Bob Dylan- Desire 1976
Bob Dylan – Desire
It is time I introduced a Dylan album into my retrospective look back at my vinyl collection. I was late getting an appreciation of the man. I was only ten or eleven years old at the time of his first coming and just as with the Beatles he passed me by – football and cricket were more interesting than music. My first introduction to him bizarrely was from someone's inexplicably purchased copy of 'Self Portrait'. Needless to say, I was unimpressed. I was aware of the cover versions of his songs by others, particularly Fairport Convention who I was a devotee of in my early musical education. Other than hearing him on 'Concert for Bangladesh' I remained aloof from his catalogue. You may recall back in the day there used to be record clubs that offered cut price vinyl and other offers, wanting you to take at least one record a month. I found that an easy way of expanding my collection, sometimes with limited success, but one month I took a copy of 'Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits'. Even then, despite the gems contained, I did not get too excited about him, it did not grace my turntable as often as it should have done. In fact, it was his collaborating band – The Band – that I was enjoying more and for that reason Dylan's live album of his 'comeback' US tour with them was the first real purchase I made of a Dylan album.
He was near to producing the album that set me on the path to discovering his music and his importance as an artist to just about anyone who ever aspired to sing and play from the sixties on. It was 'Blood on the Tracks' that just totally opened my mind to his genius. It is still in my top three album in my collection, played just as often today as it always has been. However, I thought I would start my retrospective with 'Desire'. Not in my top three but in many ways more interesting as an album and an insight into how he works as a musician and controls the production. 'Desire' is a challenging album, musically and in the subject matter of some songs. Dylan is being to his audience the Picasso or Dali of the music world. How much the collaboration with Jacques Levy adds to this is not clear but you do have to suspend a degree of reality and perhaps prejudice when taking in some of the lyrics.
Inside sleeve of Bob Dylan's Desire album
At first listening (or you may still think at the 500th listen) 'Desire' is a sloppy album but fascinating, a curiously under rehearsed mostly live take collection that has musicians and singers feeling their way around some quirky lyrics and melodies. It is deliberately so. Dylan is at the point of unleashing his Rolling Thunder Revue and this album is the template for all that chaos of creativity. Dylan encourages the collective entourage to make the best of it, contribute as you will, lettting them roll with it, maybe roll with the punches is a better expression in view of the opening song 'Hurricane'. How Emmylou Harris got on this album is anyone's guess. I suppose there is a certain logic in him inviting her. Emmylou's work with Gram Parsons has an impromptu feel to it. I cannot imagine Gram spent endless hours rehearsing, so Dylan probably was looking for a similar feel to her vocals. Dylan clearly throws her in at the deep end getting her to work out and follow his harmonies - or not as the case may be. You could find her attempts to do so excruciating, you feel for her as she is not getting much help from him, which was the whole idea. Yet, it works – how it works. Emmylou is magnificent on here, producing a miraculous performance that is a highlight on the album.
So, why is the album somewhat difficult and challenging? Starting with 'Hurricane' you struggle to take the narrative totally at face value. Rubin Carter had his negative side and spent time in prison prior to this wrongful conviction. However, Dylan portrays him as a nature loving gentle soul who fights only as a job. It doesn't ring true. Also, I find a degree of uncomfortableness about calling out living people in such a public way. They may deserve it, though Dylan himself toned down his accusations before recording the album version, although even so he was sued. The case was dismissed so maybe that gives justification for Dylan being so specific and strong in portraying the cast of characters behaviour. Later, Carter had his conviction set aside and he was released. Carter was black, had a history, was getting confident and successful – he fitted the bill to be framed. Dylan saw an injustice and certainly pursued this with vigour. The song itself is powerful and driven hard musically. Still, it is challenging in its subject matter as it focuses on being public judge and jury even though you sense Dylan was correct in most of his character profiles.
Back cover of the Desire album by Bob Dylan from 1976
More problematic is the 11 minute long 'Joey'. The song draws you in as the narrator tells this sympathetic tale of an Italian clan chief, a benevolent family head. In life he was not. It is impossible to square this circle no matter how Dylan paints this picture over a long-drawn-out epic song. With Carter you feel sympathy even though Dylan's portrait is over sentimental. With Mafia boss Joey Gallo you cannot feel warmth, quite the reverse. This makes Dylan's lionizing the guy strange and incomprehensible.
At the other end of the scale, we also have another problem with the contradictory lyrical nature of this album. 'Mozambique' simply oozes sunshine and warm sandy beaches as it breezes along in a gorgeous musically rich fun way. Even so this is such a weird subject for Dylan to have taken on. Is he being simply naïve or just plain provocative with all these three songs? When the forces of FRELEMO took control of the country after years of struggle there followed a long and brutal civil war. I belong to a social group that suffered dreadful persecution and suffering there at that time. Dylan must have been aware of the tragic civil unrest in Mozambique. The song is joyous, but can you see past the reality of the situation that pertained at that time? – I find that hard.
So, we have three songs that seem flawed in subject matter and portrayal. You can't ignore them though and this is Dylan being the artist with something to say. Considering we are still discussing it nearly fifty years later shows the strength of this writing despite any flaws we may pick in it.
The problems continue but in a different way. 'Sara' is one of Dylan's most beautiful and personal love songs. I love it. Maybe it is a bit over the top at times – 'Glamorous Nymph with an arrow and bow' is pushing the envelope a bit. It is though overall lyrically and musically exquisite. Dylan confirms that his wife Sara was the 'Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands', this being one of the few times that he gives a definite insight into his lyrics. Being so personal makes this a powerful song that portrays a strong and vital relationship for him, a love of his wife and his children. No doubt this family unit got him through difficult times after he disappeared from view in the mid-sixties. The problem for us peering into this scene of domestic bliss is that this is on an album immediately after 'Blood on the Tracks' where he laid his relationship problems out in vivid Technicolor for all the world to hear. If this song had appeared in the early seventies, then we could happily suspend disbelieve. Being on 'Desire' and immediately prior to Sara and Dylan divorcing it barely makes sense. I prefer to look on this as Dylan facing reality with regret, what he had he loves with a passion just as the narrator in Springsteen's 'The River' – but both have lost what they had. In many ways a sad song, poignant because of its timing, but a truly beautiful one.
The overall feel of the album is of crisp musicality and a lot of that is due to the extraordinary fiddle playing of Scarlet Rivera. Said to have been hired by Dylan after he stopped her in the street as she made her way with her violin case, she adds atmosphere to this album in a way that echoes the sound of the Rolling Thunder Revue. Her playing is loose but all consuming on these tracks. You sense she is put in the studio and told to just fit in where you will. There is no question that a producer who had total control would have edited and refined her contribution but that would have been a mistake when you take the album as a whole looking back over the years. Take 'Isis' for instance. One of Dylan's finest songs, taking you on an extraordinary lyrical journey. On this you really can feel the spontaneity of Rivera playing as she slips in an out of the lyric. You can imagine her concentrating on Dylan's delivery and picking her moments to add atmosphere and colour to a meandering but captivating song. Is she the greatest violinist that Dylan could have employed. Well, no, but that is not what he wanted. He got just the perfect musician for this album.
Emmylou Harris clearly facing the same issues that Rivera did. She must have followed Dylan intently to try to marry her voice to his unpredictable vocal. You can hear on 'Desire' that she is straining to keep up with him, straining to harmonize in the way that she would interpret the concept. What she did was not perfect harmony by any means, but Dylan was not after that. Again, he got imperfect perfection from Emmylou. He had seen that her work with Gram Parsons had a spontaneity, an unrehearsed quality that could not be faked. He made her take that to another level entirely on here, but it worked. As with Rivera it is the quality of their contribution that round out the atmosphere of the album. 'One more cup of Coffee' and 'Oh Sister' are amazing collaborations and Emmylou sounds like a star pupil taking an oral exam quaking before the most demanding of examiners. She passes, she surely passes.
Like many who listen to 'Desire' I have issues with it, but it is irresistible. I return to it often. It screams of its time and takes me back to that mid seventies time that we all of a certain age found changed us for better or worse. I think Dylan felt this was a crossroads for him also. It would be sometime before he produced anything approaching the quality of his work in the seventies. Having missed his early work, albums considered his masterpieces, I found 'Desire' pivotal in ensuring that Dylan would be a mainstay of my musical loves in my vinyl and later CD collections. He remains fixed there. Is 'Desire' up there in that top 20 of all time albums. Perhaps not, it is too eclectic and random for that. It is though in there as regards importance in my musical education – it made me think and still does.
A contradictory but wonderful piece of art.
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Vinyl record of the 1976 album Desire by Bob Dylan
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