If you happen to get a good recording of this you will love the crisp determined playing of the band from jump.
Jim is sparkling. Fish shines giving a perfect tapestry for the band and crowd to dance to. they ripped this Runaway Jim to shreds. You could almost assume they didn't think it would be that way with the curious but welcomed Col Forbin follow. The band is so tight this whole year, its hard to stop mentioning it. it is a good narrative . referencing the riots and another example of how self-aware the band is. Forbin leads into a Famouspus Mocking Bird that I have to say , in my humble opinion, the tightest to that point. They are on fire. Again a good recording will make this obvious. i heard this off of phistracks.com . sick quality. I can't imagine they thought they could play that song better at that time in the bands' development.
Reba follows, full disclosure my favorite song or first favorite masterpiece jams by trey in the YEM, Divided Sky, Antelope realm. Reba got me hooked on those atonal gems from trey's mind. htis written first part is played so perfect you wanna cry. The jam is Phish RnB at its best. the beginning is fish on a great groove wih Mike and Trey rocks it slowly the band gets a regular reba groove giong. Mike drops the first bomb and trey matches that figure in a DEG-like jam Then Fish's cymbals make a great appearance and then Trey just Jedi-Knight's this song. A must-hear Reba.
A blistering Maze follows. The band is in full flight drumd Trey's solo
The Stash verse is a good listen alone. Trey switches the words for a dig at the cops. . this stash is great. must listen.

I seldom leave reviews, but this show is one that I felt warranted it. People look towards April '92 to get their fill of tight, explosive playing from a developing band with a bright future and a chip on their shoulder, and they would be right to do so, but May '92 is often mistakenly overlooked. You can't really be upset with a show that begins with a Jim, Forbin > Mockingbird > Icculus > Mockingbird, and it only gets better from there. The first big highlight is the Reba, which thrashes until the very end, but the true highlight of the first set is the Stash. It's always fun when they change the lyrics around a bit, which is the first thing you'll notice, but what stands out is the tension and release jam. Trey is an animal here, and is splitting the very fabric of the universe. By the end of it you somehow end up with messy hair and a cigarette in your mouth, and don't even ask how you got there. Wow.

The entire second set has great flow and tight playing, as one would expect from a Spring '92 shows, but for me what stood out most was the Bowie and YEM. Complete with a Band/Crew Football Theme Song mixed in, this is one of my favorite pre-94 Bowies of all time. After finishing the show I had to go back and listen to it twice. The playing is fierce, and ends at such a point that you think Trey's fingers should have burned off from friction. The accuracy of notes, and release of celestial energy is something that only he could achieve. I honestly couldn't even whistle as fast as that Bowie ending goes, and he nails it. If nothing else check this show out for this Bowie. Tela is a great cool down song after it, but they just pick things right back up with a tight foam, and a raging YEM (the vocal jam is even excellent for those who tend to skip them for whatever reason). This is just an overall GOOD show, which needs to be listened to by more people on this site. Enjoy!

This bootleg was an audience recording. A little too much crowd for my taste. Not a bad balance though. The show itself might have been a case of the boys having too much fun again. Rough Trey night.

Right off the bat we have Fish coming in a little too fast on Jim, making Trey sound lost. It got better. Forbin's is great, I love this song and so far, can't get enough of it. Icculus is great, very funny stuff. Mockingbird is good. Sparkle sounds a little uncertain tonight. Reba has obvious flaws in it. An otherwise good Maze is ruined by Trey's early ending. Bouncing is fine. Stash lyrics were changed to "Police pull you over and beat the shit out of you." Pretty good Stash. Almost sounds like Trey broke a string or something because Coil is out of tune and awful. He must have fixed it during Page's solo because Llama rips as usual.

Second set has a nice birthday dedication for Sherry's 21st going into Glide complete with evil laughter. After all the foolishness Bowie has an awful start but, includes the Crew Football Theme Song! Not sure what that is all about. I'll have to do some more research. Tela was good. Foam had some shakey parts in it too. It's been a while since I've heard a bad Foam. YEM was good, vocal jam was ok. Chalkdust is fine. Rosie included Fish apologizing to Paul after a loud wooo! Cavern is always a good closer.

Fish's voice cracks during his solo moment making Monkey funnier than it already is. BBFCFM is hilarious! A must hear for fans of this song. The interplay between Trey and Mike is priceless. Fish even tries to get Paul to do the solo count off from the soundboard.

Overall this was a bad Trey night. There is some funny stuff in here but, not the greatest show.

READ THE BOOK!

The show kicks of by running away to Gamehendge. Very good and fun, worth checking out if you're a fan (also an almost insane way to START the show). But listen, I think that the jam on Reba is well worth hearing, it's shambolic and beautiful. I'd call it a must-hear for anyone interested in this era of Phish (so, Phish fans). Maze is a great call to follow and is played well (sorry Bill, Trey [minorly] fucking up the ending does not *ruin* it!) Bouncing is fine, I could have done without it in this spot. But it is alright! STASH, heyyyyy, very good li'l guy. Coil is a good call here, it did not strike me as awful (sorry Bill). Llama goes hard and fast to close the first set.

That's a real good set I. On to set II.

Glide is a fun set 2 opener, the boys are having fun tonight. Bowie kicks off with a Wizard of Oz tease fest and secret language, the crowd is loving it. This is extremely fun. This show is good. To think I was probably just watching Winnie the Pooh in my pajamas on the south side of town while this was happening. Annoying. Anyway, this Bowie is fun and good as all heck, especially post Band/Crew Football Theme Song. Tela is good, slows things down a bit and reigns in that wild energy for the time being, bringing the focus solidly to the music (and back to Gamhendge). Foam is a great call here bringing the energy back up, the crowd loves it. It's not the Platonic Ideal version of Foam (Trey struggles to get in the pocket) but it's ok, the back half is pretty good and you got to love the crowd screaming periodically throughout. It's a warm up anyway for...

YEM! Trey's Foam issues follow him into the opening of YEM a bit but it ain't bad. Page sounds good, don't even mind the electric piano. I like what Mike is up to as well. The washufizi section is a little funny with Mike stepping on Trey's lines but it's good. Crowd is going wild throughout Tramps. Very fun. Trey doesn't really do much during the jam for awhile hanging back and letting the other guys take center stage. It's good if a bit aimless. Then Trey comes in and... still doesn't really do much until he starts the build towards his usual wailing and it is tasty and good yes. Mike n Fish are great in their section. Like really good! VJ is pretty insane and good if you're a fan of vocal jams. The crowd gets into it and starts clapping along. Top shelf. The YEM over all is is average in the grand scheme of YEMs but it's wonderful in context.

CDT brings some much needed RAWK show energy back after the extreme silliness of the long vocal jam (rumpa ding ding doe dooooe). It does it's job, you know what it is. Obligatory Fishman Fun time is a fun time. Play it now! Cavern, great closer.

Sleeping Monkey, very funny call really sets up the absolutely insane bbfcfm. I mean it, insane!

I've addressed myself to DollarBill a few times in this review because any .Netter making their way through earlyish Phish comes to appreciate having him as a de facto companion. I think he was in the wrong mood for this show. It is in no way a bad Trey night. This show is really awesome. Maybe I'm just in the right mood but this is borderline must-hear (in terms of '92, maybe not all time) from me. It has that special something in the tape that elevates it from just a very good show. Reba is the highlight.

Found on the old rec.music.phish

by Patricia Chern

Whew! Great show at the Cabaret Metro last night! Aquarian Rescue
Unit opened, and that was the first time I'd heard them. They were
smokin'!! Definitely an appropriate band to play with Phish.
Runaway Jim
Colonel Forbin's Ascent-Icculus-Fly Famous Mockingbird
Sparkle
Reba

Maze (What a tune!!)
Bouncing
Stash
Squirming Coil
Llama

Glide
Wicked Witch-David Bowie
Foam
Tela
YEM
Chalkdust
Cracklin' Rose
Cavern
e: Home on the Train?
Big Fat Furry CFM

So now, on to the show: Very hot, great audience, lots of highlights.
During Col. Forb, when Trey went into narration, he set us on a very
long, detailed, extremely descriptive, extremely effective (I swear,
we really left the planet . . . )journey through space, "Far away
from all the rioting going on..." far away from this universe, and
finally, after this wonderful journey, we all came down to Gamehendge
at last where we spotted Col. Forbin climbing the mountain. I really
hope someone taped the show cuz this narration could put anyone into
another realm. He then did an extensive intro to Icculus, screaming
that we all had to read the HPB etc. etc. "We gave the HPB to the
Aquarian Rescue Unit, and they read it . . " The whole thing was
beautiful. This was the perfect thing for Trey to do so early in the
show, because I think everyone had a little bit of "something else"
on their minds when they came in, be it LA, finals, cars blowing up**
. . . but leave it to Trey to take care of that.

The jam after the structured instrumental part of Reba was the best
I've ever heard. The audience was visibly blown away, and even those
who knew the of whistling to come just went wild with appreciation
after it. You just had to. Everyone around me was just looking at
each other going "My God!" That was a pretty consistent thing for all
jams that followed throughout the night. Smoking. Everything.

Trey made another reference to the LAPD trial during Stash, though I
couldn't make out the words- did someone else hear exactly what he
said? He did the "Smegma" line, then "Police . . . " and changed the
words to what I assume applied, with everyone in the band looking at
him surprised, then sang "Laugh when they beat you, say please don't
do that"

Before David Bowie, they did this hilarious Wicked Witch of the West
thing. They'd break into that melody, when the Wicked Witch rides
her broom by Dorothy's window, you know "Ne nene ne Nah Nah, Ne nene
ne Nah Nah, over and over, falling down, playing 10 second jams, and
being generally Phishy whacky in between, always coming back to it.
It went on for quite some time (!) and the audience was REALLY into
it. The audience was really great last night and very responsive to
their clowning around on stage. And they did a lot of it.

The trampolines came out during YEM, and Mike pulled out a video
camera and taped while bouncing, holding it out to his right while
doing the spin around thing. Then he stopped and taped Trey bouncing,
then put it down and bounced while Trey videoed. Mike later picked
it up again later and taped Trey and Page during the climax of the
vocal jam. They were definitely having a lot of fun out there.

Tela sure has been modified since the live at Nectar's days,eh?

Have they done this Home the Train song before? I don't recall
reading about it. It was very bizarre, very Phish. A slow folk
ballad of sorts with wierd lyrics about sleeping monkeys, eventually
taken over acapella by Fish while Trey and Mike stood in homage to
him, hand over heart. Then it swung into jam with the same
slow-ballad chord progression. What is this song? They took it very
seriously, which was really funny because the lyrics were really
whacked.

During BFFCFM, the band just went wild, which wasn't surprising
considering how they'd been all night. They really got into the
strobes, as did the audidence. I think Mike might have been filming
then, too. Mike really extended all his "Why am I" stuff, going on
and on for a long time like that Spy Story he wrote a million
newsletters back, saying the same thing a zillion different ways.
"Why am I running? Why do I seem like I'm running? Why do I smell
like I'm running away?" and so on and so on. Mike was definitely at
his finest last night. He had an INCREDIBLE bass solo during YEM -
Trey put down his guitar and just stopped and watched in awe, as did
the rest of us while he went crazy. It was definitely something I
wish you all could hear.

Overall, this show was incredible because they were as whacky as I've
ever seen them live, but as tight musically as well. It seems in the
past when they get silly they lose their musicianship but that didn't
happen ANYWHERE last night. Everything was right on throughout the
night. I've become so impressed with Chris's light show that I think
he should be considered the 5th member of the band. he plays lights.
Fish! He got a voice! The crowd totally ate up Cracklin Rose.
ANYWAY, Overall, great venue, great show. No exceptions.

** At last, a sad but very lucky story: we had three carloads coming
from ND and one of them blew up on the toll road. Literally.
Completely. It was still completely in flames an hour later, with
smoke to be seen a mile away. God with them, they'd just pulled over
and they all got out minutes before, and everyone was perfectly fine,
just a little shaken. BUT, all the tickets were in the car!! Our
cars all left at different times, so two stayed back and sent the
rest to pile into one of our other cars when it passed. My car had
gotten there first and we wondered where the hell everyone was for
quite sometime but thought maybe they just skipped ARU to get
something to eat and couldn't get close to the stage once the show
started. I finally spotted them and heard the news at intermission.
Everyone was joking that the worst part of it all was the tickets
burning, paid for and useless. One must put things in perspective,
of course . . . they couldn't all find tickets outside once they
arrived so close to showtime, but there were plenty of places nearby
to hang out as it was a nice area.

And Ahhhh, a clear mind for finals . . .

Peace,
Patti