Twist

Here is another from a Stowe, VT farmhouse -- this time it was May 1997. We wrote Dirt, Water in the Sky, Vultures and another six songs that never became Phish songs...but possibly my favorite from this session was: Twist. I normally fly to Vermont (from my home state NJ), but this time I drove. I remember arriving after dark, and Trey was already putting down tracks on the Tascam DA-88 machines. I arrived in time to have a nice meal, sing a few tracks and then I was just so beat I went to bed. Trey on the other hand stayed up, and I have just a wonderful vision burned into my head of walking downstairs the next morning, finding Trey with his guitar still strapped-on, and a huge smile, putting final touches on the song Twist which we had started the previous night. He never went to sleep! And thank god he didn't, because he came up with that incredible "twist" to the song where the pattern builds and repeats beautifully -- like the song says. This is really one of the best examples of Trey writing a song TO the lyrics (which he does more than you might know). It's funny because you can hear the "daytime" part of the song until the 1-minute mark when Trey's night-muse came to him and drew forth that rocking ending. There's a lot to it...and this early version captures the layers of the song very well. From Trey's vocal bass line, to the awesome drum part with the double snare hits that don't quite come when expected, to the guitar layers!!! You can hear our breathless laughing at the very end as we were singing the "WOO!" parts. I could go on and on, but this was Trey's masterpiece of that session -- the one I listened to over and over for 5 hours on my drive home! Enjoy. (My standard disclaimer: Some of the songs I'm posting, this one included, were released in 2000 on a CD of 25 demos that Trey and I recorded in 1997 called Trampled by Lambs and Pecked by the Dove which is available on LivePhish.com.)