Way back when, when people connected to the Internet through 2400 baud modems and walled garden programs, Phish shows were traded exclusively via snail mail. Rec.Music.Phish allowed Phish fans from all over the world to post their tape lists, and all it really took was a few emails to find someone willing to offer up a B+P (“blanks and postage” for those of you from the digital age). I’m sure there are many people who remember the exciting day when a package finally arrived in the mail, smelling of cigarette smoke, filled with Maxell UR 90’s, or maybe, if you were lucky, a long show filling up a couple of XLII 100’s. Well, I remember those days, and I remember my first one of those days in particular, when I received a copy of 8/21/87 in the mail.

I’m not waxing nostalgic here to seem old and jaded. Sure, digital advances and The Spreadsheet have done wondrous things for the Phish community. And never in a million years would I have imagined I could one day sit in front of an HDTV to watch a live Phish show at MSG. Instant gratification is great and all, but there was something special about having to wait several weeks to receive a tape in the mail. Each tape was a long-awaited treat, something that brightened even the darkest day. It just so happens that one of my first full shows on tape came from the Summer of 1987. Perhaps it was good fortune, perhaps it was just the fact that it was one of the most commonly circulated tapes back then, but whatever it was, it started my long affinity not only with Phish, but also for the early years of the band.

Let’s back track to Summer 1987 and examine why this period was so important in the history of Phish. The band was in various stages of completing their undergraduate studies. Trey and Fish had moved to Goddard College with Page, after seeking a more liberal music program. Mike was still working on his film-making and communications degree at UVM. The band had been together about three and a half years at this point, and only about one full year with the final foursome intact. Many of the band’s oldest tunes had been written to some extent. "YEM," "Hood," "Golgi," "Slave," "AC/DC Bag," "The Curtain," and even "Mike’s." But really it is safe to call Phish, prior to this point, just a nascent cover band.

Sure, at this point, Phish had begun their two-nights-a-week gig at Nectar’s with no cover charge. But other than that, the band largely played gigs at parties every week or two, on weekends. A Friday at Johnson State College. A Saturday at Slade Hall at UVM. Most shows contained an ample selection of rock, blues, and jazz covers. Max Creek. ZZ Top. Even that rare XTC song that people these days clamour for. They played one show, 4/29/87 at Nectar’s, that featured 15 different cover songs. But up until August of 1987, Phish was really a weekend and special events party band.

All of that changed in the late Summer of 1987. I guess we’ll never really know what kick-started the band into playing more gigs. Perhaps it was the band’s dedication to a career in music spurred by their music major curriculum. It could have been a long Summer apart that fueled their desire to play more. Maybe it was an overwhelming surge of creativity from Trey, who would write nine songs over the Summer that would debut in August and September. Whatever the reasons were, August 1987 was a turning point for the band. It was also perhaps the approximate time when the force that eventually evolved into today’s Phish began.

Let’s take a look at the numbers. After August 1987, the band played at least five nights of music a month nearly every month for the following six years. Once they entered 1988, the band played 95 shows throughout the year (at least, 95 shows that we know of). Prior to this point, the band commonly took several months off in the Summer and the holiday season, when they were not all together in Burlington. After 1987, one-month breaks were really all the band got. They became a functional enterprise, out and about, and were constantly looking for places to play. They played at fraternity houses, festivals, hippie communes, and even Grateful Dead parking lots (yes, this actually happened . . . try to find the date . . . I’ll give you a hint, it’s in 1988). August 1987 basically signaled the transition from party band to a full-fledged touring band that was going to try to make it.

In many ways, August and September 1987 seem like a wonderful fusion between the band’s exploratory youth and their more mature, dedicated-adult side, willing to tackle complex compositions for seven hours a day. Shows like Ian’s Pig Roast (8/21) and the Marley Thank-you gig (8/29) showcase this decidedly new, and mixed, style. Once the band reached 1988, though, and realized that not every bar and venue would be interested in the craziness and adventure of a 15 minute "Mike’s," things tempered down, and the band played night after night of largely predictable, and consistently tight, shows. This type of playing was commonplace for the next five years until 1993, with a few highly hailed exceptions in between. For a few months in the late Summer of 1987, though, the band often showed flashes of musical exploration.

So much that originated in these few months of tightness and looseness has stayed with Phish throughout their decades-spanning career. Teasing Fish with "Hold Your Head Up," for example, gets more and more intense throughout Fall 1987. Just getting Fish to sing, really, comes out of the goading from the audience at these shows, and happens for the first time in September. The open "free for all" shows with no rules and lots of music that would carry over to Amy’s Farm and, eventually, Phish festivals, came out of some of Phish’s early party-gigs, notably Ian’s Pig Roasts and the long Halloween shows at Goddard. Summing up everything, one has to think of these months along the more revolutionary periods of the band, like August 1993 or November 1997.

Enough talking about the history. For those of you who have never been inspired to listen to pre-1993 Phish, here are some examples of some 1987 Phish you really should listen to, and you can download them all from The Spreadsheet.

"Mustang Sally" 8/10 (Fast!)

"Anarchy" 8/10 (One more time!)

"Divided Sky" 8/21 (Remember this one Garrett...wink wink...nudge nudge)

"Funky Bitch" 8/21 (Raucous and noisy)

"Hood" 8/21 (That’s why I’m in the band)

"Light Up or Leave Me Alone" 8/21 (Chaos)

"Clod" 8/21 (Would you rather hear something normal, or something else weird?)

"Harpua>Bundle of Joy> Harpua>Golgi>Sparks" 8/21 (We’ll have to do that again)

"BBFCFM" 8/21 (This one’s by Melanie)

"McGrupp>Makisupa->Bowie" 8/21 (The Gala Event)

"Lushington" 8/29 (Blistering)

"Mike’s>Hydrogen>Who Do? We Do!" 8/29 (An early double-Hydrogen)

"Makisupa" 9/2/87 (Wow effects)

"Slave" 9/21/87 (Short and sweet)

Okay, so this list seems over-laden by the seminal Ian’s Pig Roast show (8/21), but it really is a magnificent show. I’ve reviewed the band’s shows for all of this time period on Phish.Net, so you can check them out on the reviews pages if you're interested in more details about the greatness of these shows in my opinion. Some things to note, though: there are a handful of 1987 shows for which recordings do not circulate. Why, you ask? Well, Phish’s old sound engineer and roadie, Del Martin, recorded Phish during the early days throughout 1987 and 1988. Apparently, the band could never agree with Del about the price of the catalog, so they never purchased the shows. I’m not sure where the shows are now, likely in an attic or a garage somewhere, but until those masters transfer hands (and we sure hope that some day they will!), we will only have a handful of shows to listen to from this remarkable time period in Phish's history.

So, please enjoy Summer and Fall 1987 Phish, a time period that perhaps you have not really considered, and that very, very few of us got to experience live. In 1987, many of us were in high school or grade school (if we were even yet born), and the sound quality of the shows in circulation for this period isn’t quite like the professionally mixed, crystalline .wavs you can download from LivePhish these days, but Summer and Fall 1987 is exploratory, musically solid and, most of all, fun. The period ultimately signaled the birth of the current formulation of Phish, and is justifiably an important period in Phishtory.

Looking forward to your comments - especially those of you, if any, who saw the band during this time!

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