when i heard that one of my favorite bluegrass bands was going to release a live album covering one of my favorite albums by probably my favorite artist, well, that made my day. the country music hall of fame was looking for ideas to do a tribute to the making of bob dylan’s ‘blonde on blonde’ album, which had been recorded primarily in nashville in 1966. when they asked ketch secor – one of ocms’ founders – if he would be interested, he jumped on it and took charge of the project. the choice was certainly appropriate. ketch and one of the other founders – critter fuqua – were huge dylan fans in their teens and started off doing covers before moving to bluegrass and busking on the streets of nashville. probably their most well known song is ‘wagon wheel’ (made a little more famous by darius rucker’s cover a few years ago), which is a song that ketch wrote from a fragment of a lyric from dylan’s ‘pat garrett and billy the kid’ soundtrack. he gave bob co-credits on the song.

dylan was making most of his seminal albums of the sixties from new york studios, but for various reasons felt stuck in inspiration when recording the tracks for this album. when he and the producer decided to pick up and head to nashville instead, utilizing some crack local country studio musicians, it changed the course of rock history. there is an argument to be made that the current americana music genre has at least some of its roots in what came out of these sessions. ketch and critter are keenly aware of this history, and were anxious to incorporate this into their overall scheme.

there is plenty of material here, as it is the first double album in history. there is a wide range of song styles and of course voluminous lyrics. since some of the other band members weren’t as familiar with the songs, ketch constructed 43 pages of chords and lyrics, and memorized everything. another decision process was whether to stay true to dylan’s electric leanings of the time, or to be creative and stay acoustic and adjust the arrangements accordingly. they chose the latter, and i think it works really well. for example, one of the more rocking tunes on the original is ‘obviously five believers’, and the boys turn it into a fiddle hoe down. they absolutely kill ‘absolutely sweet marie’.

it is really a solid performance all the way around and i found it highly satisfying. they are taking the show on the road and will be touring very soon. i have four tickets to the columbus show. i have two extra if anyone is interested. first come first serve.