7/2/95  Sugarbush Summer Stage, Fayston, VT (Ellis Goddard)

	Show review: Started off with a Bang! :)  Trey stuck his tongue
out at the audience as Sample started to rip; funny sight, but led to some
random (and not so random) interpretations among the audience.  Then, just
before he started to rip, he's holding his hands near his waste but
motioning towards the crowd.  First, some folks in front start raising
their hands; with his palms facing up, Trey wiggles his fingers in unison,
as if to say "Lift em up, put em up, your hands: raise em, folks!"  More
hands go up, the crowd's really moving, Gamehendgedness is in the air, and
he starts moving, instead of his fingers, his whole hands, just a bit, up
and down, but higher than his waist now, as if to say, "Higher. Put em up
higher. I wanna see em. We're gonna ROAR!"  The crowd frenzy intensifies,
all sorts of hands are up, heads are spinning, the air is moving. Just as
a surge of hands goes up, toward the front, in the middle, Trey nods
slowly, to the beat, a lush grin stretching across his face, his hands go
back to the guitar, and BAM!  We're off from the Sugarbush Summer Stage
and headed to better times! No better way to follow that, IMHO, than with
Divided Sky.  Gumbo united the pace, bowls started up, and everything was
just a little smokier (ahem :) when Curtain wheeled us into full-fledged
homeland.  Julius: bam! Camel Walk: whoa, wow! Reba: yes.  I Didn't Know:
well, I did.  Rift: shazam!  While My Guitar: don't let it end, keep
going, skip the break!
	Actually, the break was nice.  I ran to the bathroom. :)  Also met
some girls (6? 7? 8 years old?) giving away "I support King Street"
stickers for small change; apparently the show was a benefit of sorts for
King Street, an after-school program, but the young with-stickers girls,
cute nonetheless, had trouble
explaining it.  (I suppose that was a lot to ask of a trio of young kids
in a crowd of x-tens-of-thousands, but I was in Curious Mode.)
	The second set and encore speak for themselves: great setlists,
and I want to hear the tapes again before I comment on delivery, esp.
since I was soaring from the first set and just having a grand ole time,
so my laudatoriness may be inflated unnecessarily. ... Nah! :)  Great
show! 
	Venue/Security/Event staff:  Big yahoo cheers and beams for
Sugarbush!  Sure, it took a few hours to bus people out, but there's no
way around that. (is there?) I found things well organized, obviously with
much time invested in planning.  The 30+ yellow school buses (ala day
camp: c'mon kids, let's go have some fun! :) were great.  It wasn't the
venue or staff that were the problem here, despite some reports, but the
concertgoers: going in through the windows and back doors, pushing them
well beyond capacity.  They aggravated many drivers, literally fought one
to keep the door open, and some punches were thrown. Big fat ugly errr! :(
No excuse; it simply did nothing but slowed things down.  There were ropes
& posts at the South lot the second afternoon; that was a good plan, to
separate people from the buses; should've used them at both lots on both
days.
	People were also out of control at the venue: hundreds at a time
over, under, and through the "fence" (a vain plastic attempt at border
control), even more on Monday.  Then, the fireworks during the start of
the simple encore the last night; nice effects, but out of hand!
	Steve, the local DJ, was great, announcing that "we know there are
more people here than the number that bought tickets, and that	Lot Scene:
I sort of hoped to get some food from a vendor, but the small number that
were prepped for the north lot were sold out before we even left the
venue.  The wait for the buses only mattered to me because I was *sooo*
hungry from boogying *sooo* hard. :)
 
-------------------------------------- 
7-2-95 Sugarbush Setlist/Review

Set 1: (1:17)

Sample (:5), Divided Sky (:7), Gumbo (:5), The Curtain (:7), Julius (:8),
Camel Walk! (:6), Reba* (:13) -> I Didn't Know (:4), Rift (:5), While My
Guitar Gently Weeps (:7)

Set 2: (1:14)

Runaway Jim (:20) -> Makisupa Policeman (:8) -> Scent (:14), Tweezer (:8)
-> Ha-Ha-Ha (:3) -> Sleeping Monkey (:5), Acoustic Army (:4), Slave (:12)

Encore:

Haley's Comet (:4), Tweezer Reprise (:4)

* no whistling

Getting into this show was a nightmare. My two friends and I had tickets
for both nights and thus arrived to Sugarbush North at 11:30am Sunday to
tried and grab one of the 1500 camping sites. Unfortunately, we were met
with a line of around 300 cars sitting at a stand-still for what turned
out to be about two and a half hours. Everyone made the most of sitting in
the line, there were people throwing disc, looking for extras, and soaking
in the sun. The most interesting event of the afternoon was a van got
busted with _seven_ nitrous tanks!! Talk about getting a little greedy and
overzealous . . . The line would have taken much longer, but many cars
were turned back because they didn't have tickets for both nights. The
security really didn't make that clear until you reached the front of the
line. Once we got up to the base of the mountain, it was a free-for-all
for camping sites. There were no plots, persay, the first couple hundred
cars parked and camped in the lot, and the rest parked and camped in
various places on the mountain (manyh people with four-wheel drive were
_way_ up the mountain.)

Anyway, onto the show. The venue was beautiful, just a big, open, ski
slope with a stage at the base. I was in the middle of the lower section
of the slope, not that close, and the sound was not incredible. I imagine
that people in the back had to strain to hear some of the quieter tunes
and jams. They opened up the show with Sample, which I was actually
psyched to hear because I realized that I wouldn't hear it again for
several months ;-) A lackluster Divided Sky followed, the boys paused for
at least one or two minutes in the middle, which not only bothered the
crowd, but also broke up the flow of the song. A good version of Gumbo
followed, they definitely seem to be increasing the frequency of this
tune. A jamming version of The Curtain came next which really caught me by
surprise and got me into the first set. I don't remember much about
Julius, but I don't think that it was exceptional. However, Camel Walk
was! Boy, do I get psyched when they play genuinely good songs that they
haven't busted out in a while! This song has a cool beat and bass line and
caught _everyone_ by surprise. I heard about twenty snippets of
conversations like, "I don't think they've played that since '89! Maybe
even '88!!" An amazing Reba came next, a tune that I think has really
improved over '94 and summer '95. It's a song that I don't usually wish
for, but am always blown away by. I Didn't Know was nice, it seemed a
little slower than usual though. Rift was standard, and a great While My
Guitar Gently Weeps closed the set. Not a phenomenal set, but it got the
crowd in the mood for an unbelieveable second set.

As I was listening to this set, as various times, I declared it the best
set of Phish music I had ever heard live. I stick to that, but after the
second night of Sugarbush, I realize that it's a very tough call to make.
The Runaway Jim that opened the set was fucking out of this world! It was
twenty minutes long, kept an up-tempo almost all the way through, and
completely demolishes any of the shorter pre-95 versions. I actually
danced, all 20 minutes! It was beautiful, and then a flawless segue into
Makisupa Policeman, a tune which had the audience cheering and grooving to
the reggae beat. Trey said "4:20", and then "Dank!" which the crowd loved.
To whoever asked about 4:20, all I know is that's the time that you're
supposed to stop whatever you're doing and smoke a bowl. Not sure where it
originated, but waiting in line on Monday, we celebrated the bi-daily
holiday :-) Scent of a Mule was another great selection; Page destroyed
Trey with his solo, and Trey barely responded. I think he conceded that
round. Tweezer followed, and it suprised me by being a rather average
version at only 8 minutes. It was tight, but Trey quickly segued to
Ha-Ha-Ha (a tune I still haven't enjoyed after three renditions) and from
there to a stirring Sleeping Monkey. I like this tune so much that I
barely realized that it's kind of a cheesy ballad, and tends to mellow the
audience out a lot. Acoustic Army followed and was fine, but difficult to
hear where I was standing. After seeing it twice, I definitely think it
should be mic'ed more, and played _longer_. I thought this might end the
set, but instead, they closed with Slave!! A great version, and a tune
I've wanted to hear since I bought the DLCD. This is just a wonderfully
composed, beautiful song and put the cap on an incredible set.

The Encore was a great Haley's Comet, I definitely can't get enough of
this tune, and a perfectly fitting Tweezer Reprise. The Tweezer was short
enough that all my friends and I were excited to get another taste at the
end.

Not much more to say except get this show if you can. I'd love to run a
tree of both Sugarbush nights, but I don't have a DAT for D>A or D>D.
Anyone? Anyone?

Take it easy, and look for a review of Monday shortly following,

Zach