, attached to 2015-08-08

Review by SkyTrainWand

SkyTrainWand My first trip ever to Alpine Valley turned out to be a wonderful adventure. I had just as much fun NOT seeing Phish as I did actually seeing them! I'll keep this review on topic though...

Set 1 highlights - stepping into the venue for the first time. Wow. Such a huge place! Anyway, No Man's Land was a great opener, Frankie Says was a welcome surprise, right into Maze which always kicks ass. Mercury is officially my #1 favorite new Phish song of 2015 and I thought it was a really stellar version, Trey seemed very focused and had a really nice solo in it. His focus seemed to continue during Reba, which I loved. Possum closer was nice, then we headed to the beer lines

Set 2 highlights - THIS SET IS AWESOME. Cannot stress this enough. The DWD > Halley's portion was absolutely wonderful, and Trey played around with his TruTron pedal quite a lot. For only being 14 minutes, there's a boatload of fantastic improvisation in this Disease and you can tell all the band members are listening to each other.

Around 8:00 in the DWD is when the jam starts getting pretty dark, but not for long - around 11:00 mark the band shifts into a major key and ends the jam with an envelope of existential bliss that had me closing my eyes for several minutes. Right after Halley's is where my mind was completely blown, since they nailed a direct segue into Twist! Really, it was seamless. I could go on and on, but it'll take too long. Everything about this set is fantastic, but I just need to note one thing:

During What's The Use, just past the halfway point, Mike hits a low note and hits his Taurus pedal. The result was a sound that I will NEVER forget, because it seemed like it caused a miniature earthquake and shook the entire venue. The reaction from the crowd was priceless.

After that, a really strong Number Line, and equally strong Slave. Meatstick was fun times, and Zero (always a rocker) took us out. I no longer have a dislike for Character Zero because it kicks ass every single time.

I think there were some better shows than Alpine 1 this tour, but holy skyballs, this is a good one! I'll be re-listening for quite some time.

4 stars out of 5 :)


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