Abandoned Love is a beautiful song, one of Dylan’s finest. A lovely song that Bob Dylan recorded for (but left out of) Desire in NYC, July 31, 1975. It was later released on Biograph in 1985. The only live version Dylan did of the song is even better. We include both of Dylan’s takes on the song here (the two great ones), but first we will present five cover versions (the three good ones).
Dylan returns to Paris 12 years after his legendary Olympia concert, and this time no guitars are out of tune! At the soundcheck, Dylan and the band run through “Something There Is about You,” “True Love Tends to Forget,” “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door,” an old blues tune (probably called “Fix It Ma”), and “To Ramona.” For the show, Dylan replaces the two opening songs of the second half (“One of Us Must Know” and “You’re a Big Girl Now”) with “True Love Tends to Forget” and the rewrite of “The Man in Me” performed on the Far East leg. Between these comes an acoustic song, “It Ain’t Me, Babe.” As with the English press, the reception by the French media is
enthusiastic.
~Clinton Heylin (Bob Dylan: A Life in Stolen Moments Day by Day 1941-1995)
Pavillon de Paris Paris, France 3 July 1978
Bob Dylan (vocal & guitar)
Billy Cross (lead guitar)
Alan Pasqua (keyboards)
Steven Soles (rhythm guitar, backup vocals)
David Mansfield (violin & mandolin)
Steve Douglas (horns)
Jerry Scheff (bass)
Bobbye Hall (percussion)
Ian Wallace (drums)
Helena Springs, Jo Ann Harris, Carolyn Dennis (background vocals).
Personally I knew that I hadn’t been in presence of such greatness since the three shows at The Brixton Academy in south London in March 1995. …. That night’s standout among a long list of standouts, was for this fan Tryin’ To Get To Heaven, which Bob somehow channelled from a realm of divine and poetic musicality down to us mere mortals…
~Andrew Kershaw (Isis Magazine – latest issue)
..And what came next ..was both breath-taking and mind blowing: a stunning, dare it be said definitive version of Tryin’ To Get To Heaven. Bob’s vocal were fragile, tender, controlled – yet always on the edge of breaking. His piano playing just holding a few soft chords and the band proving their worth with another superb backing. In one song Bob gave us everything our hearts were longing for.
~Zac Dadic (Isis Magazine – latest issue)
The Tivoli Fortitude Valley Brisbane, Queensland, Australia 27 August 2014
In decades of listening to these recordings in varying quality what I’ve always heard is a singer sharing some of his favorite songs in hopes of finding the inspiration to create new ones. The joys and treasures of both can be found on these six discs.
~Peter Stone Brown
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It’s out.. and we’re listening. There a lot of music to binge on here.
While listening it’s also fun to read about this wonderful release, and that’s why I put together this post. It’s a collection of links to relevant articles about the “The Basement Tapes Complete”.