basement tapes ‘raw’

The recordings known as ‘The Basement Tapes’ have been released, officially and unofficially, in many different forms. The series of events that led up to the recordings, and the eventual influence the songs had on the musical world, are legendary, and some very good books have been written on the subject. Essentially put on tape by Dylan and members of the Band during a ‘down’ time in his career after allegedly suffering a major injury from a motorcycle accident, the recordings are rough sketches of material being worked on for various reasons. There are also multiple covers that the group seems to be using to just get some work in. Contrary to most accounts, the tapes were made in various locations around Woodstock/West Saugerties area, not just the ‘Big Pink’ house. The sessions lasted about 6 months, from May to October 1967, and a fourteen song demo was copyrighted and sent to various artists who were known to be interested in covering new Dylan material. Almost all of them were picked by someone with varied success. In 1969 a bootleg called ‘The Great White Wonder’ appeared on the scene, with original cuts from the sessions included with other Dylan material. Eventually over a hundred cuts from the sessions were shown the light of day by various bootlegs. Eventually Dylan saw fit to make an official release of some sorts, and in 1975 Robbie Robertson was given the responsibility of putting it together. Selected cuts were remixed and overdubbed, and some original work from The Band was also added (recorded at a different period).

Now Dylan has given the green light to go back and release the entire thing, unedited. With the help of Garth Hudson, the original member who actually engineered the recording, they have been offered up in two versions: ‘Complete’, which has 139 songs on 6 discs, and ‘Raw’, which selects 38 of them for a 2 CD release. I opted for the latter, but am still open to getting the bigger eventually. At a minimum, if you are a moderate Dylan fan and have an appreciation for the history of these recordings, you have to get ‘Raw’. It is totally different than the 1975 version, and the booklet that comes with it is a small novel on everything you need to know about this special event in music history. There are also plenty of pictures of them that I have never seen. Much of the dialogue in the booklet is offered up by Sid Griffin, who probably wrote the definitive book on the recordings, ‘Million Dollar Bash’. After getting ‘Raw’ I ordered the book and thoroughly enjoyed it. The songs are not polished, and most were not meant to see the light of day. But they certainly give us a glimpse into that transformative summer in Woodstock, when a group of guys were just playing in a basement for the hell of it, trying to create something new. And they did.