Colorado’s Phish Story Goes Back Many Years

Content sponsored by AEG Presents Rocky Mountains.

Phish, the beloved jam band, emerged from the college town of Burlington, Vermont, way back in 1983.

Founded by Trey Anastasio and Jeff Holdsworth on guitar and lead vocals, Mike Gordon on bass and vocals, Jon Fishman on drums and vocals, with Page McConnell joining on keyboards and vocals in 1985, the band delivered an eclectic blend of rock, jazz, funk, bluegrass and more, with the added draw of incredible musicianship and improvisational prowess. Holdsworth left the band in ’86, and the lineup has remained the same since.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Phish began to rise in prominence, capturing the hearts of a growing fan base known as "Phishheads." The band’s live performances, characterized by intricate jams and seamless transitions between songs, became the stuff of legend. Much like the Grateful Dead, Phish fostered a sense of community among its followers.

Colorado holds a special place in Phish's storied career. Our state was the first outside of the Northeast that the band explored, playing small clubs across Colorado in 1988.

Phish's relationship with Colorado extends beyond Red Rocks, where the group first played in 1993. Its annual Labor Day weekend shows at Dick's Sporting Goods Park in Commerce City have become a beloved tradition. Since 2011, these performances have drawn thousands of fans from all over the country, who revel in the band's creative set lists and energetic shows.

Phish returns to Dick’s Sporting Goods Park August 29-September 1.

The synergy between Phish and Colorado's music-loving culture has solidified the band's status as a cherished staple of the state's live-music scene. Through its innovative sound and the vibrant community it’s built, Phish continues to captivate audiences, creating timeless memories one show at a time.
And many of those Colorado performances are thanks to Don Strasburg, veteran concert promoter and recently named president of AEG’s Rocky Mountain and Pacific Northwest regions. Strasburg’s musical career has been intertwined with Phish’s since the band’s earliest days.

While a student at Colorado College in Colorado Springs, Strasburg lived with friends in Burlington during the summer of 1989 and got to see Phish perform in its hometown. He didn’t know the band had already toured Colorado’s mountain towns the previous year on its own, and decided he had to bring the band to Colorado College and elsewhere in the state, including mountain towns and Front Range rooms in Boulder and Denver.

“They were by far the most popular band in Burlington in the ecosystem that I was in at that time. You know, that meant they were the biggest band in the world besides the Grateful Dead,” Strasburg recalls. He went on to run the concerts at Colorado College and eventually opened the Fox Theater in Boulder, a showcase for up-and-coming bands.

The AEG executive reads from a framed letter on his office wall, which is the pitch he wrote to the college in January 1990 to bring Phish to campus on Earth Day in April. “Phish is a fresh and unique band. They're drawing huge crowds wherever they play. Relix magazine, the national music publication, recently named Phish the best unsigned band in the nation. The scheduled date is Earth Day, one day prior to Earth Week, therefore will be an excellent opportunity for Earth Week to pitch their coming events to a significant portion of the student body and therefore get a larger turnout.”

Strasburg went on to promote Colorado shows that have become legendary with Phishheads not just for Earth Day, but Halloween shows and special nights throughout the years at Colorado College and beyond. Fans still revere a November 17, 1997, concert at Denver’s McNichols Arena that featured a 21-minute version of the spacey, funky song “Ghost.”
As Strasburg’s burgeoning career led him to book larger venues and Phish’s popularity outgrew nightclubs across the country, the shows became larger events. When the promoter booked the band at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park for its largest audience yet (twice the size of Red Rocks), Phish began a quirky tradition of playing sets that spelled out messages with the first letter of each song. The first was “Thanks.” They’ve only done that at Dick’s, Strasburg says.

“I was in love with the band. We were all in love with the band,” he adds. Strasburg vividly remembers every Phish concert he’s promoted, naming off every club, hall, theater and amphitheater where he’s booked the group. He’ll be able to commit another four-night stand to memory when Colorado’s dedicated Phishheads come out to express their love for the band over Labor Day Weekend.