Once again Phish has gone and done something unique with their promotion for Festival 8, which has already thrown plenty of fans for a loop. The band updated their website with another detailed Flash creation dedicated to (theoretically) revealing what album the play for their “musical costume” set, the second set on Halloween night. The animation started with 99 choices, and a following animation depicting a knife being thrown through the album cover has already been shown a few times revealing albums that likely won’t be chosen for the sure-to-be-epic set. Kudos once again to the webmasters in charge of Phish.com and their overall online presence. It always gets the fans talking.
A nice fan on the PT Boards typed up the list for everyone, so check out the 99 choices below along with some of my commentary and gut instincts on the choices themselves.
- AC/DC | Back In Black – too predictable
- Aerosmith | Toys In The Attic – not a bad choice overall, but i don’t see this as Phish material or influence really
- Allman Brothers Band | Eat A Peach – too predictable
- Arcade Fire | Funeral – i’d place this one as a solid contender in terms of cultural relevance to a huge crowd of people. i could easily see phish performing “wake up” live.
- Beastie Boys | Hello Nasty – there’s no way they could pull this off
- BeeGees | Saturday Night Fever – good choice for an easy crowd pleaser. nobody would have a hard time dancing along to this one.
- Black Sabbath | Paranoid – too mind-blowing. i don’t think the band wants to go all “scary” and dark that night.
- Blind Faith | Blind Faith – too little cultural connection for crowd
- Bob Dylan | Blood On the Tracks – too boring for that many people
- Bob Dylan & the Band | The Basement Tapes – see #9 above
- Bob Seger | Against The Wind – too little cultural connection for crowd
- Boston | Boston – too predictable
- Brian Eno | Before And After Science – too ambient
- Bruce Springsteen | Born To Run – too predictable
- Chicago | The Chicago Transit Authority – too little cultural connection for crowd
- Creedence Clearwater Revival | Green River – too predictable
- Curtis Mayfield | Superfly Soundtrack – too predictable
- David Bowie | Hunky Dory – too little cultural connection for crowd
- David Bowie | Ziggy Stardust – potentially…
- David Bowie | Scary Monsters – does the band really like bowie this much?
- Devo | Freedom of Choice – too not-Phish
- Duran Duran | Rio – now this would be sick…could you imagine fishman on one of those 80’s style electro drum kits?
- Eagles | Hotel California – too yawn worthy
- Elton John | Goodbye Yellow Brick Road – page’s choice?
- Elvis Costello (née Declan McManus) | This Year’s Model – too non-mind-blowing
- Eric Clapton | 461 Ocean Blvd – too much guitar wankfest
- Firehose | Flyin’ the Flannel – great so-cal choice but not likely to be a frontrunner
- Fleetwood Mac | Rumours – too lame
- Frank Zappa | Apostrophe – too obvious
- Frank Zappa | Hot Rats – too predictable
- Genesis | The Lambs Lie Down On Broadway – relevant to phish’s influence, sure…but not halloween set material
- Grateful Dead | American Beauty – too predictable
- Guns & Roses | Appetite For Destruction – please god make it be this one…
- Hall & Oates | Private Eyes – too predictable
- Huey Lewis And The News | Sports
- Jane’s Addiction | Ritual de Lo Habitual – too LA
- Jimi Hendrix | Are You Experienced? – too predictable but totally sick
- Jimi Hendrix | Electric Ladyland – too predictable but totally sick
- John Lennon | Plastic Ono Band – too close to The Beatles
- Modern Lovers | The Modern Lovers – really?
- Journey | Escape – too lame
- KISS | Alive II – too Halloween
- King Crimson | Larks’ Tongues In Aspic – too proggy
- Led Zeppelin | I – too not Physical Grafitti
- Led Zeppelin | IV (Zoso) – “no stairway…denied!”
- Leonard Cohen | I’m Your Man
- Love | Forever Changes – really
- Manu Chao | Clandestino – too “not English”
- Medeski, Martin & Wood | Shack Man
- Metallica | Master Of Puppets – too fast
- MGMT | Oracle Spectacular – of all the albums on this list, this one is the album i can see the band wanting to challenge themselves with. it sounds uniquely phish-y in ways and at times nothing close to it. we’ll see. i’ve got good money on this one.
- Michael Jackson | Thriller – still has to be the most obvious choice for the band; i hope it’s this one just so that we can talk about thriller all weekend.
- Michael McDonald | If That’s What It Takes – too much yacht rock
- Miles Davis | A Tribute To Jack Johnson – too influential
- Minutemen | Double Nickels On The Dime – too obvious for so-cal, but i like the spirit of choice on this one. there are 42 tracks on that album…
- Neil Young | Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere – i doubt either neil pick will win the cut
- Neil Young | Tonight’s The Night – see above
- Nirvana | Nevermind – too culturally relevant (but not anymore)
- Pavement | Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain – even though it’s their opus, i don’t think enough people know this one to give it the right impact
- Pearl Jam | Ten – too grunge-y
- Peter Gabriel | So – too emo but would be rad. “in your eyes” is basically “silent in the morning” sung a bit differently. not really.
- Pink Floyd | Meddle – too influential
- Pink Floyd | The Wall – too predictable
- Pixies | Come On Pilgrim – too indie rock
- Pork Tornado | Pork Tornado – lulz
- Primus | Sailing The Seas Of Cheese – too difficult
- Prince | Purple Rain – 25th anniversary year = obvious frontrunner
- Queen | A Night At The Opera – too
- Radiohead | Kid A – if they’re consider this at all, it’s interesting that ok computer wasn’t a possibility to the band. but this one was.
- Rage Against The Machine | Evil Empire – too Coachella
- Rolling Stones | Exile on Main Street
- Rolling Stones | Sticky Fingers
- Rush | Moving Pictures – too cool to imagine
- Steely Dan | Pretzel Logic – maybe
- T.Rex | Electric Warrior – too unknown
- Talking Heads | Fear Of Music
- Television | Marquee Moon – too proggy
- The Band | The Band (aka Brown Album) – too predictable
- The Beach Boys | Pet Sounds – i could see this
- The Beatles | Rubber Soul
- The Clash | London Calling – i could see this
- The Doors | The Doors – too LA; they’ll probably tease The Doors all weekend but i doubt it’ll be the set of choice
- The Police | Ghost In The Machine – too close to Oysterhead
- The Ramones | Ramones – too punk?
- The Roots | Phrenology – true story: i’m dressing as Questlove for halloween
- The Who | Who’s Next
- Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers | Damn The Torpedoes
- Tom Waits | Rain Dogs – too raspy
- U2 | Joshua Tree – too cultural relevant?
- Van Halen | Van Halen – maybe
- Van Morrison | Astral Weeks – too old school
- Velvet Underground | Velvet Underground And Nico
- Violent Femmes | Violent Femmes – i really hope it’s NOT this album
- Ween | White Pepper – maybe
- White Stripes | Elephant – obvious frontrunner
- Wilco | Yankee Hotel Foxtrot – obvious frontrunner
- X | Los Angeles – so-cal reference
- Yes | The Yes Album – too proggy
- ZZ Top | Tres Hombres – too little facial hair in the band
[via JamBase]
Well, there you have ’em — my 10-second snap judgments on what I think the band is going for with their epic Halloween set — and I’m sure I’ll be about 100% wrong on what choices I’ve laid out above vs. what the band will be eliminating themselves on Phish.com. It does get the speculation running about how far they’re going to take this, because where’s the fun in totally revealing which album it’ll be definitively? Part of the whole fun of the musical costume idea is that it remains at least some sort of surprise for the people in attendance. It’ll be rad no matter what, and like the other Flash animations there are no “rules” or “guidelines” into what the band needs to reveal for their fans. And they continue to exploit that wonderfully sending all of us into a frenzy of chat messages and thoughts of the circus finally coming back to town…
