Skin It Back | 1988-02-20 | Phish

View NotesPhish
February 20, 1988
ATO Fraternity House Pledge Party
St. Lawrence University
Canton, NY

DISC 1
SET 1
1.   Funky Bitch (joined in progress)
2.   Golgi Apparatus
3.   Peaches En Regalia
4.   Take the 'A' Train >
5.   Possum
6.   Phase Dance
7.   Good Times Bad Times
8.   Skin It Back
SET 2
9.   Wison
10.  I Didn't Know

DISC 2
SET 2, cont.
1.   Fluffhead
2.   Fire
3.   Fee (partial)
4.   You Enjoy Myself >
5.   Divided Sky >
6.   AC/DC Bag >
7.   Whipping Post
8.   Slave To The Traffic Light (partial)
9.   David Bowie (joined in progress)

Source:  SBD > 2nd Gen Master Cassette > Tascam 122 MK III (playback) > ProTools HD3 (capture: 44.1KhZ/16-bit) > SSL AWS 900+ Analogue Work Station > Noise Reduction > EQ > Playback Level Correction > WAV > FLAC. 

Remaster performed between October 16-December 20, 2011 by Adam Yoffe at Chicago Public Radio, Navy Pier, Chicago, IL.


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Here is a detailed history of this recording:

I attended this show, which was recorded somewhat haphazardly by a friend/fraternity brother. It was our first time seeing or hearing Phish in any form. A few months after the show, I copied his master cassettes on my Technics dubbing deck using Maxell XL-II 90's. The original recording consumed three 45 minutes tape sides, and was known to be a partial recording, given the degree to which the taper was consumed by the rather large and wild party occurring at our house that night. He captured the better part of two full sets with a few cut-numbers along the way.  A third set went unrecorded. 

The original master tapes have never surfaced, making my second-gen copy the only known version. I digitized and shared my copy of the show in the late 90's via GDLIVE.COM (which was later assigned SHNID 4508 on etree.org by Ben Mohr).  Until now, those source files represented the only known copy of this show in circulation.  

This new version represents two key updates to the original release:

1. My original master cassettes have been professionally remastered, resulting in a considerable upgrade from my original digital conversion effort.

2. The date of this show has been corrected from 9/27/87 to 2/20/88.

Charlie Dirksen from Phish.net contacted me a few months ago inquiring about the originally listed date, suggesting that various musical elements of this show, along with the presence of a few videos in the band's archive, almost certainly dated this show to Feb 20, 1988. This information, along with input from several friends who were also in attendance, we concluded with a high degree of certainty that 2/20/88 is the correct date, replacing the originally listed date of 9/27/87.

The presence of Phase Dance (Pat Metheny) was a key distinguishing factor in correcting the date, as this song was only performed by Phish four times, all in Feb. 1988.  Charlie also noted that this particular arrangement of Fluffhead is consistent with the revised date, and would NOT have been consistent with Sept. '87 renditions.  

Charlie Dirksen tells me the band's archive contains as-yet-unseen video of Good Times Bad Times, Slave to the Traffic Light, and BBFCM from this show, presumably shot with Mike Gordon's personal video camera.  BBFCM does not appear on my master tapes, and is vaguely recollected to have come from a short third set on this date. It is my sincere hope that the band may someday share the videos they have on file from this show.

Given the corrected date of 2/20/88, prior notes about this tape containing the first ever version of I Didn't Know have been removed.

David Bowie originally appeared at the beginning of tape one, side one, writing over the beginning of Funky Bitch.  Upon further review, it appears Bowie was actually the final song of the second set (given the presence of a second "we'll be right back" announcement from Trey.  The first set-break is announced after Skin It Back).  We believe the taper recorded over the beginning of set one in order to capture some of the Bowie jam after running out of tape during Slave. Given this, Bowie has been relocated to the end of set two to reflect the proper performance order.

As regards the 2011 remastering effort, after years of procrastination and plotting to improve upon my initial attempt, I enlisted my friend Adam Yoffe, an old admirer of the band from way back, who also happens to be a radio production professional with access to an extremely high quality studio at Chicago Public Radio's Navy Pier facility.  Adam and I convened at Navy Pier in Fall 2011 to re-capture my original cassettes into the digital domain. Adam then applied the technology at his disposal to make the best of a less-than-stellar master recording.

Cassette recording levels started out very low, which produced considerable tape-hiss. You will also hear Mr Languedoc tweaking and improving the mix as the show goes on. Which is to say, please don't judge this recording by the first set.  Things really start to solidify by Good Times Bad Times, and they get considerably better from there. While making every reasonable effort to balance the playback levels across the entire recording, we erred on the side of caution regarding tape-noise removal during the early numbers, finding that strong reductions of said noise also reduced the musical content beyond acceptable levels. Thankfully, the tape hiss slowly fades to almost imperceptible levels by the second set. We hope you'll agree we were able to both preserve and improve upon the fidelity of the original recording, albeit within the constraints of a 20+ year old, second generation cassette.

This was one of Phish's first shows outside of Vermont. Our fraternity (ATO), having completely exhausted the limited stock of quality area bands at prior events, hired Phish with no prior knowledge of their music, not even so much as a demo, based on a recommendation from a friend-of-a-friend in Burlington, VT.  I had the good fortune of assisting the band with load-in and setup, which resulted in a private performance of Golgi Aparatus during soundcheck. Needless to say I was mightily impressed, and spent much of my evening spreading the word to friends about the upcoming show.

I'd like to thank Adam Yoffe for his time and effort on this remastering project, as well as Charlie Dirksen (Phish.net), and my old friends Mike Reese, Chris Richardson, Jack Cooke and Joe Mastromarchi for their assistance in validating the date of this historic early Phish show. Please feel free to contact me at [email protected] if you'd like any other info about this recording. 