Bob Dylan 1993-07-01 El Pueblo Español Barcelona, Spain

Righteous To Me Box Set

discs from srk, review by gopherstick

El Pueblo Español
Barcelona, Spain
1 July 1993
 

Disc 1    [65:42]
1. Hard Times [5:12]
2. Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again [9:07]
3. All Along the Watchtower [7:49]
4. Just Like A Woman [7:39]
5. Tangled Up In Blue [10:40]
6. The Man In Me [7:05]
7. Watching The River Flow [7:04]
8. Little Moses [6:26]
9. Tomorrow Night [4:35]

Disc 2    [71:11]
1. It's All Over Now, Baby Blue [10:58]
2. Mr. Tambourine Man [11:11]
3. Cat's In the Well [7:29]
4. I And I [9:27]
5. Maggie's Farm [9:34]
6. Man In The Long Black Coat [10:00]
7. It Ain't Me, Babe [12:30]


Concert # 492 of The Never-Ending Tour.  Concert # 12 of the 1993 Europe Summer Tour. 1993 concert # 36..
Concert # 36 with the 9th Never-Ending Tour Band: Bob Dylan (vocal & guitar), Bucky Baxter (pedal steel guitar & electric slide guitar), John Jackson (guitar), Tony Garnier (bass), Winston Watson (drums & percussion).
1, 8-11, 16 acoustic with the band.
1, 8  Bucky Baxter (accordion).
10, 11, 16  Bucky Baxter (electric mandolin).
3 new songs (18%) compared to previous concert. 1 new song for this tour


NOTES:
Some track transitions are not entirely seamless, otherwise pretty darn problem-free
D2 T7:  [12:20 -12:30] dead runoff

SOUND:  Pretty nice.  Crisp and clear with well defined vocals (although it has a low ceiling at times that sifts on a watery buzz to some of the louder vocals) and punchy band.

COMMENTS:  Hard Times is a bovine's delight, Bucky Baxter is making that accordion moo.  Mobile and Watchtower are auto-pilots, in the early going Bob has the snoozefest cruising along at 38,000 feet and holding.  This is the one time I'm hoping for some turbulence,  but Just Like a Woman is only a hair above average so as not to be noticed, however it's something.  Okay now here we go, Captain Bob has turned on the Smoke 'Em Up sign and is asking that all tray tables be returned to their locked, upright positions.  Tangled Up In Blue is the first corker of the night, Bob is into it and the band shivers a groove behind a suddenly wide awake front man.  Listen to how he winds himself up with the harp solo and the final verse explodes out of him in an urgent yell.  Speaking of that, yelling, Bob hardly does any of that here.  The Man In Me is a flat out cool highlight.  He sings it confidently and laid back, then again explodes out a verse and just as suddenly dives back behind the guitars for cover.  Meanwhile the 'real' guitars ribbon in and out of his clunky-but-fairly-easily-overlooked solo,  like older brothers putting up with the snot-nosed tag-along younger sibling.  River Flow is a like an overeager puppy:  fun, but kind of annoying.  What is it with the last verses of songs tonight anyway?  He gets crazy with that last "river flow", seems to be an emerging theme here.  Don't look now, but there's a half ton of church laid down in Little Moses, damn that Bucky and his loony accordion.  Tomorrow Night gets a clap-along, and again I'm struck how queer it is to hear it from my listening position right next to Bob up on stage.  Here's a hint to everybody who like to clap-along:  don't bother, you're only pissing off your neighbors.  Anyway, this version is loose, unbuttoned, Bob even finishes off a line without the guitars, it's simply all him.  Excellent noodle work too, how he can play so well on the acoustic, yet when he plugs in....reminds me of a Jerry Garcia interview where Jerry was talking about how incredibly different the instruments are.  I play both, but I still can't quite play St. Stephen right now matter which guitar I play it on, so what do I know?  Baby Blue suffers from, are you ready for this, dominating acoustic guitars.  Those suckers are almost drowning out Bob.  It's long, too:  Bob finishes singing five minutes in, then we get another five minutes of Harpjam©. Tambourine Man is almost a carbon copy, although it's six minutes of singing and then six more of Harpjam instead of five.  I and I quickly warms up to a healthy sizzle, check out how he nails the 'vile and deprived' line, great.  And the 'dead horse' bit, his voice rises wildly, a trackless roller coaster, do you suppose when he gets like that he can even hear the music being played around him?  It Ain't Me is a twelve minute snoring purr, not the most eloquent way to bring this beast back to the barn, but what the hell, after what we've been through it's the perfect time for a nap like this closer.  

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