Bob Dylan – The Bootleg Series Vol. 13: Trouble No More 1979-1981 – Live Review

One last look at a patchy part of his career, Bob Dylan lays down the gauntlet of a troubled time. His sharp nosedive following Slow Train Coming, a fine record, was followed by Dylan chasing religion as a musical topic along with some heartless days of ill-fitting 1980s imagery. It did not suit the man. It still does not. But to put an end to it, The Bootleg Series offers up this eight-hour compendium. Digging deep and throwing out just about everything it can from this 1979 to 1981 period is a bold move, but it offers the chance to try and understand the headspace Dylan found himself in during this born-again experience. Writing off Slow Train Coming given the preceding highs of Blood on the Tracks is understandable, but these live performances give the religious period some consistency. 

Righteous material sounds better when saddled with the conviction of live performance. The likes of I Believe in You still lack self-confidence in their lyrics but the passionate display from this live performance has all the classy consistencies fans of Dylan have come to know and love. Instrumental highs but shaky lyrics of conspiracy-like style on When You Gonna Wake Up? sees Dylan aim Henry Kissinger and the likes – though it feels out of fashion given how long after the Vietnam War it was released. Still relevant, yes, but the indifferent guitar work on this makes it a hard track to endure. Trouble No More, for its first two hours, trundles on as solid background noise for filing away odd jobs and cleaning up your flat. 

But the dishes can be done without the distant strains of a man taken by religious texts. Gonna Change My Way of Thinking is very dependent on the wilder flourishes of keyboard and steady percussion, as are the best tracks of this live set. Soulful instrumentals and wonderful solos all battling for a place in the spotlight, taken up by a man moved by God. Staples like Shot of Love and Every Grain of Sand, songs which infiltrate the recent Rough and Rowdy Ways tour, do sound as good now as they did on Trouble No More – but the gap of context and the longevity of these songs was not in place for these late 1970s tours. 

To some degree, this is the closest you can get to a televangelist broadcast without suffering the demon shakes and flashing lights. At its worst, Dylan turns into a God-bothering preacher. At its best, the constraints of poor press in the past are lifted from an elated Dylan whose vocal range is in its first signs of change – but to the benefit of those attending these live shows. Saving Grace highlights this tremendously. Some of the religious predilections throughout are a storm cloud hanging over some intense instrumentals which feel like a fitting move toward clarity over the next decade. It was not to be, and Dylan would strike out consistently until the end of the 1980s. Still, it is fascinating to hear where his sound was heading – the early flickers can be heard in the Trouble No More live pieces.