Track Listing

1. Tangled Up In Blue
2. Simple Twist Of Fate
3. You're A Big Girl Now
4. Idiot Wind
5. You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go
6. Meet Me In The Morning
7. Lily, Rosemary And The Jack Of Hearts
8. If You See Her, Say Hello
9. Shelter From The Storm
10. Buckets Of Rain

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1033 in Music
• Released on: 2004-03-29
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.co.uk Review
Inevitably, when critics praise a new Dylan album, they label it the "best since Blood on the Tracks," and with good reason. Inspired by a crumbled marriage, and recorded after a tour with The Band had apparently re-ignited his creativity, Blood is among Dylan's masterpieces. The album's epic songs are well known, but its real high points are the shorter numbers--"You're a Big Girl Now", the flawless blues "Meet Me in the Morning", and the sweetly devastating "Buckets of Rain". These are songs of "images and distorted facts," each expressed through tangled points of view, and all of them blue. --David Cantwell

Customer Reviews

Peerless
The album that, in 1974, brought Bob Dylan back from the semi-wilderness he'd been in and out of since 1967. A laid-bare, heart-rending reconstruction in the recording studio of his disintegrating marriage, "Blood On The Tracks" contains some of Bod Dylan's (and anybody's) finest recorded work. It is, needless to say, completely reccommendable to anyone think of trying Dylan's music out for size, and yes there are many who know far less about his work than those of us who were brought up on this album in the seventies. These people are whom this review is aimed at. The rest of us know it's great.

The overall feel of the album, musically, is acoustic, and it kicks in with three pared-down classics of the genre - the mighty, mighty, mighty "Tangled Up In Blue" with its marvellous imagery and bitter taste abounding throughout, despite its chilled-out melodic quality; the beautiful "Simple Twist Of Fate" and the touching "You're A Big Girl". I challenge anyone not to b moved, even slightly by a proper listen to these three masterpieces. Then it's time for the venom to do its diabolic work and Dylan spits out seven minutes plus of diatribe in the titanic "Idiot Wind", the wind represented by the swirling organ sound as Dylan lets acidic raindrops pour from his mouth.

"You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go" and "Buckets Of Rain" are downbeat folky offerings that wouldn't have sounded out of place on "Nashville Skyline", while "Meet Me In The Morning" is a potboiling Dylan blues of the highest order.

For me, the highlights of the old "side two" are the magnificent narrative and impossibly cinematic "Lily, Rosemary and the Jack of Hearts" (try listening to it and not picturing each character in your head). Forget those who say "skip Lily". It remains one of my favourite Dylan cuts of all time.

"Shelter From The Storm" is a much more basic, moving song that characterises much of this album. Despite much of the bitterness and invective present, it must never be forgotten that much of Dylan's most tender moments are also found on this album. "If You See Her Say Hello" saw me through a few broken romances in the past and is as heart breaking as it is simply constructed. Dylan is a man put out by the break up of his marriage but he is completely aware of his love and of the affection he may be leaving behind. He misses it so. It shows.

"Blood On The Tracks" is regularly put up in the "top albums of all time" lists and rightly so. Maybe it didn't have the earth-moving seismic contemporary effects of "Highway 61 Revisited" and "Blonde On Blonde", but it remains Dylan's greatest album since 1967 and no doubt always will.

Not his greatest
Routinely cited by fans as proof that Dylan never lost his genius, 'Blood On The Tracks' stands out only because it was his first decent album for eight years. As ever, his lyrical prowess is not in doubt, but musically, not for the first time, it tends to be bland. The familiar strummed rhythms are ordinary and the vocals delivered in that often tuneless drawl, with the odd shout to punctuate them. 'If You See Her, Say Hello' is beautifully done, but the much-vaunted 'Tangled Up In Blue', like most of the songs, is not what it's cracked up to be. I give this album an occasional airing, but I have to be in the right mood and much prefer the earlier albums. 'Blood On The Tracks' is not only not Dylan's best album, but not even the best album of 1975. Led Zeppelin Physical Graffiti, David Bowie Station to Station: Remastered, Dr Feelgood Stupidity and Pink Floyd Wish You Were Here all made far better albums in that year. 'Blood On The Tracks' is undoubtedly very good, but nothing like the beast it's frequently made out to be.

singing
Just a note for anyone who, like me, wants to buy a CD version of this, after the old vinyl copy's become battered. Has Dylan's singing ever sounded so fresh, so full of intent and invention? It's a bizarre idea, as one reviewer here suggests, to listen to this while reading the lyric sheet; for every sentence, each word, is crystal-clear, the voice full of tautness and intelligence. On this CD (remastered?) version, the voice sits slightly apart from the instruments, not muffled behind them. A stunning performance.