Where do you start with this one? Well, several months after I gradated from Michigan, a group of my friends took a journey to New Zealand and Australia. I knew it was important to them to see the Phish before they retired, so I made a point to get them tickets to Great Woods and to Coventry. Phish then added a night at Hampton on August 9th, 2004, so we decided to add another show to the trip.
JH had been home from New Zealand for a few days, and made it downstate to my side of town. That first morning, we must have been up at 5am. We scooped up CC and PS, then drove to Ann Arbor to pick up TM who had only been home from New Zealand for a matter of hours. 5 six-foot dudes packed into my 4runner and started off on our long journey to southwest Virginia to make the show that evening.
Our drive was going just fine until we hit a traffic wall midday in D.C. I-95 was a huge mess, and we ended up on some back roads to get to Hampton. We made it to the venue and into the show at the end of the first song. Now Hampton is a cool venue (and I look forward to seeing it in a few weeks), and we hung out on the floor, but musically, the show wasn’t that great. We got up pretty close for the second set which made things a bit better. Here is the setlist for the surprise Hampton show in 2004.
Monday, August 9, 2004
Hampton Coliseum, Hampton, VA
Set I: Chalkdust Torture, Bathtub Gin -> Runaway Jim, Walls of the Cave, Loving Cup
Set II: All of These Dreams, Limb x Limb, Lifeboy, Crowd Control, Seven Below > Stash ->
NICU, Bug, Contact > Character Zero
Encore: David Bowie
After the show, I took to the wheel and we started heading up the east coast, on our way to Boston to get to the shows the next night. We dropped off PS and CC at the Baltimore airport for a one-way flight home (PS would come to Coventry, but had some commitments to take care of in between). I remember hitting a wall at some point in New Jersey, and had to have TM take over driving. I should have told TM to take the Merit parkway instead of I-95, but I wasn’t thinking. I woke up sometime in Connecticut. We made our way into Boston to crash on the floor of KW’s place for a few hours before heading out to Great Woods.
One side story, on our way to Great Woods either that night or the next, we saw a small car trying to squeeze by on the shoulder past a semi truck. The semi truck ended up pulling to the side and hit the small car. A fight then ensued which we missed, but it was a huge case of road rage. Wicked.
I have to say that the Great Woods shows were pretty good. I saw the Hood milk blimp for the first time as well. JH was especially happy with the song selection, and I’m pretty sure I called the AC/DC Bag opener on the 10th. We had pavilion for both nights, so it was a good time for sure.
Tuesday, August 10, 2004
Tweeter Center Boston, Mansfield, MA
Set I: AC/DC Bag, Heavy Things, Punch You in the Eye, Wolfman's Brother, Theme from the Bottom, Birds of a
Feather
Set II: Mike's Song > I Am Hydrogen > Weekapaug Groove, A Song I Heard The Ocean Sing -> Piper
-> Makisupa Policeman, Dog Faced Boy, Friday, Harry Hood
Encore: Possum
After the first show, we headed back to Boston for a full night of sleep. I remember eating at a really good Jewish deli as well the next day, not as good as Zingerman’s, but definitely good. Then we headed back to Great Woods for the second night.
08/11/04 Tweeter Center Boston, Mansfield, MA
Set I: The Divided Sky1, Suzy Greenberg> Down With Disease> Prince Caspian> Scent of a Mule> Tears of a Clown> Scent of a Mule, Mexican Cousin
Set II: Run Like An Antelope> Also Sprach Zarathustra, Golgi Apparatus, Waves, Tweezer> HYHU2> Terrapin, HYHU, Timber (Jerry the Mule)3, Sample in a Jar
Encore: Bouncing Around the Room, Tweezer Reprise
The show on the 11th was pretty fun too except I was pissed that they didn’t finish the Antelope.
The 2001 really stands out for me as the moment I realized Phish was done and this would be the last time I would hear this in concert. There was something epic and sad about the way Trey played it…something that said to me it had been a great ride but now it was time to go home. And that’s where I think my youth sorta faded away as well – it was time for me to grow up, stop following a band around all summer, and cut my hair. The start/stop jam in 2001 is really neat, and I still get goosebumps listening to this version.
We again headed back to Boston after the show to crash at KW’s place. We took JH to the airport the next morning as he had to get back to Traverse City for the wedding of his buddy Nick and his wife Tera.
There were a lot of reasons why we didn’t go to the Camden show the next night, the biggest being that it meant heading south again before going back up to Vermont. And that turned out to be a smart move given the chaos of Coventry. So TM and I started on a rainy ride through the quiet remoteness of Vermont, headed toward Burlington to see some of the places where Phish had begun. We visited Nectar’s, ate gravy fries, walked around town, then settled into a hotel on the outskirts of town. I recall TM being taken back by the amount of reality TV that had emerged during his year away in New Zealand. America, f*ck yeah.
The next morning, it was still raining, and we knew from the radio that Coventry, Phish’s last festival and final 2 night stand, was supposed to be really wet. It behooved us to buy more tarps and rain gear at the local Home Depot (should have bought some really huge boots). In any case, after shopping, we headed on our journey east back to Coventry. We reached the end of the line to get into the festival at around 5pm under gray rainy skies and uncertainty about when we would get in to set up camp.
The line wouldn’t move much at all that night, and as the daylight faded away, all we could see was a glow in the sky ahead where the concert grounds lay. That night was long but fun. We made friends with people with others in line, and I even ended up running into a girl who I had sold a ticket to at Alpine a few months before. We made the most of it. At some point around 3 or 4am, I had to crash, and fell asleep in the car. As morning dawned, I woke up and it was TM’s turn to crash for a few hours.
At some point, Mike Gordon made the announcement that they were going to have to begin turning away cars because the concert and camping grounds were a swamp, unable to accommodate the traffic coming into the show. We stayed in our cars, hoping that we were ahead of the cut off point. We relayed the message to our friends coming from Michigan through Canada and advised them to take a back way into the area. We were lucky not to be one of those fans who came up I-95, or others who actually chose to turn around (one of NB’s turned all the way around after driving from Minnesota).
When we finally set up camp at around 1 or 2pm, we had been in line for close to 20 hours. As it turned out, PS, JC, BE and others who had come from Michigan after leaving the night before made into the grounds before us. They had to walk in from some point, but not the several miles that people on I-95 had to deal with. NB and his friend Curtis made it in about the same time as well, so we were all camped relatively close to one another.
So not long after setting up camp, we headed into the show. The concert area was a mud pit, everywhere. Someone in JCT and CG’s crew brought a tarp, but it did little as we all sank into the mud for 2 consecutive nights.
08/14/04 Newport State Airport, Coventry, VT
Coventry
Set I: Walls of the Cave> Runaway Jim> Gotta Jibboo, You Enjoy Myself1, Sample in a Jar, Axilla, Poor Heart, Run Like An Antelope2, Fire
Set II: AC/DC Bag> 46 Days, Halley's Comet> Ya Mar, David Bowie, Character Zero
Set III: Twist> The Wedge, Stash> Free, Guyute, Drowned> Jam, Friday
Encore: Harry Hood
08/15/04 Newport State Airport, Coventry, VT
Coventry
Set I: Mike's Song1> I am Hydrogen> Weekapaug Groove, Anything But Me, Reba, Carini, Chalkdust Torture> Possum, Wolfman's Brother> Jam2, Taste
Set II: Down With Disease, Wading in the Velvet Sea, Glide, Split Open and Melt> Ghost
Set III: Fast Enough For You, Seven Below, Simple, Piper> Bruno3> Dickie Scotland3, Wilson, Slave to the Traffic Light
Encore: The Curtain With
The music at Coventry was awful, especially the 2nd night. I remember after Trey had butchered some tunes he decided to play Guyute, one of Phish’s most complicated pieces, which he butchered as well. I looked at JCT and we just laughed at how awful the playing was.
The best part of the festival was when they played Fast Enough for You to open the final set, my favorite Phish ballad. It was perfectly timed, and I got a bit emotional. Other highlights include the collective “awwwwww” as people walked through the mud and lost shoes. Another funny moment was seeing some kid sitting in a camping chair in the concert area, passed out and covered in toilet paper and trash. I got a photo of PS with him.
Ironically, as we left the concert grounds to head home, I was laughing. Although the camping and the music was an absolute disaster, I was with all the people I had spent so many years with seeing Phish, and that made up for everything. My legs may have been covered in mud up to my knees, my sandals ruined and lost in the fields of Vermont, and that one puddle I don’t think was filled with water, but I was laughing at the debacle and was at peace with Phish’s retirement.
TM and I and a friend of TM got into my car, headed out of Coventry, across the border into Canada, and home to Michigan. Apparently I drove until almost 1pm the next day, but to be honest, I don’t remember any of it. We stopped for food somewhere just past Toronto, I fell asleep, and even though it was 3 hours, it felt like 15 minutes and we were at the border at Detroit. I got home to my house around 5pm, and slept until 7am the next morning without waking up once.
So that is the story of the end of Phish. We can call that the end of Phish 2.0 now that Hampton is only a few weeks away and the adventure is set to commence again. I’m not sure what to expect when Phish comes back. I know things will never be like 1999 or even 2004, but I will be there for the reunion and I will be sure to make it to a few shows here and there. There is a new generation waiting to enjoy Phish, so I will let them take the lead in enjoying it the way I once did. There will still be trips to Alpine and Las Vegas, and I’m hoping to catch them playing Tela and hope to see them play at MSG, but I’m just happy to see the guys again and have a reason to relive my youth again.
Thanks for reading, and see you at Hampton.
