re: 19 Years Ago Today: Widespread Panic 4/18/1998 Downtown Athens, GA.

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Once the lot got overrun with heroin etc in the early 2000s was when everything got really shady and it all fell apart in 04. The Phish crowd now vs back then is night and day different.

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Birds of a Feather was their message that their hiatus was to purge the scene from those people, only to reform later in a more pure form. They had some of their own demons too. Phish is really the only band I can think of that went on a hiatus like that, and came back together years later even better. The only other band I can think of that did that was Aerosmith.

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They had some of their own demons too.

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Oh for sure. That was a big part of the first hiatus. Trey couldn't keep his shite together. Supposedly a kid of one of the Phish staff O.D.ed on heroin with some of the band/staff on that Vegas 04 run. Trey was a disaster most of that year and Coventry was one of the saddest concerts I'd ever been to seeing how far he had fallen by then. But somehow in the midst of nodding off they'd suddenly fall in sync and find a way to blow your mind. I actually miss the way they played in 03/04 at times (I like the weird out there stuff) but they're so much tighter of a band right now. Nothing like 95-98 though.

Are you originally from Georgia?

If your context of R.E.M. Was shiny, happy people... then I get why you don't see R.E.M. the way someone who was in AThens in the 80s sees them. Their shows were fun... a lot of fun... Pylon were even more fun... eventually, the townie scene(what are now known as hipsters) kinda made it less enjoyable. Then MTV and the One I love took them to a different level. It was pretty cool to see them hit it big after seeing them in little bars and the like. They kinda became dicks other than Bill Berry... who is a super nice dude. Stipe is just odd... he can't help it. My namesake was cool at times, but devolved into an arse. Bert Downs was also really cool.

They got big and lost themselves.... but they got big because they were one of the primary bands that changed the direction of popular music in the late eighties... they legitimized what was called underground or college radio. MTV went from playing them only on Sunday Nights, to playing them all the time....and when that happened, Warant and Witesnake were gone... just like that. Then came the Pixies and then Nirvana and that was that...

It really was fun to have been a part of that... even if it was just going to see them.... but ya, Shiny Happy People was horrible... yet, Coutnry Feedback was a great song on the same album. ... but the fun R.E.M. Was wolves lower and gardening at night on MDA and cocaine on a cold winter night a few days after playing in the Sugar Bowl...

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Very true. Once the lot got overrun with heroin etc in the early 2000s was when everything got really shady and it all fell apart in 04. The Phish crowd now vs back then is night and day different.

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I can only speak to the last 8-9 years, but the main difference in the Phish and WSP crowds is that WSP seems to be more concentrated in the Southeast and Rocky Mountain regions. Kids in New England aren't listening to much Panic.

Phish seems to have a wider reach. That, and more heroin.

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Other than Schools

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What's wrong with schools? That's my guitarists step bro

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i've met him...lets just say he was a lot nicer to my GF.

JB and Jojo are as approachable as can be though.

It was 1991/1992 Squatch... it was a neat to see.... then Pearl Jam came and fricked it all up... it was a good 6 months...

I worked at a flooring outfit outside of Athens in the early 90's during summer and there was this old guy there who was left handed - everyone called him lefty. He was in his mid 60's and had no clue about popular culture.

I told him i was in school in Athens and he said he had a nephew that was in a popular band there and was famous. I asked him who and he couldn't remember but said it had something to do with an airplane...I asked "B52's" and he said yeah...that's it.

I thought he was full of shite so I started asking questions. I asked if he'd ever met the band and he said yeah...then I asked if he thought the girls were hot and he said "yeah, except that one girl Kate wears those big damn wigs..."

Lefty was legit...