New Port for Bob: Dylan Goes Non-Electric

His streamed show on Sunday was mainly acoustic and perhaps his best "concert" in decades. For Bob the tombstone blues still seem far away.

What’s the matter with me, the Bard once asked, I don’t have much to say. True for me today, at least in this intro. But read on. Then share, comment, or subscribe, it’s still free. My Countdown to Hiroshima for today is posted here.

All Along the Watch Party

As some here may know, Bob Dylan holds a singular place in my musical history (and early political awareness). I posted here a few months back an account of the first rock concert I attended—in Buffalo in November 1965, Bob’s first electric tour. Of course, I have caught him live numerous times since, including the very first Rolling Thunder show, but with increasing dissatisfaction. The usual complaints: songs re-worked so much you can barely recognize them, vocals strained or strangled in the noisy mix (or mere mumbles), and so on.

So when I saw heavy advertising for his first “live” show in two years (though clearly filmed), set for yesterday at 5 p.m. ET and streamed via Veeps, I did not jump at it. Then I read that it was titled Shadow Kingdom, and promised to be “intimate” and relaxed and the promo photo was in black & white. So I coughed up the 25 bucks and tuned in.

Well, it was nothing less than his best show in decades, in my estimation, not really a concert but an artful collection of stitched together videos. You can still “attend” over the next two days by visiting here.

The setting was a small, smoky club or juke joint. It seemed to come from his own pen: “Daylight sneaking through the windows/ And I’m still in this all-night café.” In the credits, the producers thank the “Bon Bon Club” of Marseille, probably just another Dylan fiction (reportedly it was shot on a sound stage in Santa Monica). In any case, it was filmed in B & W with no closeups of the star, perhaps in deference to his advanced age or a tribute to that popular Roy Orbison TV special. The director was Alma Ha’rel, who helmed Shia LaBeouf’s Honey Boy and various music vids and commercials.

Most of the songs were purely acoustic, often with a combo behind him, including a woman on stand-up bass. Others featured a little electric guitar, but even that was restrained in volume. Result: You could not only hear the lyrics for once but also enjoy Bob singing at his best in years, with nuance and commitment and few changes for the sake of change. Also, he played guitar for a rare time in recent years, and blew a lot of effective harp.

And the set list! All oldies (1980s and before) but full of surprises. For example, no “Watchtower” off John Wesley Harding but the rather obscure and difficult “Wicked Messenger” from the same album, along with “I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight.” No “Rolling Stone” but a beautiful ballad version of “Queen Jane” and a stunning, slowed-down “Tombstone Blues.” Then there was the bluesy “Pledging My Time” and accordian-rich “When I Paint My Masterpiece.” A fantastic acoustic version of one of his underappreciated classics “What Was It You Wanted?” and an evocative “Tom Thumb’s Blues.” Even the minor “To Be Alone With You” worked as a welcome love song breather.

I could have lived without the more predictable “Forever Young” but he sang it with subtle and (dare I say) sincere emotion. “Baby Blue” closed it out in style, again with the acoustic combo, but I doubt the “it’s all over” spoke for him. Still, a long time since 1965:

The only real “meh” moment was the one rock ‘n roll tune, “Watching the River Flow.” You can see part of it in the trailer near the top of the page, which does not represent the show at all except for the visuals. The names of the five band members were all new to me: Alex Burke, Shahzad Ismaily, Janie Cowen, Buck Meek and Joshua Crumbly. (Meek, the guitarist, is a Texan from the band Big Thief.) It’s possible that the songs were all pre-recorded with the band miming for the videos. No matter. More please!

True, the “set” was only a modest 50 minutes but it made me wonder if he was planning to do this several times over the next year—he has enough great songs to pull it off. The subtitle for this week’s film was “The Early Songs,” which suggests one or more sequels will come our way. A perfect pick for the next one would be “Things Have Changed,” here live at the Oscars show when he won the big prize.

Song Pick of the Day

Bob’s version yesterday made me recall the fine Willie Nelson cover of “What Was It You Wanted?”

And then there’s this:

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Greg Mitchell is the author of a dozen books, including the bestseller The Tunnels (on escapes under the Berlin Wall), the current The Beginning or the End (on MGM’s wild atomic bomb movie), and The Campaign of the Century (on Upton Sinclair’s left-wing race for governor of California), which was recently picked by the Wall St. Journal as one of five greatest books ever about an election. His new film, Atomic Cover-up, just had its world premiere and is drawing extraordinary acclaim. For nearly all of the 1970s he was the #2 editor at the legendary Crawdaddy. Later he served as longtime editor of Editor & Publisher magazine. He recently co-produced a film about Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.