How Phish is reinventing the Sphere in Las Vegas

TFD – Immerse yourself in Phish’s revolutionary Sphere concerts, marking a paradigm shift in live music experiences. With groundbreaking visuals, never-repeating set lists, and insights from Trey Anastasio, discover how Phish is reshaping the concert landscape at the $2.3 billion Las Vegas venue. Join us as we delve into this innovative journey and witness live music evolution in action.

Loved Vermont jam band Phish is recognized for its extraordinary, once-in-a-lifetime concerts that combine spectacular visuals with unplanned musical experiments.

The band is well-known for never repeating set lists and for having played over 2,000 gigs over the years. They draw heavily from their vast repertoire, which includes over 300 original songs and innumerable covers.

That is still the same. However, the band has now, 41 years into their career, devised yet another novel way for fans to experience their music live: four performances at Sphere, the $2.3 billion Las Vegas facility that was dedicated last November with a run of performances by U2. Starting on Thursday, the Phish gigs will continue until Sunday night.

The bandleader and creative power of Phish, Trey Anastasio, told last week that the Sphere gigs represent “a paradigm shift in live music and visual (presentation).” “This is a fascinating new canvas,”

After U2, Phish is only the second band to perform at Sphere. A massive LED screen that encircles and rises to a height of almost 250 feet dominates the cutting-edge, circular stadium. The large screen and the 167,000 speakers that provide crystal-clear sound create an engrossing concert experience.

However, Phish is adopting their customary carefree style, while U2 performed essentially the same set list and matched songs with pre-made films that were replayed every night.

Over the course of their four nights, the band won’t be playing the same song twice, and the lighting for each show will be unique and sometimes even improvised, much like Phish’s longtime lighting designer Chris “CK5” Kuroda has done.

“All of our visuals can be executed, modified, and manipulated in real time,” said Abigail Rosen Holmes, the band’s creative director for the Sphere events, to TFD. “Instead of being confined, they will observe the band’s musical performance, enabling Phish to perform with the same freedom as they would at any other event.”

As predicted, during Sphere’s opening night on Thursday, the surreal animations and visuals seemed to soar and glide to the music, producing 3D effects on the enormous screen. Every song had a different visual treat, such as gorgeous, both earthly and celestial, scenery, or multilayered abstract tapestries.

Phish members claim that in order to get ready for their performance at the Sphere, they researched U2’s 40-concert residency. In order for the band to perfect the appearance and sound of the gigs, Phish’s audio engineer even built a small replica of Sphere’s production setup at a practice studio in Pennsylvania last summer.

Anastasio stated last week that utilizing Sphere’s enormous expanse in a way that seemed natural would be difficult.

The production and the music are flawless when you see a large-scale production, like that of Beyoncé, U2, or any other truly big, major pop performer. Thus, it facilitates scheduling everything to occur at the appropriate time,” he remarked. “And that’s not what we do.”

However, he seemed happy with the location following the performance on Thursday night, stating that Sphere offered “an intimacy” despite its enormous scale.

“I could see the crowd very well, and that made a big difference in the music.” I play so much better when I can look directly at people dancing. I can respond to their vigor. I was surprised by that,” he emailed CNN. It’s a great boon. It was really cozy.

Phish developed a close relationship with its audience right away.

Jazz, funk, blues, and other musical styles are blended with progressive rock arrangements to create Phish’s distinctive sound.

While attending college in Vermont, where Anastasio met bassist Mike Gordon and drummer Jon Fishman, the band formed in 1983. About two years later, Page McConnell, a pianist, joined the ensemble.

Anastasio remarked, “We began as a group of friends, in a room with our friends.” After playing until 1:30 in the morning, we would all head to Howard Johnson’s for French toast and eggs. as in, the audience and the band, literally. And that never really altered in certain ways. Even now, it feels like way.

The band began performing live in their early years at Nectars, a restaurant and bar in Burlington with a little stage tucked away in the corner. They began by diligently practicing their intricate arrangements, frequently according to Anastasio’s daily plan that indicated when they would add more depth to particular parts of each song.

Phish gradually grew a following, primarily via constant US touring.

Gordon states in the band’s 2000 documentary “Bittersweet Motel,” directed by Todd Phillips, “We built up this following just by playing.” “Records, radio, videos, or anything similar never truly helped us advance in our careers. All of it was through word-of-mouth.

According to both band members and fans, the reason why people attend gigs is “because they don’t know what’s going to happen,” Gordon continued, “just like we don’t know what’s going to happen.”

“We never truly were in the spotlight,” Anastasio said last week. “We don’t win Grammys, have hits, or anything of the sort. It is what it is—a community. And it actually is, really is. That’s how it feels even now. That, in my opinion, accounts for a significant portion of our differences.

Anastasio claims that he senses the “energy” from the audience throughout every performance, and that feeling guides his choices for the band in real time—a strategy that Phish has employed throughout its whole history.

It is independent-thinking. Everything is up for grabs, Anastasio declared. It resembles a blend of total freedom and self control. You can’t have one without the other, in my opinion.

The band has covered famous albums by other bands at their shows, along with donuts.

Leading the intricate logistics necessary to execute such extravagant productions is something Anastasio claims he enjoys doing. Making ensuring his bandmates remain present while performing is his main concern.

He declared, “Mike Gordon plays the sickest bass of anybody who has ever lived, if he is completely not thinking.” “He stops playing well the minute you get him thinking.”

According to Anastasio, his most thrilling live experiences occur when the group ventures “completely off the map” and into unexplored musical territory.

And there are a lot of them where I’m not sure what key we’re in anymore or where the downbeat is. And everything that Mike is playing, Fish is playing, and Page is playing is blowing my mind,” he exclaimed. “And it feels like you’re in a little rowboat in the middle of an oceanic storm.”

With the exception of Billy Joel, the band has performed in New York’s famed Madison Square Garden more times than any other artist. Phish transformed the venue into a massive underwater visual extravaganza featuring flying dolphins on New Year’s Eve in 2022. A year later, they used their cherished “Gamehendge” suite—a fantasy rock opera that was last performed in its entirety in 1994—to construct an almost entirely realized Broadway production at MSG.

“People will query us… Something like that would be developed by a typical band and then toured for four years. Why only carry out these actions once? stated Anastasio. “And my answer would be that we feel like we owe them a new, fresh experience because most of the people in the room have been with us for such a long time.”

The band has also gained recognition for putting on lavish parties. Their Halloween tradition began in 1994 with an unexpected whole album cover of The Beatles’ White Album. Since then, they have occasionally dressed up as “musical costumes” and performed songs from other artists’ famous albums.

Tens of thousands of people saw them perform from midnight to dawn on New Year’s Eve 1999 at The Big Cypress festival in the Florida Everglades, helping to ring in the new century.

Additionally, they were well-known for hosting a series of themed performances at Madison Square Garden over the course of 13 nights in 2017; this event was dubbed the “Baker’s Dozen” and featured a different donut being served to the audience each night.

Fans have grown to love them for their lively, unplanned attitude in an era of highly scripted concerts.

The inaugural edition of The Pharmer’s Almanac, an encyclopedia that gathers the band’s history and statistics, was written by veteran Phish fan Andy Bernstein. “Every single show is different, and they keep challenging themselves to be better,” Bernstein remarked.

Working with the band to build a Phish radio channel, Ari Fink, senior director of music programming at SiriusXM Radio, said, “They built an incredible bond with fans by super serving their audience.”

Fink says he is aware that casual listeners might not be able to appreciate the band’s unconventional music.

He told, “I can totally understand the barrier of entry that some music fans might experience when they give Phish a shot, but the two benchmarks they bring to the table are the playfulness and the commitment to their craft.”

Together, the band members have experienced a great deal.

Following their fully booked performances at Sphere, with premium seats fetching over $2,000 on the secondary market, the quintet intends to resume their summer tour in July. They also intend to release their 16th studio album, “Evolve,” in the same month.

August will see Phish host the Mondegreen festival in Delaware, their eleventh major festival that they have produced themselves. The band began this tradition in 1996 when they took over an abandoned Air Force Base in upstate New York.

There is always some turbulence when a band lasts forty years, and Phish is no exception. Before becoming drug- and alcohol-free in the mid-2000s, Anastasio struggled with substance misuse. The band went through multiple hiatuses, and its future was previously uncertain.

The four musicians, however, have persisted and claim that their fraternity has become stronger with time. Since they first started playing together as teenagers, Anastasio says he has been increasingly in awe of his bandmates, and they are all incredibly appreciative that they still get to work their magic on stage.

“At this moment, the volume of content and the amount of shared history are simply incomprehensible. It doesn’t seem to be slowing down at all, so I’m trying to locate some wood to pound on,” he remarked.

He remarked, “As the years have gone by, walking on stage has become consistently more emotional, like we look at each other before we go on.” “It’s unbelievable that I get to play with these guys again, wherever we end up.”