Bob Dylan “Shot of Love”
How was he only 27 when he was crooning with Johnny Cash on “Nashville Skyline?” Is it possible that he was only 33 when he recorded “Blood On The Tracks?” It is staggering to consider the sheer volume of experiments that Dylan had conducted by 1981, the year he turned 40. Was it all the work of one man? How many lives had he lived by the time he tried on Christianity and kicked off his trio of “born again” albums? In retrospect, it seems inconceivable that fans or critics could, in the moment, keep up with Dylan’s breakneck turns, much less effectively assess each new disguise with any objectivity. He is the ultimate critical challenge -- both iconic and known and entirely unknowable.
Full disclosure -- my Bob Dylan consumption ends at “Infidels.” No specific reasons. I just moved on to other stuff. Post-punk, Indie, marriage and kids — you know. Same thing happened to me with Van Morrison after “Into the Music.” Perhaps I wanted the stories to end well? And, even during my trek through the Dylan discography, I skipped a few albums, including the three “Christian records.” Part of it was surely fatigue. Some of it was laziness. Mostly, though, my avoidance was driven by the herd review, which suggested that these albums kind of sucked.
In the last ten years, as fans and critics started to catch back up and reassess middle-aged Dylan through a wider aperture -- via documentaries, the official “Bootleg” releases and revisionist histories -- I also checked back in. I still haven’t ventured into the late 80s or early 90s, but I dove headlong into the later 70s and early 80s. “New Morning” goes down pretty easily. “Desire” and “Infidels” may not be as great as I recalled. The former sounds a little loose to the point of being sloppy and the latter sounds aseptic to the point of being boring.
After “Infidels,” however, I took the full leap and was, at least, half-baptized. “Slow Train Coming” sounded OK to me. I liked the way it grooved. I liked Dylan as a “Staples Brother.” “Saved” sounded thinner and redundant. But, “Shot of Love” -- the final album of the “born again” trilogy, the one with the curious pop-art cover, the one most likely to be found in dusty thrift store bins, that one -- someway, somehow sounded downright fantastic.
Dylan made “Shot of Love” during a period of enormous productivity and restlessness. The number of outtakes and alternate takes from this period is astonishing. He allegedly struggled to find the right studio for this album. He struggled equally to find a producer. He rejected mix after mix. Perhaps he knew exactly what he wanted it to sound like and he couldn’t quite get it. Or perhaps he was conducting too many experiments at once and had lost the core hypotheses.
It is an album that can play like a swaggering Americana record, an easy going singer-songwriter album and an oddball Gospel record. And what reads like a mess as I write it, ends up sounding immediate, complete, ambitious and -- yes -- fun. There are moments when you imagine the band is in Nashville. There are moments when you imagine they are on a porch listening as the sun sets. Danny Kortchmar channels some very authentic Robbie Robertson on guitar. The piano sounds live and the Hammond drops in at perfect moments throughout. In fact, this is the closest any Bob Dylan album comes to resembling a record that The Band would make.
The album’s first three tracks -- ”Shot of Love,” “Heart of Mine” and “Property of Jesus” -- are practically flawless. Once I disabused myself of anti-religious bias and just listened, I discerned the strut of a masterful bandleader and full throated singer at the peak of his powers. It sounds live and urgent like he and the players are plugging in and just letting it rip. Turns out that Gospel Rock Dylan was extraordinary.
The various elements at play are so strong, in fact, that even when reconstituted as Reggae, on “Dead Man, Dead Man,” they are not only not embarrassing, they groove. Ironically, the singer songwriter moments are less interesting. “Lenny Bruce” might have appealed to aging hippies and purists, but the song is boring. I know that, in 1981, critics hailed “Every Grain of Sand” as the album’s redemptive moment. But, forgive me, because in 2020, it sounds repetitive and dull — like the lazy poetry of a middle-aged man who temporarily misplaced his genius. In the context of a generally live wire album, “Every Grain of Sand” sounds bolted on. I also realize that this is a highly unpopular opinion.
Unsurprisingly, the denouement is not as enthralling as its opening salvos. And the ponderous closer is a bit of a bummer. But that’s just nitpicking, honestly. I know that there have been countless revisionist takes on every part of Dylan’s career, including this one. So, I guess you can add this essay to that pile. I’m certainly not the first person to re-assess “Shot of Love” and suggest that it was much more than the C+/B-/2 star album that critics and fans suggested nearly forty years ago. While I may not feel original, however, I do feel incredibly lucky. Lucky that I came to this album without the baggage of its original context. It’s not another post “Blood” let down. It’s not an affront to his agnostic true believers. It’s not an unfinished patchwork. In 2020, it’s nothing short of a gift.
Bob Dylan was never a hero of mine. But I have been guilty, like so many, of idolizing him. Now 46 myself, I have tried to conceive of Bob Dylan, the person, alongside Dylan, the legend. Candidly, it’s not easy. He is so mercurial and dense that it’s hard to know what is earnest, what is genius, what is impaired and what is a performance. Bob as circus ringleader is an oft-used metaphor, but it’s a good one. And, on “Shot of Love,” I can hear and picture a confident bandleader. But it’s not a circus. Maybe it’s in a big tent. But it’s more of a revue or a celebration. Sure, the Jesus hologram is there. But, he also conjures Levon Helm, Mavis Staples, Johnny Cash and every other version of Bob Dylan we’ve imagined before. “Shot of Love” is a great, imperfect album made by a great, imperfect person in a moment of release.