Phish turns up voltage onstage July 15, 1993 - The Washington Times By Mouncey Ferguson "Bluegrass, jazz, hard-core, calypso and barbershop quartet." That's how Page McConnell describes the influences on his band, Phish. But you won't understand the band's music by talking about its individual influences, he says in a phone interview from his home in Burlington, Vt. You have to talk about the spirit of the music, the feeling the musicians both give and get during their increasingly legendary live shows. "It can really be an uplifting experience if you get into it," says Mr. McConnell. "The music has almost religious connotations." To him, playing is "sharing," and the discipline of the music is "meditation." What the band is really known for, he says, is the high energy of its live shows. "We really have a good time up there," Mr. McConnell says. Specifically, that means that each member of the band gets on his own miniature trampoline and bounces in place while he plays. It means that each musician throws a beach ball into the audience and then plays along with the ball's motion, so that the audience controls the music. It means the drummer gets up and plays the vacuum cleaner into a microphone sometime during the show. Trampolines, you say? Maybe that's the uplifting part. Phish, which comes to Wolf Trap Saturday, has been around for 10 years. "For the first five years, we were primarily a local Burlington band," Mr. McConnell says, "and for the last four years we've been touring nearly nonstop." Phish is composed of Mr. McConnell on keyboards, Trey Anastasio on guitar, Mike Gordon on bass and Jon "Tubbs" Fishman on drums and trombone. All of them sing. "We're not doing anything different than a lot of college bands," Mr. McConnell says, "except that we've worked really hard on getting our music out to the people." In the past four years, the band's frantic, impulsive and creative live shows have earned it a loyal following. "They look sort of like hippies . . . but they're not one kind of people," Mr. McConnell says. "Some are hippies; some are computer hackers. "I think they like the fact that we're really enjoying ourselves up there. There's not a lot of whining and grunge in our show," he says. "Why would someone sit around and listen to a lot of whining? "It's not that we sit around and sing only happy songs all the time, but we're really into the innocence of the music." Phish's latest album isn't quite so cheery and fun-loving, though. Titled "Rift," it documents the doubts of a man who feels distant from his lover. At times it has the sincerity of early Simon and Garfunkel and at other times the flamboyance of Queen. But it always has that "Phish-esque" blend of eclectic styles. The first track, "Rift," lays down barbershop-quartet vocals over a bluegrass bass line, with a reggae guitar jaunting behind. Previous albums include "Junta" and "Lawnboy" on independent labels and "A Picture of Nectar" on Elektra. On previous tours, the band has played either in small clubs or in auditoriums. On this tour, though, it'll play at a lot of outdoor-indoor arenas such as Wolf Trap, "sheds" as they're known in the industry. Where will the people dance? "I think they'll find room to move," Mr. McConnell says.