Scorsese's movie about Dylan

Watched this last night and don't have anything really original to add. But, fwiw: I loved it, basically, especially the gig at Lightfoot's and especially especially Joni (she nicks this, as she does The Last Waltz); also loved the bridge club and the gig at the reservation. I love all of the live stuff but probably the biggest revelation was Hattie Carrol - especially Ronson's incongruous gurning and soloing. Dylan's teeth give me the heebie-jeebies, as does his driving. I've always been pretty anti-Baez, finding her out of her depth, and vaguely feeling that Dylan is taking the piss out of her but she's a strong presence in this (dancing like she's auditioning for the Doors movie, aside) and I could have watched more of her. The 'fakery' doesn't really work as fake or as real so I'd jettison it altogether.

I said on another thread that I'd avoided the Revue period for vague reasons - partly because I had something closer to the self-congratulatory vaudeville cokefest of the Last Waltz in mind. Not that coke wasn't the driving force behind this but it was much lower-key than I'd imagined. As others have said, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Ginsberg and Bob Neuwirth doesn't exactly scream wild night on the tiles. This only makes the presence of Ronson and his hair even more incongruous. The low-key nature of it makes me think of the Basement Tapes if anything.

yeah rewound the joni clip twice and then found it on youtube to share elsewhere. it's quite wonderful.

btw i LOVED this

Do you really think he drove the bus that often, aside from that clip?
― TS The Students vs. The Regents (James Redd and the Blecchs), Monday, June 17, 2019 10:23 AM (one month ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think he probably did, Bob's a pretty hands-on guy making cabinets and welding and whatnot, likes to sneak around doing "normal person" stuff

The greater my desire to rewatch this for the performances, the more disappointed I am that it will include pointless Spinal Tap business. Marty really shat the bed. I hate to imagine how much cool performance and candid footage was left on the floor in order to give "Tanner" time.

xp Have you ever listened to that recording of AJ Weberman on the phone w/Dylan, and Dylan keeps trying to politely hang up by saying he's got a bunch of furniture to build?

that is the best

my favorite part of that tape:

AJ: Comin’ from somebody who wrote, that writes songs like you write, man.
BD: Hey, man, who writes better songs than I do. Name me somebody.

AJ: I can name you a hundred fuckin’ people.
BD:Oh come on. You can’t, you know you can’t.

AJ: Ah, let’s see. Creedence Clearwater.
BD: Oh bullshit.

AJ: Gordon Lightfoot ain’t bad.
BD: Yeah, he’s fine.

AJ: He writes good, he writes good songs. Let me see, there’s some cat, who uses a very, very, a lot of imagery just like ‘Tarantula’ — ah, Barbara Keefe.
BD: Uh.

AJ: Ah . . . Ken Lauber.
BD: Oh, he’s alright. Yeah, he’s very good.

AJ: Jack Elliot.
BD: Jack doesn’t write songs.

AJ: John Lennon.
BD: He’s improving.

AJ: George Harrison.
BD: Hmmmm … Sure.

AJ: Jim McGuinn.
BD: What????

AJ: Procol Harum, Keith Reid what’s his name.
BD: Yeah, well, they’re swell.

AJ: How ’bout Grace Slick? Too political?
BD:I don’t know, does she write stuff?

Bob otm re: all those ppl tbh

(maybe not about Creedence)

At least he's heard of Ken Lauber, which is more than I have.

https://rockasteria.blogspot.com/2014/08/ken-lauber-contemplation-view-1970-us.html

Perhaps of interest given ILM's collective obsession w John Wesley Harding:

I wrote, Contemplation (View), in my home up on Upper Byrdcliffe Mountain. In an unheated back room, a few dozen or so songs spilled out during the cold winter 1967. A subtle friendship began with Bob Dylan, who was also lived up on Byrdcliffe and was a neighbour. Bob was gracious enough, as often he is with other musicians, to invite me over to his home one day to listen to a test pressing of his new album, "Nashville Skyline." I loved it almost immediately We listened to all the tracks in silence. After, he asked me what I thought of it and I replied instantly, without thinking. "I like the spirit of it." Days later, I played him some of my new songs and he said I should go down to Nashville and record down there with some of the same musicians that played on "Nashville Skyline" and before that on the "John Wesley Harding," album. He spoke with authority and enthusiasm about how the Nashville musicians picked things up quickly and how their respect for lyrics, allowed the personality of the song to emerge clearly.

Good timing cannot be denied. At the same time, a friend, who liked my songs, introduced me to the head of the newly formed American record company, Polydor Records. I played him the new songs I had written and told him I wanted to record in Nashville. He liked the songs and the concept of recording them in Nashville and offered record contract. The record was recorded and mixed, at Wayne Moss's eight track garage studio, Cinderella Sound, in Madison Tennessee, with Gene Echelberger and Eliot Mazur as engineer and producer. Gene built Cinderella Sound with and for, the highly regarded and super talented guitarist and bass player supreme, Wayne Moss. The space was formerly a two car garage behind his Aunt Lucy's house. The line up of musicians was the following: the great Kenny Butrey on drums. The man of all instruments, Charlie McCoy on blues harp, bass and organ, the brilliantly melodic Weldon Myric. on pedal steel; a strong lead guitar soloist, Mac Gaydon, on electric guitar and the versatile and easy going Pete Wade on all the acoustic guitars.

dude's voice is terrible tho tbh

Oh right, he was his neighbour, no wonder he'd heard of him!

Weberman really pioneered the art of "negging."

Hi. You'll need to forgive me for not reading through the whole of this thread but I have a question which I can't currently find a better place for.

Having watched this film, I am now obsessed with Hurricane and Isis, but am not sure where to go next with Dylan. I know the LPs 'Bob Dylan' and H61R, and a bit of Blood on the tracks, which I have, despite repeated efforts, never taken to. With Hurricane and Isis, I love their relentless structure as well as their lyrical complexity and detail. I also love Hurricane's clear-eyed political engagement and Isis's lengthy, personal and expansive surrealism.

If you have any recommendations for me, do please let me know.

Yeah, I kinda had the same response, and I've mostly just fallen in love with the entirety of 'Desire' (though Joey is shit). Best track: Black Diamond Bay, which unfortunately he doesn't seem to have played live. On the other hand, it's used in James Benning's '11 x 14' to great effect. But I honestly can't really find anything that scratches the same itch. In my case, I think a lot of it has to do with the violin, though.

With Hurricane and Isis, I love their relentless structure as well as their lyrical complexity and detail. I also love Hurricane's clear-eyed political engagement and Isis's lengthy, personal and expansive surrealism.

I mean, those qualities are present in much of Dylan’s work(!) I suggest Hard Rain, Street Legal, Planet Waves, Greatest Hits Vol. 2...

C’mon Street Legal is terrible

It's not terrible. I hear it as an amiable self-parody – mostly amiable, at any rate ("Baby Stop Crying" and "Is Your Love in Vain?" are not amiable). But it should be album #10 or #11 you stream/purchase.

We’ve done this before (lol)

though Joey is shit
Joey is good

Honestly a person could get Bootleg Series Vol. 1-3, plus the “Royal Albert Hall” bootleg, and have essential Dylan coverage even if they never go further.

I like Joey but recently learned that Abandoned Love was dropped from Desire for Joey and obv that's five times better

Desire with Abandoned Love in place of Joey would contend for greatest Dylan.

If it's the relentless structure and lyrical complexity and detail that grab you, maybe give Highway 61 Revisited a shot. It's got lots of those songs with many verses, and rocks a little harder than the other masterpieces of its era imo. Also search "Ballad of a Thin Man" and "It's Alright Ma" from Before the Flood, and "Changing of the Guard" from Street Legal.

I like Joey but recently learned that Abandoned Love was dropped from Desire for Joey and obv that's five times better

I love Joey, but “Let me feel your love one more time, before I abandon it” is on the shortlist of Dylan’s greatest kiss off lines.

Amazing. Thank you all.

I know Highway 61 Revisited, and am totally with it. I'll check the other recommendations.

Just to check, are Hurricane and Isis anomalous in terms of Dylan's songwriting, or the way they are performed on record?

They arent really anamolous, apart from the violin which is def an outlier

If Highway 61 clicks then you're ready for Blonde on Blonde and Bringing it all Back Home too.

Most his songs (after the early days) aren’t as “topical / issue-oriented” as Hurricane.

Its a style he deploys intermittently throughout his discography. George Jackson might be the closest analog.

Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll, Masters of War

Some of the gospel period stuff, altho that often isnt v specific

Honestly a person could get Bootleg Series Vol. 1-3, plus the “Royal Albert Hall” bootleg, and have essential Dylan coverage even if they never go further.

So otm. I love Dylan and I’m positive I listen to these more than anything.

They arent really anamolous, apart from the violin which is def an outlier

I think there’s also some violin on Love and Theft, which you also might want to check out if you like the classic surrealist phase albums. The imagery is not quite as wild though there is a similarity of lyrical density.

after Trouble No More I really have a hard time wanting to listen to the gospel records ever again

b/c the versions are so much better? I haven't heard it so I'm curious about that statement

yeah it's so hard and frenzied

The live versions of Gotta Serve Somebody are so much grimier and funkier

Fred Tackett is absolutely ham for Jesus on the six string

the Trouble No More set definitely rendered those records kinda pointless

still going back to it more than anything else in the bootleg series

“Martin Scorsese Hasn’t Spoken to Bob Dylan in Twenty Years“

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/martin-scorsese-bob-dylan-922912/

I'm assuming it's more like Bob Dylan hasn't spoken to Martin Scorsese in 20 years.

I’m a bit puzzled then by the interviews with Dylan in the movie. Was Scorsese not there for those?

Apparently not!

I know that dylan’s archivist/manager interviewed bob for no direction home. That might be the case for the rolling thunder doc as well.

What he says is sort of hokey, and I hate crying in documentaries--Ginsberg stops just short--but one of the most moving things I can think of in any music documentary is his first appearance in No Direction Home, where he describes hearing "Hard Rain" for the first time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=84bNaA-BV4Q

This may be the greatest thread that I have never seen before.
For anyone curious about the original Renaldo and Clara, here's a pretty good detailed (but not too lengthy)description:
https://thefreelancementalists.blogspot.com/2012/02/renaldo-and-clara-can-this-marriage-be.html
Some of the best bits in I'm Not There were inspired by R and C, esp. David Cross as Ginsberg and omg Cate Blanchett---BD said she should have played him in Masked and Anonymous at least)

Added some more from 2015, about "Hurricane," the way its writing etc. came across in the 70s and later, also how it comes across in R and C, and the amazing scene, if you can call it that, in which black citizens on the street get into a conversation about Ruben Carter, people who don't necessarily know each other, but they hear and respond. Reminds me a bit of the interviews after the concert in Don't Look Back, kids overhearing other kids being interviewed re Mr. D. (Also tried to improve the look of the whole thing as much as possible w that ancient template.)