Pholktales.

Phish General
#1

For my acting class we had to write a story that changed our life for someone to use as a monologue, this is what i wrote about…I dont know if i already told part of this story on here, but this is the whole story. Use this thread to tell your Phish story!

I found out Phish was breaking up and I had to go to the last concert, because they are my favorite band! I bought my ticket even though I had no one to go with, I’d find someone to go with later. It turned out none of my friends were going, so I tried to at least find some kind of ride there. My friend Rich said I could go with his friends, but that ended up falling though. I only had 2 days left to find a ride, and my friend Courntey helped me too. She called everyone she knew who listened to Phish. My last resort was going on the internet to a Phish ride board. I found one, but it left from Schnectady, which is 3 hours away, on the morning the festival began. Courntey drove me there, because she knew that I needed to be at Phish’s last show.
The kid I got a ride with was pretty cool. He also went to Ithaca and knew some kids I knew. He bought me a bike for 5 dollars at a garage sale on the way to Vermont because he knew we would have to bike in because there was too much traffic. We were stopped and had to park on the highway 8 miles away from Coventry .A pick up truck drove us 5 miles so we biked the last three. There were so many other fans walking in. It was a huge exodus to see our favorite band play for the last time.
As we arrived on the scene, the show was about to start. But first I had to put my stuff somewhere. I also figured i’d ask around for a ride back to Ithaca, where I started out. I found these kids right outside the venue and asked them if i could put my stuff down and if they knew anyone who could give me a ride back when the weeeknd was over. This boy, Keegan told me he could bring be back, so I decided to hang around with these kids for the weekend. The seemed like nice people.
By the second day I got to know them pretty well. Before second set we all ate mushrooms together. As I stared at the sky I started to feel uneasy. Then I started to doubt myself and every decesion i’ve ever made in my life. Why did i take drugs? Who are these people? I don’t know what to say to them? I’m such a freak and I don;t know what to do. I was cold. then I was hot, my entire being was breaking before me. Then the music came on. And the glowsticks went flying. I remembered why I was here. To see my favorite band’s show and most importantly to have fun! Nothing else mattered, these people weren’t judging me, they were here for the same reason! Even though I just met the kids I was hanging around with, they were my friends and the thought me the same. Then I stumbled upon some kind of meaning of life, that we’re all here together, and we have to take care of eachother and that nobody knows the meaning of life anyway so just have a good time and enjoy it and don’t care what others think, because they know just as much as you! That night I walked away with a new sense of being, and I truly knew who I was from that point on, it was the same kid I’ve always been!

#2

My Pholktale,

ONE WEEK before conventry i started listening to phish.

i’m still crying.

#3

I’ve got a pretty funny pholktale.
I was way into Phish at this point, but I had never actually gotten the urge to jump up and dance to their music. Sure I’d air guitar/air drum/whatever, sing along, and nod my head/tap my feet. But I was never so moved that I had to get up and dance.
That was before I heard Live Phish 17 for the first time. I will always have a special connection with this show because in listening to the second disc I felt like I was finally understanding another part of the Phish experience. I was getting way into the music but it was the segue from Tweezer into Free that made me finally get up. As the song suddenly shifted into full on funk jamming I could not stop myself. I have never danced like that before or since, but my body was suddenly moving in ways I didn’t know it could. I think I did some kind of modified handstand at some point. At any rate I was completely unself consciously moving and reacting to the music as I heard it.
As the song finally ended I was out of breath and wanted some water. Just as I turned toward my door I saw my dad standing in the doorway smiling like an asshole. I don’t even remember what we said to each other but I had never felt more embarassed in my life. Yes, even more embarassed than the time my mom forced me to watch her put a condom on a banana so I would “know how to do it when the time comes.”

1 Like
#4

terrible

#5

sometimes we learn too much from you greg.
But I’ve had a few embarrasing moments like that, when my parents have walked in on me totally enveloped in the music (dancing, singing, waving my arms around like a douche)

#6

Very cool story FunkyB. How did the class respond to hearing all that? Did a lot of them know of The Phish already?

#7

i don’t know yet, my class is tonight. so we’ll see

#8

That was a great read funky. In the least clich

#9

Good story. for my english class last month i had to write about a piece of art (Painting, sculpture, music…) that inspired/moved me. so i wrote about the Bathtub Gin from The Great Went… i can never stop talking about it… i talked about how moving it is to me and how it means even more since the first time i heard it was when i was told the horrible news that my gpa passed away. Some PBR and a great bathtub, and you’re ready to deal with anything… so basically since then, that song has a pretty important meaning to me. and that’s why i rant and rave about it all the time.

#10

Phishtails… hmmm… I’m sure this has happened to others, esp tourheads but on many occasions I’d go to a show alone and wind up bumping into friends. I guess I always found that cool since out of thousands of people you find your buddies… if you wanted to find them you probably couldn’t! Now some cases were more freakish than others, I mean if a friend is hanging around the gates then thats a no-brianer but there have been some more interesting meetings. One in particular was at the WENT and I ran into two people at different times in the midst of that sea of people. Oddly enough I was not thrilled to see either of these folks… cosmic joke I suppose. I kinda wish I wasn’t so spun at this show, can’t remember crap. They played a great Gin?? Ah balls I don’t remember.

The ultimate was not at a phish show but Woodstock 94… here was a big show yo… 100,000+??? Alot of peeps… well it was quite the adventure getting in, meeting strange ladies, dumping the car 20 miles outside the gates, taxi and hoofing it a little and then just as I enter the grounds the first people I see are high school buddies… they’re like “Heeeey!” and crack a beer open for me as they try to get passing ladies to give us cheap shows mardi gras style… In my head I was just flamboozled.

Crap I should try to think of a good phish story but none are coming to mind except balls of light bouncing off school busses at night.

#11

yo icc- if you were walking in on saturday afternoon that could have have been me you saw.

and goldphish- i love running into people at shows. When I saw Tea Leaf Green in the city, i had kind of a shitty day that day and I wanted someone to go with, but i couldn’t find anyone. But as soon as I got there all these kids i knew were tapping me on the back. one of the coolest nights ever.

and by the way- the girl who read my piece in class did a decent job. and my teacher enjoyed the mushroom part.

#12

I have been VERY fortunate to be able to see Phish as many times as I did. They played at my highschool in 91 and all I remember was hearing that they bounced on Tramps and the Drummer played the Vacuum.
Well, I guess you all know what happened. That was it for me, it was like seeing the ocean for the first time, or being in love, I was completely and utterly BLOWN AWAY. Sooooo…
The funniest thing I saw at a show… not sure if this is the funniest but I was at Great Woods and they were in the middle of McGrupp and the Watchful Hosemasters. Right when they hit the line “I’d like to get his autograph, but he looks too much like Dave.” a guy ran by me with a small piece of paper with the name DAVE on it and shoved it in my face and said “Dave??” and then he ran off.
It was hilarios because of the timing.
I miss the little things like that.

#13

^
I miss them too, here’s one…

I’ve been teaching for twelve years and for the most part, my musical interests have not really connected with my students. But back in the 98/99 school year I had a student who was into Phish because of his older brothers. We used to chat about shows I had been to and our tape collections. It was just talk but he’d always end the conversation by saying, ‘When I finally get to a show, we’ll meet up and have some fun.’ I always responded in kind but never thought it would happen. Admittedly, part of me was a bit uncomfortable about crossing paths. Trying to keep the personal and professional lives separate.

Anyway, Fall 99 rolls around and this student had gotten himself into some trouble (not sure why) and he spent a week in ISS (In School Suspension). I stopped by one day to give him work for my class and he’s got this huge grin on his face and his eyes are glassy looking…almost maniacal. I asked him if he was okay. He reaches into his jacket pocket and fans out tickets to the four New York shows for that October (Nassau and Albany) and belts out, “I saw you…with the ticket stub in your hand.” I almost lost it. The supervising teacher reprimands him and gives me a look of disapproval. I nodded to him and walked out.

I saw John in Albany that October as well as the two December shows in Philly and two of the NYE run shows at MSG.

I got a letter from him Tuesday. He finished his B.A. in English last spring and is back in school studying for his M.S. to become an English teacher. Weird.

#14

At Coventry, there was this dude camping by my buddies and me and he was all alone. He had flown in from Seattle and rented a car and was clearly stuck in all the muck. Anyway, he was there on Friday night and slept in his car but left it running and sure enough, he ran out of gas and was really stuck. He called AAA and they brought him some gas. The next night after the first show, he did the same thing but didn’t start the car so his battery died. AAA came again and jumped him and he was okay. Sure enough, the last night rolls around and he does the same damn thing. He was still there when we left Monday afternoon, waiting for AAA to bring him some gas. We offered to sipher him some be he was clearly in no rush. He had spent the whole weekend except for the shows themselves in his car alone, even during the day. To each his own I guess.

#15

This is a great story. Sometimes the briefest encounters have such a lasting impact on us. It’s really what makes life so meaningful.

Thanks.

#16

I was an art major in high school. The teachers in the art department were cool, they wore jeans and birkenstocks and tie dye shirts year round. Our art classes were in the shop wing, so all you could hear were machines running over in wood and metal shop. The kids in my class hated the noise, so they asked the teach if they could bring in a boombox. The teacher was cool with it, and actually brought one in to leave in the classroom for all his classes. He said it was good to get our creative juices flowing.

I should say first off that I’m deaf, but not totally deaf - I can hear music with hearing aids. I can’t always make out the words, but I sure as hell get it when they jam. You know all you need to do is feel it cuz with Phish you know it’s not about the words, it’s about the music.

So anyway I’m sitting there trying to draw a piece of fruit or something stupid like that and this song comes on. Five or six kids start dancing like crazy. I look at the kids and think “what the f…k” My teacher looks at me with the same expression. One of the kids says “Don’t you get it? Can’t you hear it?” They were looking at me like they felt so sorry for me. They cranked it up and moved the boombox over near me.

I closed my eyes and it took about 20 seconds before I got it. It helped that there were kids going nuts around me. It was September 1991. By the end of the year, we were all crazy over Phish, including the teacher who went on to become a major phan. The last I heard, he’d been to over 100 concerts. By the time I went off to college, I had gotten into a different crowd and stopped listening to Phish. (Yeah, I know, how the hell did I do that?)

I started again when I graduated from college. I graduated from college in western NY. I moved out to California after graduation and worked a lot of crazy hours in human services then in the movie industry. I spent a lot of time alone or with cool people. Cali people are the best at what they do - hang out, smoke, and listen to music. I got really into it.

Then I moved back to NY and started working again in the corporate world and it kind of died down until I got back into human services. I know it makes no sense, but when you can’t be who you are at work it makes a difference in what you do at home. When I heard Phish was seriously disbanding, I tried to get out to see them in June 2004 and also at Coventry, but I couldn’t get off from work. I was pretty upset, but I think it’s better this way cuz the last time I went to see them, the world was a different place - and I like remembering the way it was.

That song, by the way, was Divided Sky, 4/21/91 Potsdam. If I went back and listened to it now, it wasn’t that great. The only really good thing on that was Weekapaug Groove. But it was the most amazing thing I’d ever heard up to that point and it got me hooked!

#17

One of the greatest things is that everyone of us has that initial moment when we hear it for the first time. And I really mean HEAR it, whether it is the first note that you everhear or the amazing YEM and your brain says…Wait a minute…this is killer!

I was at the Clifford ball between sets during the day, I told my friends I was going to go the bathroom and I would be back in a second. I walked through the crowd, who were mostly sitting down and hanging out and every 50 yards or so I would hear a whistle or a yell and there would be someone from my past who I had not seen in years. We would embrace and laugh and then part and then it would happen all over again 50 yards later.
It was always such a great feeling. Good vibes and good people

#18

I remember clearly the day i fell in love with Phish.

My husband had been a head since before I met him ( which was during hiatus) and kept playing them in the car, much to my dismay. i never could “get it”, but he swore to me that if only I could see them live… everything would click and there would be no turning back. He was right. a couple of months later I was on Phish.com( trying to gain an intrest in something that meant do much to my then boyfriend) and saw that the hiatus was over. Brian was asleep at the time and I thought that that would be the perfect news to wake him up with. I told him and I still don’t think I’ve ever seen him that happy or in disbelief.

needless to say we got tix to all three nights of hampton, and that first night when the lights when down and the crowd erupted, it finally clicked. The happiness and excitement in that place was infectuous,and I had never been in a crowd of people that large, that was that chill. the music atarted and i just couldn’t stop dancing. the second night they did Possum and the whole plave was shaking!

I grinned at brian and he gave me this all-knowing grin like …" See I told you…" and I’ve been hooked since then.

#19

I never heard their music but bought a ticket on a whim (this is back in 91 or 92) and I was blown away at the show. I’ve been hooked ever since.

#20

Not about Phish but Trey Band…

The second day red rocks 02’ My bro and I get seats 4th row. We are listening and dancing all night and then Trey breaks into Sand. I got so into it I started doing this weird dance and closing my eyes. When I opened them I looked at the stage and Trey was looking at me laughing and started doing the same thing. I got so suprized that I started to stand still.

God I miss stuff like that.