Since the Basement Tapes is a nice tasty banquet for the fans to sink our teeth into, perhaps the next release will be something a little " less filling", for a change of pace...perhaps either a collection of the 1986 tour with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, or the. 1987 tour with the Grateful Dead!?!
1978 tour, done properly. 1980 West Coast-1981. + Another "compilation" like the original sweeping together lots of miscellaneous releases--originals, B sides, duets, TV recordings, "one offs" etc. Naomie Wise, Hezekiah Jones, Lonesome Whistle, Emmet Till through Pancho and Lefty (with Willie Nelson), People Get Ready, People Get Ready, TV Talkin', Change Gonna Come etc etc, so many. + Bromberg sessions PS yet to be convinced at all by the Supper Club
I'm not sold on the Supper Club recordings either. The band sounds great but I'm not in love with his vocal tone, and that's really what carries a show (for me). I think the New Orleans 1981 show will be released at some point, and Toronto 1980 with video, and I think an 80s Shot of Love or Infidels through Down in the Groove or Traveling Wilburies set is almost inevitable although I'm sure it's taking the compilers some time to find the jewels in there. I hope the Letterman set from 1984 makes it onto the set.
I disagree on the limited appeal front, because I completely agree that this is a fantastic idea. I absolutely adore those shows. BUNCHES of YouTube clips on these, and when I went to fetch a link of one of my favorites ("Tangled Up In Blue" from Duluth, 1999) I found some VIDEO. It's exactly what you'd expect in terms of picture and sound quality, but boy howdy, you can get a great idea of how good a proper release would sound -- AND nice and close on Bob for his acoustic jam solo. Nothing but smiles and shimmies. VERY much worth 9 minutes of your time. I love that you mention Larry Campbell too. The tandem of him and Charlie Sexton working together is some of why I have such fond memories of the fall 2002 shows in particular. Obviously starting to get to a different thread, but they were also doing a lot of covers on that leg. It started after Warren Zevon announced he had cancer, and starting in October, Bob had a bunch of Warren songs in the setlist. The night I saw him that November, he did "Accidentally Like A Martyr" and "Mutineer," plus killer versions of "Brown Sugar" and "Old Man," a couple of all-time concertgoing highlights for me. (Pretty slick setlist that night, btw.) Other nights, he played anything from "Boom Boom Mancini" and "Lawyers Guns & Money" to "The End of the Innocence," and one of his super-wide swaths of his catalog -- 128 songs in all played on that tour. I could be reading my own feelings about the show into it, but he seemed to be riding high off the energy from Time Out of Mind and (especially) Love & Theft, and he looked as happy as I've ever seen him. Absolutely in control, and yes, smiles and shimmies aplenty. Definitely a ROCK STAR. Official releases from this run would be a dream come true for me. I'd actually love to see Bob pursue a Dagger Records-like strategy that the Hendrix folks have: release the "official" alt stuff in the traditional way, then offer deeper, less pristine stuff to the hardcore largely through the web. I'd pay for a TON of Bob shows. And yes, I'd happily pay for the sorry scraps that were too nasty to make the cut for the official Basement Tapes boot. As a couple of folks have already mentioned, this is a fun exercise, and I could (and probably will) keep talking about it for days....but as much as I have some strong feelings about what I'd LIKE to see, they've now more than earned my confidence that I'll be pleased by stuff that I never even considered putting on the list, maybe even gobsmacked by it. This is an absolutely amazing time to be a Bob fan.
I just want a single nice LP with the complete Blue Rocks studio session Info from bjorner.com: Blue Rock Studios New York City, New York 16–19 March 1971 What was recorded according to Heylin: When I Paint My Masterpiece Watching The River Flow Spanish Harlem, That Lucky Ol’ Sun, Alabama Bound, Blood Red River Rock Of Ages Great band: 6-12 Bob Dylan (vocal, guitar & harmonica), Leon Russell (piano) Jesse Ed Davis (guitar), Don Preston (guitar), Charlie Radie (bass), Jim Keltner (drums), Claudia Linnear & Kathy McDonald (backup vocals).
Exactly. And I'm somewhat anxious about finding a way to actually digest The Complete Basement Tapes. Maybe I'll have to start smoking pot again or something.
If the Blood on the Tracks archive had feelings to hurt, I'd worry about it starting to take it personally that it has repeatedly been the set that *seemed* next to go, before being dropped for the next great thing (first ASP, then CBT). Not sure it could handle losing out to Supper Club this time around.
I've always wanted a Bootleg Series: Ain't Gonna Go To Hell Would include: post Street Legal 1978 tracks w/girlfriend/backup singer - first religious songs Outtakes from Slow Train, Saved and Shot of Love Unreleased or radically changed songs performed on gospel tour (i.e. Groom's Still Waiting) That'd be a good 2 CDs of stuff They could also do a nice series Infidels through pre-Oh Mercy (Tell Tale Signs)
Regarding a Gospel Years set, Rolling Stone (yet again!) weighed in recently with their "Dylan Source" (also note that as of January of this year, they were still intending to go with a BoTT set): The Toronto stop on Bob Dylan's 1980 gospel tour was also professionally filmed. "That was shot on two-inch tape," says the source. "The band is really great though. You can see some of it on YouTube. Many shows on that tour were just incredible, but I'm not sure that particular night, unfortunately, captures the incredibleness of those shows." Other shows on the gospel tour were professionally recorded. "It'll make a cool Bootleg Series and we will do it one day," says the source. "The only issue is that we fear nobody will be interested. It's not a period people are clamoring for, so it's kind of a square peg for a round hole. That said, exploring the born again period would be very interesting. He played a lot of songs live that weren't recorded and a deluxe box would be fun to do. It's a period that been much-maligned, but with the benefit of hindsight it's clear that Bob was doing some great things." http://www.rollingstone.com/music/n...ries-eyeing-blood-on-the-tracks-next-20140123 And yes, this is a case where a "deluxe box" would clearly be really fun to assemble. So many possibilities.
One of the questions of a Gospel Years box is how narrow will/should they cast it. There's a case to confine it just to the the STC/Saved sessions & tours. But many people seem to include Shot of Love in this era, and that would considerably expand the studio possibilities. *Maybe* even Infidels (which I think stretches the concept too far, but IF they don't plan an "80's Box" someday, it might be the only foreseeable opportunity to tap the staggering cache of Infidels outtakes).
Since he threw together the Self Portrait stuff and defied all the haters (you reading this probably aren't one), then maybe a curve ball of sessions from Blood Red Sky and Knocked Out Loaded.
A Gospel Years compilation doesn't do much for me. Then again, I was meh about Self-Portrait. Until I heard it. Blood on the Tracks would be at the top of my list, assuming there's enough compelling unreleased stuff. Then follow with a massive Blonde on Blonde box set.
If you're talking '79-'81 you're already probably looking at a pretty big box. Toronto '80 and New Orleans '81 will be released in their entirety SOME day, and a Gospel Years box would seem to be the place to do it. That's four discs, plus two discs of studio (and finally a real home for "Trouble in Mind") and you've got a super deluxe (and they can put a sticker on the front "Features Like A Rolling Stone" to help "move units").
If this session (aside from WIPMM and WTRF of course) occurred as reported, if it's as good as rumors suggest, and if Sony had the tapes, wouldn't it have been included (at least in part) on ASP? That's the big mystery to me. But yeah, I *really* want to hear it!
The "Street Legal" piano demos might be the closest thing to this concept that we know about. But based on Heylin's description, I'm not sure if any of the songs on it are complete.
Do you think they're finished with the Rolling Thunder Revue material? I would like to see the shelved version of the Hard Rain TV special released on video "someday," as well. The clips of it on youtube look great.
Sadly, also from that Rolling Stone article: With the exception of 1995's MTV Unplugged, Dylan has released very few concerts onto DVD/Blu Ray. "Hard Rain [a May 1976 concert filmed in Fort Collins, Colorado show that was later broadcast on NBC] and other videos will probably be available after the Rolling Thunder thing happens," says the source. "The problem is there's no market for this stuff. We waited too long. There's no DVD market these days."
I agree that is likely, as there isnt likely enough BOTT stuff to fill 2 discs. For those who prefer a standalone, its quite possible that (especially given the album's stature, that one disc may be presented as an alternate BOTT, with the second disc being the surrounding era maybe picking up from where Another Self Portrait left off and touching on the Desire sessions and maybe beyond. Anyway, though a few BOTT outtakes appeared elsewhere over the years, they'll probably be fair game to be repeated on a BOTT BS series release, as some recent BS releases have pulled thematically correct tracks from BS Vol 1-3 to fully compile an era - See the Publishing Demos (Vol 9 IIRC). Actually I hope they do, as I'd like a non messed up If You See Her Say Hello alt take for the collection since the one on BS 1-3 has some weird digital echo or something. Anyone else have that, or am I just lucky? The first line Bob sings on my copy is "If y-y-y-ou-ou-ou ssssseeeee her, say hello." I know thats not how its supposed to sound, because the radio special/Elliot Mintz interview promoting the release that I taped off the radio back in the day, played several songs from the album, including that one and it played totally fine - no glitches.
