If you think the 2016 election cycle is an exercise in vicious polarization, try listening to Phish. The quartet, formed at the University of Vermont in the early '80s, is one of the most successful touring acts in American rock.
Known for their meandering musical style and an open-minded, left-field approach to live improvisation, Phish enjoys an army of dedicated followers, who chase them around in a manner similar to their sonic predecessors, The Grateful Dead. (Vermont's own Bernie Sanders recently lauded them as "one of the great bands in this country.")
One thing Phish does not have: casual fans.
You're either a diehard — the type of person who plans a summer social schedule around tour dates and can break down the difference between "Type 1" and "Type 2" jams with aplomb — or you're the absolute opposite. Based on a series of miserable experiences at Phish concerts, I can safely say I'm a member of the latter camp. But Chris Arnone, a bartender at Zahav, is a card-carrying phan, and he's marrying his musical and professional passions for an evening of interesting alcoholic experimentation.
On Monday, March 28 at 10 p.m., Arnone, who's attended more than 90 Phish shows since the late '90s, will join Guy Smith at The Good King Tavern (614 S. Seventh St.) for a one-off cocktail event they're calling "Dead Phish."
It's part of an ongoing guest-bartender series Smith has been organizing at the Bella Vista bar and restaurant, events he designs to highlight the personalities of his friends.
"It's the improvisational aspect behind it — I've never seen the same show twice," says Arnone of the appeal behind Phish. "You never know what can happen from day to day."
He's attempting to harness that energy in a series of original cocktails inspired by Phish's sound.
Smith, who works as a DJ when he's not making drinks, is not quite as phanatical. "It's the vocals, man," he says. "I really like their musicianship. But then they start singing and it's like, you lost me."
So he's looping in The Grateful Dead — with a soundtrack curated by his friend Brad Tucker, who worked on the legendary band's recent Fare Thee Well tour — to complement Arnone's pet tunes.
"The main reason I threw the Dead in on this was I knew I couldn't stand listening to Phish for four hours," Smith jokes. There's a bit of a dancing-about-architecture to creating cocktails inspired by music, and Arnone is interpreting the challenge in a few different ways.
"Bathtub Gin," for example, is a beloved Phish song, so of course he's putting together something with gin as a nod. But he's also getting a little wackier with the source material. In the lyrics to "Reba," frontman Trey Anastasio rattles off a list of disparate ingredients — coffee grounds and mud, coconuts and chloroform, apple core and worms galore. In Arnone's hands, this become an inspired twist on a White Russian — apple brandy, a homemade coffee cordial and coconut milk, with a Gummi Worm garnish. On the Dead side of the menu, Smith is drawing inspiration from songs like "Black Muddy River" (a bourbon flip, with Fee's old-fashioned bitters and dark stout beer) and "Cosmic Charlie" (pisco. Campari, white vermouth, sloe gin, cinnamon bitters).
If all this sounds a little too heady for you, you can opt for a "Mexican Cousin" — a shot of tequila and a can of Tecate — while deciding where your jammiest loyalties lie.