------------------------------

From: jamie@access.digex.com (James Treworgy)
Subject: Re: Signals, Stonybrook!!
Date: Mon, 23 Nov 1992 02:07:30 GMT

In article <1992Nov17.170658.9232@uvaarpa.Virginia.EDU>
ELEE@eagle.wesleyan.edu writes:
>Okay.  Here are all the signals that I know o....there may be some that have
>been added, but here goes...Signals will usually be preceded by a high trill
>on Trey's guitar...
(etc.)

>6)is there a sixth?  we'll see...

There are lots, at one show I saw Trey said something like "there are
probably 20 or 30 of them but these are our favorites".  One that I know
that I hear on some really old tapes is two series of three quick
ascending trills (like bwee bwee bwee ... bwee bwee bwee), then the whole
band, on the next beat, goes, DUM dum dum, DUM dum dum (kind of hard to
explain a musical occurence in words, but I've heard it a lot).

Now, on to STONYBROOK!!!!  The set, benissimo.

I: Landlady, Jim, Foam, Glide, Poor Heart, It's Ice, (shit this is from
memory and it's failing me... )... Maze, Forbin->narrative->Mockingbird,
Possum.

II: Carolina, Curtain, Mike's Groove!!!, Uncle Pen, Guelah Papyrus,
Coil, Honey Love, Llama!!! (with
bouncing balls, one for each band member..., very interesting idea,
the band reacted to what their ball was doing in the audience.
Unfortunately I think nobody had a clue).

E: Buffalo Bill? (new), BFFCFM

That set II was probably in the wrong order, and I think missing one song.
ah well someone else'll get it right.

An excellent show!!! Mike's was amazing!! Now onto the negative points.


The arena sucks. On all counts.  

1: The sound is pretty poor. Not as bad a syracuse but very muddy.

2: It is a minature version of the Capital Center.  The security was
all students but they were ASSHOLES!! There must have been one security
guy for every ten people.  No smoking anywhere in the building.  I got
yelled at for SITTING DOWN on the floor during the set break out in the
foyer.   About twenty people had a mini-mosh pit going during BFFCFM
and they security guards descended on them like vultures and basically
hassled them for having a good time.  And the only area where you could
go without a ticket, that is, the bleachers, is pretty hard to dance in.
We were on the floor for the first set but you couldn't see a thing
from the back section so we moved to the bleachers. Almost fell three
or four times :-) Finally, to crown it all, my friend Jon, who somehow
managed to get a plastic water bottle into the building, was trying to
fill it up in the bathroom and the sentry team that was posted there (to
prevent people from smoking... everyone was smoking in the bathroom during
first set but they figured it out and decided to squash that last bit of
dissention by putting guards in there)... told him he could not fill it
up.  I have no idea why.  Maybe they needed to sell more Cokes.  Who
knows.

I have no idea why they felt they needed fascist security
for a Phish show, and I am going to give the band the benefit of the doubt
and assume that it was beyond their control, but I will really think
twice about going that far to see Phish in a place with not-so-hot sound
and total jerks running the place.

But enough of that.  I had a good time anyway.  It was pretty cool because
a guy who was meeting us at the Stonybrook station missed his train, and
the next one didn't get in until 8:15.  We had no idea what had happened
when he didn't arrive on the 6:30 train, and so all of us but Lee went
inside, and Lee waited for the next train. He didn't find him at the
station on the next train, and so went back to the arena to get rid of the
extra ticket and go inside.  Anyway he was just about to sell it when our
friend showed up at the door!!! He HAD been on the 8:15 train but somehow
they missed each other at the platform and he went right to the arena
(walked through the woods, dumb luck that he actually found it).  The only
missed half of Landlady :-)

Oh yeah, on the way home, two friends who I was travelling with met
Trey's mom and sister!!!! Of all places, they were using the ladies
room at a rest area in Delaware and Trey's mom saw her Phish shirt,
and said, wher did you get that?  So she told her what the deal was
and that's who they turned out to be!!! She is in fact living in
Ireland now (no idea what they were doing in Delaware).  They were not
at the show, and couldn't believe that we had driven all the way up
from DC to see the show! She was really psyched about how successful
the band has become.  I never talked to them but my friends said they
were really nice :-)

Anyway, I can't think of a better omen for the Portchester shows next
week!!!! See you there,

Jamie
-- 
James A. Treworgy
jamie@access.digex.com

------------------------------

From: niranjan@sbgrad10.cs.sunysb.edu (Niranjan)
Subject: Re: Signals, Stonybrook!!
Date: 23 Nov 92 05:16:48 GMT

>An excellent show!!! Mike's was amazing!! Now onto the negative points.

Indeed! My first Phish show, and I'm hooked!

>2: It is a minature version of the Capital Center.  The security was
>all students but they were ASSHOLES!! There must have been one security
>guy for every ten people.  No smoking anywhere in the building.  

Before the show, every security person had to come and ask me(and my
friend) to show our tix; surprised to see us sitting in the front, were
they?

During the set break a couple of guys were smoking cigarettes in
the men's room and they were thrown out of the arena. Amazing.
I remember the security being real mellow during a Band show a few
years ago - people were smoking right in front of them (it was all GA
and I was somewhere in the front and smoking was not allowed); it was
pretty  OK for a Dylan show too (last year?). I remember there having been
a  Fishbone/Primus concert sometime early this year where quite a few
people were seriously injured - maybe this incident made the SB Polity (or
whoever organizes these things) jittery?

-Niranjan.

------------------------------

From: b4562@moncol.monmouth.edu (JUSTIN BLACK)
Subject: SUNY show
Date: 23 Nov 92 23:05:26 GMT

Phish Phans,
  I saw my first show of Phish without any other bands on Saturday.  Wow,
it was great!  Event though the gym was small and the sound system really
stunk, I still had a good time.  BBFCFM was a great encore.  
 I'd also like to add that I wrote email about directions to SUNY, and 
about a net gettogether.  I never heard so I guess there was no gathering
.  But then I read tonight on the network that there was.  I'm pissed that
I missed it.  Well, maybe next time.    
Anyway, the new Idea with the big balloons was great.  Write me and tell
me
what you thought. (b4562@moncol.monmouth.EDU)
             
                                    Let down,
                                           Justin
-----------------------------------------------
From: "Rich Fromm - 'Whatever you do, take care of your shoes.'
Subject: albany, stony brook :^)

ok, on to Stony Brook...

was there any kind of gathering before this one?  ya know, for the low-key
level that most gatherings end up being, it seems like we spend an awful
lot
of bandwidth discussing them ;^)

i've never seen so much security at a Phish show; metal detectors, and
signs saying "No Metal Objects", "No Weapons", etc.  These guys must have
had some way bad experiences in the past with concerts.  When I tried to
enter the gym with my Phish-ness I was told "You can't bring that in here
filled."  But it's only got water, I told him.  "Well, you never know what
might happen." No, I really couldn't think of what might happen, so I
asked?  I'm not sure if he had anticipated that one - his response was
something like "You might spill it on someone."  I'm not making this up.
Anyway, I dumped it out, and between sets I filled it up and placed it in
my backpack before bringing it in. I've also never seen a front row at a
Phish show that was so far from the stage. There was the first row of
seats, then a big blank space.  Then a rope type of boundary, and some
more space.  Then a chest high wooden boundary, and some more space before
the stage.  Standing behind the wooden boundary were about a dozen
security guards.  And there were guards every else imaginable.
This one who was right in front kept shining her damn flashlight
everywhere, mostly in people's eyes.  I thought about responding in kind
by shining my flashlight in her eyes, but I wasn't sure how much of a
sense of humor she'd have. During the first set I wanted to check out the
scene further back, to see if there was more free space to dance.  Well,
after getting hassled enough by security for dancing way back, I decided
to return to my seat.  After showing my ticket to numerous guards every
several feet as I approached my seat, the final guard wanted to know where
I'd been.  He was actually hassling me because I had gotten out of my seat
and gone elsewhere.  And security hassles weren't limited to during the
show.  On numerous occasions before the show and during the set I was told
to move simply for standing around talking to friends.  And I can't 
believe they threw someone out for smoking a cigarette.  Ok, you could
argue that she broke the rules and deserved to be punished.  But I think
the punish-ment should fit the crime.  For instance, simply asking her to
put out her cigarette would have been fine.  Throwing someone out of a
show for that is just ridiculous.  Ok, enough gripes about security.  Just
to let you know that a small venue doesn't necessarily mean a mellow
scene.  Albany was MUCH larger, but MUCH more laid back.

on to the actual show...

| Colonel Forbin's Ascent ->
| Famous Mockingbird

there was also a Gamehendge narration in between here

| Possum

2 signals in the intro, the Simpson's "DOOH!" and the all fall down; the
all fall down signal was a riot!  security looked utterly baffled; at
first this guy was shining his light on us like he wanted to make us get
up, but then he noticed that it wasn't just us; word of the signals still
needs to get around a bit; there were a decent number of people that fell
down around us, but it was definitely well less than 50%

| Honey Love 

i'm amazed at how much of a dynamic range Fish can get out of that vacuum;
when i first heard him play it a couple of years ago, it was just noise;
but he's getting really good at it now!  some points of interest:  he
announced that his vaccum is a 1967 model Electrolux, in case you care;
when he announced the band, he annouced Trey as "Ernest Giseppie (sp?)
Anastasio", and he also announced one of the pairs of eyes on his new
dress as Miles Davis' eyes;  the security around me also seemed rather
perplexed by this whole vaccuum thing

| Llama (with beach balls)

this was a lot of fun - especially because i think that security hated it!
i hadn't noticed the beach ball/band member correlation during the music,
because i was too busy trying to get my hands on a ball (the guy next to
me was a bit taller than i was and kept getting to it before i did)

| Buffalo Bill (new)

this was another new Fish song, and it featured him playing the washboard;
kind of an interesting washboard - it had two metallic breasts on it -
looked kind of like something i've seen Madonna pictured with i didn't
feel the same level of intensity that i did at Friday's show, but i think
that was just because i was getting a little tired (maybe those 2 cups of
coffee before the Friday show really helped!)

i'd like to thank neal and jeff for providing crash space for me on friday
and saturday night respectively; it's so cool that people who i've never
met before are willing to trust me and let me spend the night; isn't the
net just great? and i hope the guys who were looking for rides to boston
found them, since neither of them called me on sunday morning before i
left stonybrook

only 4 days until portchester!

. . . r i c H

p.s. matt, you really ought to start bringing some net shirts to the
shows; everytime i wear my shirt people ask me "how can i get one of
those?"

------------------------------

From: Alan Sodoma 
Subject: Al & Karen's weekend Phishing trip! 
Reply-To: ajs@jloda.cci.com
Date: Wed, 25 Nov 1992 16:38:46 GMT

Stony Brook:
We got there in 3 hours and pulled into the Holiday Inn, got our
room and popped open the bottle of 151 and had some rum 'n Pepsi's
'til it was time for gig #2 of our trek around NY state.

We cut, I mean, got in line and Karen notices some disturbing signs
on the doors of the place.  'Metal Detectors in use'!!  I won't go
into anything about the security people.  It's been mentioned already.

Only one new one this night:  Buffalo Bill.  In the encore, no less.
I think Landlady is a great opener.  Other good points:  Bouncing,
Forbin>Mockingbird, vacuum, beach ball jam and a great Mike's
Groove.

A good concert but not quite as good as Albany.  :-)
Then it was back to the H.Inn and a little while later Shelly shows
up.  Fresh from the West coast and all ready for a week of Phish!
Karen, Shelly and I talk for awhile (Shelly posts the sets) and then
it's time for sleep, as the next morning puts on the road to....

Al Sodoma