I've reviewed this show at least twice. But it's because I go back and listen to it again and again as the years pass along. And I can't say that about a lot of dead shows or a lot of years. Yes it's true that they weren't playing their best, well, I should be specific: JERRY wasn't in his best shape during this time. The band was just fine and continuing to evolve as usual. And when Jerry could step up, they were as good as ever. But that was hard for him in 95, so the whole year unfortunately gets a bad rap due to laziness and ego-driven listening habits by so called deadheads. But if you have the patience to dig in and listen you will be rewarded. I mean honestly, how many times can you jack off over the same May 1977 show or 74 or 72? That 70's stuff just gets really sterile and repetitive and boring to me after a while, I don't care how good they supposedly "played". It's like formula. But this show and the ones around it really ARE Grateful Dead to me. Anyways, this second set features probably the greatest sequence of song playing and improv jamming and segueing through drums and space I maybe have ever heard. Give yourself a chance to sit down and relax and start with the Scarlet fire you will not be disappointed

Also, I have always found it amusing when people get upset and then write reviews on other people's reviews. I never thought I would do that. But I scroll down and saw this guy's review I'm just a couple of years ago and it's so off on some very basic points I have to comment in order to hopefully enhance other people's perceptions. First of all, because the Scarlet fire is terrible because Jerry doesn't know what song he's in. When you listen you will hear that he drops the lyrics during the first verse. However you feel so really listen you will notice the playing is very on point. I mean this is really one of the best Scarlet fires you can hear from this era. So why did he forget the lyrics? The reviewer says he can't believe it since there was a monitor, I assume he means teleprompter right in front of him. I know the dead fans were pretty freaked out when we all saw those teleprompters during this last two tours. I found out later that they didn't even have the lyrics on this teleprompters for the classic dead song. Only a few of the new songs were programmed in. It was literally a new experiment that they were on The Cutting Edge of trying that they really honestly barely had worked out. Go figure. When I listen to him play this Scarlet and I listen to him drop those lyrics, which I have several dozen times, i always imagine that Jerry looked out in the first couple of rows and saw something very distracting, and then just couldn't remember where he was in the lyrics. His playing is obviously on point so he's obviously not "out of it" or just not paying attention to the song.

I think what happens with this 95 stuff is people get super freaked out when they hear Jerry losing it and they just can't listen to anything else. But if you open your mind and you understand what's going on you can understand that he could lose it a little bit here and there due to the physical circumstances he was struggling with, but then rally and deliver a good performance, you then understand and can really HEAR these shows.
Those performances where he rallies despite his neae death health situation are superheroic if you ask me, and they sound great! It's too bad some people just are so stuck in what they want to expect out of the Dead that they can't really Listen to Jerry and what he was going through as he performed

I regret passing up my chance to see the Grateful Dead during the summer of '95... thinking I'd just hope to get a chance to see them somewhere that fall. And it would have been RFK which ended up being a good one... oh well... luckily had been able to see them in Charlotte and at the Omni in Atlanta (whew!) that spring. Of those shows I saw, this second night at Charlotte with Hornsby as surprise guest was just awesome. I Remember just being blown away at it. I feel like I've already reviewed this show so many times... probably on other sources... So, I'll just say this: if you are here reading this, you're probably trying to find out if you should prioritize listening to this show or not. Well, I will say YES - you should! It honestly ranks up there as one of the best, if not THE best show of the final year. Even the "space" is a must-listen version... the whole fluid sequence of Corrina all the way to Days is just exceptional and demonstrates the group-sound focused new modern-Dead sound they had evolved into by this tour. I go back and listen to this a lot, probably more than any other 95 show...
5 star for the whole show - excellent mix on this sbd

Hornsby really fires this up, especially Jerry -- it's the only Unbroken Chain where he does much of anything guitar-wise, for starters, and the Fire On The Mountain is extreme, and Days Between, and So Many Roads, and the Corinna > Matilda roars. True, by mid '94 and especially '95, his chops were mostly shot, but when he cared he could still put what notes he still had in the right place. I saw this whole tour from Charlotte forward and this was certainly the best of it and the best I heard all year (I saw 23 Dead shows of that short last year) -- plus all ten Jerry Band shows, all at the Warfield, Jerry's living-room, and ours -- which was a totally different deal -- Jerry's heart was in it always and to the very last). I give this five stars for heart.

..and yes, I understand exactly what that means: best show of their worst year.
But the recording is a great soundboard, and even at this late stage a Hornsby cameo had them all upping their game.

I'm enjoying the hell out of it, especially the second half.

the Dead forgetting words are flubbing licks is all part of the appeal, they are not perfect, but when they are on...they are ON.
these shows were not on by any means.
this is when is really became aware of how bad Jerry was. every show from here on out for me was hard to listen to or watch.
i remember during Scarlet/Fire, i thought , "he has no idea what song he is playing or the words".
he had a monitor right in front of him with the lyrics.
not as bad as the Highgate fuck up but close

This sounds good as for the sound on quality only. I am not going to knock them for always trying to give us there best. Yes this is not the Jerry I so loved for all the years that I followed everywhere. So before anyone gets the chance to rag on the way things were in the later years I thought I would throw in my 2 cents worth.
The set list is intriguing to me... Imagine if this were the set list of maybe a show from 1981 we would be praising a show like this if it were the case.....
My point is some will come here and tell us it was the best show they saw others will come here and Kill it because Jerry doesn't have the same sound we came to love. My point is to each there own. I give this 3 stars because it is from last year of bands existence and is intriguing in itself. Just not my cup of tea but I did listen to it all the way threw. 4 stars on sound 3 stars for joy it gave me this morning. Hopefully some of you love this show because you were there like many of us on tour in 80's.