The Never Ending Tour Extended: “When I paint my masterpiece” and the greatest moment in the tour.

I don’t know what it means either: an index to the current series appearing on this website

——————

The Never Ending Tour Extended: This series primarily uses recordings selected by Mike Johnson in his inestimable masterpiece The Never Ending Tour, and looks at how those performances of individual songs change as time goes by. The selection of songs from the series, and the commentary below, are by Tony Attwood. A list of all the songs covered in the series is given at the end.

——————

Today, I think it is maybe time to bring this series to an end – and “When I paint my masterpiece” seems an apt conclusion. But of course if there is a song that you have been waiting to see covered in the series please do write to me (Tony@schools.co.uk) and I’ll see if I can find anything to say. Or indeed you could write your own article on a particular song selecting examples from the series (just quote the article URL or title in each case) – and send it to the same address.

So to conclude for now, (except for a PS that I am going to add in which I indulge myself by picking my absolute favourite moment from the tour), here we have “When I paint my masterpiece”….

Between 1975 and 2024 Bob played this song 383 times. As ever our quest in this series is to look at how the performances changed over time.

1991: Feet walking by themselves

This is interesting in that it is rare for Bob to start a song with a harmonica solo – and even rarer to go through two verses that way. After that we get an instrumental verse which Bob joins in toward the end. And then finally he comes in with his vocal.

This was the era when Bob insisted on taking his voice up to the top of his range for the last word of each line. It was a curious effect, and one that never appealed to me, and indeed the constant use of the technique seems to me to be tedious where there is nothing much else added to the performance, and the words are being delivered in a rush. So that even though I know the lyrics, I find myself losing track of the song.

There is also for me the impression that the vocal line is getting more and more frantic in the verse that starts around 4 minutes 20 seconds, and I can’t quite understand why – especially as the band plods along in an unvaried way.

I suppose my real problem is that we have getting on for seven minutes of a song in which the band is unvaried in its approach. The variation comes from the lyrics and the harmonica… and I don’t find either successful. But the audience obviously did, so, not for the first time, that’s just me.

1995: The Kingdom of Experience

And what a difference four years has made. Bob now sounds like he cares about the song rather than adding it to the show because it’s one of his more famous songs.

The accompaniment too takes us for a sympathetic ride – music and lyrics in harmony, even in the middle 8, and what happens thereafter. Performances like this which I really like, make me wonder quite how Bob can choose to deliver versions like that of 1991 – especially given the obvious affection in which he holds the song.

And yes, do take in the extraordinary instrumental break that starts just before the four- minute mark, and which is taken right back down by the middle 8 and the following verse. Better still it feels like it is coming to an end at around 5 minutes 30, but we get a really delightful instrumental break, which is full of surprises.

2018: The Return of the Master Harpist

So now we jump forward – and from the off we know that this is another re-write as the opening is declaimed by Bob. And to our surprise, he doesn’t take up the beat immediately. Indeed the slow approach goes on into the middle 8, until half way through that we get the beat, and we are straight into a harmonica solo. It really is quite a rearrangement.

For me however there is a problem, because although the arrangement is interesting, I am not sure that it is enough to hold my attention for six minutes. Indeed if I may say so after the five minute mark, the endlessly repeated musical phrase (which sounds like Bob playing an electric keyboard although I could be quite wrong), is not one of the finest moments.

The performance does recover but it never reaches the heights.

2019 The Liberated Republic

So finally we reach the end and Bob is back to reciting, although with much more of a melody than has always been the case. But he has retained his view that slowing this piece right down to a recitation is the way forward.

And yet and yet, as we get to the three minute mark it starts to make real sense. Indeed I think this is the version that Bob was looking for throughout the tour. So I would say, even if you have not been impressed by what you have heard so far please stay with this. The latter part of the performance really is the best of the bunch, and would go onto my imaginary album of The Greatest Moments of the Never Ending Tour.

Postscript….

However if you have stayed with me through this rambling series of reflections you might recall that there was one moment when I jumped out of my skin with utter surprise. So although the conclusion of “Masterpiece” above really is a perfect conclusion to this series looking back at how Bob changed his songs across the years, I now must add my own selection of a masterpiece.

It comes from 2014: The survivors

Since I first heard this when Mike provided it in July 2023, it has been right up at the top of my selection for the best moment of the Never Ending Tour. Best not only because it was so unexpected, but best because of its lyrical and musical quality.

For it was then, during the writing of this series, and still is now, the very best Never Ending Tour moment, not least because it was totally unexpected, for none of the earlier versions of this song on the tour gave us a clue of what was to come.

As I said in my review of this song when we got to it in this series, “Who, honestly, on hearing the original live versions could ever have imagined the song could be like this? How did he clear his mind of everything the song has been before, to get to this?…

“I play this, I keep playing this, and I am so, so grateful to Mike for having selected it from the thousands and thousands of extracts he listened to.”

Mike, I owe you so much for your original series on The Never Ending Tour, and for choosing Untold Dylan as the place for it to be published. And beyond that I owe you for giving me the ok to work on this second series which attempts to show how the songs evolve on stage over the years.

And to you, my reader, I do hope that if you have only taken in one or two articles in the series, you have discovered, as I have, the vast ability that Bob Dylan has as a re-arranger of his own work.

Of course inevitably most focus on Dylan is on each new song that he creates, and of course that is reasonable. But for me, if no one else, Bob’ ability to rework songs into totally new formats, or indeed just to make a handful of changes which can nonetheless transform a song into something new, is utterly remarkable.

If you have been following the series through all 58 episodes, or indeed if you have just dipped in once or twice, I hope you have enjoyed what you have found. And of course, if you do feel there was one song that I really should have included, do write and let me know and I’ll have a go. Or indeed you could perhaps write the article yourself, and send it in for publication. I’m, always delighted to hear from new contributors. As noted above, just write to Tony@schools.co.uk

And if you have been, thank you for reading.

The Never Ending Tour Extended

Leave a Reply