Slow and intense.

Very intense version in a bluesy second set.

to expand on my previous comment, I listened to this show again yesterday. This is incredible. To get the full effect, you have to track the full meltdown from Space as part of the Watchtower track. I have the matrix source, and my Watchtower track is 8:58, so whatever source you get, add enough of Space to the beginning of Watchtower to make it about 9 mins. That will give you about 10-15 seconds of space until Jerry first hints at Watchtower. The next 2 1/2 minutes are seminal Grateful Dead music as Space slowly melts into Watchtower, then Watchtower builds up from a gentle guitar melody into a raging jam where Jerry is absolutely shredding. I think Bob is a little shell shocked over what just happened because he flubs the entry into the vocals a little, but otherwise, this version is not perfect. Absolutely stunning. This whole show is criminally underrated. It has by all time favorite versions of at least 3 songs - Loose Lucy, Looks Like Rain, and Watchtower. They were on fire this night.

Not a huge fan of LL Rain, but this is my go-to version of this song. I really can't stand Donna's vocals on this song at all, so all of the 70s versions are out for me. This one is planted right in the middle of a great run of songs (China > Rider > LL Rain > Aiko > Dark Star > Terrapin) from one of the best post-Brent shows, so it has a lot of momentum and they really nail it on this night. Good stuff.

Brent's segment in this song was the highlight of this show. It was the day after the SF earthquake and 2 days after the spectacular "Nightfall of Diamonds" show. The band came out sluggish and shellshocked from both those things, and the set opening Shakedown was actually listless and disjointed. The show had very little energy at all until Brent's turn here where he stood up, growled through his verse about f-ing your henhouse, and then absolutely pounded on his B3 for the whole solo. The rest of the band was smiling by the end. It wa a moment I'll never forget. Unfortunately, they couldn't hold the energy through the whole show (I understand if their minds were elsewhere on this night...), but they made up for it in the next two nights.

This is by far the best version of this song that I've ever heard (by the Dead anyway, LOL). Definitely a worthy set 2 opener of a very hot set in the middle of one of their strongest overall tours of the Brent era.

I have never listened to this one, but one of my personal favorites on 9/2/83 in Boise less than a week later is a ripper as well, so I believe the hype for this. My go-to post-coma version is 6/10/90. Check that one out before you write them all off...