Revisiting (HOIST)

Phish's fifth studio album came at a pivotal moment in the band's history

I’m going to go out on a real limb here with a controversial statement that might well get me in a lot of trouble in the Phish community: 1994’s (HOIST) is the band’s greatest studio album.

There, I’ve said it. That bell can’t be un-rung.

I haven’t always thought this - in fact, I’ve changed my mind on this recently. Sure, the band had other albums that charted higher, like Billy Breathes, and plenty of other albums that were certified gold - but Phish is hardly a group that measures themselves by their commercial success. If we’re going by that metric, though, (HOIST) actually does pretty well there: it’s still their best-selling studio album. The Village Voice didn’t like it, only reviewing it with a bomb emoji, but then, they also gave Counting Crow’s August And Everything After, released the prior year, a B-.

Professional critics must often be aghast at what the public likes. Personally, I give Robert Christgau an F for his taste - because that’s all it is.

It’s not just that it did well commercially, however: it came along at a seminal moment in the band’s history. They’d just released their one and only official studio concept album, Rift, in 1993, which also did well commercially. The success of both Rift and (HOIST) would prove somewhat divisive amongst the fan base, with longtime phans wondering if they were beginning to focus on chasing commercial success - but they needn’t have worried. This is, incidentally, a repeated cycle that we see with nearly every release of a studio album by Phish: Dedicated phans eagerly anticipate it, initially react negatively to it, and then finally come around to it - or at least, to a few songs from it.

Sure, they’re not all home runs: Big Boat was kind of a dud, for instance, but even it had Blaze On and No Men In No Man’s Land, songs still played regularly today. (HOIST), though, is in a different class: It didn’t just produce one or two good songs, but a whole album full of them. Nearly every song on the album, save the novelty Riker’s Mailbox, is not just still played today but played regularly. The horse on the album cover, incidentally, is a photo of a horse owned by Amy Skelton, a Maine-based fan and friend of the band. They held a legendary early free show at her Auburn farm in 1991.

Take a look at the track list and you’ll see why:

The only real flop on there is Demand, which has only been played sixteen times total and not once since 2016. That’s understandable; like Riker’s Mailbox, it’s a more experimental piece, albeit one that actually functions independently on its own. We’re getting ahead of ourselves, though: Let’s take a look at the album track-by-track.

The album opens with Julius, a high-energy rocker. It’s a bit of a fusion between blues and rock, which makes the studio version with additional vocalists and a horn section all the more powerful and uplifting. While it’s served as a vehicle for longer jams on occasion, it’s never settled fully into that role - instead more often utilized as a set opener, whether in the first or second, to get people up on their feet. It’s also been used often as a one-song encore to send you fine people off into that good night, much in the same fashion that Say It To Me S.A.N.T.O.S. is frequently utilized today. It’s honestly one of my favorite songs to catch live, which I have nine times. It’s virtually impossible to sit still during this song. It also inspired the name of a damn fine beer from Tree House Brewing down in Massachusetts¹. It’s rightfully found a permanent home in the Phish canon, having been performed live 237 times since its debut.

The next track, Down With Disease, is an entirely different beast. While it’s a rocker like Julius, it isn’t always high-energy. It starts slowly with a deep intro that can be very dank and very slow when performed live. It can certainly be just an energetic rock piece, but it’s never played straight: It’s always at least a shorter jam, if not an expansive piece that wanders all over the place. Indeed, since the album’s release, it’s become one of the band’s most dependable jam vehicles. Not only have they performed it live 332 times, an astonishing 107 of those times have landed it on phish.net’s jam charts - the highest ratio of the album. This funk rock number might seem simple on the album, but it’s never played that way - it’s always given room to breath, and it can go in any number of different directions. Unlike some funkier numbers, it’s not always funky; unlike some higher-energy songs like Julius, it can go in either direction, down and deep or high energy. They even released their own music video on it, their only one ever (directed by Mike Gordon). Which, you know, is a thing that exists.

After those two high-energy openers, we have a slow, pretty, melodic number, If I Could. This beautiful ballad features Allison Krauss on backing vocals in studio, which is well deserved. It’s found a home as a breather number in-between high energy jams in Phish’s canon, serving a similar role as Farmhouse or Bouncing Around The Room. Indeed, it’s followed Down With Disease in direct album order six times. Breaking up big jams, whether funky or higher-energy, with a slower song is common practice for Phish, and for jam bands in general. If I Could’s A-major key lends it to this, completely, as does its slower tempo, giving it more an Americana feel overall. It wouldn’t feel out of place on a Mallett Brothers album. It’s not quite slow, like Lifeboy, but it’s not as country as Dog Faced Boy. I wish they’d use If I could more in this role as a break, lending greater variety to set lists2 and breaking it out more often. Indeed, the general structure of the album follows a live show - except for the next track.

Riker’s Mailbox is the one song from (HOIST) that has never been performed live because, well, it’s hard to imagine how it possibly could be. It’s a joke, novelty song much along the lines of Ass Handed, except it’s not particularly playable. It’s never going to be performed live, either - unless Jonathan Frakes, who played Commander Riker on Star Trek and whose character is the song’s namesake, shows up. If he does, well, then, all bets are off, and everyone in attendance will get a true notch in their fandom belt.

After the oddity of Riker’s, we move on to Axilla (Part II), a heavier rocker than Julius or even Down With Disease. It has a bit of an odd history: It was played heavily at first, but then vanished completely from 1995-2021, missing all of 2.0 and pre-pandemic 3.0. Surprisingly, given its rocky nature, it hasn’t notched many entries on the jam chart, but it could well serve that purpose, just like Down With Disease. Indeed, just like DWD, it has that dark, E-major energy, yet it’s only been paired with the song twice. They could definitely utilize that transition more often.

After Axilla (Part II), we get into another slower, breather song - Lifeboy. This is a criminally underrated, and underused, song. Lifeboy is a slow, drifting, ambient song, moving along in the same tempo as Farmhouse, but in a B major key, giving it a slow, glowey warmth. Phish, in general, needs to work on rotating more of its slower songs into its breather slots, laying aside the heavy dominance of Farmhouse, Waste, and Bouncing in that position. Lifeboy is a wonderfully beautiful song that has been criminally underused by the band, and they’re missing a chance to mix things up with a similar, if looser, song to their usual breathers.

Here, again, we go into another song that is a jam vehicle that is fully established: Sample In A Jar. Like Julius, it’s not a true jam vehicle, but of a very different nature: It’s got a right quick start to it, for one, striking immediately with a recognizable guitar riff. It’s structurally similar, working perfectly as a high-energy sett opener, albeit in more of a power rock mode. If you hadn’t noticed, in show terms, Sample In A Jar kicks off a set, and, like Julius, it’s served that role well: 50 of the 300 times it’s been played. It can also serve equally as well as a high-energy closer to a set, just like Julius can,

From there, they launch into a true jam vehicle, the second of the album: Wolfman’s Brother. The second-greatest jam vehicle of (HOIST) has been played 245 times total, and 71 of those have landed on the jam charts - a slightly slower clip than Down With Disease. Wolfman’s is, in many ways, similar to its earlier cousin, Runaway Jim: a jam vehicle that trends even more towards dark, funky, slow explorations than DWD. Whether it’s placed in the first or the second set, Wolfman’s is always wide open for expansion - even if they don’t quite follow through. If they don’t, it may be followed by another big jam immediately thereafter; if they do, it’ll probably be followed by a breather song. No matter what, though, you know you’re getting something good. It’s spiritually similar to Runaway Jim, its predecessor, and Fuego, its successor.

Next, we move on to Scent Of A Mule, an excellent, bluegrass number written by bassist Mike Gordon. Gordon songs tend to go in one of two directions: bluegrass, weird, or both, but Scent is firmly in the former, even though it dabbles in the latter. It also serves as a nice, high-energy break number after Wolfman’s, presuming that this entire album is in the pattern of a show - which it is. Phish has a sneaky tendency to slip in one Mike Gordon song in the second set, and this is the perfect spot for it. They should play this one more often. It’s not a slow song, but Phish has been playing more bluegrass songs this year, so it’d be a great chance to take it off the shelf.

Next we’ve got Dog Faced Boy, breaking up the show pattern. Dog Faced Boy is another criminally underplayed slow Trey song that they could use more often as a breather. This is a rare slow song that’s not a Trey solo composition - the entire band wrote it together - but it’s a beautiful break song that’s still sadly overshadowed by the standards.

Finally, we have Demand - the one flop from this record, a song that just exists. It has been played live, a handful of times, but mainly it’s a weird little bonus track at the end of the album. Two things must be noted about this: This was not uncommon, even amongst mainstream bands in the 1990s, and Phish has one of these on most studio releases. It’s a pretty song, that could readily be adapted to the breathing space - and makes reference to The Squirming Coil - but they’ve dropped it. That’s not a sad thing; it’s just a thing.

What do you think? What’s your favorite song from Hoist, and what memorable performances from said song have you been to? I want to hear from you. Chime in below!

Jim is also a weekly columnist for the Portland Press Herald, Maine’s largest daily newspaper. Follow him on X, BlueSky, on Facebook.

1. Thanks, Leslie, for the resupply!