Phish’s Trey Anastasio Previews Las Vegas Sphere Residency (2024)

The shows at the state-of-the-art venue April 18 – 21 will be tied together by a theme.

By Scott Bernstein Apr 11, 2024 • 7:43 am PDT

Phish will make their debut at the Sphere in Las Vegas one week from tonight on Thursday, April 18. Guitarist Trey Anastasio spoke about the four-night residency at the state-of-the-art venue in a new feature published today by the Washington Post.

Phish enlisted artist and designer Abigail Rosen Holmes to work as show director and co-creative director for the Sphere shows. Anastasio revealed all four Phish concerts at the Sphere will be tied together by a theme. However, Anastasio and Holmes declined to divulge the theme in advance. “I’m not trying to be cagey,” Holmes told the Wasington Post. “I just want people to not have any idea what’s about to happen when they come into the room. That’s part of the fun of this.”

One of the big questions when Phish announced the Sphere residency was why limit the run to a mere four shows? Trey asked Abigail about the effect of doing a second weekend. “It’ll be good,” Holmes responded. “But it won’t be great. If you just do four nights, it’s going to blow minds.” Anastasio is all about blowing minds and the band decided to keep their Sphere debut to a single weekend consisting of four performances.

The Washington Post article mentions that Phish had been in talks to be the first artist to perform at the Sphere. Yet it was U2 who wound up opening the venue with a series of 40 U2:UV Achtung Baby Live At Sphere concerts that began on September 29, 2023 and continued through March 3, 2024.

Trey Anastasio and Abigail Rosen Holmes went to see U2 at the Sphere. Anastasio quickly realized Phish would need to come up with an alternate approach as huge imagery of band members wouldn’t be the band’s style.

“It suited Bono because he is that kind of star,” explained Anastasio. “But that’s not me. I don’t do that. And same with Edge. There’s one song where he just rocks into the camera. He steps forward and he’s 800-feet high on the wall. I’m not going to do that.”

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When discussing the quartet’s first-ever performances at the $2.3 billion venue Holmes asked Anastasio a key question. “I said, ‘What do you think this is? Do you think this is one of those New Year’s productions or is this a Phish show in a great new environment?’” Holmes remembered. “And his thought is that it’s a Phish show in a great new environment. And so that’s sort of how we framed thinking about all of the creative choices we’ve made. We wanted to absolutely make the most out of the room and also support Phish doing what Phish does best.”

Anastasio also came away from the U2 show realizing the sound would present a challenge:

At the U2 show, Anastasio was struck by how mono the mix was, as if all the speakers were crammed together, booming from the small stage on which the band performed. He discovered that there was a reason for this: The Sphere’s shape spawns reverberations that make it difficult to effect a true stereo sound without creating bounces and delays that would distract people on one side or the other. But Anastasio recognized it wasn’t inherent to the venue’s sound system. When he went to see the short Darren Aronofsky sci-fi film that screens regularly in the space with a different setup, he was impressed by the acoustics.

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Enter veteran Phish sound man Garry Brown. With the help of the Sphere staff, he crafted a miniaturized version of the venue in Rock Lititz, Phish’s regular rehearsal space in central Pennsylvania.

“I don’t know what limitations U2 put on themselves, but obviously with them being the first one in the building, it was a learning experience,” says Brown. “With my mini-Sphere, I could technically go in, sit in Section 201, which is all the way left, you know, far away, all the way over. And I could technically sit there and place the instruments where I felt they could work. And then I could move around to 13 different seats in the venue digitally, to see if what I was doing was working. And so I’ve created a soundscape that is a lot wider than what U2 did.”

Phish keyboardist Page McConnell also weighed in on the Sphere run and Anastasio’s qualities as a leader. Head to the Washington Post to read the full feature.

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