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By PAUL BRENNER
On the old, old, old, old
Tonight Show, one of the highlights during the
reign of Jack Paar was when he would show home
movie footage of himself dyspeptically wandering
around British castles and Spanish bullfight
arenas. In 1966, a rock legend found himself in
metaphoric bullfight arenas of his own. When Bob
Dylan and his sidemen -- later known as The Band
-- made their way around the world, heading to
venues in Hawaii, Sidney, Sweden, Denmark,
England, Ireland, Scotland, and France, Dylan (the
folk laureate) abandoned his acoustic songs of
innocence for hard-edged rock 'n roll songs of
electrified experience. Dylan's transformation
from folkie to rocker was a pivotal moment in the
history of popular music, but at the time many old
style Dylan fans resented Dylan's strumming on a
Stratocaster and belligerently refused to go down
without a fight. The jeering crowds, the raucous
handclapping, and the gentleman in the balcony in
Manchester calling Dylan "Judas!" is all stuff of
rock n' roll history.
When the Hawks (Robbie Robertson, Rick Danko,
Garth Hudson, Richard Manuel, and Levon Helm) were
recruited by Dylan for his world tour, Helm
(stunned by the angry reception to Dylan's
electric folk rock at an earlier pre-world tour
gig in the United States) bowed out. In his place,
Dylan recruited Mickey Jones, the raw sounding
drummer from the Johnny Rivers band. Jones
accompanied Dylan with his drumsticks and his 8mm
camera. Jones shot 8mm footage of Dylan and The
Band's around the world journey, and he now
reveals his "never before seen" footage in
Studioworks Entertainment's "World Tour 1966: The
Home Movies" -- another entry in the Dylan revival
sweepstakes to go along with Columbia's sublimely
packaged releases of old Dylan bootlegs and the
creepy Victoria's Secret commercials.
This release will only appeal to Dylan aficionados
who keep their eyes in their pockets and their
noses on the ground. To begin with, this
much-vaunted footage is compromised from the start
since, because Jones is the drummer on stage, the
shots of the concerts are extremely limited (on
rare occasions Jones hands over the camera to a
crony to get some out of focus shots from the
audience). Most of the time, the shots consist of
mundane footage of hotels and airports with nary
an image of Dylan, except for vague traces of the
back of his head from the car in front of Jones's.
And, as if that weren't enough of a flim-flam, the
background music (undoubtedly because of copyright
issues) is not even music from the actual tour but
Dylan covers by a group called The Highway 61
Revisited Bob Dylan Tribute Band. (In fact, the
cards of the DVD are exposed when it is revealed
that Joel Gilbert -- the director, editor, and
interviewer of the production -- is also the front
man for the cover band and appears during the
closing credits pathetically trussed up like a
puffier version of early '70s Bob.)
So Dylan acolytes beware of this DVD. Like Judas
of old, they lie and deceive.
But for consumers who refuse to heed the call and
insist upon casting their fate to the wind, this
Dolby 5.1 DVD also offers a photo gallery. It's
amazing what you can do with Final Cut Pro and DVD
Studio Pro! |
