Good as I Been to You | ||||
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Studio album by | ||||
Released | November 3, 1992 | |||
Recorded | Mid-1992 | |||
Studio | Bob Dylan's garage studio, Malibu | |||
Genre | ||||
Length | 55:31 | |||
Label | Columbia | |||
Producer | Debbie Gold | |||
Bob Dylan chronology | ||||
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Good as I Been to You is the twenty-eighth studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on November 3, 1992, by Columbia Records. The title comes from the second line of side 2 track 4.
It is composed entirely of traditional folk songs and covers, and is Dylan's first entirely solo, acoustic album since Another Side of Bob Dylan in 1964. It is also his first collection not to feature any original compositions since Dylan in 1973.
On the charts, Good as I Been to You reached No. 51 in the US [1] and No. 18 in the UK, [2] and helped to restore Dylan's critical standing following the disappointing Under the Red Sky .
Since launching the Never Ending Tour in June 1988, traditional covers became a feature at virtually every Dylan concert, often as part of an acoustic set. After recording Under the Red Sky in 1990, Dylan would not release an original song until 1997, and during that time, he would increasingly rely on his stockpile of covers for 'fresh' material. Dylan called these covers "the music that's true for me". [3]
Dylan scheduled studio time at Chicago's Acme Studios in early June 1992, hiring long-time associate David Bromberg as his producer. An album's worth of cover songs were recorded at these sessions with the accompaniment of a full band. [4] The recording engineers were Blaise Barton and Dan White. [5] For reasons unknown, Dylan scrapped the release of this album, deciding to record solo acoustic material instead. Two songs from the Bromberg sessions, "Duncan and Brady" and "Miss the Mississippi", would eventually be released on the album The Bootleg Series Vol. 8: Tell Tale Signs: Rare and Unreleased 1989–2006. All of the songs for Good As I Been to You were recorded later at Dylan's garage studio at his home in Malibu, sessions that are believed to have taken place from late July to early August 1992. [6] [7]
Producer credit was given to Dylan's longtime friend Debbie Gold while Micajah Ryan was credited with engineering and mixing the sessions. [8] Ryan later recalled that "Debbie had a great working relationship with Bob, so that took some of the edge off for me – and for Dylan as well. He consulted Debbie on every take. He trusted her and she was never afraid to tell him the truth, and, boy, was she persistent, often convincing him to stay with a song long after he seemed to lose interest. He’d come in each day with at least a couple of songs to work on. He’d do several takes in every key and tempo until he felt he got it". [9]
Dylan recorded a wide range of traditional songs: "Froggie Went A-Courtin'," "Blackjack Davey" and the anti-recruiting "Arthur McBride" were part of the British and Irish tradition of folk songs. "Little Maggie" was a popular bluegrass standard. "Diamond Joe" was well-known thanks to fellow folk revivalist Ramblin' Jack Elliott. "Frankie and Albert" and "Sittin' on Top of the World" both had long, deep roots in folk-blues. Dylan also covered songs that weren't authentically traditional, such as "Tomorrow Night" (best known for Lonnie Johnson's hit version in 1947 and a version by Elvis Presley released in 1965) and Stephen Foster's "Hard Times". [10]
When time came to sequence the album, producer Debbie Gold was unable to convince Dylan to include "You Belong to Me". Though it wasn't authentically traditional, it was popular enough to be covered by Jo Stafford, Patti Page and Dean Martin. The most popular version was recorded by the Duprees, one of the final Italian doo wop groups to make a wave in the early 1960s. Dylan's version from the Good As I Been to You sessions eventually appeared in Oliver Stone's controversial 1994 film Natural Born Killers and on its accompanying soundtrack album. [11]
Stereogum ran an article to coincide with Dylan's 80th birthday on May 24, 2021 in which 80 musicians were asked to name their favorite Dylan song. The Strokes' Albert Hammond Jr. selected "You Belong to Me", noting "It’s just a very powerful song. You can’t explain sometimes how songs hit you...It’s impressive to keep going and still create stuff. It’s one of my favorite songs. Any mix I make for anyone, I put it on there. I know it’s not his. But you can definitely have something that’s not yours and own it. He’s done that a lot". [12]
Review scores | |
---|---|
Source | Rating |
AllMusic | [13] |
Robert Christgau | B+ [14] |
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music | [15] |
MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide | [16] |
Orlando Sentinel | [17] |
Rolling Stone | (favorable) [18] |
The response to Good as I Been to You was surprisingly positive, particularly for an album with very modest ambitions. It drew comparisons with the acoustic sets featured in Dylan's "Never Ending Tour" shows, drawing much praise for his interpretive skills. A number of critics pointed out that Dylan's voice was now physically ravaged, but the focus was often on the phrasing. "Dylan sounds now, in comparison to his younger self, like one of those ghosts," wrote David Sexton of The Sunday Telegraph , "but a powerful ghost. The effect is not so much nostalgia...as deeply inward". [19]
In a four (out of five) star review in Rolling Stone magazine, critic David Wild wrote: "In its stripped-down intensity, Good As I Been to You recalls the midshow acoustic segments that in recent years have been a consistent highlight of Dylan’s Never Ending Tour. Even more than that, the album’s intimate, almost offhand approach suggests what it would be like to sit backstage with his Bobness while he runs through a set of some of his favorite old songs. This is a passionate, at times almost ragged piece of work that seems to have been recorded rather than produced in any conventional sense". [20]
David Bowie was a fan of both Good as I Been to You and World Gone Wrong , stating in a 1997 interview that "[Dylan's] albums have a great class to them, even those albums where he is actually playing songs of long-dead blues singers". [21]
Spectrum Culture included two of the album's tracks, "Jim Jones" and "Froggie Went a Courtin' " on a 2020 list of "Bob Dylan's 20 Best Songs of the 1990s". [22]
NJArts' Jay Lustig wrote that Good as I Been to You is a "solid but not exactly essential addition to [Dylan's] catalog" and cited "You're Gonna Quit Me" as the highlight of the album. [23]
All songs are traditional, arranged by Bob Dylan , except where noted.
No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
---|---|---|---|
1. | "Frankie & Albert" | arranged by Mississippi John Hurt | 3:50 |
2. | "Jim Jones" | 3:52 | |
3. | "Blackjack Davey" | 5:47 | |
4. | "Canadee-i-o" | arranged by Nic Jones | 4:20 |
5. | "Sittin' on Top of the World" | Walter Vinson and Lonnie Chatmon | 4:27 |
6. | "Little Maggie" | 2:52 | |
7. | "Hard Times" | Stephen Foster | 4:31 |
Total length: | 29:39 |
No. | Title | Writer(s) | Length |
---|---|---|---|
1. | "Step It Up and Go" | 2:54 | |
2. | "Tomorrow Night" | Sam Coslow, Will Grosz | 3:42 |
3. | "Arthur McBride" | arranged by Paul Brady | 6:20 |
4. | "You're Gonna Quit Me" | Blind Blake | 2:46 |
5. | "Diamond Joe" | 3:14 | |
6. | "Froggie Went a Courtin'" | 6:26 | |
Total length: | 25:22 |
Blood on the Tracks is the fifteenth studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on January 20, 1975, by Columbia Records. The album marked Dylan's return to Columbia after a two-album stint with Asylum Records. Dylan began recording the album at an A & R studio in New York City in September 1974. In December, shortly before Columbia was due to release the album, Dylan abruptly re-recorded much of the material in Sound 80 studio in Minneapolis. The final album contains five tracks recorded in New York and five from Minneapolis. The album's songs have been linked to tensions in Dylan's personal life, including his estrangement from his then-wife Sara. One of their children, Jakob Dylan, has described the songs as "my parents talking." In interviews, Dylan has denied that the songs on the album are autobiographical.
Highway 61 Revisited is the sixth studio album by the American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on August 30, 1965, by Columbia Records. Dylan continued the musical approach of his previous album Bringing It All Back Home (1965), using rock musicians as his backing band on every track of the album in a further departure from his primarily acoustic folk sound, except for the closing track, the 11-minute ballad "Desolation Row". Critics have focused on the innovative way Dylan combined driving, blues-based music with the subtlety of poetry to create songs that captured the political and cultural climate of contemporary America. Author Michael Gray argued that, in an important sense, the 1960s "started" with this album.
Bob Dylan at Budokan is a live album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released August 1978 on Columbia Records in Japan only, followed by a worldwide release in April 1979. It was recorded during his 1978 world tour and is composed mostly of the artist's "greatest hits". The performances in the album are radically altered from the originals, using almost all the musicians that played on Street-Legal, but relying on a much larger band and stronger use of woodwind and backing singers. In some respects the arrangements are more conventional than the original arrangements, for which the album was criticized. For a few critics, such as Janet Maslin of Rolling Stone, the differences between the older and newer arrangements had become less important.
World Gone Wrong is the twenty-ninth studio album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on October 26, 1993, by Columbia Records.
"Masters of War" is a song by Bob Dylan, written over the winter of 1962–63 and released on the album The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan in the spring of 1963. The song's melody was adapted from the traditional "Nottamun Town." Dylan's lyrics are a protest against the Cold War nuclear arms build-up of the early 1960s.
The Never Ending Tour is the popular name for Bob Dylan's ongoing touring schedule which began on June 7, 1988. During the course of the tour, musicians have come and gone as the band has continued to evolve. The tour amassed a huge fan base with some fans traveling from around the world to attend as many Dylan shows as possible.
"Pledging My Time" is a blues song by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan from his seventh studio album, Blonde on Blonde (1966). The song, written by Dylan and produced by Bob Johnston, was recorded on March 8, 1966 in Nashville, Tennessee. Dylan is featured on lead vocals, harmonica, and guitar, backed by guitarist Robbie Robertson and an ensemble of veteran Nashville session men.
"Girl from the North Country" is a song written by Bob Dylan. It was recorded at Columbia Recording Studios in New York City in April 1963, and released the following month as the second track on Dylan's second studio album, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan. Dylan re-recorded the song as a duet with Johnny Cash in February 1969. That recording became the opening track on Nashville Skyline, Dylan's ninth studio album.
"If You Gotta Go, Go Now" (sometimes subtitled "(Or Else You Got to Stay All Night)") is a song written by Bob Dylan in 1964. The first released version was as a single in the US by the UK group the Liverpool Five in July 1965, but this did not chart in the US despite receiving much airplay, particularly in the Pacific Northwest. Another British band, Manfred Mann, then issued the song as a single in September 1965 and had a number 2 hit. Fairport Convention also had a chart hit, with a French version, in 1969.
"When I Paint My Masterpiece" is a 1971 song written by Bob Dylan. It was first released by The Band, who recorded the song for their album Cahoots, released on September 15, 1971.
The Bob Dylan World Tour 1966 was a concert tour undertaken by the American musician Bob Dylan, from February to May 1966. Dylan's 1966 World Tour was notable as the first tour where Dylan employed an electric band backing him, following him "going electric" at the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. The musicians Dylan employed as his backing band were known as the Hawks, who later became famous as the Band.
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"Duquesne Whistle" is a song written by Bob Dylan and Grateful Dead lyricist Robert Hunter that appears as the opening track on Dylan's 2012 studio album Tempest. It was first released as a digital single on August 27, 2012 through Columbia Records then as a music video two days later. A limited edition "Record Store Day" 7" stereo single was released on November 23, 2012. It was also anthologized on the 2014 reissue of The Essential Bob Dylan. Like much of Dylan's 21st-century output, he produced the song himself using the pseudonym Jack Frost.
Ronald Dean Cornelius was a session musician and producer who has played on albums by Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Al Kooper and Loudon Wainwright III. He was also the president of Gateway Entertainment which was established in 1986. As a producer he has produced Miko Marks's Freeway Bound album in 2007. He is also the co-writer of "Chelsea Hotel No. 2", which has been covered by many artists including Rufus Wainwright.
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