, attached to 2011-09-04

Review by n00b100

n00b100 The massive tour-closing party yin to 8/15/11's musical masterpiece yang. Set I opens with a powerful Maze, gets a strong, Mike-led jam in Gin that ends with Trey scaling some heights in his solo (with fun Low Rider teases), contains a wonderful new cover in The Way It Goes (I do like me some Gillian Welch - I'd like to hear Phish cover Revelator, since MGB does a very good job with it), and has a strong six-song closing sequence that flows well together, even without any jams. A first set with a Timber (especially a Timber where Trey really shreds like he does here) is not a first set to be trifled with, IMO.

The second set starts with an exciting rendition of Rock & Roll that doesn't go Gorge deep but provides an energetic opening to one of the most compulsively listenable sequences of 3.0. Then the band starts going into what might be C&P, but the jam then morphs into a surprise Come Together, and while the version is rickety and obviously unrehearsed, it's still a cool surprise. Come Together makes a surprisingly natural segue into Twist, which is a fine version if not spectacular (although the Low Rider callback is inspired), but segues wonderfully into a Piper that IS spectacular and includes a really interesting mid-set jam that sounds like a pre-written song, it's so naturally created by the band, before getting ugly and (as @waxbanks noted) storage-y at the end, modulating tempo between sludgy, slow weirdness and fast-paced crazed weirdness, Page's theremin swirling around everything like a mischievous ghost. That's the first half of the set, and it's a hell of a first half.

Then comes a marvelous (mid-set!) Hood, the peak all the more gorgeous by dint of being mid-set, and a slow, sweet Roggae to give everyone a moment to relax, before the last big jam of the night. And that big jam is a glorious Ghost, which dips slightly in intensity before blooming big and bright and immediately heading for Guy Forget, which is played with rocket-powered intensity, then slides neatly back into Ghost for one last burst of rock. WOTC and #L are just fine closers.

What else can I say about this show? It's a true classic, with a strong first set and an absolute celebration of a second set. Just wonderful.


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