My goal for 2019 was to write at least a little something about every show I see, preferably by the next day, and holy crap I did it! I saw 400 shows and reviewed like 99% of them. I hope you’ve enjoyed reading these (if you have!). Happy to hear from you with comments, etc. always feel free to drop a line.
16Dec19
Going back to Monday, the resideNYC club hit two different shows at Barbes. Won’t write too much about these, but as with all shows at Barbes and all residency shows, these were great. lap steel player Raphael McGregor (of Brain Cloud) seems to have settled on a real band that might be playing with some regularity. The lineup is interesting with McGregor’s lap steel joined by another guitarist, bass and drums as well as a three-person horn section of sax, clarinet and trombone. That’s a unique band! The did some western swing, some surf rock, some more jazz-centric tunes, some covers, some originals. It felt very much work-in-progress, but when it was good, it was definitely good and you could feel some potential. Something to keep an eye on.
The late show was Locobeach who I’ve seen there a few times. The big difference this time is that there was actually a crowd there. It’s always been pretty good, but it’s also not the greatest to play all this great made-for-dancing funk music to a mostly empty room. This Monday the room was full and it infected the music with a little extra oomph. Maybe more than a little extra. It was easily the best I’ve seen the band. Their psychedelic cumbia definitely works better in a full room and Barbes is just more fun in the late slot when there are people up and dancing. Then again, we left between sets and it’s entirely possible that the late set was as empty as the other late sets I’ve caught. Locobeach has a new record out this year that’s definitely worth checking out.
18Dec19
Pirata @ Nublu 151
The history of Pirata is an interesting one, from my point of view. The first “real” time that Dave Harrington and Joe Russo played together (I think they technically played a song or two in the same band at a Relix Dead-covers holiday party a couple months previous) was as part of the Icy Bridge series Joe did at Threes Brewing a few years back. There was no one really in the room that night, but the music, an out there set of drums/guitar/electronics straight improv, was surprisingly great. Those Icy Bridge sets could get weird and challenging, but you could sense something in there. The next time they played together (I believe) it was at the old Nublu classic, a sort of last minute late night gig that brought Spencer Zahn into the mix. The trio played a set of improv, but this was much different than the Threes gig, this was an after-midnight masterpiece of trio jamming. The show was so good, I woke up the next day and told JamBase that I needed to write it up for their site and that review is here. That night was packed with people, somehow everyone knew something special was going to happen and it did. That trio played one other time and it was just as good, maybe better, definitely more packed. Those two shows were the first two times I’d seen/heard/heard of Spencer Zahn. At the time I was impressed, but he felt like the weak link to me, somehow not as impressive as the uber-impressive Joe Russo or the becoming-a-personal-favorite-at-the-time Dave Harrington. Maybe it was just because I didn’t know him, but it very much felt like a one of these things is not like the other situation in the trio. Still, it was some of the best jamming I’d ever seen and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one that was waiting/hoping/praying for another Russo/Harrington/Zahn trio show. Another show that never came. Why? Was it because they didn’t feel it was as good as we did? Did they not get along? Or just random circumstance? At the time it was very much who knows, and there was plenty of opportunity to see those guys in different combinations, on top of everything else, so not really something to dwell upon.
Fast forward to earlier this year, a gig for a band called Pirata that brought that magical trio back together, with some look under the hood new upgrades. Stuart Bogie on horns and Jonathan Goldberger on second guitar. That’s a fucking band and it’s got a fucking name, too, which can only be good things. That gig was reviewed by me and others back when and in certain circles is certainly considered one of the better shows of 2019. So, it was with some excitement that we learned that they decided to play a couple more shows before the year was up, that they were into it, that they weren’t just playing shows, but recording them for potential release (fingers crossed!). That sounds like a real band to me, born several years ago in an empty upstairs room at Threes. That’s fantastic.
Which is a longwinded introduction to review the show last night, the 2nd Pirata show ever of how many, we’ll see. The interesting thing about this band is how quiet and patient they are. This is pure improvisation, there is no plan when they start playing and when they started last night, you could feel that. This would be the first set of four and there was a feeling-it-out vibe for the first 15 or so minutes, everyone latching on to a thread for a second, and then letting it go, seeing how the others would react. Bogie was the melodic voice for most of the opening stretch, moving between flute, clarinet and sax to bring a few different feels to things. I don’t think the first legit guitar solo was played until over 30 minutes into the night, which is, if you think about it, kind of nuts. But that’s the way this band operates… there are four or five leaders in there, four or five guys who can take the helm, come about and steer the sailboat into the horizon. And yet, for large stretches, the music was rudderless, no one stepped up, quite the contrary, they receded, let the line go slack and let the current steer the boat where it would. That’s one approach and it worked with some mixed results during the first half of the set. Interestingly, it was Spencer Zahn, providing a steady undertow of downbeat bass grooving (entirely on upright, btw), with Russo reacting quickly and smoothly to the bass, filling in a wide variety of percussive sounds on his bespoke kit. The music was deliciously patient, quiet, it was less a story than a mood.
As the comfort level grew, the set took on more shape, picked up a little wind. The latter half of the first set was best-in-class kind of improv, from best-in-class players who really enjoy playing with each other. Goldberger alternated between acoustic and electric guitar which provided even more angles for the band to take. The penultimate jam of the first set was a masterful manipulation of quiet, Bogie leading on clarinet. As great as all of these guys are, it was fascinating to see them occasionally just stop playing, to let the others work on what they were working on, to know and trust that they weren’t needed or that, perhaps, they’d only mess up what was clearly a good thing. Each of them would drop out for stretches and just observe, almost as if they were still playing, but just playing silently; a member of the ensemble, but passive for parts. It’s a rare thing to see, rare especially with these guys, speaks volumes… not literally.
The second set was pure fruit juice, freshly squeezed nectar, impossibly sweet and unnaturally delicious. Whatever meandering or footing-finding of the first set manifested as A+++ playing in the second set. The amount of emotion, beauty and awesome these guys are able to transmit without falling into familiar jam tropes — no big guitar solos, no build-to-climax, no tension-and-release. Just playing. Friends conversing the best way they know how. There was one piece near the start that was just pure slow groove, music for dancing as much as music for not dancing at all. The highlight, though, may have been another piece during which Goldberger found something. Like an old gold rush prospector finding a vein flecked with nuggets of gold, none too big, but collectively something worth getting the pick axe out of. Goldberger happened upon this gold, this shiny, impervious trove of nuggets, of tone and melody and tempo and he just methodically picked at it, taking a theme and twisting it, adding, dropping, rearranging, minutes, minutes, glorious, glorious minutes of this absolute guitar gold. Awe inspiring. The rest of the band would hop on or hop off, quite knowing where they could make it better and holding back when they couldn’t. I mean… WOW!
Everyone was fantastic during that second set. Joe had an arsenal of non-standard cymbals and Morfbeats shit and other bang-able doo-dads and was able to set up these incredible palettes of percussion. There was one cymbal that looked melted over the stand, like a Dali painting, and he’d hit that with some regularity, sounding like the entire band was jumping into a swimming pool of almost-molten metal, a splash like no other. I love to hear Joe interact melodically with his bandmates, to steal a riff from Bogie or Goldberger or Zahn and reproduce it on his analog computer of a drum kit. I’ve mentioned Spencer already, he was such an understated jam sherpa, the one who took whatever formless exploration the others had randomly happened upon and turned it into something with a little groove. That leaves Dave Harrington, who may be, of all my favorite guitarists, the one who can do the most with playing the least, the one who is happy to let the other guy take the solos (especially when the other guy is Jonathan Goldberger) and do the shading and editing, either with his ethereal slide guitar background, or the backwards zips from his electronics. Yeah, he took a couple sweet solos as well, but, last night at least, that wasn’t his role in this band. A great show. Looking forward to the album.
Wayne Krantz, Evan Marien, Cliff Almond @ 55 Bar (late set)
Ducked out after about 45 minutes of the second set to head to 55 Bar. A little tough to leave, but also had my fill and there was no way I was missing the final WK set of the year/decade. I have been to 34 Krantz shows in 2019, I think he played 40, so, like, almost all of them, and most of them reviewed fully here. So, I won’t go into terrible detail. I will say that Evan Marien was a fucking beast last night, at one point dropping an old school bass bomb that rattled 55 Bar like few I’ve heard in that room. The set was long and deep, they went a full 75 minutes or so (last few weeks or months have been 60 at most) and almost every track was like the trio strapped a couple cinder blocks onto the collective audience’s feet and threw us into the river… we sank deep and went quickly. There was no fucking around and very little exploration, it was just straight fire, long relentless guitar solos, total drum poundage and Evan Marien doing most of whatever you might call subtle melodic playing. A fiery, fitting end to a crazy year of awesome.
In lieu of more details, I thought I’d give you a rundown of my year in Krantz:
34 shows (missed only 6, I believe?)
20 were as part of a 2fer
10 were part of a 3fer
1 was part of a more-than-3-fer.
Drummers:
Almond 12
Dion 10
Hoenig 5
Abadey 3
Carlock, Wood, Stacey, Guiliana each with 1
Bassists:
le Fleming 13
Marien 8
Genus 6
Scott 5
Lefebvre, Scherr each with 1
Most common lineup:
le Fleming/Almond: 4
le Fleming/Dion: 4
Marien/Dion: 3
Genus/Almond: 3
Marien/Almond: 3
11 other lineups seen once or twice.
Minds blown: 1 (x34)
Going back to last week, I did not review the Freaks Action Network Holiday Jam at Littlefield (20Dec19) which was, in my humble, unbiased opinion, a great night of music, people and fundraising. Chris Lightcap played with a slightly tweaked version of his Superette band, using Matt Stevens on guitar. I had never seen Matt before and am now, officially, a fan. I thought his solos were a nice balance of light-touch/vicious-shred. Chris’ material for this band (some written by the other guitarist Curtis Hasselbring, who is also a world-class trombone player, because, of course he is) is so freakin’ great, completely uncategorizable, but utterly accessible. I think they were inspired a bit by the Freaks crowd to unleash some more jams, especially later in the set. Anyway, too bad more people weren’t there to catch this, they totally killed. Kaleta and Super Yamba played a similar (awesome) set to what they played at Knitting Factory and were a perfect dance party soundtrack. These guys had a rather big 2019 and I’m curious to see what and where the next year or two take them. I feel like with the right opening slot or a Tiny Desk Concert, they’re ready for their close-up. Their new record sounds better each time I hear it. Anyway, a great time to kick off a long (for me) livemusic holiday hiatus. Eight nights until…
28Dec19
Yo La Tengo (Snail Mail opens) @ Bowery Ballroom
Vacation was great, but it also meant missing a huge chunk of Yo La Tengo’s Hanukkah run at the Bowery. Last year I caught YLT 7 times total including several of their year-end run, which was great, so a little bummed to miss the bulk of it this year and watching reports of the openers and guests and reviews roll in was not the best.
So, glad to get there last night at least, circling a couple times for parking and making it into the packed Ballroom for the latter half of Snail Mail’s opening set. I feel like in my limited Yo La Tengukkah experience, I manage to get the opening bands that fall into the never heard of ‘em/haven’t played together in decades/only 5 people in the room appreciate this variety, so I was halfway happy that this was a band I had indeed heard of and can acknowledge that they are on their way up. I would generously describe their sound as inoffensive nondescript indie and wouldn’t pay to see them headline but there was at least one woman near me who was loving it and inoffensive is a plus in my book. So, like, fine. The comedian was Matt Walsh who did an occasionally funny bit playing YLT’s PR rep/guitar tech which led to a good brief Q&A with the audience. So, like, fine.
Yo La Tengo took the stage shortly after 10pm and, as they do, they kind of meandered their way into a two hour set. I’ve seen this band now over 20 times but still consider myself a completely uninformed newbie when it comes to their history, catalog and possibilities. One thing I do have a grasp on is their unique ability to probe the extremes. A couple years back they did a tour that they kind of billed as a one set acoustic/one set electric, but which was really a one set quiet/one set loud. They do both brilliantly, but it’s not just quiet/loud, it’s pretty/ugly, short/long, silly/serious. They have a moderate squishy middle, too, sure, but it’s the extremes where their bread is buttered and the best YLT shows are the ones where they do both within the bounds of a single set. Last night they started almost as nondescript as that Snail Mail set, everyone’s vocals showing a little 7th-of-8-night, not-to-mention-3+-decades wear. Those opening songs (full setlist courtesy of Jesse Jarnow/@bourgwick can be found here) felt like they were in danger of falling over, a flimsy house of playing cards. Then, next thing you know, you’re glad you got your earplugs in because Ira Kaplan’s electric guitar is right here, inescapably loud and gnarly.
The set, for me, really got rolling when they invited former YLT member/longtime friend/collaborator David Schramm on stage with a second guitar. The ensuing 4-song mid-set mini-set was a glorious display of two-guitar motifs. Schramm and Kaplan fell into the easy patter of old friends, their guitars finishing each other’s sentences, or talking right on top of each other, the doubled conversation finding new meaning that their singular sentences did not contain. This is quintessential Yo La Tengo, an easygoing trio playing affable indie rock all of the sudden becomes this eloquent two-guitar poet unfurling where did that come from odes as good as anything you could have imagined hearing when you bought your tickets way back when.
After Schramm left, the band seemed totally energized and the final stretch included some killer renditions of what may or may not be YLT “old favorites,” but certainly songs that me, the idiot, recognize. Loved the quiet-but-not-too-quiet beauty of “I’ll Be Around” and the drawn out off-kilter pretty-drone awesome of “Autumn Sweater” and the burn-the-fucker-down all-outness of the set-closing “Blue Line Swinger.” Somewhere in there was a song that featured a so, so good neddyo’s-awestruck solo on an acoustic guitar from Kaplan that was, uh, so, so good. This was a show that started in one uncertain place seemed to get better with each song they played and ended in that incredible that’s-why-people-come-all-8-nights spot that nearly every YLT show seems to find.
Hanukkah show encores typically center on covers written by Jewish songwriters (heavy on Dylan and Lou Reed, but random others as well) and often feature more surprise guests. 2019, night 7, was no different as they brought out Robyn Hitchcock who did a great job acting as bandleader on, yes, obscure Dylan and Lou Reed covers as well as a couple of his own tunes. Almost exactly two hours of slapdash, killer Yo La Tengo. One night to go…
Karina Rykman @ Nublu 151
I feel like I’ve seen most, if not all, of Karina’s NYC gigs, like ever, and she’s rarely disappointed. The ride from Bowery to Nublu was short and we did surprisingly well with parking, so we were there early enough to be one of the first people in the door. While it started off empty, by the time the music got going at 1am, the place was comfortably more-than-half full. As much as I’ve enjoyed watching Karina take her full-on improv thing to a more polished song-centric set and to see some of the “jams” become cool instrumental things, I do think that seeing Karina and her trio just get loose and weird in a late night setting is the absolute perfect spot for her. Last night was no different. I thought they killed it, finding a great middle balance between doing “songs” — their originals and a few choice covers — and freeform latenightfunk jamming. So, pretty much every “piece” started in one place and then found its sea legs and floated off into waters unknown. The room felt very vibey, full, but not crowded, the perfect sized crowd, with room to move and dance, but enough people to create an energy. Every time I see these guys I always think they’re fucking great and, so much potential, only getting better.
Last night they were LOUD in a very good way. It was the loud volume of confidence, of taking over a room and just having your way with it. About 45 minutes in it appeared maybe Karina had busted the Nublu bass amp and admitted that she had been abusing it. And damn, was she. High-volume, serious groove bass riffs that filled the after-midnight room like a glove. These guys are really just better and better every time good. At times I felt very high Battles vibes, like they’re this electro instrumental math rock thing crossed with an all-improv jamband. I loved how dark things got, evil, evil funk and improv, but also how happy the music is, a weird balance between light and dark and how the tension between the two, between the infvectious smiling energy of Karina Rykman and the absolute kill-your-puppy energy of the sounds coming out of her bass, that Palpatine/Skywalker tension is where all the good shit comes from. And there was so much good stuff. Adam November on guitar/electronics has his own distinct style, an aggressive, occasionally soaring lead and an in-the-shadows set of electronics and effects to balance. They have this song that’s sort of this narcotic dub thing, a low, subtle groove that’s made for a not-ready-to-call-it-a-night aftershow crowd… last night that song gobbled some of the giddy Phish energy and opened up into what can only be described as a fractured Anastasio thing, November channeling Trey, but only moderately, completely turning the original darkness inside-out and then launching into all these bliss clouds of jam, many minutes of greatness before going rightside-in once more, dark-grey clouds of dubby loop again. That was exemplar of the whole thing, starting in one place (originals like the infectioius “Plants” or a couple covers I never know the names to) and then cracking open like an egg, scrambled over low heat, maybe a little salt and pepper, some killer drums/bass/guitar, straight up jamming, unleashed and totally killer. Unfortunately it was 2am, The Squeeze had already held up admirably considering she’s suffering with a pretty bad cold and we had to leave after an hour, never getting a chance to hear what Dave Harrington was going to bring to this already pretty great mix. Too bad, but can’t win ’em all and we live to see another night.
29Dec19 Yo La Tengo (Jon Spencer & the Hitmakers opened) @ Bowery Ballroom
It’s funny the way things work out. Without giving you the full play-by-play my Sunday evening involved several back-and-forths over text with a couple friends that included me somewhat cheekily telling one of them that my music plans for the night were up to the whims of the livemusicgods. Whatever they wanted me to see is what I would see, maybe even nothing at all. All the while, I was getting a hard sell and offer of a ticket for the Phish show and, having missed the opening night, I can’t say I wasn’t tempted. But something inside me told me that one Yo La Tengo Hanukkah show was not going to be enough. I threw a last-ditch piece of bait on the rod, threw it into the churning river of ticket procurement and, lo!, not too long afterward a nibble, the possibility of a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend looking to unload became a quick text -> PayPal -> ticket secured. The livemusicgods had spoken, less than two hours later, two hours after having no plans at all, I was walking solo into the Bowery Ballroom. Don’t fuck with the livemusicgods, they know what they’re doing. They’re gods after all.
Speaking of gods, let’s cut right to the chase, after a blistering opening set from Jon Spencer and his current band The Hitmakers, I mean, seriously blistering, these guys kind of blew me away, after that and a performance by a magician/mentalist/comedian, after the killer opening set and the goofy comedy thing and Yo La Tengo coming out somewhat haggard-but-triumphantly to the goddamn Rocky theme and the trio ripping up a set-opening tweaked version of “Seven Day Weekend” (changing it to “Eight Day Weekend” to celebrate the 8th night of their Hanukkah residency), after all that, I spot a figure walk out onto stage, a hey, wait a minute fellow, a is that who I think it is?!?!? guitarist take his place between Ira and James and I somewhat involuntarily shouted out “OH FUCK YEAH!” at the top of my lungs, because there he was, Bill goddamn Frisell, a gift from the livemusicgods for not fucking with them, what felt like a personal gift from them to me, Bill Frisell come out on stage to play with Yo La Tengo. Don’t miss a Sunday show, friends, don’t miss it.
Your standard tape measure would not be long enough to adequately quantify the smile on my face at this point. A quick flashback to the previous day when I spent a good amount of time getting started writing up my favorite shows of the year piece and writing a bit about Bill Frisell, how he’s been more or less the defining presence of my livemusic year, how I’d seen him 7 times and how each and every one of those times, whether solo or duo or in a goshdarn trio with Julian Lage and Gyan Rile (fercrissakes), how each time I’ve seen him has been one of the most transcendent livemusic experiences of my year, of my life, damnit. Bill’s guitar playing moves me like no other and it felt like my constant acknowledgement of this truth seems to have manifested him out of the thin air of one of his telltale chords and put him right there on the stage in front of me. I knew he wouldn’t be leaving that stage until the show was over, I knew I was in for it. Good lord, those livemusicgods!
So, Ira introduced Bill and the music is still kind of stirring and the now-quartet just sort of marinates in this little instrumental puff of smoke, maybe a minute of just feeling-it-out almost-jam, a thing of exquisite beauty. It wasn’t even really part of the show, it felt, but if they had stopped then, the chills it gave me would’ve been worth the cost of the ticket. Of course, they didn’t stop there. Again, I can’t give you a setlist blow-by-blow, I just don’t speak YoLaTengoese well enough, I mean, sure the “More Stars Than There Are In Heaven” was impossibly sublime and the “Ashes” appeared to invent new colors it was so fantastically great, but I can speak of the show as a whole and it was, in a word, perfection. I wrote about the Saturday night YLT show, about how the band thrives in the extremes and doesn’t often dwell in the moderate, squishy middle. Well, I am here today to tell you that that was not quite correct, that, in fact, Sunday’s show operated almost entirely in that mid-range, a Goldilocks perfection of not-too-hot/not-too-cold/just right, just so right, right, right. Volume, tone, energy tempo, it was all just right there in a comfy, just-feels-right cushioned coziness that I never wanted to leave.
The show really had me thinking about the role of the special guest. If the music is like a piece of writing, the guest, especially a lead guitarist, is often a co-author or even the author, the band ceding a large portion of its metaphorical wordcount to their temporary bandmate. We all see this regularly, a top-notch guitarist sits in and the band gives him space to take big, fat juicy solos. Sometimes the guest is more of a collaborator, an equal, there to contribute ideas and get into a back-and-forth musical discussion with the band. This is what happened with David Schramm sitting in with YLT the previous night. What happened with Bill Frisell Sunday was a rarer thing. I likened his set-long sit-in as an editor. The band almost kept chugging along as if he wasn’t there at all and, indeed, if he hadn’t been there, if you had somehow unplugged his guitar or had the sound guy erase it from the mix, the show still would have been a very compelling piece of literature, a page-turner of an epic. On top of this, Frisell sprinkled in his magical pixie-dust guitar like an editor, swapping in a better synonym, removing text here, adding a comma there, coming up with the mot juste again and again and again. Taking a great novel and turning it into a masterpiece. And make no mistake, this set was a goddamned masterpiece. I loved how the band kind of met Frisell halfway, creating a setlist (Jarnow’s setlist here; and also big public thanks to Jesse for friend-of-a-friend’ing me that ticket!!!) that was perfectly matched for his additions, but also how they kind of didn’t compromise at all, how they got loud and gnarly just as much as they quiet and pretty… well maybe not just as much, but they certainly didn’t hold back. Bill wasn’t afraid to get weird and loud, either, but he also wasn’t afraid to just hang back and find his moments. There were a few points where he (wisely) just stopped playing all together. Thankfully, there were just couple of these moments, for the most part if there was music being played, Bill was there. And another thing I loved about the show (and damn, there was much to love) was how Bill just didn’t really take solos. Sure, there was one or two spots where the spotlight fell on him, but what a wonderful YLT-esque sit-in to just poke, prod and pixie-dust instead of taking a big solo here or there. It was the kind of good that made you want more, an album with the quartet or a tour or, damnit, just another show or two. A funny thing about the show was how this space that the quartet created, this cozy, impossibly beautiful space, somehow became a space that was dominated not by Bill or Ira, but a space that, for me at least, felt built for the drumming of Georgia Hubley. I am constantly reminded how smitten I am with her drumming almost every time I see Yo La Tengo, but something about Sunday’s show, that sound the band had, it was just such a perfect for Georgia’s best work, mallets and brushes and, sure, drumsticks, those deceptively easy rhythms, not too hot, not too cold, just right, just right.
Like Saturday’s show, the set had a natural folding spot. Saturday’s was Schramm’s guest spot, everything coming after being a tumbling-upwards ascent to a meltdown peak of the night. Sunday the fold came when the mentalist, who used to be in a band YLT knew from Lollapalooza way back when, came out and sang, quite admirably, “The Days of Wine and Roses.” The ensuing finale of the night and the run was, as the French say, tres magnifique! “We’re an American Band” and (loudly requested the previous night) “Drug Test” and the killer closing “I Feel Like Going Home,” it was all so damn good, the three of them digging deep to drive home the always-ambitious-and-audacious 8-night run. I’ve seen some really good YLT shows, each one really is a unique fingerprint of time and venue and, quite often, special guests, but Sunday’s had to be one of the best. I actually can’t imagine a Yo La Tengo show being any better than this one, something that felt predestined the moment Frisell walked out, the moment that ticket manifested itself. My biggest concern at this point was that I now had to rethink my favorite-shows-of-2019 piece that was mostly written. It’s tough to top a show like that with an encore of any kind. I had this thought the other day, the fact that these Hanukkah shows encore with music from Jewish songwriters and how John Zorn is, to me, as Jewish a songwriter/composer there is and so it would be funny/awesome if they did some YLT-icized Masada tunes one of these shows. So, when occasional-Zorn-collaborator Laurie Anderson came out for the encore and knowing that longtime-Zorn-collaborator Bill Frisell had just walked off the stage, I figured that was maybe as close as we’d get. No, they didn’t do any Masada, but instead we got Anderson on violin for that crazy drone version of Paul Simon’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” and some Lou Reed (natch) before Ira Kaplan brought out his mother to sing the last song of the week, as you do in these situations.
Absolute show of the year candidate. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a burnt offering to make for the livemusicgods. Don’t fuck with ‘em.
30Dec19 Phish @ Madison Square Garden
Ah, so about those livemusicgods. I headed into NYC last night without a ticket or really the energy to find one. Somehow I still had little doubt that I would make it into the show somehow, me and the livemusicgods are tight like that. To make a long story short, at about 7pm I had nothing in hand or a prospect for getting in and was happy with that (there are other options, this is New York fucking City, after all). At about 7:01, I was thanking someone I had just met for the ticket in his goddamn suite overlooking the stage. If my 30-year livemusic career has taught me anything, it’s that karma is real, put as much positive energy out into the universe and every once in a while it will come back to you when you most need it. And if it never does, there are worse ways to waste your energy on than dosing your world with some positivity.
I know a lot of Phish folk like to go to shows because they have their “crew” and there is something ritualistic about seeing shows with your people, like sitting in the same seat in church, there is extra spirituality in the microcommunities and maybe the real Phish is the friends we made along the way. I’ve been seeing this band for 27 years and I don’t really consider myself to be a “crew” person. I mean, I’ve seen and see a lot of shows with the Big Squeeze and have been to a bunch with my brother and a couple choice friends from college, but there is no collective I call my people. Actually, I like it quite the opposite. Over the years I’ve done shows with random assortments of people, the rotating cast of other dudes who used to hang out on the rail in the mid-90’s, different small groups of friends here and there, and, more often than not, the person who set me up with a ticket for that show. I actually love this aspect of my PH’n career, the variety, the role the livemusicgods have to play in the energy you give and get from a show. I often think back to the three MSG shows in the 97 NYE run, how I spent each one in a different spot with a different group, 12/29 with a guy I met and hung out with solely in the front rows of Phish shows, 12/30 with my two college buddies, the guys I’ve seen more shows with beyond my wife and brother and then, on 12/31, on the rail with… my wife and brother. That’s the way to do it, that’s what I love. Last night I got gifted an amazing ticket and ended up in a suite with a gang of people I had never met before and that is just part of the tale of my 12/30/19. The vantage was awesome, my new friends were awesome, Phish is… awesome. I was ready to bring the energy to the party regardless of what the band had to offer, but that wouldn’t be an issue. It was 12/30 after all, one of my favorite Phish dates. 12/30/93 and the aforementioned 12/30/97 were two of the most fun nights of Phish I’ve ever experienced and 12/30/18, another how-did-I-end-up-in-a-suite? night, bordered on too much fun of the sweat-through-your-t-shirt-before-setbreak variety. I was fucking PUMPED for the show to get going.
It was the ghosts of a different 12/30 that floated around the room last night. Sure there were shades of 93 in there, plenty of 97, too, and yes, echoes of last year’s epic 12/30 show. But when things got started, when Trey pumped that opening two-chord snarl to signal the start of Wilson and the crowd, equally aflame with anticipation chanted “WILSON,” howled it into the arena in unison, well that was a direct echo of the chant that kicked off Phish’s first show at MSG, exactly 25 years ago. There is zero doubt in my mind that the opener was an intentional call out to that crazy night. I will never, ever forget what it was like being in the room on 12/30/94, when they opened with Wilson, a song that appeared on no album of any sort, a song you could only know if you were in the know, if you were someone who went to shows or listened to the tapes, and here was a room, not just any room, but Madison Square Garden, filled to the tough-ticket sold-out brim, and what felt like every single of the thousands of voices in the room were howling, howling “WILSON!!!” I can still remember how it made me feel, these were all my people, and holy shit there are thousands of us! That moment blew me away, I still get a little giddy thinking about it 25 years later. But not as giddy as it made Trey that night way back when. Check out the video and watch him strut in absolute glee while the crowd chants, it’s something else and perfectly captures the energy that night. And that was the energy that the band summoned last night by opening with Wilson. It was an historical nod, yes, but it was, make no doubt about it, a summoning of 25-year-old ghosts and an acknowledgement of what’s transpired, especially in that room specifically, over the last 2 and a half decades. And that’s just the opener!!
A lot happened betweeen that opening Wilson and the night-ending Rock and Roll three hours and change later. A LOT. I think I have the experience to anoint the ensuing show a perfect Phish show, a show that hit all the right marks for a successful PHish show, but hit them with such fuckyeah energy and precision that it was elevated above a “great” Phish show to something of pantheon-worthy splendor. So much happened, especially in the ridiculous second set, that it’s easy to forget all the magnificence of the first set, a first set that a couple guys in the suite declared it the best of the over-halfway-home run. I don’t know if I’d go that far, but can we discuss the 46 Days? I think that song flies under the radar quite a bit, so many versions, regardless of length, find interesting nuggets of jam. Last night’s was even better than that, the band flexing their two-shows-in chops, sculpturing interesting improvisational abstractions, musical late-period Picasso, cubist, weird, engaging, wonderful, artistic. I loved that version. I was sweaty as fuck by the time it was over. “Blaze On” might have been even better. It seemed at this point that Trey and the band were determined to do one thing all night: make the room explode in ecstasy, like the porn director’s one goal is to get you to orgasm, this band was just primed for climax from start to finish. “Blaze On” was blazing with bright, shiny happyvibe peaks, glory, glory hallelujah! I was even sweatier by the time it was done. But, I mean, a couple bustout covers in there, and not just rarities, but great rare songs played very well, “Corinna” and “Curtis Loew,” I mean, what more can you ask for? How about a first-set Mikes>Contact>Weekapaug Groove? Sure, sure, sure. Lay it on me! The funny thing is that looking back on this show, the Mikes section might have actually been the weakest part of the night. Crazy, but, like kind of true… not that it wasn’t great, it was fine, a perfectly slightly-below-average but shreddy-as-fuck Mike’s Song and a bouncing Weekapaug and yet, everything else last night was so good that it ends up as almost an afterthought. Wasn’t bad, but everything else was just so much better. Superlatively better. DAMN! “About To Run” is easily my favorite of the Ghosts of the Forest batch that have made it over to the Phish repertoire…. quite simply if you’re not rocking the fuck out to that one, you’re a damned fool and you can quote me on that. Last night it raged proper, but I’m still waiting for that one to crack open and get the holyshit treatment we kind of all know it’s capable of. Similarly, of all the cheesy middle-school-lyric’d newish Trey tunes, I find “More” to be my favorite and I have never not enjoyed dancing my ass off and singing along to that one. Great way to end a great, great first set. I have to say, without delving into too many specifics, that the four of them were really all sort of democratically awesome all night long. The best of the best shows require all of ’em to find a meeting spot that’s mutually convenient and somehow they got their Outlook calendars synced up and found the right spot at the right time. A special shout out to Fishman whom I found to be, if I had to choose one, the MVP of the first set. Sometimes it’s just a mood or where you’re sitting or some who-knows-what, but I just find myself zoned in on one guy some nights. Nassau I was deeply into Mike’s playing. Last night, especially early on, it was Fishman. It made me marvel how these four guys found each other and continue to get better together and how fucking lucky we are to get to go see them play at such a high level. Sweaty, sweaty, fun with my new friends who were quickly becoming when are we doing this again? friends. Can’t imagine anything more fun than that… except for maybe 12/30/93 or 12/30/97 or 12/30/18. I guess I just like to have fun on 12/30.
Walked down to the concourse and hung with other friends, aired out the sweatiness a bit and agogged a bit about the set with them. Lingered maybe a second too long and then the concourse is kind of emptying out and you hear the opening notes to TWEEZER! Ah shit, get back to your spot! Sucks to miss a few seconds of a great song, but, now speaking from experience, missing the first 60 seconds of an all-timer 36-minute Tweezer is absolutely no big whoop. In my experience, that is. I sometimes laugh at folks who judge Phish jams by their length, pshawing at anything less than 20 minutes, but on the other hand, I also appreciate that, more than any other band I’ve ever known, longer really is kind of better with Phish. Longer jams gives them more space to explore, more swings of the bat means more chances to hit that dinger. Still, not all 35 minute Tweezers are built equally, many of them meander before finding that spot and sometimes that spot is just a single riff or one joyous climb to bliss or one weird ambient space couched in minutes of not so much. Last night’s Tweezer was special not because it was long. Not merely because it was long, to be more accurate. It was special because there was very little chaff to be separated from the wheat. This thing was all wheat. Actually, no, it was wheat and it was rice and it was oats and a bunch of those exotic grains that you’ve never heard of. It was nutritious, it was delicious, it was about 8 different jams in one, 8 different jams each of which any lesser band would die to have in their bag, all of them different and all of them awesome, each distinct but each of them feeling like part of the grand whole. How grand it was, too! But, really, it wasn’t even just that, it was that so many of the jams felt so fresh and new, they felt different from other Phish jams we’ve heard before. They didn’t fall into old, recognizable patterns, they invented new motifs and musical space. There was an ambient stretch that sounded like some of the obscure blisstronica I’ve been getting into over the past couple years, a dreamlike stretch that was so uniquely awesome, some of the coolest Phish I’ve ever heard. There were other sections that hearkened back to 12/30’s of the past, to the personal-fave 12/30/93 Mike’s Song or the gloriously skunked funk of 12/30/97, all updated to the 2019 version of this band, this crazy, crazy band. I mean, I haven’t heard too many 30+ minute jams from Phish (who has?), but almost every one I heard dragged at some point, had some challenging weirdness in the middle, parts that, if they could be removed, would make the whole shorter but better for it. They’ve often felt long. Last night’s Tweezer actually felt short to me. I’m actually surprised it was over 30 minutes, I would have guessed 15, maybe 20. That’s a testament to how good it was, how compelling all the overlapping melodic arcs were, how fucking amazing they sounded as they moved naturally from one to the other, like each hop was predestined, already written out in the stars, already written out on 12/30/94 and 12/30/97. In a word; wow!
And, the show was so good that, take that all-timer Tweezer out and you’ve still got a pretty great Phish show. Ruby Waves and Steam carried over the energy of the Tweezer and all ran together like so many tumblers filled with free suite vodka. I would go deeper into the rest of the second set, but I’ve literally got to get ready for tonight’s show, so gonna wrap this up right quick. Second set was easily the best I’ve seen from the band this year and maybe in a few years, perhaps on my all-time list. 26 years ago, on 12/30/983, I stood near the front of a line to get into the show on one of the absolutely coldest days of the year. Stood there almost the entire day. I mean, damnit, I had to get on that rail. And while we waited and the line grew longer and we got to chatting with the people we’d be spending the show with, there was this kind of collective what song do we want to hear? moment. In my memory, I was the one who said “Slave,” (they had brought it back that summer, I wanted to hear that fucking song, damnit!). Maybe I was the one who spoke up and said “Slave!” maybe someone else said it and I chimed in right after and said “yeah, Slave!” emphatically enough to give the movement some momentum. Regardless, within a few minutes we all agreed: we would get Slave played that night. Long story short, we chanted for it collectively at a couple key points during the killer, killer show which ended with Trey acceding to our request, my first Slave to the Traffic Light still being my favorite because of the circumstances and also it absolutely crushed and also it came at the end of one my all-time favorite night seeing nights of livemusic. To me, then, it was no mistake that they ended with Slave last night, no more than it was random that they opened with Wilson. In retrospect, that show had to end with Slave, and a patient, gorgeous, give-me-chills-Trey version at that. It had to, it did, helllllsyeah it did! A nearly perfect set, a nearly perfect Phish show, seen from an almost perfect spot having way, way, way too much fun along the way. The world is a terrible place, the world is an amazing, beautiful, awe-inspiring place. The no-throwaway Rock and Roll encore, my 3rd Lou Reed encore in 3 nights (hey!), was a great choice to end it all.
Got absorbed in a Pennsy dance party, but The Squeeze got me down to catch the last 30 minutes of Agents of Mayhem playing the late night slot at Nublu. And, damn, I’m so glad I went. Totally rager danceparty, the band is still young and raw (I think this was their 3rd or 4th gig?), but the jams I caught were soooo fun and intricately groovy. This is a great band, hopefully have a chance to catch them soon. Also, that was my 399th show of 2019. One more to go, somehow worked it out perfectly. Them livemusicgods and me, we got it going on. Time to get ready for 400, see you there?
31Dec19 Phish @ Madison Square Garden
New Year’s Eve at MSG with Phish! What could be bad. A strange show with a technical malfunction during the NYE gag, but wouldn’t miss it. I was honored to review this show for JamBase. Check it out!
