Phish Festival Falls Short, but Still 'It' August 18, 2003 - Reuters/Billboard By Ray Waddell NASHVILLE (Billboard) - Phish may not have "slam dunked" its summer tour, but the pride of Burlington, Vt. still notched solid business on its first outdoor run since ending a two-year hiatus in 2002. Phish's summer tour was capped with a flourish by the band's own It festival Aug. 2-3 at Loring Air Force Base in Limestone, Maine. It marked a stellar return to the group's festival form, grossing about $8.25 million and attracting some 60,000 Phish Heads, as the band's fans are known. The summer shed run grossed about $14 million from 19 dates, with an average of $736,842 per show. On Phish's 2000 world tour, prior to its hiatus, the band grossed $36 million from 54 shows -- an average of $666,666, according to Billboard Boxscore. Longtime Phish manager John Paluska says the 2003 summer tour went well. "Musically, it went exceptionally well. They're really in a great place right now in that regard," Paluska said. "Attendance did very well, but not extraordinary. We still did great business. Promoters were telling us we should be happy, but it was not up to our own high expectations." Even so, the downturn is minimal. According to Boxscore, Phish has played to 90.8% capacity this year; in 2000, the band played to 95.5% capacity. The Phish camp is unsure why numbers didn't meet expectations. "That's a topic that got a lot of discussion this summer," Paluska admitted. "I think the biggest factor is our economy. It made people more selective. Instead of going to a few shows, they might go to one." Paluska also believes the jam-band market might be diluted to a degree by the increase in the number of festivals. "I think there might be a thinning out of that," he said. "There may be more than the market could bear, and I heard some lost their shirts this year." Phish's festival was not one of them, and Paluska says perhaps fans are opting to go to It or other festivals instead of other concerts, including Phish shows. "That's just a hypothesis," he added. "There's not a darn thing we would have done differently. We're not the kind of band that comes up with desperate marketing schemes to prop up our popularity." It came off smoothly, despite rain. "The only drag was the same thing a lot of these have: traffic," Paluska said. "The hard thing now is the level of search we need to do post-9/11 is so much more than in the past. It really slows things down." And while It grossed double the amount previous Phish fests have rung up, including Clifford Ball in 1996 ($3.3 million), the Great Went in 1997 ($4.2 million) and Lemonwheel in 1998 ($4 million), it cost much more to produce. "We spent nearly twice as much as the last one we did in Maine five years ago," Paluska said. So is producing a Phish fest worth the huge expense and logistical headaches? "We could do two dates in a bunch of places and make as much money as we did in Maine, but is worth it because of the experience people have with us," Paluska said. "You can't even measure its value in terms of the band's long-term relationship with its audience. This is community building." As for the shed run, Paluska is clearly pleased with the final results. "This was one of our favorite tours in a long time," he said. "We did 15,000 or more in a lot of markets, it just wasn't a slam dunk across the board." Phish is still finalizing its plans for the remainder of the year. Bassist Mike Gordon will play a small number of shows in support of an album titled "Inside In," due this month on Ropeadope, and keyboardist Page McConnell's side project, Vida Blue, has a Sanctuary album in the works. A fall run for Phish is possible, as is a New Year's Eve show. Copyright © 2003 Reuters/Billboard