Blonde on Blonde - Bob Dylan

Year Released: 1966

Label: Columbia

Year Bought: 2001

"You don't have it? That is perverse! Don't tell anybody you don't own fucking "Blonde on Blonde". It's gonna be okay."

- Barry, High Fidelity

And so, thanks to High Fidelity, I went to HMV on Oxford Street one afternoon in the summer of 2001 and bought Blonde on Blonde.

I already had an early greatest hits collection that spanned Bob Dylan's output up until 1967, but this was my first album by the great man.

Many consider Blonde on Blonde to be the first album - the first time an artist had thought about the coherence of a record as a singular art form, instead of a collection of songs. It is also thought to be the first double album - although the CD version that I have erases that presentation.

Recorded in Nashville by someone who was more at home in New York, Blonde is Blonde is seen as the final record in Dylan's folk rock trilogy - after Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited.

Why does Jack Black's character in High Fidelity think it's perverse not to own this album?

Because it's fucking great. It has Dylan being funny, poetic, cheeky, nonsensical, romantic, free-wheelin', philosophical, optimistic, nihilistic, ambitious, traditional - sometimes all in the same song.

'Rainy Day Women Nos 12 & 35' opens the album, kicking off with a marching band drum evoking the American past, before descending into shouts of "Everybody must get stoned!" Counter-culture meets the establishment in one song. This must have sounded revolutionary to youngsters in 1966.

The album is peppered with tracks like 'Rainy Day Women...' that blend whimsy, humour and wit.

'Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat' is an ode to a garment that "balances on your head just like a mattress balances on a bottle of wine", while "Stuck Inside of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again" has some brilliant lines: "Now the rainman gave me two cures, Then he said, 'Jump right in', The one was Texas medicine, The other was just railroad gin, An’ like a fool I mixed them."

There are some tender moments - 'I Want You', 'Just Like A Woman', 'Visions of Johanna' - as well as a response to The Beatles' 'Norwegian Wood' in the form of '4th Time Around' (Bob Dylan trying to be John Lennon trying to be Bob Dylan, someone said.)

Musically, it's more blues than folk, and bounces along with liberal use of the harmonica, some scratchy guitar solos and a loose feel that gives it energy and warmth.

As you can tell, I love this album. Every time I listen to it, I always wonder why I haven't been listening to it more. To me, it has everything you want from a Bob Dylan record. Yes, it is a long album, clocking in at over 72mins, but I happily get lost in it every time.

10/10

Comments

Franz Ferdinand – Franz Ferdinand

Year Released: 2004 Label: Domino Year Bought: 2004 January 2004. I'd just quit uni. Was back at the family home in Bishop's Stortford. The place I'd been so desperate to get away from, and I was back and already bored. And then things got a bit less boring. I remember this so clearly. I was having a shower and the radio was on, and on came 'Take Me Out'. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. At first I thought it must be an old tune that had passed me by, but no, it was announced as a new song by a band called Franz Ferdinand. It sounded glorious. It sounded interesting. After the staleness of the post-Britpop years, and beigeness of Coldplay, Travis et al, there was actually a British band doing something interesting. I loved it, and when the album came out the next month, I gobbled it up with glee. Listening back now, and I still love it. The hushed opening of 'Jacqueline', the sleaze of 'The Dark of the Matinee', the homoeroticism of 'M...

The Best of David Bowie 1969/1974 – David Bowie

Year Released: 1997 Label: EMI Year Bought: 1999 My love of Bowie started as a wind up. There was a rumour round our school that one of the French teachers used to go out with Bowie, so as part of my ambition to be a cocky little shit I decided to try to sneak some Bowie song titles into our lessons. "I don't understand how this verb ch-ch-ch-changes, Miss" – that sort of thing. It turned out that not only had she dated him, she was still friends with him, and even had side-of-the-stage tickets when he played Glastonbury in 2000. She might still be the coolest person I've ever known. In my bid to learn some more Bowie tunes I dug out my mum's old vinyls and fell in love with 'Hunky Dory'. For Christmas 1999, my mum got me 2 CDs, this one, which covers 1969/74, and the next one which goes up to 1979. That Christmas, I had them both on repeat as I played FIFA 2000 on the PC (which had a picture of pre-Judas Sol Campbell on the cover). This compilation reall...

Eye To The Telescope – KT Tunstall

Year Released: 2004 Label: Relentless Year Bought: No Idea I'm not sure why I have this record. I have no record of buying it. I've never listened to it. But then I do own two Dido albums so it's not exactly out of character of me to have it. I've always thought KT Tunstall was a pretty cool person. She's clearly talented. But this album, I just can't really connect with it. There's some good tunes on here. 'Black Horse and the Cherry Tree' is great, as is 'Suddenly I See'. 'Another Place To Fall' hints at some darker tones, and 'Under The Weather' builds nicely. But overall it's just all a bit safe. I vaguely remember reading an interview with Tunstall a few years after this came out in which she said the original mix was a lot more rough and bluesy, but the label wanted it more polished. You can definitely hear how this album could have been scuffed up. 'Stopping The Love' is a good example of that. It's a mi...

All The Records I've Ever Owned

Search This Blog