Bob Dylan – Never Ending Tour Rehearsals Review

Despite a sudden flood of contemporary quality, Bob Dylan still struggled towards the end of the 1980s. Oh Mercy may have been a shot of sudden studio quality for Dylan, but he was still searching for suitable next steps on stage. It would not be until the soft nostalgia reboot of MTV Unplugged that he found a worthy instrumental change, but it was at least not far off. The five years between Oh Mercy and the return of polka dot shirts on hip music channels are still rough. Even after touring with Grateful Dead, Dylan was struggling to pull anything of true brilliance out. You can hear a soft desperation on Never Ending Tour Rehearsals, a compilation where each song sounds as though Dylan is trying to break down his style. I Shall Be Released is one of those moments, a recording where the veteran songwriter tries to release himself from a dated guitar rock style.  

He does not manage it on this tour, though it provides an interesting listen, nonetheless. The troubles of this compilation are clear. Shot of Love sounds flat, as do the rest of these ’80s releases. Dylan had not yet found a suitable style for them, either instrumentally or vocally. Amid the sea of covers, be it Gordon Lightfoot or Eric Clapton, there is a sense of insincerity to the instrumentals. Guitar work which would blur with the pop music of the time, percussion pieces which sound underwhelming, and a fiddle for the first Shot of Love, which acted as a callback to previously revolutionary stage presentations. Never Ending Tour Rehearsals is of interest to those who want to hear how Dylan picked out the pieces of a very messy period. You can hear it across the later songs on this compilation, the likes of Ballad of a Thin Man and Shelter from the Storm, flat and loose.  

At least there are rarities within. Covers which did not seem likely for Dylan at the time. Little Queen of Spades and I’m Not Supposed to Care act as a welcome break from the five Shot of Love renditions. It leaves these rehearsals lacking a clear direction, though. Dylan is trying and failing frequently to reinvent the instrumental flourishes which had him frozen out of critical acclaim in the ‘80s. He would be back in their good graces, briefly, with Oh Mercy. There’s a definite shift around Peace in the Valley. A confident sound, a sense of experimenting with how loud or quiet a song could be, how capable it was of still carrying a message. Shelter from the Storm is a superb example of this. An upbeat and swinging style to a song which works best when it is a contemplative, slowed ballad.  

Desperation takes many forms. Sometimes it will be pleading, other times it will be an unsteady tempo for Blood on the Tracks rips. It’s a mess of a listen, but a fascinating piece which adds an essential layer of context to Dylan’s struggles in the ‘80s and early ‘90s. These are reasons why he caved to the nostalgia show MTV offered. He could not have been at a lower point creatively, and that seemed like, at the very least, a chance for reinvention. Dylan, at this stage, sounds as though he has forgotten the clear way to a new sound. It comes from revisiting the fundamentals of your earliest works, of playing back the style which had worked well then and adapting it to the times. Never Ending Tour Rehearsals forgets that there are never-ending influences to be heard in stripping a song back to its foundation. Layer after instrumental layer is added here, and it makes for a messy collection of lifeless tracks.