, attached to 1998-07-20

Review by n00b100

n00b100 It's hard not to like a set that gets started with a 20 minute Bathtub Gin; this Gin really hits a sweet groove halfway through, Trey alternating between mellifluous soloing and his usual rock-god tone and Mike laying down some really thick baselines, before the jam shifts into raucous funk mode and then cools out and finds its way back home. The rest of the set is just a set (although the Poor Heart is quite amusing - one almost imagines Trey limping off the stage draped in a cape), until the closing SOAM, a super-cool version that lopes along before Trey really pours on the nastiness in the second half of the jam. That's a lot of quality jamming to offer from a first set.

The second set's setlist is outright ridiculous, and though the band's performance doesn't quite live up to it, they still put on a damn good performance. Drowned doesn't leave its usual song structure, but the jam is molten lava, with Mike and Page's exceptional support work a real treat. As the jam cools down, Trey starts ripping off some trills, and we enter effects land before segueing into Makisupa, which does its Makisupa thing before the band whips up a thrillingly ambient coda (shades of the post-Walk Away jam from Fukuoka) and Fishman starts up Maze. Maze absolutely rips, Page shining with his solo work before moving over, Rover, and letting Trey take over (sorry, that sounded a lot better in my head), and then as Maze wraps up Page immediately rolls into Sea and Sand, and it's a sweet version, as perfectly placed as NYE '95's version. Caspian and Hood are nice listens, but the set's peak has already passed. Then comes the 20 minute encore - Fishman warbling through a charming, if insanely sloppy version of Sexual Healing (was it so hard to learn how to play the bridge?), and a Halley's Comet that hits one more relaxed funk groove (very, very gently suggesting the 11/22/97 definitive version at times) before a very cool ending where a digital delay loop plays as every instrument drops out, leaving the loop to close the show.

@MiguelSanchez sums it up quite nicely - the Gorge and Shoreline are more well known (rightly so with the Gorge show, of course), but this show has a dream second set setlist and some super jams, meaning that it should not be missed.


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