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“Phish rock out with energy and urgency on their 16th studio album, ‘Evolve’…this boundary-pushing quartet has progressed over four-plus decades by fusing rock, jazz, bluegrass and other freewheeling sounds…
this album gives plenty of reason to keep it going.”
– Associated Press
Today, Phish release their first album in over four years, Evolve, available now in all formats – including digital, CD, and double LP vinyl – via JEMP Records/ATO. Limited 2LP “Crimson Robed” and “Pillow Jets” Editions, as well as an exclusive range of new Evolve merch, are available now via the Phish Dry Goods store.
Phish’s 16th studio album, Evolve was recorded in the fall of 2023 at the band’s Vermont recording studio, The Barn, with producers Vance Powell and Bryce Goggin. The album has been heralded with such songs as “Evolve,” “Oblivion,” “Hey Stranger,” and the latest premiere, “Life Saving Gun.”. This week saw Phish celebrate the arrival of Evolve with a rare late-night TV performance of “the title track on NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. The band, Jimmy Fallon, and The Roots also cold opened the show with a hilarious comedy bit called "Phish In An Elevator."
WATCH PHISH, JIMMY FALLON, AND THE ROOTS TONIGHT SHOW COLD OPEN
WATCH “EVOLVE” LIVE ON THE TONIGHT SHOW STARRING JIMMY FALLON
Evolve continues what is proving a historic year for Phish, including their highly acclaimed four-night sold-out run at Sphere in Las Vegas and upcoming summer tour – the band’s only scheduled live dates for the remainder of 2024. The summer run gets underway with a three-night stand at Mansfield, MA’s Xfinity Center (July 19-21) and then continues on with performances at Uncasville, CT’s Mohegan Sun Arena (July 23-24), East Troy, WI’s Alpine Valley Music Theatre (July 26-28), St. Louis, MO’s Chaifetz Arena (July 30-31), Noblesville, IN’s Ruoff Music Center (August 2-4), Grand Rapids, MI’s Van Andel Arena (August 6-7), and Bethel, NY historic Bethel Woods Center for the Arts (August 9-11). The tour will culminate with Phish’s traditional Labor Day Weekend run at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park in Commerce City, CO, returning for four nights (August 29-September 1). Limited tickets remain available for most dates. For complete details and ticket availability, please visit phish.com/tours.
This summer will see also Phish hosting Mondegreen, a four-day festival set for August 15-18 at The Woodlands in Dover, DE. The band’s 11th self-produced festival and first in nine years, Mondegreen will see Phish performing over four days and nights, alongside an array of interactive fan experiences, specially curated regional food and drink, art installations, and much more. For complete details on passes, car and RV camping and parking options, on-site glamping accommodations, travel packages, and more, please visit phish.com/mondegreen.
In addition, Phish recently announced their return to the breathtaking beaches of Mexico for the 8th annual Phish: Riviera Maya, set for January 29-February 1, 2025 – the first time the event will be held at the end of January following its traditional late February dates. Presented by Playa Luna, the all-inclusive concert getaway will four spectacular nights of Phish on Mexico’s Caribbean coastline, including an additional set that will complement the special Welcome Performance on Night One, with a total of eight sets instead of past years’ seven. Limited packages are on sale now. For complete information, including booking details and payment plans, please visit phishrivieramaya.com.
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PHISH
EVOLVE
(JEMP Records/ATO)
Release Date: July 12, 2024
Tracklist:
Hey Stranger
Oblivion
Evolve
A Wave of Hope
Pillow Jets
Lonely Trip
Life Saving Gun
Monsters
Ether Edge
Human Nature
Valdese
Mercy
The Well*
* Vinyl Only
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PHISH – LIVE 2024/2025
JULY
19 – Mansfield, MA – Xfinity Center
20 – Mansfield, MA – Xfinity Center
21 – Mansfield, MA – Xfinity Center
23 – Uncasville, CT – Mohegan Sun Arena (SOLD OUT)
24 – Uncasville, CT – Mohegan Sun Arena (SOLD OUT)
26 – East Troy, WI – Alpine Music Valley Music Theatre
27 – East Troy, WI – Alpine Music Valley Music Theatre
28 – East Troy, WI – Alpine Music Valley Music Theatre
30 – St. Louis, MO – Chaifetz Arena
31 – St. Louis, MO – Chaifetz Arena
AUGUST
2 – Noblesville, IN – Ruoff Music Center
3 – Noblesville, IN – Ruoff Music Center
4 – Noblesville, IN – Ruoff Music Center
6 – Grand Rapids, MI – Van Andel Arena
7 – Grand Rapids, MI – Van Andel Arena
9 – Bethel, NY – Bethel Woods Center for the Arts
10 – Bethel, NY – Bethel Woods Center for the Arts
11 – Bethel, NY – Bethel Woods Center for the Arts
15 – The Woodlands, Dover, DE – Mondegreen
16 – The Woodlands, Dover, DE – Mondegreen
17 – The Woodlands, Dover, DE – Mondegreen
18 – The Woodlands, Dover, DE – Mondegreen
29 – Commerce City, CO – Dick’s Sporting Goods Park
30 – Commerce City, CO – Dick’s Sporting Goods Park
31 – Commerce City, CO – Dick’s Sporting Goods Park
SEPTEMBER
1 – Commerce City, CO – Dick’s Sporting Goods Park
JANUARY 2025
29 – Quintana Roo, Mexico – Phish: Riviera Maya 2025
30 – Quintana Roo, Mexico – Phish: Riviera Maya 2025
31 – Quintana Roo, Mexico – Phish: Riviera Maya 2025
FEBRUARY 2025
1 – Quintana Roo, Mexico – Phish: Riviera Maya 2025
For more information, please visit phish.com
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PHISH EVOLVE
By David Fricke
Trey Anastasio sums up Phish's 16th studio album, Evolve – everything you hear and how it got there – like this: "The sound of rock 'n' roll," the guitarist says, "is not isolation."
It's a philosophy of recording as old as rock itself and as immediate and thrilling as last night's gig – everyone going for the right take together, in a single room and real-time. It's the way Elvis Presley cut his landmark singles for Sun Records and how Aretha Franklin captured the sacred and the sultry, at the piano backed by the Muscle Shoals rhythm section, in 1967 on "I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Loved You)." The Rolling Stones even had a name for it: Let It Bleed.
In that spirit, Phish caught the 12 new songs on Evolve in dynamic fast-off-the-floor live takes at the Barn, their Vermont studio, with producers Bryce Goggin and Vance Powell, enriching the tracks with overdubs and vocal harmonies. But that happened only after Anastasio, keyboard player Page McConnell, bassist Mike Gordon and drummer Jon Fishman put the material – mostly written by the guitarist across the last four years, alone and with co-writers Tom Marshall and Scott Herman – through months of study, experiment and crowd testing on the road. The result, four decades into Phish's enduring bond as composers, improvisers and one of the most successful touring groups in rock: the Ultimate Studio Album by the Ultimate Live Band.
"This is where Phish sounds best – when the takes are fast, when we're not thinking," Anastasio declares. "We came in, set up and played – minimal separation, maximum two or three takes of each song. We had already opened the doors on tour, finding the songs everyone in the band felt good about and, with the audiences' help, identifying the ones that had the magic."
"What you hear is what we did on the road," McConnell affirms. "Whatever we learned from playing them live – the right key, where to put the jam – we got in the studio. It was probably four days," he says of the live tracking. "But I knew as they were going down: 'Man, this is so good. It's so great and easy."
Evolve opens with the hearty stride of "Hey Stranger," Phish's expansive arrangement of a song from Anastasio's solo, acoustic 2022 LP, Mercy – an emotional snapshot of pandemic-era exile that now doubles as an introduction to every new fan at a Phish show ("Hey, stranger/Come crash for a minute"). That record's title ballad is now the tender climax of Evolve, developed live by Phish over 2023 and wreathed in strings "like a little prayer at the end," Anastasio says. In between, "Oblivion" is a brawny portrait of the times as a ball of confusion, fortified with McConnell's Hammond B-3 organ; "A Wave of Hope" swings the pendulum back to joy, its crunchy-Stones riffing and bright, vocal flight driven by Gordon and Fishman's explosive gallop; and "Ether Edge" is deceptively complex solace, its serial art-pop changes lined in soothing, choral harmonies.
“A Wave of Hope” saw its first performance in June 2021, while "Oblivion" and "Ether Edge" premiered live in July 2023 with the exuberant "Pillow Jets" and the eerie menace of "Monsters" during a three-night stand at Denver's Mission Ballroom by a unique lineup of the Trey Anastasio Band – the leader with Fishman on drums and TAB bassist Dezron Douglas. "We played 25 new songs," says Anastasio. "This was a conscious choice. I wanted to see how the crowd reacted." Phish then took that bag of tunes on their 2023 summer and fall tours "to see the songs that resonated" in that setting.
Evolve's title song – a jaunty urgency that first appeared on Lonely Trip, a 2021 solo project by Anastasio – was "one of those," the guitarist notes. "Every context it was played in, it worked." "Life Saving Gun" started out as a number on Anastasio and McConnell's 2023 collaboration, January – a short outburst of ZZ Top via Kraftwerk – that "really took off" with Phish, McConnell says. "We played it live three times before we recorded it" for Evolve. "Every time it was a banger."
McConnell recalls developing the vocal harmonies for "Ether Edge" in Phish's backstage practice room at Dick's Sporting Goods Park in Denver, then playing the song that night. "There was a gasp after the opening notes," he says, "when people recognized it" from the earlier renditions at TAB's Denver gigs. "It was amazing to have that response. We are in a unique situation. I don't think any band has been where we are creatively, 40 years into our career."
Evolve is effectively a return to what Anastasio calls "the young band advantage" of early Phish albums like 1989's self-released Junta and 1990's Lawn Boy "when you'd go out and play songs before you go into a studio. The complaint over the years has been 'Why don't Phish albums sound like Phish? There's one Phish I see live and one Phish I hear on albums.'" The 2020 studio album, Sigma Oasis, was a decisive response – new tunes from the road recorded quick and live at the Barn in November, 2019 and issued in the early weeks of lockdown.
This time, there was an additional step after the stage research for Evolve, stemming from Anastasio's solo acoustic tours. He cut an entire version of the album in that format, before the Barn sessions – on a stool with an acoustic guitar (as he did for Mercy). "Little things revealed themselves," Anastasio explains. "This song needs an intro, or the B section should be four bars instead of eight. And you start looking at the lyrics: 'What am I trying to say there?'"
"That's as much a part of the process as the band thing," McConnell says. "It's what continues to rise through those steps. We can put on as much production as we want. But the song is there."
Two tracks on Evolve are so new they have not been played live by Phish – yet. "Valdese" is named after "one of my favorite spots," Anastasio says, a town in the Piedmont region of North Carolina. And Gordon came to the Barn with "Human Nature," sunny funk with a catchy chorus. "We jumped on it and started doing cool things to it," Anastasio says of the song, "like double-micing the guitar through this old amp."
"The Barn tracks are the foundation of everything you hear" on Evolve, McConnell adds. But the songs, like those on every other Phish album, remain unfinished in the best way. "They will continue to improve – the vocals, the jams, the way we communicate with each other." At one show in December 2023, at Madison Square Garden, "A Wave of Hope" went for 24 minutes. "We've been doing it so long, listening so hard," McConnell says. "We're like a giant art project that keeps rolling along. And it's still fun."
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