FROM THE VAULT: Mike Gordon

In celebration of Mike Gordon's 60th birthday, we look back on seven conversations with the Phish bassist from over the years.

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Viktor & Relix Daily
June 08, 2025

June 8, 2025

FROM THE VAULT

In celebration of Mike Gordon's 60th birthday, we look back on seven conversations with the Phish bassist from over the years.

Here is part one of an extended conversation with Phish bassist Mike Gordon, conducted by former Relix editor Toni Brown for the October 1995 issue of the magazine.

As Phish continues its June tour, we’re dipping back into the Relix archives. Here is Mike Greenhaus’ interview with Mike Gordon that originally ran in November 2005.

March 6, 2019 marks the 10th anniversary of Phish’s three-night reunion run at Hampton Coliseum, ushering in a new era for the jam quartet, which fans – or more accurately “phans” – refer to as Phish 3.0.

It is tempting to call Mike Gordon’s latest studio album, Overstep, a departure but, then again, the Phish bassist’s solo career has been defined by its amorphous definition. Gordon has come by his eclecticism naturally, pursuing the music and the method that feel vital to him in the moment.

Trey Anastasio knows that feeling when you catch a band in their prime. It was the summer of ‘99 and Phish had traveled to Japan, for the first time, to perform at the Fuji Rock Festival. Rage Against the Machine, who were riding their own wave of success as a politically charged, hip-hop/rock alternative to late-‘90s complacency, were headlining on another stage. The only problem was that Phish were going up against the start of their set.

Sometime in the 1980s, Jon Fishman saw Leo Kottke perform for the first time at the tiny Burlington, Vt., club Hunt’s. The drummer—who had recently co-founded Phish with Trey Anastasio, Mike Gordon and Jeff Holdsworth—had been listening to the lauded acoustic guitarist’s music since high school and was particularly mesmerized by his reading of The Byrds’ classic “Eight Miles High.” But the nascent Phish member still left that seminal performance with an unexpected realization.

Both Marco Benevento and Mike Gordon are known for duos. The Phish bassist has collaborated, on and off, with revered guitarist Leo Kottke for the past 20-plus years.