Part I: History
Bringing It All Back Home
was the record where Dylan finally plugged in. His first attempts to record
amplified music had been in the autumn of 1962, when he produced the frantic
but aborted "Mixed Up Confusion" single, the gentler "Corrina Corrina as its
B-side and the even more discreetly-accompanied take of "Corrina Corrina" that
appeared on The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. There was also the bluesy "Rocks And
Gravel" that was cut from that album at the last minute, some rockabilly-styled
outtakes of "That's All Right Mama", and possibly one or two others that remain
in the can. It seemed that at the time Columbia wanted Dylan firmly as a folk
artist, not as a Sun-era rock and roll revivalist. From the three recording
sessions he did with backing musicians, only the album cut of "Corrina"
survived at that time.
By December 1964, though, the folk-rock bandwagon was starting to roll. Tom Wilson - already Dylan's producer, of course - was engaged to take some of Dylan's 1961-62 recordings and overdub backing musicians onto them, just as he had already done for Simon & Garfunkel. The results, however, were not forthcoming. Dylan presumably didn't like them, and it seems unlikely that he had anything to do with the idea. However, this at least shows that while most of Dylan's fans probably wouldn't have voted for an electric album, Columbia would have been more than happy.
Recording
Dylan was clearly ready for it
too; he arrived at Columbia's Studio A on January 13, 1965 with fifteen or so
songs, spent a day putting down acoustic guide versions, and then got started
the following day with a group of studio musicians. These included guitarist
Bruce Langhorne and bassist Bill Lee, both of whom had played on Dylan sessions
in 1962, and Bobby Gregg, who was among the musicians at the previous month's
unproductive overdub session. Also included were pianist Paul Griffin, whose
playing was heard to much better effect on Highway 61 Revisited and the "One Of
Us Must Know" single; 44-year old bass-player Joe Mack, contracted under his
proper name of Joseph Macho Jr.; and guitarists Al Gorgoni and Kenny Rankin.
The studio records show that on the evening of the 14th, some different musicians were brought in; these included John Sebastian and Steve (né John) Boone from The Lovin' Spoonful, and John Hammond Jr., son of Dylan's erstwhile producer. However, none of the recordings from this evening session were used on the album, and none have even circulated. The next day the first group of musicians were back again, and work carried on as though nothing had happened. The whole of the released album was recorded in just two days. The producer was Tom Wilson, the recording engineers Roy Hallee and Peter Dauria.
Mixing
In the 1960s Columbia used different
staff engineers to mix the mono and stereo versions of albums; this is one
reason why the mono and stereo mixes so often sounded different. Nothing seems
to have been written about the mixing of this particular album, but since
stereo was still a minority format it is likely that Dylan's involvement would
have been with the mass-market mono version, particularly as this was the one
which would get AM radio airplay.
Vinyl Releases
Bringing It All Back Home
was released in March 1965 in the US, May in the UK, in both mono and stereo.
The mono version was deleted around 1968 in the US and in 1969 in the UK, though it continued in production in some countries into the seventies. In March 2001 it was reissued by the US specialist vinyl label Sundazed, remastered from the original mono mix-down tapes by the label's owner, Bob Irwin.
The stereo LP version has remained unchanged since its release, and is apparently still on Columbia's catalogue in the US; it has been deleted in the UK and Europe for several years. In 1999 the UK audiophile label Simply Vinyl reissued the stereo album under licence, but this edition also appears to be deleted now.
One result of using different mixing engineers is that songs were often faded out differently in the stereo format. This is very evident on Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde On Blonde, where some tracks differed by half a minute or more. There are several differences of this type on Bringing It All Back Home, but on a much lesser scale: the biggest discrepancy is only 5 seconds. Details are given in Appendix A.
The stereo LP mix also balances the various instruments slightly differently here and there, with the piano in particular being more audible on some of the songs on Side 1. The biggest difference, though, is the thin, weak sound; this is discussed in more detail in Part II.
CD Releases
The album was first released on
CD in the United States, in 1987. While it has previously been thought that
this was produced from a vinyl cutting master , the audible evidence
contradicts this. Close comparison of the CD with the stereo LP suggests that
the four acoustic songs (Side 2 of the LP) were actually remixed for the CD
from the multi-track studio tapes. No information has emerged about who did
this remixing; however, it could possibly have been Tim Geelan, the Columbia
staff engineer who remixed Blonde On Blonde for CD around this time.
For the seven electric songs (Side 1 of the original LP) the engineer does appear to have used the original 1965 stereo mixes: the positioning and balance of all the instruments seem to be identical. However, several of the tracks have longer endings than on the vinyl album, suggesting that the CD master for these songs was actually made from an earlier generation tape, possibly the original stereo mix-down reels.
Despite this, though, the CD still has a constricted, cut-for-vinyl sound (discussed at greater length in Part II of this essay). This contrasts strongly with the DCC gold CD of Highway 61 Revisited, which was produced from the original stereo mix-down tapes for that album, and which has a beautifully full, open sound. The difference may be partly down to the skill of engineer Steve Hoffman, who put a great deal of effort into getting the best possible sound for his remastering of Highway 61 Revisited. But Hoffman has recently reported that as a rule Columbia's stereo mixes in the 1960s were actually equalized at the mix-down stage for the purpose of cutting vinyl; Highway 61 Revisited was therefore a lucky exception. If this is true, then any remastering of Bringing It All Back Home based on the 1965 stereo mix tapes seems pretty much doomed to mediocrity.
Curiously, where songs from this album have been included in CD compilations, the versions from the Bringing It All Back Home CD have not been used; the tracks appear instead to have been derived from the stereo LP master.
As a footnote, a quite bizarre CD release appeared in China around 2000; this is a mono CD, but not mastered from the original mono mix. It appears rather to be a mono reduction from the normal stereo CD master. All tracks except the first have the first second or so cut, so the mono sound is probably just an accident of inept mastering. Despite sporting a Sony catalogue number (Sony CD-116), this is quite likely a pirate release. I only mention it here to dispel any legend of an official mono CD release of Bringing It All Back Home.
Album Sleeves
Rod MacBeath made an
excellent, detailed study of this album's cover in his series on Dylan's record
sleeves in The Telegraph some years ago. He identifies, for example,
practically all the LP sleeves (within a sleeve) so carefully strewn around in
the front cover photograph, and even names the cat (Rolling Stone, if you must
know).
The record cover was a field day for Daniel Kramer, with that brilliantly staged colour photo of Dylan and Sally Grossman on the front, and six monochrome shots on the back showing Dylan in the company of various famous friends of the time - Joan Baez, Peter Yarrow, Allen Ginsberg, film-maker Barbara Rubin.
As was standard Columbia practice in the sixties, the stereo edition compromised the original front sleeve design by dropping the title and picture down in order to accommodate the stereo serial number and the "360 Sound" double-arrow logo. As a result the white space below the picture pretty well disappeared.
On the US rear sleeve Columbia printed their logo and the catalogue number in the top right-hand corner of the photo of Dylan with Joan Baez. This proved difficult to adapt for the UK market, which required the CBS logo and a different catalogue number; so the background was cropped form the upper part of this photo, Dylan and Baez appearing as cut-outs.
The sleeve variation that has provoked most comment and perplexity over the years is the one released by CBS in the Benelux countries. Here, to cash in on the popularity of Dylan's latest hit single, they actually changed the title of the album to Subterranean Homesick Blues. The album is otherwise identical. Amazingly, the variation carried over into the CD era, and this is still the standard title on copies sold in that part of Europe. Although all European Sony CDs now seem to be manufactured in Austria, England has its own edition with the proper title. Recent UK-market copies also have a see-through CD tray, backed with a blown-up detail of the front cover photograph.
France, as usual in the sixties, did its own thing with the sleeve, though at least it used the original title. The original French sleeve was a gatefold, with the rear photos rearranged, and Dylan's sleeve notes omitted in favour of advertising for other French Dylan LPs and EPs. To make up for that the centre spread contained transcribed words for all the songs (generally closer to the recorded versions than the words published elsewhere), with some interpretative notes on the songs in French.
The recent Chinese CD mentioned above has appropriately strange packaging - weird card components glued to a plastic jewel case, and the familiar blue lettering of the album title rendered in orange.
The Future
We've all grown weary of waiting
for Dylan's back catalogue to get the renovation it deserves. The idea of a
series of expanded, remastered CDs, rumoured for years and then supposedly
kicked off at last by the release of The Essential Bob Dylan in late 2000,
seems now to have sunk below the horizon once again.
In fact, two of Dylan's three great mid-60s electric albums, Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde On Blonde, have actually already had skilful makeovers for the digital age, but the average record buyer would be quite unaware of this: Steve Hoffman's remastering of the former has now been deleted for several years, while Michael Brauer's remix of the latter is still only available in the specialist SACD format. The far inferior standard Sony editions are all that most people will ever see and hear. Bringing It All Back Home, despite being the source of some of Dylan's most enduringly popular songs, has yet to appear in a satisfactory digital edition.
Part II: The Versions In Detail
General Characteristics
The three different versions of
the album - mono vinyl, stereo vinyl and CD - have some general characteristics
which I will try and describe in general terms before looking at the individual
songs one by one.
The mono mix gives you the original 1965 album straight - tight, energetic sound, full bass, natural vocals. What it lacks is detail in the individual instruments.
Constrained by 1960s stereo disc-cutting and playback technology (see the essay on Blonde On Blonde in Issue 3 of The Bridge ), the stereo LP mix had its bass end severely limited. This shows even on the second side's mainly acoustic songs, in the thinner tone of the guitars. On the electric side, the lateral separation of the instruments further dilutes the music's impact. The spreading out of the instruments also reveals some relatively crude playing; the next two albums were to present rapid increases in musical sophistication. By the time of Blonde On Blonde, a stereo presentation is really necessary to fully appreciate the detailed delights of the accompaniment; but there are few such pleasures to be had here.
On the electric side in particular, the garage-band sound comes across much better in mono, with all the instruments blended together. Given the additional benefit of its much better bass response, the mono mix has a depth and punch that the stereo version just fails to deliver.
Another, perhaps even more important, advantage of the mono mix is its presentation of Dylan's voice. Here it sounds entirely right, whereas in the stereo mix it has the timbre of corrugated iron: thin and strident, with a tiring emphasis on the upper-midrange frequencies.
The CD version differs in some details from the stereo vinyl album, particularly on the remixed acoustic songs from the LP's second side; but overall the sound is very similar, lacking in bass and general impact.
All but the last three songs on the album are faded out, and on the majority of songs the lengths of the fade-outs vary slightly between the different releases. In most cases the mono has the shortest, most concise endings, the stereo vinyl mix is slightly longer and the CD version is the longest. Appendix A details length differences for all tracks; only the more notable cases are mentioned in the text.
The Sundazed reissue of the mono LP has very slightly trimmed endings on all the tracks, presumably to reduce the intrusion of tape hiss as the music fades out. This is only around half a second per track when compared with the original mono LP.
Finally, speed and pitch: for reasons that are not clear, the original mono vinyl version played slightly fast, and hence fractionally above proper musical pitch, and the stereo version slightly slow. At least, this is true of English pressings. The stereo CD, though, plays at correct musical pitch, and so does the Sundazed mono vinyl reissue.
The Songs
SIDE 1
Subterranean Homesick Blues The opening track nailed Dylan's new colours
firmly to the mast, with its vocal echoes of Chuck Berry and its overdriven
jug-band sound. The stereo CD gives us an instrumental fade-out that is six
seconds longer than on the original mono release. The stereo separation also
makes the electric piano much more audible than it is in the mono mix. On this
one track the Sundazed mono reissue seems to be slightly subdued; it lacks the
edge and sparkle that the track has on my original UK mono pressing.
She Belongs To Me This track sounds absolutely beautiful on the mono album, with the bass full and Dylan's voice subtle and warm. Having said that, I confess that the stereo version does makes it easier to tell that it is an acoustic string bass, not an electric, being played on this track; the texture of the instrument's sound is more easily distinguished. Unusually, the stereo CD shaves a second off the end of the track.
Maggie's Farm Again, the electric piano, mixed with the drums on the right-hand channel, is more noticeable in the stereo mix.
Love Minus Zero / No Limit Like "She Belongs To Me", this song benefits particularly from warmth of the mono mix. The stereo version allows us to distinguish a very heavily reverbed electric piano on the right-hand side.
Outlaw Blues In the stereo mix we can more clearly hear the harmonica that riffs away throughout the song. This goes on behind Dylan's vocal, so presumably it is played by one of the other musicians; Dylan did not generally use overdubs at this time. John Sebastian is perhaps the most likely candidate for harmonica player, though according to the studio records he didn't participate in the sessions until later in the evening. The CD gives an additional five seconds of instrumental fade-out compared with the mono version.
On The Road Again The mono mix gives more prominence to the lead guitar on this track; but the stereo version has the guitar which plays the underpinning boogie riff more clearly audible on the right-hand channel.
Bob Dylan's 115th Dream Here, once again, the electric piano is much more clearly audible in the stereo mix.
SIDE 2
Mr Tambourine Man The
acoustic songs on Side 2 show a huge difference in the tone of Dylan's acoustic
guitar between the mono and stereo mixes. The mono gives the guitar lots of
body and bass, but not a lot of detail in the high frequencies, while the
stereo versions give the opposite on both counts. Dylan's guitar is placed to
the right of centre in the stereo mixes, while Bruce Langhorne's amplified
guitar is on the left.
There is a distinct difference, though, between the stereo LP and the CD. On the CD Dylan's guitar is very precisely located, only slightly to the right of his voice, while on the LP it is more spread out, with the higher frequencies coming from well to the right. The difference is very easy to hear if you compare the Bringing It All Back Home version with the same song on The Essential Bob Dylan (or practically any other Dylan CD anthology), as the latter is derived from the stereo LP master.
Unusually, the stereo vinyl mix is faded out substantially earlier than the mono version; given the importance of the harmonica breaks to the song's structure and sense (think of the 1965-66 live performances), this seems a real loss. Fortunately, the CD release of this album restores the missing music - though Dylan anthologies, of course, use the shortened version.
Gates Of Eden The stereo LP mix of this song sounds as though it was produced by a different engineer than the other acoustic tracks. When compared with the mono mix there is the same thin sound to both guitar and vocal, but the stereo LP gives no lateral separation of voice and guitar; in fact it barely sounds stereophonic at all. Only the slightest hint of ambience is detectable when switching the playback amplifier from mono to stereo. Possibly the song was actually recorded in mono, and the minute audible differences between left and right channels are an just unintended artefact of stereo mixing or copying equipment.
On the CD the guitar sounds just as monophonic, but the vocal has noticeably more ambience; presumably this was added as part of the remixing for CD.
It's Alright Ma (I'm Only Bleeding) Like "Gates of Eden" this song has just Dylan's voice and guitar. On the stereo LP mix both are placed in the centre of the sound stage, but here the ambience is much more noticeably stereophonic than on the previous song, the guitar sounding particularly three-dimensional. Strangely this ambience has been reined back in the remix for CD, and the guitar is much more tightly focussed behind Dylan's voice. It seems as though the remix engineer consciously evened up the sound of this song and the preceding "Gates Of Eden".
It's All Over Now, Baby Blue This closing song has the same instrumentation as "Mr Tambourine Man", although here Bruce Langhorne plays his electric guitar fills in a lower register. Not surprisingly, the two stereo mixes run along the same lines as they did for the earlier song; exactly the same comments apply.
Conclusions
There is clearly much less
variation to report for Bringing It All Back Home than there was for either
Blonde On Blonde or Highway 61 Revisited. We only have three versions: the
mono, the stereo vinyl and the stereo CD.
The stereo vinyl album, at least in pressings that I've heard, has the least to recommend it. The stereo CD version has the minor interest of the longer track endings, but it is the mono album that still gives the best impression: it has more impact than either of the stereo versions, and presents Dylan's voice in a much more satisfying way. It is also probably how Dylan wanted the album to sound back in 1965.
We now have the mono version available once more, courtesy of Sundazed Records, and for this we should be grateful. However, the fact that it is only available on vinyl not only limits the unblemished life of individual copies but also limits the market to that enthusiastic but relatively small band of vinyl enthusiasts - plus of course those prepared to put up with the vinyl format in order to get a decent-sounding Dylan album. Many buyers of the Sundazed issue will, I know, copy it themselves onto CD-R in order to gain the convenience and longevity of the digital format. Why cannot Sony license the mono mixes for reissue on CD as well as on vinyl? Maybe they would not sell well through shops, but internet marketing would surely work, as it has done for more specialist releases by Jimi Hendrix, The Grateful Dead and probably others.
While the mono mix is the best version of the album currently available, and deserves to be preserved in its own right, it is not perfect. Not only does it miss the spaciousness of a stereo recording, but it lacks musical detail in the accompaniment, which is a particular loss in the case of Dylan's guitar on the album's acoustic songs. These are factors that CD-attuned ears have come to expect, for better or worse.
So how could a high quality stereo release be produced? Here there is a problem: the available evidence suggests that the original stereo mix is unlikely to be adequate for the purpose. Even if the original mix-down tape still exists and is in usable condition, it will probably have the constricted sound of a 1960s tape created for the cutting of stereo vinyl albums.
This will be heresy to some, but I believe that a sympathetic remix from the multi-track masters could deliver the best possible Bringing It All Back Home on CD and Super Audio CD. Michael Brauer, with the SACD version of Blonde On Blonde, has shown that it is quite possible to produce an excellent-sounding remix without losing the original spirit of the album. What is needed is the combined will of Sony and Dylan to make this happen.
Meanwhile (and it could be a long while), my advice is to get your turntable out of the loft and buy a copy of the Sundazed reissue while it is available.
Appendix A: Differences in Track Lengths The table below takes the US mono LP as its benchmark, and shows for all other versions the approximate number of seconds added to or subtracted from each song.
| Mono Vinyl | Stereo Vinyl | CD | |
| Subterranean Homesick Blues | 0 | +2 | +6 |
| She Belongs To Me | 0 | -0.5 | -1 |
| Maggie's Farm | 0 | +2 | +4 |
| Love Minus Zero / No Limit | 0 | +0.5 | +3 |
| Outlaw Blues | 0 | +2 | +5 |
| On The Road Again | 0 | -1.5 | +3 |
| Bob Dylan's 115th Dream | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Mr Tambourine Man | 0 | -5 | +1 |
| Gates Of Eden | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding) | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| It's All Over Now, Baby Blue | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Appendix B:
Discography of
Bringing It All Back Home Releases
The following are the significant
vinyl and CD releases of the album that I know about which have at some time
been on regular sale in the US and the UK.
| Year | Country | Label | Catalogue No. | Description |
| 1965 | US | Columbia | CL 2328 | Mono vinyl |
| 1965 | US | Columbia | CS 9128 | Stereo vinyl |
| 1965 | UK | CBS | BPG 62515 | Mono vinyl |
| 1965 | UK | CBS | SBPG 62515 | Stereo vinyl |
| 1987 | US | Columbia | CK 9128 | CD |
| 1989 | Europe | CBSColumbia | CDCBS 62515CDCBS 32344 465417 2 | CD titled Subterranean Homesick Blues |
| 199? | UK | Columbia | CD 32344 | CD titled Bringing It All Back Home |
| 1999 | UK | Simply Vinyl | SVLP036 | 180 gram stereo vinyl reissue |
| 2001 | US | Sundazed | LP 5070 | 180 gram mono vinyl reissue |
Appendix C:
Notes on
methods and source materials
Comparison Methods
Some tolerance has to be
allowed when comparing vinyl discs; different pressings can vary quite
noticeably in their sound, and the quality of the vinyl used may vary. After
allowing for these factors, it is sometimes hard to tell whether the same or
different master tapes have been used for vinyl releases.
Comparing track lengths is particularly difficult. I have ignored the timings printed on album sleeves and labels, as these are very unreliable; and instead of comparing total track lengths, I have concentrated on timing the length of additional music in the longer of two versions; doing it this way, any error will be much smaller. For playing vinyl discs, the turntable speed was set stroboscopically.
Recordings Used
All comparisons were made
using the following recordings:
Mono vinyl copies: UK pressing (CBS
BPG 62515); Sundazed US reissue (LP 5070).
Stereo vinyl copies: UK
early 70s pressing (CBS SBPG 62515); CD-R of early 70s US pressing
(CS9128).
Stereo CD copies: UK copy titled Bringing It All Back Home
(CD 32344); European copy titled Subterranean Homesick Blues (CDCBS 32344);
CD-R of US copy (CK 9128).
Books and Publications
Information was
drawn from the following:
M. C. Strong, The Wee Rock Discography,
Canongate, 1996
John Bauldie: Interview with Steve Hoffman in issue 44 of
The Telegraph, 1992
Rod MacBeath, Looking Up Dylan's Sleeves, Part 1, in
issue 50 of The Telegraph, 1994
Michael Krogsgaard, Bob Dylan: The
Recording Sessions, Part 1, in issue 52 of The Telegraph, 1995 (this can be
seen online at http://www.punkhart.com/dylan/sessions-1.html )
Web Sites
Remastering engineer Steve
Hoffman's web site,http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/
Catalogue of European Bob Dylan CD releases on Wim Vuijk's Dylan web
site, http://odur.let.rug.nl/~vuijk/dylan/cds.htm
Acknowledgements
My thanks to Anthony Perry
and Bob Stacy, and to anyone else who has posted contributions on the subject
to rec.music.dylan over the past few years, and whose name I've overlooked
here.
Comments are welcomed, and can be sent via The Bridge or e-mailed direct to rogerford@blueyonder.co.uk .
One of these tracks, an overdubbed version of "House Of The Rising Sun" from Dylan's first album, was released on the 1995 CD-ROM Highway 61 Interactive, amid much confusion as to when it was recorded.
Gregg, of course, continued to play with Dylan both in the studio and on the road for the next year.
As reported by Michael Krogsgaard - see the list of Books and Publications
Though Frank Owens replaced Paul Griffin on piano.
A cutting master is a tape which has been produced specifically for the cutting of vinyl LPs; the frequency response and dynamic range have to be limited in order to keep within the capabilities of the cutting and playback equipment of the time.
It is possible that two separate stereo mix-down tapes were produced in 1965, one being used for the LP and the other - eventually - for the CD. If this were the case then we would not need to guess at who might have remixed the second side in 1987.
The comments, which did not specifically refer to Bringing It All Back Home, were made in a discussion thread on Hoffman's own web site, http://www.stevehoffman.tv/forums/ .
Part of the problem with this project format may be that many of the best outtakes have already been released on The Bootleg Series 1-3.
An updated version can be found at www.rdf.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk .