Glitching Out

12/5/99, Rochester, NY, Bluecross Arena

SET 1: Carini > Gotta Jibboo, Back on the Train, Taste, Bug, Sparkle, Tube, Lawn Boy, Ginseng Sullivan, Twist

SET 2: Mike's Song -> Meatstick > I Am Hydrogen > Weekapaug Groove, Brian and Robert, Jennifer Dances, Maze, Fluffhead > Chalk Dust Torture > Frankenstein

ENCORE: Character Zero, Hello My Baby

Listen

The classic Phish Decembers of 1995 and 1997 were both able to capitalize upon the momentum built up over weeks or months of touring. But 1999’s had to start cold and warm up fast – it’s a 14-show sprint over 17 days. And the one-of-a-kind festival waiting at the finish line brought an extra layer of urgency to the whole affair. As the final grains of the millennium fell through the hourglass and everyone wondered if computer programmer shortcuts would bring down society at month’s end, the atmosphere was truly jacked up for these shows, night after night.

So when Phish attempts to play a sleepy, songy Sunday show in Rochester to close the tour’s first weekend, the crowd and the universe align against them. The rowdy GA environment of the former Rochester War Memorial is a constant hum of popping balloons, whistles, and restless din, especially noticeable on the slow songs. Technical glitches – unintentional or otherwise – threaten to derail the big jams. And the song making its premiere is one of the band’s most infamous. Eventually the band gives in to popular demand and plays four high-energy set closers in a row. Surrender to the flow is their signature advice, after all.

But for most of the show, I think the tension works – certainly better than this show’s mediocre reputation, at least. There’s a trilogy of uniquely restrained T-songs in the first set; Taste burbling instead of peaking, Tube giving Trey’s synth its nightly workout, Twist premiering the new arrangement cooked up for Farmhouse. As in the Palace, there’s a tasteful confidence to these performances, Phish indulging the right to play at their own pace and resist the crowd’s desire for predictable fireworks.

They’re ready to crank the volume for the second set though, leading off with Mike’s. But as the jam starts to get interesting, the gremlins* show up. At 7:20, there’s a weird metallic hiss that resolves to feedback, and it says something about Trey’s 1999 sound that I can’t tell if it was a gear malfunction or a textural choice. When it comes back a minute later, it certainly sounds like he’s manipulating it rhythmically, and similar glitchy/feedbacky effects occasionally intrude for the rest of the set – over the final few minutes of an excellent, exploratory Meatstick, in the intro to Brian and Robert, during the space-laser breakdown of Frankenstein. Is it just a newly discovered patch on the AN1x? Or a genuine accident that he had the incredible presence of mind to sample and recycle? Either way, it adds a fascinating industrial edge to the night’s menu.

The night’s final round of confrontation takes the shape of Jennifer Dances, one of – if not the most – reviled songs in the Phish catalog. I have to admit, I don’t understand why; it doesn’t stand out as significantly cornier than the other 98-99 pop ballads, and it’s got an earwormy hook. Gun to my head, I might even prefer it to Heavy Things. But it seems doomed from the start, drawing mild applause from a Rochester crowd that was likely expecting something more enticing after Trey’s “this is definitely a very, very favorite room of ours” intro banter.

So they pivot to that streak of loud crowd pleaser punctuation marks. Based on the yikes-y moments in Fluffhead and the Return of the King-like ending structure, I’m guessing the band’s heart wasn’t totally in it. But at some point, you give the people and the gremlins what they want, even if Phish knows that it’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon – a marathon with another marathon waiting at the end.

* - Seasonally appropriate, given that Gremlins is the best Christmas movie (get outta here, Die Hard)