CC00016: Bob Dylan
Submitted by lbangs on Tue, 02/20/2001 - 10:24
Tags:
- Highway 61 Revisited (10)
- Blood on the Tracks (10)
- The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (10)
- Blonde on Blonde (10)
- Bringing It All Back Home (10)
- John Wesley Harding (10)
- Desire (9.5)
- Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits (9)
- Bootleg Series, Vol. 4: Live 1966 - Royal Albert Concert (9)
- The Times They Are A-Changin' (8.5)
- Bootleg Series, Vols. 1-3: Rare & Unreleased, 1961-1991 (8.5)
- Another Side of Bob Dylan (8)
- Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Vol. 2 (8)
- The Basement Tapes (8)
- Biograph (8)
- Oh Mercy (8)
- Nashville Skyline (7.5)
- Time Out of Mind (7)
- New Morning (6.5)
- Planet Waves (6.5)
- Greatest Hits, Vol. 3 [US] (6.5)
- Street-Legal (6)
- Slow Train Coming (5.5)
- Empire Burlesque (5.5)
- Bob Dylan (5)
- Before the Flood [live] (5)
- Shot of Love (5)
- Infidels (5)
- At Budokan [live] (4)
- Real Live (4)
- Down in the Groove (4)
- Under the Red Sky (4)
- Good as I Been to You (4)
- World Gone Wrong (4)
- MTV Unplugged (4)
- Self Portrait (3)
- Hard Rain [live] (3)
- Knocked Out Loaded (3)
- Saved (2)
- Dylan & the Dead [live] (1.5)
- Dylan (1)
Author Comments:
This is an entry in a continuing series I call Critical Consensus. I am averaging the opinions of several excellent music critics to produce a list of each artist's albums. The albums will each have a rating between 1 and 10. The albums will be listed in a recommended purchasing order, so new fans will have an idea of where the best place to start buying an artist's work is. These are not my opinions, although, since I have chosen the critics used (and I'm using many), my taste will perhaps seep through a bit.
Terribly nerdy, I know, but maybe this will help people only now beginning to dabble into certain artists' bodies of work.
I am surprised that both Time out of mind and Street legal don't have at least an 8 rating (especially TOOM). Even though an album can't become an instant classic overnight, most people seem to agree that it is a very strong album, and even one of his best (according to Elvis Costello), so I feel that 7 is a liitle bit low for such a good album.
Best wishes,
Edward Sames
Well, the critical sources I was using were mostly old enough not to be able to include the remixed Street Legal, and the mix was an element often cited as a flaw. Perhaps the newer version would rank higher now.
For the most part, the critics I consulted liked Time Out of Mind, but did not love it. The swampy production was often cited as annoying, despite the quality of the songs. It almost tried to hard to be a quiet, spooky, deep album. I must say I tend to agree with this view; I rather favor Love and Theft as a proper comeback (and, frankly, one of the better albums in Dylan's career).
Shalom, y'all!
L. Bangs