Mike Gordon
Released: August 5, 2008 (Rounder Records)

TRACKLISTING
01. Another Door
02. Voices
03. Dig Further Down
04. Pretend
05. Traveled Too Far
06. Andelmans' Yard
07. Radar Blip
08. Morphing Again
09. Jaded
10. Sound

The Green Sparrow showcases his wide range of influences in a winning 10-track album that reminds us that Gordon is one of the most imaginative and mold-breaking artists in music today. Recorded at Mike's home studio in Vermont and mixed at The Barn, his former band’s studio and art space, The Green Sparrow features special guests Chuck Leavell, Trey Anastasio and Page McConnell, Bill Kreutzmann, Ivan Neville and horn players from Antibalas.

An artist known for his endless creativity and touring stamina, Mike took 2007 off from touring and dedicated his time to writing this record. The end result is an eclectic album boasting Mike's skillful assimilation of free-form rock & roll, calypso, pop and funk that showcases an unexpected side to Gordon's songwriting.

From the deeply rooted funk of “Radar Blip” to the rousing intricacies of “Andelmans' Yard,” from the spirited rock of “Traveled Too Far” to the punch of “Another Door,” The Green Sparrow is a playful album from an artist who continually reveals new layers of far-reaching invention.

THE PLAYERS
Mike Gordon, Doug Belote, Trey Anastasio, Scott Murawski, Joe Russo, Chuck Leavell, Bill Kreutzmann, Page McConnell, Jared Slomoff, Russ Lawton, Ivan Neville.

LINKS
- Click here to order The Green Sparrow
- The Green Sparrow Album Reviews

The Benevento/Russo Duo featuring Mike Gordon
Released: July 11, 2006 (GRaB)

TRACKLISTING
DISC ONE
01. 9x9 (7:44)
02. Sunny's Song (4:14)
03. My Pet Goat (11:19)
04. Best Reason To Buy The Sun (5:30)
05. Becky (6:52)
06. Welcome Red (6:38)
07. Foam (15:29)

DISC TWO
01. Hoe Down (5:22)
02. Scrachitti (9:54)
03. The Beltless Buckler (9:15)
04. Mike's Song (8:59)

As the sun began to set on the first day of Bonnaroo 2005, the Benevento/Russo Duo featuring Mike Gordon took the stage of "That Tent" for a killer set; one many have claimed to be their best show to date. The set was made available on LivePhish.com shortly after. In 2006, a remastered version of the show was released as a Limited Edition 2-CD set.

THE PLAYERS
Mike Gordon - Bass, Vocals; Marco Benevento - Keyboards, Vocals; Joseph Russo - Drums, Vocals

LINKS
- Click here to order Live At Bonnaroo 2005

Leo Kottke & Mike Gordon
Released: August 23, 2005 (RCA/Victor)

TRACKLISTING
01. Living In The Country (3:51)
02. The Grid (3:17)
03. Oh Well (3:22)
04. Rings (4:30)
05. Cherry County (2:30)
06. Sweet Emotion (5:32)
07. The Stolen Quiet (3:06)
08. Balloon (3:26)
09. Over The Dam (3:40)
10. Can't Hang (1:54)
11. From Spink To Correctionville (2:28)
12. Ya Mar (5:01)
13. Twice (4:10)
14. Invisible (6:35)

A childhood trip to The Bahamas found Mike dripping with emotion like never before while listening to the lilting calypso sound of The Mustangs. It was then, in mid-swimming-pool, that he decided to become a bass player, and it seemed fitting to return years later and construct his own calypso album with Leo Kottke, their second disc together. Mike and Leo enlisted Bahamian drummer Neil Symonette, and brought a smattering of song possibilities ranging from originals to an island infused version of Aerosmith's “Sweet Emotion.” Mike found the island emotion poignant once again.

THE PLAYERS
Leo Kottke - Guitar, Vocals; Mike Gordon - Bass, Vocals, Electric Guitar; Neil Symonette - Percussion, Chimes, Cymbals, Drums, Triangle, Claves, Caxixi, Cajon, Madal, Shaker, cowbell, Guiro, talking drum, Agogo Bell, Udu, Bell-tree, Cabasa, Flexatones, Frame Drum; Additional vocals by Jared Slomoff

LINKS
- Click here to order Sixty Six Steps
- Click here to download Sixty Six Steps in iTunes
- Sixty Six Steps Reviews

Mike Gordon
Released: August 26, 2003 (Ropeadope)

TRACKLISTING
01. Take Me Out (3:03)
02. Bone Delay (4:20)
03. Admoop (1:56)
04. Outside Out (3:23)
05. The Beltless Buckler (3:22)
06. Soulfood Man (3:28)
07. The Teacher (3:31)
08. Gatekeeper (3:22)
09. Couch Lady (4:01)
10. Major Minor (3:43)
11. The Lesson (3:00)
12. Exit Wound (3:22)
13. Steel Bones (5:55)
14. Take Me Out II (2:24)
15. Take Me Outro (2:09)

Lyrics were added to the background tracks of Mike's first feature film, Outside Out and "Inside In", a spacey, country, funk dream of sorts, was created. Gordon Stone's steel served as lead tone, and Mike brought in friends like Bela Fleck and Vassar Clements for some special licks, as well as strange words from Col. Bruce Hampton. Mike rented a cool sports car and drove the perimeter of Manhattan cranking the album with some friends once it was done. They were going fast. They dug it.

THE PLAYERS
Mike Gordon - All guitars and basses - vocals, plates, keyboards, banjo, accordian, blue button, washing machine, dryer, vibe tube, pedal steel, bass harmonica, percussion. Additional players include: Elizabeth Combs Beglin, Buddy Cage, Vassar Clements, Jeff Coffin, Jon Fishman, Béla Fleck, Future Man, Col. Bruce Hampton, Ret., James Harvey, Ida James, Gabe Jarret, Craig Johnson, Jeff Lawson, Russ Lawton, Stuart Paton, Jared Slomoff, Gordon Stone, Jimi Stout, Heloise Williams

LINKS
- Click here to order Inside In
- Click here to download Inside In at iTunes
- Official Inside In Website
- Inside In Reviews

Leo Kottke & Mike Gordon
Released: October 8, 2002 (RCA/Victor)

TRACKLISTING
01. Arko (1:23)
02. Car Carrier Blues (3:50)
03. From Pizza Towers to Defeat (3:08)
04. Clone (4:51)
05. Collins Missile (4:01)
06. Te Veo (2:33)
07. Disco (3:01)
08. June (3:03)
09. I Am A Lonesome Fugitive (3:07)
10. Clay (3:03)
11. Strange (1:12)
12. Middle Of The Road (2:55)
13. Whip (2:29)
14. With (2:46)

After a few jam sessions, Mike and Leo Kottke decided to resituate where there would be tape decks. Though no album was intended, the recordings of bass and guitar interplayfulness started to sound albumic. The duo returned several times to Paul DuGre's tiny hut in Burbank, California, often banging on pots, pans, or whatever else was lying around. David Z was brought in to mix because of his proven prowess on Leo's album "Standing In My Shoes" (not to mention Purple Rain). The homemade feel of this album doesn't undercede some of the intricate patterns within.

THE PLAYERS
Leo Kottke, guitar, vocals, condor, percussion, cakepan; Mike Gordon, bass, vocals, piano, electric guitar, skull flute, percussion

LINKS
- Click here to order Clone
- Click here to download Clone at iTunes
- Clone Reviews

Joey Arkenstat
Released: August 23, 2004 (Ropeadope)

TRACKLISTING
01. Region (6:11)
02. Listen Ray (5:56)
03. Island Remedy (2:31)
04. Birthington (2:52)
05. The Right Number (4:01)
06. Re-John (5:07)
07. Shoof (3:34)
08. Zim Zamf (3:21)
09. Sicilian Defense 3:43)
10. Ratamacue (3:12)
11. Fs-ch (4:30)

While technically not a “Mike album,” Gordon's intimate involvement with this project merits its inclusion here. He met bassist Joey Arkenstat while filming Rising Low. Later Arkentstat found Mike and enticed him to produce the album. Each musician was asked to improvise the entire album in one take including the pedal steel and fiddle of Larry Campbell, known partially for his work in Bob Dylan's band. The album was even mixed in one take. Mike also added crazy chanting and perhaps some bass notes to this album, which is a wild ride through non-stop schizoid bassisms (checker matches were sometime transcribed onto the bass fretboard) - not for the faint at heart.

THE PLAYERS
Joey Arkenstat - Bass and Vocals; Barry Rosenhouse - Drums, Silvia Sierra - Vocals; Andrew Vladek - Vocals; Mike Gordon - Vocals, Shofar; Jared Slomoff - Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Treatments; Larry Campbell - Pedal Steel, Fiddle

LINKS
- Click here to order Bane
- Official Bane Website

Phish
Released: October 27, 1998 (Elektra)

TRACKLISTING
01. Ghost (3:51)
02. Birds Of A Feather (4:15)
03. Meat (2:39)
04. Guyute (8:26)
05. Fikus (2:20)
06. Shafty (2:21)
07. Limb By Limb (3:32)
08. Frankie Says (3:06)
09. Brian And Robert (3:03)
10. Water In The Sky (2:28)
11. Roggae (2:59)
12. Wading In The Velvet Sea (4:29)
13. The Moma Dance (4:28)
14. End Of Session (1:54)

Phish, Mike's old band, spent a year or so recording jams onto two-inch tape until sunrise. They took some of these jams and went to a farmhouse to add lyrics, sometimes using the Tom Marshall prose packet. The process was more collaborative then ever, and the result was an organically funky mélange of songs and ditties. Putting the icing on the cake, revered painter George Condo provided an eight-foot painting of a “ghost.” On the CD, this painting has been reduced in size so that it would "fit."

THE PLAYERS
Trey Anastasio - guitar, vocals; Jon Fishman - drums, vocals; Mike Gordon - bass, pedal steel, vocals; Page McConnell - keyboards, vocals. Additional players include: Dave Grippo, James Harvey, Jennifer Hartswick, and Heloise Williams

LINKS
Click here to Order The Story Of The Ghost
- Click here to download The Story Of The Ghost at iTunes
The Story Of The Ghost Reviews

(1997)
Mike Gordon
Daunting Literary Snippets from Phish's Bassist

Paperback: 148 pages
Publisher: Bulfinch Press; 1st ed edition (May 1, 1997)
Language: English

Instead of paying attention to semiconductor physics lectures, or electromagnetic filed theory, Mike zoned out in the back pages of his little blue homework assignment notebooks. A high school teacher had encouraged him to write anything that would come out and it didn't matter what or the integrity of punctuation. Often the whole intention was to mock the academic floundering which littered countless analytical works that came across Mike's collection of course syllabi. Mike read Kant and wrote “On Philosophy.”

I guess it was strange to be learning to surrender and not think during jams at band practice, and at the same time to be analyzing one miniscule moment of culture, like certain phonemes and how they do or do not contribute to self-consciousness in four year olds within certain ethnicities and demographics. Soon these rants made their way into the aptly titled Phish newsletter, Doniac Schvice in the "Mike's Corner" column (Fish's Forum and Mike's Corner were at constant battle, often taking stabs at each other). Mike also created most of the illustrations that would later accompany these "daunting literary snippets" within the colorful little book, published by Bulfinch. During one entire Phish tour, Mike had to spend all of his leisure time arguing with a copy editor about whether certain made up words and made up punctuation and made up usages were okay in that they weren't afterword mishapen in the has-but.

- Click here to order Mike's Corner
- Click here to read more of Mike's writings

(2003)
by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

An archivist by nature, Mike worked with Jared Slomoff to pull the best moments from 2,500 Phish videotapes. Some films and tapes were created by Mike himself and many others had been catalogued by Phish archivist Kevin Shapiro and his team. We see the band in an early Goddard college practice room with their long hair, learning "Fluffhead." We see their first tour (to Colorado), a staged percussion jam, many special guests, the band vs. audience chess game, moments from certain magical jams, and a lot more, all in a forty-minute flick. The video was projected at Boston's Fleet Center between sets of the 20th anniversary gig. Mike intends to dive back into the project, pile on even more footage and release it as a DVD.

(2002)
directed by Mike Gordon
Released: October 8, 2002

It was neat to get involved with this Gov't Mule project since it meant Mike would get to meet more than twenty of his bass heroes. The documentary is about the late Allen Woody, of Gov't Mule and Allman Bros. fame, and the process the Mule went through while making their Deep End albums, for which many of Woody's bass influences paid tribute by playing basslines. The film includes such luminaries as John Entwistle, Flea, Bootsy Collins, Jack Bruce, and Phil Lesh and also attempts to answer questions like "What is the essence of bass?" and "Why do certain people rise to critical acclaim?" This exploration is enhanced by trickiness, like filming players with an aura-camera, or Mike playing Entwistle's bass line on a wall of bricks. Rising Low won the award for best documentary at the Newport International Film Festival.

- Click here to order Rising Low
- Rising Low reviews

(2005)
directed by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

During high school, Mike built a cabin in the woods behind his house. It took two years and he also made a scale model with the idea of filming it’s construction, animation style. Materials were assembled at varying rates - four frames of film here, two frames there - with the idea of making music to the intricate chart of rhythms. Decades later, the cabin had burnt down and it was finally time to write that music. After much math, Gordon composed music for bass and flute and edited the film together. You see someone searching for a good spot in the woods, and then the cabin seems to build itself. Even before audiences saw this seven-minute film, they found it strangely endearing. It debuted at the 2006 DC Shorts Film Festival in the Fall and many people clapped.

(2000)
written/directed by Mike Gordon
Released: November 9, 2000

Neither Mike nor Bruce Hampton remembers who approached who first, but both had the idea to make "The Outstructional Video," mocking the kind of VHS that would supposedly help youngsters learn guitar. The project grew and grew, and after 5000 hours of work, Mike had created a feature film about Rick Bault, a high school guy with one last chance to pass music school auditions before his Dad would send him off to a military academy. With Bruce Hampton as his teacher, Rick's playing seemed to be getting worse instead of better. Mike jumps on the other side of the lens to do a cameo as Matt Gizzard from well-known country outfit, Ramble Dove. The film won an award at the South By Southwest Film Festival, and was projected on screens as a dual bill with Hampton's own band with Mike added on guitar (and tricks like keyboards facing the audience on the edge of the stage that front-rowers were encouraged to play). Some people don't get this film and others seem to know every line by heart.

- Click here to order Outside Out
- Official Outside Out Website

(1997)
directed by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

Mike documented the transformation of his old log cabin into a multidimensional dreamspot with recording studio. While in real life, the project took 400 percent of the alloted time period, the film makes it seems much quicker. Mike talks to house visionary Mike Larson and Larson claims it will only take a few minutes to build the house. Giving credibility to this theory, the two men walk through the house and bad quality video footage of the old house is translated into good quality, well-lit footage of the new house with each camera pan. And that whole montage is crosscut with fast motion imagery of the post and beam construction.

(1997)
directed by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

It was a Bruce Hampton term, and this tiny experimental moment features a slow motion shot of Bruce's Hand moving from left to right - over and over again (and some warped footage of Victor Wooten). While the piece itself is quite insignificant - Mike had made it while wasting time in a tiny closet during the Hoist recording sessions - Bruce Hampton seemed to really dig it, enough to inspire the film collaboration, which turned into Outside Out (and this thing can be seen as an extra on the Outside Out DVD).

(1994)
produced/directed by Mike Gordon
Released: October 1, 1994

This video was trashed in an early edition of the fanzine Pharmer's Almanac. After making a '93 Summer Tour video for the band and friends, Mike realized he wanted to make something shorter, and raw with feeling. The idea was not to show talking, just flourishing emotions during the overdubbing and special guest phases of the production of Phish's Hoist album. You see Jonathan Frakes from Star Trek playing trombone, Alison Krauss, Bela Fleck, The Tower Of Power horns, and unexpectedisms like walking slowly on stones for the song "Lifeboy" or a an arcade game miked up for it's beeps and whirs. Things start to peak when the one live jam on the album (A Cleveland "Split Open And Melt" jam) provides the pulse behind shots of huge forest fires getting closer and closer to the studio, and Fishman's car accident in the hills of Hollywood. Tracking is only available on VHS.

- Click here to order Tracking

(1994)
directed by Mike Gordon
Released: April 7, 1994

Whether or not to make a video was one of those discussions that ate up hundreds, if not millions of hours of time while Phish drove themselves around in a van (before the tour bus era). They thought if Mike made the thing, it would be more palatable, and Hoist seemed to be the right album to "sell out" for, since it included blockbuster hit singles like "Scent Of A Mule." The idea for this was neat - the guys jumping into an actual small fish tank in scuba gear, swimming around, and then into the giant clam of the New Years '93 set. The final footage shows the live concert, complete with aquarium set all around. In the last few seconds, we see Trey's dog Marley (who had traveled everywhere with the band for years) all wet and disgruntled, on the floor of the living room set, after her own passage through the virtual aquarium. The band ended up feeling there were too many chefs involved, and thus Mike's sensibility wasn't captured as it had been, say, in his short film "Stewart." But the video did end up on Beavis and Butthead, where they talked about how fish swim around in their own shit.

- Click here to watch "Down with Disease"

(1997)
directed by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

It seemed such a shame that no one had used any of the six camera shoot from the 1994 Great Woods Phish concert in "Massachusetts." The Photo Resource Center in Boston challenged Mike to provide a new video piece, so thus made was "Goodwood". The short piece abstractly overlays multiple images and sounds (sometimes you hear several jams at once) and inter-cuts shots of Paul Languedoc supposedly fixing something in the "engine room," that could cause the stage to blow up. This piece looped all day long on a TV at the PRC. Steven Tyler supposedly stumbled in and liked it. While it hasn't otherwise been available for human consumption thus far, it will be by 2011.

(1984)
written/directed by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

After two and a half years of electrical engineering, Mike designed his own major in Mass Media with an emphasis in film- making, rooted in the art department. By the time of this senior project film, Mike was ready to mock some of the lectures he had sat through, analyzing films and other media. The film begins exploring issues like "violence on TV," but as with French New Wave films, it quickly turns inward, mocking itself. In the film, one professor says, "this film might as well be about toaster ovens!" and an entire TV sequence, beginning with someone shopping for TVs, is repeated with toaster ovens. Like Gordo himself, it’s a bit crazy and no one has had the opportunity to see the film except the review committee who watched it that fateful graduation week. One professor almost insisted on leaving mid-film, but others found the film to be quite fazmotic, indeed.

(1985)
written/directed by Mike Gordon
Released: 1985 Training Video

Climbing through insulated hanging ceilings to change fluorescent fixture ballasts at Store 24s was getting old, so Mike moved over to the human resources department and started to create training videos. "Is That All?" was the first one. It tried to demonstrate ways of offering good customer service. Failed attempts at a voice-over dialogue fix created the line of the video, "Do you have whipppwhiwhpiippipping cream?" After that Mike directed the riveting piece, "Lottery Operations," which explained how to use the Mass state lottery ticket machine in a series of long close-ups on the front panel buttons. "Store 24, Opportunity And More" involved going to all the departments and showing the viewer that you can grow with the company rather than leaving right after being trained like most employees. A video on store safety was started by Mike but completed without. Research for that included late night adventures to rough neighborhoods dressed in jacket and tie, watching a security person deal with shoplifters.

(1985)

Page McConnell stars as Stewart, a lost seeming young man in search of – well, nothing I guess. While most student films consist of many signifiers with nothing being signified, this plotless adventure actually has a great deal of charm to it. At one point Stewart is seen walking and walking, and then a payphone rings and he walks up to answer it. Though he doesn't seem phased, it's his mother, and she doles out a chant of "Why haven't you done anything with your life?" which then morphs into gibberish and then we see Stewart twirling on a merry-go-round intercut with closeups of coffee and soap swirling in a water jar. Unlike the body of the film, the end credits are in color and show characters who weren't really in the film - or were they? Following the credits, Jon Fishman has a cameo as “film commentary guy.” As of blurbtime, no one has seen this short, but a clip was used in "Phish: 20th Anniversary."

(1984)
written/directed by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

Having created a smattering of skits and films whilst "growing up," it was time to get away from the rigmarole of countless engineering classes in order to take "Film I" at Emerson College one summer. The final assignment was, well you guessed it: for each student to make a film. The Invention depicts someone walking with his briefcase through alleys and up into the hallways of large mill buildings (Mike's grandparents had run Natick Mills, where Gordo got to jump on hundreds of huge burlap sacks full of wool when he was a tyke) to a table of business types who were waiting to see his new invention. What the invention does, as it turns out, is - well, never mind, I won't spoil it for you.

(1979)

This is actually a compilation tape. You see, Gacto had collected some of the black and white surveillance cameras from his father's Store 24 chain. He had even nabbed some black and white reel-to-reel video decks to boot. This was before people had video cameras or cellphones with video cameras. While the cameras had shoddy performance (these are the ones that had been thrown out), they provided the tools for some crazy little skits. The title track sketch shows a goofball hardcore punker in strange net shirt and big curly wig, singing the first version of what would become Phish's "Big Black Furry Creature From Mars". These same questionable cameras were the perfect tools years later when David Lynch asked for an artist endorsement of his Fire Walk With Me movie, supposedly Mike's favorite film at one point.

(1974)
written/directed by Mike Gordon
Released: n/a

At age nine, Mike wrote a thirteen-page script for this superhero action thriller, with his truly as Mr. Man. While no bigtime producers were interested in seeing this bit turned into a blockbuster hit, it still seemed worth pursuing its production in the various rooms of Mike's "house." What's really funny, though, is the video created years later using that Mighty Man footage, but with an added commentary track in the bland monotone style of Steven Wright. Well: not really funny. I would actually skip this one, and just go and see Steven Wright instead.

Joey Arkenstat

Mike Gordon contributes vocals, shofar and produces.
©2004 RopeADope Records

Gov't Mule