Thanks for your comments, Charlie. I'm right with you most of the way here. I haven't listened to nearly all of the tour and am pretty amazed to hear that you're still at with this level of dedication. From what I have heard (maybe 1/3 to half) nothing comes close to touching the Clarkson Disease, which is a beautiful piece of music. I do dig all the great stuff in the first set from Bethel2, as well. A fine Gin. I wonder if some of Phish's "Type II" explorations on this tour tend to be overrated, simply by virtue of their being a greater rarity these days. It could also just be my taste (of course!), but neither Charlotte's Rock n Roll-> Ghost nor the Raleigh Split do much for me, for example.

And while I used to think it was petty and foolish to let setlists and song selection affect how I read a tour, I've come to admit that it's ok that this is part of the equation for me, and that I found myself shrugging about it this tour more than ever. Let me explain a bit further.

I have no problems with any given song being used as a jam vehicle or not. To me it's all about the pace and overall balance of a show, and I couldn't care less where the jams come from, and what other songs occupy the rest of the set-space, as long as it's all in balance. (Side note: yes, I was particularly happy to see Halley's given a little jam treatment again this tour. It was always one of those songs that seemed to follow me around and deliver the type II goods, so hearing it come to life that way again was like bumping into an old friend.) With the band playing so many songs in any given show these days, however, many classics and jam-vehicles get taken out for a spin more often than they used to (often in quick succession). Or at least it seems that way. On the flip side, with so many songs being played in any given show, there's room for dropping lots of one-offs and stuff, which is great. But at the same time these also feel like token novelties sometimes, as opposed to carefully selected and placed rarities.

Anyway an unfortunate result of all this is that shows and tours then start to kind of melt into each other (especially with slightly less jamming); one of the (many) reasons it's worth attending over and over again starts to erode.

Don't get me wrong, this is a subtle thing and I'm exploring it maybe ad nauseum here as an exercise, but I do think there's some truth to it. I believe there are a bunch of songs that would really benefit (and by extension benefit shows, and tours) from "showing up" maybe or two or three times a tour instead of six. Of course the performance is what matters most, but that sense of scarcity also contributes to the overall value and impact. For better or worse, it's part of the mythology for me.

My two cents!