Italo Disco

7/15/96, Sesto Calende, ITA, La Marna

Photo by Keelan Jones.

SET 1: My Friend, My Friend, Punch You in the Eye, Fast Enough for You, Guyute, Possum, I Didn't Know, Harry Hood, Cavern

SET 2: Down with Disease > Maze, Loving Cup > Makisupa Policeman > It's Ice, Julius, Hold Your Head Up > Purple Rain > Hold Your Head Up, Uncle Pen, Run Like an Antelope

ENCORE: Golgi Apparatus

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The allure of following Phish to Europe is to go back to the past, seeing them in the kind of venues they have long outgrown back home. But while Europe ‘96 has been scenic, it may have been slightly a disappointment in the time travel department so far. With Santana, they have played soccer stadiums, outdoor lots, and large indoor rooms that aren’t too far off from where you could recently see Phish away from their power center of New England. And while they played smaller rock clubs in London and Amsterdam, the intimacy of those shows was offset by Phish playing either extremely safe or dangerously stoned.

It’s in the tiny lakeside town of Sesto Calende where the European swing finally lives up to its Doc Brown promises. I would love to know how a 10,000-pop town in the North of Italy ended up on Phish’s itinerary between the Dour Festival and joining back up with Santana in southeastern France. But whatever the reason, it seems to have been a treasured stop for the fans on tour in 1996, with a trainload of hippie backpackers descending upon the town and its discoteca, La Marna. 

If Facebook is to be trusted, La Marna still exists, though it hasn’t listed a performance since pre-COVID times. And truth be told, the venue does not look like the kind of room I’d like to be packed into until the world has reached herd immunity — it’s dinky, with low ceilings and no seating, just a big dancefloor. The interior appears to have received some aesthetic upgrades, but in photos from Phish’s 1996 visit, it looks more like a seafood restaurant than a rock club, with a painted mural behind the stage and acoustic tiles overhead. 

Photo by Evan Wolfe.

So if London was a journey back to early 1994, Sesto Calende is a deeper dive back to 80’s Phish, the days of providing the background noise for gravy fries and frat parties. The tape reflects this vibe perfectly, with the band right up close, echoing off the walls and ceiling. Meanwhile, the crowd is insanely amped, clapping along to both Possum and vacuum solos like they’re soccer chants. 

Phish adds to the illusion by playing by far their most relaxed and honest show of the year so far. Ten songs make their 1996 debuts, there’s secret language and moderate rarities such as Guyute, Makisupa, and Loving Cup, and a second round of Trey attempting Italian stage banter. Songs that debuted long after Phish graduated from Nectar’s gain a new youthful charm; Guyute feels like a close descendant of Divided Sky or Fluffhead, while Julius makes them sound like the world’s greatest bar band. They even take a few swings at making up for the Disasterdam in Amsterdam, with proper versions of It’s Ice, Purple Rain, and Antelope that actually remember their conclusion.

Photo by Keelan Jones.

In fact, a couple songs go farther into little post-ending codas, such as the about-to-breakout Disease and the brief ambient segue between Loving Cup and Makisupa. In a year that has so far been entirely bereft of open jamming (apart from chord progressions suggested by the audience), these all too short moments are welcome glimmers that the band is overcoming its wrongfooted, unorthodox start to the summer. At the very least, it’s a fun show that conveys its unusual setting even through speakers 25 years later.

But alas, after this one-night dream gig in middle-of-nowhere Italy, it’s back to the Santana-supporting grind. An entire European tour of such out-of-the-way destinations and improbably intimate clubs might have been just the antidote they needed for the post-peak slump since last December’s highs. Instead, it’s a special oasis in the middle of a month that, on tape, is both very weird and very dull, the one quantum leap that this overseas excursion promised.