Really Heads? Not here yet? 21 minutes of super fine hotandheady jam. Blazing hot, capping off a year of just outrageous Playin' playing.

Don't know the '70s versions enough to say "unique", but check this one out for beeeautiful vocals over light-as-light sweet acoustic playing.

The boys start the show with all guns blazing. Seems like they'd open with this when they were most massive. Ahhhh, Winterland.

The band has come together, the vocals are warm, the solos are sharp, so strap on boys and girls 'cause this show just ignites from here on out....

Great Caution, but absofreakinglutely outrageous feedback into the deep deep space and back. Face stolen, body floating -> Bid You Goodnight. Damn.

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.