From: "Rich Fromm - 'Whatever you do, take care of your shoes.'  23-Nov-1992 1829" <fromm@rock.enet.dec.com>
Subject: albany, stony brook :^)
Reply-To: fromm@rock.enet.dec.com
Organization: The Internet
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 23:30:02 GMT

first let me ask a question about colchester:

| Vocal Weekapaug Meltdown-->

could someone who was there please explain what this means?

ok, on to shows that i was at...

albany:

|I Walk The Line -mike- Johnny Cash classic
|David Bowie

i think they did a bit of a Bowie tease before I Walk The Line; well, at least
two other people and myself were certain they were going to go into Bowie; and
then when they did play it, they didn't finish it!  i can't remember now
exactly how they stopped, but they never quite got to that final crescendo and
 finale; i was certain that they were going to open up the second set by
finishing Bowie, but they didn't; so then i was hoping that they would finish
it for an encore; i mentioned this to trey after the show (he popped out of the
stage door to chat with some phans), and he said something like "yeah, i
thought we were going to finish it too, but then the Dude of Life showed up";
i suggested that they finish it the next night, and he said he'd maybe they'd
do that; but alas, even though i kept screaming "FINISH BOWIE!!!" at Stony
Brook, they didn't

| Y.E.M.>vocal jam

way cool vocal jam!  they ended up slowly singing (someone mentioned it sounded
a bit like a gregorian chant) these neat harmonies

| Terrapin

any thoughts on whether or not everyone leaving Fish on stage alone was
planned?  he definitely looked kind of perplexed when he looked around and
everybody else was gone; i guess Fishman decided he couldn't repair his old
dress with any more duct tape and decided it was time for a new one; somebody
said he introduced himself in Vermont as "Eyeball Man", but it was definitely
something else in Albany; i thought it sounded like "The ??? Eye"; Jeff, what
did you say you thought it was?  "Iandi" (as in I-And-I)

| I Don't Care About Anyone Except Myself

I didn't pick this up until Rob Johnson pointed it out, but this sounded
EXACTLY like Chalkdust!  I've got to go home and listen to Amy's Farm to see
if that was the case there, or if they just purposely fooled with it to make
it seem that way in Albany.

i had a great time at this show; even though the venue was significantly larger
than most of the shows that i've seen, i really liked the place - it's really
pretty nice inside, security was not overbearing, the acoustics were good, and
i didn't feel that the closeness of the band and the audience had disappeared
just because there were a lot of people there; on the contrary, it was kind
of neat to be sharing in the groove with so many other people simultaneously;
i spent both sets up in the balcony, and i had plenty of room to move around
and dance; it was kind of neat being so high up - i could even see when Page
was playing the organ, something not possible from floor level (except at the
Campus Club last spring, when I spent the show about 5 feet to the side of Page
and had an excellent view of everything)

as for the net gathering, it did actually occur, but in the future it would be
nice of somebody who knows the area could take the initiative to make a final
decision and post it, along with directions; i found out how to get there by
calling information to get the number, and calling the Half Moon Cafe to get
directions; it was a decent place for a gathering, although it wasn't, imo,
very close to the venue; ideally it should be a convenient walking distance;
it was nice to meet some new people at the gathering, and i saw a bunch of
other familiar faces at the show

many intense musical highlights for me, esp. Reba, Stash, Fluffhead, and
Harry Hood

new songs:  i don't really remember too much about them, except i think there
was one that was kind of slow, not too typical of Phish (in a certain sense 
kind of like Silent In The Morning) - maybe this was Fast Enough For You;
anyway, i kind of like tunes like this; while the all out jamming songs are
what i like best about Phish, it's great that they can exhibit so much musical
variety and explore new forms of expression; When You're There (or whatever
Fish's new song was) - kind of silly, but hey, why not?

oh yeah, i also thought i heard a bit of Ballad Of Curtis Leow when Trey was
saying something about Curtis (who is that anyway?  i think he was wishing
him a happy birthday or something); they didn't end up playing the song, but
i won't complain about seeing the Dude of Life instead

ok, on to Stony Brook...

was there any kind of gathering before this one?  ya know, for the low-key
level that most gatherings end up being, it seems like we spend an awful lot
of bandwidth discussing them ;^)

i've never seen so much security at a Phish show; metal detectors, and signs
saying "No Metal Objects", "No Weapons", etc.  These guys must have had some
way bad experiences in the past with concerts.  When I tried to enter the gym
with my Phish-ness I was told "You can't bring that in here filled."  But it's
only got water, I told him.  "Well, you never know what might happen."  No, I
really couldn't think of what might happen, so I asked?  I'm not sure if he
had anticipated that one - his response was something like "You might spill it
on someone."  I'm not making this up.  Anyway, I dumped it out, and between
sets I filled it up and placed it in my backpack before bringing it in.  I've
also never seen a front row at a Phish show that was so far from the stage.
There was the first row of seats, then a big blank space.  Then a rope type
of boundary, and some more space.  Then a chest high wooden boundary, and some
more space before the stage.  Standing behind the wooden boundary were about
a dozen security guards.  And there were guards every else imaginable.  This
one who was right in front kept shining her damn flashlight everywhere, mostly
in people's eyes.  I thought about responding in kind by shining my flashlight
in her eyes, but I wasn't sure how much of a sense of humor she'd have.  During
the first set I wanted to check out the scene further back, to see if there
was more free space to dance.  Well, after getting hassled enough by security
for dancing way back, I decided to return to my seat.  After showing my ticket
to numerous guards every several feet as I approached my seat, the final guard
wanted to know where I'd been.  He was actually hassling me because I had
gotten out of my seat and gone elsewhere.  And security hassles weren't limited
to during the show.  On numerous occasions before the show and during the set
I was told to move simply for standing around talking to friends.  And I can't
believe they threw someone out for smoking a cigarette.  Ok, you could argue
that she broke the rules and deserved to be punished.  But I think the punish-
ment should fit the crime.  For instance, simply asking her to put out her
cigarette would have been fine.  Throwing someone out of a show for that is
just ridiculous.  Ok, enough gripes about security.  Just to let you know that
a small venue doesn't necessarily mean a mellow scene.  Albany was MUCH larger,
but MUCH more laid back.

on to the actual show...

| Colonel Forbin's Ascent ->
| Famous Mockingbird

there was also a Gamehendge narration in between here

| Possum

2 signals in the intro, the Simpson's "DOOH!" and the all fall down; the all
fall down signal was a riot!  security looked utterly baffled; at first this
guy was shining his light on us like he wanted to make us get up, but then
he noticed that it wasn't just us; word of the signals still needs to get
around a bit; there were a decent number of people that fell down around us,
but it was definitely well less than 50%

| Honey Love 

i'm amazed at how much of a dynamic range Fish can get out of that vacuum; when
i first heard him play it a couple of years ago, it was just noise; but he's
getting really good at it now!  some points of interest:  he announced that
his vaccum is a 1967 model Electrolux, in case you care; when he announced the
band, he annouced Trey as "Ernest Giseppie (sp?) Anastasio", and he also 
announced one of the pairs of eyes on his new dress as Miles Davis' eyes; 
the security around me also seemed rather perplexed by this whole vaccuum thing

| Llama (with beach balls)

this was a lot of fun - especially because i think that security hated it!  i
hadn't noticed the beach ball/band member correlation during the music, because
i was too busy trying to get my hands on a ball (the guy next to me was a bit
taller than i was and kept getting to it before i did)

| Buffalo Bill (new)

this was another new Fish song, and it featured him playing the washboard; kind
of an interesting washboard - it had two metallic breasts on it - looked kind
of like something i've seen Madonna pictured with

i didn't feel the same level of intensity that i did at Friday's show, but i 
think that was just because i was getting a little tired (maybe those 2 cups
of coffee before the Friday show really helped!)

i'd like to thank neal and jeff for providing crash space for me on friday and
saturday night respectively; it's so cool that people who i've never met before
are willing to trust me and let me spend the night; isn't the net just great?
and i hope the guys who were looking for rides to boston found them, since
neither of them called me on sunday morning before i left stonybrook

only 4 days until portchester!

. . . r i c H

p.s. matt, you really ought to start bringing some net shirts to the shows;
everytime i wear my shirt people ask me "how can i get one of those?"

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