Saturday, October 18, 2008

Dreaming of You

For any of you who haven't heard it yet, the new Bob Dylan Bootleg Series Vol. 8 is incredibly good. If it were anybody but Bob Dylan I might say it was shockingly, unbelievably good, but with Dylan I was perfectly prepared to believe that his musical scraps from the past 15 years would be able to fill two CDs with compelling, impeccably arranged performances. I also love the music video for one of the previously unreleased songs, "Dreaming of You", which features Harry Dean Stanton, who I believe is essentially playing the role of Bob Dylan in this video. He looks through scraps of old paper and tapes, listens to old recordings, and reminisces sadly about his career. It almost reads like a lost final chapter of I'm Not There, as sad, old Bob Dylan reflects on all he's been through.



It reminds me of Johnny Cash's final video, for his cover of "Hurt". It's such a similar concept I wonder if the parallel was intentional.



I just hope that Dylan keeps going on for longer than Cash did after making that video. I'd certainly love to be able to hear all the treasures on The Bootleg Series Vol. 9 after another 15 years have gone by.

1 comment:

drischord said...

If it offers any hope, Bob Dylan told Rolling Stone he was "in his middle period" after Modern Times came out.