What’s the difference between a Radiohead and a Phish fan? No, that’s not the setup to a joke, but an observation that Radiohead’s guitarist Ed O’Brien apparently made to Phish frontman Trey Anastasio.
As Anastasio tells Rolling Stone, O’Brien had attended a Phish show and shared his thoughts with him, giving what Trey calls “one of the greatest compliments.”
“[O’Brien] watched the show from the audience, and then he came backstage and he said, ‘I spent a lot of the night facing backwards. I was watching the last row of the arena, in the way back, all the way at the top,'” Anastasio recalls. “‘Every single person in the room was completely involved in the concert. Usually there’s a crew up front that’s really into the band, and then there’s a crew kind of in the back that … it’s hip to come see the band.'”
Anastasio adds that O’Brien told him that “Sometimes at Radiohead shows I look back, and I think a lot of people are here because it’s cool to go see Radiohead, but they don’t necessarily know all the material, and they’re talking,” whereas at the Phish show, “Your fans are completely involved with, and informed about every detail, all the way to the back row.”
“I thought that was a really astute comment, being at his first Phish concert,” Anastasio says.
Sounds like that’s a challenge to all prospective Radiohead concert attendees to start studying the deep cuts. Of course, Radiohead hasn’t performed live since 2018, but maybe you can prove your knowledge at a Smile show.
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