back in the nineties, i was friggin' addicted to neo-hippie jam bands. among the percy hills, strangefolks, god street wines, blues travelers, dave matthews bands & aquarium rescue units, my favorite band of them all was clearly phish. i was quite fond of waxing on about their musical talent & even went as far as to write a paper on my all time favorite phish song (harry hood) for my music & society course at b.u. it detailed their use of a fugue in the song. during the decade, i went to thirteen shows, all here in the northeast corridor, last seeing them with a group of high school & college friends back in august of '98 at the two-day great went festival, way the f up in limestone, maine. out of my friends, i was one of three who neglected to bring a tent to the festival because "it's august. it'll be fine to sleep out under the stars." turns out that when you're that close to canada, it gets down into the fifties at night. we slept shivering in my friend's truck. a few weeks later, i moved to sunny florida.
i never saw phish play during the period after that, when they headed downhill & eventually broke up, so my image of them might be a bit less tainted than others. when they got their collective shit together & reunited this march, i figured i had to see them when they came around. since circumstances meant they were playing two shows semi-locally (mansfield, ma & camden, nj) over this past weekend & circumstances also allowed me to see them for free, i couldn't pass up the opportunity.
my journey started on friday, when i took the day off to head up to the parow estate in nh. my brooklyn brother was also going up to nh for the weekend for a friend's 30th, so we were going to try to catch a fung wah together, but weren't sure if meeting up was going to work. about a half hour before i needed to catch the bus, i got into the city & gave bro a call...no answer...so i headed to the ATM to re-up. after transacting, i left the bank & turned the corner down toward canal. as i did, i noticed some kid walking toward me wearing a shirt with the letters ΧΦ (my college fraternity) on them. this caught my attention long enough for me to basically walk straight into my brother, who was randomly crossing my path to go to an ATM, unaware that i was standing there. who says that banking doesn't bring people together?
on saturday, i had to meet friends in boston for a carpool to mansfield for the show, so i left the parents & headed over to salem to pick up a rental. when i got there, there was this short, cute girl working at the counter who totally matched the voice that'd confirmed my reservation the day before. she asked me who my "employer" was & i said "live nation" & this led to me mentioning that i was renting the car to go to the phish show & she was "so jealous" because she wanted to see them (but at least she got to see DMB) & i cringed inside but didn't hold it against her, because well...she was short & cute. long story short...she talked me into the insurance coverage.
we got to the lot around 2pm for the 7pm show & basically hung out all day in the sun/shade, drinking beers, grillin' & shooting the proverbial shit. somewhere, there is now a blinding picture of me & leduc with our shirts off, taking in rays. good times. the show itself started out with a slow first set, but the second set ruled, with songs such as fluffhead, the aforementioned harry hood, possum & contact. on sunday, i got up early to catch a fung wah & make my way back to the city to meet a friend in jersey & drive down to scenic camden for the next show. once my dad dropped me off in boston & drove away, i realized i'd left my cell phone & ipod in his car. awesome. after a frantic fifteen minutes, i miraculously reached him, he returned to save the day & i made my scheduled departure. unfortunately, when i arrived in brooklyn, i realized that some time the day before, i had lost the keys to my apartment & was locked out until at least after the show. double awesome.
as for the camden show, i hung out with a younger friend from the college fraternity, someone i don't think i'd ever really hung out with. we went with his cool canadian girlfriend & a girl from one of ΧΦ's favorite sororities--ΔΓ. she was cool too & although she was fond of occasionally asking me to hold her drink, she made my non-feet moving phish dancing even more fun than usual. at one point before the show, my older cousin stopped by in the lot & we hung out for the first time in years. as for the show, it was the better of the two this weekend, as they played an inordinate amount of tasty songs--lizards, fee, tweezer, chalkdust torture, run like an antelope. i've been listening to mp3s of the show constantly today. they were just as good as i remember them & when combined with all the hang time i got with peeps & all the random interactions i had with strangers, it made for a solid weekend. call me an old neo-hippie, but i had a smile on my face pretty much the entire time. it was totally like "wow," man.
#98 - phish jam.
snack: cvs fruit & nut medley
drink: sync berry-cherry vitamin water
on sunday, i grabbed a bag of cvs fruit & nut medley to snack on throughout the day, figuring that snack mix was a relatively healthy way to keep from starving in the lot. as it ended up, i ate other stuff & forgot about them in my bag until the ride home after the show. when i discovered them in my bag around midnight, it was like the best ninja surprise ever...next to the ninja surprise i got when my new found dancing partner friend fell asleep on the ride home & eventually leaned on/drove her head into my arm. oh you crazy tired, drunken girls. what will we do with you?
so the snack mix...i decided to go with the fruit & nut medley because i wasn't in the mood for the other, m&m containing kind they had at cvs. the medley's made up of pineapple, mango flavored pineapple, raisins, almonds, banana chips, yogurt covered raisins, cranberries & cashews. i like all those things, especially when they're together in a resealable pouch.
this weekend, i made sure to complement the copious amounts of beer with a ton of water, adding a couple vitamin waters into the mix on each day. on saturday, i tried one of vitamin water's newer flavors, the sync berry-cherry vitamin water. it's all hip & shit, with a myspace partnership that gives me a free music download at amazon for buying it! the myspace partnership also highlights a bunch of myspacey acts & a few big acts like 50 cent (obviously), alicia keys, carrie underwood & chris paul. it's sad that 50 cent's my favorite out of that group of artists.
anyway, i do declare that i really enjoy the berry-cherry flavor, despite all the lame copy on the label, copy that offers promises of "sync(ing) up with your daily download of key vitamins & antioxidants." whatever. it tastes like cherries & berries and has a bunch of vitamins & sugars & junk, so it definitely helped with the weekend hydration, but i'm not going to try to tie that to downloading music. synergistic branding should be taken only so far & not a step further. i don't care how community 2.0 they think they are. thanks for the free download though! i'm going to get back to my regular musical environment & download me some indie rock now.