Expecting Rain

Saved: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8s-7TXD7 ... ure=relmfu


Shot of Love is by far my favorite album of the three, even the weaker songs have wormed their way into my heart. Great outtakes, too!

In the Garden:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pRDrZajE ... re=related

Powerful Stuff!

I think Chronicles III should be a release of the Gospel Trilogy with a book written by Bob about his theology and what he was thinking during this period. He could provide some explanations of songs like Lenny Bruce and Property of Jesus being on the same album. Maybe even discuss why he left Ain't Gonna Go to Hell for Anybody and Ain't No man Righteous (No Not One) off.


I know I'd buy it...

I imagine the book Bob Dylan´s Theology - at least 500 sides and with his own illustrations - yes, I want to dream about it....There must be a lot of songs just being left - like this one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYuSG7HUBr4

i really liked SOL when it came out. The album sounds less tight on the message and delivery, a bit more open in its approach. There is a good sense of joy to the whole thing, unlike the previous 2 albums.On the road to recovery, i'd say.
btw, have you been...reading...too much...Celine...(3 dots..?)

You might've completely missed the sarcasm in the song, although the whole thing sounds uplifting.

those were disco records, the Christianity was to disguise the fact, and I like them

No, no! The sarcasm is precisely what makes the song so entertaining. It's sneering Bob at his blistering, contemptuous best.

Untrodden path, Bob's theology seems (or seemed) pretty straight-up to me. Jesus is The Way and there is no other path to salvation or redemption. You cannot be saved by works; even your own moral conscience itself is 'vile and depraved.' We're thus called to completely surrender the self to Christ. This is straight, undiluted evangelical Christianity reaching right back to Martin Luther. What I like about Bob's gospel period is that he's not feeding you dogmatic formulae per se, he's conveying the experience of living in those beliefs. This is what it's like, these songs seem to say, to live in this world of salvation and damnation, of escatology, of dramatic personal and human redemption by divine grace. Bob's songs have always had that quality of opening up their own worlds; while not everyone is interested in the Christian world made available on these particular records, that he succeeds in opening up these landscapes for us to wander in is hard to deny. He lays it powerfully out there, if you want it.

I like the trilogy. It's not his best songwriting, but there are plenty of gems all the way through. It's strongly held together by the themes that run through it, and its sung and performed with passion and commitment.

Most of his later 80's albums seemed to be made out of habit, rather than with any real direction, but there is a clear sense of focus and purpose to what he's doing on the Christian records.

Dylan wanted to release Saved as a live album, but Sony refused. Some of the performances from 1979 and early 80 of those songs are awesome in the true sense of the word. When he got into the studio, somehow the magic left him and Saved is a leaden album. Shot of Love I like and wouldn't dismiss Lenny Bruce as dross... here's this guy who's supposed to be a Christian singing about a maverick like Bruce. It's lovely stuff & funny too. Again, Deadman, Deadman as a performance is streets ahead of the insipid album version.

I like all 3 records.
Saved is my favourite of the three; some great songs - I would have liked Aint Gonna go to Hell and Coverdown to make the record.
Shot of Love is terrific (even in the old vinyl format without "groom"). I like the variety of this record. There are some great lines as well - "Nightclubs of the broken-hearted; stadiums of the damned".

Pass Me Not O Gentle Saviour, 1999. He did that for awhile amongst other covers. I wouldn't argue if he added stuff similar to this to the set lists again.

I'd buy it too, but I ain't holding my breath.

Jim,
I would like to know if you have listen to the album "street legal" ? and what do you think about it and Bob in this one ?
After you will answer me, i will try to convince you

mental illness and art, for that matter, sheesh

I've grown to really enjoy that nasty final track on Saved; it absolutely kicks the snot out of Slow Train, Knopfler notwithstanding; Dylan at his most incorrigible

From the big harp solo in What Can I Do For You right through to the end Saved just ramps.

Actually that's another one that I haven't listened to alot. What I can say is that I steered clear of '80's Dylan but because of the controversies that that period inspires here I decided to check out Street Legal. It was awhile ago but I quite liked Senor and Where Are You Tonight Have to give it another listen.

[quote="jimb727"]
Actually that's another one that I haven't listened to alot. What I can say is that I steered clear of '80's Dylan but because of the controversies that that period inspires here I decided to check out Street Legal. It was awhile ago but I quite liked Senor and Where Are You Tonight Have to give it another listen.

Well, if it is possible (and if you want), could you listen, in this order : "Blood on the tracks" (my favorite album), "Desire" and "street legal" ? It's MY trilogy ! And say to me, what do you see identical between them, the common point. Take you time for that. It's Bob's birthday
To be continued...

"Street-Legal" is my second favorite album of his, I really get the feeling that he's fighting with inner demons when I listen to it, and it always holds my attention; has some of his most extravagant, juiciest writing as well.

Yeah, Street Legal is a great album... hugely under-rated... and, I alway's consider it to be the musical peer of Planet Waves... those two albums fit together perfectly.

Stunning albums with stunning songs.

^ Pair that Pair with Infidels and Empire Burlesque and you have yourselves a Love Quartet! but let's save this juicy stuff for the non christian trilogy, non rut thread. coming soon!

I`ve always thought of Planet Waves, Blood On The Tracks and Desire as a kind of trilogy - a lot of the songs concern different stages of his relationship with Sara - and Street Legal I think of as a bridge from that trilogy to the Christian trilogy.

4 records in a row that start with "S" - that's one more than a trilogy (probably a quadra something) and I think Dylan once said he wanted to title the next one "Sinners" or "Savages" or something like that until he realized it would be the fifth straight, thus becoming Infidels!

Part 5 of the increasingly improbable trilogy, as Douglas Adams would have put it.

Should have embraced the album's dichotomous nature and called it Shitastic