Bob Dylan: The Bootleg Series

"Ah yes, the customary "it's not all hip-hop mixtapes and metal" Pfork review of an archival release by an irreproachable sacred cow"

pfork is all hip hop tapes and metal? those are usually the buried 4th-5th reviews on the "newest albums" page

there is a metal review like every day

that is a lot

the singing on both self portrait and bootleg series versions of "days of 49" is atrocious

No way dogg

This is so good

a review that fails to quote a single Bob Dylan lyric in a review of a fucking Bob Dylan record. Yes, indeed, Bra-VO.

There aren't too many "Bob Dylan lyrics" to quote from SP.

So far the ultimate Dylan Sunday morning album

"New Morning (Van Morrison Remix)"

the singing on both self portrait and bootleg series versions of "days of 49" is atrocious

You remind me of New York Jake, the butcher's boy, spoiling for a fight.

i mean he hits bum notes all over the place. not his usual wavering "i am the Volk" tone but just fucking bum notes. kind of massacres the song like that aunt of yours who is tone deaf. the outtake on the new set is better than the one on the original LP but it's still, and i quote, "atrocious."

this is from a guy who thinks dylan can really sing. i mean REALLY sing. some of the stuff he writes for himself is challenging to sing and he pulls it off. you must leave now take what you need you think will last. that's a hard line to sing, go ahead try it. but his singing on days of 49 and some other stuff is just so bad. i think something was happening to his voice. he says he laid off cigarettes so maybe that's it. starting smoking, stopping smoking can fuck your vocal cords up for a while.

listening to this, i'm struck by how much dylan was really sticking to a basement tapes approach, just taking it outside the basement. (talking about the actual basement tapes sessions, not the official LP). trying out covers to stimulate creativity, writing "genre" songs, trying out different voices... he doesn't seem like he's having quite as much fun, but he's in a big studio in nyc or nashville, not someone's house, I guess.
anyway, really enjoying this set -- i definitely want more of these thoughtfully compiled overviews of specific eras from the bootleg series.
oh and hey, speaking of "thoughtfully compiled overviews," this site is where it's at: http://thousandhighways.blogspot.com/

i bought this. they had exactly one copy at the FYE atore. as i noted elsewhere, when i was paying for mine one of the FYE dudes was on the phone with someone who wanted to know if they had any John Philip Sousa. Americana day. and it was labor day at that.

i have listened in the store but i would have to take it home and really listen to have anything to say. sounds cool. i like Self Portrait anyway so i figured i'd dig it. i still haven't read the GM essay.

I DLed the 2cd version and am getting pretty sucked in with each listen. Tyler otm that this is like the rest of the basement tapes, the part that was all Ian and Sylvia covers and shit.

Now I really want the god damn Isle of Wight part!!! That version is 21 bucks at emusic. Which would be almost my whole emusic credits for this month. Grr I bet I'm gonna do it.

yeah i saw you could DL the mp3s of the isle of wight stuff, but it is expensive on amazon too. lamesville. i will probably break down and get it. amazing that they make playing in front of 100,000+ people sound like they're playing in an upstate NY living room.

No digital option for the remastered original album, it seems...

irritating. let me pay you a reasonable amount of money for these things, record company!

Jon - check your facebook mail.

Ruh roh!

Amazon MP3 Store has the 2-CD tracks plus Isle of Wight, 53 tracks in all, for $27.98, last time I checked. I might get that.

Remastering's not gonna help the original Self-Portrait, unless they mix down a bunch of strings etc., and even then some of the vocals are way too bland, and deliberately so, according to Chronicles. He wanted to deflate great expectations, exploitations, etc.

Dude just wanted Weberman to stop digging through his garbage.

I downloaded the 2 CD version of this from eMusic. I think this is one of my favorite Dylan periods. He was (is?) a great interpreter of traditional songs. World Gone Wrong was another big discovery for me recently. This sounds great too. It reminds me that my copy of New Morning sounds like crap. I have the pre-remaster version though. Does the reissue sound as good as this? It would be worth buying it again if it does.

better - re-mastering plus studio sound, but 'natural'

i really need to illegally download the isle of wight show *cough cough is anyone holding cough cough*

i bought the 2cd like a good citizen but this is just fuck you territory by the label IMO

while you're waiting just watch this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gWfiAK0EKSo

why don't you guys just download this stuff illegally like everybody else? bob dylan doesn't need your money (much less sony).

Hook a brother up!

check your facebook messages, homeslice.

:)

dylan doesn't need our money but he certainly likes it. everyone d/loading his shit = disinclination to release more of it.

he's probably released enough by now.

listen i bought the fuckin Another Self Portait 2CD set. i've purchased p much every dylan album that's been released (except the xmas one) on the first week since like time out of mind, not to mention all the old stuff on CDs i bought back in the day.

i would have gladly purchased the isle of wight show on its own, as an individual 2CD set or whatever it is....but since the company said the only way i could have gotten it was to buy a $110 deluxe set version i really can't afford, i couldn't do it.

hell i might have even gone for the vinyl box which is like 70 and saved up but they didn't even include the goddamn isle of wight show CDs in that! its' just 2 CDs of random songs that you just purchased on vinyl (which obv could have been done with a damn DL code anyway)

so yeah i don't need a lecture ward, thank u very much

everyone d/loading his shit = disinclination to release more of it.

Considering Dylan fans essentially invented the bootleg in "Great White Wonder," I'm not so sure about this.

dylan doesn't need our money but he certainly likes it. everyone d/loading his shit = disinclination to release more of it.

― Ward Fowler, Thursday, September 5, 2013 6:13 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

oh, plenty of people are going to buy this

i want to buy it! just not for $110!

they could have done the 2CD Another Self-Portrait + Isle of Wight on another for like $35

& then later just individually packaged self-portrait remaster if they wanted to

but also that's a $4 LP almost anywhere so sorry

AAAAANYWAY GUYS THIS IS STILL GREAT SO LETS NOT DO THE ETHICS OF DOWNLOADING PT. 4,390,890

while you're waiting just watch this

Right on.

upper, i really really wasn't trying to 'lecture' anyone about the ethics or o/wise of downloading stuff, was just trying to say that my impression is that dylan is a bit of a breadhead and that a large part of his motivation for releasing the bootleg series is the cold hard cash they generate - like i just can't seem him sanctioning more archive stuff if they didn't make him any money - he's not doing this for the fans, or for posterity, imho

the outrageous price of the extra discs on this (and on tell tale signs) make me puke, seems like pure hardcore fan gouging and def makes me like dylan - or his management or his accountants or his rec label or whoevs - a little bit less

does bob dylan post here? i heard that some famous people do. is he who they are talking about?

and hell yeah dylan is gouging fans for money and you would be a sucker to buy this shit instead of download it. he is a great american songwriter, but he pretty openly doesn't care about his fans. it shouldn't make you like him more or less... it is an integral part of his mystique.

Lately the impetus for various releases seems to be the extension of copyright. See: that huge UK rarities dump last year.

hey james franco feel like we should talk

the isle of wight set is so nice to hear in full, in sbd quality. favorite things are the john wesley harding numbers -- i love that album, but i can't help but be mystified as to why Dylan didn't just record it w/ The Band. i guess he thought about having hudson and robertson do overdubs, but decided against it.

The like a rolling stone is crazy, as if they melded the original with the basement tapes "all I have to do is dream". One too many mornings another hilite.

i e-mailed GM to tell him that i enjoyed his notes for this latest bootleg thing and i was happy when he told me that he loves Nazareth's version of "The Ballad of Hollis Brown". one of the best dylan covers of all time if you ask me. he'll be in boston this fall for an upcoming lecture series. i'm gonna try and make the dylan one. looks good.

http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~amciv/massey/index.shtml

wow thx for the tip! this is nuts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoNoUw9br5M

Christ, that's a motherfucker.

yeah they basically invented doom metal with that

omg that guitar sound--what year is that?

that song seems to have been a favorite among "heavy" bands--stooges did it in concert.

this is a wonderful collection of songs. really happy i bought this. i would be curious to hear the vinyl, but the CDs sound fine. i wonder who they got to put it on vinyl. its all from old tapes, so, it could sound great if they did a good job.

Nazareth's version roolz, ditto their ultrapainful, truthful "Love Hurts." I'd like to hear a whole metal or "proto-metal" album of Dylan covers. More links please!
One seemingly likely reason for not doing JWH w The Band: he wanted somrthing much more austere and near the knuckle; droll smoke ring curlicues and occasional death marches, re grimy Basement Tapes, would have blunted these songs. (The album was trippy enough: my personal acid folk.)