The boys seem to love playing in unanounced, unstructred jams like this. Freedom reminiscent of some '67-69's but with the '73 songlist.

Rippin' show opener with Bobby twang sliding and a 2nd Jerry solo taking it up and over the top. Plus its Nashville.

Turns typical 1st set filler into a great jam. One of Keith's best solos of Summer '73.

Cool and fast w/ 12min jam before 1st (and only) verse. At 08:30 Phil goes teases what sounds like Milking the Turkey. Is that possible?

A greasy gritty super-funk sex parade. Wasn't often the Dead sounded this horny after Pigpen died.

'77 Scarlet>Fire, and the standards are soooo high. This one has a little looseness to the joints and Jerry flubs but recovers the lyrics before moving on. It's short and sweet, but doesn't really lift off during the second solo section. It rather vamps and spreads out in a spacey way before Jerry signals he's back and fully ready to burn down the mountain. I wouldn't call it the best one of the year... but what a year to choose from and I'm picking at nits.

Showcases the weird freakiness hidden in plain sight amongst the best Estimateds: Around five-and-a-half minutes in Keith hits you with smearing swooshes of sound that will give you flashbacks, accompanying Jerry throughout a smoldering solo.

Starts a little loose, but tightens right up and becomes quite snappy, hurt only by the limited mix quality of the radio broadcast. Bobby and Donna are sounding good, and by Jerry's big solo the band is so tight that he just hits terminal velocity. The outro shreds so hard that we can still hear the heads grinding their jaws and trying to hold on to their eyeballs 47 whole years later.

cgarces: I'm no writer either, but I recall a period when these Winterland '73 shows were unavailable on the Archive. No access = No votes. It may be just as simple as that. On this version and recording: Such a pleasure to hear Bobby clearly, he's all but erased in too many shows from the era and here you hear just how much he feeds the jam, lifting and twisting up everything behind Jerry like the tightly coiled spring that makes the watch go. Phil's 100% dialed in here too, and Billy is lucid, clean, precise, and melodic, his soloing matches the big man's point-for-point. This is A+ top shelf PITB and its a pleasure whether you're listening for the first time or the 500th.

This is really fun and beautiful. Bobby is really audible in the left channel, which is relatively rare for the era, but he pops out during a couple of patches. I think the last time I went through '73 show by show these beauties weren't available (maybe the box was just coming out?) so goddamn, but it seems like I don't know them at all. Looks like I've got my listening sorted out for the next couple of days. It's like finding buried treasure here folks, imagine my smile.