This year’s official Deer Creek (aka Verizon Wireless Music Center) poster

The Midwest run began with somewhat of a whimper, but the first song hinted at the leap forward in full-band communication we were to experience this weekend. It was “Runaway Jim,” and nobody expected hugeness, but Mike and Page were sowing the seeds of exploration even though Trey never quite caught on. Summer 2010 has already had numerous great moments, but when all else fails, you can tune out everybody else and just listen to Mike. He has been in complete control of Phish for most of the year and endlessly imaginative even when nobody’s paying attention. But even though Trey missed an opportunity in “Jim” (and indeed, virtually the entire first set), Deer Creek was a statement from Trey: I’m taking my band back.

The highlight of the set was “Cars Trucks Buses.” There’s really no argument to be made otherwise, unless you want to talk only about Mike and his funktastic “Wolfman’s Brother.” “Roggae” was not as horrible as it can be, and it actually crawled into a lovely little jam. Other than these anomalies, it was choppy going throughout. This rendition of “Time Turns Elastic” did the song’s supporters no favors; after crushing it at Blossom on the first leg, tonight’s outing was sluggish, hitting its stride a couple of times but nowhere near its potential.

Running on four hours of sleep and having sweated out most of my body’s nutrients, I was sapped of energy. I was resigned to the fact that it would take a Herculean jam to salvage any enthusiasm, and that’s what we got. In a nod to last year’s triumphant second set at this shed, “Drowned” developed into a perfect example of the kind of turned-on, locked-in adventure that the band seems to be able to access almost at will this second leg of summer. Themes were forged, applied, nurtured, venturing into “Twist”-like space, Trey and Mike linking up for a beautiful resurgence towards the end when you might expect an abrupt detour. This jam ranks with anything carved out in 2010.

Next, Trey turned “Gotta Jibboo” into a melodic guitar showcase, lucid and fluid, not just his same ol’ licks. It may not be fair to presume anything about the effect of Trey’s new Languedoc guitar, but it is a gorgeous hunk of wood and he seems to be gaining confidence by leaps and bounds the more he plays it. Last fall he was switching between several guitars during shows; it’s comforting to see that he has hopefully found all he needs in this one. As “Jibboo” seemed to be ending, whether by happy accident or supreme planning, they sank into a brief quicksand variation on the thing and turned on a DIME directly into “Bathtub Gin.” No blending of thematic elements or cross-fading, but pulling off the split-second sidestep is at least as challenging, and with all the trouble Phish has had with naturalistic segues in the modern era, this was a very satisfying moment.

“Gin” itself featured rock star Mike cranking out a fresh new bass ditty every few bars, and along for the ride, the band was pure intuition, following his lead through one of the more engaging “Gin”s of the past couple of years. But it was “My Friend, My Friend” that shook us up and set the tone for the remainder of this mind-blowing set. Trey’s efforts in climaxing this song lately have been mostly ugly, but this one amped up to a screeching howl so out of control that it might have shattered the fabric of time for a couple seconds. “Buffalo Bill” then came out of nowhere, and then “Twist” appeared for real, climbing out of its creative lull and swirling off on a gust of solar wind, magnificent work from Page and more of the boundless creative synergy that I guess we can start expecting on a nightly basis again. And we were nowhere near finished. For the first time in 3.0, “Split Open And Melt” showed up in the final frame and just blasted off. The boys often use this song to get a little lost in the woods, but this time they followed their whims (particularly Mike’s) so far afield that Fish was never quite able to rein them back into the coda of the song, and in the end, who cares? This set was all about spontaneous creation of new music, and “Split” capped it beautifully, drifting into “Dog-Faced Boy” in another well-timed lull.

Even the relatively formulaic “Harry Hood” couldn’t escape the band’s overflowing group consciousness, as Mike and Trey latched onto a hypnotic nebulous groove entirely separate from “Hood” and rode it as long as they could before plunging back into the usual build and peak.

After “Golgi Apparatus” closed the set, Trey brought out a new megaphone for the “Fee” encore (first time in ages) and then used it to begin the looping drone of “NO2” and then “Kung” as well, and during this creepy interlude, a helicopter appeared in the night sky, shone a light on the mesmerized crowd as it swooped overhead, and then flew off. Shenanigans? As the encore finally ended with “Fire,” we were still in a daze trying to figure out what exactly had just happened. That’s how you’re supposed to feel at the end of a Phish show.