Collecting an artist's entire catalog of original studio albums says something about you.
I've long believed you can surmise a lot about a person by looking at his or her record collection. If you own both of Justin Timberlake's albums, I'll go all in and bet you won't be spotted at the next Cradle of Filth show.
The number sounds arbirtrary, but if the artist has more than five albums and you own them all, you're devoted. If we apply the modern release cycle, which is around one record every two years, five albums is a decade of work. You've either been a dedicated fan for a while or you've stepped into the back catalog.
Either way, you've made a commitment to that artist at the five-album mark. It's not like owning every original Sex Pistols studio album, which anyone with $10 can do.
It's this sense of completion that inspired the outlandish but not inconceivable goal of obtaining every original Bob Dylan studio album, which I recently did.
Dylan has released 32 original studio albums, so we're not talking Willie Nelson-level completist crazy. But 32 is a figure which rejects compilations, live tapes, box sets and bootleg recordings. So, if you're keeping score, The Basement Tapes is in, but Biograph is out.
Making the 32-album commitment shows a serious dedication. We're past "just being there for the music" at that point because, let's face it: For every Highway 61 Revisited or Time Out of Mind, there are misfires such as Shot of Love or Down in the Groove.
But with Dylan, the quest to collect them all exists because there are additional cards at play. A mythology swirls around him, one to which he's contributed to by refusing to be pigeonholed, choosing relentless evasion. That adds to the fun of studying his recordings and trying to reinterpret them as you learn. How delicious is the esoteric, nonsequitir-laden "Tombstone Blues?"
Another point is tediously cliché but true nonetheless: Dylan's records are a viewfinder of a half century of American history. His songs and albums are part of our lexicon, musically, spiritually and even conversationally.
The album's covers reflect that growth and change. A then-recent photo of Dylan adorns many of them, his strong jaw line and pointed chin the only constants as his wardrobe mutates from Carnaby Street ruffian to a blues rocker with light-socket-shocked hair and so many more.
As Todd Haynes' imaginative I'm Not There movie did an exemplary job demonstrating, Dylan's story is fascinating because the well of incarnations runs so deep. Many can draw something from at least one of his shapeshifting portraits — the heartbroken Dylan, the cheesy '80s Dylan, the born-again Christian Dylan, the outlaw Dylan, the poet Dylan, the rock star Dylan, etc. He's had more faces than Joan Rivers.
These are characters that personify and reflect a part of us. There's richness in these covers. He's a naive, baby-faced dreamer on his self-titled 1962 debut. He and Suze Rotolo battle the cold of New York City and the future on The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. The original cover for Saved (seen at left), which evokes Michelangelo's work in the Sistine Chapel, screams that it's from his born-again phase. Down in the Groove says everything about where Dylan was in the '80s: A lone spotlight shines on him as he's strums, smushed to the edge of the frame against a black background, as though he hopes to disappear into it. Then there's that unenthused glower at the camera on "Love and Theft."
If 2006's Modern Times stands as his final studio offering — as he's hinted it might, but with Dylan, nothing is certain — even though he's not on the cover, it still speaks about its time. His name and the title are slanted over the top of a nighttime cityscape as a blurry car passes in the foreground, making Modern Times both a pun on the aged sound of its music as well as a critique of the fast pace of the information age in the early 21st centurty.
And he's still going. He turns 67 Saturday and 2009 would mark 50 years since his career began in earnest.
Gathering all 32 of his original studio offerings opens the door to this green pop culture valley. The joy is in studying its highs and lows, asking why and knowing you may never know the answer. It's a glimpse at one of the great recording artists of our time as well as American history. It's a feast for the mind, an intellectual crusade.
Now, with those thoughts in mind, it's time to go. If you need me, I'll be in the kitchen with the tombstone blues.
I have all of Bob Dylan's studio & live releases, as well as about forty bootlegs, and let me tell you it was a task.
Posted by: Al Borges | May 21, 2008 at 08:47 AM
I've bought every Dylan album as it came out since "Freewheelin'". It has enriched my life.
Posted by: woozle | May 21, 2008 at 09:03 AM
Only the 32 studio albums? You've just begun the journey, Grasshopper. The Bobster is the only one I know of that has a bootleg and unreleased side that not only rivals, but in many cases surpasses his released output. This is almost certainly true of his live recordings. Check them out. Also, give Shot of Love a second chance. Many diamonds in there.
Posted by: Gary | May 21, 2008 at 12:00 PM
Biograph contains about 1 entire cd of unreleased material, much completely essential. I can't imagine even a marginal Dylan fan thinking he doesn't need it.
Posted by: Bob | May 21, 2008 at 12:27 PM
His studio albums are often great, but check out the live albums! I have betweem 150 and 200 CDs and a bunch of LPs, that is often where the REAL diamonds are hidden!
Posted by: John | May 22, 2008 at 04:34 AM