October 12, 2012
Review by Luigi B.
It is not easy to transfer emotions into words, not for common people, at
least. Bob can, but I doubt I will be able to convey what happened friday
night at Vancouver,s Rogers Arena. Let's give a try, anyway. I was in
sombre mood after viewing the setlists from the Prairies leg of the tour,
I understood Bob wasn't much into neither guitar playing nor live
rarities. I also had to forgo an all-family concert for my two very well
Dylan-read daughters, courtesy of the Vancouver-style inflated price for a
sidestage seat bought 6 weeks in advance. I heard of people buying
thousand-bucks packages for the reserved stalls. I do not belong to that
income bracket and so I parted with wife and children around 6 pm heading
for the Arena on an underground train. Daylight was fading away as rain
kept on pouring, I had a not-so-rainproof jacket and the Pacific Coast
damp was gnawing at my bones. When security at the entrance directed me to
joining a three-people queue under a leaking daisy, I just started to hope
that all this was to be compensated by His music. The crowd was a nice
cross section of city type, squinted on baby-boomers with attached spuoses
and occasional offspring, clearly in tow of Main Fan in Charge of
explanations, paying for expensive merchandise and booze (sorry about
that, but as Italian I am still at odds with anglo attitude towards
alcohol drinking). I was so excited that just went straight into the wrong
section and row, and started to loose myself into the conversations I
could overhear. Long gone concerts and emotions few free into the
cavernous ice venue. Then it was Mark Knopfler time to warm us up. I felt
even a little guilty to get bored after 30 mins of mostly faultless music,
but I was there for something else. And when the lights went off and
without a warning, He came out of the wings, cream coloured hat blazing in
the night, and the bluesy intro of Watchin' the river flow started, I knew
I was there for that something. Could he have done better than evoking To
ramona from 50 years ago? You never got what you want but what you
deserve, and refusal is not an option with Bob. So you put up with a
concert without Him playing guitar, without stratoclassics that few years
ago were main staple of his concert, and discover the True meaning of a 71
years old poet and entertainer, mostly sitting at a grand Piano when not
crooning wisdom sentences with a mike in his hand and a harmonica in the
pocket of his heavy dinner jacket. Was he mostly grinning or acting or
playing fancy chord through Times have changed, Tangled Up in Blue and
later High Water? Wasn't everything ringing truer than a all classic
concert? And they are not classic anyway? Maybe for this I bought a
Thunder on the Mountain t-shirt, before the concert... Anyway, highlights
apart, a concert to remind us of the sorrowful state of things ahead.
Still relevant today, for sure.
Luigi B.
Review by Jerry Tenenbaum
The Roger's Centre is a vacuous hockey arena that serves hockey well and
musical concerts less well. In such a setting, we saw Mark Knopfler and
band and Bob Dylan and Band last evening. Both overcame the sad lacking
of arena rock and the sound was acceptable. Mark Knopfler's delivery of
his recent catalog and particularly the material from his superb album
"Privateering" was fine. With a wonderful backing band, the blues were
bluesy and the celtic Irish material took you to another place. The
Knopflerian guitar of course was existential and made this performance
superb. The same cannot be said for Dylan and his band. Overall, we
both felt the performance by the Band was uneven. If you are going to
see Dylan sing his songs, forget it. This is a recital of his lyrical
poetry sometimes growled and sometimes spit out with venom. It is a
different and evolving rendering of material previously sung and has to
be interpreted in a new way from the way we have heard Dylan before. It
worked well for most of the blues high tempo material (tonight
unfortunately not for "Watchtower") such as "Watching The River Flow",
"Thunder on The Mountain" and "Highway 61". It worked less well for the
welcomed "To Ramona" and "Love Sick" was a letdown (a beautiful song that
was played by the band in what can only be described as 'dire' and
atonal). They missed the boat on that one totally. Dylan was best
centre stage with mike and mouth harp in either hand. He was lively and
animated, seemingly happy and alive, dancing and prancing as a typical
'song and dance man' (recital though it was). He seemed involved and
committed. The sound mix failed him at times tonight and as noted, and
for the reasons given, sometimes the overall delivery worked and other
times it fell short (not unusual of late for the Dylan concerts I have
attended). I was happy to hear 'Desolation Row' and 'Tangled' but
disappointed by the arrangement of the latter and the rendering of the
former. 'Thin Man' was superbly delivered. The Dylan instrument of
choice is the piano but the playing, when you heard it through the mix,
was elementary but appropriate. We went hoping to hear a song or two from
'Tempest', knowing that only one song ('Scarlet Town') has ever been
played in the few concerts so far.
We were disappointed but not surprised. Perhaps we'll get 'Duquesne
Whistle" or some of the others in the future. I'll see Dylan and
Knopfler again in Toronto. I am a true fan and keep the faith as so many
do, waiting for the gems to appear and they do. Dylan is clearly doing
what moves him and directs him at this moment, and recital rock is what
it is.
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