Thread by @drewphish

A note on the slow tempos:

Tempos are slower but probably not by nearly as much as you might think.

I listened to last night's Stash which felt slooooooow. And it was. Around 170 bpm.

But I checked out some other random 3.0 Stash's + they are only at about 180 bpm. #phish 1/X

That makes last night's Stash barely over 5% slower than other recent versions.

Why it sounded significantly slower is actually the flow, or lack there of, of the composed section. Believe it or not it's *much harder* to play stuff like this at a slower tempo. 2/X

This is sometimes counterintuitive to non-musicians + a little hard to explain.

When you get into a flow state your muscle memory takes over and you simply hear what you want to play in your head (composed or improvised) and then make it come out of your guitar (or tuba!) 3/X

When a passage goes slower than you're used to playing it it is much harder to get into that flow state where you are simply hearing it in your head and, like tracing paper BITD, simply trying to draw over those lines in your head. 4/X

That's because you have to think about your fingers, lips, left foot, etc so much in the moment. It's kind of wild how many more CPUs you use as it's happening. And that directly leads to a less clear picture of what you're trying to sound like. Not ideal on multiple levels. 5/X

Maybe 15 years ago I chaperoned a youth band trip to Europe and performed the piccolo solo to Stars & Stripes Forever on tuba probably 6 different times. The conductor kept taking it at like 100 bpm instead of 120 which made it HARD AF. Like 10x harder than usual. 6/X

Playing things fast just takes lots of homework. It's actually easier as long as you've done the work.

Slowing stuff down *really* exposes any small aspects that need polishing like a specific articulation or maybe two 16th notes that aren't exactly even. 7/X

So while it's only 5% slower, that makes it much harder to play with great flow. So it feels like the band, and Trey in particular, are constantly pulling back on the reins. That makes it feel even slower than it actually is. 8/X

The lack of flow state also explains why Trey kept messing up the lyrics. He was thinking so hard about some aspect of operating the guitar that it made the lyrics not accessible in those moments. Every musician has been there. 9/X

In summary, it's mainly a lack of overall flow that we're all hearing more than the actual tempo when it feels so slow. And that, ironically, would be much easier to fix at slightly faster tempos. 10/X

That being said, what came afterwards was GLORIOUS!

Creative. Inspired. Urgent storytelling. Next-level communication.

Improvised chamber music at the highest levels possible. I would have been losing my shit if I had been there like I did in my kitchen just now. 11/X

Can't remember the last tour #phish was this in sync creatively out of the gate. Special shit is happening every single night.

This is only trying to add my two cents + a little context to the many conversations I've seen about tempos this tour.

See everyone in Hershey! 12/12