Bob Dylan – Not at Budokan: Volume One Review

Live at Budokan will, one day, be exonerated. Bob Dylan at his very best. An on-stage masterclass which can easily slot into place as his best live album release. Further servings of that, seconds and thirds from the trough of bootlegging, is what any sane fan would want. Not at Budokan: Volume One, gives us just that. A compilation pieced together by Ray Padgett of Flagging Down the Double E’s, Not at Budokan explores the other performances Dylan was putting on at the time, a moment in history where the critics had turned on him. Fairly, in some instances, but horrendously cruel in other moments where a continuation from Dylan in doing what he wanted, the big band appeal, for instance, was frowned upon. He was not entertaining the zeitgeist, whatever that word now means. No, there was no interest from Dylan in the modern-day pop scene, not yet. Not at Budokan: Volume One remains a remarkable time. 

An instrumental riff on A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall into Sam Cooke-penned track She’s Love Crazy is quite the bold opening. Not all of these recordings are taken from the Budokan shows, much of this compilation comprises tracks from the 1978 tour. From Los Angeles to Brisbane and back to Paris and Osaka for some handy classics, Not at Budokan pulls a global tour into a digestible and thoroughly confident hour and forty. Backing vocalists make all the difference for Dylan here, their additions would become a name stay of the religious trilogy and his live performances, most of the best gathered on Trouble No More. A tremendous playthrough of Blood on the Tracks and Nashville Skyline pieces is what is worth sticking around for in these early moments. If You See Her, Say Hello and I Threw It All Away, while not as strong as their album counterparts, are served well on stage here.  

Most of the tracks within Not at Budokan: Volume One are served with a sense of defiant purpose. Dylan was steadfast in his desire to play these songs with big band appeal, against the grain of what everyone else was doing at the time. Performances of To Ramona, You’re Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go and It Ain’t Me, Babe, are masterful. These are moments where Dylan finds a clear yet still exciting link between his folk material and the post-electric fuzz, the divorces and deaths swirling around and affecting his songwriting. Live at Budokan sounds incredibly tight and features some magnificent instrumental work but, internally, feels like Dylan is trying to piece an overbearing puzzle back together. 

Hearing it occur on the likes of Tomorrow is a Long Time and I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight is nothing short of mesmerising. Songs which, had they been released when first written, would be right up there as classics. But they serve well as bonus material, as songs for the hardened fan. Where the recording quality may waver, it is to be expected of bootlegs piecing together twenty-six magnificent tracks. Instrumental variants of Rainy Day Woman #12 & 35, as well as a nice selection of Los Angeles rehearsal sessions. Dylan speaking to the crowd, performing with the same blistering spite which guided him on Blood on the Tracks and Street-Legal, is a volatile and wonderful moment, and yet each of these performances shows another of the worrying cracks beginning to show in the well-oiled Dylan machine.