NOTE - THIS IS LONG... Sorry... lol....
Long-Form Review of Phish in Hampton, VA - 3/07/09

                Nine Years… That’s a long time to wait for anything.  For me, it was the approximate length of time since the last time I had a chance to see Phish live. 

                To put this in perspective, from the years of 1993 through 2000, I saw Phish live 115 times.  As far north as Maine, as far south as Florida, as far west as California, as far east as New York… if they were playing, and I had the means, I was there.  Over those 7 years, I learned not only to love the band and music, but also the people around me at the shows too.  The point of going to a show started out as just going to see a band play a rocking show, but by the end of my 7-year, 115 show run it wasn’t only about the concert anymore… it was about going to see my friends (friends I sometimes only ever saw at shows, others that went with me to many of those 115 shows), hanging out with new friends, soaking in the great atmosphere and energy that seemed to fill the area whenever Phish was coming to town, and generally to get away from anything that was ailing me at the time.  Phish became a way to level out the other BS that existed in my life by simply going into what was, for all intents and purposes, another world… whether for one night, or for an entire run of shows.  
               
               A quick note here, I’m not one for the “noob vs. old-school” fan argument.  I don’t care if you’ve been to 1 show or all 4,000+ they’ve played.  If you have an appreciation for the music, a decent attitude and leave me some room to dance… well then you’re cool in my books… that’s the way I was treated when I first hit the scene in ’93 and it’s the way I feel any new member of the Phish family should be treated.  However, that’s my opinion and I’m sure there are people out there that would slap me for it… but to continue:....

              Phish came back a few years after their break in 2000, to mixed reviews… and to a topsy-turvy time in my life, so whether by some act of the gods or by sheer coincidence I missed the entire set of “post-hiatus” shows through ‘04.  Since the general feeling from some trusted sources was that the band wasn’t the same band we’d been watching through 2000, and since the reports were that the Phish “scene” had deteriorated into something just slightly above a large gathering of drug-seeking morons, I felt lucky to have missed that “comeback” and vowed that I had seen my last Phish show.  After all, I had a very wonderful picture of the band and its followers in my head and I didn’t want to risk ruining those memories.  And having read the MANY reports, reviews, notes, and even seeing some of the videos I know now that I would have ended up not enjoying those shows nearly as much as I would have hoped and would have left feeling let-down… Thus, when Trey said that Coventry was THE END, I wasn’t dismayed… the end for me had already happened almost 4 years prior… 

                In 2006, my vow not to attend any type of “post-hiatus” show was lifted.  Not for Phish mind you, but for their front man Trey Anastasio.  He was doing a solo tour that happened to be passing not far by me, so I decided to head out to Philadelphia and check it out.  I had started listening to some of his solo work and was actually enjoying the direction it was heading in.  The Trey show in Philly was musically wonderful, full of surprises (including an appearance by Mike Gordon), but the vibe from the crowd wasn’t quite the same as I had remembered from Phish tours gone by.  Chalking up the crowd issues to 6 years having passed since I’d seen Phish, I decided to take my wife (who had barely heard of Phish before meeting me) to Trey’s New Year’s Eve shows at the House of Blues in Atlantic City.  Those two shows renewed my faith not only in Trey’s musical ability (which had never really faltered, I was just always a PHISH fan first and foremost… their solo projects sometimes just weren’t my bag), but also in the “scene”, as I bumped into a few old heads there – namely Patrick and Stephanie (I hope I spelled those right guys)… Pat and Stephanie helped remind me why I loved this scene so much, it wasn’t just the music, it was seeing people you’ve lost touch with over the years and getting to enjoy a magical night with friends… old and new.  With their help (and the aid of 2 amazing shows), my wife was able to understand why I kept going on about the music and Phish in general…

                Fast forward to 2009.  The Phish Reunion shows were announced… an announcement which actually slipped past me at first – I have my father to thank for hearing it on the news and telling me about it immediately.  I decided to break my rule and attend one more Phish show.  I didn’t go for the entire run, just one night was enough.  Doing a three-day run is sometimes a stressful thing, and I wasn’t going to stress myself out… I was heading down to decompress after what had been an emotionally challenging year prior to the show, and I was still a little wary of what the “scene” would be like… but I knew I’d have my wife with me, so I’d at least have someone to enjoy the music with.  Enough with the back story – on to the impressions from the day…

                This “review” being as long as it already is, I’m not going with the song-by-song, blow-by-blow review style… there are enough of those out there already about the Hampton ’09 run of shows… but here are my impressions from Saturday March 7^th, 2009:

                First and foremost is Hampton, Virginia.  Hampton has always been a great place to see a Phish show… the arena looks like a spaceship for crying out loud (hence the “Mothership” moniker used by so many Phish fans when referring to it).  Also the people of Hampton, and this includes the police force, have always been great to Phish fans during show time.  Anyone who thinks this isn’t the case probably needs to take a better look at their own actions… if you’re respectful and reasonably well behaved there’s no reason to expect a problem.  On the other hand, if you’re a mouthy, loud retard, smoking a joint 3 feet from a cop… well then, you really don’t have much room to complain that you got the “rough treatment” at Hampton.  The previous statement was proved 110% during the show I attended this March.  Every local I ran into: store owners, hotel managers, police, security guards, heck even people on the street were great… everyone was in a wonderful mood, and even as early as 10am the day of the show you could tell everyone around was excited.

                On to the fans hanging out in the line...  Now, I’ve spent my time in the lots… heck I’ve spent my time, your time, and your buddy’s time in the lots… this was one of those days where I just wanted to hang with the folks in line, relax, and get inside and get a decent spot – I’m not 20 anymore, hehehe...  The first sign that the old “scene” was trying to reemerge from the ashes came when the wife and I bumped into Patrick and Stephanie from the Trey shows on New Year’s in Atlantic City… 3 years without speaking, emailing, writing, anything, and there we were – in front of the line again.  And it was like no more than two weeks had passed since the last time we saw each other.  Once the “official” lines started to form, I noticed other signs of the old “scene”:  Everyone was talking to everyone, didn’t matter if you knew the person next to you or not – everyone had at least one thing in common, we were all there to see Phish.  This being my wife’s first show, she was a bit worried the “old-school” fans would make fun of her for not having been to a show before… the exact opposite proved true.  Everyone who found out she was attending her first show that night was excited for her, happy she was there, and happy that they could be there to help her understand and enjoy everything that was going to happen.   For that matter, there were some people from the Phantasy Tour boards there who were great – one made sure she had her “I’m a Noob” sticker and keychain (If you happen to read this man, I’m really sorry I forgot your PT name, we wanted to email you and say thanks)… some may think that handing someone an “I’m a Noob” sticker or keychain would be considered a put-down… but as the saying goes… better to be a “noob” than a “never-was-there”. 

               As for security in the lines and inside the venue – they were a great group of guys, totally friendly as long as you weren’t a total douche to them… I heard they had some problems day one, but by Saturday they seemed to have a decent system worked out… line-cutting wasn’t tolerated from security at all, and they addressed all complaints of it immediately.  Where we were there really wasn’t much of a cutting problem, everyone around us kind of memorized the faces of those around them… if someone had to go move a car, or get food or a water we all made sure their spot was waiting when they got back… From what I could tell, those of us who put our time in at the lines (You know, those of us who sat in line from 10am through the 6pm door opening) got to the spots inside that we wanted… for us (Me, Wifey, Patrick, Stephanie, Steve and Balls – I swear that’s the only name I ever heard anyone call the guy… lol) we were front row, right in between Page and Trey on the left side of the stage.

                New fans and old filed into the Coliseum filled with energy for the night’s show.  The vibe in down front on the floor was great… it felt like the crowds from the 90’s had been resurrected just to hang out with us.  Yeah, we had the usual morons trying to play the “my friend was standing right here” line, we had some morons just try and push us out of our spots, and we got stepped on a few more times than we may have liked, but that’s kind of just the way things are down on the floor… 90% of the people you bump into down there are cool, just a few are morons – and their usually gone rather quickly once they realize that nobody is going to tolerate someone trying to ruin their show… peaceful hippies we may be, but try and cut in between my wife and I, and the husband side tends to override the hippie side.  But this night wasn’t filled with those types of issues… we had people around us from EVERYWHERE, and for the 4 hours of the show we were all one big family down there.

                The music… OH MY GOD, the MUSIC!  The band took the stage customarily late (not as late as most nights, but if they started on time it wouldn’t be Phish), and lit right into a rather fitting song (at least for me) – Get Back on The Train.  Like I said, I’m not going to do a blow-by-blow here, it’s been done too many times already, and I agree with many of the reviews I read.  Suffice it to say that the band I remembered from 1993 through 2000 seemed to be back… now I’ve read reviews that were frighteningly harsh regarding Trey missing some changes, some songs being “messed up”, and things of that nature… not to beat a dead horse here, but I’ve been to 116 shows total, and I seriously don’t remember one of those being a perfect note-by-note performance.  Part of the reason we love the band is that they experiment with their music, and if you’re going to experiment in the middle of a jam, you’re going to miss some notes, maybe even a change – sorry, that’s just life folks.  The Phish that I saw on stage on March 7^th, 2009 was a renewed band… a band that reminded me of the one that I have loved so much all of these years… all four members of the band were smiling, everyone seemed happy and energetic, and that energy transferred straight into the crowd.  There were moments during the show where everyone was going crazy, there were moments when everyone was just awe-struck at what we were hearing, and then there were those moments that seem to last a lifetime – The ones you don’t want to end…. 

                I know the highlight for the night for my wife came during Lawn Boy – her camera had been acting up all night, and Page had come up front to swoon to us all with a wonderful Lawn Boy.  With Page a mere 3 feet in front of her, she just could not get the camera to get the shot off when she needed to… During the song, Page was looking in her direction during one of her more harried moments trying to get the camera turned back on and during the last verse of the song stood facing her directly and made sure to look right down at her and made sure she got her picture.  I’m sure that’s a shot she’ll never forget.  It’s moments like those that I missed all those years… even though we’re separated as Performers and Audience, there’s still a bond between the band and it’s fans…  one that even managed to stay alive for 9 years while I waited for my chance at seeing one more show.

                During Guelah Papyrus, I took a moment and just surveyed the entire scene… and a calm came over me… this is what I had been missing for those nine years… this was the one place where I didn’t feel like a geek, hippie, nerd, wookie, loser, or a waste of space.  This was the place where I fit in… after all, in the end – “old-school” and “noob” alike we’re all just Phish fans.  I looked back at the 14,000 other people, the Coliseum, the lights, I felt the music, I felt the vibrations as the very building we were in shook with the energy of 14,004 people rocking to the same beat, and as I took it all in I felt a feeling I hadn’t felt in 9 years: Peacefulness.  Life takes people down many rocky roads, and lately I’ve gone down quite a few of them, but in that moment it simply didn’t matter.

               Some fans are going to say that the shows were horrible and Phish should have quit while they were ahead, but from what I can tell there are still some great moments ahead.  I walked into that show planning on it being the last time I saw Phish live… I walked out knowing that I’ll go to another show… Perhaps I’ve gotten to the point where the front row isn’t the place for me anymore, and that’s fine – 116 shows, and at least 90 of those I spent no further back than 20 rows… and I’ve also spent only the good lord knows how long in line to get those spots… but I’m in my mid-30’s now, it’s time for the next generation of fans to get their time up front.   It’s time to pass the torch so to speak to the next generation of kids, so they can understand why it was that we spent so much of our lives with this band.

               So, if you’re looking for this “old-school” fan at a show, look for me in a seat somewhere where I can enjoy the music, the lights, and the company of some good friends.

               If you skipped these shows thinking that the band was the same band that left the stage in ’04, then you’ll be happy to know you’re wrong.  The band and the fans have grown since then, and I think we’ve all collectively remembered what it was that we loved about this phenomenon in the first place – this thing we’ve all helped to create will never stop growing, changing, and evolving. 

               In closing (finally): Older fans - show some love to the younger fans… stop trying to act holier than thou about your experience with Phish and their shows.  Everyone went to their first show one day, whether it was in ’84 or ’09… Younger fans - show some respect to everyone… this “scene” grew around MUSIC and COMMUNITY, not drugs and partying… those were just a by-product.  If you’ve never been to a show, don’t assume you know everything… none of us do… and remember, some of us are protective of the “scene” we “built” because we do love the community that much… for many of us, it was our only method of escape when we needed it… 

The Setlist (For the Record):  Phish - 3/07/09 – Hampton Coliseum – Hampton, VA

Set I:  Back On The Train, Runaway Jim, Brian & Robert, Split Open and Melt, Heavy Things, Punch You in the Eye, Gumbo, Reba*, Mexican Cousin, Ice, Halley's Comet, Beauty of a Broken Heart**, Guelah Papyrus, Lawn Boy, Antelope

Set II: Rock and Roll, Limb by Limb, Ghost > Piper > Birds of a Feather***, Wolfman's Brother, Prince Caspian, Mike's Song > Hydrogen > Weekapaug Groove, Character Zero

Encore: Day in the Life

*     = No-Whistle for Ending, straight into Mexican Cousin           
**   = From Page’s Solo Album – First Time Played
*** =Trey flubs lyrics  2^nd Verse....

See everyone on the next run!
Peace.
N.....

For those who heard, my wife, myself and my two kids were involved in a semi-major accident this afternoon.  I say semi-major because our car was the least damaged of the three cars in the accident, the other two cars involved were fairly well banged up, with the car stuck in the middle totaled and left without a trunk... however nobody was seriously hurt (some bumps and bruises to the adults and the kids were unscathed)... the wife and I are having minor injuries checked out in the morning just to be safe... most likely we'll just be sore for a few days... however I do believe a nice older woman's bowling ball may have been seriously injured in the accident.

The woman in the car behind us was absolutly amazing during the entire event.  Even though her seatbelt had hurt her shoulder and chest - making us all worried that she may have more problems, (she was 79 years old, and NOT at fault by the way) she was more concerned about the condition of us and our kids than she was about her own problems and even her own car.  She was a shining example of a selfless and caring person, and an absolute sweetheart.  They don't make people like that anymore.

Also, the responding police officers were great, even helping us check out our car to ensure it was safe and that none of the damage it suffered rendered it illegal in any way.  The officer on scene was a shining example of a "good cop". 

The at-fault driver was a moron and a shining example of the reason you should look ahead when driving, instead of arguing with your passenger and ignoring the 10 cars stopped ahead of you.  The at-fault driver should also be the poster boy for people who deserved to be smacked in the head for being stupid.  But that's just my opinion...

Again, we're okay, pictures of the Green Monster are up, and she survived like the tank we all knew she was.  Even completing a 6+ hour drive immediatly after the accident.

Peace & Safe Driving
N. 

I figured I'd write a review of the Jim Norton show we went to last Friday... why?  Why not...

Jim's set was obviously the highlight of the night.  He played around with some crowd banter, tested out some new material and basically was the funny 'lil' Jimmy we've all come to know and love.  He stuck around and signed photos, books, cds, dvds, and basically anything anyone handed him.  For a comedian who's reached his level, he's still a down to earth guy and a great entertainer.  Of course his material isn't for everyone, but that can be said about any comic. 

As for the club and the openers... I've attended the Reading Comedy Outlet since I was 16 years old, prior to it's move to its current home at the Sheraton in Wyomissing, PA.  The old owner is a friend of mine... I saw so many great sets, even by unknown acts that I can't even count them.  It saddens me to see what the club has become now.  The personality and warmth of the RCO is gone, then again so is most (all) of the orginial staff.  It's still the only strictly Comedy room in the Reading area however, so if you want to catch a show it's the place to be...

As for the openers and MC's at the Reading Comedy Outlet... all I've got to say is that sometimes the cheapest comedian you can find isn't the best answer.  When an opening act's entire 20 minute set is ignored by the ENTIRE audience - it's a sign.

Overall the show was great, and anything that detracted from the show certainly can't be blamed on Jimmy Norton.  I recommend catching him on tour this year, because he's on fire, and he just keeps getting funnier.

That's just my 2c though. 

Peace.
N.

It's been a little while since I've gone out and really "saw" a show... but it's time I crawl out of that little hole I've been hiding in and get out there - if you can find tickets, I highly recommend both shows as they'll be great... plus I'll be there and we all know I'm the life of the party anyway!

Oct. 24 @ The Reading Comedy Outlet - "lil" Jimmy Norton - 10:15 show...

March 7, 2009 - The Return - Phish Live In Hampton, VA!!! 

The wait is over, it will have been : 3,073 Days, or 8 Years and 5 Months, or 265,507,200 seconds... take your pick... The wait's been long, but they're back, I'm back, now who's comin' with me?

See Ya at the shows...
Peace.
N.

As the hotels fill up in Hampton, VA and the city prepares yet again for another weekend of havoc, I'm filled with memories... We've had a ton of memories in Hampton already, it almost seems fitting to be going back there for one last go at it, at least for me that is... I spent most of my late-teens and 20's trecking from City to City to go live the life and see the scene... and now 9 years since the curtain fell on the last Phish show I attended, I'm preparing to go to Hampton for one more night.  One more show.  One more chance to relive the old days... here's to hoping they haven't been spoiled over time...

To all you 'heads trecking down, I'll see you guys down there, and if my theory is correct it won't be the first time...

And thus the countdown begins - 149 days to go...

See ya in Hampton.

Peace
N.

DJ Minnow is no more... it was a horrible turntable accident, don't ask.

If you would like to book me as a DJ for your Weddings, Parties, and school functions please contact B&B Light and Sound at 610-670-4960 or on the web at www.b-n-b-discjockeys.com and remember to tell them you want Norm, the 14-year veteran DJ to do your show...

I already handle Reading Southern Middle, Pottstown Middle, and Exeter Middle schools, as well as several Christmas shows, including shows out as far as Riverhead Long Island this year, plus I work a pretty tight schedule during these busy months, so book early, and book often.

I travel with a fully stocked system, 43,000+ legally owned music tracks, 500+ Music videos, 2000+ karaoke tracks and a state-of-the-art digital display system.

So book them shows people... Peace.
N.C.W.