Customer Reviews

Live Phish Vol. 15: 10/31/96, The Omni, Atlanta, Georgia

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I love Phish, but I have to say that the recent releases of the Halloween shows have been hit or miss and that's mostly because of the music.

But check this one out. Disc Three of this four disc set is a cover (in its entirety) of the Talking Heads album "Remain In Light". Here Phish are able to merge their jazzy/bluesgrass jamming sensibilities with the avant-garde/odd timed/afro-beat jams from David Byrne and crew. The results are quite amazing and the covers of "Quadrophenia" (Live Phish 14) and "The White Album" (Live Phish 13) pale in comparison.

If you're a Talking Heads fan, you've got to pick this up. It's got all of the genius behind the songs, and all of the musicality of the TH, but it still has that joyful playfulness of Phish. These versions of "Cross-Eyed and Painless", "Houses In Motion", "Born Under Punches" all stand up to the originals and "Once In A Lifetime" only just misses because of some timing and lyric screw-ups.

And that's just one disc! The rest of the sets are some of the best stuff Phish has put out. I don't think there's a better version of "Reba" or "Maze" in the Live Phish series, "You Enjoy Myself", "Down With Disease" and "Prince Caspian" are all great versions of great songs.

Another note: The sound quality here is first rate and one of the best mixes I've heard in this series. It sounds like the band knew they were going to have a keeper, they pulled out all the stops did an excellent job with recording.

If you haven't bought any of the Live Phish albums, this is an excellent place to start.

As a longtime fan of prog rock, I almost have no way to apologize for not having payed attention to the band's work before, but the placement among the top 100 guitarrist of all time by Trey Anastasio in a 2003 Rolling Stone article made me think twice about it. Well this live volume (the 15th in the band's live series) gave me plenty to satisfy my musical curiosity.

With samples of some of their best stuff (in particular, I found the 22+ minute long "You Enjoy Myself" mind-blowing and very much reminding of the long Grateful Dead guitar solos by Jerry Garcia) and a whole disc (#3) devoted to covers of classic Talking Head tunes, this quadruple album is a keeper for all people who love listening to works of virtuoso musicians. Anastasio and company sure belong up there!

This is one of Phish's best live albums. This, along with A Live One are the ones to get. Forget about Hampton Comes Alive.

This is from Halloween, 1996. As in all of the Halloween shows, they play a complete album by some other group. They have done The Beatles (White Album), Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon and The Who's Quadraphenia. But, all of those have been rather disappointing. They usually don't practice the material much, and they just run through the album. They really don't add anything over what the original artist did.

On this album, they play the Talking Heads' Remain in Light. They play the album with amazing energy. It just drives throughout. It is very remeniscent of how the Talking Heads play in the movie Stop Making Sense, but with even more energy.

The rest of the album is very good. There are 4 CD's and about 4 hours of music. It is similar to what the band was playing in the mid nineties. So, if you have other live CD's from this time period you will get some repeats.

As with all the Phish live series, it comes in special packaging. The cover is a small, jewell box-sized cardboard case. The artwork is done in silver foil. The CD's are held in a 4X4 plastic slip case that folds up to slip into the cardboard cover. Or, slipcase can be opened up. It has three holes punched in the side. You can buy an optional three ring binder to hold each of the concerts, like a photo album.

I was lucky enough to have attended this, and with the exception of Big Cypress Y2K, it was the best Phish show I've been to. When I bought this volume of Live Phish, I was hoping I didn't build up that Halloween night in '96 TOO much in my head over the years...but after hearing it, it only confirmed that the boys were indeed on fire. Talking Heads' "Remain In Light" album was right in the bands' wheelhouse, and surpasses the other albums Phish covered on Halloween ("Crosseyed and Painless" even re-appeared several times in future shows & has become a fan favorite). As for the other material, standards like "You Enjoy Myself", "Reba", "Down With Disease", and "Maze" are cream of the crop versions, and rarely is there a weak moment anywhere else on these CDs. This is a "desert island" show, so pick this up NOW...

My first Phish show and the last that I would ever see with that kind of energy and chaos. Those guys blew the roof off the Omni that night. Sanity>Highway to Hell has to be the best Halloween opener in history. DWD>YEM>REBA just melted the walls and made the omni shake. Talking heads set is so good, you have to hear it to believe it. Santana's percussionist Karl Perazzo sat in with Phish which made the set tribal in beat and groove. Third set they open with Brother which is a classic rarity into the space funk of 2001. Maze and Suzy G with the horns topps off a show for the ages. I never saw another phish show as powerful as this. Once in a lifetime indeed!

I remember saying to a friend of mine after leaving the Omni that this was one of the best live shows I had ever seen. The discs prove that Phish peaked that night during an incredible second set. Sure, the first and third sets are worth listening to but buy this set for Remain in Light.

BTW the sound quality of these discs sound a lot like some Dead shows I have on tape where the soundboard and audience feeds are mixed together. The sound is crisp and the audience noise adds to the music without being obtrusive.

Alright, so trey flubbs the arpegios at the beginning of yem, but parts of the yem, like the lyrical section and later solos are some of the best out there, they all just rip it up. Then theres the reba and the colonel forbin/fly famous, possibly the best versions of these songs.
The Remain in Light is practically flawless, Trey nails all of the abnormal solos with his own twist, and Gordon slaps all the bass lines while still keeping to the heads themes. Born under punches and houses in motion are spectacular, and the version of The Great Curve is perhaps one of the best songs of all time, the first solo is perfect, and the second goes into this ridiculous jam, which the horns add to a lot.
To top it off, the open the third set with a sick Brother, and keep it fresh until the simple, the song part of Simple is pretty solid, and if you wait through the five minutes or so after that part (through the long bass drum and keyboard jam that doesnt change until about 11:00) trey comes in with this really intense pitch and they go into one of their best jams of all time... This show is easily one of their best performed.

I was fortunate to have witnessed this show live and it is wonderful to finally have a great recording of what I consider one of the best shows I have ever been to.
Phish covered one of the most complex and innovative albums ever released from the Talking Heads that very fine evening.
This 4 disc set catches Phish at the top of their game in 1996.
I also recommend buying the original Talking Heads album, Remain In Light and listen to it before hearing Phish nail it down in Hot'lanta!! You won't be sorry!

Volume 15 of the Live Phish series is the best one that I have heard so far. It is the perfect example of Phish's ability to do covers. The whole second disc is Talking Heads' covers. If you are a Talking Heads fan this cd is perfect. If you do not know much about them, you have still probably heard the song "Once in a Lifetime". Phish does an excellent cover of this song. This cd is the perfect cd for any Phish- phile or Talking Heads fan.

A wonderful version of Remain in Light. It's like getting a brand new Talking Heads album as a present in 2004!