headyversion

find the best versions of grateful dead songs

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Carrion_Crow

Stealth Head

+49667


Submissions

9
Jack Straw
June 26, 1973
Seattle Center Coliseum

Purrs along like a smooth stretch of highway. The whole first set has understated beauty. A gem.
15
Hard to Handle
Feb. 18, 1971
Capitol Theater

Pigpen's voice is deep, SC-soaked and clear. The jam is ballsy and pushing out against the seams.
10
St. Stephen
Oct. 13, 1968
Avalon Ballroom

Blasting '68 psyhedelia - A bit wilder than the legendary night before's version. Goes into one of the all-time great 11s after, too.
10
Scarlet Begonias
May 25, 1974
Campus Stadium, UCSB

Great early version, Donna and Jer are on. Sorry my version sounds like they played in a tin can, though.
28
Eyes Of The World
June 24, 1973
Memorial Coliseum

Builds and builds from subtle spaceyness to a burning jam. Whole show seems overlooked but well worth it.
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Comments

Playin' In The Band
Sept. 21, 1972
The Spectrum

A version I could just put on repeat and listen to all day. Keith is exquisite, and the jam is hot and intense, then gentle and subtle, then hot again, all in 17 minutes, which feels short considering how much they cover. I love the re-entry around 11:50, when Jerry emits swirling borealis sound-beams around the magnetic poles.
Cumberland Blues
Sept. 21, 1972
The Spectrum

Has a loose sparks-flying feel like a coal car with no breaks speeding down the tracks deep into the mine, like the best ones do, but with a biting hard electric feel that is just exactly perfect.
Ramble On Rose
Sept. 21, 1972
The Spectrum

This song always works better for me when it has that bite-down-hard electricity to it. This one does, driving up the hot-wire tension throughout, and never dragging (as some lesser versions do, "this song, it ain't never goina' end" indeed...). This whole show is peak dead in any case. No toss-aways anywhere.
Loser
Sept. 21, 1972
The Spectrum

This show gets a lot of deserving love, but to me this Loser stands out as a particularly strong part of the first set.
Greatest Story Ever Told
Sept. 19, 1972
Roosevelt Stadium

Probably the worst AUD without an alternative source in the whole of 1972. Pity, because they're just absolutely blazing right out of the gate with Bertha, GSET and then that massive Bird Song. With August-September '72 is up there with the most consistent highest quality shredding Dead of any two-month period in their whole history we should hope hope hope for a cleaner set of reels out there - even if supposedly incomplete. (Please and thank you.) I'm no AUD-phobe, but this one will test the patience of even the most hardcore completists.
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