Bringing It All Back Home - Dylan, Bob (CD 1990)

Along with Paul McCartney and Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan is the most important figure of post-WWII popular music. This album was one of the four, along with "The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan," "Highway 61 Revisited," and "Blonde on Blonde," which turned him from just another folk singer into the pre-eminent singer-songwriter of our time.

While Dylan's stature and historical importance are objective facts, whether or not one likes his music is, of course, strictly subjective. People usually fall into one of three camps, those that love him, those that hate him, and those who like his songs when someone else is singing them. I fall into the first group. Although I like covers of his songs very much, especially those by Judy Collins and Joan Baez, it is always enjoyable and interesting to hear the originals.

This album doesn't have a weak song on it. His "hit singles," such as "Subterranean Homesick Blues" and "Mr. Tambourine Man" (the latter far better than the sanitized version by the Byrds, which is wildly overplayed on oldies radio stations) are there, along with the typically Dylanesque epics of many stanzas and one predominant rhyme, such as "It's Alright Ma," and "Bob Dylan's 115th Dream." "Love Minus Zero/No Limit," covered by everyone, never loses its charm, whether sung by Dylan or anyone else, and even the album's less familiar songs, such as "Outlaw Blues," and "On the Road Again," provide interesting rhymes and great lines. "Gates of Eden" shows the political protest, "Blowing In The Wind" side of the folk singer, "She Belongs To Me" the "I have trouble with women" side, and both sides are combined in "Maggie's Farm." Still, if I could only have one song off of the album, it would probably be "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue," if only because it made possible Judy Collins' cover of it, one of the most perfect songs of all time.

If you have any interest in Dylan or the history of popular music, get this album and the three others I mentioned earlier. Songwriting just doesn't get any better.