Question: When is a concept album not a concept album?<\/p>\n
Phish has walked that fine line several times over the course of their career, most notably with their 1996 release Billy Breathes<\/i>. But three years prior, Trey Anastasio and crew released Rift<\/i>, an album which, if you weren\u2019t paying attention, would only hint at a reoccurring theme. Coming off their previous disc A Picture Of Nectar<\/i>, it was a slight step down, but still a powerful disc.<\/p>\n
The overlapping tale throughout the album is that of a forlorn lover, troubled by a strain in his relationship, and the restless dreams he experiences throughout the night that challenge his view of whether the relationship could continue or not. The use of Jon Fishman\u2019s rhythmic recreation of a clock ticking at various times in the album, as well as the two interludes of \u201cLengthwise,\u201d help try to tie the story together.<\/p>\n
Here\u2019s the thing, though: you don\u2019t need to understand what is occurring in the storyline to appreciate Rift<\/i>\u2014in fact, trying to follow along with what is happening as the subject of the album passes into different zones of his dreams sometimes weighs down the proceedings. Taken as a whole, though, the album might not be as experimental or random as A Picture Of Nectar<\/i>. Whether this is a good thing or bad, I\u2019ll leave up to the individual listener.<\/p>\n
What can be told is that Rift<\/i> contains some incredible music. \u201cFast Enough For You\u201d is a track that coulda, woulda, shoulda been a staple of rock radio, if only the industry had had the balls to give it a fair shot. The same thing can be said for the disc\u2019s closer, \u201cSilent In The Morning,\u201d which raises the energy level at just the right time. Maybe\u2014just maybe\u2014had these gotten the kind of airplay that \u201cFree\u201d would get a few years later, Phish would have gained a whole new world of fans sooner.<\/p>\n
This isn\u2019t to say that every song on Rift<\/i> works as well. \u201cMy Friend, My Friend\u201d has the feeling of a \u201cYou Enjoy Myself\u201d retread, and isn\u2019t as captivating as one might have hoped it would be. \u201cWeigh\u201d is a dark track featuring vocals by bassist Mike Gordon, which tries to inject some humor but comes off sounding a bit like free association in terms of the lyrics.<\/p>\n
Ah, but these moments are few and far between. For the occasional miss, there are tracks like \u201cHorn\u201d (which took me a little time to warm up to), \u201cThe Wedge\u201d and \u201cMaze,\u201d which give all the members of Phish plenty of room to express themselves while not overstaying their times in the spotlight at the expense of the song as a whole.<\/p>\n
Rift<\/i> is the kind of disc that, to newer Phish fans, might not seem to be the most approachable. However, it is well worth the time and effort to listen to, even if you choose to toss aside the loose narrative binding the tracks together. It\u2019s not their greatest album, but it\u2019s still damned good.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34615,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[5628],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-46466","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-phish","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46466\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46466"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=46466"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=46466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}