As I sit here, without question, the topic on most of my friends fingertips (and tongues) is the Phish hiatus. The dichotomy between the words "break" and "break-up" has induced many otherwise placid heads to breakdown. Of course there's also the debate over who will most "benefit" from the band's decision (to invoke the language of the New York Times). In that regard let me quote String Cheese Incident bass player Keith Moseley who in this month's issue says, "the band most likely to benefit from Phish taking a hiatus is Phish." I agree wholeheartedly. Many of you know that I did my share of taping/touring and even writing about Phish (it looks like the Phishing Manual may be out of print which is fine by me- there are plenty of additional resources out there already and more on the way) and I can certainly understand the band's desire to tone it down for a while. For a passionate, eloquent account of one person's relationship with the group read ZZYZX's column this month.

As for the new issue- in addition to another month brimming with content we finally have our new Tour Dates page up and running. I put this one together myself after spending too much time two weeks ago going from site to site to site trying to find out accurate tourdates for a dozen bands. It's easy one stop shopping- just use your "back" button on your browser, I didn't feel the need to entrap you by creating separate frames, I have faith you'll be back :)

So what else is new? I could prattle on about Jam Nation, the radio show Jeff Waful and I have on Sundays nights 8-10PM at WMRQ 104.1 in Hartford but I'll save that for next month- maybe I'll even have war stories about going toe-to-toe with MMRQ morning jock Dee Snider (not likely, although I did interview Dee for an upcoming book project- another story for another day...)

How about shows? The next 30 days should be jam-laden as everyone seems to be out on the road (okay with the exception of the aforementioned piscine quartet from Vermont). Hopefully I'll see you at a few...