Listen to the Lion

CD review - The Doc Watson Family Tradition

Doc Watson & Family
The Doc Watson Family Tradition
Rounder Records
4 stars (out of 5)

Recorded in 1964 and 1965, this isn't so much a Doc Watson album as it is a literal exhibition of the musical tradition - both immediate and ancient - that he came from. Doc and members of his extended family take turns sharing fiddle tunes, banjo pieces, lullabyes, gospel songs and ballads, some of which are hundreds of years old.

Backed only by father-in-lay Gaither Carlton on fiddle, Doc's best vocal is on "Am I Born to Die?" Doc's cousin Dolly Greer steals the show with her a cappella singing, especially on "Omie Wise."

A perfect introduction to what we call old-time music.

I can't believe I watched the whole thing!

Here's a link to my Da Vinci Code column for the Examiner, and here's the PDF:

Download 26_may_06_examiner_da_vinci.pdf

Just to make sure Dan Brown wouldn't make any money off of me, I actually bought a ticket for Mission Impossible 3 and saw Da Vinci instead. Even though Tom Cruise profits from that, so does Philip Seymour Hoffman.

More Bob birthday stuff, slightly belated

I was on the road in the Promised Land on Bob's birthday Wednesday, but I wanted to post some recommendations and some live tracks, even if it's late.

The 2-disc DVD of No Direction Home is available for sale or rent. Containing the incredible ’66 concert footage, Dylan’s first electric performance at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival and dozens of other gems, this is essential. So is the 2-CD, 28-track No Direction Home: The Soundtrack (The Bootleg Series Vol. 7), which is actually, and happily, misnamed since most of the live cuts and alternate studio takes it contains, though from the same period covered by the film, don’t actually appear in the film.

Finally released officially in 1998 after circulating as a bootleg recording for years The Bootleg Series, Vol. 4: Bob Dylan Live, 1966 is the best commercially available Dylan live set, featuring Dylan both solo acoustic and with The Band (minus Levon Helm, who didn’t play on the foreign dates of the ’66 tour).

 In addition to Bringing It All Back Home (1965), Highway 61 Revisited (1965) and Blonde on Blonde (1966), check out Bob’s other studio masterpieces: John Wesley Harding (1967), Blood on the Tracks (1975), Time Out of Mind (1997) and Love and Theft (2001).

The question of Dylan’s status as a bona fide poet is argued convincingly by Christopher Ricks in Dylan’s Visions of Sin, out in paperback. The most fascinating and exhaustive analysis of Dylan’s lyrics is Michael Gray’s Song & Dance Man III: The Art of Bob Dylan. Greil Marcus dissects Dylan’s greatest single song in Like a Rolling Stone: Bob Dylan at the Crossroads.

By far the best Dylan biography is Clinton Heylin’s Bob Dylan: Behind the Shades Revisited.

And finally, for more of Dylan in his own words, go to Chronicles: Volume One, his pleasantly surprising first memoir.

Here are 2 live cuts from 1997:

Download 104_bob_dylan_positively_4th_street.mp3

Download 102_bob_dylan_lay_lady_lay.mp3

And here's Bob singing "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue:"

Happy Birthday, Bob!

My Examiner column this week is a birthday card to Bob Dylan. Read it here or grab the PDF file here:

Download examiner_dylan_19_may_06.pdf

Bruce, Neil and Rolling Stone

This week's Examiner column about the continuing ridiculousness of Rolling Stone magazine:

Download examiner_rolling_stone_12_may_06.pdf

Manliness

Here's today's Baltimore Examiner column about Harvey Mansfield's book Manliness, United 93 and more.

Download be_column_5_may_06_manliness.pdf  

Van Morrison, Hank III and the best country so far this year

A survey of my favorite country music so far this year here at NRO.

Van's Ryman show on CMT tonight

Tonight, and no doubt various times afterward, CMT is televising portions of Van's excellent March 7 show at the Ryman, filmed in black & white and along with some interview segments. More info and schedule here. You can see the video for "Playhouse" here.

The rest of Bush's term

Here's last Friday's Baltimore Examiner column on W., a couple of books about him and the rest of his term.

Download examiner_column_28_apr_06_bush.pdf