Just got Phish's last album, "Undermind"

[Taverner]

If Round Room was the band's Let It Be, Undermind is surely they're Abbey Road. I'm sure this is not the last time you will hear this comparison - but it fits.

As any Phish fan will tell you, this is their last album - and currently they are on their final tour, ending it in a two day festival in Vemont, where the band began.

Undermind has a perfect mix of melodies, jams and even a return to some of the goofiness that was their hallmark in the early days. First pressings even include a DVD of the making of this album - which will let you into the minds of the geniuses that create such art. (You also get a chance to see why Jon Fishman, the drummer, is referred to the other members as the crux of the band. The man is a genius who works math into all of his ryhthems, and will wax poetically about how an octagonal room is the best way to record 6/8 timings.)

The album is one of their best - even with its weak spots. Two tunes stick out - Army of One, penned by Page McConnell and Scents and Subtle Sounds, an Anastasio tune which the album revolves around. Both showcase the musical acumen of the band, as well as showing their jamming potential which they are known for.

I may be going out on a limb here, but Phish is the last great Rock and Roll band. Turn on the radio today and you will hear overproduced, session work where the 'band' is merely a bunch of beautiful people dancing and lip synching. Even the bands that play their own instruments merely copy riffs laid down ten or even five years hence. The most innovative band today, White Stripes, merely repackages Iggy Pop and punk licks for today's audience.

Phish is dead. Long live Phish.
Rock and Roll is dead. Long live Rock and Roll.

[Droopy]

1. Wow. I didn't know they were breaking up.

I thought they'd be around forever, or at least until one of the band members died. So, what's the story behind that?

[ET Awful]

2. Basically they decided to stop at a peak . . .

rather than wait until they grew stale. They want peoples memories of the band to be at their best, not as they were on the decline.

[Taverner]

3. Well here's...

Trey's take:

http://www.phish.com/news/index.php?year=2004#story182

And Page's take:

http://www.phish.com/news/index.php?year=2004#story185

Honestly, if you can get the version of "Undermind" with the DVD, it's way worth it. Watching these geniuses work is something to be seen.

[WilliamPitt]

4. ...and the audience take

is that the last several shows have been unrepentantly craptacular. The band clearly lost interest in itself, and the hiatus did not solve that.

Selah.

[Taverner]

5. Hey Will - you going to the Coney Island show?

Either in person or at one of the theaters simulcasting it?

[WilliamPitt]

6. I hadn't planned on going to the show

but I also didn't realize they were simulcasting it somewhere. Do you have a URL for where it'll be shown?

[Warren DeMontague]

7. My Take On Phish

Extremely talented musicians. As an old school deadhead, I never felt the unifying sort of underlying, we-are-all-one spiritual vibe- that I used to get in certain dead shows- in Phish's music. I went through phases where I really liked their stuff, and then phases where I could take it or leave it. The first time I saw them play was at a bar in Chicago with about 200 people (Biddy Mulligan's, 1991) so it was a little difficult for me to reconcile seeing them in stadiums just a few years later. And I was getting a little old for the "scene", so it was hard for me to observe it without comparing it to the way things used to be around Dead shows in the old days.

All those boys are great, first rate musicians. Probably the first show I went to, after Jerry died, that made me feel like I was back seeing powerful, relevant psychedelic music being made, was one of those "Phil & Phrends" shows at the Warfield in 1999, where you had Trey and Page up there with Phil and Steve Kimock. Watching Kimock & Trey play off each other was truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

I'll probably buy the new Phish album. But I'm not as devastated by their breaking up as I might have been if I was 15 years younger and still looking for the kind of crazy road fun that I used to have going around to Dead shows..

As far as this being end of the "last" great rock and roll band. I beg to differ. (Besides the fact that there are a lot of great, undiscovered bands out there) For instance, I can think of one American band, from Athens, GA., that has been around for about 25 years, has made some of the most powerful, timeless, and subtly psychedelic albums of all time, is still making kick ass music with no signs of stopping, (including one of the only overtly political protest songs to be released last year), and has another album coming out before this fall's election...

[WilliamPitt]

8. Yeah

I really like Phish, first saw them in the Bates college cafeteria in 1989, and have had my brain whalloped out of my skull at more than a few of their shows, but I am kind of in the same camp as you vis a vis the Dead.

I think it is the musical basis for both bands that brings about that different vibe you spoke of. Phish's musical base is all over the map, and a lot of their music is based on straight-virtuoso theory. That is one of the things which makes them extraordinary.

The Dead, by comparison, drew their musical heritage from bluegrass first and foremost. They are, in the final analysis, a plugged-in jug band on acid. That kind of music is old, and goes a long way towards creating that we-are-all-one spiritual vibe you spoke of.

Also, I'm a big fan of lyrics. Phish's lyrics are, for the most part, gibberish. Robert Hunter, on the other hand, was a genius.

[Warren DeMontague]

9. I agree, except

Since I still pass him on the street now and again in Marin, Bob Hunter might not appreciate being moved into the "was" category... At least not yet.

Actually, some of the stuff hes written lately reads brilliant and beautiful. Remains to be seen how it'll translate into music.

[WilliamPitt]

10. Point certainly taken

Tell him I said hi, and thanks.

[Taverner]

13. As Trey put it

He was talking about influences, and how people compare them to the Dead, and how Phish could never be the Dead...how Jerry Garcia grew up in the 30's and 40's among the labor heroes of San Francsico...and how the protest songs and folk music of the time influenced him, compared to Phish being influenced by the likes of Garcia and the scene around the suburban Northeast...

[Taverner]

12. Here's the list

http://www.phish.com/news/index.php?year=2004#story188

I'm travelling all the way to Sacramento from San Ramon since they were sold out locally...

[SarahB]

11. You should go to it.

:hi:

Actually, I should have seen them before it was too late and it almost is. Excellent band.

[ALago1]

14. Haven't bought it yet

Phish played an integral part of my adolescence, having gone to 30+ shows and seen some great music put forth by the boys.

I've heard "The Connection", their first single, is a very poppy tune with potential to be a radio hit. Any substance to this claim?