On Thursday night, Phish kicked off its 2022 summer campaign at Mansfield, MA’s Xfinity Center (rotating corporate sponsors be damned, it will always be Great Woods). The performance fell just one week shy of the 30th anniversary of the band’s first performance at the shed, a venue with one of the longest, most storied histories in Phish lore.
There’s something comfy about kicking off a tour somewhere so familiar; the Massachusetts venue has seen some legendary Phish shows over the years, and a great performance there is almost as much of a certainty as getting caught in the traffic post-show.
Wasting no time setting the tone of the summer, the band kicked things off with its sweatiest groove, “Ghost”. Dropping quickly into a strong pocket, the jam crescendoed into a fierce and confident peak, a move highlighting the quartet’s continuing evolution away from superfluous tension and release just as subsequent torch-chasers move to claim it as their own.
The jam out of “Ghost” led into the first of many buttery segues of the night, this one into “Set Your Soul Free”. The band played hungry on this charging rendition with heads-up agility and quick catches on the plethora of ideas that each band member tossed back and forth. A deep segment of the jam featured Page McConnell focusing in on his Hammond organ, a staple of the earlier Phish sound that has been delegated to more of a bench-player role as his synth arsenal has grown. “SYSF” eventually landed seamlessly back into “Ghost”, a far cry from the ripcord callbacks that Trey Anastasio that had become something of a trend this spring.
The always welcome “The Wedge” popped up next, offering the same warm escape it did in the early years. This version was strong, and the band tried to ride that momentum into the first “Mound” in the post-lockdown era. Although they had trouble skating over a few patches of rust, it was still a stoke-the-fire moment for the crowd.
The increasingly common “Mountains in the Mist” came next, drifting into the slow-Jerry float it often evokes. As long as you don’t have too many people talking around you, “Mist” can be a magical pre-sunset song to experience on a summer night at a Phish show.
The chugging “Back on the Train” followed, and was played with a little extra “oomph” after popping up just two weeks prior when Trey sat in with Billy Strings in NYC. For a brief moment, things revved up enough that it felt like “L.A. Woman” was on the horizon, but the reins were reeled in and things ended up in “Ruby Waves”. Perhaps a nod to the all-time-great rendition of the song three years ago to the day at Alpine Valley, this “Ruby” featured some diverse synth attacks from Page McConnell.
@rene_huemer pic.twitter.com/QBF5oDtDHI
— Phish: From The Road (@Phish_FTR) July 15, 2022
The annual once-a-year performance of the Billy Joel-iest song in the band’s catalog, “I Been Around,” popped up next as an appetizing precursor for the massive “Tube” that would follow. While perhaps not reaching the full “jam” status that many demand of the song, this “Tube” had everything you should want in one—verses nailed, Jon Fishman and Mike Gordon locked in their Meters-in-hyperspace pocket, and Trey using his most obscure filters in tasteful spurts alongside deep shred on his clean signal—despite wrapping up just prior to the point of dancefloor destruction.
Ghosts of the Forest favorite “About to Run” then tried on its set-closing suit for the first time, and I’m sure we’ll be seeing it in there again. This one felt especially loose, and Fishman’s work decorating behind the downbeat was nothing less than exceptional. Fish seemed in particularly fine form on Thursday, especially for a tour opener, and when he’s emitting such confidence from behind the kit, the rest of the pieces tend to fall in naturally. Once the band members start evolving off of one another and that perpetual motion machine gets turned on, you can feel them drop their oars and ride the current.
Trey kicked off the second set with a timid intro to “Chalk Dust Torture”, but it was clear that this version’s destiny lied in its life as a jam vehicle, not as the quick thunder punch it was originally conceived to be. Touching on multiple ideas—from a “Little Drummer Boy” tease to a delightfully Plinko-esque segment—the band was clearly having fun and feeling at home. Next came another one of those smooth segues, this time into “Plasma”. If Phish was a band that made any sense to make assumptions about, I’d think some of these transitions had been discussed beforehand, but being unsure is part of the fun.
This “Plasma” jam was on from the jump: hive-mind soaring, faucet-flowing, and oozing the essence of subconscious improvisation while Chris Kuroda and Andrew Giffin‘s LED-lined rig illuminated the stage with sheets of light and color. Complete with a sweet, veteran-coveted “Dave’s Energy Guide” tease from Trey, everything was firing before another cool transition into a “Mike’s”-less “Weekapaug Groove”. Continuing with the rolling-groove vibe of the night, this “Weekapaug” felt more like a deconstructed “Suzy Greenberg” before it got weird, and then got weirder, and then weirder still, but remained firmly nestled in that ever-sought dark corner of the Phish potentiality.
It only made sense then for things to perfectly resolve into “I Saw It Again”, and the cheekily dark tune got a little darker than normal as Page tested various sonic waters. Personally, this author loves his Phish dark, so I’ll take any jam that feels like the mummified corpse of Vincent Price is about to be lowered onto the stage. Now, smack in the middle of the soundtrack to a druid resurrection ceremony is not where I personally would choose to start up “Prince Caspian”, but this isn’t my band.
It is Trey’s band, though, as he asserted when he made the subsequent turn into “Backwards Down the Numberline”. When “Numberline” devolved into “Bug”, the prior momentum of the first half of the set seemed all but lost. “Bug” usually works best as a landing pad, so it felt a little flat after two other non-whammies. It did end strong, though, perhaps built upon the echoing energy that still lingered from Trey performing the song with 10-year-old Jovi in Michigan last month.
7/14/2022 Mansfield, MA
— Phish: From The Road (@Phish_FTR) July 15, 2022
One final throwdown in “Sand” to end the night restored some balance to the force, and that strength continued into the unexpected “Punch You In the Eye” encore. “Punch” had only taken that spot one other time in the past 24 years, but its placement felt perfect—much like any “Punch” placement, I suppose.
“Say It To Me S.A.N.T.O.S” capped the night, affirming its now-dominant role in the closer spot, much to the chagrin of “Character Zero”-lovers everywhere. Overall, both a thunderous and auspicious opening shot from Phish to kick off the tour.
Click below for a selection of videos from the tour opener and scroll down to view a gallery of photos from the show via Charlie Jenkins.
Phish returns to the venue formerly known as Great Woods tonight, Friday, July 15th. For a full list of upcoming Phish tour dates, head here. To order your LivePhish webcast for any of the band’s upcoming summer shows, head here. To sign up for a free trial membership to LivePhish+, head here.
Setlist [via phish.net]: Phish | Xfinity Center | Mansfield, MA | 7/14/22
Set One: Ghost -> Set Your Soul Free -> Ghost, The Wedge, Mound, Mountains in the Mist, Back on the Train > Ruby Waves, I Been Around, Tube > About to Run
Set Two: Chalk Dust Torture[1] -> Plasma -> Weekapaug Groove -> Saw It Again -> Prince Caspian > Backwards Down the Number Line > Bug > Sand
Encore: Punch You in the Eye > Say It To Me S.A.N.T.O.S.
The post Phish Opens Summer 2022 In Mid-Tour Form With Several Seamless Segues In Mansfield [Photos/Videos] appeared first on L4LM.
