Fans of Bob Dylan’s Live at Budokan release say the album flopped on release because it “wasn’t what anybody was looking for.”
The live album released in 1978 to mixed reviews but has been re-evaluated in the decades following its release. Fans of the live album were stunned to realise initial response to the album’s release was negative. A post to the r/BobDylan subreddit saw those fans try and work out why it had received such a middling reception on first release. One fan asked: “Did people really not like Live at Budokan? I’ve recently listened to some of the songs on The Complete Budokan and so far it’s GREAT.
“The fact that all these songs sound so different from the album recordings and yet they still sound so good really made me realise just how much of a musical genius Dylan is outside lyricism. But then I see that the album was really poorly recieved when it first came out and I really don’t get why (I only listened to a few songs on the album, maybe the rest are pretty bad but I highly doubt it). Were people expecting Dylan to play the songs exactly like the studio version?”
Fellow fans of the album are now trying to figure out why the reception to the album was so negative, and cited “a losing streak” as the possible reason. They wrote: “Bob was on a losing streak at the time with critics. They didn’t really care for Hard Rain, they absolutely panned Renaldo and Clara, and Street-Legal likewise got a walloping.
“I think this was just one of many times where, even though in retrospect it’s just a smaller part of the larger Bob Dylan story, at the time people were left scratching their heads. Plus, look at what was en vogue at the time. And then you have Bob Dylan looking like he’s wearing Elvis cosplay and playing with a big band. It just wasn’t what anybody was looking for.”
Another considered the impact of two previous live albums from Dylan, who went from having none in his discography to three over a period of four years. One user wrote: “Bob never released a live album and then all of a sudden, he releases three of them in a relatively short span (’74, ’77 and ’78).
“I remember Before the Flood being well-received because it was a thrill that Dylan was doing shows again and doing them with The Band. Hard Rain was dark with half of its songs coming from albums that had just come out (Blood on the Tracks and Desire) and weren’t certified classics yet with the older songs being drastically reworked.
“And then here comes Live at Budokan with Bob channeling Elvis and Neil Diamond with (again) drastically reworked versions many with flute and reggae beats. In anyone’s book it was weird. It quickly became known as the ‘alimony tour’ and it did seem like Bob was trying to get financially right after his very expensive divorce and Renaldo and Clara ‘investment’.”
Did people really not like Live at Budokan?
byu/felipe_martin2002 inbobdylan
Some cited the “Elvis in Vegas” criticism as a reason the album was never meant to release anywhere but Japan. One user wrote: “The At Budokan album was never meant to be released, other than in Japan. It was only released there due to some contractual quirk.
“When it was released there it soon became available as an import (in the UK at least) and was very popular but highly priced. It became so popular and sought after that CBS/Columbia decided to give it a full release.
“Although there was some criticism of the (Elvis in Vegas style) big band and the arrangements (changed for the sake of change) it was actually well-liked and popular in the UK.”
