Reviews

Paris, France

Grand Rex

April 13, 2019


[J Marc], [Nick Cowie]

Review by J Marc



Starry eyed and ...... smiling with still some tears of joy i left this
magnificent venue!!! I had seen Bob in Düsseldorf i was speechless!
Au Grand Rex with this intimate atmosphere with Bob and his quartet of
aces I reached still another level! Bob I know is The Master.....
creating  beauty, emotions is his art!  Listening to That Voice His
voice always makes the world different! We know the story but when he
begins simple twist......... he takes us to sheer emotion with him.
Masterpiece is a ....masterpiece,  Scarlet town shows us a place where 
humans toil and ...live. Rolling stone has reached a new level Don't think
twice is  ............. sorry i m  still with Bob...  just
emotion.... his voice is so full of it, his piano playing, his harmonica,
the way he moves , he shares his own frailty like in Love Sick, Soon
after midnight! How many times .... have I said' Bob you're killing me
softly with your songs'  It takes a lot ends this list of gems and
jewels!!!!!  And Bob bowed twice!!! Yes sir! His arms open including
us who have been lucky to share what he offered us! YOU know Bob knowing
you since summer 1965 is the best encounter i have made in my life !
YOU deserve to live on and on for all that you have accompished to
make this world a better place for us all . God bless you .....and may
you and us stay forever young at heart and all! Love.

J. Marc

[TOP]

Review by Nick Cowie



A packed house at the Rex with Bob and the band coming on around 8.15 once
everyone was seated. The pre show ‘no phones, no photos’ announcement
had been greeted with a warm round of applause and the show was not marred
by this kind of selfishness. The Parisian crowd were really warm and
switched on, clapping on the on beat, Euro style, through Scarlet Town and
Like A Rolling Stone.

Bob was in commanding and beautiful voice from the off. Stand-outs were
Simple Twist Of Fate - You should have met me back in ’58. We could have
avoided this little simple twist of fate, Cry A While, When I Paint My
Masterpiece - an extraordinarily intimate rumination and reinvention in
voice, word and piano, Scarlet Town - a mesmerising, swinging centre stage
performance flanked by double bass and mandolin and Don’t Think Twice -
the emotional climax of the show. I always enjoy Pay In Blood, and this
was a good one. To these ears the impassioned vocal and new emphasis of
the re-tooled Gotta Serve Somebody was yet to be supported by a matching
individuality and strength of character in musical arrangement but it was
great to hear it for the first time.

The sound was the best I’ve heard for a Bob show in memory. The vocal is
being thickened with slight reverb and some echo added for emphasis making
for a well-balanced sound stage. Being one guitar down seems to have
worked out for the best.

Bob’s impeccable musicality, phrasing and timing makes his older songs
sound new and gives one the sense of hearing them for the first time. It
was a privilege to be at an astonishingly proficient and moving show.

Bob stood for a moment in the stage light at the end with two fingers
briefly drawn in gunfighter salute to the audience and then the lights
fell. 

[TOP]

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