[Billbbill]

Goin' to phil and friends w/trey 7/7 at Jones Beach this friday. Lookin' forward to catching Trey, never seen him live before.

Hoping to get out there early for the obligatory p/l jammin'. Anybody else who is gonna be there who wants to hook up, give a holler, ya hear.

It's a 5 o'clock show but I hope to be out there by 1 or 2 but that depends on the job thing.

5 o'clock is a pretty weird start time, eh?

[phreaker]

I'll be at Ratdog/SCI on the 7th. I'm seeing Phil on the 19th, though. Same venue, too. Convinent, eh?

Post how the show went, though. I'm pretty stoked.

[Billbbill]

OK phreaker. Will do.

[FretfulDave]

for whatever reason the Philly show tickets said gates open @ 4:30, show @ 6pm. Trey was first and came on @ 7pm. I thought 6 was early also.

Anyway, have a great show.


Dave

[shakedown_04092]

Just got back from Phil & Friends w/ GRAB (Mike Gordon, Joe Russo, Trey Anastasio, & Marco Benevento). Saw the show at SPAC and the one at Hartford.

SPAC was good, but was definitely a more mellow show. GRAB did a killer version of "Who Are You" by the Who which caught everyone by surprise. Phil's set was veeeeery good, but if you look at the setlist, it was more or less comprised of softer, mellower songs, and was more "slower" than "rocker". Very good nonetheless, and as a friend of mine who went to the previous 2 shows said, the Phil show seemed to coinside (sp?) with the tour "groove". He said the previous 2 nights at Camden & Holmdel were rocking shows, so this was a "cool down" show that was sort of needed. Makes sense, I guess. Trey did come out to close out Phil's set, joining him for "The Wheel" into "NFA", as well as the encore "Casey Jones".

Hartford....well, that was another story. Phil opened, GRAB closed out the show.

One of the best shows I've ever been to. Phil's set was crankin' right from the get go, opening with "Passenger" followed by "Pride of Cucamonga", and closed the set with a rockus version of "Good Lovin", complete with that old school intro/outro that they used to do circa '76-'77.

PS - if anyone knows that intro & how to play it, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE post it.

Trey cam out for the entire 2nd set, and it was awesome (Barry Sless ended up taking the 2nd set off). Now, I am a big Trey fan, and being able to see him play a whole set on stage w/ Phil was one of the coolest things I've ever seen. Watching them go back and forth, and watching them working off of each other, weaving jams in & out was really special to watch. Shakedown opener, a cool slinky version of Candyman, and the Viola Lee into Bertha was unreal.

GRAB closing this show out was like a happy ending at a massage parlor. I brought an older buddy of mine to both shows, and he had never seen Trey before, so I was wondering how he'd perceive him, being an older Deadhead, and he was blown away. Incredible high-energy set that left us with our eyes wide and mouths hanging open. They played a great version of the Beatles "Get Back", and 2 other surprise covers (and very well done) were The Beatles "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" and Steelers Wheel's "Stuck in the Middle With You". Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey was INCREDIBLY well played, and SITMWY was a pretty big surprise (first time played for each song). They really are doing something special onstage, and you have to take into account the fact that these guys have only been playing with each other for less than a month, and that this was their 6th live performance together. That's saying something right there.

Anyways, hope whoever else is lucky enough to see any shows on this tour enjoys them; you don't get a chance to see stuff like this everyday.

[Billbbill]

Thanks for the reviews/info shakedown. Somewhere I read (the other current Phil thread?) where they're alternating who's opening/closing. Is this true? May add some incentive to actually go inside BEFORE anybody starts. I'll probably do so anyway.

Thanks again.

[shakedown_04092]

Thanks for the reviews/info shakedown. Somewhere I read (the other current Phil thread?) where they're alternating who's opening/closing. Is this true? May add some incentive to actually go inside BEFORE anybody starts. I'll probably do so anyway.

Thanks again.

I HIGHly reccomend going in at the time the ticket says, which is usually around 5:30ish. It's worth seeing the 45 minute Bennevento/Russo set, and you DEFINITELY do not want to miss either GRAB or Phil. I think if you go to www.philzone.com and click on the summer tour schedule, it'll tell you whose coming on first (either Phil or Trey).

Hope you have a great time.

PS - I strongly reccomend getting as much to the middle of the venue as much as you can - seems like that's where the best sound is (which is typical of any show). The reason I mention this is because at SPAC we were as far right as you can go and the sound was hollow, and at Hartford we were dead center and it was perfect; a much better experience, musically.

[FretfulDave]

They played a great version of the Beatles "Get Back", and 2 other surprise covers (and very well done) were The Beatles "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" and Steelers Wheel's "Stuck in the Middle With You". Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey was INCREDIBLY well played, and SITMWY was a pretty big surprise (first time played for each song).

ummm... pretty certain that "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" is not a Beatle's song. It is Paul and Linda McCartney from McCartney's second solo album "Ram" in 1971.

Dave

[CaptainTrips]

I was at the SPAC show as well and Im pretty sure Trey played Get Back there . . . 100 percent actually

Phils set was awesome bringing out Unbroken Chain, Dire Wolf, Speedway and a great version of Althea to close the first set.

[st stephen]

saw holmdel>spac>hartford...i thought hartfprd was def the best show. Thought phils saratoga set was great....everything after uncle johns was just smokin. And the althea at toga was amazing.

Grab Will be opening the show at jones beach. they will probably come on around 6.00. The only thing negative i can say about grab is that they basically do the same set over and over again....with a few new covers each night. If i here Get Back by the beatles again by grab i will shoot myself. But man they jam hard and trey is sounding amazing especially when he gets up there with phil. The shakedown and treys solo in bertha when he was up there with phil in hartford was just amazing.

[shakedown_04092]

ummm... pretty certain that "Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey" is not a Beatle's song. It is Paul and Linda McCartney from McCartney's second solo album "Ram" in 1971.

Dave

Ehhh, close enough. But it was a killer version nonetheless.

[CaptainTrips]

phils saratoga set was great....everything after uncle johns was just smokin. And the althea at toga was amazing.

Grab Will be opening the show at jones beach. they will probably come on around 6.00. The only thing negative i can say about grab is that they basically do the same set over and over again....with a few new covers each night. If i here Get Back by the beatles again by grab i will shoot myself.

I loved Phils set especially that set closing Althea . . . I was hacking with a bunch of dudes outside the fence and couldnt help but sing along to it . . . .amazing!

And I thought that grab's Get Back was very well done . . . just heard it too many times?

[st stephen]

yeah man i just heard it (Get Back) 3 nights in a row. I like the song and all but when u see trey and gordon 3 nighs in a row u are expecting 3 completly different sets. And 3 different experinces.

But hey i am going to jones as well, and plan on getting there for the grab set.

[Billbbill]

OK - I'll start with a quote from the philzone forum for last nights show. This from "John"

"not a fan of huge monitors when showing 40 foot high images of trey's guitar face...I know it's irrelevant to the music, but damn is that distracting...like a giant near sighted chipmunk is jamming with the band"


Way funny. All night trey looks like he's tryin to spy a bud in the last row of the upper level.

But of course this really has nothing to do with anything except I thought it was pretty funny.

1st set

Playin>
China Cat
Let it Ride
Reuben & Cherise
Big River
Sugaree

2nd set

Scarlet>
Fire>
Darkstar>
Other One>
Stella Blue>
NFA
----
U.S Blues


1st set Barry Sless on pedal steel, no Greg Osby (sax)

2nd set Flip the first set although Osby didn't play on all songs

Now - I should say it's rough getting 15 or so yrs of seeing JG out of my head when I see Phil.

Seen phil 4 times, "the dead" once and ratdog once.

Overall opinion - the show was good. Had some very good moments and some lulls. I kinda measure with my own internal scale, that has at it's best, those "over the top crescendo" moments where verse after verse of jam builds off the previous.

There wasn't much of that. There were some good, I'll call them single key jams in for instance DS, especially some nice trading between trey and osby and China Cat with a very nice segue, tempo change, extended jam, coming from Playin'.

Of the former the highlights for me were:

The last jam in Sugaree, one of the fotm jams where trey had a nice turn, and the 2nd* jam in Stella Blue.

By the song

Playin> - Nice but guitar a little low in the mix (Larry Campbell) Love Barraco's voice. If I go to another phil show I'm gonna make a shirt. "Let Rob sing more". Very nice jam into CC

China Cat - Also Good with a good jam but never guite went over the top.

Let it Ride - I'd never heard this but it was nice.

Reuben & Cherise - I enjoyed this (Joan on vocals) - nice studio album feel w/LC on mandoiln.

Big River - Definitely a more Johnny Cash feel to this (although still faster) with LC's guitar. Nice tight jammin' but alas, no crescendo's for me.

Sugaree - This was good with some nice work from Osby in the last jam.

Scarlet> - Trey on vocals, does a nice job. Jam is a little "noodley" for me as TA and LC take turns on either side of "Ain't nothin' wrong.." verse. End jam got a little weird for me as TA seemed to be going into a 3 or 4 chord jam that was decidedly bluesey as opposed to the usual spacey jam I'm used to here. - Thought they were actually going into a song but eventually came back to the end lick and then into Fire.

Fire> - Phil then Joan then Trey? on the verses here. Other than a real nice over the top pushing line from trey, the jamming was good but nothing amazing imho

Darkstar> - Some nice runs by phil and some real nice work between ta amd go.

Other One> - Some more real nice runs by phil as he was in full rumble mode but I thought this, as a whole was somewhat dis-jointed. Partly because phil really had a rough time with the lyrics.

*Stella Blue> A highlight for me w/Joan singing although there was some weirdness during the bridge. Joan sings the "I've stayed...win for tryin'" line and then backs off and the band goes into an extended and again somewhat disjointed jam, before joan steps back up, sings the rest of the bridge/song and then a real nice end jam. Some folks at the philzone forum who were up close to the stage seemed to think there was some tension here between phil and joan concerning either joans timing or forgeting the lyric. (which led to the seeming impromptu bridge jam). I couldn't really tell what was happening. Phil's known for changing syuff up so I wasn't sure if this was planned or not, though it seems it wasn't.


NFA - This was OK - nothing special from my vantage point.

Due to a badly aching knee, we left and as we were leaving phil did the donor rap and they finished up with USB - that I really didn't hear.

Most reviews at philzone.com seem to be more positive than mine. Like I said at the top, it's rough gettin JG and even Bob out of my brain when seeing phil.

But just the same, I did enjoy it and I'll be back.

I should also note that some slack should be cut due to TA's newness to the arrangement. I think he could be a pretty good fit if they wanted to work out a more extended role for him.

[Billbbill]

As for grab, I thought they were good although I only knew the wings and steelers wheels covers. I really liked 2 or 3 of the other tunes and was impressed by all of them. Thought the keys guy could have been a little louder in the mix.