The 1981 Listening Post - Bob Dylan - Shot of Love

 Bob Dylan - Shot of Love

#356

By Paul Zickler

August 10 1981

Bob Dylan

Shot of Love

Genre: Gospel Dylan

Allen’s rating: 2.5 out of 5

Paul’s rating: 3.5 out of 5

Highlights: 

Every Grain of Sand

Heart of Mine

The cover seems pre-made to go right into the cutout bins. Exploding 80’s pop art backdrop design, blown straight into your face. 

Bob Dylan is tired of waiting for us to catch up.  He’s figured it all out, see, and he’d hoped we’d get it too. He made two straightforward, no punches pulled Gospel records, accompanied by the most heartfelt and solidly rocking tours he’d ever done. No masks like Rolling Thunder. No big stadium shows like with the Band. No folk festivals. Just a crackerjack band, some holy rolling backup singers, and one clear-as-day message: Jesus is the answer. 

But people didn’t get it. To Bob, it was so obvious. Just listen to the words, go read the Bible, and get your life straight. Seems simple.

So on this album, the third in the Gospel trilogy (Bob’s albums always end up being trilogies, at least that’s what the smart critics tell us later on), Dylan is going to either clinch the deal or die trying. 

(Narrator Voice: he did neither.)

I need a shot of LOVE. The rest of you fools are taking shots of whiskey and heroin. This heart of mine can’t risk reaching out to people who don’t want real love. I’m the property of Jesus, and you all hate me for it. Look what you did to Lenny Bruce. You don’t want a love that’s real, you want to drown love, you want a watered down love. 

And that’s just side one.

So is it any good? Yeah, sometimes it is. And sometimes it’s not. 

Rolling Stone hated it, which is saying a lot, since Rolling Stone would give a recording of Bob reading the phone book 3 ½ stars. It didn’t sell, but none of Bob’s albums really ever sold as well as you’d think. His first number one album didn’t come until the 21st century. 

I bought it right away. It came out at the height of my Christian Youth period. I remember letting a couple of guys borrow it to use “Every Grain of Sand” as their “devotional song” for some youth group meeting. They asked me if I had a Jesus-sounding track that was really long so they wouldn’t have to talk. As I recall, it worked perfectly. 

Lots of ink has been spilled about Bob Dylan’s tragic decade, the 80’s. Bleh. He made some good music and some bad music, often on the same record. That’s certainly true here. I still love Every Grain of Sand. Heart of Mine is a sneakily fun bit of fluff (with Ringo on tom toms). Lenny Bruce became a truly beautiful thing when Dylan brought it back to his live shows in 2019. Depending on what mood I’m in, I can enjoy most of it. Almost all of it. 

The back cover is Bob sniffing a rose. Find the beauty in life, stop worrying, get with the program. This was his last obviously “Christian” album. The one after it, Infidels, was pretty darn good. It could have been a true classic if he hadn’t left two of his best songs of the decade off the record for whatever reason. Who knows why? It’s Dylan. You just take what he gives and move on. 

He surely does.

https://open.spotify.com/album/14cScWsd0lPdSlNFfr9AmA?si=hubrwhY_RxecC-ZV0NfanQ

The 1980 Listening Post - Bob Dylan - Saved

 Bob Dylan - Saved

#256

by Jon Rosenberg

Bob Dylan 

Saved 

Genre: Jebus rock

Allen’s Rating: 2 out of 5

Jon’s Rating: 3 out of 5

Jon’s Highlights: 

Saved 

Solid Rock 

Pressing On 

Sometime around 1978, the former Robert Zimmerman cast off his yarmulke and became a Born-Again Christian. It was a career move that pissed off his fans even more than when he “went electric.” “Saved” is the second of three much-maligned Evangelical Christian gospel-rock albums Bob Dylan released between 1979 and 1981. For me, it’s the weakest of the three musically, but it probably contains his most authentic gospel music. The performances are heartfelt and you can feel his commitment to the Lord. Any other Jew from Minnesota might have felt like a gefilte fish out of water (or whatever that jellied shit is), but Bob jumped in head first, assembled a top-notch band of seasoned session players (Jim Keltner, Fred Tackett, Spooner Oldham & Tim Drummond) and three powerful backup singers (Clydie King, Regina Havis & Mona Lisa Young), and spread the good news to anybody who would listen. Though I guess he wasn’t technically Jewish at the time, Dylan isn’t the first Jew to write great Christian songs - Norman Greenbaum’s “Spirit in the Sky” and Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas” spring to mind. And there are a couple of great songs on this album. The title track and “Solid Rock” are real barn-burners, and “Pressing On” will have you doing cartwheels between the pews.  Unfortunately, the rest of the material is a bit slow and dull in comparison. A friend of mine attended a Dylan concert during this time, and he told me the general reaction from the crowd was “What the fuck is this shit?!?!” Quite understandable when the audience was looking forward to hearing “Everybody must get stoned!” and instead they get a ten minute sermon about the End Times (Yes, Dylan really did preach from the stage at these shows). But, hey, that’s our Zimmy! Over the course of a career that’s lasted almost 60 (!) years, Dylan has had his ups and downs. He’s often been referred to as “mercurial.” You never know what you’re gonna get. And that’s part of the fun. By 1983, Dylan had given up on Christianity, returned to Judaism, and released “Infidels,” a near-masterpiece in my opinion. “Saved” is no masterpiece. It’s a decent album with some fine, listenable songs. If you can’t get past the religiosity, then don’t bother. There’s plenty of Satanic metal out there for ya – praise the Lord! 

https://open.spotify.com/album/6ytk4mtIgQP7F67XL1nozV?si=xFJDEffvTICR_1xWXZhd5g

The 1986 Listening Post - Bob Dylan - Knocked Out Loaded

Bob Dylan - Knocked Out Loaded

#289/1414

July 14 1986

Bob Dylan

Knocked Out Loaded

Genre: Rock

3.5 out of 5

Requisite 80s cover:

“They Killed Him” by Kris Kristofferson. I find it interesting that Bob opens this record with not one, but two covers. This one is filled with gospel sounds and references to SkyDaddy so I’m guessing Bob’s religiosity isn’t over. That said, it’s lovely. 

I swear on my kids’ lives that when I first heard Bob mumblesing “You wanna ramble” I thought he was singing, “You wanna back rub.” That would have made the song more interesting, tbh. 

Someday I’m gonna tell the story of how I ended up convincing some college friends that I was a potentially great editor because I was giving my thoughts in the editing room on a film that was either directed by Jessie Dylan. 

Oh. 

That’s the story. 

A lot of the songs on this record just seem to run out. Like Bob just got tired and said, “let’s just fade out, I didn’t really write an ending.”. 

But then, on Side Two, he teams up with Sam Shepard for the 11 minute bonkers epic, “Brownsville Girl”. I can’t recommend it but I also can’t not. Then he teams up with Tom Petty for one and Carole Bayer Sager for the last. It’s the most inspired I’ve heard Dylan in a while. Not as good as his previous two but he’s getting there. 

https://music.apple.com/us/album/knocked-out-loaded-remastered/717150822

The 1985 Listening Post - Bob Dylan - Empire Burlesque

Bob Dylan - Empire Burlesque

#204

June 10 1985

Bob Dylan

Empire Burlesque

Genre: Rock

3.5 out of 5

Highlights:

I’ll remember You

Dark Eyes

In 1985, if you were the youngest Boomer, you were about 25. The calculations are fluid but many people agree that GenX begins in 1965, although I think it starts earlier, in 1961ish. This is the year we are seeing a lot of longer in the teeth musicians putting out self-assured if not remarkable boring albums as they approach midlife. 

Knopfler, Springsteen, Sting, all of them in their mid-30s and slowing themselves down. Relaxing. Settling in. 

Here is the grand Boomer Voice of a Generation himself putting out what has to be his most accessible, if not kind of dull, record. There are more “songs” here than on his previous 4. And, full disclosure again: My experience with Bob really starts with this project and Street Legal in 1978.

I find myself wondering: Was Dylan so perfect a voice for the changing of the guard that, like a mosquito in amber, he is best remembered for that time? If you came to this album having never heard him or of him, you’d think, “What is this? How did this nasal voice warbler get a record contract? He can’t even hold a not in tune on the centerpiece ballad, “Emotionally Yours”!!!”

Although “Dark Eyes” is lovely and I wish the album had more of that. 

Empire Burlesque is fine. It’s better than Saved. Better than Street Legal. About as interesting as Infidels. But with more strings. (And no one needs Dylan with strings)

https://music.apple.com/us/album/empire-burlesque-remastered/717155647

The 1983 Listening Post - Bob Dylan - Infidels

Bob Dylan - Infidels

#177
October 27 1983
Bob Dylan
Infidels
3.75 out of 5

Highlights:
Jokerman
Sweetheart Like You
License to Kill

I’ve always had my own problems with Dylan. I feel like, if I really wanna “get it”, I have to do so much work. Like if I want to know what a song is REALLY about, it’s not enough to decipher the lyrics but I should also have to know Dylan’s position and state of mind while writing it. That’s a lot of work, man. Like, “Union Sundown”. If I extrapolate…and really dive in…and use the filter of 2018…and my unionist experience…is Bob anti-globalism? Is he a Nationalist? Sounds like it. But, is it his position or is he expressing someone else’s view? I’m so confused.
That’s probably not fair and I’ll get castigated for that statement but look at “Neighborhood Bully”, a series of couplets set to music but, is it a song? Is it a jam? It’s a jam! That’s what I don’t like about this guy. Take the poetry from myriad tracks and put them on myriad backing music beds, nothing coalesces or informs the other. The “singing” is atrocious, I’ve never cared for his voice so…oh, I know! It’s spoken word set to music with occasional melody from a troubadour who can barely hold a tune.
I don’t care for this guy. I wanted to. But this project, which started with music from 78-82, presented me with the worst of Bob’s oeuvre. Shot of Love, anyone?
I bought this album in 83. I felt smart for owning it. I was bored by it. It sounds like exactly what it is: Bob Dylan set to the music of Dire Straits. Another band I find dull.
That said, the first half washed over me more ease and accessibility than those others. Now, it does run out of steam by the end but there are moments that really shine.
I feel like I’m all over the place here. Cuz, that’s what Dylan does to me.
Christgau wrote about this album: “Nevertheless, this man has turned into a hateful crackpot.” Ok. I didn’t delve into the meaning of all the songs. Cuz, like I said, too much work.