Phish guitarist Trey Anastasio brought this solo acoustic tour to the Paramount Theatre of the Arts in Oakland on Saturday. Last night, Trey continued the trend of delivering acoustic debuts with the first solo take on “The Connection” along with offering up stories about a Phish inside joke and declaring his love for goat simulator.
Anastasio opened up the evening in Oakland with a pair of selections from Joy delivering takes on “Kill Devil Falls” and “Stealing Time From The Faulty Plan.” The former was played for the first time since March of last year and just its second take since 2011. The first of six cuts from Farmhouse followed with “Sleep,” which was revived earlier this year after sitting the shelf since 2006. Anastasio started to tell a story about the song’s origin before quickly abandoning it and professing his hatred for kale instead. Trey looked to his solo output for “Frost” next, giving the tune from Traveler its third ever solo acoustic rendering. Two songs later Anastasio served up the debut of “The Connection” in this format.
The Undermind track was followed by the guitarist’s first real story of the night. After talking about how the format of his acoustic tour make the venues sound and feel different, he launched in a tale about Phish’s early trips out to the West Coast in the late 1980s/early 1990s. First, he mentioned a time that band’s car had been robbed in Los Angeles and feeling a million miles away from home in the pre-cell phone days. He then jokingly declared, “I sound like some old guy on a chair with a guitar.”
Anastasio then detailed a band inside joke from that era called “The Wait.” Trey talked about teaching “It’s Ice” to the rest of Phish backstage before shows and because of the complex nature of the tune he would repeatedly play the song’s first lines and mess it up and say wait. The band turned the practice exercise into a joke they brought on stage. Trey referenced a show in Colorado that they debuted this game at. The audience got so annoyed with their antics they began to chant “Fuck You.” He closed the story by asking the audience if anyone was at that show, then saying “next time you’re like ‘I’ve been to 300 shows man,’ but you haven’t been to ‘the wait.’”
The third ever solo acoustic “Winterqueen” followed the lengthy tale. Later in the set, Trey once again got chatty after performing “Heavy Things.” The audience participation in the tune prompted Anastasio to thank everyone for singing. He then declared he thought that since so many people in that area likely work in tech they’d be less interested in singing and more interested in goat simulator. After giving a brief description of it, Trey anointed it the greatest video game ever invented saying, “I can relate to that. I travel around wrecking stuff, leaving a trail of horror in your wake.”
“Sand” kicked off a long segue-filled stretch as he stitched together “The Horse” and its traditional partner “Silent In The Morning” with “Backwards Down The Number Line” and “Blaze On.” The latter part of the set was highlighted by a tender “Strange Design,” “Limb By Limb” and “Twist.” Trey worked in the “Wait” gag into the set-closing takes on “The Lizards” and “Wilson.” Anastasio brought his night in Oakland to an end with a five-song encore. After a take on “Waste,” Anastasio went with back-to-back rarities with “Driver” which hadn’t been played solo acoustic since 2011 and “Dog Faced Boy.” The night concluded with the third ever solo workout of “All Of These Dreams” and “More.” Watch fan-shot video of the stories Trey shared last night and check out the full setlist below:
Oakland Story Montage Captured by Mitch Dorff
Setlist (via Phish.net)
Set: Kill Devil Falls[1], Stealing Time From the Faulty Plan[1], Sleep[1], Frost[1], The Inlaw Josie Wales[1], The Connection [2], Winterqueen[1], Water in the Sky[1], Miss You[1], Heavy Things[1], Sand[1] > The Horse[1] > Silent in the Morning[1] > Backwards Down the Number Line[1] > Blaze On[1], Strange Design[1], Till We Meet Again[1], Limb By Limb[1], Twist[1], The Lizards[1], Wilson[1]
Encore: Waste[1], Driver[1], Dog Faced Boy[1], All of These Dreams[1], More[1]
[1] Trey solo acoustic, [2] Trey solo acoustic; first acoustic performance by Trey.
This entire show was performed by Trey solo acoustic and featured the first Trey acoustic performance of The Connection. In the banter after The Connection, Trey teased and quoted Wait. Trey also quoted Wait in The Lizards and Wilson.
