To commemorate the 20th Anniversary of Phish “retirement” shows, hop in the wayback machine to revisit the historic, chaotic, at-times catastrophic Coventry festival, hosted in northern Vermont way back in August 2004. Twenty years later, Episode 080 colorfully unspools an oral history of this fateful weekend, reflecting upon the legendary traffic jam, difficult weather and its consequences, plus inspired creativity, community action, local heroes lending helping hands, and determined phans hiking up to 20 miles into the fest.

The focus of this podcast is not the band’s atrocious, nerve-wracked, debilitated performances or their precarious situation at that moment in time, as those aspects have been long addressed ad nauseum. Instead, we shine a light on the humanity, heroic efforts, sad turns of fate, and collective connection that defined what was an epic journey to some, and a traumatic experience for others. After I sounded the alarm for last minute submissions, a dozen brave Coventry survivors were kind enough to contribute short personal stories for this wacky, wild, wide-ranging oral history. 

In addition, last week saw the unveiling of ‘JAM - The Documentary’, a 27-minute DIY film from Alex Daltas that dissects this monumental excursion to say goodbye to The Phish from Vermont at Coventry. The motion picture is mostly sourced from his own pre-festival footage, and a smattering of news reports; it took Daltas two decades of dedication to bring this patchwork vision into tremendous fruition. Alex slides thru to open up about the adventures of Coventry & then the 20 year odyssey of manifesting this movie.

• 0:00 ep.080 preview


• 3:30 - a word from our sponsor Fete du Void


• 6:15 - The Upful Update


• 9:40 - introducing COVENTRY & ep concept


• 16:45 - Oral History of Coventry [57min]


• 1:14:00 - introducing ALEX DALTAS - Jam the Doc


• 1:17:20 - conversation w/ ALEX [68min]

Rent/Buy JAM- The Documentary HERE

Jam the Documentary - story/press release

B.Getz 'Era Ending Event' -

Pharewell My Phriend JamBase 8.20.04

Check out our friends Fete du Void, Oct. 3-6 in Oakdale, LA

EMAIL the SHOW

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Theme Song: "Mazel Tov"- CALVIN VALENTINE