Keith shines on a long, flowing intro section that spills into space-mellow Rat-Goodness

Emerges from Space with a very long intro & very distinct and sustained St. Stephen tease! My favorite version.

Part of what made this Alpine run so legendary. Soulful and Brent-astic.

Maybe the best pure hard riving Rock&Roll version. Lean, mean, and Jerry supreme!

Rarely heard (left out of DP Bonus tracks for Vol. 34) but another sweet/smooth '77 winner.

Just a picture perfect rendition...at once fierce and yet played with achingly good precision...liquid Garcia, monster drumming, all cylinders firing...a tour de force.

Having revisited this one recently and seeing where it is on the list I gotta say, this is way under where it needs to be. The bulk of this DS is just a mellow but always flowing and interesting improvisational jazz jam that shows off everyone's chops. It moves into an equally quiet/contemplative spacy section that never devolves into unlistenable distortion sound-for-the-sake-of-sound mucking about. Phil drops some deep heavy bass boulders but does so in tandem with an eerily atmospheric sustained Garcia guitar note in the backdrop and it really does give the feeling like you're floating somewhere out in the universe of stars. All this happens before the first verse is even sung, and that emerges from this quiet space with no forewarning but somehow naturally, as if it was waiting behind the veil the whole time. All this eventually tumbles out into a rollicking Cumberland, which is an odd choice I suppose (same when they've decided before on El Paso) but the transition is flawless and takes nothing away from the Star itself, This is a top 5 for me now easily (10/25/69, 4/8/72, 12/31/78, and 2/13/70 taking the other 4 slots) and this really should be higher on the list than some others...if I had my way ;-)

New convert to this version, which I'm proud to have just bumped into the "20s" for votes and hope it goes much higher. I think the reason I never really noticed it before is that 1973 is just too chock full of great versions wherever you look. There is no "poor" '73 Eyes. But this version has a couple of things going for it that set it a bit apart from the others. 1)The jam breaks between the first two verses are a little more stretched out and lengthier than others and Garcia is just pouring liquid through his fingers in the process. In a year known for jazzy Eyes this is as jazzy as it gets. The second jam break in particular shines in a way many others this year don't and reaches some great peaks and even a brief Keith moment of fills before Jerry takes over again and 2) the post-lyrics jam is really special...confident and expressive and drops seamlessly into the Stronger Than Dirt section in a way that some others of this year don't (if there is any flaw in the '73 versions it's in the early part of the year when they don't really have that part of the jam worked out yet and the Stronger Than Dirt sections suffer from some tentativeness and clunkiness. Not here. As also noted, a bluesy jam emerges and then dips into Stella and at nearly 22 minutes long this Eyes is a candidate for best of 1973, and that's saying an awful lot for a year in which this song has such a strong showing.

Best of '74 right here. Bookends an incredible run-jam started by Truckin'. Super fast and furious but well controlled version.

Why oh why am I only hearing this now? Absolutely stellar Birdsong from the year in which this song was consistently played better than any other. Excellent Miller SBD to hear and just a spectacular find. Hear it, love it, bump it up, please.