The Story of the Ghost, contrary to the beliefs of many Phish fans, is a concept album, along the same lines as Rift. The album commences with "Ghost," consisting of Phish's most profound lyrics ever written to date. "Ghost" tells the tale of a tortured soul who has lost his truest companion, the person who understands him to the greatest degree; it can be speculated that this person is a friend or perhaps even the narrator himself.

The beauty of the ghost, which if describing the purest sense of the word “friend,” is that he can be the silent observer and yet know you better than you know yourself. Yet you must heed when he speaks for he is providing you with wisdom and honesty that you may not be able to provide for yourself at certain times-that is the beauty of a true friend.

If the “ghost” is the narrator’s own inner drive, strength, and understanding (which has clearly gone astray at the beginning of this song), the same metaphors apply. “His answer came in action, he never spoke a word, or maybe I lay down the phone, before he could be heard;” perhaps the narrator became too confident in himself that he lost his sense of self-awareness.

He laid down the phone, he did not listen either to his companion or to himself. Yet, the narrator foreshadows what might lie ahead at the end of the long and agonizing journey he is about to undertake: “I guess I just stopped needing him as much as once before. But maybe he’s still with me, the latch was left unhooked, he’s waiting in the wind and rain, I simply haven’t looked.”

The album shifts to the upbeat tone of "Birds of a Feather," which describes the person's love for an object outside of himself, perhaps a group of people who have a great passion for a musical group. The protagonist warns that, “It’s easy sometimes when you just coast along, but like it or not something always seems to go wrong. Sometimes people build you up just so they can knock you down, sometimes they will have you there cause they need someone around.”

The group of fans might be a collectively tortured on outside of the music “scene;” they “hang on emotions they bottle inside” and the only way to temporarily ease the suffering is by coming together to “peck at the ground and strut out of stride” in a community where all accepts all. “It’s not an experience if they can’t bring someone along…” The narrator returns to the ability of music to heal later in the album.

"Meat" is the come down from the high. "Meat" continues the sobering thoughts of "Ghost" as the protagonist clearly begins to sink into a deep state of depression. Here, the narrator describes himself as “a ghost, but I cannot fly. I’m stuck here as the years fly by. I need a resting place cause I already felt my body die.” Aristotle said that a friend is one soul dwelling in two bodies. With the absence of one body comes the absence of part of the soul.

As a ghost who cannot fly, the narrator refers to the ability of his companion, also a “ghost” as depicted in the story of the first track, to give him wings to fly (perhaps a metaphor for living, friendship, understanding, peace of mind). Treasuring moments of his earlier pleasures, he drinks away these memories (“let them sink...”). "Guyute" is the silly, but evil imagery produced by the drunken imagination (I compare this song to “Weigh” on Rift in terms of silly, but disconcerting and vivid sights and symbols-“I’d like to cut your head off, so I can weigh it, whaddya say?”) and "Fikus" turns drunken stupor into a drunken introspective dream.

"Shafty" involves the change in state from drunkeness to denial; the terrible thing about hell, the song tells us, is that when you're there you can't even tell (“As you move through this life you love so, you could be there and not even know”). The ultimate alcoholic's dilemna, in the context of Story of the Ghost, "Shafty" neatly sets up the transitional phase from denial to acceptance.

"Limb by Limb" and "Frankie Says," behind "Ghost" could quite possibly be two of the greatest pieces of poetry ever composed by Phish. Both songs tell the tale of falling apart in every dimension, and the torture of struggle between sinking to the lowest possible point(being ripped apart by emptiness, lost of friendship in the purest sense of the form, complacency, and denial) and overcoming to begin a new life.

You can sense the narrator’s struggle between these two ends; his complacency is exhibited in the beginning vocal duet between Trey and Page (“left is where I always turn, left is how I’m forced to learn, left the route my walking takes, left alone with my mistakes, up against a person who, up till now I never knew, up from Hell the answer blew, up or down it’s up to you”), his falling apart occurs in the chorus by “coming unglued in midair”, and yet he acknowledges that he “lands to reform”.

The pain and despondency is “lingering slowly, melting away,” but is purely symbolic and transitional at the moment. “Frankie Says” further depicts this struggle between despair and overcoming. The protagonist’s stubbornness and desire to begin a new life once again begins to creep into view and builds on the lyrics of “Limb by Limb.” There is the profound realization that he doesn’t “need these orbits in my mind, revolve and cycle through, don’t keep coming back for more; I don’t need these circular designs, wheel and spin away from me, you’ve been by here before.”

Picture the narrator on his knees alone on a field during a thunderstorm, begging for answers from whomever might be listening; “Frankie Says” is clearly the epitome of the tortured soul. The narrator ends the song continuing on this theme, uttering the frightening lyrics of “I’ve lost my mind, I’ve lost my way, I’m bound to lose, I don’t know where I am.” In the next song, “Brian and Robert,” the narrator wears his heart on his sleeve, singing a song to all those who may be experiencing what he is-loneliness, emptiness, pointlessness of existenc

“Water in the Sky” follows and provides a wonderful upbeat contrast to the depressing previous songs; in fact, it shows the first signs of action, not just words, in the process of overcoming and moving on. “Close the shutters, draw the shades, filter out the Everglades, glistening in evening dew.” Something clearly has grabbed the protagonist’s attention, gripping him and moving him away from the brink; “Thunder calls and water falls, rising tides and ocean walls, I can hear you when you sigh.”

Perhaps the beauty of nature, personified by the pronoun “she” in this song, has reminded the narrator that a new beginning is emerging. The somber reflection of “Roggae” should not be misinterpreted as depression or a reversion to prior anger and hopelessness. By reminding us that “If life were easy and not so fast, I wouldn’t think about the past,” the narrator correctly portrays life as being a frustrating process with many obstacles, and yet a process on which every action has an influence on the future.

By thinking about the past, the narrator teaches us a valuable lesson that we must learn from our actions and our experiences and allow them to shape us who we are as human beings, but not necessarily dominate us and tie us down forever. We learn, we process them, we take from them what we can, and we move on a better person (so we hope).

In “Roggae,” the narrator shows again how music and the concert going scene of “Birds of a Feather” can also be a medium by which we forget about our troubles and think about what is most important most special in our life. For the narrator, “The circus is the place for me with bears and clowns and noise; I love the shiny music that descends from overhead.” The circus, metaphorically, is probably a concert.

“Wading in the Velvet Sea” follows the transitional introspection of “Roggae.” “Velvet Sea” expands on the action, the process of overcoming and being proactive, that began in “Water in the Sky.” The narrator “took a moment from my day, wrapped it up in things you say, mailed it off to your address…” Yet beware; if the packaging breaks (metaphorically, if the person to whom he is writing does not understand the gravity of the situation), then the significance and seriousness of the process of overcoming will be for naught and “all the points I try to make are tossed with thoughts into a bin, time leaks out my life leaks in.”

The narrator’s efforts to move on from the pain and helplessness experienced at the beginning of the album will be subverted, his thoughts will be tossed into a bin, time will run out, and the former events of his life will leak in. The narrator reminds us, “You won’t find moments in a box, and someone else will set your clocks,” so he takes that moment from his day, wraps it up in things you say and mails it off to you. He trusts that you will understand.

Finally, “The Moma Dance” provides a sense of closure to the long and arduous struggle of our protagonist, the ghost with no wings. Here, the narrator is setting sail, getting pushed away from shore, leaving his new life behind, and the moment ends. “The moment ends though I feel winds, blowing differently than ever before, and they’re pushing me further from shore.” The narrator must listen to his captain, perhaps his inner voice, his inner resolve, and continue forward despite the trouble the winds are giving him.

Life has given the narrator plenty of troubles, and yet he has learned to perservere. “Up the rig, take up sail, mind the skipper, will not fail, we’ll bring out wine and we’ll be fine, just heed the order, watch the sail….The moment ends, the moment ends…” The ghost flies on, complete once again.

Even though “Ghost” and “Meat” seem to refer to a friend from whom the narrator has been separated or with whom he has lost that treasured inner connection, the narrator is most likely battling himself and when he finally resolves his dilemma from “Water in the Sky” through “The Moma Dance,” it can be implied that the narrator has made peace with himself, and the ghost, whether it be an actual true friend or merely his own inner confidence and strength, is clearly on its way to being fully returned to him.

- Dave Salvo