Bob Dylan – In the Summertime: Volume 2 Review

A turn of good fortune was in the hands of Bob Dylan as the summer and later winter dates of a 1981 tour rolled on. This is not a positive. In the Summertime: Volume 2 is a unique piece for it serves as a bonus, now, to The Bootleg Series: Trouble No More. Controversial works on Slow Train Coming and the release of the initially misunderstood Shot of Love made up a touring schedule trying to tie the knot between religious clarity and hit-making classics expected of his ever-growing audience. The times were – as Dylan says in the crackling opener to an unofficial compilation here – changing. Crucial for listeners blindly heading into this one is to prepare for Dylan to cast aside the tempo of his songs and instead leap into the deep end of changing their tone. The message remains the same as powerful songs mould to the times, but the off-the-cuff feel of these recordings makes it a fascinating listen.  

Where the calamitous build found on Saved may now be a treat it still sounds too much like a gospel motion – a piece to try and swerve Dylan into a new genre. Heavy, heavy lifting was required and where the backing vocals add little to this version, they are on hand to provide stronger efforts elsewhere on this maligned tour. A lot of thanking the Lord but there is no salvation for those in the crowd. Listeners tuning in forty years on from this tour may feel short-changed, not by the solid quality offered on this collection but by the vacant noise Dylan makes throughout. It has trouble connecting to its finest moments, the rarities and fresh material within sound choppy and disorienting in spots. It is tour by tour. Qualities can change. Interests may flicker. But the venom heard on The Rolling Thunder Revue and the exceptional qualities which would follow this tour throughout a vocally challenged and eventually riotous 1990s mean this early 80s output is lukewarm in comparison.  

Repetitive works like Dead Man, Dead Man find new life here. The Shot of Love piece has an instrumental groove which fits nicely into this fluid approach Dylan has to his work at this point. Some rambling before a Birmingham-based Ballad of a Thin Man performance has Dylan air his love for England and launch into a particularly incredible rendition. Punchy, gutsy and a strong example of how best these backing vocalists are used during this early 80s period, Ballad of a Thin Man has it all and throws a shadow over the production and instrumentation of those Shot of Love songs. Even then the darker start to Jesus Is The One throws a volatile and darker section in there, however briefly, as a confident mark of change. Even the odd ode to Lenny Bruce feels like a neat occasion here. It still makes little sense and was mocked well by Tim Heidecker during a live show but this In the Summertime volume revels in its appearance.  

In the Summertime: Volume 2 is best listened to for its instrumental variances. Slow to start and strong to finish as the first volume was. Hear those cult-like claps and hollers for the prelude to Mr. Tambourine Man and revel in the eventual appearance of the Bringing it All Back Home classic. Dylan is far away from the headspace he was in for that classic but gives it as close a studio performance as he can with this trip to Drammen, Norway. Keep hold of those classics and occasionally you stumble onto a bootleg performance where Dylan kicks into gear and cruises down memory lane. Smooth work from the man who would soon head through his darkest days as a commercial and artistic draw. But the light at the end of the tunnel is found in these final tracks.