Relisten

2:43:22
SBD
Taper:
Jedtainment
Transferrer:
Jedtainment
SHNID:
jed2025-02-22
Source:
SBD>WAV
Lineage:
WAV>FLAC
Taper Notes:
View NotesIt's year sixteen for Phish Bowl and Clueless Wallob returns to rock a brand new venue! This is always one of Jed's most anticipated shows of the year and with good reason - it has so much to offer! As always there are two sets of Phish tunes along with the fanfare of the championship, the trophy presentation and the now traditional live halftime show too! But this year one thing is different. Jed and the gang constructed a beautiful new stadium and named it Lexie Luan Memorial Arena in honor of their dear departed friend and musician. So Phish Bowl XVI is both a time honored tradition and an exciting new inauguration!

The show kicks off with its usual exciting intro, followed by the singing of the National Anthem complete with flyover and fireworks. From the cacophony emerges the show opener "Down With Disease" which the band immediately sinks their teeth into with a nice jam. Kenny Kaufman takes the mic next and treats us to some "Gumbo," followed by "Sand." It produces the first type II jam of the evening which find it's way into a beautiful rendition of "Waste" led by Mark Mattson on piano and vocals. After a brief word about Lexie Luan, it's back to the music with a Clueless Wallob debut of "Fuego" which also produces a nice jam that segues into an extra funked up version of "Tube." A nice rocking version of "46 Days" closes out the set and produces the halftime winner in the box pool.

The halftime show features popular Second Life vocalist Sarita Twisted doing a medley of Pink songs (in honor of lexie Luan who's color and album title was pink). Sarita blows the roof off the joint (well, if there was a roof), and her amazing performance is of course followed by the Phish Bowl Trophy presentation, which was awarded to August 17th, 2024 at Mondegreen in Dover Delaware, becoming the first Phish festival to take home the prize.

Second set opens with a doozy...the newer Phish tune and another Wallob debut "A Wave Of Hope" which the band extends to nearly eighteen minutes, with the help of Pete Martine driving beats on the drum kit. When it's finally over, "Free" emerges nicely from the jam. Up next is another new one for the band, "Hey Stranger" which is a great non jammy addition to the repertoire. But there's still plenty of jamming left to do as illustrated by the "Simple" and "Lonely Trip" combo which comes next. Mark takes the mix one more time for a juicy "Wolman's Brother," before Jed leads the band into the final play, another Wallob debut "Say It To Me SANTOS" which is a super fun way to end the set and award the fourth quarter box pool grand prize. A short "Suzy Greenberg" encore puts an exclamation point on the game.

It's hard to believe this has been going on for 16 years, and even harder to believe that it just keeps getting better, but truly this is a fantastic event, with the band firing on all cylinders, delivering a great mix of classics, new tunes and hot jams, along with an incredible halftime act, all the fun trimmings of the Phish Bowl narration and soundtrack AND a beautiful new virtual stadium which is hopefully going to host many more Phish Bowls! Definitely give this a listen, especially if your a phan, but even if your not! Enjoy!