The fall tour of 1998 was my first full tour and it was a marvelous, magical, and mind blowing experience. It was also very difficult and my "baptism by fire" of what it meant to really be on tour. This is not the forum for that entire story, though. Therefore, I will relate just a snippet, but a monumental one.
I don't think I really knew what I was in for when we rolled into Vegas. My compatriots were JH, whom is now a lifelong brother, and Cole who picked us up in his sweet 78 Westy outside of the Greek in L.A. in an absolute downpour...I do wish I knew where he was now. Needless to say, any of those who know, know Vegas Phish is outta hand. Everyone needs to do it at least once.

The first show of the two night stand was incredible. Good ol Whitey hooked me up with a ticket and my CO friends gave me some mushies. A jam packed (as in lots of tunes) first set with a couple rarities and a seemlessly segued second set. To this day, only 12/31/02 was a louder crowd than that 15th anniversary show.

Halloween was a different story. It was madness. No tickets to be found. A lot of kids I knew got in, but alas, Halloween still eludes me. JH and I got shut out, but Cole had a ticket. He was disappointed coming out of the show. Oh well. The talk now turned to what to do next. A lot of the kids on tour were skipping Utah. Not just skipping, but making it very clear that Utah sucked. I'll never forget my good bud Reno, "Dood, fuck Utah. Mormons, man. The cops suck and its so far. I'll meet you guys in Denver." That was the general consensus.

I'm so glad I was with JH and Cole. We were on tour to SEE SHOWS, not to sell shit, or just thought it was cool to be on tour...like many kids out there, sorry to say. So, we headed for Salt Lake City.

As the show approached, I went out there to get myself in. I stood on this pylon, finger in the air and big smile on my face. It wasn't long before a beautiful little lass bestowed a miracle upon me. When we got in, we noticed something strange, there was basically no one there. When the lights went down, the floor was almost full and the seats on either side of the stage were filled...thats it. The place was practically empty. We were in disbelief, but our disbelief was only beginning.

As excellent first set. The Tube>Drowned>JLC still swims in my memory. Now at halfway through the second set, things were already blistering, but when you hear an oom-pa-pa...fahgettaboutit. Trey told the tale for us all, the craziness of Vegas and kids not being able to get tickets. Now, as everyone knows, Harpua contains a few bars of a song they usually wouldn't play, which is fine, a bit of fun. Well, this time the snippet didn't end. It took me until Time to realize that they may just play the whole thing. I'll never forget my friend Mindy clutching my forearm, exasperating, "Are they really doing this?!" They were doing it...they were playing the entirety of Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. Not only did they play it, they nailed it. Unreal.

We staggered out of the venue. Our eyes were wild, our jaws dropped open, tongues upon the pavement. That is when I really knew that Phish cares about their fans and will throwdown for those who put in the effort, and always look out for the "out of the way" show. All I did was laugh the next time I saw Reno. The look on his face like he just swallowed sour milk was classic. And that's why I never schwag Utah.

-Danno