UPtempo and full of piss and vinegar, just how I like them.

@ Carrion_Crow "Anyone know what rig he was playing?" Keith had a Polymoog synthesizer he used throughout '77 and through the mini winter '78 midwest tour, I believe, as it's also audible on the Estimated Prophet on Dick's 18. Shortly thereafter, he would drop it and play digital electric grand piano exclusively for the duration of his tenure. This version holds a special place in my heart because this 10/2/77 show (known mostly for the Casey and Dupree's bustouts), for whatever reason, holds the distinction of when I, after much listening, FINALLY GOT IT. And I had heard plenty of great vintage, primal Dead (Live Dead, Dick's 1, Two from the Vault) that failed to make even the slightest impression on me at the time, which was frustrating as I took to Phish like a fish out of water (awful pun at least partially intended) and was musically adventurous in my listening (Sun Ra and late-period Coltrane sat comfortably next to Talking Heads and The Replacements). The Dead's harmonically and rhythmically challenging improvisational style, not to mention their penchant for old-timey story songs with characters like Stagger Lee and August West, took me a bit to decipher and appreciate. But it all came together on a magical Fall '96 afternoon when I received these tapes in the mail. The Phish NYE '95 show was the real score in the acquisition, or so I thought at the time, but just for shits and kicks I asked the guy I was trading with to throw in a good Dead show, and lo and behold... My tape was missing the Samson 2nd set opener. No matter. Listening again 25 years later at the office on headphones and it sounds just as sweet as it did then. Some beautiful piano runs from Keith during Jer's solo and Donna sounds really nice and restrained in her vocalizing over the start of the jam. As many have noted, the transition into Fire is buttah. Keith gets a nice counterpoint thing going on the Polymoog at about 4:30 into Fire. There are some more really nice Keith moments sprinkled in Playin' later in the set. There are many wonderful versions currently above this (and for good reason, most of them anyway) but this is when I got on the bus.