Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 01:35:47 -0400 (EDT)
From: Bretskey@aol.com
Subject: Gorge shows 8/2 & 8/3

   The band was tight both nights, and the site was stunning as usual, but
the logistical  stuff was a little weak on the part of the Gorge management.
 There were cops posted at the main intersection to the road to the entrance,
but they weren't doing anything helpful.  Here's a suggestion: don't pay the
overtime if the people being paid aren't going to do anything.  The camping
area was packed, and at $20 per ticket, could bbe much better run.  Plus
which, plenty of people were camping in the main lot, which is not supposed
to be done.  But I must give most sincere thanks to the staff at the first
aid station, who saved me from nasty dehydration, and all were as pleasant as
coulb be.  Speaking of the heat- what idiot decided to put concrete on the
main lawn area?  We aren't going to be playing any basketball down there!
     Anyway, the shows were great.  Saturday's show mixed known quantities
with new songs, at least new to those of us who haven't seen any other shows
this year.  Divided Sky was my personal first set fave, with set opener Theme
>From the Bottom right there with it.  I can't say much about the second set-
I spent most of it getting an I.V. and sleeping.  I was brought back to
lucidity before the medical attention by the Down With Disease/Tweezer mix,
but slept through the rest.
     Sunday's show was a subtle build up.  I felt the many jams during the
first set got to be tiresome-  but I was still shaky from the previous
night's dehydration, and my patience was a bit thin.  The second set was much
more energetic- Simple, Fluffhead and Frankenstein were outstanding, and the
encore of Bouncing and Slave to the Traffic Light were as well.  
     The crew deserves much praise as well.  The lighting was terrific,
almost a visual musical instrument (if such a thing is possible).  Phish
concerts are as close as I, and expect many others, come to communal musical
moments, the kind that make you say "You were at that show? Man, wasn't that
great?" to people you just met.  The mythological Gamehenge songs and
stories, along with lighting that sets a mood, make for a all-six-senses
experience.
      Peace and Love all you Phishheads.

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Date: Wed, 6 Aug 1997 16:03:42 -0400 (EDT)
From: Bretskey@aol.com
Subject: Re: Gorge shows 8/2 & 8/3

The Gorge 8/3

     After a long day in the sun (how do all you travelling phreaks do that
all summer?), anticipation was high for the second show.  The consensus as
far as I could tell (I expected the same) was that this show would feature
more well-known material.  Opening with Bathtub Gin --> Foam seemed to
vindicate that theory.  But the band veered into some less familiar territory
with Dirt, Vultures, My Minds Got a Mind of it's Own and Twist Around.  I
don't know- maybe the songs are well known to most- I've only been to five
shows, and I was still recovering from the I.V.  Jesus Left Chicago, Limb by
Limb and Character Zero rounded out the set.  Solid, but the jams went on a
bit long for my taste, they seemed to be very repetative as opposed to
improvisational.
     The second set Sunday night was definately the highlight of the weekend.
 Julius, Simple, Fluffhead --> Fluff's Travels, Lifebuoy, Taste, Ragtime Gal
and Frankenstein.
I don't think some sort of analysis is necessary here, read the set list, and
you can imagine the show.  Again, I got this set list from the AOL page, and
I'm pretty sure it's a bit inaccurate.  I know My Old Mountain Home was
played on Saturday, and the posted list only lists Fluffhead, not
Fluffhead-->Fluff's Travels.  The encore of Bouncing Around the Room (can't
get tired of that or Simple) and Slave to the Traffic Light was the cherry on
top of Sunday.

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Date: Wed, 06 Aug 1997 16:30:04 +0000
From: patrick chadwick pchad@guaranty.com
Subject: Gorge Shows

Hey

My most hearty recomendation to everyone is that they go see a show at
the Gorge...it's the most incredible venue I have ever seen; imagine
Alpine Valley except take trees and hills out of the background and add
a massive rocky gorge with the beautiful Columbia River rolling through
it...truly incredible. I was happy just laying on the lawn bouncing
around the clouds and checking out the scenery while waiting for the
shows to start...The on-site camping is a complete 24-hour non-stop
melee, probably only half the people go to the show. And it rages all
night long. My only complaint was the lack of ice at the little general
store, but I'm sure they were completely overwhelmed...still, be advised
to pack in everything you need when you go. No cops in sight, and the
staff is nice enough.

Anyhow, the shows...

Sunday

More brutal heat, hard to keep the beer cold, but, as professionals, we
managed...

First set:
Bathtub Gin: Very jammy, and an excellent start.
>Foam: Nice transition, great jam.  
Dirt: Fit in well, this is building up to be a killer show!
Vultures: New one, great stuff...
Mind Gotta Mind Of Its Own: New one I think, not familiar with it if it
isn't, but a great song! I couldn't really understand the lyrics, but it
sounded great to me!
Twist: Rolling along nicely.
Jesus Left Chicago: WOW! The first WOW of the night (but not the last!)
In case anybody wasn't sure just how incredibly talented Page is, this
song would have done it for you. Great bluesy-kinda pi-ana rock thing.
Yeah Page!
Limb by Limb: More newness, good tune:
Character Zero: I love this jam anyway, and everytime I hear it I come
up with new words for the chorus. Great ender...

Second Set:
Julius: Excellent way to kickoff the highlight set of the weekend...it
really appeared the band was having fun and were ready to ROCK!
Simple: Monumental. Such a great live song anyway, and they really
belted it out. Cymbals and saxaphones!!!!!!!!
Fluffhead: Another monumental effort, a monster jam-out that had
eveybody stoked and going crazy. The band was definately on!
Lifeboy: Rocked, everything in this second set was a WOW!
Taste: Slowed down a little, but still massive and sounded excellent.
Ragtime Gal: This totally blew me away...when they put down their
instruments I almost became livid, ready to scream "HEY yer not done
yet!" Then they did a wonderful barbershop of the whole song, much to
the delight of the crowd...then casually gearing up they kicked into the
Big Daddy of the weekend:
Frankenstein: (!!!) HOT DAMN! Edgar Winter would have proudly saluted
this massive cover...they absolutely poured it on, and it's such a great
jam anyway, but they took it to new levels. An excellent choice to cover
and to close a set. After the giant helicopter-landing-on-yer-head part
they exploded back into the groove so hard I thought I was going to fly
back about ten feet. Incredible.

Bouncin: Fish just started hammering out the beat before anyone was
ready it looked like, and everybody was so jazzed after Frankenstein it
was an excellent choice. Cookin!
Slave to the Traffic Light: Tremendous drawn out jammer, an excellent
and fitting end to a great weekend of music.

I think I got the lists straight. Overall, a killer two day affair...the
new songs all sounded pretty good, and everything went fairly smooth.
Hopefully we can get them to play three days next time, or at least play
a show in Eugene then go up to the Gorge for a couple (hint hint!) If
anybody ends up with tapes of this weekend, lemme know. It's definately
tradeworthy!

See you soon.

Patrick
Eugene, OR
pchad@guaranty.com

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Date: Thu, 07 Aug 1997 09:52:11 -0800
From: Darius Zelkha 
Subject: Shoreline/Gorge reviews

After a good night of sleep and listening to the guy in the tent next to
us throw up on the hour, get laughed out by his friends, and then yell
at them before throwing up again (on the hour), we awoke early, made
breakfast, and wondered how they could top last night's show.

Well, we got that answer:  they couldn't do it.  

The second Gorge show was lacking in all departments, unfortunately. 
The GIN opener was a good start, but fizzled as the jam went on.  Just
nothing that interesting happening here, unfortunately.  Too bad they
wasted this tune as the opener; I think if it had come later in the set
it would have had more potential to really get crazy.  

The bassline to FOAM kicked out of the Gin jam (">", no "->").  This was
the highlight of the set, no question: the best goddamned Foam I've
heard.  Some mistakes on the head, but when the jam began, look out. 
Trey's solo began with him using the Leslie effect to create a watery,
Charlie Hunter-esq groove (great!!!), and as he launched into his solo,
the jazz and bluegrass licks came out of the woodwork.  Absolutely
stellar Foam that should be used as filler everywhere.

The third song was a short, seemingly old school instrumental that NO
ONE (and I mean absolutely no one, not even  the net.gurus) could figure
out.  Sounded very old, that's for sure; I'd be very interested to hear
what this tune was and what planet it came from.

The rest of the set sucked, basically, with the exception of the Jesus
Left Chicago that segued ("->") out of the Twist Around jam.  (FWIW, I
think Twist is the worst thing Phish has ever written, period.  I would
rather hear an entire set of Lucy/Carini than Twist.  Absolute SHIT,
IMO.)  The JJLC was just great, with Red House (Jimi) teases from Trey
left right and center.  LIMB by LIMB was good; probably better than the
Shoreline version, with Fishman and Trey decidedly switching up the
groove a bit at times.  I didn't like the CHARACTER ZERO that closed the
set at all; just messy, big rock jamming that didn't go anywhere at all
(and I usually like this song).  Blech.

The first set was weak and uninspired, and everyone knew it.  We had
high hopes for the second set, though, and the JULIUS that opened the
set surely added flames to that fire of hope.  Though I'm aware of the
Dirk420 rule that states that every Julius someone catches live will no
doubt be dubbed the "best Julius ever!", I have no qualms in stating
that this was by far the greatest Julius I've ever heard (I've heard 5
or 6 of them, I think).  The solo section began with a slight change
from previous renditions, as Trey played accompaniment and let Page go
on the organ for a while, which sounded great.  As Trey began his solo,
the licks just kept flying at us; I've never heard Trey nail the Julius
solo so tastefully before.  He was absolutely on fire, as he let the
jazz side of his playing take over and just burn this Julius to the
ground.  A huge build, with rhythmic and melodic themes passing again
and again, and the band returning to the opening theme of the solo
before launching back into the final chorus.  Can't wait to hear this
again.  

SIMPLE had some fresh stuff happening, as the jam wound down into 'Ween
'94 Simple territory before seguing ("->", I think) into FLUFFHEAD. 
Powerful Fluff, but had some minor flubs.  Great to hear, though; first
time played in a while.  The solo guitar outro to Fluff segued (">")
into LIFEBOY, another tune that hasn't been around lately.  Delicate
version, but, unfortunately, severely lacking in the jam department.  No
jam, no build, no nothing.  Extremely disappointing.

The TASTE that followed was the absolute highlight of the show, no
question.  The best version of Taste I've heard; this worked as the
centerpiece of the set, if you can believe that.  The band was
absolutely keyed into each other, and developed several rhythmic motives
that build and tossed and turned Trey's solo section into a full-fledged
jam.  I've heard the Raleigh Taste with lightning, and I will say
without a doubt that this Taste is more jammed out than that one, and
just as musically inspired.  Wonderful.

The rest of the show was very, very disappointing, as there wasn't a jam
tune to be found.  A very long SLAVE salvaged the encore, but couldn't
come close to salvaging the show.

In terms of rating the three shows:

Shoreline:  7.5 -- Some great exploratory jamming, but too many slow
moments in set one.

Gorge I:      7.0 -- Shoreline may have been more exploratory, but this
show was more solid, IMO.  Hardly a dull moment in the first set, and
the entire second set and encore were killer.  While I think most people
will disagree with this, I personally found this show much more
enjoyable than Shoreline, though I will admit that Shoreline was more
"out there".

Gorge II:     4.0 -- Great Foam and a killer Jesus Left Chicago, as well
as an unbelieveable Taste, but that's about it.  No jam tunes, which is
inexcusable these days.

On a personal note, it was really great to finally meet so many fellow
West coast netters.  Eric Burns, Chris Bertolet, Eric Angel, Kim:  Wish
we could've hung out more, but it seemed like finding anyone in the
camping lots was an absolute impossibility.

Some funny stuff that I saw:
- Some guy in the tenth row at the Gorge using binoculars to see the
band.
- Some of the worst bootleg Phish shirts EVER.  People, these are
fucking pathetic!!!  Examples:

Real logo               Phish takeoff
---------               -------------
sTp (motor oil)         yEm        
Jurassic Park logo      "Gamehendge" where it says "Jurassic Park"
Subway                  Sanity (also saw one that said "Runaway")
Maxell audio tape       "Axilla" where it says "Maxell" on the tape, and 
                         "420" where it has the length of the tape.

I'm sorry, but these shirts just have absolutely no hope of working. 
Snapple/Simple works.  Mountain Dew/Morning Dew works.  Camel
Cigarettes/Camel Walk works.  Tide/Glide works pretty well.  Mike's
Song/Star Wars is creative, at least.  But STP/YEM?!?  The only
connection is that both have three letters!  And Subway/Sanity?!?  Are
you kidding?  I couldn't believe that shit was selling.  Pathetic. :)

Seriously, though, I really, really hope that Phish decides to make The
Gorge an annual stop, as I'm sure they could sell out three and four
nights there.  Thanks to Phish, the Gorge, and everyone I met for making
this a great weekend of music (minus the Bouncing encore, of course ;-).

Darius

----------------------------------------------
Join the revolution going on in Gamehendge!
http://www.phish.net/mockingbird/announce.html
----------------------------------------------
darius.zelkha@oberlin.edu

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Date: Fri, 8 Aug 1997 20:47:13 -0700
From: Paul O Scott twillee@juno.com
Subject: The Gorge II  August 3, 1997  George, Washington

Hello again, and welcome to night 2 at the Gorge with Phish.  After a
blistering 102 degree day in Washington on Sunday where everyone was
scampering to find any type of shelter from the evil yellow entity that
we call the sun,  we packed our supplies of water and mind altering
substances to give us some of that energy back that the sun had so
wrongly taken from us, and we headed to the show.

Aug. 3, 1997
The Gorge,  George, Washington
Set 1:

Bathtub Gin:  Great opener , its always good to here a gin and this was
no exception.  Pretty standard gin, got the sunbeaten crowd up on their
feet while the sun was heading downward on the horizon at this beautiful
venue.  Then a fairly nice segue into>

FOAM:  Not paticulary one of my favorite Phish songs but this version
really got me moving.  Great jazzy jamming all the way through this one,
vocals were tight, and Fishman sounded great. then we got something that,
at the time nobody knew what it was.(and maybe still dont)>

Blow Wind Blow?:  This is what Ive seen it called so far,(also have seen
Samson kicked around as well) but nevertheless whatever it was it was I
liked it.  It was a pretty short jazzy instrumental that seemed to have
alot of cohesion to it which leads me to believe that it may be a work in
progress or something, great beat and really kind of a out there spacy
feel to it.

Dirt:  Well this is my second time hearing this song live and like the
first, it still doesnt do much for me.  Its still definetly a bit rusty ,
so maybe it will come around but until then?

Vultures:  Now heres a new song that is going to be a real fan favorite I
think, its definetly one of mine out of the new songs.  This song has a
hard driven guitar riff all the way throughout it, and lots of room for
extended jamming.  Trey went off while playing it, doing those rock star
power chord lunges(which I got a great picture of)he looks like he really
enjoys playing this tune.  All in all it was a good strong entry into the
first set but still a little sloppy.

My Minds got a Mind of its Own:  Great bluegrass energy here, this is
where the set started to pick up, up to this point in the show I must say
I had been a little dissapointed with the song selection thus far.  But
being the brainwashed (by choice) Phish fan that I am, Ill gladly take
whatever they want to throw at me.

Twist Around:  Well, this is my first twist, and I maybe going out on a
limb here but out of all the new songs this is numero uno so far.  Great
bass line, great groove, great jam!  Once again still a bit rusty, but
this one you could see right through the rust.  I loved how they layered
the vocals on the chorous, and the extend jam was very much unexpected. 
Cant wait to here this one again.  The show really started moving from
this point on.  I dont know how they are going to release all of the new
songs but when they do, this one is going to be the hit.  All thumbs up
on this one guys!!

Jesus Left Chicago:  How can you not love Page when he bust out the
Jesus.  Wow, great blues is hard to beat and Phish does great blues. 
Page's solo work was better than a pint of some of that gooey Phish Food,
and Trey's guitar solo as smooth as it gets.  Close to being my set 1
highlight if not for the closer.  Thanks for playin this one!

Limb by Limb:  Another 2nd time around new song but this one got me the
first time I heard it.  This maybe the best new song for pure jamming,
its wide open ready for anything to be inserted in it.  Great to here
this one again.  Its about time that Fishman got a little show off drum
solo.

Character Zero:  Yes Yes,  Get on the Zero bus baby,  this one is going
to new hights and new places.  What a jam, what a set closer.  The best
zero Ive heard bar none.  Great straight out rock and roll jam with lots
of energy.  If you havent come around to the zero yet get this tape and
be converted.  Trey is the guitar God, how many different styles can he
play.  SET 1 HIGHLIGHT!

SET II

Julius:  We love the Julius, and what a great Julius it was.  Wow what a
band.  You dont get it any better that this people.  Just take your best
Julius youve heard and replace it with this one.  Its a definate keeper. 
Perfect opener to what was to be a great set of music.

Simple:  Ah nothing like a skyskraper in the band.  Mike Mike Mike is all
I can say about this one.  I didnt know you could slap a bass guitar that
hard.  Mike was really going off like a bat out of hell on this one, what
intensity on his face, what a sound coming out of that shiny new bass. 
The jam was awesome, I thought it could have went on a little longer, but
then again I think all jams should go on a little bit longer, Im jam
happy what can I say.  Mike has sounded so Great these last 3 shows, lets
here it for MIKE!  Then to my suprise what were we hearing>

Fluffhead:  Woo Hoo, Perfection in everyway, this is the SHOW HIGHLIGHT. 
All I can say is get the tape, once I heard this Fluffhead after the show
I was even more impressed!  FLUFFY FLUFFY HEAD!

Lifeboy:  This song was almost needed after that fluffhead just to slow
down the bloodpressure.  Pretty standard version but great to here live
for the first time.

Taste:  If not for the fluffhead this was next in line,  I really love
where this song goes and goes and goes.  Once again Trey's jamming took
me into outer space and then left me with a few million brain cells less
than I started the song with.  The songs from Billy Breathes are really
starting to come into there own class of Phish tunes live.  They all are
so damn powerful live, I love it.  Keep them coming Phish.

Ragtime Gal:  OH how I hoped for a Freebird when I seen them bring out
the accapella vocal mics.  Could have been tighter but still great.

Frankenstein:  Nice set closer,  Awesome as usuall,  Page is the man on
this song I love the keyboard and guitar duo at the beggining of this
song.  And after Fishmans drum breakdown when Trey does those guitar
trills I cant see how anybodys fingers move that fast, it was perfect. 
What a great Frankenstein

Encore:
1st--Bouncing Around the Room:  Why Phish Why, not for an Encore that has
to be one of the biggest letdowns I have ever had at a Phish show.  Maybe
if you put the BATR on the shelf for about 2 years or so then well like
it for an encore!
2nd--Slave to the Traffic Light:  Well I really wanted to here this song
but after the BATR I dont think that much could have been done to quench
my dissapointment.  But nevertheless this was a really great Slave, nice
mellow jam but I think that an encore doesnt need to be mellow
personally.  Give me a GTBT any day.  But all in all from the shoreline
show to the shows at the Gorge, this band rules.  And having just seen
the fall tour dates with no West Coast shows I can say that I am
completly bummed out.  All I can hope for is Halloween out here please
please.  These shows have some of the Greatest Phish performances Ive
ever seen or heard so make it a priority to get em and listen to them. 
See all you Phreaks next tour(hopefully)

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