The Sigil of Slateman: Concerts: Phish: WIP

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!!MAJOR WORK IN PROGRESS!!

Fall Tour 2003

Anniversary Tour - Fall 2003

The band's 20th anniversary....

Jeff Holdsworth came out on stage to play a few songs.

More to come!

Set I:

Set II:

Encore:

06:26 | Fire

Summer Tour 2003

Summer 2003: It Festival
2nd & 3rd August, 2003 - Loring Air Force Base Limestone, ME

The only date I could afford on the summer tour, this would be my 4th festival after Lemonwheel, Oswego and Big Cypress NYE.

I left the house at 10am having packed up everything myself for the Phish show and the week-long stay in my cabin in Maine. Ran some quick errands and Stacy got out of work at 11. We drove east and met up with Vinnie and the car was completely packed. Out to Orient Point we drove to catch the ferry over to Connecticut and then the real journey began.

How about some numbers?

10:00am - Leave
11:00am - Pick up Stacy
11:30am - Pick up Vinnie
01:20pm - Arrive for 2pm Ferry
03:50pm - Ferry lands
07:15pm - Arrive in Maine
09:45pm - Hit major traffic in Maine

02:45am - Hit shortcut, Route 11
04:30am - Landed in midst of traffic on Rt 1. Some people already waiting 12+ hours. Mile 623
06:00am - Mile 624
07:00am - Mile 626
07:22am - Mile 627
08:05am - Mile 628
08:35am - Mile 629
09:00am - Mile 630
09:45am - Mile 631
10:30am - Arrive in Parking Lot! Driving 24+ hours by this point
11:45am - Parked, Done!

634 miles - 25:45 Hours

Took 7 hours from Rt 1 merge, some must've reached a 24 hour wait on that one road alone. 08/02/03: Day I

Set I:

Set II:

Set III:

Encore:

6:29 | Dog Log
8:46 | The Mango Song

2am Set:

59:23 | Tower Jam

08/03/03: Day II

Set I:

Set II:

Set III:

Encore:

09:29 | Good Times, Bad Times

Winter Tour 2003

After the long hiatus had ended, tickets for Phish's NYE 2002-2003 run sold out very quickly and I was not fortunate enough to get tickets. Once the winter tour was announced, I knew the same trouble might plague us and so we planned on getting tickets to several shows.

Tickets went on sale in order: NJ (9am), MA (10am) and NY (11am). Since I was away on vacation, Stacy phoned in and tried for all 3. As expected, the NY show sold out and so we were glad to have gotten tickets to 2 shows. 1 show is simply not enough to get a taste of a tour, and so things worked out well.

Monday, February 24, 2003
Continental Airlines Arena, East Rutherford, NJ

Encore:
07:06 | Farmhouse

The first of the 3 shows was on Monday the 24th of February and I left work early to head to NYC. We were able to take the train in and then take the bus over to the Continental Arena next to Giants Stadium. I foolishly drank a beer while waiting and had the worst 'piss pains' ever experienced as we rode the bus into Jersey.

Our seats were almost directly behind the stage, good for viewing Fishman playing, but little else really as we were just a little to the left. There was a cool guy from North Carolina to our left who was there by himself.

The first set was average IMO, DWD always has a good jam, but the following songs aren't among my favorites. I really don't like Wolfman's Brother actually....

But anyways, after a few songs, I saw a large black man slowly walking from the left portion of the stage. I knew it immediately and told the guy to my left that it was B.B. King. The crowd ROARED as he took the stage, it was really incredible. He took a seat and jammed out 3 lengthy songs with the band as the first set ended. He looked a little uncomfortable, but the songs came out well and he left to another roar before the first break.

The second set began with Halley's Comet, still the most redundant song ever, but some interesting segues made it an exciting set and we heard Waves for the first time. The Farmhouse encore was interesting and different and I can't really recall the ride back to NY at all....

The setlist:

Wednesday, February 26, 2003
Worcester Centrum Centre, Worcester, MA

For the Worcester show, I took a half day the day of and the day after the show to cover the travel and late night sleep. The drive up was uneventful, having done it several years earlier for the Fall '98 tour. I don't really like the venue due to the smaller size and lack of plumbing. There literally are only a handful of stalls, so set break piss runs become hour-long fiascos if you don't do it right.

It was extremely cold and we only arrived with a small amount of time to spare. After parking what seemed like miles away, the walk to the venue was painful and somewhat familiar. Hordes of people were waiting outside to get in and once inside, it wasn't long before the band started up.

The show was a bit of a homecoming, as the tour didn't hit the New England area until this show (iirc) and the energy level was infinitely greater than the show in NJ, even with B.B. King's appearance. The setlist was better as well IMO, and the band debuted 4 songs from each band member's side projects: Clone, Drifting, Blue Skies and Final Flight.

The YEM opener was apparently the first one since 1989 but the 2nd set really stood out. Like NJ, it featured several excellent transitions (Ghost > Low Rider Jam > Makisupa > Ya Mar and Waves > Caspian > Frankenstein > Golgi). Waves was the only duplicate and wasn't bad as it's got a cool jam in there and worked well into the segue.

No major specific memories from the show barring the cool jams and excellent fan response. Loving Cup was a much more exciting encore than Farmhouse and gave us a little more energy for the long ride home. Stacy passed out and I recall almost dozing more than once, but we got in around 3, slept till 11 and went to work for 1. Not a bad deal at all. The setlist of course:

Set I:

Set II:

Encore:

11:52 | Loving Cup

# debut of Clone (from Leo Kottke/Mike Gordon Clone), Drifting (from Trey Anastasio), Blue Skies (from Pork Tornado), and Final Flight (from Vida Blue)
# Low Rider was instrumental