IS IT ROLLING, BOB?

By late-1965 Bob Dylan was riding high with two successful albums, Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited, completed a successful British tour, was filmed for the movie Don’t Look Back and made his third appearance at the Newport Folk Festival. It was 25 July at Newport and earlier in the day he played an acoustic set but later played an electric set and a small section of the audience booed and jeered. Reports stated it was the whole audience, but this was not the case and many believe it was more likely a reaction to his short set of only five songs. However, the reaction to this new sound would rear its ugly head again when he toured the United Kingdom the following year.

Dylan was undertaking a six-month world tour with his new electric band, The Hawks, and taking time in between to make his first visit to Nashville to record tracks for a new album, Blonde On Blonde, released in May 1966. The same month found Dylan back on British soil for a tour that would see him suffering more negative reaction to his new sound which would come to a head at The Free Trade Hall in Manchester on 17 May. Many of the folk purists felt he had deserted them and at Manchester one fan decided to express his disgust just before Dylan’s last song… he shouted one word, ‘Judas!’

Back on home soil Dylan fled to Woodstock for time out despite being in demand for press interviews and a new tour. What happened next is shrouded in mystery and caused the rumour mill to go into overdrive. On 29 July 1966 Dylan was involved on a motorcycle accident and various causes were given including oil on the road and the sun in his eyes. Whatever the reason it put an end to plans for a new tour and Dylan retreated further and spent time with his young family.

Although he would not tour again until 1974 Dylan did spend time with The Band at Big Pink, a communal house in West Saugerties, New York. Between April and October 1967 they recorded over 100 songs, just demos, but released in 1975 as The Basement Tapes.

Dylan was also working on the lyrics for a new album which, throughout October and November, would find him back in Nashville recording tracks for what would become the John Wesley Harding album, released the following month. The album found Dylan backed by some of the Nashville elite, Charlie McCoy on bass along with Kenny Buttery on drums and Pete Drake on steel guitar. Produced by Bob Johnston, who at the time was also producing Johnny Cash, John Wesley Harding was a return to his folk style and well received by fans and critics alike.

Dylan returned to Nashville in January 1969 with Bob Johnston producing and supported by some of Nashville’s best – Norman Blake and Charlie Daniels on guitar, Charlie McCoy on bass, Pete Drake playing steel guitar, on the drums was Kenny Buttery and Bob Wilson on piano. Over two days they recorded nine tracks, including one instrumental, which would be released in April as Nashville Skyline. Another track, recorded a few days later, would also make the final cut. The country feel built on the rustic style created on the previous album with its simple structure and basic lyrical themes. Despite the change of direction the album was well received by the critics with Rolling Stone writing, “Nashville Skyline achieves the artistically impossible: a deep, humane, and interesting statement about being happy. It could well be…his best album.”

As mentioned previously there was one more track on the album and it was a duet with Johnny Cash on Girl From The North Country. This wasn’t Cash’s only contribution to the album. A supporter of Dylan and his music, Cash wrote the liner notes for the album for which he won a Grammy.

Cash was also at the Columbia Studios working on his new album and on 17^th and 18th February both artists recorded a number of duets together, including Girl from The North Country, which have become known as the ‘Dylan/Cash Sessions.’

Cash was recording with regulars Marshall Grant on bass and W. S. Holland on drums and new guitarist Bob Wootton who was making his first studio appearance with Cash.

They recorded a mix of country standards, Cash and Dylan originals, gospel and old Sun Records classics. It was an unlikely pairing as they were not the ideal partners with both singing in different registers, often with different phrasing and very rarely singing the same song the same way twice. However, it was an historical meeting of two artists whose admiration for each other was evident to hear.

There have been many bootlegs featuring these legendary recordings and it always seemed unlikely that they would ever find an official release. That was all to change with the 3-CD,  2019 release Travellin’ Thru – The Bootleg Series Vol. 15 1967-1969.

Unlike previous releases in the ‘Bootleg’ series the compilers have chosen to pick single rather than multiple takes as on previous releases like The Cutting Edge and More Blood, More Tracks. While it is interesting to hear how a song came together this new release gives a more pleasant and balanced listening experience.

The first CD features alternate versions from the John Wesley Harding and Nashville Skyline sessions with seven tracks from each album along with a previously unreleased outtake of a song that didn’t make it onto Nashville Skyline. On these tracks Dylan didn’t alter lyrics during the recording like he was often prone to do and so many of these takes are very similar to the released versions. That doesn’t mean they are not interesting to listen to as there are subtle differences in the backing and his vocals. Highlights include first takes of Drifter’s Escape, All Along The Watchtower, John Wesley Harding, To Be Alone With You, a great version of Lay Lady Lay and the previously unreleased outtake, Western Road. This last track is a blues song which would have seemed out of place on Nashville Skyline but is a great performance nonetheless.

Disc two finds us in the studio with Dylan and Cash on nineteen tracks, not all complete. The set opens with I Still Miss Someone the first of two takes on the CD. Other Cash classics include Big River, I Walk The Line, Guess Things Happen That Way. There are tracks from Sun Records including That’s All Right, Mystery Train and Matchbox, the latter features the guitar of Carl Perkins who was also in the studio recording that day. Other songs include Mountain Dew, attempted twice, You Are My Sunshine, One Too Many Mornings, and a couple of Jimmie Rodgers medleys. Wanted Man was a Dylan original that he never recorded himself but Cash would use as the opening song at his San Quentin concert a few days later. Careless Love finds them trying to find words to rhyme with various guns and is fun to listen to. Dylan had written and recorded Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right and Cash took the melody and wrote his own song, Understand Your Man. Here they choose to sing the songs together, each singing their own song and swapping mid-way through. It shouldn’t work and in places doesn’t, but it is one of the standout tracks.

This session always seemed like two friends just having fun but from listening to the CD it is obvious it was more than that. From the multiple takes of some songs and hearing Cash on a number of occasions asking for the lyrics to be written down leads one to the feeling that this was a serious attempt to record a ‘Duets’ album.

The final disc features five more duets, Dylan’s appearance on Cash’s TV show including their duet on Girl From The North Country, two tracks from the Self Portrait sessions (covers of Cash’s Ring Of Fire and Folsom Prison Blues) and a handful of tracks Dylan recorded with Earl Scruggs.

I have all fifteen releases in the Bob Dylan ‘Bootleg’ series and this is a welcome addition and one of my favourites. As Dylan said… ‘Is it rolling, Bob?’ The answer is yes. Sit back and enjoy!

With thanks to Steve Berkowitz, Tom Burleigh, Jeroen Vandermeer and Sony Music Entertainment.