<\/p>\n
The devout would be forgiven for feeling the Cult of Dylan has lost some exclusivity in recent years. The release of two very hip, very high profile films (plus another, only slightly Masked and Anonymous<\/em> mess) have been only one face of an accessible coolness also marked by the first volume of Dylan’s\u00a0<\/span>Chronicles<\/em> and his remastered catalogue overflowing the racks or virtual racks of your favorite record shop. To that end, however, this new merchandise goes some way toward bridging the distance between Bobcats who may have been at the Free Trade Hall and current undergrads who still find social currency in debating the Electric Question. To be fair, the films and last two volumes of \u2018official bootlegs\u2019 have only helped propogate the false centrality of that early schism, turning attention away from the welcome focus of this week\u2019s Bootleg Series,\u00a0<\/em><\/span>Volume 8: Tell Tale Signs<\/em>\u2014the glory of what the late Edward Said might call Dylan\u2019s \u2018late style\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Thus, for any fans living in a cave since that renaissance began with 1989\u2019s Oh Mercy<\/em>, this set serves the retrospective purpose quite well. More than that, though, it succeeds at dramatizing our hero\u2019s profound resurrection as well as any film. First of all, we have a couple of stand-out covers (Robert Johnson\u2019s \u201832-20 Blues\u2019 and Jimmie Rodgers\u2019 \u2018Miss the Mississippi\u2019) from that transitional period in the late eighties when Dylan was having another of his come-to-Jesus moments, tapping his traditionalist roots in the World Gone Wrong <\/em>sessions. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The story continues then with live cuts and alternate versions drawing out nuances of his revived songcraft that (with all due respect to Daniel Lanois) were lost in some cases in the ethereal production of Oh Mercy<\/em>. The best two songs from that album, \u2018Ring Them Bells\u2019 and \u2018Most of the Time\u2019, are assured their place in posterity by a quite spiritual live take of the former and a solo acoustic take of the latter which hearkens hauntingly back to the mythos of his 60\u2019s albums, complete with harmonica.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n From 1997\u2019s Time Out of Mind<\/em> come a couple of shockingly unreleased masterpieces in \u2018Dreamin\u2019 of You\u2019 and \u2018Red River Shore\u2019, a 7 1\/2 minute epic already sending chills down the collective spine of online fan forums. The double-highlight from the Grammy-winning <\/span>Love and Theft <\/em>(2001) is two priceless versions of \u2018Mississippi\u2019, originally recorded for <\/span>Time Out of Mind.<\/em>\u00a0Both are more low-key heartbreaking than the album version, one of them solo but for Lanois\u2019 sparse noodling.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Although, chronologically speaking, this tale told by Tell Tale Signs<\/em> draws to a poignant close with the inclusion of a couple of alt-takes from 2006\u2019s Modern Times<\/em> and some contributions to the soundtracks of recent films not about Dylan, the fact that these songs aren\u2019t ordered chronologically only emphasizes the forcefulness of this period as a whole, allowing this essential chapter to find its own way into followers from all corners. <\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Once again, since its inception in 1991 with the boxed release of Volumes 1-3, Dylan\u2019s \u2018official bootleg\u2019 series has gone well past trendsetting, with a consistency among outtakes and alt-takes that makes anyone else\u2019s use of the word \u2018vault\u2019 seem quaint.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n – Bootleg Vol. 8: Tell Tale Signs<\/em> <\/strong>is out 7 October in a two-disc (reviewed here) or three-disc version, for anyone needing to prove their faith to Sony by shelling out 100 quid for ‘deluxe’-ness.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The devout would be forgiven for feeling the Cult of Dylan has lost some exclusivity in recent years. The release of two very hip, very high profile films (plus another, only slightly Masked and Anonymous mess) have been only one face of an accessible coolness also marked by the first volume of Dylan’s\u00a0Chronicles and his […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\n