Last night at Jones Beach Phish (@Phish) pulled out the biggest bust out in their history by opening the show with Little Feat’s Skin It Back. Having not played the tune since July 29, 1988 at The Roma in Telluride, Colorado, the 1,417 show gap edged out the Fuck Your Face 2010 bust out in Charlotte by only six shows. Thanks to the webcast offered by Live Phish for both of the Jones Beach shows, fans both in attendance and on #couchtour were able to catch the epic opener. Plenty of fans recognized the significance of the opening number and tweeted their reactions, below I’ve rounded up a few to get a feel for how special of a performance this was.
They're nailing Skin It Back. Unreal that it's even being played
— Scott Marks (@bizarchive) July 4, 2012
::faints:: #phish
— Scott Bernstein (@heyscottyb) July 4, 2012
SKIN IT BACK opener. Holy fuck, #phish
— ?️rian ?️avosa (@BrianBavosa) July 4, 2012
https://twitter.com/OneTwoOhMahGawd/status/220310895409106944
Skin It Back. Holy Shit!! Could have sworn Spanish Moon at first but even better. Last time 1988, WOW!!!!
— Mike (@marshmeli) July 4, 2012
https://twitter.com/hillzy/status/220312893235798017
My buddy Patrick and I have jokingly been "calling" the Skin It Back for 14 years. Wow. #phish
— Skogs64 (@64Clarence) July 4, 2012
Skin It Back?!? Oh man…..no words…
— quenna (@quenna) July 4, 2012
Ahhhhhhhhhh Faaaaakkkkkkkkk. I missed Skin it back!!!!!! Dammmmmmmmmmmmmmiiiiiiiiiiiiiittttttttttt
— RageWPage (@DeadlyIcyCalm) July 4, 2012
They're playing "Skin It Back"!! 30 shows for me, 82 for my Idiot Human and this is the first time for BOTH of us!
— Spac the Bear (@SpacTheBear) July 4, 2012
I suspect they played Possum for everyone who needed to S their pants after Skin it Back 🙂
— ⚡️ Allie ⚡️ (@alliedise) July 4, 2012
The fact that I witnessed the first Skin It Back in 24 years still hasn't sunk in yet. Fun show tonight #Phish
— Scott Marks (@bizarchive) July 4, 2012
And for fun, check out this Twitter search for “Spanish Moon” and see how many fans were fooled at first by the (possibly teased) other Little Feat song.
Tonight, history repeated itself as Phish fans pulled a CNN and called Spanish Moon when it was really Skin it Back #featproblems
— The Phunion 4.0 (@thephunion) July 4, 2012
All those who called Spanish Moon are forgiven. Skin It Back hasn’t been played by Phish in 24 years. Lucky Jones Beach attendees!
— Phish.net (@phishnet) July 4, 2012
6 Responses
I was there, and you’ve got it wrong they played Spanish Moon. hahahaha.
I would hardly call Skin it Back a major bust out. It’s a Cover. Dog Log, Shafty, Those are bust outs!
In terms of documented shows, it was the biggest bust out in Phish history, that’s just a fact. If you don’t feel covers count as bust outs in terms of importance, that’s a different conversation.
I will agree with you on that.
Wow! You’d think Trey walked on water for playing Skin it Back. I guess since they can’t get people excited for their improv anymore, they’ll throw out “classics”. Most of Phish’s old stuff is crap and there’s a reason why it’s on the shelf. Granted, Skin it back is a good song, just not a phish song, or a phish cover song that I typically consider a phish song.
It was a great moment, fun show. Thanks for picking my twitter reaction.