Friday 1 January 2010

Live 1966: The "Royal Albert Hall" Concert. Bob Dylan



The infamous concert, where to quote Wiki:-
The early bootleg LPs attributed the recording to one of Dylan's tour-closing concerts at London's Royal Albert Hall. However, Dylan's now-legendary confrontation with a heckler calling out "Judas" from the audience, clearly heard on the recording, was well-documented as having occurred at Manchester's Free Trade Hall on May 17, 1966. After "Judas!", there is clapping, followed by more heckles. One of those shouts, barely audible on the record, is a man shouting, "I'm never listening to you again, ever!" Dylan then says "I don't believe you", then after a long pause, "You're a liar." Then, Dylan can be faintly heard telling the band, "play it fuckin' loud", as they start to play "Like a Rolling Stone". At the end, the audience erupts into applause and Dylan says, "Thank you."

Split into two cds' the first one is just Dlyan by himself, guitar and harmonica, and the audience listening in hushed reverence, his harmonica playing is surprisingly good and impressed me, but the second one he is joined by The Hawks (to become the Band) and it goes electric. Quite rough and sloppy to be honest, and a poor recording given that the source was the mixing desk, but very authentic.

I rather like the first half, but glad that he was a Judas nevertheless.

9.25/10

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