The Bootleg Series Vol. 5: Bob Dylan Live 1975 - The Rolling Thunder Revue

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Bob Dylan

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This fifth entry in Dylan's much hailed Bootleg Series chronicles the his legendary carnival like 1975 tour, the Rolling Thunder Revue. Legend says that Dylan wanted to do something fresh so he got together a new group of people, some new and some old, and set out to re-invent himself with new energy and purpose. This set, which was taken from shows in the early parts of the tour, displays Dylan at some of his most free and open, feeding off his assembled band.

Once of Dylan's best qualities is the fact that no matter how old, new, bland, or ballsy a song of his is, he has the power to change it to be whatever he wants it to be. He can re-invent everything from the mood to lyrics without making the song any less powerful. Anyone who has seen him on tour lately can attest to that and it's just as obvious here.

Featuring some, at that time, new material the tour had to be a treat for fans because I can't imagine the songs can sound anymore passionate than they do on the record. A good bunch of songs that ended up on the 'Desire' record (which I do not yet have) are quite spectacular. Many thanks to the splendid violin work of Scarlett Rivera, which adds some extra flavor to already great songs. "Isis" is Dylan at his most passionate, "Sara" at his most open, and "Hurricane" at his most political.

Songs like "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue" and "Love Minus Zero/No Limit" are that much more touching with Dylan injecting spirit into them with his voice being in top form. "Tangled Up in Blue" can stand side by side with it's studio counterpart, this time Dylan's coming across even more personally part of the song. "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" is even more tense and dramatic here than the original with Roger McGuinn of Byrds fame lending a hand.

Folk singer Joan Baez contributes vocals to a couple of tunes and her vocal performance is the perfect compliment to Dylan's rough voice. Being an old friend of Dylan, she fits naturally into songs from his early career like the classic "Blowing in the Wind" and one of his more well known unofficially released tracks "Mama, You Been on My Mind".

Although bootlegged many times over, this will easily stand as the definitive issue from the legendary Rolling Thunder Revue. A treat for Dylan's newest fans and longtime fanatics alike, it captures the freewheeling, loose feeling that the tour was supposed to be all about. One only can hope Columbia keeps pushing these Bootleg Series releases out as they've been nothing but universally hailed as worthy releases (a sixth one is already slated for next year). The 2 video and one audio bonus DVD adds that much more to the set, allowing the viewer to grasp the collective feel the tour was about as well as getting a glimpse of Dylan in one of his more unique looks with his mysterious white face paint.

It's amazing how people from Columbia never could dig what Dylan fans really want. This is probably among the reasons for all these bootlegs around Dylan's material. With an exemption of "Before the flood" they've never released a live album of any relation to what was going on at concert.

Anyway, to release 1975 Rolling Thunder, probably one of Dylan's most creative periods with 20 minutes left on each disk, but without "Never let me go", one of the best Dylan covers ever, is simply ridicilous. Just proves the point that they are incapable of appreciating artist's real talents.

Anyway, it's a must for any Dylan collection, just being annoying that you still have to grab a boot or 2 to see what was really going down that winter.