Hi everybody and welcome to today's episode of Attendance Bias. I am your host, Brian Weinstein.
When I began this podcast, I didn’t know too much about the key shows of the end of 1.0. The years 1999 and 2000 weren’t exactly lost to me, but it was harder then than it is now to get the most recent recordings. And even if you were lucky enough to get a recording of a recent show at the end of the century–or the beginning of the new one–chances are that the recording didn’t quite capture the intricacies and details that you would need to hear in order to appreciate what the band was playing at the time.
That’s a long way to say that today’s guest–Will Little-shines a ton of light on the technical aspect of what Phish was up to, musically speaking, during the summer, 2000 tour. Will chose to discuss his memories from July 4, 2000 when Phish played the 2nd of two nights at Camden. While many guests on Attendance Bias, and I’m guilty of this as well, focus on the fan perspective of their chosen show, Will focuses mostly on what made the soundscapes and atmospheric playing of 2000 so interesting and compelling. For years, I’ve known that soundboard recordings of this tour were high-level, dense stuff but never had the vocabulary to explain why. I still don’t have the vocabulary, but luckily we have Will here to help out.
And boy, did he pick the right show. July 4, 2000 encapsulates the “2000” sound as well as any other show that year. In fact, the second set is a legendary 5-song second set that opens with a 30-minute Gotta Jibboo. If you’re the type of fan who likes to press play, lay back, listen, and then wonder “how are they doing this?!”, then this is your show and your episode.
If you haven’t figured it out by now, Will is a multi-instrumentalist from the south-east who is typically involved in a number of projects, including longtime Asheville-based band East Coast Dirt, and by the time this episode airs, he’ll be playing with Phish tribute band, “Nectar: A Picture of Phish.” He’ll give more details about his projects once the conversation starts.
So let’s join Will to chat about the the nuance of specialized guitar effects, what the funk siren really is, and whether or not Backwards Down the Number Line is a great Phish song as we break down July, 2000 in Camden.