Phish Opens Alpharetta Show with Extended Performance of “Tweezer,” Still in Progress

ALPHARETTA, GA – Vermont’s grooviest export, the band Phish closed down their three-night run at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater just outside of Atlanta, GA on Sunday night to massive crowds, most of whom will not be at work today. Their absence will not be due to the copious amounts of drugs and alcohol consumed at the show, but rather because the fans are still there, listening to the opening song.

“Tweezer,” one of the bands more popular songs, has never been played for longer than 45 minutes, until now. Coming out onto the stage around 7:15 PM, singer and guitarist Trey Anastasio announced that he had made a bet in regards to how long he could play without stopping, and then dove into the opening licks of the tune. As drummer Jon Fishman entered with a few carefully placed boomwhacks, the audience erupted into a frenzy from which they have yet to emerge.

Over the course of the evening the band moved in and out of several other tunes, including “Fee,” “You Enjoy Myself,” “Julius,” “Louie Louie,” “MmmBop,” the third movement of Rachmaninoff’s second symphony, and a medley of songs featuring Cardi B, but always returning to the original Tweezer theme. After the first hour or so of the song, some of the fans began to get restless and confused, but by the second and third hours everyone knew they were part of something extraordinary and were going wild.

Doctors are unsure how long everyone’s adrenaline will allow them to continue jamming at such a high level of intensity, but as of 8 o’clock this morning there were no signs of a slow-down. At press time Mike Gordon was on stage, 11 minutes into an extended bass solo seeming based around the theme song from Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood, while the rest of the band was having a bathroom break. The full song is clocking in at almost 13 hours at this point, but we will update this article as the story, and the musical theme, develops.

Image Credits: Heather Katsoulis.