One More Cup of Bobby #4: Shadow Kingdom - Highway 61 Revisited is Revisited Again

Folks that appreciate Bob Dylan will tell you -- it has been a stellar week and keeps getting better. As of today, July 24, 2021, there have been two major Dylan events that stand out in relief:

1) The streaming of a pre-recorded, filmic concert on July 18, 2021, Shadow Kingdom where he reinterpreted some early-career classics.

2) The news that the 16th installation of the Bootleg Series, Springtime in New York, will release on September 17, 2021. This will include outtakes, alternate takes, and live performances from the years 1981-1985 (the albums Shot of Love, Infidels, and Empire Burlesque).

I can't reflect on the full gravity of the second event given I'm waiting like everyone else for the release date of Springtime in New York. However, Shadow Kingdom is itself a fantastic lens into the constant ambition of Dylan to revive material and share it with a willing audience of listeners. It's my hope here to touch upon some aspects of Shadow Kingdom in relation to one album that gave many songs to the concert: Highway 61 Revisited.

First, Shadow Kingdom was originally billed in the trailer as "The Early Songs of Bob Dylan" as the singer croons through a vibrato-laden, mid-tempo, bluesy take on his 1971 single "Watching the River Flow." We are in the midst of a smoky speakeasy, musicians and patrons alike swaying smoothly in black and white video. The complete setlist, with corresponding albums/release years are as follows:

1) "When I Paint My Masterpiece," Cahoots by The Band, (1971)

2) "Most Likely You Go Your Way and I'll Go Mine," John Wesley Harding, (1967)

3) "Queen Jane Approximately," Highway 61 Revisited, (1965)

4) "I'll Be Your Baby Tonight," John Wesley Harding, (1967)

5) "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues," Highway 61 Revisited, (1965)

6) "Tombstone Blues," Highway 61 Revisited, (1965)

7) "To Be Alone with You," Nashville Skyline, (1969)

8) "What Was It You Wanted," Oh Mercy, (1989)

9) "Forever Young," Planet Waves, (1974)

10) "Pledging My Time," Blonde on Blonde, (1966)

11) "The Wicked Messenger," John Wesley Harding, (1967)

12) "Watching the River Flow," Single, (1971)

13) "It's All Over Now Baby Blue," Bringing It All Back Home, (1965)

Dylan firmly stays between the decade from 1965-1975, with all but one song ("What Was It You Wanted) falling in that frame. While it cannot be denied that Shadow Kingdom details one of the most protean, vibrant periods of Dylan's career, there were many unexpected musical choices during the time that alienated listeners (making the country album Nashville Skyline; not attending Woodstock 1969 in favor of The Isle of Wight concert instead; a string of cover albums that didn't meet full expectation). Following the lionized (and lion-maned) Blonde on Blonde (1966) and his motorcycle crash suffered later that year, Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits (1967) was released. Only 6 years after his debut Dylan had a "greatest hits" album -- what a testament to the 26-year-old's achievements. Of course, Dylan was far from done and madly determined to keep up the pace. This he has done and will likely do all the way to the borderline and beyond. By eschewing classics from his first folk-centered albums, Dylan asks us to reconsider from his own perspective what "early songs" meant in the Shadow Kingdom trailer: it is a period of iconoclasm, experimentation, and intimate blues-rock.

For the sake of brevity, I'd like to discuss the three songs he reanimated from Highway 61 Revisited, as they form an equivalent plurality with John Wesley Harding renditions and, undoubtedly, appeal to a wide base of Dylan fans. Besides, it's hard not to be tempted, comparatively speaking, to appreciate how Dylan at 80 performs the rollicking rockin' and rollin' tunes of his 24-year-old self.

"Queen Jane" flashes across the screen. A brief pocket of silence is suddenly filled with the round tones of the double bass and the mezzo piano electric guitar apparently riffing on the motif to the Hallelujah chorus of Handel's Messiah. The spirited acoustic guitar enters with slight pitch bending and palpable verve. As Dylan enters, the ensemble pulls back but does not drop out. Dylan sings the first verse in a grainy, confident voice that, while thin at times, is not weak:

When your mother sends back all your invitations

And your father to your sister he explains

That you’re tired of yourself and all of your creations

Won’t you come see me, Queen Jane?

Won’t you come see me, Queen Jane?

This rendition delivers upon the emotional content of the lyrics in a manner different than the orignal version. Whereas before Dylan's climbing voice and loud articulation projected a kind of wily romance, this is the cool criticism of a welcoming, wise sage who makes an offer rather than a request. "Won't you come see me?"

The delivery is smooth, calm, and entirely personal. Understandably, the harmonica solo that follows the fourth verse in both versions is markedly gentler in delivery. Singing along with the recent version, one feels invested in the unfolding of questionable situations, the emotions of trying to welcome a mysterious Queen while clowns die, roses fade away, and advisers flag in loyalty. There is a subtle change to the lyrics in the fourth verse whereby:

When all of your advisers heave their plastic

At your feet to convince you of your pain

Trying to prove that your conclusions should be more drastic

Won’t you come see me, Queen Jane?

Won’t you come see me, Queen Jane?

Becomes:

And when all of your advisers start to regret you

And you cannot convince them of your pain

And you want someone to protect you

Won’t you come see me, Queen Jane?

Won’t you come see me, Queen Jane?

Whereas before the narrative presents ecologically careless advisers that foist their problems ("their plastic") on Queen Jane and explain away her pain, now we are presented with a situation where Dylan acknowledges that the attempt to tell other people about the pain is failing and that he would offer protection. One might consider the change in lyrics to be a translation of the abiding sentiments in the original, a contemporary take from the vantage of age and in an age where plastic-heaving advisers are no surrealist abstraction, but a painful reality.

Next from the Highway 61 Revisited days is the witty, eminently singable "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues." The video begins focused on a painting of three tangled ships and fades softly to show Dylan in the far foreground, some dapper young men puffing cigarettes, and the rest of the band barely taking up the frame save the acoustic guitarist. Dylan, unabashed and fairly well, bends the pitch of his voice up and down, occasionally flaring up in a gravelly vibrato. The delivery itself moves swiftly; each line fits at the top end of the up-tempo 4/4 song and floats over the syncopated eighth note acoustic strumming and the airy electric guitar tones. Though more subdued than the original on Highway 61 Revisited, the recent rendition delivers on the same sharpness that buoyed the song into the public's eye and, hopefully, in their own singing voices.

Immediately after finishing "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues" the band sets up a subtle line of long tones (complemented by the quietly bowed double bass) to lead into "Tombstone Blues." Much like the previous version, Dylan forgoes heavy instrumentation for the simple lilt of his own lyrics that expand and contract. He is quick but never rushed, sustains notes without going over the edge. Visibly, Dylan sways stiffly, deliberately, occasionally leaning in to enunciate, placing hands on his hips or balling a fist as he wags his head in disapproval. Sharp, precise, this feels like a mix between getting called out for the duel at high noon and the wise advice of a grandfather. But the chord is struck; anyone who wants to slingshot down the highway blasting the original (made all the more fiery by Mike Bloomfield's incendiary riffing) can do so, and anyone who wants to languish uneasily in the dense, mighty lyrics can do so in the Shadow Kingdom version.

Where do these revisitations leave us though, be we fans already or newcomers to Bob Dylan? I would venture that the show encapsulates referential renditions as much as it attempts to reveal the multiple strata that always existed in the songs. Whenever I try and explain Dylan's knack for self-reformation and reinterpretation, I always turn to a metaphor with cups. I hold up an opaque coffee mug, representing musical genre. The contents within, the lyrics, can generally be corresponded to an artist and the vernaculars in which they operate. With Dylan I say that he lyrically fills the various vessels he picked up (folk, blues, rock n' roll, country, hard rock, 80's synthesized music, etc. etc.) with lyrics that, when appreciated, do not correspond to generic expectations. Only listen to Highway 61 Revisited that, even when dialing back the octane of rock n' roll, presents a kind of lyric strangeness that invites repeated listening. Where once he filled the coffee cup with Coca-cola, now it's like a draught of fine whiskey -- goes down easy, but not without some kick. Shadow Kingdom is a concrete call to relisten, to appreciate the musical and lyrical grades that inhabit the songs and which, from different angles, can be made apparent. From reviews of the performance I've read, I'm not alone in saying that the Highway 61 Revisited classics earned a great deal of praise. And all of this is to say nothing of the infernal twang of "What Was It You Wanted," and the perpetually celestial prayer-in-music, "Forever Young," delivered by a man of an unmistakable voice and much much more to tell folks who will listen.

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Image: Bob Dylan sings "What Was It You Wanted," as we are menaced by stares, Shadow Kingdom