Reteaming with the Band, Bob Dylan winds up with an album that recalls New Morning more than The Basement Tapes, since Planet Waves is given to a relaxed intimate tone -- all the more appropriate for a collection of modest songs about domestic life. As such, it may seem a little anticlimactic since it has none of the wildness of the best Dylan and Band music of the '60s -- just an approximation of the homespun rusticness. Considering that the record was knocked out in the course of three days, its unassuming nature shouldn't be a surprise, and sometimes it's as much a flaw as a virtue, since there are several cuts that float into the ether. Still, it is a virtue in places, as there are moments -- "On a Night Like This," "Something There Is About You," the lovely "Forever Young" -- where it just gels, almost making the diffuse nature of the rest of the record acceptable.

A recurring theme for me in this thread is that I discover that some of my favorite of the second tier Dylan songs are tunes that appeared on the Biograph album since I'm pretty sure I listened to those three discs roughly 5,000 times between 1995-98.

"On A Night Like This" fits the bill here. Love that tune.

A recurring theme for me in this thread is that I discover that some of my favorite of the second tier Dylan songs are tunes that appeared on the Biograph album since I'm pretty sure I listened to those three discs roughly 5,000 times between 1995-98.

"On A Night Like This" fits the bill here. Love that tune.

I also really like his singing style on some of these tracks, it's similar to his singing on the Rolling Thunder tours which is my favorite live stuff from him by far.

'Tough Mama' fucking swings though.

Following on the heels of an album where he repudiated his past with his greatest backing band, Blood on the Tracks finds Bob Dylan, in a way, retreating to the past, recording a largely quiet, acoustic-based album. But this is hardly nostalgia — this is the sound of an artist returning to his strengths, what feels most familiar, as he accepts a traumatic situation, namely the breakdown of his marriage. This is an album alternately bitter, sorrowful, regretful, and peaceful, easily the closest he ever came to wearing his emotions on his sleeve. That's not to say that it's an explicitly confessional record, since many songs are riddles or allegories, yet the warmth of the music makes it feel that way. The original version of the album was even quieter — first takes of "Idiot Wind" and "Tangled Up in Blue," available on The Bootleg Series, Vols. 1-3, are hushed and quiet (excised verses are quoted in the liner notes, but not heard on the record) — but Blood on the Tracks remains an intimate, revealing affair since these harsher takes let his anger surface the way his sadness does elsewhere. As such, it's an affecting, unbearably poignant record, not because it's a glimpse into his soul, but because the songs are remarkably clear-eyed and sentimental, lovely and melancholy at once. And, in a way, it's best that he was backed with studio musicians here, since the professional, understated backing lets the songs and emotion stand at the forefront. Dylan made albums more influential than this, but he never made one better.