Bob Dylan – Stuttgart 1991 Review

It is no good compartmentalising the Stuttgart 1991 recording. We all have off days. Some of us will have forgotten to unload the washing this morning, their bedsheets and what few t-shirts remain without any holes are now stale and need another cycle. Others will have found their bin is still overflowing with empty wrappers and Bon Jovi records. These are the mistakes we make when foggy brains persevere. But the off days for instrumentalists, for those who work their way through the stage, are criticised far more. Stuttgart 1991 is the vicious side of bootleg recordings, the collective fascination with a below-par performance from someone who was so consistent earlier in their career. The bar is high for Bob Dylan, and the higher it is pushed the more these recordings are listened to. But does Stuttgart 1991 deserve its reputation as the worst show he ever performed? 

A sluggish instrumental intro would suggest so. Repetitive and indifferent performances of all the hits. This is fatigue in motion rather than anything of suggested artistic shortcoming. New Morning may open with some slurred words and a piano introduction which sounds akin to a cat collapsing onto the keys but there is surely something of good form to hold onto. There is not. Despite the heavy-hitting setlist of songs, what few can be identified are ruined by an impressively poor vocal performance from Dylan. 1991 is not a golden year for Dylan, on stage or in the studio. He was creatively flatlining and a performance like Stuttgart 1991 is indefensible. A turgid and bloated instrumental selection paired with a Dylan performance which sounds stripped of care and interest. His rambling, almost drunken-live delivery is a nasty piece of work. Funny in the first few tracks – shocking in particular for Lay, Lady Lay – but it soon turns nasty.  

Vocally like a stomped cat and conducting himself with a careless attitude to a stunningly quiet audience, Stuttgart 1991 is a sign of something wrong. A creative malaise or some discontent with the works of the past. It is something Dylan has fixed in his most recent works and it means reformatting his traditional songs and contemporary pieces to a new style, something to drag him back from the brink of disinterest as heard in this infamous performance. Yes, it is that bad. Bright sparks can be found within, though brief as they are present Dylan is aware of where he is and of what instruments he is using. Mr Tambourine Man is the most palatable of all these crummy performances and even then, he sounds rushed off his feet, searching for the end of a classic. It is not the change in tempo which is the issue but the conviction of the performance. There is a looseness to it and the rest of these songs here which shines a light on Stuttgart 1991’s greatest trouble.  

Mumbled nonsense at the best of times, Dylan is either out of it or showing a sudden interest in shoegaze here. Borderline disastrous. But those with a little more sympathy can reason with Dylan’s performance. Creative fatigue had flatlined Dylan through the 1980s and after a brief spark with Oh Mercy, it seemed like business as usual for the Never Ending Tour. Crashing out at a time of immense pressure and artistic malaise feels like a given for any artist – we just remain shocked in hindsight that it can happen to the best. Stuttgart 1991 is a disaster and while we can use the context of the time and hindsight as ways of understanding it further, there is never an excuse for putting on this bad of a show. Dylan is outshined by his harmonica playing, any break from his vocal work here is a blessed relief. This should have been the end of his instrumental amplification – and it would be when he reignited a passionate interest in his career with a return to his roots for MTV Unplugged just three years after this performance.