Covering Bob Dylan. It’s something every guitar picker out there has done. It didn’t matter if you were a great player, or a great singer, you would sit down with your Yamaha FG-180 on your lap and play through the Bob Dylan songbook. Three chord progressions, maybe a relative minor, and you were away. Over the years there have been dozens if not hundreds of albums (or at least songs) performed in interpretive versions by artists all over the world. Songstresses like Joan Baez, Judy Collins and Maria Muldaur have released whole albums of his songs, as have The Grateful Dead, The Hollies, The Byrds. He’s been covered by topic in the recent collection of “Gospel Songs of Bob Dylan;” by style as in Dylan Country or recast as in the Dylan volume of the This Ain’t No Tribute blues series. Guitarists Steve Howe and Duane Eddy put out Dylan albums! And I’ve been known to sit down with my own guitar on an afternoon and work through the newest lyric book. The words are good, and the melodies? Well the melodies are much better than many people give him credit for!
Bryan Ferry has just released a new DVD called Dylanesque Live to accompany his recent album of Dylan interpretations. Ferry from Roxy Music, that’s right. He’s been doing Dylan since his first solo album, and in an interview on his Web site he said, “As far as the words are concerned it’s a bit like an actor tackling Shakespeare. I like finding the melodies that Dylan’s hidden away in there. I sat down with [pianist] Colin Good and worked out keys, tempo, the feel of the thing. No demos. We just did it. Most of the recording was done inside a week. Then we did a couple of days at 4th Street Recording, a funky old studio in Santa Monica where the Beach Boys used to record.” We’ll come back to Ferry’s offering, but first a hat trick of albums by lesser known artists who attempted the same thing.
Joel Gilbert is the leader of Highway 61 Revisited, a band designed to simulate the Bob Dylan experience on stage. He has made a couple of Dylan documentaries (now available as DVDs) and has taken on the whole Dylan persona. He even looks like Bob! And he sounds like him too. The songs on their self-titled CD are performed just as you might imagine a tribute band would do. Gilbert assumes Bob’s voice and everything that entails. Phrasing, timing, and backing are essentially lifted from the canon. The band is solid and features excellent guitarwork, and a rhythm section that just won’t quit. The backing vocals are perfect. The song choices are a bit obvious — the album resembles a greatest hits collection: “Memphis Blues Again,” “I Want You,” “Like a Rolling Stone,” “Just Like a Woman,” “All Along the Watchtower,” and “The Times They Are a-Changin’.” So why do you need an album like this? Because Bob Dylan has rearranged these same songs so radically on his Never-Ending Tour that a band like this is the only 
place you’re going to hear these original renditions. The CD is enjoyable, if not particularly original.
Jackie Greene is a San Francisco songwriter who opened for Buddy Guy when I saw him, in the spring of 2007. He really impressed me with his “early-Dylan” acoustic guitar, harmonica-on-a-rack stylings. His own albums are filled with original songs that have a raw and earthy quality that lift him above the competition. I particularly recommend his gone wanderin’ album! But he took part in A Bob Dylan Tribute in 2003 along with former Beau Brummel Sal Valentino and the results of the evening were released on Positively 12th & K. Jackie shares lead vocals with Sal and while some of the songs are repeated from the Highway 61 disc, they’ve included some more interesting choices. For instance, the more obscure “Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window” takes the place of the hit “Positively 4th Street,” they do “Isis” from Desire, whereas Gilbert’s group does “Hurricane.” Their versions show respect for Dylan’s originals, but there is no slavish copying; these are more interpretive (listen to “Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here With You.”) I like it and the audience caught 
on tape that night sure sound like they had a good time. As an added plus, it’s great to hear Sal Valentino again.
Howard Fishman is called (on his Web site) “composer, guitarist and bandleader…recognized as one of today’s most agile interpreters of the American songbook.” It lists the following styles as representative of his work: “early jazz, folk, blues, free jazz, classical, rock, pop, funk, country and…New Orleans brass band and gospel music.” Wow! This most recent CD finds him covering songs from Bob Dylan and the Band’s The Basement Tapes. It’s another live recording, done at Joe’s Pub in New York City. And it’s just what it claims to be in its somewhat unwieldy title. It was recorded on a minidisc recorder from the stage (with a backup DAT taken from the soundboard) so the quality is not perfect. It’s pretty good, though. What you hear is what you got. The recording was originally done just to archive the performance for Fishman.
Dylan and the Band recorded their versions of these songs (and a bunch more) for the same reason. Just to have a copy. The tapes were raw, you couldn’t always tell who was singing, the harmonies were ragged, chances were taken. It’s similar here. Fishman and the band sound like they’re having a good time, and so does the crowd. Fishman plays acoustic guitar and sings in front of a big band that includes upright bass, drums, violin, electric guitar, trumpet, tuba and cornet. There’s a New Orleans jazz feel to some of the tracks, while others echo the Desire era with Scarlett Rivera’s violin replaced by Mazz Swift’s. The songs range from the semi-familiar “This Wheel’s On Fire” to the obscure “Santa Fe.” Arrangements are all Fishman’s own, and he in no wise attempts to replicate Dylan’s versions. The CD is accompanied by a brief DVD with video versions of four of the songs. The single camera doesn’t move, you get a cover shot of the performance, “Yea! Heavy and a Bottle of Bread,” “Down In the Flood,” 
“This Wheel’s On Fire,” and “I Shall Be Released.” It gives a sense of the dynamics in the room — very interesting.
This brings us back to Bryan Ferry. On his very first solo album These Foolish Things (1973) he covered “A Hard Rain’s a-Gonna Fall” in a rendition that paid tribute to its composer but also to the interpreter. Ferry has a unique singing voice and his own image. He is called the “suave Euro crooner” in his promo material, and I think that’s a fair assessment. Rolling Stone described his style as “camp disengagement,” and I would argue that while there might be elements of camp involved, Ferry is definitely engaged with the songs…he just might not be engaged with the real world. The video he made in ’73 of “Hard Rain…” is included as a bonus track on the DVD, and it’s a fascinating place to start, even though its placement in the programme is in the middle of the bonus tracks (the rest of which are from the same session as the featured presentation.) In this early video a young and smoothly handsome Ferry sits at a grand piano, as behind him a trio of female singers in raincoats and sunglasses add “oohs” and echoes. He either stares right at the camera or shows his aristocratic profile. He delivers the lyrics in a straitforward talky vocal, the band rocks a bit, and the violins saw. The lyrical imagery is represented with some obvious news footage, intercut with the pantomime. It’s all so ’70s!
The 2007 Bryan Ferry is older, still handsome, but a tad rumpled. He sits on a stool, his blue shirt open at the neck, tie loosened, in a very expensive sport coat, and a pair of jeans. His band is around him, three guitars (Chris Spedding, Leo Abrahams, Oliver Thompson), drums (Andy Newmark), bass (Guy Pratt), and bandleader pianist Colin Good. Four girl singers this time (Me’sha Bryan, Sarah Brown, Anna McDonal and Tara McDonald). It’s not the most visually interesting video I’ve ever seen. Everyone basically stands there doing their thing, while Ferry sits on the stool, lyrics on a music stand in front of him. OK, he moves his shoulders in time with the beat. He plays a bit of harmonica, he smiles, he adds a touch on the Farfisa. The musicians, though, play well. The arrangements are creative, using the Dylan songs as a jumping- off point. There is no slavish copying here. Ferry finds the melody in Dylan’s songs which are sometimes obscured by Bob’s own voice. He doesn’t oversing anything. There’s no American Idol warbling, just the songs and the odd sizzling guitar solo arising from the mix. Oh, and then there’s the interviews.
Between the songs, Ferry talks openly and candidly about why he chose the songs and how the project came to fruition. It’s all very professional and insightful. The songs? Interesting choices, some obvious, others not so much. “All Along the Watchtower” owes a debt to Jimi Hendrix’s version…but then so does Dylan’s own rendition when played live. “Gates of Eden,” “Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues,” “All I Wanna Do,” “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door.” And as bonus tracks…”Baby Let Me Follow You Down,” and the George Harrison/ Bob Dylan co-write “If Not For You.” I’m liking this DVD, and thinking I might go search out the CD too. Can’t watch a DVD in the car.
There you go. Four ways of interpreting Bob Dylan. From the simple act of Xeroxing the original to the highly interpretive. That’s the beauty of Dylan’s songwriting. The lyrics take on new meaning when sung by different voices, and the music develops new legs when new players are added to the mix. Even you, sittin’ in your basement, strummin’ your six-string. The three CDs can be ordered from their respective Web sites, the Bryan Ferry CD should be available anywhere.
(Big Eye Music, 2002)
(DIG Music, 2003)
(Independent Release, 2007)
(Eagle Vision DVD, 2007)
