By Dan Tebo, Vermont Country correspondent.
MANSFIELD, Mass. — It’s just after 4 p.m. on a blazing hot Saturday in July, yet the parking lot at the Xfinity Center in Mansfield is already nearing capacity. Phish aren’t due onstage for another four hours, but my parking space neighbor, in between sips from a handle of Captain Morgan’s, assures me that the show actually begins the moment one drives onto the lot.
Ever since the early 1990s, I have clung to the belief that Phish is abjectly terrible. I am, of course, aware that there are millions of people who do not share this opinion. Not only are the UVM-born quartet the Green Mountain State’s most famous export, they’re an indestructible touring juggernaut who continue to pack arenas for their marathon performances after four decades together.
Jam band fans are always telling nonbelievers that they need to catch a gig to truly understand, maaaan. With this in mind, I put out word that I would go to a Phish concert if someone else would purchase the ticket. To my mild chagrin, a free Phish ticket arrived within minutes. I drove myself to this outdoor amphitheater with a capacity just shy of 20,000 to finally see what the phuss was all about.
Before meeting Oliver, my ticket benefactor, I ambled through my first Shakedown Street. The Shakedown is a dizzying makeshift bazaar where vendors are allowed to peddle a cornucopia of items: Phish and Grateful Dead merch, crystals, pipes, vegan pierogies, steak tips, Vermont IPAs from Alchemist and Hill Farmstead and Bob Seger refrigerator magnets. A wad of cash held aloft signals you’re looking for a ticket. Or other less legal things.
Oliver and I found our seats around 7:15. He introduced me to the strangers to my left, right, back and front, all of whom were genuinely excited I was about to see my first Phish show. I was told for the first (but not last) time that the band has had the same lighting director for their entire career and to pay attention to the lights for clues. Clues to what, I did not know.
Phish took the stage at 7:40 and eased into “Theme from the Bottom.” The capacity crowd rose to attention, gently twirled themselves in circles, and sang every word. The steady groove gathered steam until frontman/guitarist Trey Anastasio peeled off the first of roughly 37 guitar solos. They barely paused for a breath before slamming into the countrified shuffle of “Back on the Train,” which also stretched on for a mild eternity. The band played approximately three songs in 30 minutes, giving Anastasio, keyboardist Page McConnell and bassist Mike Gordon ample opportunities to solo. Drummer Jon Fishman never took the spotlight, but his drumming style could be best described as an endlessly skittering, low-grade drum solo.
After dispensing with the ’90s almost-hit “Bouncing Around the Room,” which felt like a Guided by Voices song at a tidy 3:49, the band launched into an hour-long run of songs that started to sound like an endless jumble of mid-tempo waka-chicka white boy funk. My seatmates continued to rhapsodically feed me new song titles as they arrived (They’re playing “Wolfman’s Brother!” WHOA!) and encouraged me to try to catch the groove but I mostly caught myself scrolling through Facebook.
After a brief intermission, set #2 kicked off with a 15-minute version of “You Enjoy Myself,” and I suddenly began to, well, enjoy myself. It’s a proggy, multi-part suite that sounds like Yes … if Yes songs featured a capella scat solos. I started to spend more time peering through the thick fog of reefer smoke at the swaying mass of bodies, who continued to hang on every last noodle with unbridled euphoria. Watching 20,000 people block out the sad state of the universe and lose their minds and bodies to this deathless quartet suddenly seemed like the smartest thing one could do with their Saturday evening.
After climaxing the main set with an interminable “Chalk Dust Torture,” the encore came on soft with the downcast “When the Circus Comes,” which finally did not sound like any other song they’d played so far. My mind turned to the venue’s notoriously bottlenecked exit route so I decided to opt out. Oliver assured me that the entire show would be available for complimentary download on LivePhish.com by 4 a.m. the following morning.
I awoke early Sunday morning and listened back to the full set, which was far less compelling minus the buzz I caught from my $24 cocktail the previous night. I started to experience a strange nostalgia for an event that was only a few hours in the rearview. I looked at my empty calendar for the evening ahead and thought about how Phish would be returning to the Xfinity to play 17 completely different songs over the course of four hours. And for reasons I can’t quite possibly explain, I desperately wanted to purchase a ticket and take the ride again.
Dan Tebo is a Boston-based film critic whose work regularly appears on his mother’s refrigerator. He works as a waiter and amateur archivist and runs a VHS blog with a readership in the high single digits.
