Sounds Phishy

Here's the thing about Phish, at least for me. I like them in theory. That is, I like the idea of Phish, since they seem like cheerful young men who don't take themselves too seriously and sometimes bounce on a trampoline in concert. The trampoline thing might be going a little too far, but in general, I approve.

Except for the music. I've heard some Phish, and I generally find it kind of meandering and not all that tuneful. That's one of the risks of listening to a "jam band," but even when they're playing songs, they're usually not songs I really get into. I like a lot of Phish performances, but they're pretty much all crazy cover songs. Like that time they covered all of the Beatles's White Album including Revolution #9. That was awesome. If Phish just stuck to the goofing off and didn't do the core stuff, I'd be way into them.

Well, and then there's the fans. I've got nothing against hacky-sack, in its place, but when you combine it with the patchouli and the pot, it all creates a gestalt that I find very tiring. Plus, I think there are two types of Phish fans. And no, I shall not be spelling that with a "ph". On the one hand, you've got people who have liked Phish forever. They're the ones you used to see with the stopwatch timing the longest note at each concert. Clearly, they are nerds. And I support nerdism in almost all of its forms. But then there are a lot of Phish fans that just started following Phish because the Grateful Dead ended and they needed a new marijuana-friendly band to follow around the country.

I'm a little suspicious of that last group. It seems like the band doesn't matter, that what they really like is driving around the country smoking pot and doing that weird dance. And I'm not saying they can't do that, but I'm not sure that they even need a band. Wouldn't they save a lot of money if they didn't have to buy tickets? And what happens if Phish stops touring? Eventually they'll run out of bands with the right vibe, and then they'll have to follow Mariah Carey or something. It's just that I have a hard time taking seriously someone who enthuses about how uniquely magical the energy is at a Phish show when a few years ago they were enjoying that same unique magic somewhere else. It's almost as if the drugs were the important part of the process.

This entry was going to be a response to Dan on Pamie's blog, but it seemed kind of long, so I realized I could steal it and put it on my own site. It seemed a little long to go as a comment, but now it seems a little short to be its own entry. I could go on about some of the wacky covers Phish has done and how no matter what it may sound like, I don't really have anything against them. But I already covered that in the first paragraph, so I figure if you forgot that already, there's no hope for you. Really, I'm just filling time at this point.