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 Better with age September 11, 2006
14 out of 16 found this review helpful
For some reason I have always had a love/hate relationship with Bob Dylan and I really don't know why. Maybe it was his disregard for smooth, high-fidelity recordings that I always preferred in all genres that put me off. But the older I get the more I find I love his music more and more. While not quite as hypnotic and intoxicating as "Highway 61 Revisited," this album still pulls me into a world that intrigues and fascinates. His phrasing and his carnival-like lyrics leave me shaking my head in awe and I feel like I missed out on so much by not paying better attention to him in the decades before. Alas, I figure better late than never and I was happy to add this to my collection. Please do the same. You'll thank me someday.
 The Ultimate Bob Dylan Album September 24, 2005
12 out of 12 found this review helpful
For me, Blonde On Blonde is the essential, ultimate Bob Dylan album. Not necessarily his greatest, that would be Blood on the Tracks, but Blonde On Blonde is the album that really sums up who Bob Dylan is as a singer, songwriter and musician. With this one, he laid it all out for everyone to see, then went in a completely different direction for his next album, John Wesley Harding. Fans were shocked, but really that's the only thing he could have done. How could he have topped an album like Blonde On Blonde? Over 70 minutes of musical bliss. This is the album that I would recommend most to Dylan newcomers to become acquainted with the master at the peak of his powers. However, it's a long rambling record. Newcomers might be intimidated by the length of the record.
Perhaps I'm so in love with Blonde On Blonde because it was my first Dylan album, and the one that made me fall in love with his music. Listening to it, I'm reminded of years ago when I first heard it and every song was a revelation to me. I'd never heard anything like it. Most of the record is a raucous, rocking good time. The music is great, electric guitars and organ everywhere. It's probably not Dylan's finest musically. In fact, in a lot of the songs seem to sound kind of the same, but the music always compliments the lyrics and singing very well.
The songs:
1. Rainy Day Women #12 And 35 - Definitely my least favorite song on the album. I don't hate it, but it just doesn't compare to what follows. It makes me think of high school stoners who only know Bob Dylan as the guy who sings "Everybody must get stoned".
2. Pledging My Time - A fine blues track. I always enjoy Dylan's forays into blues and this is a great example of Dylan's mastery of the blues.
3. Visions Of Johanna - The best song on the album and one of Dylan's best songs ever. This song just blows me away. Some of Dylan's greatest and most memorable lines are here in this excellent song. "Name me someone that's not a parasite and I'll go out and say a prayer for him".
4. One Of Us Must Know (Sooner Or Later) - A change of pace. A slower, almost confessional song. Not nearly as extravagant lyrically as the rest of the album.
5. I Want You - A pseudo-love-song. More surrealist imagery which has little to do with the romantic longing of the chorus. Great song, though.
6. Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again - One of my favorite songs on the album. Some of Dylan's best lyrics, which would have fit right in on Highway 61 Revisited.
7. Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat - Bluesy rocker with quite humorous lyrics. One of the more memorable songs from the album.
8. Just Like A Woman - One of the album's hits. This is a wonderful song that has been covered many times by many different artists.
9. Most Likely You Go Your Way And I'll Go Mine - A bitter kiss off to a friend or lover turns into this upbeat, lively song. Not one of the best, but very listenable.
10. Temporary Like Achilles - Dylan slows things down with this countryish ballad. Probably the only country song ever to contain "Achilles" in the title.
11. Absolutely Sweet Marie - Another upbeat rocker with prominent organ and guitar. Very nice.
12. 4th Time Around - One of my favorites on the album. Supposedly a parody of John Lennon's "Norwegian Wood". I love the lyrics and the melody is nice too.
13. Obviously 5 Believers - Another blues song. Pretty simple lyrically, but quite good. Great harmonica and guitar.
14. Sad-Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands - Epic ballad devoted to Dylan's girlfriend/wife, Sara. It's very long, but it's an amazing song. One of his best.
That sums it up. If you're new to Dylan, you need this album. Your Dylan education begins right here. Dig in and enjoy.
By the way, excellent live versions of some of these songs can be found on the Bootleg Series, Volume 4 - Live 1966 CD. Great performances of Visions of Johanna, 4th Time Around, Just Like A Woman, and Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat are featured on that landmark concert recording, which is also recommended.
I'm just sitting here beating on my trumpet. September 2, 2006
12 out of 12 found this review helpful
Blonde on Blonde is Dylan's absolute masterpiece. The two-record set featured the stoned celebration of "Rainy Day Women #12 & 35" and the sweetly engaging "I Want You", but it was for it's ballads--"Visions of Johanna", "Just Like a Woman" and the side-long "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands"--that he drew forth the most dense, hypnotic music of his career, and poetry that overflowed not only with hypnotic wordplay but a depth of mood that language can rarely convey. Played by guitarist Robbie Robertson, the future leader of the Band, as well as by a group of ace Nashville studio musicians, the songs were hardly country songs, but the recording milieu certainly was--and it suggested the next turn Dylan might take.
 Blob On Blob January 14, 2007
9 out of 32 found this review helpful
From the very beginning, Bob Dylan's army of apologists described his voice as "an acquired taste." Well, I began collecting Mr. Zimmerman in 1967 so I've had time, and I can only report that today, it is every bit as unlistenable as it was forty years ago. One could, I suppose, acquire a taste for bashing your hand with a ball peen hammer if you were so inclined - but life is short.
Dylan is admirable in two respects and two respects only, as a poet and as a songwriter. As a poet he is without peer, able to balance exotic, jarring imagery with powerful, direct emotionality. His talent as a songwriter is almost as great - just recall the Hendrix cover of Watchtower. Many an artist has found his or her own voice, and his or her own truth, in the chords and words arranged by Mr. Zimmerman.
Unfortunately, this is where the good news ends. As a musician he is just another guy strumming the guitar - at best. His harmonica playing is downright embarrassing. We have already covered what is often referred to as his singing. So it is my sad duty to deconstruct this sacred cow, Blonde On Blonde, which astonishingly appears on the Rolling Stone list of 100 top albums of all time.
Rainy Day Women. Try listening to this sometime when you're not drunk - it's funny once. Pledging My Time - an average blues. Visions of Johanna - better read than heard. One Of Us Must Know - great song, would have liked to hear someone else perform it. I Want You - ditto - really a great song. Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again - almost an anthem - superb writing - Dylan's voice less awful than usual here. Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat - funny once. Just Like A Woman - superb song, has been covered very well by actual singers. Most Likely You Go Your Way And I'll Go Mine - standard fare. Temporary Like Achilles - excellent writing. Absolutely Sweet Marie - catchy, nice writing. 4th Time Around - pleasant but feels like filler. Obviously Believers - routine blues. Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands - wow - what a stinker - unlistenable and interminable.
Dylan slipped in under the radar during an era when being an iconoclast was fashionable, and kids paid careful attention to lyrics. His writing was so good, he got to stick around, and gradually his woeful limitations as a performer became a comfortably familiar part of the landscape. It's probably for the best, after all, who actually reads poetry anymore? I'm told that T.S. Eliot wasn't much of a singer either.
That wild mercury sound December 9, 2004
8 out of 8 found this review helpful
Everyone of a certain age remembers the double album with its gatefold sleeve of a slightly blurred Dylan in double-buttoned winter coat and scarf, and side 4 exclusively devoted to the marvellously melancholic Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands, perfect on repeat-play for hung-over Sunday mornings, unhurried and timeless, ending with a harmonica solo that slowly and statuesquely faded away.
The CD version was disappointingly butchered with many of the running times noticeably truncated to fit onto a single disc. Just Like A Woman unbelievably faded out instead of ending, and Sad Eyed Lady Of The Lowlands sacrilegiously lost a vital 30 seconds at its conclusion.
When the Bob Dylan Reissue Series reached Blonde On Blonde these anomalies were thankfully minimized, and the total playing time on this edition is upped to 73.03 (compared to 71.31 on the earlier edition), and the overall sound has been significantly upgraded, making this finally worthy of replacing the rather worn vinyl copy in your collection.
This album, recorded between January and March 1966 in Nashville, is after all one of Bob Dylan's most vital, the one about which he said, "The closest I ever got to the sound I hear in my mind was on individual bands in the Blonde On Blonde album. It's that thin, that wild mercury sound. It's metallic and bright gold, with whatever that conjures up. That's my particular sound."
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