, but the songs themselves are awful.

possum? what the fuck was that? i straight up left and kicked it in the hallway with some friends, it wasnt worth the heat in that room to sit thru a song like that. makisupa policeman? wtf????

there were some great jams, especially in the first nights second set, but honestly id much prefer this band if they just played GD covers or something...im not a big GD cover band guy but holy hell 75% of the time any of those four guys opened their mouths it was like i was forcing my weiner thru a meat grinder.

weird review

Yep it's true Phish are nerds that went to college and shit!

Since the early 90s I have had issues with what I have always called their "D&D side" - Gamehenge lyrics and songs like Dog Log, Harpua (sorry I always just saw it as a comedy bit song), Alumni Blues, Big Fat Furry Creatures, basically the stuff that could have only been written by college dorks. The more sensitive-y type songs would begin with songs like Fast Enough for You and Horn and I actually really like some of those songs. I drifted away from Phish and HORDE bands in 1995 (Phish was the only one I really liked) but saw Trey at the Jerry tribute show at the Greek in 2005 and started following him again. After a 10 year break I still can't stand some of their songs but hey I like the Beatles and indie rock so I can appreciate plenty of the tunes they wrote '96 - '04.

Possum is silly but I will never forget the raging version they did at the Roxy Theater in ATL in '93, or just that show in general. Phish was a pretty different band then. 

Chalk dust opener

Inglewood

Chalk Dust Torture

Everythings Right

Rift

Wolfmans Brother

its not so much the nerdy kinda lyrics, or the absurd/surreal stuff, its more the sound that really grates on my nerves. lots of the songs played, especially in the first set, just did not jive with what i am looking for at these kinds of shows. struck me as very stereotypical, uncreative overly happy songs that end up sounding childish and amateurish.

if phish was not a jamband, and a friend took me to the show because he loved their songs, i probably would have left after just a few songs. without the jams many of those songs are meandering, uninteresting, and as i said before, really childish.

now on the other hand they have songs like carini or saw it again that are dark, deeply psychedelic, and just fucking rage super hard...and as a dead fan i can put up with a few buzzkill songs here and there in a set, but when you start getting up well over 50% of those songs, for me it starts to detract from the improvisation.

i saw my first phish show in 2016 at the BGCC and i think i got pretty lucky with the song selection, first set had stuff like wombat, song i heard the ocean sing, split open and melt, scents and subtle sounds etc, and i dont really remember hearing any overly silly, ameteurish sounding stuff...and then the second set had lots of goodies like down w disease and no quarter...only silly song was fluffhead, and between the amazing jam and reference to "fluff", i even enjoyed it quite a bit.

ill see them again, the jams are absolutely incredible, but man, those songs...

are these kinds of songs pretty much expected at every phish show, or are there some shows where they play silly songs and some shows where they dont?

How Many People are You

HORN

Water in the Sky

20 Years Later

Sand

Set 2

Blaze On

Dwd

Simple

Ghost

Finished w bounce around the room, mikes song, slave to the traffic light, sleeping monkey

Weekapaug groove

Hell of a set

Replay of last night, on all day

http://mixlr.com/terrapinsummercouch5/

It's funny to read Daylight's comments, because in '92 & '93 when my friends were first dragging me to see Phish I was saying the exact same things about them.

But over time and some unbelievably great shows I gradually came to understand the band and their goofiness much better, I came to like or at least appreciate some of the strange or bubble-gummy songs more and I came to accept that there was going to be some of what they do and some (many) of their songs that I would never like and I learned to put that away and just LOVE what I love about them.

Phish has always been extreme at what they do and they've never been an easy band to "get". Some never do, some it takes a long time. I think for many, like me, we have to push away the walls of our own wishes & likes and just surrender to the flow (sorry, I couldn't help myself). 

For me it was during my 4th & 5th shows at the Warfield in '94 when it was like athletes will say; "Suddenly it all slowed down for me", or like looking at one of those strange designs that look like gibberish and then suddenly I could see the image inside it clearly. It didn't hurt that especially that 5th show is still one of the greatest and most unique concerts I've ever seen in my life.

I was lucky that I was coming of age with Phish during what is generally considered their peak years (damn they were fucking unreal in the mid-nineties) but over the 26 years I've been seeing that band I've seen them do so many things I could not and can not believe that it became easy for me to forgive, forget & learn to like, understand or at least accept what isn't in the wheelhouse of what I generally "like" about music or bands.

In other words, I think the good FAR outweighs the bad, and like any language it all begins to make much more sense the better you learn to understand it.

BTW, it was good to run into you at the show Daylight. I think my head was as far in left field at that point as yours seemed to be in right.

Far out.

The Phish are at a unique place in their Musical journey right now.

They have put all the kids through College and (most likely) have decent retirement funds.

So they are in it for the Fun (although they might make a few bucks).

Maybe some of the latest tunes are quite lame,  but they will  still break even,  or so.

Haven't been since last year at the Donut run,  maybe I'll go to Camden one night.

I very much support Tom's comments above. Not only because I have a similar historical Phish track but because it is about seeing the glass half full.  

Im very thankful these guys continue to bring full tours and I find it impossible to be them.  More than 4-6 nights/Year would be unsustainable.  Unless you live near NYC. 

Enjoy the show tonight all.  

it was great to see you too lance! i was probably pretty twisted...we usually run into each other at TXR and i dont really get that wild at TXR...but if you see me wandering the halls of the BGCC its safe to say im having a significant amount of trouble forming coherent words amidst all the psychedelic gymnastics. :)

and i could see some of the songs growing on me over time as i form memories and a relationship with the music in the same way i did with the dead...but at the end of the day, a huge amount of the stuff at "dead shows", i also feel like i am just sitting and suffering thru them to get to the jams and improv...its just different things i have to suffer thru at a dead show vs. phish, but at the end of the day, the parts that are really giving me what i need are pretty similar for both bands...and IMO phish is a much better band than any of the GD offshoot projects within the last 5 or 6 years...but on the other hand id probably rather see furthur or something like that, even tho phish is a better unit/band...it just doesn't click for me like GD music.

these shows really got me pumped for JRAD. it sucks to go out and do the cover band thing, but JRAD is the only band where I dont feel like i have to sit thru any garbage to get to the serious improv.

here's hoping phish does not skip the SF bay next summer like they did last summer!

w/ “What’s Going On” (Marvin Gaye) tease

w/ "Becky" (Benevento/Russo Duo) jam

w/ “Wild Thing” (Tone Loc) tease

w/ "Theme From A Symphony" (Ornette Coleman) tease

w/ "Sledgehammer” (Peter Gabriel) tease

w/ “Poison” (Bell Biv DeVoe) tease

w/ "Dancing In The Streets" tease

w/ "Dark Star" tease

w/ "Terrapin Station" tease

w/ “Borderline” (Madonna) jam

w/ "Cumberland Blues" tease

I had a freakin' blast at the 2 SF shows I attended! 

GO PHISH GO!