Record Details
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Record ID
1739
Artist
Bob Dylan
Title
Planet Waves
Field / Genre
Rock
Year Recorded
1974
Label
Columbia
Pressing
Am
Rating
****
Discs
1
Media
CD
Date Bought
26 Jan 2006
Cost
¤0.00
Cover Name
dylan-planet.jpg
Review
<p>Back to the starting point! The kickoff, Hebrew letters on the wall, Victor Hugo's house in Paris, NYC in early autumn, leaves flying in the park, the clock strikes eight. Bong -- I dropped a double brandy & tried to recall the events... beer halls & pin balls, polkabands, bar bwire & thrashing clowns, objects, headwinds& snowstorms, family outings with strangers -- Furious gals with garters & smeared lips on bar stools that stank from sweating pussy -- doing the Hula -- perfect priests in overhauls, glassy eyed insomnia! Space guys off duty with big dicks & duck tails all wired up & voting for Eisenhower, waving flags & jumping off fire engines, getting killed on motorcycles whatever -- we sensedeach other beneath the mask, pitched a tent in the street & joined the traveling circus, love at first sight! History became alive! The sideshow took over -- what a sight! the threshold of the modern Bomb, Temples of the Pawnee, the cowboy saint, the Arapahoe, snapshots of Apache poets searching thru the ruins for a glimpse of Buddha -- I lit out for parts unknown. Found Jacob's ladder up against an adobe wall & bought a serpent from a passingangel -- Yeah the ole days are gone forever and the new ones aren't far behind, the laughter is fading away, echoes of a stampof energy vampires in the bone world going Wild! Drinking the blood of innocent people, Innocent lambs! The wretched of the earth! My brothers of the flood, cities of the flesh -- Milwaukee, Ann...Arbor, Chicago, Bismark, South...Dakota, Duluth -- where Baudelaire lived & Goya cashed in his chips. Where Joshua brought the house down! From there it was straight up -- a little jolt ofMexico, and some good luck, & more brandy & the teeth of a lion& a compass</p><hr /><p>Reteaming with the Band, Bob Dylan winds up with an album that recalls New Morning more than The Basement Tapes, since Planet Waves is given to a relaxed intimate tone -- all the more appropriate for a collection of modest songs about domestic life. As such, it may seem a little anticlimactic since it has none of the wildness of the best Dylan and Band music of the '60s -- just an approximation of the homespun rusticness. Considering that the record was knocked out in the course of three days, its unassuming nature shouldn't be a surprise, and sometimes it's as much a flaw as a virtue, since there are several cuts that float into the ether. Still, it is a virtue in places, as there are moments -- "On a Night Like This," "Something There Is About You," the lovely "Forever Young" -- where it just gels, almost making the diffuse nature of the rest of the record acceptable.</p>— <b>Stephen Thomas Erlewine</b>