BOB DYLAN : LIVE 1964 - THE BOOTLEG SERIES VOL. 6

BOB DYLAN : LIVE 1964 - THE BOOTLEG SERIES VOL. 6 - CONCERT AT PHILHARMONIC HALL

Disc One (63:49)

The Times They Are A-Changin'
Spanish Harlem Incident
Talking John Birch Paranoid Blues
To Ramona
Who Killed Davey Moore?
Gates Of Eden
If You Gotta Go, Go Now
It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)
I Don't Believe You (She acts like we never have met)
Mr. Tambourine Man
A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall

Disc Two (40:14)

Talking World War III Blues
Don't Think Twice, It's All Right
The Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll
Mama, You've Been On My Mind (with Joan Baez)
Silver Dagger (Joan Baez)
With God On Our Side (with Joan Baez)
It Ain't Me, Babe (with Joan Baez)
All I Really Want To Do

Label : Columbia

Venue : Philharmonic Hall, New York City, New York, USA

Recording Date : October 31, 1964

Release Date : March 30, 2004

Review (AllMusic) : It does seem strange, very strange indeed, to be hearing an official release of this historic concert, which has been available as a bootleg for decades. The Halloween gig at Philharmonic Hall in New York was a special part of the tour for Another Side of Bob Dylan, arguably his greatest acoustic recording. What's more poignant, however, is how it previews the material on Bringing It All Back Home. While the songs on Another Side hinted at things to come, nothing could have prepared audiences for the dreamy surrealism of "Mr. Tambourine Man," or the nightmarish abstract poetry of "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)," and "Gates of Eden" - all of which appear on Disc One. The remainder of the material comes from Dylan's preceding catalog; there are stirring protest and topical songs, folk songs, humorous narratives, love songs, great wisecracks, and talking blues - "Talking John Birch Paranoid Blues!"), most of them classics - "With God on Our Side," "Hard Rain's Gonna Fall," "Times They Are A-Changin'," "Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll," "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright," "Mama You've Been on My Mind," "All I Really Want to Do," "It Ain't Me Babe" - all of these songs and many others (there are 17 in all) are delivered with the confidence of the seasoned performer; a man who knows his audience and how to handle them. It's not cynical, not detached, just masterful. For those unfamiliar with this set, Joan Baez makes an appearance near the end of the show, and duets with Dylan on four cuts including an amazing read of "Silver Dagger." It is true that if you possess the boot, you have all the music here, and chances are, it has some pretty good sound. But you'll need this version, too. For starters, the sound is spectacular, wonderfully warm and immediate, and the transfer is extremely clean with wonderful dynamics. Secondly, the package is deluxe. In addition to a fine essay by Princeton historian and author Sean Wilentz (he made the gig when he was 13), there are a truckload of killer photos from the show and the period, along with complete discographical information that puts the bootleg packages to shame. For those interested in the acoustic Bob Dylan, this concert is like the grail; his voice is in impeccable shape, and his delivery is revelatory. For those interested in the transition from acoustic to electric, this show is the seam, and for those who are die-hard fans, this is another welcome item in the official catalog.

Review (Wikipedia) : The Bootleg Series Vol. 6: Bob Dylan Live 1964, Concert at Philharmonic Hall is a live album by Bob Dylan, released in 2004 on Legacy Records. It is the fourth installment of the ongoing Bob Dylan Bootleg Series. The album is the complete recording from the October 31, 1964 "Halloween" show at Philharmonic Hall in Manhattan by Bob Dylan. The set list was dominated by Dylan's protest songs, including "The Times They Are a-Changin'," "A Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall", and "The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll". Joan Baez, a major supporter of Dylan's in his early career, duets with Dylan on three songs, as well as singing another alone ("Silver Dagger", to which Dylan contributes harmonica). However, Dylan performed these songs alongside early versions of three songs from the soon-to-be-recorded Bringing It All Back Home. New compositions like "It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding)" and "Mr. Tambourine Man" showed Dylan moving in a new direction, becoming more immersed in evocative, stream-of-consciousness lyrics and moving away from social, topical songwriting. Even as he was moving in this new direction, Dylan was still portrayed as a symbol of the civil rights and anti-war movements, and the Halloween concert of 1964 caught Dylan in transition. The album debuted on the Billboard 200 chart on April 17, 2004, at number 28 and spent four weeks on the chart. It also reached number 33 in the U.K. When Dylan and Sony began planning for The Bootleg Series Vol. 6, they were not sure what to release. Steve Berkowitz, an A&R head at Sony Music who worked on all the Bootleg Series discs with Dylan's office, stressed that Dylan's office, not Sony, was behind the brainstorming and decision-making for the Bootleg Series. Concerts held at Carnegie Hall and New York's Town Hall, both in 1963, were considered for The Bootleg Series Vol. 6, according to Berkowitz, but they were ultimately rejected. The Halloween concert of 1964 had been previously bootlegged on vinyl and CD, but those releases were incomplete and taken from poor dubs of the soundboard tapes. The Bootleg Series Vol. 6 presented the entire concert for the first time from the original master tapes. The set was well received by most critics, with NME's Rob Fitzpatrick giving it the magazine's highest rating (a 10 out of 10) and calling it "utterly brilliant". In 2016, the set was reissued by the Audio Fidelity label as "Live 1964", on two 5.1 multi-channel SACDs.