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The Chronological Bob

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Sometime back @junior-wells drew our attention to a Spotify playlist with all of Bob Dylan’s recorded material available for streaming, in chronological order of recording date. Well, since then, I have been working my way through it, so you don’t have to it. I admit it’s not exactly a lockdown challenge to rival, for example, reading all of Proust’s ‘A la Recherche du Temps Perdu’. But it’s kept me busy and given me much enjoyment, and I have some observations to make. You may or may not agree with them. Please do let me know. I will make them in the thread below.

Doing Bob chronologically. You got the time, I got the playlist

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Comments

  1. 1. There’s an awful lot of it. 77 and a half hours to be exact. And a significant proportion of it is superb. For all Dylan’s troughs, his overall strike rate, right the way through his career, is impressively high. I can’t think of another musician, in any genre, who has produced such a body of work in the last 60 years, which has essential material across every decade, up to and including 2020. Dmitri Shostakovich for the first two decades for sure, but he died in 1975.

  2. 2. That said, there’s no denying that there is a front loading in his catalogue. It took me aback to realise that 1980’s ‘Saved’ (one of his worst records) is the mid point of his 39 studio albums. And whilst there are several that came after it that are superb, I don’t think many people would take the second half over the first.

  3. 3. ‘Saved’ introduced the worst decade of Dylan albums. But it was still a decade in which he produced ‘Oh Mercy’ and songs like ‘Dark Eyes’, ‘Jokerman’, Brownsville Girl’ and many others – it’s easy to make a double album’s worth of a playlist with no filler and not including anything from ‘Oh Mercy’. 80s Dylan is by no means all bad Dylan.

  4. 4. The live albums. Dylan didn’t produce a live album until the 70s and there has been a flood of them since, though still nothing official later than the 80s. ‘Before the Flood’ was my introduction to Dylan and I still love it, as I do the ‘Hard Rain’ and Rolling Thunder releases. His 70s live output is extraordinary. Within four years he had delivered three major tours, all sounding completely different, all reinventing his material in a brilliant way. Oh, and contriving to release three brilliant albums of new material at the same time. I saw the Wembley concert which provides some of the 1984 ‘Real Live’ album, and it’s good enough. The MTV Unplugged is OK. I haven’t listened to Dylan and the Dead much, and held out hopes that it might turn out to be a neglected classic. And indeed the first track ‘Slow Train’ isn’t at all bad. But by the time I’d suffered turgid performances of ‘Joey’ and ‘Queen Jane Approximately’ the record was Dead to me once again. One more thing. I still find the Manchester and Albert Hall 1966 albums better for their historic significance than to actually listen to. I realise I am in a minority here.

    • 66 stuff essential, never warmed to either Hard Rain or Before the Flood, you missed Budokan, I quite like the Live 75 album (first one). I was also at Wembley 84, was great at the time!

      • I loved that Wembley gig. Seeing Dylan, Van Morrison and Eric Clapton on stage together was quite a moment. I also remember UB40 being fabulous and Santana dull as ditchwater.

        As for Budokan, like many here, the first time I saw Dylan live was at Earls Court on that tour and the record is a fine souvenir of a magical night. The general critical consensus is that the Budokan record, made early in the tour doesn’t truly represent how good it had become by the time they got to London. I have no idea if that’s true or not.

        • Don’t remember UB40 at all! Mick Taylor also:

          Share your views on Santana, saw him again a few years ago and left before the end, but I only went to see the support, Steve Winwood (who was great).

  5. 5. Of Dylans’s 39 studio albums no less than 9 are albums featuring entirely (or almost, in the case of his debut) his interpretations of other people’s songs. And he’s serious about this stuff. With the exception, perhaps, of some tracks on Self Portrait and the abysmal CBS revenge release ‘Dylan’, these are records which have performances in which Dylan’s respect and love for the material is evident. These records arguably tell you as much about Dylan and where he’s come from than his own songs do. The 52 American songbook records are pretty hard going when listened to in sequence, but the best tracks, taken in small doses, are beautifully and movingly done. The Christmas album is a masterpiece and I know that everyone on the Afterword is in full agreement. But his two best cover albums are his debut, ‘Bob Dylan’, and 1993’s ‘World Gone Wrong’. On the former Dylan plays songs about death and loss but his efforts to sound like an old bluesman are gloriously undercut by the sheer effervescence and energy of a talented 20 year old boy on his way to the toppermost. In the latter he’s still only 52 but he has become that old bluesman at last. He sounds as old as the hills and as tired as Jonah. ‘Delia’’s refrain ‘all the friends I ever had are gone’, sung in a voice that carries every one of those 52 years and more, might just be the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.

  6. 6. I hadn’t listened to Time Out of Mind for a while. It’s absolutely brilliant. When it came out all the talk was that this was old man Dylan facing his own mortality. Except he was only 55 when he wrote it which is a damn sight younger than many of us. What strikes me now is that it’s a companion piece to Blood on the Tracks – and almost as good. Once again he’s still on the road, heading for another joint. He’s walking on that dirt road and through streets that are dead. He’s moving but he’s standing still. He’s moving through the middle of nowhere. He’s twenty miles out of town in the mist. It’s not entirely clear where he’s going to. Maybe the highlands where the Aberdeen waters flow, but even he knows that’s never going to happen. But it is clear where he’s going from – ‘a million miles from you’. Almost every song sees our narrator aimlessly going he knows not where, but feeling love sick and sick of love yet unable to deal without love. He seeks solace in Miss Mary Jane in Baltimore, and in a hilariously spiky flirtation with a waitress in a cafe. But it’s no good. His relationship is over and he can’t deal with it. It’s 20 years on from Blood on the Tracks. The earlier record was angry, spiteful, affectionate, sarcastic, regretful, apologetic, but still hopeful. In Time Out of Mind all hope is gone. There isn’t the energy of anger, there’s just a careworn world weariness. It’s Blood on the Tracks two decades on, older, but not wiser. It’s a masterpiece.

  7. 7. Blood on the Tracks sparked a spectacular revival in Dylan’s work, followed as it was by Desire and Street-Legal, along with the Rolling Thunder tour.

    So too did Time Out of Mind. Since that record he’s released five albums of original material. “Love and Theft” is a joy. ‘Modern Times’ and ‘Together Through Life’ are decent record but lack truly memorable distinctive songs. ‘Tempest’ is patchy but at its best it’s superb. And whilst the jury is still out on exactly where ‘Rough and Rowdy Ways’ sits in the canon, it’s currently sounding pretty damn good to me. All in all, Dylans’s work this century, taken as a whole, has arguably been better – and certainly more consistent – than any period since the 70s. Which makes it very good indeed.

  8. 8. I know almost all of this material far too well for this listen to produce any dramatic reappraisal. But one record which I do find myself giving more time for than I did when it came out is ‘Tempest’. There are a handful of awful tracks but the best is terrific. ‘Duquesne Whistle’ is an excellent opener, and tracks like ‘Early Roman Kings’, ‘Pay in Blood’, ‘Narrow Way’ and ‘Long and Wasted Years’ have a real heft.

  9. 9. I haven’t said anything about the 60s albums, but only because it’s all been said. The seven album run from ‘Freewheelin’ to ‘John Wesley Harding’ in four and a half years simply beggars belief, especially if you lob in all the stuff he wrote and recorded in that time but didn’t release.

  10. 10. My problem with Dylan getting the Nobel prize for literature is that it reduces Dylan’s songs to lyrics rather than pieces of music which use melody, rhythm, and performance as well as the lyrics, to get their effect. But if ever anyone deserves such recognition for the impact and quality of his artistic output it’s Bob Dylan. Chapeau.

    • Yes. And thanks for review. I’ve had only a brief acquaintance with his more recent work, but he can do no wrong for me purely on the basis of those early classic records.

  14. A noble venture. Unusual that such a successful, acclaimed, major figure in popular music should be so marmitey. No one else like that. Many people really don’t get him, can’t get past the unrefined voice and harmonica. Nashville Skyline and Desire possible exceptions, or more sweet, palatable covers. But still. Intriguing.

  15. One day I’ll write a proper response but my thoughts will always be – between roughly 1965 to 1975 Bob was our guiding spirit, our shaman. Works of outstanding brilliance seemingly crafted out of the very fabric of our Understanding. Then his muse more or less left him. Sure, there were moments of magic (Jokerman et al) and I’m still trying to get to grips with Rough & Rowdy but his voice has gone and so has The Magic. Still, nobody better and never will be – at least till the next time.

  16. ‘Senor (Tales Of Yankee Power)’ is stunning. His great overlooked masterpiece. A dream film inside your head to raise the hairs along your spine.
    ‘Street Legal’, especially the remastered version, is premium Dylan. No doubt about it.

    • Street-Legal has been described so many times by many people (me included) as Dylan’s most underrated album that it can’t reasonably be called underrated anymore. The four major tracks on it are superb though actually Senor is probably my least favourite of them – I think Changing of the Guards and especially No Time To Think and Where Are You Tonight? are genuinely great Dylan songs.

  17. Dear BB,

    Thank you for this thread.

    I would like to respond to (probably) all 11 of the salient points you raise above, but as I am currently preparing for board meetings tomorrow and shall be umpiring over the weekend, I should be grateful if you’d allow me until next week to formulate a coherent(?) reply.

    Yours sincerely

    MPT

    (for and on behalf of Biggles)

    xx

  18. Thanks @Blue-Boy ,though appalled that this discussion commenced while I slumbered.

    A few random notes .

    The Budokan tour performances definitely improved as they progressed. I have posted about these before. I had Dylan tragics complaining how they were expecting Hard Rain which is odd given the hard rain songs were significantly different to the original. Why would he not change again some2/3 years later? It was a big band and that takes some time to optimise. It was a crack band esp Steve Douglas on sax and Billy Cross on guitar. It really was cooking by the European shows as evidenced by the Paris bootleg.

    Saved – the much maligned Saved. How much of the critique is about the songs or the proselytising? This era delivered Slow Train, When He Returns, I Believe In You, Precious Angel, Gotta Serve Somebody, the remarkable Every Grain of Sand and from Saved In The Garden, Pressing On – now a gospel classic and Solid Rock which ,as the Trouble No More release can attest, really rocks. Tim Drummond, Spooner Oldham, Fred Tackett -crack musicians as usual.
    So plenty of pearls there and I compare it to say Richard Thompson who I find incredibly patchy even on his best records.
    @Dai has tossed up McCartney as one to rival Dylan’s output and quality. Post Lennon collaborations in the Beatles 25 albums including solo and Wings plus 5 classical . Dylan 30 albums since 1970. I was quite surprised how many albums Macca has released. For mine too many songs seem to me like ditties, insubstantial and too much music hall but I accept I don’t know his catalogue well and would be happy to listen to a well curated playlist to test my prejudice.
    Dai has also cited Springsteen. First album 1973 and 19 in total so right up there on the quality but less so on the output.

    • I think I will work on some solo Macca stuff and put in a thread sometime soon @Junior-Wells

      As for Bob’s Christian period, I think Slow Train Coming (containing most of the songs you mentioned) is a great album, but Saved is fairly dire. Perhaps this era is best served by the excellent Bootleg Series release from a couple of years ago.

      Springsteen’s actual recordings are probably at least double what he put out originally. So you can add, Tracks, The Promise, The Ties That Bind and probably the rumoured upcoming Tracks 2 also. Of course Dylan has form in this area too ….

      • I agree. Slow Train Coming is a fine record – one of his best in terms of production. At the time I did struggle with his Christian songs because they lacked the complexity and ambiguity that I treasured in his songs. Except now I realise they are no different in that respect and often as powerful as his early ‘finger pointing’ songs.

  19. I am listening to a Macca playlist seemingly curated by Sir Thumbsaloft. Yes pretty damn good. Wonderful singer, diverse, very competent multi instrumentalist.
    When it comes to it my favoured genres are blues and increasingly jazz. Dylan comes from the folk blues tradition and always returns to it. Macca hasn’t got a blues bone in his body. He also wants to be down with the kids a bit, responding to musical trends. A plus for some, meh for others.
    Listening to some live tracks it struck me how he plays them totally straight, seemingly every time. I wonder why he doesn’t change em up. Maybe coz he has toured a lot less than Dylan.

    This is the playlist. I am listening to. I’d like to hear more stuff than the hits.

  20. Maybe cos he (Macca) believes more in the ‘importance’ of his legacy, trying to reproduce for posterity. Dylan possibly doesn’t give that much of a shit. Or is playing the super ego so hard as to be in the belief that posterity wants him not to. With McC you get the songs, D you get D.

  21. Bob said he didn”t know how he made those 60s records like Blonde On Blonde. He couldn’t do it again. People might find those albums a bit daunting, how do we approach them? But we should rise to the challenge, make the effort. There are excellent records after the mid 70s but they are not on the same level for me. There’s a safe musical place to go to. Whereas with the likes of Highway 61 he was out on a limb, in uncharted territories. Later on the musical landscape is already formed, established, rather than being formed by him, out on his own, as it was in the 60s.

      • You get the impression that back in those days the songs were coming to Bob almost as fast as he could write them down. Same with Neil Young in the 70’s.

        Exciting and exhilarating to have that intensity when in your twenties but not sure its something that can be sustained for too long, as the footage of Bob in 1966 bears out

        • Agreed, and the same could be said for McCartney I think. But for all that the sheer volume of quality was unsustainable, I still say that right through his career he has come up with songs, and, occasionally, whole albums, which are right up there with his very best material from the 60s. Trying to Get to Heaven, Mississippi, Things Have Changed, Pay in Blood are just a few examples but there are many more. I wouldn’t have missed late Dylan for the world.

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