Sweet version with just Bob and Jerry for the David Letterman Show. Funny interviews + a Monkey & the Engineer. On YouTube. Jer outsmarts David L.

'71 Playin's are a special kind of love: nothing like what it became, a clang machine 10/4 poppin' country yodel. This one knocks my socks off.

The Prelude only, but really it's a thematic and 2nd meltdown to the mind-blowing Dark Star. Under certain circumstances this one could be dangerous.

A seamless sweet groove - into a very cool TOO. This show doesn't get enough love - all Summer '74 is hot, but this is a real corker.

Some of the best boogie-woogie cowboy barroom stride piano from Keith here.

The Billy/Bobby interplay is clear - and beautiful - in the mix, which is a rare treasure. It reminds me of being at shows and being able to focus (when focus was even possible) on different combinations of the boys at play, depending on where you were in the audiospace. This isn't the most polished or most experimental version you'll hear. It isn't even the most well-played. It is,however, bursting with creative synchronicity and it quite simply doesn't resemble any that went before it. PiTB is a study in the Dead's evolution, and within one year it went from the weirdly apocalyptic psychedelic jam "The Main Ten" to a twangy country warble with its off-kilter meter and explosive energy. Within another year we arrive at Veneta and PiTB is there with Dark Star as one of their vehicles for interdimensional exploration. This one stands at one of the junctures.

Right on, unstrucksound, glad you dug it!

Little known fact: Phil has twenty fingers. Evidence? This song.

Good goddamned hot, this one. So much energy, they're just giving giving and giving.

Sure thing, Deadhoe69, but here it's uptempo, fresh, and pushing forward. Later ones don't (for me) have that essential pulse as the earlier ones. And Jer's vocals here push it forward with meaning and soul. There's a pulse here that sometimes I lose in the later ones. He's right, this is a good call. You'll love it. I do.