weirimpressed wrote:but the way Ive been seeing it lately is the dead had more structured americana jams and suchI'd have to agree with TJed. A Dead jam could go anywhere, become funky, bluesy, Appalachian, Chinese... evaporate or collect into pools... Phish semed to attempt to become that type of jam collective during the late 90's and imho that's what made that period of the band quite boring, because the one-chord "funk" or "ballad" jams would stretch on and on and on and on and never develop into something different or exciting or scary(i.e. fun). Imho it was during some of Phish's more structured pieces that they could really go out to the edge of the galaxy and incredibly hold on to the changes of the song structure and reel themselves back in for a fiery reentry or an amazing segue... see early 90's Phish, jams like David Bowie, Suzy G, Split Open, YEM, Coil, etc etc
where phish had the funk, free-lance jams
i dunno, just my frame of thought right now (I have been listenin to a lot of '95-97 phish and)
"There, in huge black letters, was 'The Grateful Dead'. It just... cancelled my mind out."-Garcia