From: Victor Szalvay
Subject: Antelope in Review Pt.27 11/24/96
Greetings Everyone, Ok, Ok!! So, I�ve been gone for like a couple months, but now I am back hopefully for a while. School and tests got a little out of control, but you know how it goes. Well, Antelope still intrigues me, and I�ve noticed you MUST be in the right mind set to feel the full effect of this one. Just as the song says, you can picture this herd of wild, out of control, stampeding antelopes running through the wild! Free as the night and without constraints of any kind! The ultimate expression of freedom, imo. So, this version, to get back on track, is from my home town of Portland, OR 11/24/96 was the date and this is a very good version at that. (Also, see the Portland Reba if you want to get your socks knocked off). Here it is: Antelope -- Intro: So after I Didn�t Know, they surprisingly took their seats for a little Antelope action to close out the set! Good call, I thought, I mean, it IS an essential move, right?!! So, the intro was really calm and laid back as intros go, and there seemed to be a lot of people there not knowing what was coming, so when the Opening theme commenced, everyone went nuts! So they brought it down all the way to silence and then... POW! Opening theme: Right on track! The place erupts and the boys really got the desired effect. RakE!: Pretty smooth, the riffs afterwards are a little sketchy. Key Change to Em: Here we go! Trey is intently starring off into the crowd during this entire version. Silly as this sounds, I felt like he knew I was there and was looking right at me! You know, like when he does this starring thing and you think he is looking right at you... well, I was close enough to see his eyes and I was able to fool myself! Pretty stunning feeling. They get serious right away as we head into the realm of the Em jam!! There is no turning back as Page lays down some serious structuring and Trey gets mean with some nice licks. Milling around for several minutes, the tension is alleviated and heightened all at the same time and Trey starts in with a cyclic Psycho style riff, compounded by Page�s ominous chord work... the pattern evolves out to be a bit more complex and Trey gets neurotic on this little line... Page is there ever-more increasingly to heighten the tension. Trey releases with a little bump in the road and more cohesive solo line starts up... The darkness is evident once again as Trey hits another round of severe tension building... Page is really noticeable all the way through... They even it out with a pausing riff that just hold out before the shift for a second long, and then... Second Gear: Nice and smooth... nothing enormous but interesting out of the stagnant riffing. Here we see another pausing stagnation and Trey gets wild while Phish pounds away. They raise noticeably to another slight shift... I wouldn�t give this one gear-status but another tension evolves and simply explodes into a downright gear-grinder!!! 3rd gear: Whoa!!! The grinding is on as this extended shift really feels help from the double-kick work of Fish!!! 4th gear: Follow not long thereafter!! Trilling all the way another extended session and really, really intense!!! The build just keeps going after this as Trey just trills and trills and trills!!! All the way to the sky and back; to fall into the... Pre-Marco-Groove: Hello again! back to earth... Trey moves immediately to the kit! Go Trey!! Pretty calm PMG until Trey announces: Ry, Ry, Rocco!! Norton Charleston Heston (Trey points to Fish and Fish responds with some Ey! Ey!!) Been you to have any spike, man? High Gear Theme: Nice transition, but nothing miraculous! It smoothes all the way into the end with no other noteworthy happenings. End: All in all a fabulous version. I wouldn�t say it is top 20 or something, but still very smooth nonetheless. Ferocious gear shifting, and listen to this one if you want to hear a really nice gear-grinder. Well, overall I�d give it a 6.5 on the Victor Scale. Take it easy everyone, -Victor Szalvay