Bob Dylan "The Bootleg Series" – overview and possible future projects

If you told me I could have one more "Dylan" thing it would be all the 1966 footage.
If it were possible to then put together a complete concert, even an edited together one with cutaways where necessary I'd be ecstatic.
I believe there's only 20 or so hours of film, is that correct ? Not sure how much got filmed at each concert but I would really love to see it all. If Smile was the studio peak of 60s creativity (I am a believer on that score), I would argue that the finest tour was that 1966 Dylan tour. I know we've got the audio box but film too ? Yes please.

 

Any idea how much more? I enjoy "Head Cold" Bob during this era a lot, especially "When I Paint My Masterpiece."

 

Thanks, nice sum-up heading into 2018. It seems Rolling Thunder is the most likely candidate for the next archival release, assuming the documentary gets finished. It will be interesting to see how they go about an accompanying audio set with it. Will it be a mammoth release with every available concert or a more curated set? If the former, then it probably won't be under the Bootleg series moniker.

Should the doc for some reason not be finished in time, they probably have one or two other projects to put into production. BOTT might get the slot then, since by all accounts it is more or less ready to go.

 

My recollection is that Michael Chaiken (curator of the Tulsa Archives) said in interview that there was 30 hours of 1966 footage. Mind you, I'm sure I've also read that he found 30 hours of unseen "Dont Look Back" footage and (in a previous role elsewhere) 30 hours of unseen Rolling Stones "Gimme Shelter" footage also.

One day we'll find out!

 

Count me in for everything. While some bs volumes don't get played as much as others in general these sets have been fantastic and an automatic purchase for me.

Personally, I would love a deep mid 80s collection----guess I'm with Clinton on that one.

 

You and me both. Hopefully Heylin has enough pull with Jeff Rosen to will this into existence. (As well as his Rundown Era idea.)

 

Bootleg Series, Volume 22: The Eighties Comin' Back From The Dead

 

More Rolling Thunder Revue!

 

Don't worry -- that's practically a given.

 

Much as I want both of these sets also, I really hope Heylin does not get too much influence on what to include though. I appreciate a lot of his research, but personally I have often felt that his views on what constitutes great or poor Dylan, do not correspond with mine. And the way he passes judgment with absolute certainty can be annoying.

Iwish Paul Williams was alive, I would trust his judgement a whole lot more. I can see him as Rosen's "consigliere" in all BS related matters. Or indeed you @Sean Murdock , since I see you already have a variant of that particular title .

 

As do I. Paul Williams was my favorite author on all things Dylan.

 

I've had some influence (and even some material sourced or located by myself has seen official release) though I'll never get credit for various reasons. You'd be surprised what has 'influenced' a few releases in the last decade or so.

 

Is that you Clinton....?

 

I would never forgive my parents if they had called me Clinton...

 

Any chance that they skim the interwebs to see what the rabble (us) are saying?

 

I don't think 'they' do. Not in my experience anyway. Not in any formal way.

 

I agree with you about Heylin, although I suppose if he's the only real "spokesman" for the fans, he's better than nothing. As for my "title," someone long ago in a Beatles thread jokingly called me the "Apple Consigliere," and since I am actually nowhere even remotely close to that connected, I added the "In Waiting."

FYI ... I'm still waiting!

 

Can't say I'm surprised, although I'd still guess that our collective voice gets through to them somehow. In January 2014, the Dylan "source" told Rolling Stone, "The only issue is that we fear nobody will be interested [in a Gospel-era Bootleg Series]. It's not a period people are clamoring for, so it's kind of a square peg for a round hole." But lots of fans have said (loudly) for years that we DO want a Gospel set ... and here we are, less than four years later, with the biggest, most elaborate non-Big-Blue Bootleg Series set ever. So even if they just take an unpaid intern and say, "Go look at the last year of internet postings on the Bootleg Series and give me a one-paragraph summary" ... well, it's something, anyway. Maybe.

For that intern, just in case: Mid-80s Bob. Complete BOTT. Complete Infidels. Complete Oh Mercy. Complete TOOM. Oh, and you have about a day and a half to release the Copyright 1967 set!

 

I think actually the ideas for this stuff comes from lots of different places and even circumstances.

Up until the last 10 years, most tapes - mostly master reel to reels from sessions at least - were held in storage, so the stuff that came out was the stuff that they already had mastered or had compilation reels for. I believe most of the stuff for Biograph and The Bootleg Series 1-3 and Manchester 1966 (the reel not the transfer) were pulled out of storage in 1983-5. The original 'Bootleg Series' idea (not called that) goes back to around 1982. There have been other archival digs since then. Obviously there's cost involved in retrieving and going through tapes, so the whole digital transfer / Tulsa thing that's gone on more recently is being off set by the new Bootleg Series releases and so on.

 

Fascinating, as always. I'd love to read an entire book that was just about the Bootleg Series. Do you think Dylan's people were inspired by Neil's Decade, which Biograph resembles? And wasn't Biograph prepped and sequenced in 1982 or 1983 (explaining why it cuts off three years before its release date)?

 

Could have been but I honestly don't know.

Is there information that it was sequenced in 82/83? I know it was around that time that the majority of tapes, if they weren't already in the offices, were dug out.

 

While I am crossing my fingers for a decent revisitation of the whole Blood On The Tracks set I was surprised to see the lack of mention of his three night stand at NYC's Hammerstein Ballroom captured during his triumphant 2003 Summer tour (which melted into the impeccable Fall tour).

Check for yourself right from the beginning with opener 'Silvio" how our friends delivered that night. Dylan truly at his peak with the most remarkable line-up he ever had.

 

I remember reading somewhere that Biograph -- the 5-LP version -- was compiled in 1982 and not released until 1985. Not sure where -- might have been Heylin, actually, albeit not in Behind The Shades, which I just double-checked. Either way, I don't recall if there was actual evidence supporting this speculation, other than the fact that there were no Infidels tracks on the set -- which you would expect considering it was his "secular comeback."

 

Yes, I remember this too.

Makes sense to me, especially as the 'newest' tracks from 1981 are scattered somewhat haphazardly throughout the set as a kind of 'feature', IMO (my main criticism - the 'modern' 1981 tracks spoil the flow for me slightly, even though I like all 4 of those songs).

 

Excerpts from Rod MacBeath's lengthy and informative "Looking Up Dylan's Sleeves", published in The Telegraph in 1995 and 1996:-

Biograph

Rumours of the preparation began to spread in early 1983... In fact, Columbia proposed to issue the set for Christmas 1982 to celebrate Bob's first 20 years with the label, following a conversation between Jeff Rosen and Bruce Dickinson....in January 1982. Rosen himself explained:-

"We were talking about some of the great boxed set collections the Japanese and German record companies release. Wouldn't it be great, we thought, to do something really special with Dylan's music..... After we missed 1982, we shot for a Christmas '83 release. Then '83 came and went and things still weren't done. We kind of forgot about 1984 ["Real Live" was our Christmas present that year...] and set our sights on Christmas '85, which meant we had to finish it six months before then."



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