Great Have Mercy into a very strong Hood, Trey tears it apart. I really enjoyed The Pendulum, it was a lot of fun and a great DEG. Short Icculus and a raging YEM to close. Help > Slip has some good jamming and they drop into Bag quite nicely. McGrupp is a lot of fun with Trey doing his Dylan impersonation and he's not bad. Standard fare to close out the show, oh and I LOVE Dear Mrs. Reagan, they need to bring that one back with updated lyrics.

There seems to be some nice progress in the couple months between this show and the circulating February show at hunts. Quinn is decent enough but the pure gold from this show is "Have Mercy" the middle section has some great Piano and Guitar interplay that is beautiful for any era, and something I will probably go back to which is saying a lot from this period. Hood is interesting because the middle section is quite different than what it will grow to be. Instead it includes teases from Col. Forbin and some other nice elements before concluding. The Pendulum is an interesting piece based on the fact that Phish has never known to be particularly politically charged (Jeff was probably the sole member who was) so it's cool to hear them do something like this. For cross over fans from the Dead community it is cool to hear the Help -> Slip suite with Bag at the end as opposed to Franklins Tower. The majority of the show is fairly lackluster and average for this year. Overall nothing to write home about besides the superb have mercy. But that's enough for a 3 star rating from me.

Fans of both Phish and the Dead will undoubtedly enjoy the "Help on the Way>Slipknot! second set opener, which I thought was very well played. The "Fade Away" encore starts strong, but fades away (no pun intended) after a minute or so. Otherwise, there isn't much to see here beyond some decent early versions of YEM (minus Mike's bass spanking) and Hood.
I think the most interesting listening "observations" of these early shows is the ambient noise of the crowds. You can clearly hear the entire bar having their own separate side conversations while the band jams away. If they only knew what they were missing!

This show is decent, with some phenomenal highlights, but there are also some lulls in it as well. A couple of notes before I get to my highlights. The first recording of Icculus is short and rather uneventful, none of the drawn out shenanigans we will one day anticipate. For YEM, they still haven't quite ironed out the "Boy Man God Shit" transition but the main composition is fairly solid and very funky. Finally, I wouldn't say that McGrupp is recited Dylan-esque (I was expecting weird singing with that comparison). Instead, it's more like a recitation, with poetic meter (which I guess you could say is Dylan-esque... but that's not what comes to mind when I hear that phrase!). Highlights:

1) Have Mercy: First known performance of this beloved cover, it has the absolutely gorgeous ethereal middle section, thanks to some reverb effects from Trey. Very cool!

2) Harry Hood: My god, this Hood peaks pretty hard. Perhaps the first great Hood I've encountered as I'm going through Phish's recorded history chronologically. Check this one out.

3) Help on the Way> Slipknot!: In particular, the Slipknot! jam gets pretty wild, with essence of some of the ragier Antelopes that would emerge in '92/'93. The chaotic rage dissolves into some absolutely weird spacey jam with lots of synth-effects from Page and then later some echoing bass from Mike. Eventually the jam seamlessly segues into...

4) AC/DC Bag: ...Such a cool little intro fpr AC/DC Bag! Very slick! The first recorded version of Bag is a banger from day 1. Great tune from the outset.

5) Dear Mrs. Reagan: First recorded performance of this song... meh, it's OK. Check it out if you've never heard this tune.

And then one day you find to your intense delight
That three wrong turns can really make a right
So why not be like me, be proud of all your crimes
Cause when I screw up once, I do it two more times

That is a man giving the middle finger to cops still and God still and that is not good. Life is about love and submission to mercy and grace not believing in aliens and the notion that we were once all monkeys Trey is such a proud monkey like one of my favorite songs by DMB "Proudest Monkey" but we gotta eventually submit to a higher power When will Trey admit to HIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! First Have Mercy I love Bob Marley and Reggae Music i know this is not his song but a Marley-esque song for sure it definitely IS Icculus debut also that is so cool This is NOW Iconic like Harpua and Col Forbin's Ascent>FFM and a few others but I love Tela and Esther and McGrupp and The Lizards more than all those rarities combined played at least on their own out of context now They used to play them in order like Trey's thesis but now that it is all an amalgamation of Gamehendge and Phish and 2 Versions of Me Trey with then Oysterhead and Opium Trey and then TAB and solo Trey and then Ghosts of the Forest Trey (my favorite Trey because it is FINALLY REAL and HONEST) and then back to alice in wonderland idiotic making fun of their fans Trey with Kasvot and Sci Fi Soldier Lets go back to actually trying to cover other artists on halloween like The Who The Velvet Underground The Beatles David Bowie Little Feat The Rolling Stones and The Talking Heads Lets make good music again like Genesis's The Lambs Lie Down on Broadway or Michael Jackson's Bad or Led Zepplin's IV or Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon (DONE PROPERLY SOUND BOARDED ON HALLOWEEN) or my favorite album The Division Bell after Roger Waters left but we all know what they should do is THE WALL because it is a double album and it is theatrical like Phish and they can make it funny and whimsical in a way that David Gilmore and Roger Waters hating each other in real time could NEVER be because they are more likely to go to Boxing territory and televised in Las Vegas instead of anywhere USA-Great Britain or Cream or Eric Clapton's 461 Ocean Boulevard or Fiona Apple's When the Pawn. . . or Radiohead's Kid A or The Smashing Pumpkins Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness So Many great albums out there shit even Pearl Jam's 10 which Phish would never play because they hate Eddie Vedder but even Vitalogy is better than Sci Fi Soldiers playing Kasvot garbage from Nashville

ICCULUS and HAVE MERCY made this show NOTE WORTHY !!!!! I love the cover and i love the crazy short original in Gamehendge !!!!!!! and the abrupt ending makes Icculus that much better more funny and more iconic

I will never be like you because PRIDE is SIN and makes us fall and I have been like you and every time I went to jail or had to pay fines and financially was ruined or worse i was belittled and bullied by the left telling me I deserve what I get Amber Heard SHIT (all devil shit that i must ignore) I hate the song Blaze On because it condones blacking out and fading out on POT and putting on Sun Glasses like Ray Bans and Oakley's to hide the person within I know thank God now the Covid Masks are gone so we can finally be free and real and be ourselves I love the song Sigma Oasis and I despise the songs Bug Lifeboy Friends https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5xzCCG_8K8 worst LYRICS ever written by Fishman or ANY man they are defamatory Everyone is talking about Johnny Depp but my Lord the man that MADE and named Fishman Anastasio Gordon McConnell was actually defamed on a cross for crimes he never committed and Gordon and Fishman both Isrealites are still denying him as Lord with their dematory "Friends" lyrics. That song is pure blasphemy!!!! I have never heard a worse song. At least DDHVL is just tongue and cheek but there is nothing snarky or sarcastic about Friends That is how Fishman with a Donut dress a drunk actually feels about his savior He hates Jesus. . .I wonder how many times Jon Fishman says Jesus Christ not talking to the man that made him in blasphemy daily. . .it is probably countless. I know hearing Trey on IT and Bittersweet Motel and "Light" Lyrics inspired title Between Me and My Mind btw I love tha