5/16/94 - The Wiltern, Los Angeles, CA

Date: Fri, 16 Jul 1999 16:47:06 -0700
From: Mike Indgin [email protected]
To: "'[email protected]'" [email protected]
Subject: 5/16/94 review and setlist notations

Phish *  Wiltern
Los Angeles, CA  5/16/94 all

1: Buried Alive>Poor Heart>Sample in a Jar>
Divided Sky, Axilla [Part II], Rift, Down
With Disease> Bouncin', Stash, Sweet Adeline*

2: 2001>Antelope** Sparkle>It's Ice>Julius>YEM***
BBFCFM>Amazing Grace*> BBFCFM

E: Fee>Rocky Top

*without mics
**with BFFCFM tease and two secret language breaks
***with Louie Louie jam before bass break

 <>
On a perfect Spring night in May, Phish erupted into the lung and heart of  
Los Angeles, culminating a crazy 30th birthday week. Four days earlier I was
watching the Allman Brothers from the front row of the same venue. I turned
30 during Whipping Post and after the song, Warren Haynes threw me his
guitar pick. Then two days later in Ventura I saw my final Jerry Band show.
Now here I was back in the parking lot of the Wiltern with my Deadhead
friend, Gary. I had only seen Phish once before at the Palace a year earlier
and was highly anticipating my second show (it was Gary's first and only
show).

We were immediately hit up to buy some Beevis and Butthead acid. "No
thanks," I said. "I don't want to eat anything that has a drawing of what
I'll look like into an hour after I swallow it."

I asked the kid with the doses if he was worried about getting busted
(remember '94 was the height of the Dead lot DEA frenzy). "Nah," he said.
"No one knows about this scene yet. This tour is like the Dead tour of '74."
In a way, he was right.

Inside we found our way to the 14th row and settled in for what would be my
most raucous and loudest Phish show ever. In fact, Gary claims to have
suffered permanent hearing loss from the levels at this show. This was not a
show for beginners anyway, opening with Buried Alive and ending with BBFCFM.
The veterans among us went nuts however. At one point during Sparkle, the
balcony was bouncing so hard I was convinced it was going to fall down on
us.

The band themselves may have grown musically since '94, but boy, man, God,
shit was it a great time to see them. Back then they didn't know any other
gear except high.

The high point of the first set was Divided Sky. The whole second set raged,
from the psychotic Antelope complete with secret language and BFFCFM and
Somewhere Over the Rainbow teases, to the tenacious YEM with a Louie Louie
jam, to the frightening BFFCFM>Amazing Grace> BFFCFM closer. I got my Fee
encore and then a Rocky Top topper. Afterwards, Gary pledged to stick with
the Dead. Me, it was official, I now had two favorite bands. Given the
performance, I just thank God I didn't take the Beevis and Butthead acid.


click here to return to the 1994 reviews page


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