Dylanists discussion

Here's ten of my all time Dylan obscurities... and it really is a freeze-out here in Nottingham tonight.

1. I'm Not There
From the Basement Tapes but Robbie Robertson didn't include it in a moment of madness. How great it was to hear this most beautiful and mysterious song played over the end credits of the movie I'm Not There.

2. Caribbean Wind
Two really different versions of this, one of which was finally released on Biograph. This would have been a standout on any 80s album.

3. Deportees
Duet with Joan Baez during the Rolling Thunder review. This is a great passionate version of Woody Guthrie's ballad.

4. Abandoned Love
Brilliant song, again two really different versions, but I love the spontaneous live solo acoustic version which some guy who'd gone to the Other End to see Jack Elliott just happened to tape.

5. East Virginia Blues
with Earl Scruggs in 1971, Dylan sings old timey

6. Dirge
This is on Planet Waves, a fairly rubbish album and Dirge always gets overlooked, but it's stunning. Same line-up as Blind Willie McTell - D on piano and an acoustic guitarist (Robbie in this case) who has to wing it like mad

7. Dear Mrs Roosevelt
from the Woody Guthrie Memorial Concert, 1968, with the Band - very moving song and perfect performance - "I voted for him lots of times and I'd vote for him again"

8. All the Tired Horses
A real weird gem, no Dylan to be heard, gorgeous strings

9. Moonshiner
This is the one I always suggest when people moan on that D couldn't sing. Beautiful song, incandescent performance

10. Rocks and Gravel
From the Finjan Club 1962 - he did this lovely old blues several times but in this version he stretches out the lines to lung-breaking point and beyond - really great

Damn what a list, thanks Paul. I've always thought the world of Dirge too. I've never heard him sing Deportees; have to go back to Moonshiner.

moonshiner could be my all time favorite dylan performance. truly beautiful & tragic stuff.

let's all have a listen:

Moonshiner

thanks EM, love it.
and thanks for the list, paul.
i'm not familiar with all that stuff, gonna search it out.

i'd also add, from the bootleg series, seven curses and the acoustic versions of idiot wind & tangled up in blue... i also love senor off of street legal, but not sure if that constitutes an 'obscurity'...

I think it rates about 7 out of 10 on the obscurity scale, i.e. well-known to fans but nobody else. Street Legal is a strange albu. Possibly Dylan's weirdest song : No Time to Think. I never listen to Street legal.

Brian, I adore Seven Curses. Damn thing never fails to make me cry. Anyone besides me, when listening to the acoustic version (and changed lyric) of TuiB get a totally different feel for the narrator? He's a different person, with different motivations in the version on the bootleg series. I guess I just 'see him from a different point of view' hehehe

Senor is a great song, isn't it? Dylan's version can't be bested, but Willie Nelson also does a fine take.

Just stumbled upon this group, I love the list. I have played "Moonshiner" for people as proof that Dylan is one of the greatest singers of all time. If you dig the song "I'm Not There" check out "Sign on the Cross" which is on various Basement Tapes bootlegs. My favorite song from the Basement Tapes sessions by far. Also, why we're talking about "Street Legal," I've always been partial to "New Pony.

Sign on the Cross is extraordinary and one of the few which hasn't been released in the Bootleg Series. Then again, we must be due for an upgraded Basement Tapes set at some point.

Ah, how can you not dig Street-Legal? He sounds so mentally unstable on it that it's impossible to not love it (makes you crave for a hot shower though, tee-hee), and just look how well it contrasts with the cheesy pop sound. Golden-haired strippers, renegade priests, warlords of sorrow and the Armageddon - they're classic Dylan. "The endless road and the wailing of chimes, the empty rooms where her memory is protected, where the angels' voices whisper to the souls of previous times" It has some of his most extravagant poetry. And stuff like "I was lying down in the reeds without any oxygen; I saw you in the wilderness among the men; saw you drift into infinity and come back again" is just plain disturbing.

Paul: Nice selections, but Planet Waves is hardly rubbish. It is in fact one of his best records, but it needs to be listened to at least, say, 20 times because these beautiful sultry temptresses described have such subtle shades.

I would also include New Danville Girl (bootlegged but never officially released), Farewell from the Witmark Demos, and a handful of others.

Here’s a news item with two topics of interest to Paul: Bob Dylan and Swedes.
“Five Swedish scientists have confessed that they have been quoting Bob Dylan lyrics in research articles and are running a wager on who can squeeze the most in before retirement.”
http://www.thelocal.se/20140926/scien...

I am sure the Swedish scientists are top in the international poll of Scientists who Smuggle Dylan Quotes into Their Research. I bet British scientists didn't even know it was a thing.

Paul wrote: “I bet British scientists didn't even know it was a thing.”

U.S. court judges have been giving it a go.
According to Wikipedia:
Dylan earned yet another distinction in a 2007 study of US legal opinions and briefs that found his lyrics were quoted by judges and lawyers more than those of any other songwriter, 186 times versus 74 by The Beatles, who were second. Among those quoting Dylan were US Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Antonin Scalia, both conservatives. The most widely cited lines included "you don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows" from "Subterranean Homesick Blues" and "when you ain't got nothing, you got nothing to lose" from "Like a Rolling Stone".

One line I suspect they didn’t use: “She knows too much to argue or to judge.”

or

The judge, he holds a grudge, he's gonna call on you. But he's badly built, and he walks on stilts. Watch out he don't fall on you