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7 Best Moments From Phish’s Las Vegas Sphere Residency Kick-Off
Phish kicked off their Las Vegas residency on Thursday (April 18) at Sphere and Billboard was on the scene; check out the best moments.
Phish shares some traits with the Irish group – both are quartets with decades-long histories of concert production experimentation who remain major live draws – but the revered Vermont jam band still had something to prove as it kicked off a four-night run at the cutting-edge Sin City venue: How would an act known for its exploratory improvisation navigate a daunting visual space that on its face might seem more suited for tightly planned productions like U2:UV Achtung Baby Live at Sphere, which remained relatively static throughout its 40-show run? Across three-and-a-half hours and two sets of music, singer-guitarist Trey Anastasio, bassist Mike Gordon, keyboardist Page McConnell, and drummer Jon Fishman seemed relatively unphased by the eye-popping animations darting across the 160,000-square-foot Sphere screen above them – at least, other than when Anastasio remarked to the crowd halfway through Phish’s first set that they “should see it this way, it’s pretty cool!” – and instead focused on delivering quality versions of jam vehicles old (“Tweezer”) and new (“Life Saving Gun”). Each of the setlist’s 18 songs featured a different animation, ranging from kooky graphics to abstract patterns, and Sphere Immersive Sound rendered the band’s audio in new, novel ways.
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