I think this show’s low rating is more about song selection than playing. To that end, it was posted on Instagram that this was Trey’s vocal coach’s first show. To that end, some of the set list reflects songs where Trey is probably trying to show off his singing lessons (mercy, Shade, Drift), which also happens to be songs a lot of folks are critical of.

This show kind of reminds me of of Bangor N2 from 2019 - a set that hung on a lot of newer songs where people’s dissatisfaction with song choice and perceived setlist flow ended up overshadowing some great moments in the second set.

Happy birthday Jim!

First off, about the venue and Wilmington. The venue is beautiful. The field has a very gentle slope to it and the sightlines are very clear. I was pretty close to the rail on Mike's side, so I can't comment on the sound throughout the field, but all band members were coming in very clearly. Maybe it's me, but Mike and Page have been super clear and pronounced to my ears since I jumped on tour at Alpharetta. There was a line for early entry and another line for regular entry, and the staff was super accommodating and informative. They were constantly advising everyone on how to make entry quick and easy, and security was pretty lax. Our preshow meal and beer was at the Marina Grill adjacent to the venue, overlooking a nice marina. By the way, how about those house boats available for rent?! Pricey, but very cool.

Now the music. As expected, everyone was very excited for the music. All 3 Alpharetta shows were heaters, and as you'd expect, expectations were very high.

Set 1: Simple>Camel Walk, Gotta Jibboo got everyone dancing right away. I expected at least one blue grass tune, and we were treated to Poor Heart. It ain't Billy Strings, but it was fun and everyone seemed to enjoy it. Pretty straightforward Cavern, but who doesn't love Cavern. Divided Sky was Divided Sky, one of my favorite songs. It also hit the feels really hard, as I've been away from home for a week and I miss my three young sons dearly (I can't wait to see them on Thursday). I really liked the Mike tune, Casual Enlightnment...it was funky and fun to dance to, and I'm all for more Mike songs (ok, maybe except Let's Go). Shade is a good cool down song, it's popular with the none die-hards and even for the vets, again, good cool down song, and it was needed IMO, because it was very warm last night.

Set 2: This is a review, so I must be honest. Aside from ASIHTOS and maybe 20YL, there isn't much to rave about. Numberline always gets the juices flowing, and Bug is a song I enjoy, and it's a good sing along for those that like to sing. I have no problem at all with people singing along, it just doesn't matter to me.

Encore: The Howling was fun. Outer space funk is a good time, and when our fearless tells us to Howl, we'll freakin' howl, whether you like it or not.

Getting out was a bit cumbersome, as the exit created a serious bottleneck effect, but the crowd easily dispersed once past the gate. We parked a block away and exit was a breeze at that point.

Whether the show is an all time great, or dud, I always have the same outlook: I'm grateful to have attended and I had a ton of fun. What these guys are doing in Year 40 is unmatched, and I'm here to enjoy every second of it.

Well, well, well…. Wilmington N1.

Had high hopes for this show especially coming off 3 heaters in Alpharetta. Tonight just seemed a little off. I was in attendance and the band just couldnt get it going imho.

The start of set 1 was very strong. A good simple into camel walk.

Then comes jibboo which I always like.

Not the biggest fan of steam.

Poor heart was cool like all of their blue grass songs as well as the cavern > divided sky. I love divided sky and I think they ripped it as well.

Then comes the energy killers.

3 songs that really just didnt do it for me.

Set 2

That was my first timber! I was very pleased to hear that, which was followed by ASIHTOS which jammed for a bit but it really never got going imo.

Light was okay giving us another jam of the night.

This was pretty much the end of the show. The rest of the set was just meh.

I guess we are living off a high from the previous 3 nights and our expectations are unrealistically high. Tonight just didnt do it for me. I still love this band and am excited for night 2 but tonight just wasnt their night.

One of the lowest rated shows on Phish.net in a long time it seems; I can see why - but Im going to say this at the very least. ASIHTOS was epic. That is something you will need to listen to if you have not.

Honestly, this show was no all timer but it was also no full on snoozer either. The band still gave us some surprises here and there. If this is the worst show in years, thats a great fuckin sign for this band. It prob deserves like a 3.3

By no means was this a "bad" show, but just very forgettable. It reminded me of being a kid and being super excited to see a classic rock act only to leave feeling really disappointed.

There's a lot of songs here that I really like but they weren't exactly spectacular versions. Cavern, Shade, Drift While You're Sleeping, Bug etc. all songs I love. Just not memorable versions. The collective vibe of all the best stuff was I think just lethargically mellow and I feel like at some point the band had to have realized the energy was way too low. The Howling and Suzy were both strong but they should've been there before the encore.

Casual Enlightenment: I think a lot of people are going to point to this song as the disaster of this show. Honestly, yeah it was bad and really killed the vibe. Not sure if it's a bad song or just a particularly bad performance of it. Either way this song is due for another 70 show gap.

As far as highlights go, ASIHTOS > Light was pretty good. My personal highlight was Jibboo. There was some cool stuff going on in that jam and it's worth revisiting. All that said: I'm only adding Jiboo and ASIHTOS to my highlight playlist for this Summer. Pretty forgettable show. 2/5 may seem harsh but until .net let's me rate things on a 1-10 scale that's just what it has to be. 5/10 for me.

It's good to be at Phish shows. This was my first show since 2019, and my first at the venue. To quote Nicky Sobotka from the Wire "It's f***ing picturesque is what is." Any place with an entrance and exit that can be accessed via a boardwalk on the adjacent river is gonna be an improvement over the generic mega venues in Alpharetta and Charlotte. Certainly the smallest outdoor venue I've seen them play at, with gently sloping lawns that are comfy for the barefoot dancers among us. Wilmington was one of the chiller locales that I've been to, lots of parking and nearby places to groove and get more crunchy, albeit with a pretty confined Shakedown Street.

Kuroda has a pretty righteous set up for outdoor shows these days. Very rotate-y and sequential.
On to the music. Speaking from the back of the lawn, I wish it was louder, and that Mike was turned up in the mix [note: I always wish for Mike to be turned up in the mix, so your response to that may vary].

First set started off with the nice Happy Birthday for Jim Pollack, which was pretty sweet. Simple was danceable and is always welcome in the rotation, Camel Walk and Jibboo can bring the funky moves out of the ricketiest. Steam through Divided Sky hit solidly. My first Casual Enlightenment, and not one that I am able to immediately recall anything about ... Shade and Drift combine for a subdued end to a first set of a Phish show.

Timber is a favorite of mine, it's good as a second set opener, it's a crunchy jammy. ASIHTOS was gnarly in the moment and just kept on going, and is gonna be worth a relisten. Dissolve into Light, which continues the dance and jam show and has a tease of Timber in the jam. i will have to relisten to mercy to remember much about it other than that it was kinda slow and not a dance party song, which is fine... 20 is good, and the set closing with numberline bug and SANTOS is not particularly inspiring from an 'all jamming all time' perspective but it's phish playing songs they like to play so /shrug. a Howling//Suzy encore and we're out of here for night one.

It's good to be at phish, it's better than anything i'd rather be doing at that moment of the day. The first half of the second set is the highlight. Since everything is relative to our expectations, I had no expectations this night other than 1)phish will probably play a show, and on that note, they certainly did. More critically, both sets were 'fine', although both could be said to arguably start pretty strong and then fall short of sustaining that level.

I agree with some of the points made from other attendees, and maybe the expectations were outsized, but I thought it was pretty awesome overall. The 3 songs at the end of the first set would be my only complaint. The second set was fantastic... but I love 20 years later and bdtnl. i am a joy mark, i guess, although not the biggest Light fan. Timber was an awesome surprise... all of the teases in the 2nd set, as i keep hearing Boogie On and have for days... bug and say it too me santos were outstanding. and that was an all time encore for a night one. cant wait for tonight. im old now, and maybe not as critical as I was in the early 90s, but trey and the boys can pretty much pee in my ear at this point. And i love the venue and the sound. Saw TAB and DMB there, but last night seemed different. I thought Cactus was fantastic... Not trey's sharpest performance. Lots of notes, but complaining about Ernest(o)'s grandson seems like low hanging fruit, and not insightful, as he is unreal and a joy machine. The Chairman of the Boards and the son of a dentist turned Selectman are always damn near perfect in my estimation. I have no idea how they do it.

Phish coming to town has been very exciting for me. Traveling to shows is awesome, but sleeping in my own bed 4 miles from the venue absolutely rules.

Live Oak has a tent problem. It's been there for 3 years. But this show was one of the least affected by it as the lights were above it from the mid-lawn area I occupied last night. As always, the light show was incredible.

The show was not my favorite. I enjoyed the jam out of Simple quite a bit. Divided Sky was a treat too. First set started out strong but seemed to lose energy as it continued. Second set did the same thing, although SANTOS is always a great closer. The Howling was the highlight of the night, and I really enjoyed the encore. I've played outdoor shows in July here - the heat and humidity can suck you dry. I have to wonder if the boys were worn out from it.

I hope everyone enjoys our little beach town on the river. The vibe downtown was great all day and night. It's hot as balls out, so stay hydrated y'all.

Pumped up for night 2 as I'm sure the energy will be different!

This one was a banger for me I got to see my 4th cavern and my first divided sky and I was wondering why they didn’t pause the cavern for long until they played divided sky and the encore was and insane outerspace dance party with the howling into Suzy greenburg and when John fish man said you wanna know something about neurologist? We’re all gonna need one someday AND THEYRE GOOD FOR YOU! That shit blew me up in a way that you wouldn’t be able to explain!

Was really excited to see Phish play in such a small space compared to other venues they play at. I had a great week in Wilmington and hope they play there again, that is if I can get a show that was worth the money I paid lol. Heard a few tunes that I haven't heard live yet: Camel Walk and Poor Heart for example, and it was my first show on the rail thanks to early entry. The playing itself was pretty good, despite a few slippery moments which is normal when you're at a live show, but the song selection felt a little weak compared to all of the other sets that they have played on tour thus far. I get it, they came in HOT in AL and Alpharetta always gets the blessings, so I was prepared for a show of "leftovers".

Casual Enlightenment brought the momentum down quite a bit after Divided. I was hoping for at least 1 solid jam in set 1 (I don't count Divided because it has a built-in solo/jam form). The Steam was probably the best "jam" of set 1 even though it was only 8-9 minutes. The jams in set 2 were pretty good, but I was hoping for a bit more density after coming off 5 shows of well-executed jamming. After playing all of the funky bangers that I was hoping for (2001, Tube, Ghost, Sand, etc.), the Howling was exciting to hear (I had been feeling that one all day). They did completely botch the intro chords but it was recovered well. I can't complain much about their slip-ups, as I play in a Phish-cover band myself and found it comical that they were making the same mistakes that my band does as well.

Overall, I had a great time. It definitely left me feigning for more and feeling quite a bit of FOMO of all of the other shows they've played this tour. Hope I can see them again before the year ends!

Loved the venue. Cozy. Intimate, as far as that goes where a band playing to sub-10k counts as "intimate". Gradual lawn. H[sub]2[/sub]O refill stations... And when you lead off a review with venue notes... that tells the reader something.

The show, well, wasn't our favorite, but that's not a huge knock.

The conversations with multiple folks last night went like this:
Someone: "That was middling phish, which is still better than everything else."
Other someone: **nods**

They cannot blow the roof off a place every single night, and tonight was one of the "not blowing the roof off the place" shows.

Highlights included the Howling and Suzy for the encore—great energy. We also liked the second set a lot—Timber>SIHTOS>Light had a great feeling to it. Got lost in the music there, with jibboo, and with Say it to me SANTOS. Really grooving with those tunes last night.

SET 1: Happy Birthday to You: Nice nod to the Jim.

Simple: Nice dark direction as the jam gets going. Surprised me and thought it would bode well for the show as whole. Big peak in the mid 8’s with some Trey/Page interplay. After this things definitely get into that major mode spot for almost 3 minutes >

Camel Walk: Unexpected. I don’t think I have seen one since 7.29.03 – Twenty years later, indeed! What is that whisper at 4:02 into the mic?

Gotta Jibboo: Big cheers in our section for the ‘ol loop. Nicely jammed.

Steam: Mike seemed extra funky/assertive here.

Poor Heart: Little sloppy at the onset.

Cavern: Mid first set? Very rare! Little off in the intro.

Divided Sky: This took gumption to play this here. Broadway Trey with the “Wind blows hiiiiiiiiigh” Sun was setting amidst a haze of Canadian wild fire smoke - Beautiful and the right place for it. Absolutely crushed and the place was going nuts after this. Seriously listen to Trey after the pause, it’s electric.

Casual Enlightenment: An extremely poor choice. 3rd time played and first since 10.20.21. Please don’t every play this again. Woof!

Shade: Standard. Woof!

Drift While You're Sleeping: Standard. Woof!

SET 2:

Timber (Jerry the Mule) – Yesssss. Attendance bias – but after another re-listen – this gets there. Nice, dark, and intense. Place was getting down. It does eventually go major mode though, I mean, really? >

A Song I Heard the Ocean Sing: Broadway Trey to the absolute max and beyond. If you can get beyond that, you will unpack an interesting, disjointed jam. Around the 8 minute mark I thought they were going for Tweezer Reprise. You can clearly hear it on the LP I can’t quite place the tease at 9:46?. Late 10’s sees a build toward extreme peaks, but the collective teamwork hasn’t really put in to reap this reward – I’m not sure if this makes sense but I bet it will if you listen closely to this – What I am trying to say is that this version was really herky jerky with sections being forced together without putting in the necessary work to make them seem more organic. I will say another thing that I will have the back of this jam for is that it’s completely without a net, they obviously went for it and for that I will give credit – Check out the old school backwards effect/reverse reverb in the early 15’s. Another subtle Tweezer Reprise thing from Trey at 16:32. The last 90 minutes are ethereal. >

Light: Wasn’t thrilled with this selection, some of the air seemed to come out of the balloon collectively around the venue. As the jam gets going Mike compliments Trey very well adding robust, bouncy fills. Timber teases at 7:58. I thought at the show and now again listening that there is a Gloria in excelsis Deo tease that starts at 11:28 – the theme is repeated a number of times through 12:44. This light jam was decent, pretty mellow. >

mercy: Didn’t know this tune at the show, had to look it up on From The Road’s Twitter. Did not need this kind of tune after light.

Twenty Years Later: Many a groan was heard around us as this started up, me included. All momentum has now been effectively nuked. Really dissonant and whaley at the outset of the jam. Around the 9 minute mark this finally starts to get interesting. >

Backwards Down the Number Line: Everyone knew it was coming, and there it is. Oof. Standard version. >

Bug: I like Bug, but surely not here. Woof. Broadway Trey’d as well. >

Say It To Me S.A.N.T.O.S. – Standard.

ENCORE:

The Howling: Such a lazy, lame song. >

Suzy Greenberg: Standard.

Summary: First set was going along just fine but took a serious dive after Divided Sky. Really disappointing. Same with the second set for the first 30 minutes or so and then it just totally folded in on itself. Had fun at this show, smallest venue I had seen Phish in since my first show 11.17.94. But this ranks up there with the worst Phish shows I have seen. I just can’t put it any other way. I would give this show a 2 out of 5. What a cluster getting out of there by the way, total bottleneck.

Replay Value: Divided Sky, A Song I Heard the Ocean Sing