I went Friday and Saturday. I regret not going Sunday.

Both shows I saw were fantastic and exceeded any expectations I had. However, I would give the edge to Saturday as better than Friday. Page may end up as Phish 3.0's MVP. He was better than he's ever been.

All in all, the band sounded better than they have since probably 1999 or so.

I'm going to try to go to the Alpine Valley shows. Loved listening to the Hampton shows the last few days.

Not that it's a surprise, but...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090309/...sh_fan_arrests

What is surprising is that this hasn't been posted yet!

Picture of the Red Roof Inn after the Saturday show

Way to keep violent criminals off the streets!

Jesus. I'm glad I stayed in Williamsburg. I'm too old/sober to handle that.

amazing weekend. i'd have to rank the shows 1-3-2, but they were all amazing. there was just no duplicating the feeling on night 1 when the lights went down. SO glad to have been there.

if anyone is interested, i got a ton of good pics. nights 2 and 3 being the best.

Night 1, Part 1:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...651454&l=e4e1d

Night 1, Part 2:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...651454&l=54201

Night 2, Part 1:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...651454&l=6e68a

Night 2, Part 2:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...651454&l=370f3

Night 2, Part 3:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...651454&l=ad389

Night 3:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?ai...651454&l=ec8eb

Holy shit, mkdevo! The wifflewook that you took pictures of crushed the styrofoam cooler of the people parked next to us and fell into our camping chairs. He was hilariously fucked up. He was only with our group for about 20 minutes (no, none of us knew him) and was quite destructive. We ended up trying to trade him to passers-by for a Sunday ticket. ("This wook for your Sunday.") No takers though.

ha! he came up to us on saturday and said in the faintest, slowest voice ever, "you... guysssss.... got.... one?.............. jusssssst one......". he then proceeded to join the wiffle ball game going on across from us, which provided us with some entertainment. i shot video of it for like 5 minutes, because it was hilarious, but not really worth keeping.

i'm working on all my (HD) video from the weekend now. i got a ton.

We ran into him on Saturday as well. We were parked right in front of the convention center.

Before the "This wook for your Sunday" shenanigans my group pulled, the guy with the smashed cooler he crushed stood up, put his arm around him, and began to yell at passers-by, "Hey, who dosed my little brother? Who the hell dosed my brother?" Everyone in the area was laughing hysterically. Then the wook started saying as loudly and coherently as he could, "Please dose his little brother!" Then, he fell down.

I didn't go to Hampton, but I'd put NYE '02 up against that.

Here's a bunch of photos I took.

here the first of MANY of my HD videos from the weekend:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJz6GcdSFHk&fmt=22

subscribe to my videos if you want to be notified when more go up. there's about 30 all together. it's gonna take a while.

Many thanks to sauce for the pics and mkdevo for the video. It's almost a week later, and I'm still kind of giddy about how awesome last weekend was.

Late Summer Dates
7.30.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
7.31.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
8.01.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
8.02.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
8.05.09 Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View, CA
8.07.09 The Gorge Amphitheatre, George, WA
8.08.09 The Gorge Amphitheatre, George, WA
8.11.09 Toyota Park, Chicago, IL
8.13.09 Darien Lake Performing Arts Center, Darien Center, NY
8.14.09 Meadows Music Theater, Hartford, CT
8.15.09 Merriweather Post Pavilion, Columbia, MD
8.16.09 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY

I hoping to do Red Rocks and Merriweather

I'd love to do the four nights at Red Rocks, but I have to draw the line somewhere. Stupid responsibilities.

Wow, I'm surprised, I was at 2 or 3 of the nights at Red Rocks when they played 4 nights in '96, then they got banned after that because of all of the illegal camping and I think there was also a small riot. Anyway, glad to see Red Rocks is lifting the ban, I will definitely have to make it to a couple of those shows. I guess Red Rocks just saw the dollars that are going to come in.

i put in for:

7.30.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
7.31.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
8.01.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
8.02.09 Red Rocks Amphitheatre, Morrison, CO
8.05.09 Shoreline Amphitheatre, Mountain View, CA
8.07.09 The Gorge Amphitheatre, George, WA
8.08.09 The Gorge Amphitheatre, George, WA
8.14.09 Meadows Music Theater, Hartford, CT
8.16.09 Saratoga Performing Arts Center, Saratoga Springs, NY

fingers crossed.

Jethro Tull had a riot at Red Rocks back in the day, causing rock to be banned for some time. Tull just came back this/last year for the first show since.

I put in for the Gorge. Those are the only shows this summer that I have any chance of making.

Rolling Stone has a pretty great article about Hampton in the newest issue. Very candid about reasons for the break-up after Coventry (Trey was abusing drugs) and the rest of the band's bitterness (particularly Fishman's) following the break-up, mostly because Trey said he needed to get off the road and back to his family to get clean. Then, he proceeded to tour and record with his solo band until he cleaned up.

I did like Trey's quotes about how his community service was partially served at a state fair. He was doing the menial jobs it took to put on a festival...parking cars, scrubbing toilets, cleaning up trash. He sent a message to Fish..."If anyone ever hears me complain about playing 'You Enjoy Myself', they need to smack me. I have now done every job it takes to put on a Phish festival, and playing guitar is by far the best part."

Fish on Hampton: "Our band had driven itself into a ditch. We needed to establish credibility among people again." Well, they succeeded. I'm more excited for this band than I've been since Big Cypress...

Is this the issue with U2 on the cover?

I honestly have no idea. Someone on Phantasy Tour posted scans of the article.

[shiver]nope, Gossip Girls on the cover [/shiver]

I also put in for the Red Rocks shows. The request period is over, and we're supposed to find out by midnight tomorrow. How long did it take to get back to request-ers for the NJ shows?