Last Wednesday I worked in the morning for a few hours and then got on the road for Kansas City. Half the trip was retracing my route to Des Moines where I saw Umphrey's McGee in late June. Having gone to school in Ames I know this route pretty well. The weather was in the low 70s. I drove through a very brief thunderstorm in Missouri. For dinner I stopped at Arthur Bryant's and had a pulled pork sandwich. I found a spot in front of the soundboard in the middle of the venue. The crowd was rather chatty. This was an out of the way show to hit. Many people "on tour" might be inclined to skip this one. Starlight is a great venue. I've seen a couple Panic shows and the Phish show in 2012.
From the start I was impressed with Anastasio's technical prowess. It's clear that the practice he put in for the GD50 shows has carried over into this summer Phish tour. He's playing with more confidence and is incorporating his loops and effects more effectively than any other point of the 3.0 era. Things are good in the Phish world right now. The first set really didn't have much in the way of jamming but was teeming with energy from start to finish. The Divided Sky had a little extra gusto on this occasion. Mike Gordon's solo tune The Last Step was played for the only time on the Phish stage during the first set.
Some youngsters who were going to Iowa State University asked me what I thought they would open the second set with. I answered with Gotta Jibboo. Some shows you can feel the flow. I loved this Farmhouse heavy second set. DWD was 20 minutes and was clearly the improvisational highlight. Joy was perfectly placed in the cooldown slot. This was the type of second set where they cap it off with YEM. This was the better of the two versions they've played this summer. Bug was a great call for the encore. I tend to get brought down by the minutia of life at times when in the end "it doesn't matter". I made it up to Iowa before taking a nap for a few hours at a rest area. As the sun came up I hit the road for home and arrived around 8 am.
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