Review by Jim Maynard
I can die happy now... I finally got to hear Bob Dylan perform Blind
Willie McTell in Memphis! I¹m so glad I got tickets for the Tuesday (May
25 ) show at the Memphis Orpheum instead of the Monday tickets. This was
about my 15th or so Dylan concert (I lost count), thankfully Bob comes
through or near Memphis regularly, but something tells me this may be my
last one. You never know... I was especially happy to finally get to see
Dylan in The Orpheum, the last few times were the baseball field shows
with Willie Nelson, which were just not as intimate as a good
auditorium/theatre show. (My favorite Dylan concerts were my first one
back in 1992 at the Robinson auditorium in Little Rock, and in 1999 at the
New Daisy, a small club down from the Orpheum near Belle Street in
Memphis.) The Orpheum was not quite as intimate as the New Daisy, and I
had gallery seats which they ³upgraded² to row F Balcony seats. The
Orpheum in Memphis is a beautiful renovated/remodeled old theatre.
I hoped the sound would be good for a Dylan concert, but it was not as
good as I hoped. Lots of cave/echo sounds up in the balcony which made
some of the harder songs, when Bob strains his ragged voice to its limits,
hard to make out. Things started out pretty rough with Most Likely You Go
Your Way (not one of my favorites). But he shown on the slower songs,
displaying a still powerful/expressive voice on Mr. Tambourine Man,
Masters of War (a great version, slow, he enunciated every word and
syllable with his deep baritone voice‹and I yelled ³Impeach Bush² at the
end, hope it makes it on the tapes:), The Lonesome Death of Hattie
Carroll (another of my wish-list songs, and a standout for me). It took
me a few minutes to recognize Down Along the Cove (the band cooked and
jammed) and This Wheel¹s On Fire.
Of course he and the band rocked on High Water and Summer Days.
The highlight for me (next to Hattie Carroll, one of my favorite Dylan
songs that makes me eyes water up every time), was Blind Willie McTell!
Bob always skips this song in Memphis, until tonight! Dylan sung the song
slow and put a long of effort into singing the lyrics, and the band gave
it smoking and simmering arrangement.
Dylan played a lot of harmonica, particularly on the end of the first few
songs. And his keyboard was a little louder in the mix and he actually
plays some synthesizer stuff.
And the light show was interesting. Not Pink Floyd, but it was the most
light show I¹ve seen at a Dylan show, not too much, but perfectly matched
the music and songs...
Sometimes Dylan concerts are memorable for what happens off stage. A
couple of elderly couples sat nearby, surrounded by mostly younger folks
and a few stoners and some on harder stuff.. One guy fell behind me and
bashed his head open on the cement stairs, which broke my concentration on
Dylan for a bit... One elderly couple was really into the show, swaying
even to the hard rock thunderous Like a Rolling Stone and All Along the
Watchtower (which seems to get louder, harder and more Hendrix-like every
time I hear it), and this is one Dylan song regular I never get tired of,
a perfect way to end every concert. I was thinking the older folks were a
little too old for this song, until I realized they were probably about
Dylan¹s age!
All in all, another very good Dylan concert, probably my last, but I got
want I wanted. Hattie Carroll and Blind Willie were worth the price of my
tickets!
--------
Oh, Merle Haggard was pretty good too, I¹m not a big country music fan and
not too familiar with his work, but I can see some similarities between
him and Dylan. They are both outside the mainstream of their respective
musical fields (rock/country), Merle said in an interview here that he
quit listening to country music and hated the new video-oriented country
music. I really liked ³Are the Good Time Really Over² song, when he
mentioned Nixon lying to us on TV and I yelled out ³& Bush!² He¹s no fan
of Bush either, which he has made clear. He sing some of his ³patriotic²
songs with a tongue in his check, like when he stopped the song at
³remember when a Joint was a bad place to be..² backed up and changed it
to ³was a good place to be.² And I¹m sure when he wrote ³Okie From
Muskogee² was probably smoking a joint :)
--
Jim Maynard
Email jmaynard2@earthlink.net
Web Page http://home.earthlink.net/~jmaynard2
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