Tag: northfield mount hermon

Saturday, 05/20/1989
Northfield Mt. Hermon School , Northfield/Gill, MA

Set 1: AC/DC Bag >  Alumni Blues >  Letter to Jimmy Page >  Alumni Blues,  You Enjoy Myself,  The Lizards,  Wilson,  Divided Sky,  I Didn’t Know,  Possum

Set 2: Bold As Love,  Mike’s Song >  I Am Hydrogen >  Weekapaug Groove,  Foam,  Contact, Take the ‘A’ Train,  David Bowie,  Golgi Apparatus

Encore: Good Times Bad Times

One great thing about being a New England band is the wealth of opportunity for shows. The ability to play in 7 different states within a few hours of driving is helpful. Also helpful is the amount of colleges within the area. Having a base in Amherst, MA only helps with 5 colleges just in that area alone. Of course, there’s a 2nd tier to the Connecticut River valley, the large amount of private schools also concentrated in that area. If you make it big enough on the college circuit, hopefully some of those students have little brothers or sisters who will rave enough about the band that they’ll get booked to play at their school. This is probably the case of how Phish played some private school gigs during these important years, gaining fans that would help propel the rise to success without radio play or hit singles. A college-level band playing your school is a big deal. I went to the Westminster School just outside of Hartford and when Dispatch came to play there, not only was it big for us, the students, it turned out to be one of their most downloaded live shows.

That brings us to today’s show at Northfield Mount Hermon. The reason I’m conflicted about the location of this show is because both Phish.com and Phish.net say it was in the gymnasium. Firstly the school had two gymnasiums on two different campuses at the time this show occurred, as referenced when they announce the buss before “Contact”.  The name Northfield Mount Hermon comes from the fact that the Northfield Seminary for Girls merged with the Mount Hermon school for boys in the 70s. Secondly, Trey keeps referencing the field they were playing on, most notably before Divided Sky. So I don’t even think they were in either gymnasium. At the end of it all, they were at least at NMH.

The show itself isn’t particular outstanding to other shows at the time. Highlights here are mostly the banter. This event was billed as “One Last Thing”, obviously the last social event before graduation the following weekend. Trey dedicates “Alumni>Letter>Alumni” to the graduating seniors once again. Trey introduces “You Enjoy Myself” as the “trampoline segment of the show” and that the audience joins in on the imaginary trampoline. Trey says that the band will build an all-trampoline venue with speakers in the floor. I think we’re all still waiting on that one. Trey introduces themselves as traveling minstrels from Gamehendge again and they’ll do a couple songs from their homeland. A fan yells “Wilson Sucks!” and the crowd goes along with it. It’s interesting to hear Trey count off when the band joins in “The Lizards” intro. Trey introduces who Wilson is during the intro to “Wilson”. It’s kind funny because he calls Wilson an asshole and then realizes he’s playing to a high school crowd. It’s also part of the rebel in him reminded of his own days at Taft. “Wilson” also finally gets its own ending back instead of segueing into “Peaches en Regalia”. Trey closes the Gamehendge trio with “Divided Sky” explaining the ritual of praying at the Rhombus but at the same time, some hecklers go on about a towel, bantering back and forth with Trey about this. It’s funny to hear him try to maintain the upper hand. The “Divided Sky” is a sure highlight of this set with blazing playing by Trey and soaring organ work by Page at the end. “I Didn’t Know” is interesting in that the crowd gets surprisingly quiet during Fish’s vacuum solo, like he entranced the audience with his ability. Set 1 ends with a very strong “Possum”.

We meet Set 2 already in progress in “Bold as Love”. Trey continues the trend of mention Rhode Island at the start of the “Mike’s Groove”, the “Groove” itself is solid. Trey mentions that headlights are not the bus going back to the other campus but they are the 2nd-to-last bus back to the other campus, prompting the crowd to yell “Hell no! We won’t go!”. Trey then says they wrote the next song about that bus and also asks them to sign the mailing list, noting that they’ll learn such facts as how much cable it took up to set up the band at that time. That’s an answer I’d like to know right now, actually. The band changes the lyrics to “The tires are the things on your bus that make contact with the road.” “David Bowie” features more hi-hat hi jinx as Trey weaves “A-Train” and the Woody Woodpecker theme into the intro. The band comes back for the encore and someone asks for “Fee for Tim Rogers. I would think that would be the same Tim Rogers that was their former lighting designer as Trey seems to also know Tim Rogers, joking that “We wouldn’t play a song for that guy….”. Did Tim go to teach at NMH after leaving Phish? Hmm, another mystery of Phishtory to crack! They don’t play “Fee” but Trey does dedicate “Good Times Bad Times” to Tim. The show reminds me of 8/27/88 at Mont Alto, with that same “rock show” attitude but with an actual audience. A fun show to listen to but nothing groundbreaking here.

Just want to take a moment to apologize. I’ve been working on other projects and the radio show, but I’m getting back in the saddle here and ready to continue riding along. Helpfully you’re enjoying This Week in Phish on JEMP Radio as well! Thanks for sticking with me!