Good bass

It really is.

Nothing like setting up the mike in front of Phil Lesh’s speakers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ABCBE5N3Tio

“Brother Esau” had a haunting quality when the Dead first started playing it, and it still does.

I think the lyrics are good in their own right. However, they are typically subject to interpretation. (As typically as the long pause before the song starts…)

My brother Esau killed a hunter
Back in 1969
And before the killing was done,
His inheritance was mine.
But his birthright was a wand to wave
Before a weary band.
Esau gave me sleeplessness
And a piece of moral land.

My father favored Esau,
Who was eager to obey
All the bloody wild commandments
The Old Man shot his way.
But all this favor ended
When my brother failed at war.
He staggered home
And found me in the door.

[Chorus:]
Esau skates on mirrors anymore…
He meets his pale reflection at the door.
Yet sometimes at night I dream
He’s still that hairy man,
Shadowboxing the Apocalypse
And wandering the land.
Shadowboxing the Apocalypse
And wandering the land.

And

We shadowdance the silent war within.
The shadowdance, it never ends…
Never ends, never ends.

This is just one of those nights in which — fortunately or unfortunately — I have nothing to talk about… and if I did I probably wouldn’t. Or couldn’t.