Empire Burlesque (1985)

As album covers go, that is horrible. I know this was the mid '80s and taste had taken a sabbatical but, still, was there really no other option than to dress Bob in a jacket stolen from the set of Miami Vice and give design duties to a teenager let loose on a ZX Spectrum? Worst Dylan sleeve. Ever.

To the songs. Is this also the worst Dylan album - musically - that we've covered so far? Probably not. It has the same hit and miss rate as Self Portrait (50% decent, 50% dross) but Empire Burlesque would just get the nod for being a more coherent whole.  That said, as Dylan albums go, it is not particularly good.

The biggest question for me is how much the production - once again - is the problem here. This is so 1980s pop influenced with the infernal boooosssh of electronic drums ubiquitous. I don't want to be one of those people who complains when Dylan moves on to the next sound, a modern style. I want to be the person digging his new direction, not shouting "Judas" from the balcony of the Free Trade Hall. Truthfully though, with an open mind and everything, this is still not a very good LP and the '80s pop stylings are only part of the problem.

The whole album seems to adhere to a precise mathematic equation that, after literally minutes of work, I have devised as:

enjoyability of track n = (strength of song ÷ level of 1980s pop style production) x number of weeks since you last listened to Blood On The Tracks

And that is a scientific fact.

The best example is the worst culprit: When The Night Comes Falling From The Sky. Dylan goes disco. There may be people out there who like this track. There may be people who think it is a work of genius. I doubt it but, as there are also people in this world who think that Eddie Murphy in a fat suit is the height of comedy, you never know. But don't listen to those lunatics, this track is terrible. The song itself, while not being anywhere near a Dylan great, isn't a complete write-off. There is a version of it on the first Bootleg Tapes album with the E Street Band's Steve Van Zandt and Roy Bittan that is not bad at all - it's simply that the song isn't strong enough to put up with the aural mauling that producer... err... Bob Dylan puts it through. Please, Bob, don't ever attempt disco again.

It is no coincidence that by far the strongest tracks on the album - I'll Remember You, Clean Cut Kid, Emotionally Yours and Dark Eyes - are the ones that get a reprieve from synth-pop hell.

Clean Cut Kid is an interesting conceit; a story of a boy brutalised by service in the Vietnam War set to one of the jauntiest, swinging songs that Dylan has written up to this point. The juxtaposition is a clever attempt at subversion but, ultimately, lessens the impact of the story as I find I get caught up more with the melody than the lyrical intent.

The other three of the stronger tracks are all gentle ballads that Dylan treats kindly. I'll Remember You and Emotionally Yours are pleasing love songs whereas Dark Eyes is much deeper. Apparently inspired by a fleeting encounter with a prostitute (no, not that sort of encounter), it is a simple yet beautiful, with Dylan giving us something lyrically interesting to chew over. It is starting to be a recurring theme of his 1980s albums that they close with the strongest track by far.

The only song that gets close to standing up to the 80s production is Tight Connection To My Heart which gives the album a lively, catchy start. I must admit to preferring the earlier version of the track available on the Bootleg Tapes (when the song was called Someone's Got A Hold Of My Heart) but it still gets the toes a'tapping.

Elsewhere there is very little to write home about. Seeing The Real You At Last, Never Gonna Be The Same Again, Trust Yourself and Something's Burning Baby are all pretty sub-standard songs in themselves, done no favours in how they are presented here.

Overall, this is a second-rate Dylan release; an LP where only about half the tracks are anything like enjoyable and a couple can be classed as real stinkers. Not even ending with the lovely Dark Eyes can make you forget that there was a lot of wading through mediocrity to get there. 

Sorry, Bob. Next, please.

Out of five?

Two and a half

Favourite track?

Dark Eyes

Next up?

Knocked Out Loaded.

Infidels (1983)

After a great deal of consideration, this is what I've settled on:

'Infidels is a solid if unmemorable LP'.

There, that's it. If that seems like I'm damning with faint praise, then I got it right because that's exactly what I was trying to do. My issue with this album is this: there's not a duff track; every single song on the record is fine, nice, good, even lovely in places. Then why is it, when the needle has reached then end of side two and lifted itself back into its place of rest, that I feel ever so slightly underwhelmed?

I think it might be the production. Mark Knopfler has done a good clean job. Perhaps too clean. A lot of the time - especially on I and I - this sounds like one of Dire Straits' first two LPs. That's not a problem in itself - I own and like both of those albums - but add that feel to the tightness of the musicianship Sly Dunbar, Robbie Shakespeare, Alan Clark, Mick Taylor and Knopfler himself (again, all fine musicians who I really like) bring and it gets a bit antiseptic. There are no edges. That's it! There are no edges here. Dylan, good or bad, is never tame and here, for once, he is.

Nevertheless, we get a strong start to the LP with Jokerman. I'm not entirely sure who or what Jokerman is about. It appears to be some sort of general rail against demagogues but, as far as I can see, doesn't get any more specific than that. I've seen religious interpretations of this and other tracks on Infidels and, given the last three LPs, it's easy to see why, but this is clearly more of a political rather than religious record. There are religious themes here and there - surely to be expected given Dylan's recent experience - but when they come, they do so with a fairly negative air. Here, in Jokerman, he appears to lump the religious establishment in with all other leaders subject to his wrath:

Well, the rifleman's stalking the sick and the lame,

Preacherman seeks the same, who'll get there first is uncertain

It seems Bob has fallen out of love with the church. Unless I have totally misread the lyrics to this song, then, who knows.

But Jokerman is a enjoyable tune. In fact you can say that about all of the songs here. They are all enjoyable tunes and, in the case of License to Kill, I'd even say that it was lovely in parts. There are no knock-your-socks-off Dylan classics but it is solid songwriting. The most interesting thing about this LP is the lyrical content; a game of trying to work out what he is actually on about and whether the religious themes are only undertones or something more substantial, if cryptic.

[Afterthought: It was remiss of me not to mention that fact that Blind Willie McTell was recorded for this album but omitted - according to Dylan - because it was never properly finished. This is such a shame. That track is one of Dylan's greatest and the version available on the Bootleg Series sounds finished to me. Having Blind Willie McTell on the LP would have improved it immeasurably.]

Some are easy enough - Union Sundown is a straightforward complaint about the demise of industry in the USA, License To Kill is a more general condemnation of the belligerent nature of mankind and Don't Fall Apart On Me Tonight is a simple enough love song to end the LP.

We also have Neighborhood Bully which has been subject to varying interpretations but seems to me to be obviously a defence of Israel. An odd choice and really unfortunate timing - the LP gets released only six weeks after Israeli forces were complicit in facilitating the massacre of 800 civilians by Philangist militia in the Lebanese Sabra and Shatila refugee camps. Ironically, the next track on the LP is Licensed To Kill.

Anyhoo, more cryptically, Dylan gives us Man Of Peace with the refrain "sometimes Satan comes as a...". Is this something from the Slow Train-Saved-Shot of Love cannon? Is this an attack on a particular individual? Or is it just a tirade against generic men of peace who turn out, on closer inspection, to be the dark lord? I have no idea.

The 'is it a religious analogy is it not' game carries on with Sweetheart Like You and I and I. Apparently there is a theory doing the rounds that Sweetheart Like You is a dig at the established church and its abuse of the message of Christ. I can sort of see it - at a stretch - and I certainly hope there's a hidden message in there or else it's a fairly odd song based round a tired pick-up line. In I and I Dylan seems to... well, to be honest, I haven't a clue what I and I is about but there are religious overtones, suggestions of personal introspection on Dylan's part, hints of an affair, and it's all pretty intriguing, so no complaints.

Ultimately, Infidels is an easy listen, with pleasing melodies and interesting themes. It's fine. Not a bad LP at all. Just not very exciting.

Wow, this has all been a bit serious and downbeat. Let's move along quickly so I can poke fun at Dylan's jacket on the next album sleeve.

Out of five?

Three and a half.

Favourite track?

Jokerman.

Up next?

Empire Burlesque.

Shot Of Love (1981)

Gee, we're not in a great period when it comes to album covers, are we? Never mind, let's get to the music...

This LP has presented me with a puzzle. An uncomfortable train of thought, if you will. Let's put it like this: If I just listened to the first nine tracks of this ten track album, these would be my thoughts -

****

God, part three. Although, this time, not so much. With the exception of the - no prizes for subtlety here - Property of Jesus, the religious overtones are understated and proselytising barely evident. If it wasn't for the biblical quote on the album sleeve and the fact that Dylan's conversion was a well known and much discussed affair, you be forgiven for missing the religiosity of many of the tracks here; there are just as many biblical references in some of the songs on John Wesley Harding as there are here. As if to emphasise the shift away from Saved style pulpit thumping, we also get the first completely secular song for a while in Lenny Bruce; Dylan's tribute to (lament for?) the eponymous, late, controversialist comedian.

Musically the album is somewhat of a mixed bag but every song is decent enough. Tracks such as Shot Of Love, Property of Jesus, Watered-Down Love and, the reggae influenced, Dead Man, Dead Man are at the lower end of the quality scale but each moves along with a certain verve and pleasant melody. Apart from the opening, title, track (produced by the wonderfully named Bumps Blackwell) - which almost sounds like a live recording - the material is handled consistently skillfully by producer Chuck Plotkin.

The higher spots on the record (in some sort of reverse order) are Heart of Mine, Lenny Bruce, Trouble, In The Summertime and The Groom's Still Waiting At The Altar. Heart of Mine is perhaps a breezy, throwaway, but enjoyable affair, while the others are certainly quality tunes albeit in very different ways. Trouble almost has the feel of mid-period Tom Waits records (and I write as a huge Waits fan) with an angular guitar and pounding beat perfectly framing the rough tone of Dylan's voice. In the Summertime is a understated tune with a beautiful melody in the verse, a contrast to the thoroughly rip-roaring The Groom's Still Waiting At The Altar.

[It should also be noted that the highly-regarded songs Caribbean Wind and Angelina were recorded in the sessions for Shot of Love. I've never been crazy about the former but Angelina is a wonderful song whose omission is perplexing.)

Lenny Bruce is the oddity on the album. A moody lament, it works in a large part because of the force of conviction evident in its writing and delivery. And mostly because it is so damn heartwarming to hear the much idolised Dylan singing about someone he so clearly admires.

However, lyrically, I'm not so convinced. Lenny Bruce provides a exemplar for the reservations I have with the lyrical style of a lot of this LP. Dylan is certainly not at his finest and his use of metaphor often becomes distinctly clunky:

Never robbed any churches nor cut off any babies’ heads
He just took the folks in high places and he shined a light in their beds
He’s on some other shore, he didn’t wanna live anymore

"Cut off any babies' heads"? Really? I'm not sure his writing feels forced or careless, or whether there's meant to be a kind of blunt realism going on but it sits awkwardly on the ear. Similarly, in Heart of Mine, when the refrain goes,

If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime
Heart of mine.

Unless Dylan was the first to coin that, now hackneyed, phrase, that's just lazy.

But, no matter, this might be an LP of highs and lows but, what's pleasing is that the highs are high and the lows aren't that low.

****

Here, though, is the twist. Along comes track ten, Every Grain of Sand, which is a masterpiece. Poetic, gentle, beautiful. So difficult to pick an example but let's go for:

Don’t have the inclination to look back on any mistake
Like Cain, I now behold this chain of events that I must break
In the fury of the moment I can see the Master’s hand
In every leaf that trembles, in every grain of sand 

Lovely, lovely, lovely. There's nothing more I can say.

So, what's the issue? Well, I'm now not sure if I've been far too generous to the rest of the songs on the album and, indeed, the past three albums. This is Dylan at his best. This is what the man is capable of. Maybe I've started to suffer from diminished-expectations syndrome. I suppose it doesn't really matter, but when you're suddenly reminded of the true heights his song-writing can reach it is such a jolt to realise just how long it has been since we've climbed them.

Out of five?

This is tricky now...err... three and seven-eighths?

Favourite track?

Every Grain of Sand

Next Up?

Infidels

Saved (1980)

If anyone hoped Slow Train Coming to be a one-off declaration of Dylan's new faith, they were to be very disappointed. Very. Saved has just as much God and, this time, it's Gospel.

It's also more personal. While Slow Train was a mixture of personal reflection and evangelising, Saved is almost entirely directed inwards with Bob expounding on his own salvation and how happy he is with it all. In Satisfied Mind:

"But one thing for certain
When it comes my time
I'll leave this old world with a satisfied mind." 

In the title track:

"I’ve been saved
By the blood of the lamb
Saved
And I’m so glad"

In Saving Grace:

"By this time I’d-a thought I would be sleeping
In a pine box for all eternity
My faith keeps me alive, but I still be weeping
For the saving grace that’s over me" 

and so on. 

Ultimately, how much you're going to like this offering is largely going to depend on how much you like gospel. At first, the combination of the gospel sound and another full LP of God-bothering filled me with ennui. It was with a weary sigh that I placed the CD into the car stereo on that first morning but, you know what, the more I've listened to this, the more I've liked it. And a few weeks on, I think this is a really enjoyable album. Not an all-time great Dylan release but a thoroughly enjoyable one nonetheless.

Kicking off with Satisfied Man, Dylan goes straight for the gospel jugular. It is a slightly odd track in that it sounds much like the intro to a song that doesn't actually happen, but I find that if you ignore the gap between track one and track two - Saved - the two halves fit nicely as one song. And what a song; Saved is a rip-roaring, all-singing, gospel choir clapping and dancing on a church stage, celebration of a track. Imaging the scene where John Belusi sees the light in The Blues Brothers and you've got the feel of Saved. Dammit, it's fun.

The LP takes a step down in both tempo and quality for the next two tracks. Covenant Woman is a decent song, musically reminiscent of Baby Stop Crying from Street Legal, but no great shakes and it's followed by What Can I Do For You?, which is OK, a little laboured, and certainly the musical low point on the LP.

But just when you're losing faith in the album, Bob gets you back on your feet with Solid Rock, another rock-gospel, swinging blast of song. The much slower Pressing On follows and it is a beautiful piece, deftly produced, beginning with shades of When He Returns from Slow Train Coming but soon settling into a smooth tempo not too far removed from some of the songs from his Woodstock period (I'm sure there are hints of The Band's The Weight here) before rising into a glorious gospel crescendo.

In The Garden starts off sounding as if it wouldn't be too out of place on the Jesus Christ Superstar soundtrack (that's not a criticism  -  I love that film) but, much like the previous track, builds and builds till you can't help but being swept up in it the bluesy-gospely loveliness of it all. The very personal Saving Grace comes next and, probably because of the nature of the lyrical content, produces a great vocal from Dylan that lifts what might have otherwise been a so-so filler track.

Ending with Are You Ready? is a strange one. You can see, philosophically (theologically?) why he chose to  - after telling you how great being saved has been for him, Bob lays down the gauntlet for you to join him - but after the celebratory nature of the album's high points its a rather relentless, pounding track. It wins me over (musically, rather than religiously) but is still wouldn't be my ideal finish to this particular LP.

That aside, I've become somewhat of a convert to Saved. This is a fine, fun album, a mile away from the po-faced impression you'd get from the cover or the title. One that will definitely get more of a run out in the future.

Out of five?
Four

Favourite track?
Saved

Up next?
Shot of Love

Slow Train Coming (1979)

So here we are. The God period. In some ways it was this part of the Dylan catalogue that inspired me to begin this album-by-album blogging venture in the first place as the three albums - Slow Train Coming, Saved and Shot of Love - that make up his no-punches-pulled religious phase rarely get a spin on the player at home. The thing is, I've never been sure how much of my reluctance to dig out one of that trilogy is due to the quality of the albums as a whole and how much is because I'm not so keen on listening to 40 minutes of Bob telling me I'm going to hell.

A little personal background, if I may. There aren't that many things I can say I have in common with his Bobness - not being a Jewish Septuagenarian from Minnesota and all - but one thing we do share is having had a full-on happy-clappy Jesus period. Mine was in my mid-teens and, as a result, I am more than familiar with evangelical meetings complete with terrible musical accompaniment. It is my suspicion that within such memories lies my initial problem with this LP and the subsequent two in the God trilogy. When I hear Dylan singing that he's 'gonna change' his 'way of thinking' I can't help but be transported back to tents in Christian festivals where I'm standing amongst sallow youths holding their hands aloft, eyes closed, head titled skywards with a look of dreamy satisfaction on their faces while neatly bearded men in pressed shirts play Fender Stratocasters and sing about praising the Lord.

And not in a good way.

So, this is my opportunity to try and get past such repressed teenage memories and give these LPs a good album-as-album listen.

But, of course, we can't ignore the lyrical content either, so let's start there. Well, there's a lot of God. In fact, not much else. The only exception is the charmingly child-friendly, Man Gave Names To All The Animals, which only has overtones of the book of Genesis because of the LP on which it appears. The rest of the tracks have a directness towards their subject matter, that can start to feel... well... preachy. I know this is meant to be a preachy LP and I'm also very aware of the irony of describing Dylan as such here when we let something like Blowing In The Wind pass by without similar comment. I know all that but, still, when Dylan starts demanding When You Gonna Wake Up? it is very difficult not to respond with 'Oh do shut up, Bob'.

The evangelising aside, the quality of the poetry here mostly ok, with some good lines here and there. Only once, though, does he hit the lyrical heights that we know he is more than capable of. The closing track, When He Returns, is a lovely piece in every way.

Musically, by Dylan's standards, this is pretty mediocre LP. When He Returns along with, Slow Train, Precious Angel and, possibly, Gotta Serve Somebody are the musically strong tracks here, with the rest to be filed under 'not much to write home about'. Not terrible, not at all, just not particularly good. About a fifty per cent strike rate.

What saves this LP (no pun intended) and, ultimately, makes it much better that the sum of its parts, is the musicianship on show. Dylan has assembled a talented and tight band around him and their quality lifts the weaker tracks and drivers the stronger tracks home. Mark Knopfler's guitar is unmistakably Mark Knopfler's guitar (is it me or does he just recreate his guitar part from Dire Straits' Once Upon A Time In The West on the title track, Slow Train, here?) and serves the whole album very well. The Muscle Shoals Horns are as tight as you would hope and the piano part by Barry Beckett on When He Returns is worth the admission price alone. Jerry Wexler's production also needs to be commended as, while he has the horns and backing singers and the keyboards - just like I moaned about on Street Legal - he treats them with skill and lets the songs breathe.

It is still not a great album but it is much more listenable than I'd previously given it credit for.

Out of five?

Three and a half.

Favourite track?

When He Returns

Next up?

Saved

Street Legal (1978)

Want to make an album? Come on then. Take a mixed bunch of Dylan compositions  - some good, one great, others so-so - then pile them up and pour a huge bucket marked 'production' all over them. Go on, keep going. Can you still see the songs? Yes? Well here's some more production, chuck that on as well. Finished? Good. Let's call it Street Legal.

Of course I exaggerate, but this does have that the feel of a decent LP that's been produced to within an inch of its life. We have the horns, we have the organ and, most importantly, we have the ubiquitous backing singers, shrieking their way through every track. It seems Dylan can't sing a line without it being echoed by the chorus line. One fears that, during the sessions, if he'd said "let's take five I need a bathroom break" it'd be greeted by a shrill blast of "BATH-ROOM BREAK". The whole thing has the sound of one of those evangelical musical extravaganzas you'd catch on TV on a Sunday morning - perhaps fittingly given what was about come in Dylan's life.

I'm not sure who is to blame for this. It was Dylan who wanted the full band - horns, backing singers and all - supplied by his touring band. By some accounts he had fixed his idea of how he wanted the new material to sound and there is a suggestion that, following the death of Elvis Presley, he was going for a Elvis in Vegas kind of feel. However, producer Don DeVito has to take his share of credit and blame for the final product. Though, he might be somewhat forgiven - apparently, even before he came on board, the sessions were speedy and chaotic, leading to far from perfect recordings which DeVito needed to do a job on before they could be released. This would go a long way in explaining the layers of sound he plastered all over them.

The over-the-top production aside, this is not a bad album at all and certainly an interesting one. Written during the throes of his messy divorce from Sara and subsequent custody battles over their children, Dylan is clearly in a bad place. The song titles alone show this as a very personal album - No Time To Think, Baby Stop Crying, We Better Talk This Over, True Love Tends To Forget - in fact every one of the songs, bar Senor, hardly needs Sigmund Freud to work out where Dylan was coming from.

Within the songs he is often, lyrically, direct. In We Better Talk This Over he sings

This situation can only get rougher
Why should we needlessly suffer?
Let’s call it a day, go our own different ways
Before we decay

In No Time To Think,

Judges will haunt you, the country priestess will want you
Her worst is better than best
I’ve seen all these decoys through a set of deep turquoise eyes
And I feel so depressed

My one concern is with New Pony which, unless he is actually singing about a horse (which is unlikely) is simply unpleasant and verging on the misogynistic:

I had a pony, her name was Lucifer
She broke her leg and she needed shooting

Come over here pony, I, I wanna climb up one time on you
Well, you’re so bad and nasty
But I love you, yes I do

Musically, there is some really nice material here. Changing Of The Guard is a good lively opening, followed by New Pony which, beneath the bellowing backing vocals and wittering about horses, is based on a solid, funky, blues riff. All good stuff. No Time To Think is ok - no great shakes - and drags after eight minutes or so but then comes Baby Stop Crying. I adore the verse of this track with its beautiful understated vocal. Gorgeous. Unfortunately the spell is broken by being bludgeoned to death by the shrieking backing vocals on the chorus. A real shame, this could have been a great song, rather than half of one. Street Legal in a nutshell, really.

Elsewhere the songs are fine but no more than that. Is Your Love In Vain? is OK but dominated by the revivalist meeting style production. True Love Tends To Forget, We Better Talk This Over, and Where Are You Tonight? are all pleasant enough but don't provide a particularly strong finish to the LP.

But, of course, I've yet to mention Senor (Tales of Yankee Power). Clearly the outstanding track of the album in many ways. It is a great tune - knocking everything else on the LP into a cocked hat - lyrically more cryptic than the other tracks and, for once here, well produced. The production is not unmissable; every effort has been made to give a dusty South American or maybe spaghetti western feel, but it has been done with a deft touch, something that can't be said for the rest of the LP. It's as if all involved knew this was the track and gave it the attention it deserved. It is a beautiful song.

So, an LP with merit and some good material but nothing of the caliber of the previous two releases. I'm sure there must be a bootleg of the session tapes out there. If anyone could point me in the right direction, I'd love to hear this LP before it was polished for release. Thank you.

Out of five?
Three and a half

Favourite track?
Senor

Next Up?
Slow Train Coming

Desire (1976)

[A word of explanation - there is a case to be made that The Basement Tapes should come next. I've debated this since starting this blog and in the end decided that they really count as more of a 'bootleg tapes' type release - mainly because, as I understand it, that these weren't recorded with the intention of commercial release. It was a close run thing but there you have it.]

So far, so orthodox - he likes Freewhelin' and Blood On The Tracks, doesn't like Self Portrait, has mixed feelings about Planet Waves. Well, here's the kicker: Desire has the ability to seriously irritate me.

Of course there are caveats - huge ones - about the quality of the songwriting, the musicianship and the fact that there are, at least, two or three real no-argument-necessary Dylan classics here. But, despite all that, it has to be said that listening to this LP as a whole, time and time again, and I start to want to kill someone or something.

Actually, that's not quite true. What I really want to do is take that frigging fiddle and shove it up its owner's Black Diamond Bay. It's everywhere, ALL THE TIME. Sawing away on Isis, grinding its way through Joey, beating Oh Sister over the head until the song can't take it any more. Honestly. Go get your copy of Desire and put it on - go on, I don't like to be bossy but, go on - put the needle down on, for instance, track 4, One More Cup Of Coffee. Good song, yeah? Gentle acoustic guitar intro, lovely little bass riff. Good, yeah? Then, here it comes, HONK, HONK, it's the fiddle. Good God. I WANT TO KILL SOMEONE. I know there's meant to be a gypsy travelling band type thing going on but, please. It's got the point that it's ruining any enjoyment I've had; the track starts and rather than thinking 'oh good, Sara', I'm just waiting for the moment when that damn fiddle starts sawing away in the background. Stop it. Now.

And relax.

It's a shame that this LP has grown away from me so. When I first bought this album in my teens it got played till the cassette would play no more and was close to being my favourite Dylan release. And, apart from that bloody fiddle, this is an LP full of goodness. It's got Isis and Sara and One More Cup Of Coffee and that should be enough for any album. These are magnificent examples of song writing. Sara is particularly moving - Dylan's heartfelt attempt at reconciliation with his soon-to-be ex-wife - apparently recorded with Sara present in the studio - it pushes every emotional button possible and with a great tune to boot. Quality.

Isis is a special song; up there with some of the best of his career. Lyrically it works by telling a story yet maintaining an air of mystery as to what the hell he's actually on about and muscially it is superb, driven by a simple piano and high-in-the-mix pounding bass. (I'm also particularly taken by the live version on the 1975 bootleg issue). The simple arrangements that add to the laid back pace of many of the tracks here - particularly Oh Sister, One More Cup of Coffee and Sara - suggest a song writer at the top of game and brimming with confidence in his craft. These are top notch tunes.

Lyrically, this is an interesting album. All but two of the tracks are co-written with Jacques Levy and the effect of having a songwriting partner is felt. There is a definite feel to the lyrics here of being addicted to the rhyme. That might be an odd thing to say; Dylan himself has always been a songwriter who likes to rhyme but here, for some reason, it becomes obvious. Maybe it's because three of the tracks - Isis, Mozambique and Romance in Durango - conform to the unfamiliar (for Dylan songs) double rhyming structure of ABAB within a four line verse, which is a whole lot of rhyming in one song. Maybe it's because some of the rhymes are somewhat tortured:

We got you for the motel job and we’re talkin’ to your friend Bello
Now you don’t wanta have to go back to jail, be a nice fellow

Or maybe it's because of the contrast between the songs written with Levy and those that were Dylan's alone - One More Cup Of Coffee and Sara - which have a more relaxed, natural, even organic feel to them. That's not to do Levy down - there are some great lines here - but there is a feel of Dylan being restrained by the demands of partnership.

A mention must be made of Hurricane as here we see the brief return of Dylan the protest singer. An appeal to the innocence of the then incarcerated Rubin Carter, he tells a story of injustice in a direct narrative of the sort last heard in The Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll. It will be the last time (I think, strike me down if I'm wrong. Actually, don't) that he will protest a cause so directly.

In terms of songwriting this is right up there. My personal bee in the bonnet about the fiddle aside, this is an extremely good LP. It's just that I can't take in anything more than little bursts any more. I just can't stand that goddamn fiddle.

Out of five?
Four and a half

Favourite track?
Isis

Next Up?
Street Legal.

Blood On The Tracks (1975)

Let me count the ways...

If you will allow me to digress for a moment, For someone who is just a little OCDish about lists and ordering the finer things in life, I have never decided on my favourite LP. It is just an impossible task. Albums are too varied, too nuanced to be able to compare and compete. I have a favourite song (John Martyn's May You Never, if you're interested) but album? No. I don't see how you can line up Joni Mitchell's Blue against, say, the Pixie's Doolitle or Miles Davis' Kind if Blue against AC/DC's Back In Black, or... you get the idea. Even in the same genre, or same band it is too difficult; I think Revolver is probably the best Beatles album from first track to last but then there's side 2 of Abbey Road which is about as good as it gets, how would you measure those two against each other? It's not just I wouldn't know where to start, it's that I just wouldn't want to.

However - and you can no doubt see where this is going - if you strapped me down and beat me with a stick until I nailed my colours to the mast on this matter and chose one LP to take with me when I go, it'd be Blood On The Tracks. It is a simply beautiful, timeless album with one fantastic tune after another.

While Dylan himself - the old goat - has on occasions denied it, the fact that here is Dylan laying bare the wounds of his ongoing divorce from wife Sara makes the LP even more powerful. I don't want to get all confessional on you but there has been a time during a particularly painful break-up of my own that I couldn't bring myself to listen to this album such is the nerves it touches. It's all there: the anger, resentment, pleading, self-flagellation, wistful reminiscence, feigned indifference; all brought into the sharpest of lyrical focus as only Dylan can.

What a start. Tangled Up In Blue. Track one, an instant Dylan classic. His voice is as clear as it has been for a good long while and the accompaniment is restrained, clean, perfect. For an LP which often wears it heart on its sleeve, the opening track is, lyrically, one of the more oblique. Styled - according to Bob - on an approach inspired from cubist art (pass that pinch of salt, please?), it was never going to a straightforward tale but the imagery is playful and enticing and there are enough lines to know who and what we are talking about. A wonderful opening.

The story becomes much more linear on the absolutely gorgeous Simple Twist of Fate - apparently a wistful remembrance of Suze Rotolo, the soul mate from the past - even though Dylan shifts between first and third person to try and keep a sense of distance.

By track three, You're A Big Girl Now, any mystery as to the origins of these songs is gone and Dylan writes with a startling frankness:

I’m going out of my mind
With a pain that stops and starts

and pleads for a second chance:

Time is a jet plane, it moves too fast
Oh, but what a shame if all we’ve shared can’t last
I can change, I swear, 
See what you can do
I can make it through
You can make it too

It is a striking song - a lament - backed by beautifully gentle acoustic guitar. The heart can't help but melt a little here.

At the end of these postings I choose my favourite track from the LP. I'm in trouble with this one - we're only on track three and I've already changed my mind twice. And here's the venomous Idiot Wind, the plaintive You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go and the howling electric slide guitar driven Meet Me In The Mornings to make me change my mind three times over again. And we haven't even got to If You See Her Say Hello, Shelter From The Storm or Buckets Of Rain yet. The quality of this album is without rival.

Yet it is not perfect. Each of the tracks are musically exceptional and add layer upon layer of the conflicting emotions of a man amidst a relationship breakdown. And then, about two-thirds through the LP, appears Lily Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts. It's not that it's a bad song - it is a playful tale with interesting characters of the kind we got on Highway 61 or John Wesley Harding. For an essentially one-riff tune it does go on too long, but it is certainly enjoyable. I just can't work out what it is doing here. Musically and, especially, lyrically it is out of place, as if someone thought we would need an amusing interval to catch our breath when, the truth is, we don't.

But, hey, that's just my two cents. I know at least one person of thinks that Lily, Rosemary is the best track on the album (they are clearly insane). And that's OK. Imperfections can become part of the whole and, in some strange way, enhance it. I don't want perfection  - I want it to be strived for but not obtained - because then where would we go?

So I'll take this, Lily included. This is an LP which never gets old, which never fails to touch me, never fails to impress. Magnifique.

Out of five?
Five

Favourite track?
You're A Big Girl Now (but ask me again later and it will change)

Up next?
(I've been long debating this and will explain on the next posting but it is...) Desire

Planet Waves (1974)

[We're moving right past the LP Dylan to Planet Waves now. It is difficult to judge whether Dylan should be counted as a bona fide studio release, being as it is a series of outtakes released by Columbia in a fit of pique following Dylan (the man rather than the LP) jumping ship and joining David Geffen's Asylum Records. Anyway, it was deleted when he returned to Columbia and hence, while there are copies out there, I don't own one. So there.]

  

It has taken me a while to put finger to keyboard on this blog once more. The demands of my jet-setting playboy lifestyle aside, the reason for this delay is that 1974's Planet Waves manages the rare feat of dividing my own opinion. Some days I love this album, some days I don't and I have no idea why that is.

Or maybe I do have an inkling of why. It might be that many of the songs here contain the great, the good and the not so great or good within themselves. Two examples:

Hazel. Such a beautiful start; a squeeze of harmonica before a gentle, affectionate, melodic opening verse. Touches the heart every time. But then there is the middle eight (or is it just verse three?) where he goes off on one, up the register, a trademark slightly out of tune wail. It's not terrible by any stretch but takes a sledgehammer to this delicate gem of a song.

Dirge. Try as I might I can't resist the urge to make the very obvious comment about this song. It is a bit of a dirge and that is not a good thing. A harsh delivery of a unappealing melody, to be honest. But then you start to listen to the lyrics and they are remarkable. A brutally honest lament of a failing relationship that one does not need to be a Dylanologist to link to the breakdown of Dylan's own marriage. Any verse would do as an exemplar but, for lazinesses sake, here's the opening one:

I hate myself for lovin’ you and the weakness that it showed
You were just a painted face on a trip down Suicide Road
The stage was set, the lights went out all around the old hotel
I hate myself for lovin’ you and I’m glad the curtain fell

It is songs such as these plus Wedding Song, Never Say Goodbye, Going Going Gone and Something There Is About You that spark a schizophrenic reaction in me.  But before I start getting too indecisive on you, there is also much on the LP which gets a big thumbs-up without qualification.

For starters there is The Band. Individually and collectively, you can't get a much tighter or talented set of musicians to back you up. The only issue is whether this should really be billed as a Dylan & The Band LP so distinctive is the sound Robertson, Helm, Danko, Manuel and Hudson make. Something like the excellent Tough Mama would have fitted seamlessly on to The Band's Music From Big Pink LP. Helm's gentle drumming patterns and Hudson's warm organ particularly outstanding. (And does anyone else feel the urge to break into a rendition of This Wheel's On Fire at the end of each verse of Dirge?)

Add to this a handful of undoubtedly quality songs. Such a strong start with On A Night Like This; a driving blast of a tune with lyrics so evocative that you feel like you're right there by the fireside on a that dark, cold night. Later on the LP, You Angel You provides an equally as strong tune that is reminiscent of a funked up version of Baby Let Me Follow You Down from Dylan's first LP.

If you know this LP then you'll be ahead of me here. I was saving the best until last. Forever Young. What a song. Just, what a song. Lyrically and melodically beautiful, it is a thing of rare delight. And if that wasn't enough in itself, it is followed straight after by, err, Forever Young - same song, much more lively arrangement. While the impact of the back to back versions is probably dulled a little without the gap originally afforded by the need to get up and turn over the vinyl 12 inch record, it still works. In fact, despite them actually being, y'know. the same song, there is the perfect mix of difference and familiarity to make them complement each other. Well done Bob. (Actually, apparently, the first version was only kept on after producer Rob Fraboni dug his heels in, so well done Mr. Fraboni.)

It still depends what hour of the day I'm listening to this as to whether I think that Planet Waves is really up there with the best of Dylan or not, but if you pushed me (please, don't)... it's up there, not all the way, but up there all the same.

Out of five?
Four

Favourite track?
Forever Young (the slow version)

Next up?
Blood On The Tracks (*rubs hands in anticipation*)

Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid (1973)

So much of the narrative of the last few LPs has been Dylan, apparently, trying to struggle free of the burdens of expectation by releasing a series of perplexing albums. If that was true, it hadn't worked. Partly because, Self Portrait aside, the releases were actually quite good and partly because it would take a great deal more than that to make the Webermans of this world lose interest. I'd always wondered that, if Dylan really wanted it all to go away, why he didn't just stop releasing albums instead.

Then, after New Morning, he did. And that didn't work either.

So, following a two-and-a-half year absence, with the public whistle more than wetted, Dylan returns with Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid. For those eagerly anticipating a new release, it was a disappointment for the same reason that makes it difficult to pass judgement on here - that it is a film soundtrack LP. Not one of those Easy Rider type jukebox albums but songs and music written specifically to soundtrack a film. Music that is, mostly, designed to be in the background.

So you get Cantina Theme, Bunkhouse Theme, River Theme; pieces of incidental music erroneously elevated to the status of songs by their presence on a 12 inch record. While they are all understandably short, Final Theme - which has something that sounds suspiciously like a pan-pipe tootling throughout - goes on for more than five minutes. These are all perfectly pleasant melodies but, when plucked from their cinematic context, are, frankly a bit dull. Up to this point, whatever you think of the direction Dylan's music has taken, it has never been dull.

There is merit elsewhere on the album. Knockin' On Heaven's Door is, of course, the stand-out track and one which deservedly is now considered a Dylan classic. Billy is also a fine tune but do we really need one, two, three... four versions of it here? I love his voice on the final Billy 7 - sung at the bottom of his range, giving us a low down and dirty growl, fitting for a Sam Peckinpah western  - but by that point we really have heard this before. Three times before. Add to that Turkey Chase - a throw-away, jaunty, toe-tapping, banjo-picking, fiddle-fiddling romp that raises a smile - and that's about it.

And that's that, really. It's a film soundtrack with a couple of good songs thrown into the mix. There's not much else to say.

Out of five?
Three

Favourite track?
[With all due respect to Knockin' On Heaven's Door] Billy 7

Next up?
It should be Dylan but we're skipping right along to Planet Waves.

New Morning (1970)

Hot on the heels of the ill-received Self Portrait comes the 'that's much more like it' New Morning. On its release it was widely hailed as a welcome return to sanity, with some suggestions that its quick appearance represented a mea culpa on behalf of his Bobness for the inadequacies of Self Portrait. Since then, I think its fair to say, New Morning has become somewhat of a forgotten, under-rated LP, skulking in the much ignored hinterland of the time between the heights of Highway 61-Blonde On Blonde and the renaissance of Blood on the Tracks. In Chronicles, even Dylan seems underwhelmed by the release, saying it sounded "okay".  It is a shame as this is a rough diamond of an LP with a couple moments of near greatness, some good material, two that don't quite work, a few curios that do, before, frankly, fizzling out at the end.

Let's start at the top. Opening with If Not For You, Dylan supplies the strongest start to one of his albums since Highway 61; a lovely song with a gentle Nashville Skyline-esque swing, complemented by a slight mellowing in Dylan's voice. Even though this LP was written at a time when Dylan was still trying to wrestle free from the expectations his earlier successes had placed upon him - and that frustration comes through on several of the songs here  - the opening track, along with the equally fine title song New Morning, smack of new love and optimism.

Ah, New Morning. One of my very favourite Dylan songs. I have a particular sentimental attachment to this track as it was the song that my wife and I walked down the aisle at the end of our wedding ceremony to, but even without that personal memory, this is such a top tune.

Can’t you hear that motor turnin’?
Automobile comin’ into style
Comin’ down the road for a country mile or two
So happy just to see you smile
Underneath the sky of blue

That little vignette right there just sums up the delight of this song. The romantic, rustic imagery that pops up throughout the LP, the use of different parts of the middle line to rhyme across the verse and - most of all - musically, with the contrast of a falling guitar, a rising organ while the voice holds steady until just at the end, sends a shiver down my spine every time. This is a great song. This is a happy song. And in places this comes across as a really happy album.

In others it doesn't. The theme that runs though the album of a remote rural life shouts of Dylan's desire to escape from the 'voice of a generation' tag that, despite his best effort, continued to dog him. Day of the Locust - a good, almost Van Morrison-like, song - ends with him fleeing from a degree ceremony (apparently based on a recent experience at Princeton) "Straight for the hills, the black hills of Dakota. Sure was glad to get out of there alive." If Dogs Run Free ("then why not me?") is a blunt cry along similar lines:

The best is always yet to come
That’s what they explain to me
Just do your thing, you’ll be king
If dogs run free

[It is difficult to work up a great deal of sympathy with anyone who strives for success and recognition and then, when it comes, complains about having too much. But, on the other hand, I've never had to experience people rummaging though my trash or traipsing through my garden at all hours in the hope of discovering some great unspoken truth. Well, at least as far as I know.]

If Dogs Run Free along with Winterlude are two odd little songs that work despite themselves - probably because there has to be a great deal of tongue-in-cheek about them both. The latter is a sweet little waltz - "Winterlude, this dude thinks you're fine" - while the former is the first and (I'm sure) only appearance of scat on a Dylan LP. It is throw-away but highly enjoyable for that (although at one point it does sound like the scat singer is coughing up fur-balls which we could probably do without).

Back to the more orthodox tracks, the other highlights come with Sign on the Window - a wistful paean to domesticity - One More Weekend  - a twelve bar blues that would have sat happily on Blonde on Blonde - and The Man in Me - a quality tune which takes him into Van Morrison-esque territory once more. Tracks three and four on the LP - Time Passes Slowly and Went to See the Gypsy - are not so strong but they are, y'know, as Dylan said, okay.

The only bum note is the way the album finishes with by far the two weakest tracks. Father of Night is just not very good, whereas Three Angels is a lot of faux-gospel nonsense with a solemn Dylan intoning about angles, dogs and pigeons. Ah, well.

The ending aside this is a nice bit of work. It's not a great Dylan album by any stretch but it is a very good one. And right now, that'll do for me.

Out of five?

Four.

Favourite track?

New Morning.

Next up?

Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid

Self Portrait (1970)

A curate's egg.

I've been mulling over this LP for the past month and that's the best I can come up with. A veritable curate's egg.

I'm not sure what the point of Self Portrait is, what Dylan was really trying to do. Depending on which interview you read, it was either an attempt to bring out something so different (read toe-curlingly awful) that it would persuade all the Dylan-heads turning up at his home to finally push off and bother someone like Gilbert O'Sullivan instead or an effort to put one over on all the bootleggers by releasing album outtakes and curios before they did.

The first of those explanations certainly doesn't wash; it just isn't that terrible an album. There are some right stinkers on it but there is also a fair bit of worthwhile material here as well. And even if it was the worst album in the world, the cult of Dylan had gone too far to let something as trivial as a bad record make the hardcore Bobcats go away. He could fart in a bottle, release it and still have unwashed strangers turning up on his doorstep asking what it means. The LP as early part of the bootleg series has more of a ring of truth to it given the number of cover versions here but, really, if you have the time to worry about tapes of Bob warbling Blue Moon doing the rounds you need a hobby. It would explain the 24 tracks here - 'sod it, just stick it all on, whatever it sounds like'. You can kind of see it.

To the music. Hit and miss doesn't do this LP justice. We start with All The Tired Horses, just the backing singers (I think the first time he has used backing singers?) warbling about, well, tired horses. It's odd but I like it. It works in a hypnotic, cinematic sort of way. Then into the first song proper, Alberta #1. On my copy it's credited as a Dylan composition but let's cough politely and call it "trad arr. Dylan". It's got a nice Nashville Skyline type swing to it - this album is looking up.

Third track, I Forgot More Than You'll Ever Know. Hmm... Dylan becomes Pat Boone and croons his way through the first (of many) cover versions on the album. If this was on an Elvis Vegas comeback LP you'd sigh, blame Colonel Tom Parker and forgive him because of that voice. But Bob? I loved the country twang of Skyline but this is a dirge. Never mind, let's move on.

Days of 49.  See, that's better. A cover but a quality tune that wouldn't have been out of place on John Wesley Harding. Good, good, and then straight on to Early Morning Rain, another cover but a good choice again and nicely delivered.

At last, a Dylan composition. In Search of Little Sadie. Oh my, this is terrible. I don't know - others will - but I think I hear The Band on this (Levon Helm's mandolin perhaps?). I love Dylan, I love The Band, but this wouldn't deserve a place on The Basement Tapes. It sounds like a first take of a sketchy idea and, while we all know Dylan didn't like to do too many takes of any song, surely even Bob could say "let's try that again" once in a while. Next, please. Let It Be Me. Oh god, Pat Boone/Elvis comeback again.

So it goes on. Decent cover, decent cover, Boone, crap, Boone. Of the remaining Dylan originals we have the good - Living The Blues, The Mighty Quinn - the bad - Belle Isle, Wigwam - and the meh -  Little Sadie, Woogie Boogie, It Hurts Me Too, Minstrel Boy. That's not a great strike rate.

[And if you thought he couldn't harmonise with Johnny Cash, his cover of Simon and Garfunkel's The Boxer shows that it wasn't Cash's fault - here Dylan spectacularly fails to harmonise with himself.]

The shame is that there is a half-decent album here drowning in mediocrity. Take it down to ten or so tracks and you could make yourself a worthy release - it would just be an LP of mostly covers, that's all. By a fluke of MP3 shuffling, I'd listened to Self Portrait for the umteenth time, trying to work out what on earth to say about it, worrying about being too harsh, when To Ramona from Another Side came on. The contrast in quality was sobering. If I'm having to pick and choose between the tracks of a Dylan album to find something worthwhile then we have reached a low - whatever the reason for it. Let's move on shall we?

Out of five?

Two.

Favourite track?

Days of 49

Next up?

New Morning.

Nashville Skyline (1969)

I love this album. It's not a groundbreaking LP, it isn't a lyrical masterpiece, it won't feature at the very top of anyone's all time list of Dylan's recordings but, damn it, listening to Nashville Skyline makes me feel good. When the sun is out, the road is clear and the car windows are all the way down, this is what's playing on the stereo.  Hell, even my wife - who despairs of the length of the 'D' section of the record collection - thinks this is lovely.

His voice has taken another half step towards the back of his throat and sounds almost strangled at times. But despite that - because of that? - Dylan's tones are a rich and textured as at any point in his career. His voice caresses the melodies rather than stabbing at them accusingly as he has before. This is a sound that suits the songs perfectly.

Within the context of the career of his Bobness, the songs are in some ways unremarkable. Lyrically, they are, at their heart, simple love songs or regrets at lost love; there are no Mr Joneses, Frankie Lees or Judas Priests here and certainly no leopard-skin pill-box hats. This is straightforward unpretentious songwriting for straightforward unpretentious songs with the folk part of country-folk taking a back seat.

While Lay Lady Lay is probably the only song that you'd find on one of those greatest hits or best of packages, Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You and I Threw It All Away are just as worthy of note. Beautiful melodies with heartfelt lyrics, simple and lovely. Short too - other than the opening track, nothing here comes in over three and a half minutes. This is solid, no nonsense, enjoyable song writing.

Enjoyable is the thing that comes over. It sounds like they were having fun, keeping it simple and not trying to go anywhere too fast. Almost throwaway in places, tracks like Nashville Skyline Rag, Peggy Day or Country Pie are guaranteed to raise a smile.

And you get a bit of Johnny Cash. The choice of opening the LP with a song from The Freewhleein' album and a duet with the country legend Cash is an odd one but it works. It works even though towards the end of the track it sounds like their certainly singing different words and melody, possibly in different keys and even maybe separate songs. It works because its Johnny Cash. And Dylan. Singing Girl From the North Country, for goodness sake. (and that for most of the time they don't try to harmonise). 

This was never going to change the world but it makes me very happy every time I listen to it. All the tracks work in their own way and there are some real beauties on here. Good stuff.

Out of five?
Five.

Favourite track?
Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You

Next up?
Self Portrait

John Wesley Harding (1967)

I'm not sure how to approach this LP. Up to now, listening to each studio album in turn has been a journey, each building on the next, watching his writing skills grow, moving from Woody Guthrie wannabe to the voice of protest, rejecting that role, going electric and reaching a peak of song-writing and recording with Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde on Blonde. Then he moves to Woodstock, falls off his bike and we get this. Country-rock? Country-folk? Who knows. Whatever it is, it's like nothing he's done before. And to be frank, it's not quite as good as either of the preceding three LPs. Good but not great.


But that's probably the wrong way to look at this. It's not Highway 61 and it wasn't meant to be. What it is, looking at it purely on its own merits, is a very good album. Not a duff song on there. It never reaches the levels of bona fide genius of Visions of Johanna, Desolation Row, Like a Rolling Stone, Subterranean Homesick Blues or It's Alright Ma but you do get a bunch of solid tunes with a pretty good groove - if I'm allowed to say 'groove' - a few tracks of real originality and intrigue, and a couple - All Along the Watchtower and I'll Be Your Baby Tonight - that have gone on to become genuine Dylan classics.

The most remarkable thing about this LP is just how different it is. Different from any of his previous releases and from most of what was going on elsewhere. His voice has changed - even more nasal than before. Lyrically there's been a shift, subtle but definite; the poetic flights of fancy have been toned down but without losing the oddball character driven narrative, and a lot more biblical than before. Musically it is pared down to the bone; an odd, earthy feel, driven by a bass guitar that sounds like it's recorded halfway under water.

The greatest contrast lies elsewhere. This is 1967 for goodness sake. The Beatles are recording Sergeant Pepper, The Stones are making Satanic Majesty, The Byrds are singing So You Want to Be A Rock and Roll Star and Dylan goes and comes up with the distinctly unpsychedelic John Wesley Harding. He couldn't swim harder against the tide of popular culture if he tried.

What he has produced is an LP of consistently quality songs. The opening, title, track sets a gentle swinging mood with a feel that is replicated throughout the album. [Indeed, if there is a criticism, it is that, by the time you get to The Wicked Messenger, the uniformity of the sound can start to wear after a while. But only on the odd occasion.] While the pace slows on songs such as Dear Landlord and I Pity The Poor Immigrant the only track that stands out as having a noticeably different sound is the final track I'll Be Baby Tonight which is backed by a more traditional country swing.

Lyrically the emphasis is on storytelling with religious overtones, particularly on the All Along the Watch Tower, I Dreamed I Saw St Augustine and The Ballad Of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest. This makes it just as much an intelligent and interesting album as it is simply musically enjoyable. And, musically, it is very enjoyable. 

Ultimately this is a curious but quality release. A long exhale after the frantic rush of 1965-6. It'd be a few years until he reaches the absolute heights of the Highway 61 period again but, if there is any regret about that time coming to an end, it is more than tempered by the fact that this new phase in Dylan's career started, at least, with a solid album that still stands up today.

Out of five?
Four and a bit

Favourite track?
The Ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest

Next up?
Nashville Skyline