River Whyless are a folk-rock outfit from Asheville, North Carolina – and they’ve discovered a talented new writer in the Folk Tradition, one Bob Dylan. We jest, of course – but River Whyless have put together a beautiful new rendition of the song – crafted in a new-old folk style that would sit alongside the Milk Carton Kids, for example. Continue reading “River Whyless “It Ain’t Me Babe” – Listen”
Sheryl Crow has covered Bob Dylan songs in the past such as ‘Mississippi’ and ‘Tombstone Blues’, and she keeps up that tradition on her forthcoming ‘Threads’ album, due next month, where she covers Dylan’s ‘Everything Is Broken’ but recasts the song as a duet with Jason Isbell. As RS describes it, “their rendition opens with some fierce guitar runs from Isbell, before Crow sings about “broken lines,” “broken strings” and, in a nod to her album title, “broken threads.” Isbell steps in on the second verse, lamenting “streets filled with broken hearts.” It’s a true duet, with the vocalists eventually swapping lines and harmonizing together.” Have a listen below.
In many ways it was not the best of times for Dylan – having bared his soul on ‘Blood on the Tracks‘ he’d found a release in a whole new musical direction – a direction which would eventually lead to the album ‘Desire‘. Having helped out Roger McGuinn on his abortive ‘Gene Tryp‘ project – which delivered such landmark songs as ‘Chestnut Mare‘ – Jacques Levy had now upgraded to being Dylan’s songwriting buddy. Dylan had further found in Scarlet Rivera his new sound – wild gypsy violin that added drama to the new songs. So, this is Dylan emotionally drained, with sufficient writer’s block to require a songwriting collaborator, and scrabbling around for a new direction to immerse himself in. Continue reading “Bob Dylan “The Rolling Thunder Revue: The 1975 Live Recordings” (Columbia Records, 2019)”
Given the way in in which people typically consume music nowadays, all too often the lyrics are sidelined, if not completely overlooked. But great lyrics are often what make the best songs truly memorable. The following is the first in an occasional series about songs with great lyrics. Mark Underwood explains what makes the following 10 tracks so special. Continue reading “Here’s 10 americana songs with great lyrics”
Leaving you this week dear readers with this – Well, it probably isn’t Dylan himself doing it, he probably has a PR person or two who sends this sort of information out to the huddled masses of Dylanphiles, Bob Cats and general Americana muso’s. Or, maybe it is Dylan, in a quiet moment between concerts on the Never Ending Tour. That isn’t actually important right now.
Trapper Schoep has earned himself a co-write credit on this track with none other than Nobel laureate Bob Dylan. Seems that back in ’61 Bob produced what we might fairly call a minor work, but never completed or recorded it . Eventually the handwritten lyrics were sold at auction, Schoep saw a photo’ and decided to complete the song that celebrated his home state. With permission to co-credit eventually given he, naturally enough, recorded it and produced this slightly Sufjan Stevens-esque track.
If, like many of us, you’re hoping a copy of Dylan’s “More Blood, More Tracks” might be among the presents awaiting your attention under the Christmas Tree, I suggest you drop the fat man in the red suit a little note, requesting this stocking filler as a late addition to the Christmas list. ‘No One Else Could Play That Tune’ is an outstanding piece of rock history. Writer Clinton Heylin has left no stone unturned in his attempt to bring us the definitive breakdown of the Blood on the Tracks recording sessions that resulted in Dylan’s 1974 masterpiece – and which, in turn, created the latest release in the highly acclaimed Bootleg Series. Continue reading “Book Review: Clinton Heylin “No One Else Could Play That Tune” (Route, 2018)”
We have to refer to Neil by his full name in case any of you think you’re buying tickets to Will Young and end up bitterly disappointed. Evil multiconglomerate Barclaycard has announced its first two headliners for its British Summer Time Hyde Park events for 2019 – and they’re both playing the same night which could make getting hold of tickets interesting – no less than Bob Dylan and Neil Young are joint headliners. Continue reading “BST Hyde Park announces Dylan and Neil Young as first headliners”
“Every one of them words rang true and glowed like burning coal, pouring off of every page like it was written in my soul” – ‘Blood on the Tracks‘ is arguably Dylan’s masterpiece in a gallery of great works. What this entry into the Bootleg series – again, arguably the most important on-going archival series by any artist – offers is an alternative ‘Blood on the Tracks’, the version of the album that Dylan first recorded when he took these songs into the studio with a very different record in mind. September 16th-19th 1974 saw Dylan in the A&R studios in New York cutting tracks that had been stripped back to their essence – guitar and harmonica, Dylan’s words and voice – there was “revolution in the air“. Continue reading “Bob Dylan “Bootleg Series 14: More Blood, More Tracks” (Columbia Records,2018)”
This was the final night of Geoff Muldaur’s UK tour – and even on a tour that had taken in mostly small stages like London’s Green Note this gig deserved the sobriquet “intimate“, with a bare couple of dozen in the audience and Geoff Muldaur on stage blinded by the blue lights and unable to see the crowd, other than as a psychedelic blur, a situation that caused him to, tongue-in-cheek, regret dropping acid before coming out. Continue reading “Geoff Muldaur, Stables Stage 2, Wavendon, 7th June 2018”
