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"That comes under the heading, 'When I grow up . . .' " Trey Anastasio remarked with a huge boyish smile, after playing a long, complex reinvention of "The Divided Sky" near the end of his show at New York's Webster Hall last night. The song comes from 1989's Junta, the first album released by his former band Phish. But this encore version featured Anastasio on acoustic guitar, accompanied by a string quintet conducted by Don Hart. The score, by Hart, was at once knotty in its details and elegant in its melodic sweep. It was also a gift. On October 8th, the first of his two Webster Hall shows, Anastasio debuted the new arrangement for his mother, Diane, who was in the audience and celebrating her birthday.
The New York concerts were the first on Anastasio's fall tour to promote his latest solo album, Bar 17, which he has released on his own Rubber Jungle label. Both shows included another extended piece with strings, "Goodbye Head," that appears on the record. But last night, Anastasio played only half as many songs as he did Sunday -- because he played some of them for more than a quarter of an hour apiece, spinning out in extended guitar reveries notable for the ferocious attack he put on simple, repetitive phrases. In "Sand," Anastasio kept spearing the same high note over and over, driving the music -- and the audience -- to blues-rock nirvana. There was also a hot '72-Stones kick to the Bar 17 songs "Mud City" and "Dragonfly."
Anastasio is on the road with his latest band -- bassist Tony Hall, drummer Jeff Sipe, keyboardist Ray Paczkowski and background vocalists Christina Durfee and Jennifer Hartswick -- through mid-December. There is a second, solo Anastasio release just out as well: 18 Steps, featuring additional material from the Bar 17 sessions and available as a bonus disc with the new album at his Web site.
Catch Trey on one of the upcoming dates:
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October 11th Philadelphia, PA
October 13th Charlottesville, VA
October 14th Myrtle Beach, SC
October15th Asheville, NC
October 18th Chicago, IL
October19th Chicago, IL
October 20th Cincinnati, OH
October 21st Ann Arbor, MI
October 23rd Boulder, CO
October 24th Boulder, CO
October 27th Vegoose Music Festival, Las Vegas, NV
October 28th Vegoose Music Festival, Las Vegas, NV
October 29th Vegoose Music Festival, Las Vegas, NV
October 31st Austin, TX
November 2nd Memphis, TN
November 3rd Boone, NC
November 4th Ithaca, NY
December 6th Eureka, CA
December 7th San Francisco, CA
December 8th San Francisco, CA
December 9th Ventura, CA
December 10th Los Angeles, CA