We were doing just this, watching the rehearsal of Kid Rock's performance, when my friend noticed a familiar looking guy sitting on a stool behind Mr. Rock. He was playing a custom Paul Languedoc hollow bodied guitar. He had a red beard and mustache and red hair. He was wearing a button down shirt and jeans.

"Holy shit, that's Trey!" We proceeded to huddle around the screen, making sure it really was true. And it was. Later on, still sitting in the same office, we saw his very own guitar just sitting there on a guitar stand in the middle of the hall.

"Holy shit, that's Trey's guitar!"

It didn't end there, though. We were all newly excited (there were three of us, by the way) to watch the show now, since we'd see Trey play guitar in the background behind Kid Rock, on top of everything else (hell, it's cool to go to SNL, let alone meet SNL people, which we did). As we were standing in line to go in, my friend elbowed me in the ribs and said, "Mike Gordon just walked by." I whipped my head around and there he was, his big head of hair proceeding down the hall.

"Holy Shit."

One of my friends had the first encounter of the night right after the show. We were sitting in the office when he decided that he had to go to the bathroom. He came back ten minutes later practically jumping out of his skin.

"I just met Trey!" he told us. "He was right outside the elevator with a bunch of his friends! I told him I really liked the new CD [Farmhouse] and he said thanks!"

What the hell, I was thinking, why didn't I go to the bathroom with him?? "Awesome, man!" I told my friend.

This Saturday Night Live happened to be the last one of the season, I think, because there was an after-party to which my friends and I were able to go. This was very exciting; I met (shook hands with and was on my way) such people as Carson Daly and Tara Reid (wow...hot) along with Jackie Chan (he hosted) and Adam Sandler, Kid Rock, as well as many of the comedians on the show (Cheri Oteri and Molly Shannon are the funniest). What was constantly on my mind, though, was the possibility that Phish may have been at the party, since Trey and Mike were both at the show.

By the way, this all happened before I really appreciated and loved Phish (by this I mean that I merely had loved the studio albums for four years and had been to two shows-7.13.99 and 12.13.99-but wasn't yet listening to them 24/7, getting as many shows as possible, dreaming of them returning from their hiatus), so I wasn't as nervous or as excited or as speechless as I would be now. Needless to say, I was dying to meet him.

My chance finally came, though not without a scare. My friends and I located him talking to someone in the corner of the room, so we sidled up and quietly waited our turn to speak to him. All of a sudden, we were accosted by a short hippie-ish man with a beard.. He seemed a little bit intoxicated, but we couldn't tell if he was serious or not when he told us, "Why don't you go somewhere else right now, Trey doesn't want to talk to everyone in the building..." or something along those lines. Immediately, though, quelling our short-lived but intense disappointment, Trey stepped in, "What's up, guys?"

I wasn't sure what I would say to him, but I decided finally to ask him, after the necessary initial bows of respect ("You're music is great...it's awesome to meet you..."), if he remembered my Math teacher (who supposedly went to Taft High School with him and supposedly is friendly with him to this day). BTW, just to give a better idea of the dynamic of the conversation, we were only 15, 16, and 17 years old at the time, though we all probably looked more like 17 or 18.

"Mr. Zip?" Trey asked, laughing, "The Zipster? Zippy? Hmm....Oh yes, I remember him."

"Really?"

"Yeah. You know how when you're in high school you always have at least one homosexual experience? Well, mine was with him, but it wasn't a big deal. He only jacked me off." Trey and his friend were cracking up. My friends and I were confused, but amused.

"But seriously, no, I have no idea who you're talking about," Trey finally said, still laughing. I couldn't tell if he was serious at any point in the conversation, but that's about how far it went. We shook hands again (I can't believe I shook the very hand that produces all of those beautiful sounds, that quick funky wrist actually used some of it's power to shake MINE!), and we were all on our way.

- Zack

Editor's Note: The boys are quite the group of pranksters, eh?  Funny as hell, I must say.