Bob Dylan – Bootleg Series Vol. 14: More Blood, More Tracks (2 Nov 2018)*

All that stuff you say may be mostly true and so it's amazing what the overuse of flute and pennywhistle will do to neutralize all the good stuff. With only one new song ("Is Your Love in Vain?"), Budokan was yet another live double album only five years after the last one, except with an easy-listening vibe that seemed far too ham-fisted for most rock fans. A lot of those eccentricities were smoothed out of the arrangements as the tour went on, which is why Blackbushe is a role model for a 1978 release. That show rocks.

 

Regarding Live at Budokan, the flute and the pennywhistle add more color to the music and seem appropriate to the new arrangements. I find it a pleasant change. I also like the fact that Dylan is experimenting with new instruments, new sounds and styles. There is a brightness to the music that I respond to. I don't mind the easy listening vibe nor do I find it ham-fisted although I realize most people do. He'd work the flute and pennywhistle out of the show during the down-under leg of the tour. On the Budokan and Osaka tapes I prefer the arrangements of "Shelter From the Storm" and "It's All Over Now Baby Blue" to the summer / fall versions.

Last night I listened to Blackbushe and Zeppenfield and concluded that Blackbushe is the better of the two picnic concerts. So I withdraw my previous comment about Zeppenfield -- which is still a superb concert, but Blackbushe, as you say, rocks. His voice begins to tire before the encores, but not enough to sink the songs. The only thing missing is "Tangled Up In Blue" a highlight of the year and the most satisfying live version of that song to date.

I wonder if the official tape survives.

 

Its a nice enough listen, but I like my Bob with a bit more 'edge' ... Love the later '78 shows.
I often use Budokan as the gateway drug to entice unsuspecting Bob virgins into the fold

 

Yes. I also love the early texture of "Love Minus Zero" and "Simple Twist of Fate" (I love the Budokan version).

One the early part of the tour, "Girl from the North Country" is stunning.

 

I should have mentioned those, especially "Love Minus Zero" a foxtrot full of whimsy and optimistic charm.
There's a new range of grown-up emotions at work in Live at Budokan. He's gone past juvenile origins.
"Girl from the North Country" is rediscovered as a torch ballad, a sorrowful and intense long goodbye. I agree it's just stunning.
"Tangled Up In Blue" would take its place in the fall.

 

I have always been fond of Budokan, it was one of the first Dylan albums I owned. I would love a Bootleg series of a full 1976 show, Hard Rain era.

 

I hope they won't lump Blood On the Tracks in with The Rolling Thunder Revue.

Blood On the Tracks is a stand-alone album requiring a stand-alone entry in The Bootleg Series.
The edition could include the album as is, in its speeded-up form that we've all been listening to, as well a second disc of the album at the natural pitch.
This was released before on the Columbia Half-Speed Master LP in 1982 or thereabouts.
What a difference three seconds makes.
And then the third disc of outtakes, alternates, session tapes, etc. to complete the set.

Leave the live versions from 1975 for the Desire / Rolling Thunder Revue box-set.
Just don't mash the two albums together.

After they finish the 1960s with several Bootleg Series sets, of course.

 

This is going to sound positively blasphemous, but I prefer Budokan to Before The Flood. On Flood, he seems to be wanting to recreate 1966, but without the subtlety. It's like being bludgeoned, or steamrollered.

Budokan does feature rearrangements, and different styles, yet is more adult. I've also grooved three times this week to Real Live, and am finding that a gem. I don't think I'll go as far as Dylan & The Dead though.

 

I agree. Did people want Bob to stay the same ? 78 Bob was very different to 76 Bob - as some say, lighter and more polished. And some people didn't like him changing. Bob however, rarely stands still.

 

Agree on all counts!
Re - Dylan & the Dead, this album claims to have a run time of approx 44 mins, this is wrong; it actually lasts three whole days and a half should you ever listen to it...

 

LOL

 

Thanks for that. To me it's the worst of all possible worlds, as both parties aren't playing all that well. When you think that only 6 years prior, as highlighted on Disc2 of Bootleg Vol 13, Slow Train was awesome, and then you get Dylan & The Dead.

I've got nothing against Grateful Dead, as they cover Dylan brilliantly, and that extends to Garcia with his Jerry Garcia Band, but Dylan & The Dead as an album is wretched. I wonder if a Bootleg Series down the line will cover this tour, and could they ever rehabilitate this era: they did so with Self Portrait, and the gospel era, so maybe ?

It's odd that Dylan and The Dead had so much potential, yet misfired miserably.

 

That tour would actually be a great candidate for a Bootleg Series release. There was a lot of great material that didn't make it onto the half-assed official release.

 

I was just saying this same thing, just above. Not to hijack this thread, but...

I used to have two or three bootlegs from this tour that I listened to regularly. As I said above, there was some great material in there, although I don't know if there was any one show that I would call great start-to-finish. There should be enough material to make a good release out of, though.

Plus, I also used to have a bootleg tape (2 or 3 tapes, actually) of rehearsal sessions that were great. A lot of stop-and-start playing, but also a bunch of songs that never made it into any of the concert setlists, and some amazing rarities/curiosities like Garcia leading Dylan through "Senor" or Bob Weir leading the band through Paul Simon's "Boy in the Bubble", etc.

 

The Dylan and the Dead rehearsals would be an important part of any revisiting of that tour. Realistically, I don't see that coming any time soon (or ever).
The rehearsal tapes are up on the archive.

 

Quite good, once they actually get started.

 

Couldn’t agree more.

 

I also think Blood should be its own release. It doesn't have much, if anything, in common with Rolling Thunder.

But only 1 DISC of outtakes and alternates? And only 3 discs total? No. I want - and frankly, I kind of expect, given the comprehensive treatment of 65-66 - EVERYTHING from the studio reels. What would that be, 10-12 discs?

They should not include the official album. It's The Bootleg Series, after all, and I bet 99% (or more!) of the people who will buy this box own the official album already. Don't waste space in the box with stuff everyone has had for decades. Just give us all of the studio sessions - at the proper speed. And actually, the takes that ended up on the album would be in there, too.

 

Probably with 5-6 cds you get the entire sessions.

 

I loathed the Dylan and The Dead album the first, second and third time I heard it. And I dismisssed it for years. Two years back, a friend told me I should revisit it.
Hearing it 15 or so years later I was surprised that I quite enjoy it now. Clearly, it’s not a great live album from that era. But it’s growing on me!
I’d like to hear more...

 

I listened to this one a lot back in the day. Might have to give this video a look.

 

Agreed. I was there and it was a great experience. I have a small case of memorabilia, books, photos, news items, etc. from the day and there are a few variations of the concert available from audience recordings. However a nice official release would finish off the collection perfectly. Put me down for a pre-order!

 

I am not a big fan of the 1978 tour but I did listen to a few earlier in the year as part of a listening program including Nuremberg and Blackbushe. They were enjoyable performances but there are some arrangements on that tour I found very hard to take, most notably "Blowin' In The Wind", "I Shall Be Released" and "The Times They Are A-Changin".

 

If a Blood On the Tracks set becomes a reality I would expect them to include the Columbia Half-Speed Master as one of the discs:



Dylan ordered the regular edition of the album speeded up by two or three seconds, which is how we've all heard it since day of release, but the Half-Speed Master is the only edition that plays at the natural speed. It's not a minor thing. A few seconds makes a huge difference in the pitch of voices and instruments, not to mention in the duration of songs.

 

While I am no expert on this, I don't think there is any evidence that Bob ordered the songs to be speeded-up; on the contrary, it's almost certain that Bob has nothing to do with the speed differences, and probably remains oblivious to them to this day. There has been much discussion on this over the years and it was the subject of rigorous research by others in a thread here:-

Blood on the Tracks - MoFi reissue - is this the correct speed???

I think this all originated in print with Clinton Heylin, in his book "Behind Closed Doors", in which he indicates that Bob sped-up the recordings:-

"As a further sleight of hand, Dylan seems to have actually sped up the resultant album, both Minneapolis and New York cuts, by two percent, in the mastering - presumably because he found the material dragged a little. The vinyl "half-speed master" evidently used the pre-sped up tape, making for quite a different listening experience."

I don't think Clinton spotted the speed alteration himself, and he certainly didn't check to see if what he was suggesting was correct because it isn't, but his suggestion, assertion even, gained acceptance and has been often repeated to the point that it became accepted as fact that Bob wanted the songs to be sped-up.

In fact, the percentage change in speed between the original release and the Half-Speed Mastered vinyl release varies from song to song. @Lars1966 has the differences thus:-

Tangled Up in Blue 2.30%
Simple Twist of Fate 2.30%
You're a Big Girl Now 2.28%
Idiot Wind 2.25%
You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go 2.21%
Meet Me in the Morning 2.35%
Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts 1.74%
If You See Her, Say Hello 0.68%
Shelter From the Storm 0.68%
Buckets of Rain 0.61%

The variable figures above suggests to me that there was a technical glitch during the mastering process rather than an artistic decision by Bob to alter the pitch of the recordings. In a magazine extract of his then not-published book, "Never Say No To A Rock Star", Glenn Berger - assistant to Phil Ramone - wrote:-

"Ramone tells me that he noticed the speed up. It wasn’t intentional. In those days, tape machines could easily run off-speed, if not checked. The mastering machine, he assumes, was off. As Ramone had something like perfect pitch, he was always noticing such things, and was usually correct."

Having read this, almost simultaneously but separately, Ben Clayton and I individually contacted Glenn Berger by email with the same question. The answer we received was pretty much identical. I've lost my emails but the reply received by Ben, known here previously as @Bennyboy, and as featured in the thread linked to above, was this:-

There has been a lot of discussion of this question on forums like Expecting Rain. You might want to check that out if you haven't already. As far as all the facts go as I understand them, directly from Ramone, this was a mistake. Dylan was so detached from the production of this record that he certainly wouldn't have done such a thing deliberately, and Ramone, who was merely the engineer, and not producer, would not have made this kind of move on his own. The slower version, I believe, is the accurate one. Does that make sense?

(I don't know if Glenn's book sheds any further light on the subject. He was going to send me a copy, and may have done, but I moved. I haven't got around to purchasing it yet.)

Having said all that, I believe the Half Speed Mastered vinyl does run at the correct pitch and agree (as I've said elsewhere in this thread and others) that any BS release of "Blood On The Tracks" should contain the corrected pitch version.

Am I right in my recollection that something similar happened to "Beggar's Banquet", only the other way around, and it's recently been corrected? Also, was "Kind of Blue" affected similarly? It seems to be a problem that is not unique...




#