On December 28, 1990, Phish played their first of three shows between 1990 and 1991 at The Marquee – an early 1990s New York City nightclub best known for showcasing Indie British bands. Advance tickets to the 18-and-over show cost $13.50, and the 950-capacity club was sold out. Phish first played New York City in spring of 1988, climbing through the clubs from Kenny’s Castaways, one-offs at Tramps and Ukrainian National Home in ’88-‘89, and eight shows at The Wetlands Preserve between ’89 and September 1990. This was Ron Delsener Presents’ first Phish show, starting a relationship with the legendary promoter that continues today. The Marquee was the first show on the band’s second-ever holiday tour - a three-night run including this show, Campus Club in Providence on the 29th, and their second consecutive New Year’s Eve at Boston’s World Trade Center Exhibition Hall.
Phish released their sophomore album, ‘Lawn Boy’, in September 1990, and five of those songs made it into The Marquee setlist. Their instrumentation at this time included Page on a Yamaha CP70 electric piano and Hammond B-3 and Mike on a Languedoc bass, which translated palpably to the soundboard DAT recording. The Marquee ’90 was exuberant – stoked with holiday vibes, a sit-in by Blues Traveler frontman and fellow Wetlands alumni, John Popper, and largely seamless flow. In addition to sparking Phish’s career-long relationship with Ron Delesner, this show was where Sue Drew, a young Elektra Records A&R rep who initially noticed the band on a CMJ Magazine cover before picking up ‘Lawn Boy’ (calling it “the strangest album I have ever heard”), caught her first show. Both these connections spawned alliances that helped define the band’s future.
Highlights from Set I included an already-classic Runaway Jim / Foam opening combo with a “We Wish You A Merry Christmas” tuneup and holiday shoutout from Trey. Horn was played for the third known time, having entered the repertoire that spring, and Trey introduced the song and pointed out lyricist Tom Marshall to the crowd. Llama (also new in fall 1990) was followed by a powerful sequence of Colonel Forbin’s Ascent > Fly Famous Mockingbird > Mike’s Song > I Am Hydrogen > Weekapaug Groove.
Set II was a smooth-flowing onslaught, starting with The Landlady > Possum opening combo, pairing the new-ish (debuted 9/13/90) instrumental with the classic Possum. Next began a liquid sequence of The Squirming Coil > Tweezer > Manteca > Tweezer > The Oh Kee Pa Ceremony > My Sweet One > Divided Sky. The Coil > Tweezer > Manteca > Tweezer segment was electric, with a brief jam that hinted at Manteca. Tweezer was fast becoming a classic – already played more than 40 times since its debut that spring. This was just the second time it was split up in a sandwich (see 9/20/90 Tweezer > Buried Alive > Tweezer), and the Phishified Dizzy Gillespie cover, Manteca, was the second known performance after its November debut. Tweezer’s slowdown ending led to The Oh Kee Pa Ceremony > My Sweet One – a one-off combination of the jazzy instrumental with Fish’s song My Sweet One, which cued up Divided Sky for another dose of big bass and keys. John Popper sat in on harmonica for No Good Trying > Hold Your Head Up, Don’t Get Me Wrong, and Funky Bitch. No Good Trying (a Syd Barrett cover) and Don’t Get Me Wrong (a Phish-Popper original that built upon the original Reba arrangement) were both played for the third known and final time. Trey introduced Don’t Get Me Wrong saying, “We and John got together a couple months ago and wrote this.” The encore was Bouncing Around The Room and Highway To Hell – still the only known such pairing.
Sue Drew later recounted, “I was completely blown away. The crowd was one thing because they were all so into their own little world and into the whole music, but the band was just incredible. The musicianship was amazing. And from that minute on, I just became obsessed with them as musicians, and so I started paying attention to where they were playing.” In addition to signing them to Elektra, Sue introduced the band to their booking agent, Chip Hooper. The rest is history.
PRODUCTION CREDITS:
Recorded by John Paluska
Mastered by Fred Kevorkian at Kevorkian Mastering
Post-Production by Kevin Shapiro
