Back when Dylan got saved he put out three gospel cds, "Slow Train Coming", "Saved", and "Shot of Love". None of them recieved much attention and was viewed as a step back from his previous work. Well, fast forward a few decades and no one knows how Dylan leans. That hasn't stopped Columbia Records from compiling this tribute cd. This cd features mainly black gospel artists, so the folky gospel of the origional versions has been replaced.
Track Listing:
Shirley Caesar- Gotta Serve Somebody
Lee Williams & the Spiritual QC's- When You Gonna Wake Up
Dottie Peoples- I Believe In You
Fairfield Four- Are You Ready
Sounds of Blackness- Solid Rock
Aaron Neville- Saving Grace
Helen Baylor- What Can I Do For You?
Chicago Mass Choir- Pressing On
Mighty Clouds of Joy- Saved
Rance Allen- When He Returns
Mavis Staples & Bob Dylan Gonna Change My Way of Thinking
The highlight of the cd is by for the last track, where Mavis Staples and Bob Dylan do a duet. It is the least black sounding song on the cd. For me, my favorite songs are the ones I know best. So all of the ones off of "Slow Train Coming" top my list, however, Fairfield Four give one of the top performances on "Are You Ready".
All of the performances are very solid. Black gospel in general is not a musical genre I prefer listening to at all, so it's hard for me to judge, but these songs sound explosive.
All in all, this is a cd for the fans of that time period for Dylan. Or, if you just want to hear rousing black gospel versions of his songs give it a try. Hardcore fans will want to hear the Bob Dylan and Mavis Staples track.
peace.
Article comments
1 - Rodney Welch
Sounds most interesting. But the first thing that comes to my mind is why no one bothered to cover "Every Grain of Sand," easily the best gospel song Dylan ever wrote and, for me, anyway, one of his best songs, period.
2 - The Theory
maybe they felt incompetent.
peace.
3 - murphy
Oh man!
My hippie Jesus-people parents were SO excited when Dylan got "saved"
They'd given up the devil's music when they joined the church. But now that Dylan was saved, it couldn't be devil's music.
They were SO excited, that my nine-year-old self got a little excited, too.
But then I heard "Slow Train Comin'"
"He's a terrible singer!" i said to my mom.
"Yeah, but that's part of what makes him so good!"
I just didn't get it.
But now, I'm pretty impressed with some of those songs. I know ALL the words.
4 - The Theory
that's awesome.
peace.
5 - Al Barger
Slow Train Coming is way the most underrated Dylan album, even though commercially it was one of his two or three biggest hits. Any even halfway Dylan fan really should have a copy of this.
"Every Grain of Sand" may be Dylan's single most underrated song, although "I Believe in You" is right up there. There is a Sinead O'Connor version of "I Believe in You" that could make grown man weep. Look it up.
6 - ClubhouseCancer
Gee, your folks
a) Believe in Jesus and
b) Think Bob Dylan's a bad singer
I'm not sure which is a worse misjudgement, but pardon me if I never want to meet either.
I think "Every Grain of Sand" is one of the more overrated items in Dylanology. "Rags to riches"? "Conscience and good cheer"? "Wintry night"? These are some of the hoariest cliches he's evr put in a song. And the conclusion:
"I am hanging in the balance of the reality of man
Like every sparrow falling, like every grain of sand."
doesn't really parse.
Dylan's got 100 better songs, I think.
7 - The Theory
that is inexcusably rude, cancer. to say something like that to a person about their parents is nauseating.
peace.
8 - ClubhouseCancer
Sorry you're ill.
He brought up his parents, I commented. Thoughts on Dylan?
9 - The Theory
she brought up her parents.
dylan rocks.
peace.
10 - andy
Every Grain of Sand isn't on the album because all the songs are from Saved and Slow Train Coming.
I really don't know why any of the Shot of Love songs weren't on the album other than the fact that a lot of times Shot of Love and Oh Mercy aren't concidered part of his gospel period, even though both are heavily influenced by his Christian faith.
Also, while Dylan audiences were split w/ his gospel material, it's important to note that Slow Train Coming wasn't overlooked, and earned Dylan his first Grammy. Word.
Emmy Lou Harris has a great version of Every Grain of Sand.
Peace
Andy
I think Dylan is a great singer and...
I believe in Christ.
11 - ClubhouseCancer
I'd argue that ALL Dylan is heavily influenced by his faith.
And was that, like, a rule that the songs had to come from those two albums? I've never heard of anyone not considering Shot of Love one of the trilogy of "gospel" albums. It's got "Property of Jesus" and "Every Grain"!
12 - andy
I don't know if it was a "rule". I doubt it. It just happened that all the songs came from the first 2 gospel albums. Maybe it's that those songs transfer into Black Gospel better than Shot of Love's songs, although Shot of Love has a strong gospel rock feel to the album(although not as strong as say, Saved). Some of it probably had to do w/ the tours around those albums too. By the time Shot of Love came out, Dylan was doing his old songs again, not speaking between songs, wearing the sunglasses and whatnot, where as the tours for Saved and Slow Train Coming had a very different feel.
I don't know why they didn't put any songs from Shot of Love on the album, and I agree w/ you that Dylan's faith has influenced all of his works, especially from Slow Train Coming on. Prior to that, you could tell that he was dabbling w/ Biblical themes, but when he made a conversion to Christianity, Biblical themes seem to be much more than just a dabbling.
13 - Rodney Welch
ClubhouseCancer --
Well, you'd probably hate me, too, as well as my parents, but that's entirely up to you.
You are right that "Rags to riches" is a cliche and I guess "wintry night" is, too; I Googled "Conscience and good cheer" and -- as I suspected -- every single hit refers to the lyrics of the song and nothing else, so it can't be a hoary cliche. But if you look at the song and see only those phrases, you just aren't paying attention. Look at that whole verse:
I have gone from rags to riches in the sorrow of the night
In the violence of a summer's dream, in the chill of a wintery light
In the bitter dance of loneliness fading into space
In the broken mirror of innocence on each forgotten face
The LAST thing I'm interested in with this verse is those cliches you cite; what interests me is how the singer goes from rags to riches in the sorrow of the night, in the violence of a summer's dream -- isn't that a great line? -- in this "bitter dance of loneliness" that is fading. And is there a lover of poetry anywhere who wouldn't love to ponder the words "the broken mirror of innocence"? I can see how experience is like a broken mirror, but innocence? What in the world is he talking about -- here, or anywhere in the song?
We don't know, but we can guess. He's standing before God, he's looking at the span of his life, at how things come and go so quickly, how transitory they are, and he feels lonely. He feels afraid, but he also finds comfort in being part of something greater, in being part of a great creation and a great creator.
I think you're just grasping at straws when you say the concluding lines "[don't] really parse." Did you mean rhyme, or scan, possibly? Did you notice they rhymed in the five preceding verses?
There's much more to that song than your pissy little gripes; remember, the title comes from William Blake, and while Dylan may not be comparable to such a genius he is nonetheless a worthy student. What I see in "Every Grain of Sand" is the same thing I see in all of Dylan's best work: rich poetic images and thoughtful abstractions, words that tease and tempt and make you think about what they mean.
P.S. I failed to mention yesterday that Shot of Love has another great song on it: "The Groom's Still Waiting at the Altar."
14 - andy
Groom was added to the album later. It wasn't originally on Shot of Love.
15 - Rodney Welch
Andy,
It wasn't on the original album, correct -- but incidentally it was always on the studio cassette tape, kind of as a bonus track.
16 - andy
that's interesting! I never knew that. I heard the song from I think Bootleg 1-3, then when I got Shot of Love on disc, I was suprised to see it on the cd.
17 - Rodney Welch
On the OTHER hand ... let me add here that Shot of Love also has what to my mind is the worst Dylan song ever: "Lenny Bruce." It's kinda like "Joey" from Desire, in a way; Dylan deifying some pop hero of his. Dylan is never all that good at writing songs that look up to real people, past or present.
18 - ClubhouseCancer
Well, one may not think that the cliches I cited are important, but they are included in the song. Even if one chooses to ignore them, that doesn't make them good lines.
I meant that the last part doesn't parse, ie that the words don't work together grammatically in a way that makes sense.
"Hanging in the balance of the reality of man" isn't really evocative. It's just vague, although it sounds profound. I'm not sure Dylan really knew exactly what he was talking about here.
The mirror part is great, and you hit on a reason why: It's really an original image that anchors the ideas in real experience (unlike "hanging in the balance of the reality of man") and it takes the lyric beyond its obvious sources in the Songs of Innocence and in Whitman â€" both took them from the Gospels. Why indeed does the broken mirror represent "innocence" rather than the expected "experience?"
This a nuanced, multi-level comment on Blake and on the song's central conceit. I wish the whole song worked together like that.
The "whole world in a grain of sand" idea is not a new one, but it's got great resonance in literature, religion, and especially science. In a way, it's the metaphorical basis for Rutherford and the modern theory of the molecule. But Dalton, Rutherford, and Blake, Whitman, et al, all brought rich new ideas to the table, ideas that I don't really find in the Dylan song.
But that's just me.
I think Dylan's a huge, huge figure, as important as anybody, but looking at his work uncritically or overlooking its imperfections doesn't seem to me to improve his stature.
No one's perfect.
Love rules
19 - ClubhouseCancer
And "Groom " is weird and hilarious. The mix of apocalytpic imagery and jokes about Claudette is just plain odd. And the music sounds kinda like the Stones.
20 - Antixity
"Broken mirror of innocence" seems to me to be a pretty clear and accurate description of the state of fallen man. Man's goal is to fix the mirror so that he can reflect God's image (in which we were made) as a whole, rather than as a jumbled mess of diffused light. What astounds me is how deep and incisive an understanding of Christian theology Dylan grasps in this song; if I didn't know better, I would say he had converted to Orthodox Christianity. I have a great respect for the theology of this ancient tradition, and Dylan has a similar way of getting to the deepest core of the problem with humanity.
21 - Rockin Rev
Not only do I believe in Jesus, I have a personal relationship with Him. In fact, through Him, I have abundant life. Now to Dylan; it is astounding how a white jewish boy can write such great black gospel. And, not only write it, but get the truth 100% right. He's a voice crying in the wilderness.