Nothing but the hits!!

Woke around 8:30 & in the car by 9am. We call D & J and find out they are alright. They spend a crazy night in the hospital but are fine. The bills are going to cost them a ton but they are OK & that is what matters.
Stopped for bagels & coffee and we our on our way to Alpine by 10. Stopped by Costco for a bottle of vodka. Alpine has in the past few years devolved a reputation for being a very sketchy lot so we did not plan to bend much. We hit our first Chicago traffic a go way south down in Indiana. From around noon till 5pm we would be stuck in bumper to bumper traffic in Chicago. It SUCKED!! We were worried if we stopped to eat we would miss our chance for posters so we both are starved by the time we get in the venue around 6. We found posters and did manage to get one. We staked a place on the lawn until we saw M & he stubbed us down. We had decent seats to the right of the stage.

6/25/04 - Set I
The first set saw 2 bustouts - Glide & Roses -r- Free. Both were butchered. Nice to hear them but Trey should have practiced them first.
The low part of this set is Bowie. A 9 min version that had no heart. I have no idea why they even played this for none of the appear to want to be playing this.
The hightlight of the 1st set was Wolfman's. A solid interesting funk jam.

Set II
The 7 below to start the 2nd set took a while to get going but once it did it was a very good exploratory version that seem to set the stage for a great set. After 26 mins. below faded in buffalo bill. Then quickly to Lawnboy, then Mike's. While this Mike's did have a couple of nice peaks, it failed to really break into anything away from the standard groove. H2 -> Weekapaug finished what was a all too common, forgettable Mike's Groove.
Then YEM. Always a pleasure, but this YEM never got going. Immediately after the tramps, Trey kicks into 2001. After the 2001 I was hoping they would kick back into YEM jam but no luck. They instead end with the vocal jam to end the set.
As we head up the unbelievably large lawn at Alpine Valley they encore with ample. While this set started with lots of promise, it quickly fell into a Phish greatest hits set. A bunch of classic tunes that just don't appear to excite the band the way they once did. So with the exception of a nice 7 below -> Buffalo Bill you have a generic Phish show with a couple of poorly played bust outs.

After the show we drive with D & J to a hotel around 40 mins away and fall asleep watching Dave Chappell on DVD.