Sometimes shorter is better. At around 10 mins. this beauty from E'72 packs the jazz, jam, passion. Like a more intense version of the one on ACE!

No clean SBD on archive but at official Dead site a pristine version was on 30 days of Dead for DL. 2d best stand-alone I've heard next to 3-20-77

DP Vol. 29...Each time I think I've heard the best (i.e. 12/27/77) I hear one better. This is it. Flowing, gorgeous Jerry bridge jam. Perfection.

Proves the boys could really swing when they wanted to. Hear Jerry on "The Girl I Love" line; like 'Gator Alley--1980 a good year for this tune

Insane. Ridiculous. Drummers locked in, Garcia in take-no-prisoners mode. 16+ minutes of full-bore Rock to the G-D Roll.

Made a believer out of me. Amazing they could pull off a PITB this good in such a tough year

Run, don't walk, to hear this version in an upgraded Miller copy of the show just uploaded here: https://archive.org/details/gd1983-03-26.140315.sbd.eaton.miller.clugston.flac1648/Gd83-03-2612FireOnTheMountain.flac Long, windy 1983 with lots of grin-making moments.

I'll never share (or understand) Donnie's disdain for '77 but he does have a good ear for unheralded 90s versions of tunes (we both agree that the 9-18-90 Promised Land is by far better than any of the 70s versions that came before it) & this Estimated has some rich texture indeed, lots of interesting Jerry jamming & Bobby doing his aforementioned vocal gymnastics. But what also has to be acknowledged is how terribly weak the backing vocals are (Jerry can barely muster an audible "Californiaaaa" & the other folks are MIA) & while it may seem a small point it's actually a fairly big knock against the overall effectiveness of this version and its headiness. Any 1977 will give you better vocals all around, but in the end I did upvote this for its slower cadence and Vince's attempts to add some horn-like sounds that sound fairly annoying at first but ultimately contribute to this version's quirkiness--in a good way. Jer does some nice shredding in the outro too. Upvoted yes, but no, I wouldn't say any version from '77 has anything to worry about in competing with this one.

Not sure why I hadn't added a vote to this Gah-den Eyes 'til now but it deserves one. Reminiscent of the excellent version from 3/19/77 that also starts "cold" and just takes off into sweet jammy exploration, but I had forgotten about the nearly 3 minute intro section...yes, this is a slightly faster version (nothing like 11/4/77, though) but it still manages to take some time to find some really tasty nooks and crannies, especially in the intro section. Boston can sometimes be the Jan Brady to Cornell & Buffalo's Marsha/Cyndi dynamic, if you can follow that analogy, but there's a lot worth seeking out in that middle sister show. (In other words, I can hear Boston complaining "Ithaca, Ithaca, Ithaca! That's all anyone ever talks about!")

Gem hidden. Gem found. What's amazing about this '71 beauty is how full and spacey and just how, well, Dark-Star-Ish this sounds even with the most stripped-down version of the band that ever took the stage. Garcia teases the main theme so many times before finally singing the verse and they all find these really interesting spaces in between to play with & Keith is very present to add some twinkling star feels to the proceedings. Excellent version that should get into the higher reaches of the list if more people heard it.