Yesterday, the brief collaborative tour of Trey Anastasio Band and Goose got started in Portland, Maine’s Chase Insurance Arena - the venue formerly known as the Cumberland County Civic Center, or CCCC. Trey Anastasio Band is the side band of Phish’s Trey Anastasio, while Goose is a relatively new and up-and-coming jam band from Connecticut. CCCC is, for Phish at least and for me personally, a historic venue; they’ve played there seven times over the years, and it was where I saw my first show as a young lad. Earlier this year, TAB and Goose announced they would be embarking on a joint tour this winter, a unique and short venture that Goose and Phish fans alike immediately found intriguing and dubbed ‘TABoose’.
Trey seems to have a fondness for Maine: His side project tours have often kicked off here - Ghosts of the Forest premiered at the nearby State Theater, and TAB regularly visits. This isn’t Goose’s first time, either - they played at the State Theater last fall. It is, however, the first time for either band performing at the largest venue in town, Cross Insurance Arena.
No, sorry, it’ll always be CCCC. That new corporate name is never going to stick with me.
At any rate, going in to this tour there were a number of questions swirling around in fans’ minds - or in mine, at least:
How, exactly, will the collaborations work? Will they just drop in for a few songs here and there, or will it be more extensive than that? Will other members of the band be involved, or mainly just Rick and Trey?
Will TAB play their usual rotation of songs, or will they dip in to other material that they either have never played or have only played infrequently?
Will there be any other special guests at any of the shows, or will it be the typical TAB and Goose line-ups?
All of these questions, and more, would be readily answered. For the most part, each band stuck to their usual lineups and sung their own songs: Trey sat in at the tail end of Goose’s set, but for the most part it was a typical Goose show. I, for one, was pleased by that. Having never seen Goose live before, I wanted to see what they were like on their own in their usual format, and it’s easy to see why they’re taking off.
All of the members are very talented musicians, and they are certainly capable of executing very impressive, deep jams. The guitarist and lead singer, Rick Mitarotonda, is particularly talented at both; he’s a very skilled singer and is fully capable of keeping up with Trey Anastasia on guitar. Tonight, they went particularly dark and funky at moments, delving deep into what Phish fans would call evil Phish. Although I haven’t seen them live before, I’ve been haphazardly listening to Goose concerts - many of which are posted in full for free on YouTube, a smart move for a newer group - and this doesn’t seem to be a regular part of their oeuvre. (Goose fans, correct me if I’m wrong in the comments below - maybe I’ve just been catching the wrong shows; I’d love to see other examples).
That didn’t particularly set the tone for the evening, however. Goose also had some very pretty jams, showing off their full range and abilities. Their set was filled with a variety of deep Type II jamming (when they fully depart from the song itself), including a cover, Eddy Grant’s Electric Avenue, which they managed to turn into a jam vehicle - much as Phish often does with their cover of Talking Heads’ Cities. It’s always interesting to see bands jam on covers, since it uses someone else’s song as a vehicle for their own new music.
Indeed, that’s one of the aspects of jam bands that so entrances fans, regardless of which band they follow: the chance to not only see live music performed, but created, right there in front of them. That’s always what happens when a band does any kind of jams, and it’s an important piece to explain how and why jam bands are so different from typical bands, regardless of the particular genre they are based in. Most rock bands perform the same (or largely similar) playlist every show, and they perform the songs the same way every night, too. The tour exists to support the album and build a national (and global) fan base; it’s a means to an end. With jam bands, the live act is the primary vehicle for their art, which is why fans follow them around the entire tour from city to city.
As impressive as Goose was on their own, the moment Trey Anastasio stepped on stage, they clearly kicked it up a notch. For one, simply adding another guitar to the band was like adding a second type of cheese to a sandwich: it increases the layers of complexity and flavor to the performance. During the two Goose songs Trey joined in on, he was happy to play rhythm guitar and let Rick Mitarotonda take the lead. We were able to see a live musical conversation take place right in front of us, not only between Trey and Rick, but between Trey and other members of Goose as well. At times Trey did seem to take the lead in the jamming, moving it in another direction, but it was never in a way that seemed forced or contrived, and the members of Goose were perfectly willing to go along with it. It’s easy to see how this kind of marriage between two bands could end in disaster, but they all managed to make it work perfectly, elevating each other.
That’s one of the exciting things about this tour: seeing how much Trey Anastasio is able to impart to Goose, hastening their development as a band, and what he is able to learn from them as well. It was perfectly clear last night that Trey was in happy, energetic, high-energy mode: he was dancing and jumping all over the stage, despite the lack of a trampoline.
Once their turn came to be on stage, Trey Anastasio Band actually performed a fairly typical TAB set, although it was clear that Trey was full of energy from the night. It was, to be sure, a special night in an historic place for Trey, but he also seemed to be soaking up the energy that comes with performing alongside a young, up-and-coming band. The confluence of energies and history in the room was poignant, since it was a venue that has become too small for Phish too play, is normally too large for Trey Anastasio Band, yet at this point in their evolution is just right for Goose.
The surprise came at the end, when Peter Ansbach, the keyboardist/guitarist/vocalist for Goose, and Rick Mitarotonda came on-stage to join TAB in their first-ever rendition of Phish’s Wolfman’s Brother, a long-running staple frequently used as a jam vehicle. The TAB/PA/RM version of the song was reminiscent of the Beacon Jams, the performances Trey Anastasio Band put on live during the pandemic at the Beacon Theater in New York City along with a variety of guest performers. The choice of songs wasn’t particularly surprising, since they had played it at soundcheck and Goose had teased it earlier in the evening, but it was still a special and poignant moment in an evening full of them.
The evening eventually ended in a stunning encore: TAB’s debut of Llama, with Peter and Rick, and Trey playfully changing the lyrics to TABoose, followed by an emotionally satisfying - if somewhat obvious - conclusion of First Tube that featured all of Goose and Trey Anastasio Band on-stage together. It was a fitting conclusion to a historic and special night kicking off the TABoose tour at the venerable old building where I saw my first Phish show. All night long, Trey was in full Rock God mode, guiding both the younger band and the audience on a musical journey of discovery that left us spellbound, wondering at how they could possibly top it for the rest of the tour.