Street Legal-Dylan’s most underrated release?

This was a favourite for many years, but I listened to it lately and I dont enjoy it any more. The ensemble playing is pretty weak and the drums are mixed really badly. The desperation in his voice also sounds forced at times. Then again I have gone off Bob in a big way in recent years anyway.

 

yes, I've read "Journey to Ixtlan" but that's it.
Didn't Carlos denounce years later, that the whole Don Juan thing was B.S?
Anyway, he was definitely searching for Truth at that time.....
He hit rock bottom not long after Street Legal didn't he?

 

I had a similar experience. I've been a fan of Mr. Fulks for a long time and when I heard about his Dylan album I ordered it immediately from his website, thinking: "Street Legal? Really? That's a strange choice."

Robbie's record was so stunning I had to dig out my copy of Street Legal (which I probably haven't listened to in 20 years) and I'll be damned, it's a bloody masterpiece. I think the '70s sexy saxophone arrangements threw me off initially. Now it sounds just fine. Every song is great! Thank you Robbie.

Sometimes those old ignored LPs prove their worth years later. Now, who's going to cover Empire Burlesque?

 

I've recently watched a couple of viddies where Dylan himself indicated that Shot of Love was his most underrated LP. I've got most of the LPs from that period (short of Saved, which I'm not going to go out of my way for), but I can't seem to bring myself to take either Street Legal or Shot out of the sleeve and drop it on the platter. I've just got better things to do and I love me some Zimmy.

 

Yes! I had read how bad of an album this was over the years. About a month ago I took the plunge and listened to it. I love it! Bob is singing with a lot of feeling and intensity. The band is great and the songs are really good.

 

Shot Of Love is pretty decent. Enjoyable, even. Saved, on the other hand ...

 

Definitely my favourite of his.

Loved it since I first heard it in 1978, on cassette which I played to destruction.

Great album.

 

Not never, people figured it out but he never denounced. He later invented that Tensegrity 'dance' which he took from
Gurdjieff, I think.

 

...is even better.

 

Having recorded a 10-piece band in my small bottom-feeder studio and ended up with something that sounded surprisingly good, as well as numerous smaller bands, I'm not happy with this explanation.

 

Man! I love Saved
But if you're not coming from that "worldview" I get that you wouldn't like it...
That's one of the best most sincere gospel records of all time!

 

I'm sorry to disappoint. From David Mansfield (part of the '78 band and who played violin at the sessions) :
'The biggest problem with Street-Legal was how it was recorded, with Bob getting impatient with the engineering assistants...baffling and checking levels and getting sounds to sync; [and saying] 'Get rid of this crap, pull your stuff around in a circle and let's just play these songs.', and the recording crew just having to scramble to get mics into place, and get something on tape, while we were playing the thing the few times we were gonna play it. Consequently, the music is very poorly recorded. But that stuff sounded marvelous in the room!'

 

wow
I know Dylan can be prickly to work with but doesn't he care about getting it down, sounding good?

 

I came back to Street Legal today after hearing the excellent rehearsal of Senõr on bootleg 16. Haven’t listened to it in a good 10 years. My opinion of it hasn’t changed unfortunately, I think there is a good album hiding in there but those backing vocals are EVERYWHERE and just date and ruin the album for me. Didn’t he end up marrying one of those backing singers? Makes me wonder if he was trying to impress one of them by including them on the album so much lol.

 

I quite like side 2!

 

Agree: the passionate singing is the strong suit of the album. He continued the Dylan/Emmylou Harris' singing intensity from Desire into Street Legal.