It's a rare day when I get something interesting in my inbox. It's even more rare when it's from Bob Dylan's crew. And when someone even remotely associated with Bobby D. says "jump," I say "how high?" Per the press release:
When Bob Dylan turns 70 in May 2011, his iconic career will have spanned five decades. Yet, a true portrait of the reclusive "voice of the generation" has eluded Dylan fans. Through exclusive insider interviews, and never-before-seen photos and footage spanning Dylan's 50-year career, Bob Dylan Revealed offers an intimate biography of who Bob Dylan was, and who he is today. Producer Jerry Wexler and award-winning songwriter Al Kasha provide an untold account of Dylan's early days at Columbia Records in 1962. Drummer Mickey Jones chronicles the 1966 Bob Dylan and the Band electric world tour that changed Rock n' Roll forever, while soon after, Dylan used the cover of a motorcycle accident to enter drug rehab. Dylan's 1974 comeback tour is illustrated by tour photographer Barry Feinstein through his finest photos and behind-the-scenes accounts. In 1975, Bob Dylan hit the road with a rag-tag band of folk troubadours, culminating in "The Night of the Hurricane." Folk legend Ramblin' Jack Elliott, violinist Scarlet Rivera, bassist Rob Stoner, and Rubin "Hurricane" Carter reveal the inside story of Dylan's Desire album and Rolling Thunder Revue tour. Following a stint as The Entertainer in 1978, Bob Dylan fell into the arms of the Lord through the Vineyard Christian Fellowship Church, producing three Gospel albums. Derided as "God-Awful Gospel," Dylan's radical new direction alienated fans and enraged critics. Pastor Bill Dwyer, journalist Joel Selvin, singer Regina McCrary, keyboardist Spooner Oldham, and Dylanologist AJ Weberman share intimate accounts of Bob Dylan's "born-again" transformation - and his return to Judaism! Bob Dylan Revealed culminates with Dylan's Never Ending Tour that began in 1992 and continues to this day, as drummer Winston Watson recounts his personal journey as a warrior in Bob Dylan's "Never Ending Band."
The best Christmas party video of all time was put together last year by the one and only Bob Dylan. Bobby is mixing drinks, smoking cigars, hanging out with Santa, and throwing one hell of a house party. He has an accordion player, and even participates in some polka dancing, which is in his blood per his Northern Minnesota upbringing. I want an accordion player and polka dancing at my next party! Then things get rowdy, as they tend to do at holiday parties, and a fight breaks out. Santa and Bob just shake their heads. What can you do?
Dylan took this arrangement directly from the Grammy award winning polka group, Brave Combo who released this song on their 1992 album It's Christmas, Man! Bob is a big fan of polka and Brave Combo.
"Must Be Santa" was originally written by Mitch Miller, and released on his 1961 album Holiday Sing Along With Mitch Miller. Miller was a major force in the music industry from the late 1940s to the early 1960s, serving at the head of A&R for both Mercury and Columbia Records. With Columbia in the 1960s he was responsible for signing and producing many important pop standards. However, he did not like rock and folk music, and he greatly disapproved of Columbia's signing of a certain 1960s folk singer named Bob Dylan.
Those who know him say Neil Young never begins a new recording project before cleansing his musical soul by immersing himself in The Basement Tapes, those seminal 1965 recordings of one of rock’s overwhelming Big Bang moments, when The Band – formerly The Hawks, from Toronto – and Bob Dylan, recuperating from a motorcycle accident near Woodstock, N.Y., undertook a stunningly fruitful 100-song collaboration, melding new compositions with country music, folk music, blues, rock ‘n’ roll and R&B, and redefining the forms, functions, language and boundaries of popular American music.
So, when Young turned up one morning in April 2009 at the west-end Toronto studio of award-winning music producer/engineer Peter J. Moore to add his contribution to a collection of some great and some lesser known Band songs — recorded during the past three years by a number of Canada’s prominent pop, rock and folk acts, selected and arranged by The Band’s legendary keyboardist Garth Hudson, and released last week as A Canadian Celebration of The Band, on the Curve Music label — it was appropriate that a particularly potent talisman, the original Big Pink basement tape recording of the Dylan-Rick Danko composition, “This Wheel’s On Fire,” was positioned decorously on the studio’s fireplace mantel, oozing mojo.
Young and Toronto country-rock outfit The Sadies were about to lay into what may well be the best version of the song — recorded by everyone from Ian & Sylvia to Siouxsie and the Banshees, and also known as the theme song to Absolutely Fabulous — ever recorded, and certainly the album’s money cut.
“They had intended to record it with acoustic instruments,” Moore says, recalling some of the dozens of amusing, cathartic, frustrating and catastrophic events that occurred during the lengthy recording project, the brainchild of Hudson and his wife/manager, Maud, who live in upstate New York.
“And Neil was supposed to record his bit four months earlier, but performance schedules and a sore throat kept pushing it back.”
When Young finally did show up – his three tour buses took up an entire block of the narrow residential street on which Moore’s studio is situated – it was on a travel day between concerts in Kingston and London. And he had no intention of playing an acoustic guitar.
“There’s a knock at the door, and Larry Cragg, Neil’s guitar technician, is standing there, asking how he can get ‘the rig’ into the studio,” Moore says.
Young’s guitar rig — a famously mystical contraption made up of a battered, modified vintage Fender amplifier boosted by several custom-made sound-processing devices, distortion effects and a number of reverb plates, linked together and gaffer-taped to an assembly that rests in a huge black box — can’t be turned sideways, for fear of displacing loose but vital objects, Moore was told.
“So we had about six guys lift it over the driveway fence and into the backyard, where it was unpacked, and the rig was rolled into the studio’s piano room through patio doors that had to be removed.”
Accommodating the guitarist’s huge red pedal board with it’s gigantic “umbilical cord” that ran from the main studio in the front of the building to the rig in back, meant cutting holes in doors and jambs – ad hoc renovations that Moore, credited with Hudson as co-producer on the album, was only too happy to make in order to facilitate the creation of a recording he calls “a labour of love.”
With Hudson and The Sadies in Moore’s “big room”, and his guitar rig in another, Young worked through the song, settling the arrangement, before the musicians cut “four or five” versions, any of which would have been perfectly acceptable, Moore says.
“Then Neil left, and went back into the piano room where his amp was, and closed the door. I could hear him practicing scales in there with the piano, warming up his voice . . . then things got very quiet.”
Thinking their work was more or less done, The Sadies relaxed. Dallas Good had left his electric guitar on a stand in the studio to make coffee in the adjoining kitchen. Brother Travis was in a corner picking an acoustic guitar off-mic. Garth leaned over his keyboard. Drummer Mike Belitsky, Moore recalls, had set his sticks aside and was standing by his kit, chatting with bassist Sean Dean.
“Suddenly, the piano room door flew open, and without a word, Neil rushed into the studio, picked up his guitar and whacked out this enormous chord. He was going for it.”
The only evidence you’ll hear of the panic that ensued – Dallas flying across the room, plugging in his axe (Moore edited out the “pop” in the mix), Dean picking his stand-up bass off the floor, Belitsky diving into his kit and extracting his sticks – is the missing first beat on the snare drum.
It’s a beat Moore says he’s happy to live without.
“That was a killer take. Luckily the recorder was still running.”
Part fury, part ecstasy, “This Wheel’s On Fire” by The Sadies, Hudson and Young is a defining event on A Canadian Celebration of The Band, a three-minute explosion that captures all six musicians at their best, and delivers a heart-stopping wallop. It sounds extemporaneous, immediate, too big for the room – it’s as good as rock ‘n’ roll gets.
“I think that was Neil’s intention,” Moore says. “I’m just guessing here, but when he stormed out of that back room it was as if he meant to catch everyone off guard, to get their blood pumping.
Garth Hudson plays keyboards on all tracks along with the following artists:
1. Forbidden Fruit – Danny Brooks & The Rockin’ Revelators
2. Out Of The Blue – Mary Margret O’Hara
3. Acadian Driftwood – Peter Katz & The Curious
4. This Wheel’s On Fire – Neil Young and The Sadies
5. Ain’t Got No Home – Suzie McNeil
6. Clothes Line Saga - Cowboy Junkies
7. You Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere - Kevin Hearn & Thin Buckle
8. Sleeping - Bruce Cockburn & Blue Rodeo
9. Yazoo Street Scandal - The Road Hammers
10. The Moon Struck One – Raine Maida
11. The Shape I’m In - The Sadies
12. Tears Of Rage – Chantal Kreviazuk
13. I Loved You Too Much – Hawskley Workman
14. Knockin’ Lost John - Great Big Sea
15. King Harvest - Blue Rodeo
16. Move To Japan – The Trews
17. Genetic Method (Anew) – Garth Hudson
18. Chest Fever – Ian Thornley & Bruce Cockburn
I don't have this record yet. Who wants to get their favorite blogger an early Christmas present???
I'll start this post by confessing something sordid about my past: From 1991-1994 I was a marching band geek. For four football seasons I played French Horn/Mellophone, Baritone/Euphonium, and Tuba/Sousaphone for the Northwestern University Marching Band. I also played for the basketball pep band and a number of non-music major concert bands. Unlike some of you musicians, I can read music. In treble and bass clefs. Key of D flat major? Bring it on!
All of my best friends are from that period of my life. For the last five years we have been doing an annual reunion which has centered around a Northwestern football game and/or one of our friend's weddings. These reunions have taken place from Las Vegas, NV, to Durham, NC, and this weekend, our third trip to Chicago. These reunions quickly degenerate into a group very successful doctors, lawyers, journalists, and business people, reliving their college days by staying up until 4 a.m. playing drinking games. At one point a few years ago I counted 55 years of higher education sitting around a table, pounding High Life and doing Absolut shots.
We have a great deal with a fabulous rental house near Wrigley field for this year's Wrigelyville Classic, a "home" football game for Northwestern verses the instate rival the University of Illinois. Even College Gameday will be there. We did a little stroll about Wrigley Field today, and everything looks so cool! I can't wait for this game!!!
So what the hell does this have to do with my music blog? Other than bragging about the fact that I can read music? On October 12 the Old 97's released their eighth (?) studio album entitled The Grand Theatre Volume One. I've been super busy this fall, so I haven't been able to fully digest this ablum yet, but overall it is another quality album, along the same lines as 2008's Blame It On Gravity. Murry Hammond's song "You Were Born to Be in Battle" is especially strong. Is it me, or is Hammond becoming an even better song writer with age?
The 97's appeared on Leno on Nov. 10, which caused them to postpone their Toronto gig. They preformed the song "Champaign, Illinois," and sounded fan-freaking-tastic. I wanted to post the video, but those jerks from NBC already yanked it off of youtube. 97's singer/songwriter Rhett Miller explained the meaning of the song on twitter through a serious of tweets which I compiled below.
In the early days of the 97's, there was a great (short-lived) radio station in Champaign that played us a lot and hired us to come play. We had so much fun in this kooky little college town. Champaign is the ultimate college town. Late nights, sleeping on people's floors... One late night, I was driving the van through Illinois as my band mates slept and to keep myself awake, I wrote this lyric about Champaign. To me, college seemed like some sort of holding pattern... Waiting for life to start. So Champaign became purgatory in the song. Not hell. I could have used Austin [TX], Madison [WI] or New Paltz, NY. But their names aren't homonyms for sparkling wine. I love you, Champaign, Illinois.
Of course, my friends and I think that picking on Champaign, Illinois, the home of the Fighting Illini, is a brilliant choice. Especially for this week's football game.
"Champaign, Illinois" has co-writing to credits given to Bob Dylan. Listen to the melody and you can clearly hear Dylan's "Desolation Row." And, this is the second "Champaign, Illinois" song where Dylan shares co-writing credits. Check out this really interesting article from Smile Politely, an on-line magazine from Champaign-Urbana, Illinois. Despite the fact that the Smile Politely author clearly dislikes the Old 97's version, I think it's an incredibly catchy tune!
If any of you happen to be at Wrigley this weekend, I'll be in section 421, wearing a purple NU toque and purple sunglasses. Go Cats!
I was perusing the New York Times today at lunch and I came across an article about country music legend Ralph Stanley. Stanley is best known as a bluegrass artist, or as he calls it, "that old-time mountain music." He is 82-years young and still plays over 100 gigs a year. The NYT article previewed his autobiography, which goes on sale Thursday, October 15. Someone want to get their favorite blogger an early Christmas present???
Although he is mostly known for his unique banjo playing style, Stanley won a Grammy Award for Best Male Country Vocal Performance in 2002 for his a capella rendition of "O Death" from the O Brother, Where Art Thou soundtrack.
Here's another cool one form the Rockstar collection. Ralph Stanley sings and plays banjo with Bob Dylan on the below track which is originally from Stanley's 1998 release, Clinch Mountain Country.
Mary Travers of the 1960s folk trio Peter, Paul, and Mary passed away this past week from leukemia at age 72. Regular readers of this blog know that I am a huge Bob Dylan fan. However, my first taste of Bobby D. was actually from PP&M. Dylan and PP&M shared a manager, and while PP&M already had a hit with their 1962 rendition of Pete Seeger's "If I had a Hammer," Dylan was still relatively unknown outside of New York City. To quote AllMusic:
"The era of public activism over civil rights, directed at the administration of President Kennedy, was rising to new heights, and "Blowin' in the Wind" embodied the spirit of the time. In one fell swoop, it established Bob Dylan as the new conscience of a generation, and PP&M as the voice of that conscience, culminating with their performance of the song at the same August 1963 March on Washington where Martin Luther King Jr. gave his I Have A Dream speech."
I distinctly remember hearing this song as a child and being struck by Travers's beautiful soaring voice.
Another PP&M song that I remember hearing in my 1970s childhood home is the John Denver-penned "Leaving on a Jet Plane." This song was written by Denver in 1967, and recorded by the trio on their 1967 release Album 1700. Warner Brothers records released this song as a single in 1969 when they heard that radio DJs around the country were playing the track. "Leaving on a Jet Plane" went on to sell over a million copies and was PP&M's only #1 hit, as well as their last Top-40 hit.
As I was finishing yesterday's Replacements post, a blip came over my Twitter feed that Jim Dickinson had passed away. I thought, "no that can't be the same Jim Dickinson that I just wrote about." But unfortunately, it was. Here is the Associated Press article on Dickinson's life via Yahoo news.
Memphis producer, musician Jim Dickinson dies By CHRIS TALBOTT, Associated Press Writer Sat Aug 15, 7:32 pm ET
JACKSON, Miss. – Jim Dickinson, a musician and producer who helped shape the Memphis sound in a career that spanned more than four decades, died Saturday. He was 67.
His wife, Mary Lindsay Dickinson, said he died in a Memphis, Tenn., hospital after three months of heart and intestinal bleeding problems.
The couple lived in Hernando, Miss., but Dickinson recently had bypass surgery and was undergoing rehabilitation at Methodist University Hospital, his wife said.
His work in the 1960s and '70s is still influential as young artists rediscover the classic sound of Memphis from that era — a melting pot of rock, pop, blues, country, and rhythm and blues.
"I think he was an incredibly influential individual," Big Star drummer Jody Stephens said Saturday. "I think he defined independent spirit in music, and I think that touched a lot of people."
Dickinson's music was informed by his eclectic and encyclopedic record collection — sold off and rebuilt a few times over the years, usually around Christmas — and his wide array of friends.
"As a producer, it really is all about taste," Jim Dickinson said in a 2008 interview with The Associated Press. "And I'm not the greatest piano player in the world, but I've got damn good taste. I'll sit down and go taste with anybody."
A dabbler in music while in college and later in shows at the famed Overton Park Shell in Memphis, Dickinson was on his way to becoming "a miserable history teacher." But his wife insisted he focus on his music after watching him play shows with the blues legends of Memphis.
"They were rediscovering Furry Lewis and Sleepy John Estes, Rev. Robert Wilkins, these talents that were like gods," Mary Lindsay Dickinson said in 2008. "They were street sweepers. They were yard men. They had no money, no fame, even though they'd invented this style, this musical style that was changing the world. When I saw what he could do with them — he thought he was gonna be a history teacher — I said, 'No, no, no, no, let's try music and see what happens."
Jim Dickinson moved around, traveling with both his own projects and as a sideman until his sons were born. He gave up the road and the lifestyle, built a home studio and settled in to the hard-scrabble life of the independent producer that he jokingly compared to hustling.
His sense of humor, gift for storytelling and open door kept musicians filing through his studio and kitchen as his sons grew up. He took an interest in the boys' music as another father might his sons' baseball career, even drawing Luther and Cody into his own bands. They last released an album together as Jungle Jim and the Voodoo Tiger in 2006.
"Growing up he would play piano and electric guitar and it just always fascinated me, and I always had a little toy guitar of some sort around," Luther Dickinson said in 2008. "And I've really been blessed because I always knew what I wanted to do and it was totally because of my dad and his friends."
Dickinson's career touched on some of the most important music made in the '60s and '70s. He recorded the Rolling Stones' "Wild Horses" in Muscle Shoals, Ala.; formed the Atlantic Records house band The Dixie Flyers to record with Franklin and other R&B legends in Miami; inspired a legion of indie rock bands through his work with Big Star; collaborated with Ry Cooder on a number of movie scores, including Paris, Texas; and played with Dylan on his Grammy-winning return to prominence, Time Out of Mind.
He credited his work with Big Star on Third/Sister Lovers with keeping his tape reels turning over the years, and Stephens found Dickinson's fingerprints all over the album when he listened to it recently.
"There's so many contributions from people that Jim either brought in or helped steer," Stephens said. "And sometimes a brilliant decision is to do nothing, allow space and that sort of thing. His keyboard part in 'Kizza Me' is this great fractured piano that kind of cascades, like the piano's falling down a flight of steps. I think it was all about the spirit and the emotion."
"I'm not really a success-oriented person," Dickinson said. "If you look back at my records that I've made as a producer, they're pretty left-wing. It's some pretty off-the-wall stuff. Especially in the punk rock days. I literally took clients because I thought it would impress my children. I did work in the '70s and '80s where that was definitely my main motive."
Some examples of songs Dickinson produced, recorded, or played on:
Lucero - Drink Till We're Gone.mp3 From: The Coldwater Sessions (~2000) Rough mixes of what would become Lucero's first self-titled album, recorded on Dickinson's farm in Coldwater, Mississippi.
My buddy Jan (left, with Tom) posted this on the AltCountryTab.ca forums yesterday and it blew me away. Its possibly the best review I've ever read about anything. He just started his own blog, and I encourage you to check it out here. He is an aficionado of country and folk music, a huge movie fanatic, and a voracious reader. He previously wrote a killer review of a Mark Olson and Gary Louris show in Oslo from December 2008. Here is a reprint of his review of the Tom Russell gig on April 30 in Oslo, Norway.
Note: I suck and I don't have any Tom Russell albums, so I peppered this post with other noted tracks. I just received an Amazon gift certificate, and guess what I am spending it on?
------------------------------------------------
It's been six years since my brother Knut and I saw Tom Russell play a intimate set at Kafe K in Porsgrunn. That was back in 2003, and Tom had just released Modern Art (2003). Knut and I showed up with a friend of ours, we brought most of our records, and a stolen copy of Tom's novel Blood Sport for him to sign. Tom was playing with Andrew Hardin back then, and before the show we ran into them on street. We shook hands and talked, and I think Tom was surprised to meet such young fans. Tom put on a great show for us, he sang our requests, talked to us, signed all our records and the out of print copy of Blood Sport, witch I lifted from my high school library. Porsgrunn is nothing but a dirty little factory town in Telemark, but I have such fond memories from that November night back in 2003. That show is really special to me. Since then, I've missed a few chances to see Tom perform, so this time I got my tickets early.
Knut couldn't go. He had to stay home for different reasons, and that made this experience a little less fun. But, my good friend and band mate Frode didn't hesitate when I asked him to join me. At 09:30 am we boarded the train bound for Oslo at the Arendal train station. The shady Arendal train station made me realize how much I hate that town. I went to school there, and I work there, but I could never live there. I was glad to leave. The best way to prepare for a Tom Russell concert is by riding the rails. The conductor waved the flag, and we where out of there. I was thinking about Woody Guthrie in Tom Russell's song "Woodrow" as the train picked up speed and left that suffocating small town behind.
"Oh, the trains leave every morning, some go east and some go west
And the clacking of the iron is the sound you love the best."
This wasn't our great escape from railroad bulls or the Coney Island girl's. No, Frode and I were running from our day jobs, and our conformist lives. Two days off from work, two days away.
It took about 15 minutes to get out of Arendal. There is something funny about seeing your home pass by you from a train, or any kind of transportation really. Tom T. Hall knew it. "I Flew Over Our House Last Night." So, while looking at the farms and the open fields of Froland, my home, and driving through the deep dark woods of Vegårshei and Gjerstand and watching the green piny hills of Telemark open up before us, Frode and I discussed everything. It had been too long since last we talked. The daily grind will do that to you. You'll have to make time for friendship. We talked about our Martin guitars, we talked about folk/blues, literature, movies and off course our high hopes for the night's concert.
Frode's knowledge of old history and politics amazes me. He is a classically trained guitar player. And he can pick up a guitar and play anything from old Irish laments, to British and American folk, to blues tunes. He is an expert on the British folk revival, and his heroes include Bert Jansch, Wizz Jones, Davy Graham, and John Renbourn, who we are seeing in Oslo this summer at Herr Nilsen, with another great guitar picker named Stephen Grossman. It took us about three and a half hours to get into Oslo, who before 1878 was named Kristiania. A town I both love and hate. Henrik Ibsen and Knut Hamsun both lived there. Hamsun wrote his novel Sult (Hunger)there. Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson referred to Oslo as "the City of Tigers," "Tigerstaden." I like the renaming better, "Tiggerstaden," "The City of Beggars."
We took a taxi to Rosenkrantzgate and checked into the hotel. The hotel, Bondeheimen, opened back in 1913, is an old place. Knut Hamsun stayed there, Sigrid Undset too. We got a drink from the mini bar, left our bags at the hotel and hit the town. First we located Herr Nilsen. I'd never been there before. It is a medium sized blues club with a bar and a stage. We checked our watches and decided that we had at least five hours to kill before show time. We went outside and found a nearby restaurant. Frode had read about this place called "New Orleans Restaurant." It was in walking distance off both Boneheimen and Herr Nilsen. We decided to go for it.
We went in, sat down and let the beautiful waitress take our order. I ordered chicken gumbo for starters and the catfish with sweet mashed potatoes for my main course. It was perfect. They even played Guy Clark over the stereo. We had the place to ourselves for most of the time, but then at the end a busload of old tourists poured in and we didn't see our beautiful waitress again. Too bad.
When we had finished our meal we went prowling the book stores. I love Oslo for it's book stores and record shops. And I love the music halls too. It's the cultural center of Norway. We spent over an hour in one book store. We decided to go back to the hotel to get another drink and relax before the show.
The show was set to start at 21:00, we walked in around seven. We got ourselves a couple of Heinekens and found front row seats. It took about twenty minutes for the place to crawl with people. It was a good thing we came early. I had brought a few records for Tom to sign. Knut gave me his Tonight We Ride EP before I left and told me to get Tom to sign it. I also had my camera with me, but as it turned out, it's batteries were running low. Shit. I only got to take a few pictures.
We sat there for an hour, talking. I told Frode about the time in Porsgrunn when Tom walked up to us pointing his fingers at us like they were 45s and asked us if we "were looking for trouble." Off course Frode had heard this all before. I also told him how Tom wrote about Knut and I in his blog (Tom Russell's Blog). And said that meeting us was his highlight of that particular tour. I told him how Tom stood on stage, threatening to "come out there" if the drunks at the bar wouldn't shut up. He towered over us that night, saying stuff like, "Don't make me come back there you bastards! I'm the toughest guy in this joint. Me and Charles Bukowski!" I couldn't wait for the show to start. Our conversation was interrupted by an American. Carl, or Crazy Carl. He wanted to talk to us, mostly about his life. We had nothing better to do so we listened.
We drank some more beer and waited. The PA system played "Lay, Lady Lay." I was wondering if Tom would remember me. I didn't want to look like the fan boy in front of the stage who knew all the words to all his songs, because I'm getting to old for that. But I'm still that kid. I still obsess over Tom's song. I obsess over music in general. If there's a back story to a song, I want to know it. If there's a name of a town or a person in a song and I don't recognize it, I look it up. I'm still that 18-year-old fan boy I was back in 2003, and I couldn't wait to see Tom again.
Michael Martin walked on stage. He got his Martin and tuned it up. The lights didn't dim, Dylan didn't stop singing. It was still twenty minutes before Tom would walk on stage. Crazy Carl called Michael "Andrew." I turns out Crazy Carl didn't know that Tom had a new guitar player. Martin walked up to us, I asked him when the new Russell album would come out and if he played on it. He said it would be out in September, and "no", he "didn't play on it." "Tom wants to do something different on this album," he told us. He is working with Calexico, and he is recording at Wavelab studios in Tucson, Arizona. Frode and Michael talked about guitars for a bit, and I asked if I could take his picture.
Then Tom came out, he walked onstage wearing his hat, a big coat, and brown cowboy boots. He looked like a sophisticated wild man wearing those black and red framed glasses. Tom had to walk past me to get on stage. He looked right at me, and extended his hand. We shook. Frode smiled from ear to ear. I did too. Tom got up on stage, grabbed his beat up black Collings guitar and went to work. He towered over us again.
"Hello Oslo, it's good to be back. I want to start off with a little Leonard Cohen." Then he went right into "Tower of Song."
"I asked Hank Williams how lonely does it get." Tom knows his place. Watching him perform is something really special. His presence does not go unnoticed. It's the same presence my dad talked about when he talked about seeing Johnny Cash live. I'd felt it before,while watching Kris Kristofferson, Willie Nelson, and Billy Joe Shaver perform.
Tom didn't waste any time, he went right into "The Pugilist At 59" followed by "Ash Wednesday," both lifted from Love and Fear (2006).
He told us he wanted to do a cover, he wanted to sing a song by Townes Van Zandt. The crowd cheered. "Townes still owes me a hundred dollars," Tom said with a grin. Michael Martin pulled out the mandolin for this song and it was beautiful. Tom wanted us to sing along with the chorus, I couldn't help myself, so I sang along with the whole thing.
Tom wanted to play some new songs, and he sang "Guadeloupe." Tom closed his eyes and sang the last verse, and while doing so, left me in the dark hiding my tears.
"Here I am your ragged disbeliever
Old doubting Thomas drowns in tears
As I watched your church sink through the earth
Like a heart worn down through fear."
Tom thanked us in his frail Norwegian, "Tusen Takk." He used to live in Oslo. He and Andrew Hardin used to play all night sets in old beer cellars in Oslo back in the 80s, they used to run up and down Karl Johans gate to sober up before the gigs. Tom told us that the town had cleaned up since then. And that we were less wild and rugged.
"Drink more beer you bastards!"
Then he did another new one called "Nina Simone." I wanted to cry. I did. Then he played "Who's Gonna Build Your Wall," we all sang along. Tom said that back in the U.S. a lot of people didn't like the song. And that David Letterman didn't want him to sing that last verse about "White men in golf shirts, with cellphones in their ears."
"I sang it anyway," Tom said with a huge "eat shit and die" grin. We all cheered.
The sing along was great. The audience was having a blast, though some people kept yelling for older songs, and Tom seemed to want to play new stuff. He did "East of Woodstock, West of Vietnam," a new one about his year as a teacher in Africa. Tom talks about this song in his blog, and he told us almost the same story:
"I went to Nigeria, and came of age in the market places and bars of Ibadan, while the U.S. was landing a man on the moon. I was carving wood and musical dreams. It was a world of mosquito nets and oil burning motorbikes and cook fires and Ibeji carvings. And guns. It all went down… East of Woodstock, West of Viet Nam."
He played a few more songs, "Stealing Electricity" and "Tonight We Ride," then took a break. He walked off stage. And his wife Nadine who had been watching the show from behind the bar came out and started selling T-shirts, CD's and books. I wanted to buy the new Tom Russell & Ian Tyson DVD but she only brought two copies and I didn't get there fast enough. I picked up the last copy she had of Tom's book Tough Company: A collection of letters from Charles Bukowski (2008). I also bought a Tom Russell Band Live CD, called Lost Angels of Lyon, Live: 1989 Lyon, France (out of print).
I talked to some really nice people. I talked to two wonderful girls. A mother and a daughter who were both huge Tom Russell fans. The daughter was only seventeen years old, and she had been listening to Tom since forever. She knew all the songs, and she wanted Tom to play "Blue Wing." Tom walked back on stage, and the first song he sang was "Blue Wing." We all sang along together. I didn't bother to return for my beer and my seat. I was standing in front. I yelled out for "Woodrow." Tom played it. He talked about Woody teaching Ramblin' Jack Elliot to play guitar, and how Ramblin' Jack (who was the best man at Tom's wedding) would stay up all night at Woody's place at Mermaid Avenue. They'd drink and play some guitar. And Woody would stagger off to bed while the kids got up and got ready for school. I sang along to the song. I thanked Tom when it was over.
Tom was in a great mood, and he joked with the audience. He kept calling us "you bastards!" He asked for a Redbull, "it's illegal here, right?" The bartender said, "it's legal now!" "Fuck it then! I was backstage doing meth for twenty minutes," Tom said in his "macho voice."
"You bastards better not try something, or I'll kick some ass up here!"
He wanted to play "Grapevine," but he couldn't remember it. Instead he took a request and played "Spanish Burgundy." Tom didn't forget anything else though. He played the new song "Santa Ana Wind" inspired by Joan Didion. He played "Walking On The Moon" and everybody sang along. Tom and Martin almost burned the house down with "Out in California," and let us cool down with another song he wrote with Dave Alvin called "California Snow."
He played a few more new songs and ended the show with "Gallo Del Cielo" and "Halley's Comet." He rocked the place. It was spectacular, people stomped their feet, clapped along, yelled the lyrics back at him and Crazy Carl was up on stage doing some fucking fire trick with some flammable paper that you can buy at magic shops (he showed us before the show) that he used to do back in his DJ days. It was crazy.
I went up to Tom right after the show. He looked at me and smiled, "Where is your brother? And which one are you again?" I told him I was Jan, and he told me it was great to see me again. I said that Knut had given me something for him to sign. I took out the limited edition of the Tonight We Ride EP, and Tom said, "Wow, you guys." He signed it, and told me to give my best regards to Knut and that he hoped Knut could come next time.
"I'm coming back next year," he said. I told him we'd be there. He singed my Bukowski book, and I showed him my camera and said, "I'd love to get a picture." He reached down his hand and said "get up here, you bastard!" He pulled me on the stage and put his arms around me. He told his wife, "This is Jan, he has a twin brother, they know ALL my songs." She smiled. And Tom shook my hand again and told me to come out next time.
I wanted to stay. I wanted to ask him about Bukowski, Dave Van Ronk, about Cormac McCarthy, Peckinpah, Dylan, film noir, Edward Abbey. But there wasn't time. More CD's to sign, more people to talk to. Maybe next time. I was happy, Tom remember me. That was enough for now. I didn't want to impose.
I found Frode, who had spent a lot of time trying to get away from Crazy Carl, but with no luck. He enjoyed the show, but got a little distracted by Crazy Carl, the ex-DJ turned magician. We said goodbye to some of the fans, I met the mother and daughter outside. We talked for a few minutes. Everybody was pleased. We could have talked for hours and maybe waited for Tom outside. We could have painted the town, but Frode and I talked our way back to the hotel. It was hot as hell, April 30 had turned into May 1st, International Workers Day. Everybody was drunk. A farm kid and a suburban kid seeking shelter. Keeping to the shadows, I kept thinking about Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, I was on guard. I could feel it. The tiger's were out tonight.
Video from that night's show in Oslo, with a wonderful crowd sing-along. "Walking on the Moon"
I have a lot of crap going on this week, including the fact that I haven't done my lousy taxes yet (due April 30 in Canada), so I don't have a ton of time to blog. Here is a review of the Bob Dylan biopic I'm Not There that I wrote after seeing it at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2007. I watched this film again last Saturday night, and I like it more every time I see it. I wonder if Bob has ever seen it?
I caught the second screening of I'm Not There, the biopic of Bob Dylan directed by Todd Haynes, at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 14, 2007. It gave me a huge headache. Not the film exactly, but from the venue. To accommodate the large audience, I'm Not There was screened in a ~700 person lecture hall at Ryerson University. I was in line to get in to the sold out show a half hour early, but apparently not early enough. I had to sit in the 4th row from the front, and by the time hour two rolled around, my back and neck were killing me and my eyes hurt from being so close. Being a lecture hall, there was no reclining seating that the theatre industry has spoiled me with for the last decade. Plus, no vending! GASP! No popcorn! And, the screening was at 12:30 pm so I came to the screening directly from work, and I didn't get lunch and was very hungry.
Crappy venue aside, the film is pretty amazing (even though I was tuning out during the last half hour). The acting is superb. Cate Blanchett is astonishing! She should be a shoo-in for Best Actress this year (Edit: she didn't win!). Christian Bale is amazing too - didn't recognize him at first - as is the 11-year-old Marcus Carl Franklin. Mr. Franklin has quite an acting career ahead of him. And, you get to see Heath Ledger (mostly) naked, so what's not to like?
Its definitely an artsy-fartsy movie, very non-linear and not for the average joe-blow American/Canadian. I tried to imagine my conservative, small-town-America father, who is a 'Nam vet and a graduate of the college class of '69, watching this movie without being completely confused. I can hear him saying, "What is this crap? I don't get it." However, Dylan fans will love it. Non-Dylan fans who appreciate film as an art form will really dig it too. But it is long. Although, in retrospect, I am wondering if my perception of its length was due to my bad seat. I mean, I sat through three hours of Lord of the friggin Rings with no complaints.
The Characters (in rough order of appearance in the film, although the characters do jump around in time and some characters overlap):
1) Marcus Carl Franklin – "Woody Guthrie" – 1959, 11 year old boy, film shot in color. Metaphor for Dylan's early life on how he started to learn how the world really worked, and how he started to form ideas and transfer these thoughts to song. Woody, originally from the fictional town of Riddle, Missouri, is hopping trains with hobos and traveling around the country. Very moving scene where he visits the real ailing Woody Guthrie in the hospital and strums guitar for him.
2) Ben Wishaw – "Arthur" – 19 year old Dylan, early 1960s, shot in black and white. Smallest role. Dylan as a young, rebellious, somewhat naive poet. Its only him and some cigarettes on the screen. Like he is being interviewed or interrogated. Sort of narrates the film, but not really.
3) Heath Ledger – "Robbie Clark" – Dylan from circa 1964 to 1977, mostly focusing on his personal life and marriage to "Claire" (played by Charlotte Gainsborough), a very loose interpretation of Sara Lowlands and probably an amalgamation of other women in Dylan's life. Shot in grainy color to reflect the time period. "Robbie Clark" is a famous actor and actually plays "Jack Rollins" (Christian Bale's Dylan) in one of his film roles. Actor as a metaphor for the perils of fame. Robbie is constantly away from his family working (touring?) on film productions, and has many extra-marital flings while on the "road." Robbie and Claire's rocky relationship and marital problems are mirrored by the Vietnam war.
4) Christian Bale – "Jack Rollins" – Dylan from 1961-62 and jumps to his conversion to Christianity (~1974). 60s "footage" is in black and white, 70s "footage" is in grainy color like above, while the present day is in color. Told from the perspective of a present day documentary reflected through the eyes of people who knew him "back then." Notably, Julianne Moore plays the character "Alice Fabian" who is a present day Joan Baez. 1970s evangelist Rollins is awesome.
5) Cate Blanchett – "Jude Quin" – when Dylan goes electric in 1965-66. Black and white. Best impression of Dylan as he is classically known (big hair, sunglasses, wears all black). How he deals with the backlash of going electric at the "New England Folk Festival." Follows his drug use and his fighting with the press, especially the BBC. Hysterical scene of implied drug use with the Beatles. Blanchett just nails his mannerisms and quirkiness. Michelle Williams plays the fashionable blond Coco Rivington, who is a metaphor for Edie Sedgwick . Another hysterical scene with drugged-up Dylan and Alan Ginsberg (played by David Cross), dancing around a ten foot crucifix, and Dylan yells at the stone Jesus, "Play your old stuff!" The segment ends with Dylan's infamous motorcycle crash.
6) Richard Gere – "William 'Billy' McMaster" – grizzled, late in life, maybe takes place back in the late 50s? Color. Reclusive "Billy the Kid," who takes on "Commissioner Garrett" who wants to plow over his town of Riddle, Missouri, to build a superhighway. He meets young "Woody Guthrie" (Franklin) who begs him to take on Garrett. Garrett is also a metaphor for all of the reporters who have hounded Dylan for most of his life. Billy argues with Garrett, and ultimately loses, but he realizes that there are still things worth fighting for. He hops a train, finds his guitar, and keeps on keepin' on. The movie comes full circle.
The soundtrack looks incredible, and will be released in North America on October 30. The soundtrack consists of most of my favorite rock and Americana bands, indie and otherwise (Eddie Vedder, Iron and Wine, Jeff Tweedy, Willie Nelson, The Hold Steady, among others). Sonic Youth does a bitchin' cover of "I'm Not There" in the ending credits. But, fear not Dylan fans, most of Dylan's originals are intact in the film. I'm Not There opens in New York and Los Angeles on November 21, and in Toronto on November 28. I can't wait to see this film again. Here's to hoping that my initial reaction was entirely due to my bad seat. (Edit: It was!)
Tunes from the soundtrack that appear in the film:
Jim James & Calexico - Goin' to Acapulco.mp3 Fantastic scene in the Richard Gere/Billy segment where singer Jim James of My Morning Jacket sings this song and leads a band (eclectic indie rockers Calexico) during a daunting funeral march.
Richie Havens - Tombstone Blues.mp3 In what what can only be described as casting brilliance, Havens appears in the film playing this song along with young Woody (Franklin).
Stephen Malkmus & The Million Dollar Bashers - Ballad of a Thin Man.mp3 Cate Blanchett/Jude lip syncs to Malkmus for all of his (her?) singing scenes. Awesome. The Million Dollar Bashers serve as a "house band" for the soundtrack. They are a super group consisting of guitarist Lee Ranaldo and drummer Steve Shelly of Sonic Youth, guitarist Nels Kline of Wilco, guitarist Tom Verlaine, keyboardist John Medeski, and bassist Tony Garnier (Bob Dylan's current bassist).
John Doe - Pressing On.mp3 Christian Bale/Jack lip syncs to Doe for his "born again" scene. Also Awesome.
I had a better Christmas than you did because I got the new Bob Dylan bootleg CD in my stocking! This CD is blowing my mind - how can someone maintain such a high quality of song writing for nearly five decades? One track that really stands out to me is "Most of the Time." I first heard this song on the High Fidelity soundtrack, and I immediately loved it. This "new" version is stripped down, without producer Daniel Lanois's "swamp murk." (quote taken from the liner notes written by Larry "Ratso" Sloman.) Compare....
Note:I was traveling for business last week and could not post do to a crap internet connection at the downtown Marriott in Kansas City. Booo-urns. This should have been posted on Thurs., Nov. 6.
I was feeling all smug about the fact that I found out that Barack Obama had secured enough electoral votes to be the next president of the United States of America from Jon Stewart on Comedy Central, and not some knob like Wolf Blitzer, when my buddy Jackattack one-upped me.
You guys found out from CNN, Jon Stewart, etc. I got you all beat: Bob Dylan told me. I went to his show in MPLS tonight. Bob and the band left after their first set and when they returned he informed the crowd that Obama had won the electoral vote. Then he played "Like a Rolling Stone," "Blowin' in the Wind," and the concert was over. As we spilled out from the auditorium onto a big courtyard at the U. of Minnesota a rally was already underway, complete with chants, drum circles, giggling, screaming, and cellphone photos galore. It was really something. The sense of just...overwhelming joy was so palpable you could almost taste it. And Dylan was pretty good too
Happy US Election Day! I voted absentee in Wisconsin a few weeks ago. I'm assuming that my district received my ballot and promptly threw it in the trash.
Bob is a big fan of polka and Brave Combo.
. Miller was a major force in the music industry from the late 1940s to the early 1960s, serving at the head of A&R for both Mercury and Columbia Records. With Columbia in the 1960s he was responsible for signing and producing many important pop standards. However, he did not like rock and folk music, and he greatly disapproved of Columbia's signing of a certain 1960s folk singer named Bob Dylan.
. I've been super busy this fall, so I haven't been able to fully digest this ablum yet, but overall it is another quality album, along the same lines as 2008's Blame It On Gravity
. Murry Hammond's song "You Were Born to Be in Battle" is especially strong. Is it me, or is Hammond becoming an even better song writer with age?
I was perusing the New York Times today at lunch and I came across an article about country music legend Ralph Stanley. Stanley is best known as a bluegrass artist, or as he calls it, "that old-time mountain music." He is 82-years young and still plays over 100 gigs a year. The NYT article previewed his autobiography, which goes on sale Thursday, October 15. Someone want to get their favorite blogger an early Christmas present???
Mary Travers of the 1960s folk trio Peter, Paul, and Mary passed away this past week from leukemia at age 72. Regular readers of this blog know that I am a huge Bob Dylan fan. However, my first taste of Bobby D. was actually from PP&M. Dylan and PP&M shared a manager, and while PP&M already had a hit with their 1962 rendition of Pete Seeger's "If I had a Hammer," Dylan was still relatively unknown outside of New York City. To quote AllMusic: 
His sense of humor, gift for storytelling and open door kept musicians filing through his studio and kitchen as his sons grew up. He took an interest in the boys' music as another father might his sons' baseball career, even drawing Luther and Cody into his own bands. They last released an album together as Jungle Jim and the Voodoo Tiger in 2006.
My buddy Jan (left, with Tom) posted this on the AltCountryTab.ca forums yesterday and it blew me away. Its possibly the best review I've ever read about anything. He just started his own blog, and I encourage you to check it out here. He is an aficionado of country and folk music, a huge movie fanatic, and a voracious reader. He previously wrote a killer review of a Mark Olson and Gary Louris show in Oslo from December 2008. Here is a reprint of his review of the Tom Russell gig on April 30 in Oslo, Norway.
It's been six years since my brother Knut and I saw Tom Russell play a intimate set at Kafe K in Porsgrunn. That was back in 2003, and Tom had just released Modern Art (2003).
Knut and I showed up with a friend of ours, we brought most of our records, and a stolen copy of Tom's novel Blood Sport for him to sign. Tom was playing with Andrew Hardin back then, and before the show we ran into them on street. We shook hands and talked, and I think Tom was surprised to meet such young fans. Tom put on a great show for us, he sang our requests, talked to us, signed all our records and the out of print copy of Blood Sport, witch I lifted from my high school library. Porsgrunn is nothing but a dirty little factory town in Telemark, but I have such fond memories from that November night back in 2003. That show is really special to me. Since then, I've missed a few chances to see Tom perform, so this time I got my tickets early.
there. Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson referred to Oslo as "the City of Tigers," "Tigerstaden." I like the renaming better, "Tiggerstaden," "The City of Beggars."
Tom didn't waste any time, he went right into "The Pugilist At 59" followed by "Ash Wednesday," both lifted from Love and Fear (2006).
I didn't connect with Tom's album Love And Fear that much, but I loved Hotwalker: Charles Bukowski & A Ballad for Gone (2005).
I think Tom's forthcoming studio album Blood and Candlesmoke (to be released on September 22, 2009) will be a great return to form.
He played a few more songs, "Stealing Electricity" and "Tonight We Ride," then took a break. He walked off stage. And his wife Nadine who had been watching the show from behind the bar came out and started selling T-shirts, CD's and books. I wanted to buy the new Tom Russell & Ian Tyson DVD but she only brought two copies and I didn't get there fast enough. I picked up the last copy she had of Tom's book Tough Company: A collection of letters from Charles Bukowski (2008). I also bought a Tom Russell Band Live CD, called Lost Angels of Lyon, Live: 1989 Lyon, France (out of print).
I have a lot of crap going on this week, including the fact that I haven't done my lousy taxes yet (due April 30 in Canada), so I don't have a ton of time to blog. Here is a review of the Bob Dylan biopic I'm Not There that I wrote after seeing it at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2007. I watched this film again last Saturday night, and I like it more every time I see it. I wonder if Bob has ever seen it?
, I'm Not There DVD (2008)
or High Fidelity Soundtrack (2000)
Happy US Election Day! I voted absentee in Wisconsin a few weeks ago. I'm assuming that my district received my ballot and promptly threw it in the trash.
