This is a weird one. At times it seems like they forgot it was PiTB and went back to the HSF jam. Fun, but waaaaaaaaay loose.

Short, sweet, brand new, and flawless.

Brilliant early "slow version". I always prefered the desperado fast-paced ones, but this turns into a brilliant exploration and improv vehicle.

Uptempo, powerful, strong vocals. This is top shelf UJB. With David Crosby for that extra oomph, and with a tigh outro, it's strangely not here yet.

Like every other song in the first set, this is just pristine, air-play level perfection. Beautiful fills by Keith here, too.

This is cool and innovative, but not even a little bit on my list of top ten or twenty. The Help>Slip is interesting for its slower groove, but honestly it starts a bit sleepy, even dragging, and Jerry's out of tune - sorry guys - for part of it. The Franklin's finally picks up the steam, and there's a nice little China Cat melodic teaser around 4:20 in, like they were telling us that they hadn't forgotten about it during its off-time. Really, though, Frankln's also gets a bit scattered by minute 7:00 and I can point to many more above this one on this page that I'd take to the desert island with me first. My 2 cents, that's all,

Absolute stunner. They were clearly all warmed up and ready to go from the first note of the first set, and this just caps it off with a great stand alone SB. Starts nicely in the pocket, then Donna adds subtle, gentle touches, as sweet as she ever got with the '76 sound, and then it's off to the moon and back. At around 10:00 or so Mickey (presumably) starts throwing martian golf balls around the cowbell and it kicks everyone into the next level. Should have many more votes here. Don't vote for the mis-listed SB>Fire on this page!

Very hot for a show opener. Gives the heads heads-up that the boys mean business.

Thanks Catalonia for the essay link. I'll read that asap. I love the deadessays stuff. There's a great one about how 76 Dancin' in the Streets versions. All in all there's a ton of great '76 stuff, which I think goes mostly overlooked. The sound is still rougher than the best of the studio-tight '77 shows, there isn't that wild anything-goes feeling of the pre-haitus years. There is, however, a sense of big open spaces, that any song could become a new vehicle for deep spontaneous composition - not just the big Playin's or Dark Stars (in fact no Dark Stars all year). I'm going chronologically - you noticed! - but I prefer not to rush things. I'll spend a couple of days on a single show rather than trying to get through them all so fast that they all become a blur. Next year? I'm thinking of going through '77, but I know most of that year already. I might also deep dive into '69 - a big mostly undiscovered terrain. There's a whole lot of Dead out there. Peace, brother or sister or whoever you are.

Leads into a unique 6 minute unnamed jam mislabeled "Drums" on some versions. Very cool.