Phish: Encyclopedia II - Phish - The Beginning

Phish - The Beginning

Phish was formed in 1983 at the University of Vermont by guitarists Trey Anastasio and Jeff Holdsworth, bassist Mike Gordon, and drummer Jon Fishman. In 1985, Page McConnell joined on keyboards. A year later, in 1986, Jeff Holdsworth left the group after graduation, thus solidifying the band's classic lineup, which remained unchanged for the rest of their career.

In Phish's nascent stages, the band wrote complex progressive rock fugues and mixed them with intense improvisation. These were developed in early practice sessions that have become legendary: On at least three occasions, the band locked themselves in a practice room for up to fifteen hours, under the influence of psychedelic mushrooms and marijuana. These "Oh Kee Pa Ceremonies" were the product of listening to each member and reacting through a constant flow of musical communication, and provided the basis for the band's later, more elaborate practice rules such as "filling the hey hole." In essence, Phish created their own form of improvisation, with a set of rules, goals, and listening exercises.

In mid-1986, Anastasio and Fishman transferred -- under the persuasion of McConnell, who received $50 cash for each transferee -- to a smaller school named Goddard College, located in the hills of Plainfield, Vermont (Gordon remained at the University of Vermont). In mid-1986, Phish distributed at least six different experimental self-titled cassettes, one of which is sometimes referred to as The White Tape. The recording contained mostly avant-garde experimental pieces, long instrumental passages, electronic noise, and studio trickery, along with four standard full-band tracks. The most circulated version of the compilation travelled in tape-trading circles for over a decade before being officially released in 1998.

In late-1986, the group began working with luthier Paul Languedoc, who built custom guitars and basses. Languedoc designed instruments for Anastasio and Gordon, as well as speakers, and was officially hired as the band's sound engineer on October 15, 1986, at a show at Hunt's Bar in Burlington, Vermont. Because he had built the instruments and the speakers, Languedoc had complete control over the sound of the live Phish experience from very early on, resulting in high-quality concert sound for the remainder of the band's career.

The band's second studio experiment was a concept album written by Trey Anastasio entitled The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday. The recording was Trey's senior project statement at Goddard College in the spring of 1987. Elements of the story have comprised no less than 13 songs, only 7 of which were featured on the actual recording. The band played the complete album from top to bottom on only five occasions (in 1988, 1991, 1993, and twice in 1994). The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday, also known as "Gamehendge," became a "legend" among Phish's growing subculture, with a variety of interpretations[2].

By 1988, Phish was developing a dedicated following in the Northeastern United States that followed the band from show to show. In 1988, the group packed into their van and drove across the country to Colorado, only to find that the promoter had cancelled the shows. Phish went across the street and played another club throughout the week. Few people attended, but many of them taped the concerts, and distributed their recordings throughout the area. Two years later, Phish returned to Colorado, and found that almost every show had sold out by word of mouth. This process enabled Phish's fan base to grow without involving the mainstream media.

Also in 1988, Phish recorded a double studio album entitled Junta, which contained long, classical/progressive compositions that sought to explore and extend the boundaries of rock music.

On January 26, 1989, Phish played the Paradise Rock Club in Boston, Massachusetts. The owners of the club had never heard of Phish and refused to book them, so Phish rented the place out themselves. The owners were stunned to see a huge line of people wrapped around the street trying to get in. The show had sold out due mostly to the caravan of Phish fans that had traveled to see the band.

Much of the sensation of drama and intensity of the live concert experience was a result of lighting designer Chris Kuroda, who first worked with the band in April 1989. Kuroda used an array of lights and lasers to accompany the music, which gave the effect that he was jamming with the band. He learned every composed section of each song, and designed light-based reactions to fit each note. When the band improvised, Kuroda improvised. He was such a large part of the Phish concert experience that in the late 1990s, a group of fans lobbied to have Kuroda recognized as an official member of the band (fans have likened simply listening to a Phish concert on tape or CD as the equivalent of watching a movie with your eyes closed).

By late 1990, Phish concerts were becoming more and more involved. The band made a consistent effort to involve the audience in their performances. The group developed a special "secret language" where the audience would react in a certain manner based on a musical cue from the band (for instance, if Anastasio played a bar of The Simpsons theme song, the audience would yell, "D'oh!," imitating lead character Homer Simpson). Another favorite was "All Fall Down," where the band would play a descending group of notes and the audience would fall on their backs to the floor. Around this time, Phish introduced the "Big Ball Jam," which began with each band member throwing a large beach ball into the audience. Each time a particular ball was hit, the corresponding band member played a note, so in essence, the audience was performing and creating a composition on the spot.

Drummer Jon Fishman would often play a vacuum cleaner like a woodwind instrument, and the group would switch instruments to the left one member at a time in an experiment called the "Rotation Jam." Another of Phish's performance antics involved Gordon and Anastasio jumping on mini-trampolines in the middle of a song entitled You Enjoy Myself, doing synchronized maneuvers on the trampoline while playing their instruments.

The group also experimented with tension and release jamming, in which a jam would "bubble up" and condense itself into a tight, usually off-key musical corner, and then explode back to the main theme. Some fans found that this technique might make the concert experience more energized and frantic than other bands of similar genre, such as The Allman Brothers Band or The Grateful Dead.

In 1991, Elektra Records became aware of the band's growing popularity, and signed the band after attending one of their concerts. In 1992, their major label debut, A Picture of Nectar, was released, with far more extensive production than Junta from 1988 and Lawn Boy from 1990, which were re-released on Elektra as well.

In 1992, John Popper of Blues Traveler organized the first annual H.O.R.D.E. festival (Horizons of Rock Developing Everywhere). The lineup included Phish, The Spin Doctors, Blues Traveler, Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, Col. Bruce Hampton and the Aquarium Rescue Unit, and Widespread Panic, providing Phish with their first national tour of major amphitheaters. That summer, the band toured Europe with the Violent Femmes and later toured both Europe and the United States with guitarist Carlos Santana.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "The Beginning", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki