The beginning of Phish's end

It has only been two-and-a-half months since Phish's final concert and much to the dismay of music lovers, hippies and people with generally poor hygiene, it looks as if it's never coming back. \nLuckily for its devotedly-fervent fans, it has released the newest in a line of DVDs recording the events of the cryptically-titled IT festival which took place in Limestone, Maine a year ago.\nThe first disc features footage of the festival, as well as numerous interviews with the band members, and the second disc shows several of the songs performed on stage.\nPhish has performed seven of these two-day festivals with between 70,000 to more than 100,000 in attendance -- which is a testament to the remarkable influence Phish has had. However, IT would prove to be one of the last times legions of Phish fans would have the opportunity to travel to the ends of the earth to see their favorite band play. This is a tragic irony surrounding the "IT" DVD. The band continually refers to IT as the beginning of a new era for the band when, in fact, it was the beginning of the end. \nInstead, this DVD falls somewhere between the two and leaves you disappointed. What is really annoying is they missed a lot of obvious things that would have made IT a lot more interesting. \nThere are no interviews with audience members -- some of which traveled thousands of miles to get there -- and they gloss over some of the most peculiar aspects of the festival, like the 5K race called "The Runaway Jim," whose winners were presented with trophies on stage during the concert the second night. These are the things that make IT a story worth telling.\nThe other problem with this DVD is the fact that it is a bit grandiose at times. The filmmakers should have spent more time documenting what happened at the festival instead of trying to convince the audience -- and to some degree themselves -- how historically important this concert is. \nPossibly the most frustrating aspect of this DVD is where they chose to put in the often-pointless interviews with the band. Many times they will begin to show one of the songs the band performed, and then at the most intense part, they will cut to some nonsequitur interview of the drummer talking about what the name IT means. \nGuess what? Nobody really cares what IT means -- people would rather hear the rest of "You Enjoy Myself."\n"IT" is the worst of Phish's DVDs. It would be pointless and boring for non-fans to watch, and it doesn't have as much music as fans want. They missed both target audiences by a mile. \nHopefully, future Phish DVDs -- and rest assured there will be more -- will not make the same mistakes "IT" did.