Sid Hartha Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 as a total aside: I've been curious about all these remasters/reissues, etc., and was wondering if anyone had an opinion about any reissues of Blonde on Blonde, as the cd copy I have sounds like it was recorded in a metal barrel. poorly. The mono remaster from Sundazed is pretty amazing to my ears. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Analogman Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 DiBergi read the boys a two-word review during his documentary that simply said, "Shit Sandwich." Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Sir Stewart Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 Where did they print that!? They can't print that! Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Analogman Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 I bought a dvd of that the other day for 9 bucks. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Sir Stewart Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 I wish I had that. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Analogman Posted August 30, 2006 Share Posted August 30, 2006 They did a tour in the early 90s - I actually saw them. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Kalle Posted August 31, 2006 Share Posted August 31, 2006 I just bought it yesterday since Sault Ste. Marie doesn't get their new cd's in until Wednesdays lol. But I think it's a pretty strong album and I'm pleased with it. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mountain bed Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 Just got the new record yesterday...me likey A few tunes there really capture that "3AM" vibe....few people do that better than Bob Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Analogman Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 I think this album stinks - the music is very boring and generic. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mjpuczko Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 wow Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Analogman Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 That's how I feel right now anywhow - as I have said before, Dylan for me really stops in 1975 - with the exception of Oh Mercy and Infidels. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mjpuczko Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 ah. i think time out of mind & love & theft are excellent. this new one, right now anyway, i think i like better than those two. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
solace Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 i didn't get into Time Outta Mind right away, and Love & Theft, while i liked it a lot, again, it took me a while... this one i enjoyed right off the bat, and while it may not be BETTER than the previous 2, i enjoy it more right now... his vocals are really warm and inviting (so is the production). it's a really funny record in ways too... A-man, i'm not sure what you expect out of Bob 45 years later really... his last 3 records are a fairly timeless sound and even modern Dylan is better than most mainstream artists as far as i'm concerned. the fact that he's still out there creating music and pushing the envelope makes me happy, and whenever the time comes and he passes, the music world (and world in general) will suffer it's biggest loss since John Lennon. i really don't get how people expect artists to create work that is up there with their best work 10, 15, 20, 30, and in this case FOURTY years past their prime... you just can't compare it really, it's not fair and it's a bit silly to do so IMO. there's been very few occasions where bands/artists have made their best records 10+ years into their career. it's good music regardless, prefer what you want, that's fine. i'm not gonna say his last 3 records are up there with his best of the 60's & 70's, but they blow away anything in the 80's imo (Oh Mercy included, as much as i love it). Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mjpuczko Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 you sir, are a genius. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Analogman Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 Yes, the vocals are certainly better - I'll give you that. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
MattZ Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 i really don't get how people expect artists to create work that is up there with their best work 10, 15, 20, 30, and in this case FOURTY years past their prime... you just can't compare it really, it's not fair and it's a bit silly to do so IMO. there's been very few occasions where bands/artists have made their best records 10+ years into their career. I am as impressed with Dylan's output today as I am with his output in his "prime". I think he is still pushing the envelope and making statemetns, I just think the envelopes and statements are different. The guy is constantly touring and revitalizing a type of music that had disappeared from the scene. He continues to do what he wants and he is 65 for crying out loud. In my book that makes him as much of a rebel/punk as he ever was when when he was plugging in or singing about Masters of War. I think his lyrics are as good as they've ever been, I think his voice has developed a complexity that blows away what he was doing in the 60s, and I think the songs are top-notch. Is he writing Its Alright Ma (The Sequel)? No. Who the hell wants him to? Even he has admitted it cant be done. The fact that he recognizes this, insists on continuing to reinvent himself, tours endlessly and continues to do what he wants (and not what the critics want), blows my mind. I suppose its silly for me to argue that this period is his prime (because i dont think it is), but I think there are bits of Dylan at his best sprinkled all over the last 40 years. I think of these 40 years as his prime. Analogman - I hate to say it, but your posts are no different than the folks that say that when Dylan plugged in it was all over for them. Dylan didnt "end" in 1965 and he didnt end in 1975 either. Thats not to say that you dont have a right to feel that way, just that its interesting. *Disclaimer* - this post was written by a hopeless Dylan geek. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
solace Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 i'm with you dude... he could easily conform and write a record that sounds "modern" or go with the trends he could enlist someone like Ryan Adams to help produce and write his record (not a knock on Willie, just saying)... he could work with Rick Rubin and cover a bunch of modern songs and all the sudden become "hip" with younger people (not a knock on the Main In Black either) he isn't doing this for money or fame anymore (not saying he did before, but...), he's doing this for the love of music. this is all he knows and as long as he's able to keep creating music i will be happy that he is, hopefully that is until the day he dies like Johnny... and i agree with you about his lyrics, there's so many great one liners on this new one Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mjpuczko Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 Gonna raise me an army, some tough sons of bitchesI'll recruit my army from the orphanages Quote Link to post Share on other sites
zoom Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 Gonna raise me an army, some tough sons of bitchesI'll recruit my army from the orphanages My cruel weapons have been put on the shelfCome sit down on my kneeYou are dearer to me than myselfAs you yourself can see Quote Link to post Share on other sites
MattZ Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 he could enlist someone like Ryan Adams to help rroducte and write his record (not a knock on Willie, just saying)... he could work with Rick Rubin and cover a bunch of modern songs and all the sudden become "hip" with younger people (not a knock on the Main In Black either) I guess my point in all of this, is that what makes me most happy, is that Dylan is still being Dylan. Dylan means something to me -- he's a concept as much as anything -- and it means always being true to yourself and blazing a trail. Never repeating yourself and striving always to get better in your eyes, not anyone elses. If Bob were to try to dig up the past and recreate it, or cover modern tunes with Rick Rubin, it would devastate me for the music's sake but maybe more because it would mean that the idea that we can all be unique and true to ourselves lost its last great ambassador. That's why I agree with solace, that when DYlan is gone, it will be the biggest loss since Lennon. We should all have a little Dylan in us. I dont deify Bob and I dont consider him the voice of any generation. I think all he ever wanted was to be himself, and I think this album, shows us that he's still doing that. If I hold him up on a pedestal, its not because I think he is a prophet, its because he's one of the few people out there with the balls to say F-U to everyone. He's still a punk rocker. Just like when he plugged in. I dont see Modern TImes as any differnt than Highway 61 in that respect... "You think I'm over the hill You think I'm past my prime Let me see what you got We can have a whoppin' good time " Quote Link to post Share on other sites
TheMaker Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 (edited) Objectively, MT is maybe, if it's lucky and on a very generous day, one-fifth as good as the preceding two albums. 1) MT is barely an original album. The songs are all, without exception, neither strictly linear nor creative enough to fall into the "impressionistic" category, and they're about 60% the result of appropriation of standards and old blues. The bells of St. Mary's, two Muddy Waters songs that Dylan didn't actually "write," in spite of what the credits have to say about things, Levee's Gonna Break, phrases copped from Stanley Brothers, and on and on and on and on and on. Forgivable? Absolutely. Dylan (to say nothing of countless other respectable artists) has been doing this for years, but he usually does it brilliantly and with great daubs of panache. MT's formula, however, leaves little room for standout lines or phrases, and Dylan's messages seem trite when they exist at all. 2) If you think Dylan's singing better on MT than TOOM, you either haven't listened to TOOM recently or else you haven't listened to TOOM ever. (Slim third possibility: you are in fact stone deaf.) 3) Here is a list of songs that I'm pretty sure only a madman or the criminally insane would think have been bested by any of the songs appearing on MT: Love Sick, Tryin' to Get to Heaven, Standing in the Doorway, Million Miles, 'Til I Fell in Love With You, Not Dark Yet, Cold Irons Bound, Can't Wait, Highlands, Mississippi, Lonesome Day Blues, Floater, High Water, Moonlight, Po' Boy, Cry a While, Sugar Baby. 4) Musically, this stuff is pleasant, but how the hell can anybody stack up these dithering solos and Hawaiian guitars to the Sexton/Campbell/Meyers powerhouse band of L&T, let alone the gauzy, perfect-for-its-time-and-place Lanois production of TOOM? There's simply no contest. While I'm loving the production, a week or so after its release, the writing on MT is just screaming "MINOR DYLAN." It's generally well sung (a few wolfen numbers notwithstanding), and the instrumentation is quite pleasant, but there's no bite to anything. The words sometimes seem positively barren - where are the colourful characters that populate Dylan's best works? What happened to Samantha Brown, Romeo and Juliet, Othella and Desdemona? Mr. Jinx and Miss Lucy, Old Bill, the waitress with the long white shiny legs have all packed up and left town, only to be replaced by anonymous "you"s and "me"s in most of these new songs. And where are the one-liners that could stop a minor friggin' deity in its tracks? Compare a song like Ain't Talkin' to Highlands and just sit back in astonished rapture at how much better Highlands is in every respect. It's a focused, jaw-dropping statement about insatiable longing, whereas Ain't Talkin' is basically just a Dylan-is-gloomy-today riff. Take note of the actual language in each song. From Ain't Talkin', "As I walked out tonight in the mystic garden / The wounded flowers were dangling from the vine." From Highlands, "Honeysuckle blooming in the wildwood air / Bluebelles blazin', where the Aberdeen waters flow." Those lines are motherfucking alive compared to what we're given to chew on in the new song. Am I guilty of trotting out an isolated example? No. Don't believe me, go listen to both songs back to back. Highlands is purposeful, beautiful, and at times even laugh-out-loud hilarious. Ain't Talkin' has its moments, but it's several leagues beneath its big bro. Where's the hopeless, nicotine-stained ambience of Standing in the Doorway or the weary, yet triumphant sigh of Not Dark Yet? What happened to the jump of Summer Days and the bone-crushing stomp of Lonesome Day Blues? The sprightly hop of Floater and the excitement of Po' Boy? My biggest problem with MT, aside from its obvious banality when stood next to the back-to-back masterpieces that are TOOM and L&T, is its lack of anything to cement its very slight songs together in a cohesive whole. TOOM is the most centered album of Dylan's storied career, and for all its eclecticism L&T was packed so full of themes and lessons and styles that its songs seemed to dovetail with one another almost defiantly. There were whole worlds in the lines of even the weakest songs on these two wonderful records, and when I scan their respective track listings, I can't help but smile. I've been listening to MT almost exclusively for a few weeks (because as I said elswhere, you really need to live with a Dylan album for a while before you can even begin to think about passing judgment on it), but I can scan its songs and practically tick 'em off checklist style: "Under the Red Sky reject, slight love song, blues rewrite, slight love song, blues rewrite, great ballad, slight love song, great ballad, blues rewrite..." P.S., Modern Times is my second favourite album of the year. I don't dislike it, but to make a convincing case that it's "major Dylan" is a goddamned impossible task. It just isn't. P.P.S., I didn't plan for this to be a rant. Edited September 2, 2006 by TheMaker Quote Link to post Share on other sites
mjpuczko Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 i can't fuckin' believe i just read that whole thing. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
solace Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 god you wonder why SOOOO many people on here think you're a fucking snob/asshole dude... christ... i stopped reading after #2... ever hear about personal preference??? Quote Link to post Share on other sites
embiggen Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 Highlands is a terrible song. it drones on and on about nothing. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
MattZ Posted September 2, 2006 Share Posted September 2, 2006 P.P.S., I didn't plan for this to be a rant. Tell us how you really feel. I suppose the inner critic in all of us feels the need to compare albums to ones that preceded them, but why not just enjoy the album for what it is instead of the need to immediately rank it in some canon of Dylan lore? I dont think anyone on here was claiming that this album breaks new ground or that DYlan has invented a new genre of music. Its just a fun album that people are enjoying. I am tired of the Lanois soaked production of Oh Mercy and TOOM, and I am very happy to be knee deep in an album of rollicking fun. And you know what? My guess is that Dylan was and is too. Will it have the staying power of the others? I dont know. I will worry about that a few years from now. For now, I am spinning it repeatedly and having a blast... Highlands is a terrible song. it drones on and on about nothing. Thanks for your insight. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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