Thank Goodness for Bob Dylan

By ROB PATTERSON

These are not my favorite times politically, culturally and musically. All the more reason I am thankful we had Bob Dylan and still do.

I am also thankful that Bob Dylan engages in an ongoing program of releasing material from his archives that started in 1991 with the first edition of The Bootleg Series. Since then there has been around 25 or so such releases alongside 11 new albums – a whole lot to listen to, all of it worthy. Plus he’s pretty much out there most all of the time on his “Endless Tour.” No other musical artist comes even close in terms of what they give us.

I write this as I am listening to his latest release of live performances, a two disc, 28-track set issued earlier this year: Live 1962-1966: Rare Performances From the Copyright Collections. It takes us as far back as 1962 at Gerde’s Folk City in New York’s Greenwich Village, where Dylan was basically discovered, opening this collection with a take on “Blowin’ in the Wind,” which was the song that largely helped initially launch his career.

Most of the tracks here were only issued before in a very limited number in Europe to avoid this material shifting into the public domain. The first disc contains solo guitar/voice/harmonica performances from some of his significant early shows such as his 1963 concerts at Town Hall and Carnegie Hall, plus one song (“When the Ship Comes In”) with Joan Baez from the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (where Martin Luther King Jr. made his “I Have a Dream” speech). The disc is rounded out by numbers from Dylan’s first UK concert the next year at Royal Albert Hall.

What you can hear is an ever more authoritative performer reading his songs in ways that reveal the splendors as well as nooks and crannies in his rich song compositions. He set a standard for singer-songwriters that few have even come close to equaling in the years since.

The second disc begins with six tracks (only available before as downloads) from Dylan’s ’65 UK tour that was documented onstage and off in the documentary Don’t Look Back. Its concert sequences are, to me, utterly bracing performances that demonstrate his mastery before an audience as a solo performer, which I witnessed years later when he held nearly 90,000 people in the palm of his hand at London’s Wembley Stadium in an acoustic segment in the middle of an electric band show.

And speaking of Dylan in the rock band mode, this collection includes one of the three songs from the shot heard ’round the musical world at the Newport Folk Festival in ’65. To beg a pun, that track, “It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry,” is positively electrifying, especially the thrilling lead guitar by the late Mike Bloomfield, a master whose general recognition lags behind his greatness as a player. From that same pivotal era is “Maggie’s Farm” at the Hollywood Bowl and three numbers from the famed ’66 tour of the UK with The Band. Amidst it all he strips back to solo on a stunning take of “Desolation Row” from Australia. Capping the collection is what is one of my favorite Dylan songs (among many, but atop that list), performed alone, “Visions of Johanna.”

It’s all yet another gift from the past of an artist who indelibly changed folk, rock and the notion of “singer-songwriter.” In a recent interview on his (excellent) website, Dylan notes how, “That’s a different person than who I am now.” Both then and still today, his artistic validity remains alive. For that we must remain eternally grateful for his more than half century of excellence.

Populist Picks

Music Album: The Authorized Bang Collection by Van Morrison – Another giant of 1960s music who has also treated us to gems from his vaults of late. This collection of 63 recordings at the start of his solo career, all made in 1967, includes everything from his biggest hit, “Brown Eyed Girl,” to never before heard yet delightful obscurities.

Documentary Film: Bound By Flesh – Conjoined twins Daisy and Violet Hilton were sideshow freaks, vaudeville attractions, and two people who tried to live as normal as they could while bound together by biology, well-known throughout the 20th Century. Their life story is fascinating, and ranges from tragic to touching.

Documentary Film: Sacco and Vanzetti – Italian immigrants and anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti were wrongly convicted in 1920 for a murder and became a cause célèbre in radical circles. This award-winning films sets the historical record correct while various public fears and prejudices that affected their case still echo today.

Rob Patterson is a music and entertainment writer in Austin, Texas. Email orca@prismnet.com.

From The Progressive Populist, February 1, 2019

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