April 20, 2001

Boogie Stop Shuffle is a fun jamless opener. The first ever “Dub Dribble” follows, and the main jam is, of course, pretty mellow. It breaks down into a somewhat more sinister mood around the 9 minute mark as it makes its way to Floodlights. The Floodlights jam is a strong groove with solid interplay. In the final minutes, Barber brings the jam to an unconventionally strong peak. Floes has a drawn out intro and mid-verse jam, both of which are stronger than usual, but it’s the main jam, ethereal and patient, that merits your attention. Verging on type two, the theme slowly builds back up to a strong Floes ending. Mr. Don is a banner version. The main jam is pretty standard, but the final minutes are electrifying.

Voices has a standard intro jam. The main jam explores a mostly type one passage until around the 10:30-11 minute mark when it breaks out of the box completely. The theme is significantly more tense than a typical Voices theme, or a Spectacle intro. Barber plays a busy riff over simple and haunting synth choices. It builds up to a strong crescendo and an unconventionally energetic segue into Spectacle. One of the best Voices jams I’ve heard, and easily the best Spectacle intro at this point in time. Spectacle has a pretty cool outro that makes its way, by way of yet another “Peter and the Wolf” jam, back into Voices. A surprisingly strong sandwich! Shelby is a typically strong spring 01 version. A melancholy dnb jam builds to a strong, gorgeous peak. Magner uses the acid synths liberally, but never in a way that is abrasive or stands out too much. Frog Legs has a little unconventional jam after the second verse, before the chorus. It leaves the Frog Legs progression almost immediately, turning into a blissful trance vehicle. The jam is excellent without being exploratory, almost like a compressed version of 4/10/99 with less type two. It builds to a strong Waves peak, which drop segues into the chorus of Frog Legs. After the chorus, we are treated to the standard, in-the-box Frog Legs jam, which remains type one even if it is ever so slightly longer than usual here. After the final verse, Frog Legs is jammed out, once again before the chorus. Here, the jam develops around a cool groove built around the Frog Legs riff. It doesn’t last as long as I would like, but it’s a cool atmosphere. It segues smoothly into Ladies. Ladies is actually a pretty strong version, with a couple of very weird (in a good way) passages and a strong peak. Ladies is followed by Spacebird, which is one of the stronger versions so far. It doesn’t seem as beholden to the Spacebird rhythm structure, and crafts a pretty strong atmosphere. The outro jam sticks to the Spacebird format for a while, but develops into a tense trance theme before reaching a Kamaole peak. Once again, the band drops from the peak into the chorus of Frog Legs.

4/5. Very, very close to a five. Most of the standalones are stronger than average, and the Frog Legs segment has a few strong moments. The Voices > Spectacle is my pick for the strongest jam of the show.

Stray Observations: There is a “Peter and the Wolf” tease/jam in Spectacle > Voices.