Time for me to finally dig in to why I created this blog. The 9/24/99 Wolfman’s Brother is in my top three jams of all time, and it tends to be highly overlooked. It also serves as a fantastic introduction to the 1999 Phish jamming style and sound. Set 2, song 3; time stamps given are from the spreadsheet (streaming linked below at phish.in).

Listen: phish.in

Let me start this one out with a bit of context: my love of Phish’s 1999 jams. Often frowned upon as a lesser year, in my opinion musically it’s Phish’s best. Sure, some of the composed parts to complicated songs can get a bit messy, and set flow isn’t always as on-point as it was in prior years. But the depth of jams more than makes up for it, and I find myself often returning to 1999 jams for the heaviest and most intense bliss jams. There’s something about the swirly, psychedelic sound of this year that just has me coming back for more.

Following the release of The Siket Disc – a Phish mail order-only release – the band returned after a six-month break between New Year’s ’98-’99 with a fiery summer tour chock full of jams that hinted at the band’s strongest work (jams which I will get to in the future), and a new style inspired heavily by the cow funk jams of ’97-’98 and the ambient work of the Siket Disc. They continued the momentum with their first trip to Japan as a headlining act of the Fuji Rock Festival, and then proceeded to take a month off before resuming touring. Where July ’99 to me is much more fiery and intense, September ’99 has more subtlety and nuance in its bliss, aiming for a higher average value and spreading the energy of a joyous peak over a longer frame of time. I’ve likened it to my friends that July ’99 is more yellows and bright greens, while September ’99 is more lush purples and forest greens. Regardless, September ’99 showed that the band was continuing their upward trend and jamming dexterity with progressively more monstrous and spacey jams, as observed in the performance that is this Wolfman’s Brother. Others will often cite the Boise Bag as the go-to September ’99 jam; while it’s certainly a strong argument, I find myself still returning to the 9/24/99 Wolfman’s for its insanely strong, lengthy, and arguably simpler peak.

Set 1 is solid, typical of September ’99: a rocking Disease that includes a Tracy tease, a typically mellow ’99 Roggae, and Guyute is always welcome in my book. Set 2 blew the doors off early with a pumping Peaches en Regalia that slithers into a Possum. After a brief pause, Page gives us those opening chords on his piano, and we’re in Wolfman’s Brother. But I’m sure the audience had no idea what a mind eraser they were in for…

Intro/composed section

I really do prefer the composed section of late ’90s Wolfman’s Brothers – they’re a bit slower, slinkier, and funkier like a good Black-Eyed Katy. The band plays just behind Fish’s snare, and everything just fits a really nice, mellow mood. Not to mention, with Trey’s wah work and Mike’s slapping, they just ooze of drippy funk grooves. But aside from that, nothing out of the ordinary for a late ’90s Wolfman’s Brother.

Harmonizing is a hair more on-point than what we’re used to with Phish, but I can always take or leave that. If anything, it’s an indicator to me that they’re on and listening but not the sole indicator of a strong jam/show, so like I said I can take it or leave it.

Meaningless Excitement portion at 2:41 has Page absolutely flying on the keys with mildly more dexterity than normal, and Trey’s thick, funky wah tone compliments to set the mood perfectly. They come back in and return for the final chorus on a dime.

Right now, we find ourselves in the perfect framework for a big jam: the band is relaxed, Fish is laying down the beat with casual precision, and everyone else is in no hurry to jump into things.

Type i jamming

Immediately at 4:01 Trey changes up his standard guitar solo to syncopate to the offbeats, highlighted by Fish’s polyrhythmic cymbal work. At 4:17 Mike changes things up a hair to add a bit more pop to his slapping, but settles back quickly; Page does the same by stepping between to the Clavinet and his piano. This section requires quite a bit of patience to get to the good stuff, but lovers of cow funk are in for a real treat. The band just digs in and plays around for a while, feeling each other out and waiting for direction.

The first shift comes at 5:09, when the band settles into a straight Bb groove. This section is highlighted by Trey/Page interplay and Fish’s ride cymbal. Trey plays around lots with effects: the whammy goes on and off to create octave pairings. As much as this is cow funk, Page is going jazzy and Trey bluesy with their accidentals; this creates some interesting mild tension. Mike holds down the fort by sticking primarily to the Bb tonic and the minor 7th Ab below it. If you’ve been reading my jam analyses then by now you should be picking up that this means we’re headed for Bb mixolydian, but not quite just yet – this is still framework stuff.

At 6:15, Fish switches up out of his standard beat to syncopate the snare, and then moves his focus to the toms at 6:20, returning to the snare on 2 and the upbeat of 3. He swings his hits just a hair on the upbeat of 3 to slow things down and allow the band to step back.

Again, patience is key to this jam. This section on the surface can seem a bit meandering and pointless, but that doesn’t mean we should just filter it out. Starting at 7:08, Trey starts looping some patterns and noodling. Page is just throwing out chords to see what sticks. The band is liking the groove, and to me it sounds like they’re trying to find patterns that might work for new direction.

At 7:40, Page starts shifting his focus to a slash chord – Ab (minor 7th) dominates while Eb (major 4th) compliments. He shifts around every once in a while to the 6th and tonic, but this is more dancing around to give movement to the chord he’s suggesting. Trey picks up and shifts his focus to dance around the F (major 5th) and D (major 3rd), with Mike as usual holding the focus on the tonic Bb. Trey’s playing is marked left and right with blue note accidentals and chromatic runs.

Cultivating the jam

Finally at 9:10, Mike starts playing more than his tonic, responding to Page’s work. Trey’s playing starts taking a slightly longer and feedback-heavy tone, allowing Page’s piano to shine through.

At 9:40, we find our first indicator that things are about to get weird: FUNK SIREN. Trey hits a falling octave on his whammy and loops it in the background to overlay his feedback drones. Now we’re starting to get swirly – all that’s needed is Trey’s Univibe or Leslie to bring us in to fully psychedelic bliss territory. But he holds off for now, continuing to grow and build the tension.

By 10:35, Fish has settled into a rhythm reliant on the ride and hi-hat, with the bass drum and snare providing foundation. Mike begins playing around the tonic again, returning only on the 1 of most measures to keep the baseline cow funk steaming forward.

At 10:34, Trey hits the major 3rd, and it seems the band likes the idea; everyone slides into place by focusing on the Bb major chord and Trey’s accidentals start becoming less frequent in favor of small occasional chromatic runs.

Starting at 11:00, Trey starts playing a theme that seems to pull at the strings of minor 7th/octave very heavily, with the minor 3rd thrown in for good measure. He sustains a long F (major 5th) and lets it feed back before diving back into the fray, building more and more tension as he goes along. Page is following the energy but leading him – most of Trey’s notes are coming from Page’s jazz accidentals at this point.

I actually had to rewind the jam a few times here, as I’ve just heard something in this jam for the first time that I haven’t heard before. Page starts playing a Bb-C-D-C riff around 11:00 that becomes the recurring theme of the peak of this jam. He’s playing it in the background of this segment of the jam until the peak. It’s fantastic to hear where the rest of the band pulls the peak from. Speaking of which… thanks for tagging along so far! I promise, the peak is coming soon.

Trey is now relying on longer sustained notes to build the tension. Fish has settled back into a locked groove, with Mike tagging along for good measure. They know Trey and Page are here to shine, and it’s the rhythm section’s job to make the piano and guitar sound good.

Some more aimless noodling for a beat from Trey, until…

The infinite plane above the clouds of cathartic bliss heaven

Yep, took a while to get here. But I hope you strapped on your seatbelt – you’re going to need it as we shoot off into space, breaking the clouds and entering the realm of bliss jamming.

At 11:55, Trey hits the gas pedal and shoots us out into space. All of a sudden, the tension the band built? gone. The noodling and throwing-things-at-a-wall-to-see-what-sticks? Gone. The jazzy and bluesy accidentals? Gone. The chromatic runs? Gone. All that’s left is pure Bb mixolydian bliss.

A few things to keep in mind for this segment: Page keeps his chord sequence, albeit now a bit louder and in focus as the rhythmic root for everything; he’s allowing Trey to slingshot off of his own playing. Occasionally, Page will shift to a suspension relying on C (major 2nd) and Eb (major 4th) which always resolves cleanly back to the Bb major root. Mike is sticking to lower tones to fill out the bottom end of the frequency spectrum – mostly the Bb root, F (major 5th) below the root, and the Ab (minor 7th) below the root as well – sticking to root/fifth power chord pairings and the minor 7th to fully paint the mixolydian spectrum. Fish builds with Trey, keeping him locked in with the kick and snare and adding his cymbals in to keep the air thick and foggy amongst Trey’s jedi lightsaber of composition.

Now, on to Trey. His tone is soaring, with both univibes kicked into high gear and the feedback sustaining his notes for measures at a time. There is no shredding Trey here, only feedback-happy Trey. He also mirrors the tonics of Page’s earlier sequence of Bb-C-D-C, occasionally throwing in the Eb-F after the D instead to bring things to a higher peak. At 12:25, he turns off the Whammy’s octave-down to fill up the top end of the spectrum. Each grouping of four measures simply washes over the ears – only appropriate for a hose jam. At 13:00, Trey begins to play around with the Ab (minor 7th) as well for suspension, only to resolve cleanly every time into the root Bb. And he’s following Page’s compositional cues from a distance of almost a minute behind – showing an impressive memory and an even more impressive listening skill.

The return trip

Finally, around 14:20 things begin to settle down. Trey adds some more feedback drones to his ongoing loop, while Mike slowly fades into nothingness and Fish adds some authoritative kick drums. Page’s piano work becomes delicate, almost in recovery from Trey’s emotional overload. Trey finishes the last of his loops and steps over to his Yamaha AN1-X synthesizer – a signature of 1999 – to add texture and to simply play sounds instead of notes and chords and compositions. Mike steps up high on the fretboard around 15:30 and turns on lots of delays to blur things and create a soft landing pad for everyone else. Here we find ourself in a washy recovery blanket to comfort us after witnessing pure beauty. At 16:45, Trey plays a little loop on his keyboard that is signature to ’99 jams and 2001 intros.

Speaking of which, Mike steps up his bass game with some low rumbles at 17:00 in F. By 17:40 the original drum beat has all but ceased and Page is finally letting go of the Bb of Wolfman’s Brother. We end around 18:00 with a final sigh of Bb major from all members (save Fish, who has fully stopped to allow the band to enter ambient wash mode).

At 18:05, it seems Trey has changed his keyboard sequence loop to C, and Mike obliges. If I didn’t know better, I’d say we’re heading into a nice spacey 2001. Certainly a bit reminiscent of the 7/7/99 2001 monstrosity and building more tension. Mike’s bass drones are starting to breathe more, gaining intensity and rattling everything that isn’t fixed to the ground at 18:20. Page builds up the chord with a C major on his piano. Where are we headed – more time in space, or a landing pad?

The band places us neatly in the latter – with a solid Lizards.

This is one of my favorite jams – competes with another ’99 jam (for a future analysis) and definitely in my top 3. I know plenty of good Wolfman’s Brothers and plenty of great cow funk jams, but none of them also include the massive bliss peak that this one does. I find myself relistening to this jam on frequent basis. Give it a spin, and I dare you to not dig further into 1999.

Speaking of which, for those of you looking for more ’99 jams… I suggest you check out this reddit post that I made ages ago, there’s a treasure trove of information there and enough to keep you busy for the better part of a year. Get in touch with me and let me know what you like and I can help point you towards more jams of what you’re looking for.