Well two weeks off from proper show reviewing is enough of a break. I'm
now continuing on into the fall tour before I get too far separated from
the summer job and lose listening momentum/perspective
9/12/25 Louisiville - Bourbon and Beyond
Set 1
A fine, standard 46 Days opens the tour. Nothing remarkable and
slightest and takes a little bit to gain some heat. It's a fine little
type 1 reading, nothing more nothing less. Good opener. Good energy.
As mentioned above, apparently this show takes place 47 days after SPAC
3. How appropriate. No way in hell they didn't do that on purpose, lol.
A similarly unspecial but "what did you expect this is a festival show, its fine" version of Moma Dance follows. Predictability +1 
Hot
Moma is Hot Moma. It is extremely energetic and up tempo, its just
nothing you haven't a heard a million times before. Still kicks ass
though, I mean they are cookin!!!! Worth a mention, actually, when all is said and done.
Free is red hot and basically follows in the footsteps of Moma. Strong if inessential.
The first must hear sequence of the comes with the following versions of
Wolfman and Timber. Wolf has a jam chart and it absolutely deserves it.
This is pure an adulterated type 1 destruction. Yes it's always a hot
type 1 Blazer but even by those standards this one seems a little bit
"extra", if you will. Absolutely crushing and definitely must hear!!
Apply the above statements to the following version of Timber. Same thing. Just a plus plus type 1 and must hear all day long. The set comes to a close with a nice couplet of A Day in the Life into a typically roaring Possum.
All in all, there isn't much to say about the set at all.
Basically Fast Food Phish, but at the same time the energy is sky high
and the heat is there in spades.
The only truly must your material are the aforementioned versions of
Wolf and Timber. But the set is a good time on the whole in a small way.
Set 2
The second set opens with a large and hefty 14 minute Sand before going into a giant 22 minute Chalkdust!
Sand is absolutely incredible loaded with x Factor magic. 14 minutes of
lengthy gooey wonderful psychedelia. The song and initial jam are slow
building and patient tonight. They take your time it really getting into
it with loops and a very nice chill vibe reminiscent of Dicks 2024.
Eventually it builds and kind of peaks as expected and Trey starts the
main riff again intending to end it, but Page comes to the rescue with
some dark and heavy synthesizer stabs and the jam morphs into several
minutes of terrific robo-darkness whatever the hell you want to call it.
Absolutely must hear, this version actually goes full-blown type 2 for
about 3 or 4 minutes. Maybe the sickest version of the year if you're
asking me! Wow!
So the ending jam dies down and Trey leads us on into a 22 minute Chalkdust. This sucker is an absolute BEHEMOTH. It
rages fast and hard and powerful with insane hose type 1 all the way
until the 11 minute mark. There's even a moment where Trey holds a note
for a solid 60 seconds or longer. Absolutely insane, if it ended right
there everyone would still consider it maybe the best type 1 reading of
the year. Thankfully that's not the case and around 11 minutes Fishman
changes the beat into a more skippy kind of shuffle rhythm. From here,
they spend until the 17-minute mark evolving the champ into this
extremely hard rocking Jimi Hendrix style hard fire psych rock. Definitely shades of the 12/6/97 Tweezerbella - that kind of thing. Around
17 minutes Trey introduces a more funky lick and the jam goes into
weirdo roboticonstruction mode. In a very cool move, it doesn't
completely self-destruct and they smoothly more fit back into more hard
rocking territory without missing a beat. The flow on this jam is unreal. From there they of course bring it to a close and we get an excellent segue out into Light.
Yo dog that was absolutely incredible!!! Man there have been some
amazing versions of that song this year and that has to be in the top
three at least. Definitely one of the strongest jams of the entire year
from top to bottom. It's got a solid three or four different sections,
each one explored perfectly and with wonderful transitions from one to
the next. An a+ reading across the board!! Wow ...
And on into a 9 minute Light we go. Truly excellent type 1 reading,
while not must hear it definitely delivers the goods. A terrific kind of
upbeat bubbly jam kind of morphs absolutely perfectly, and
unexpectedly, into a short but perfectly placed Ya Mar.
Following that we get an absolutely spectacular 13 minute Carini. Kind
of the equivalent of that version of Sand from earlier in the set. An
absolute beast, it ranges hard and heavy until about 6:30. From there it
goes type 2 and morphs into this kick ass upbeat kind of synthy funk
whatever for it's duration. Total x Factor magic once again and
absolutely must hear.
After an excellent and hot type 1 Everythings Right, set to proper comes
to a close with Harry Hood. It's not the finest of the year but it's
also above average I would say. Not much to you but worth a little bit
of recognition. The build-up solo section from Trey feels three times as
long as usual tonight. Excellent "lower tier" reading.
Boring encore of C Zero and First Tube. Really strangely, they both DRAG and are very low energy. Strange end....
All in all, this was a very very enjoyable show. Of course I
definitely wouldn't call it top tier in terms of the standards of 2025,
but I'd say it's better than the 3.7 rating it currently has. Honestly
this is maybe a light 4.0 or something.
Set one was good with the very strong highlights of Wolf and Timber. But
set two was pretty much a smashing success from start to finish. I'd
still put it high in the "2nd tier" of second sets for the year but it's
excellent on the whole.
The Sand>Chalkdust is 10,000% essential, as is the Carini. And the Light>Ya Mar in between is so much fun.
Comparatively speaking, I would honestly say that second set was far
better than that of, say, Charleston #1. And the show as a whole I would
take over both of the Philadelphia gigs all day long (come at me!)
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