Hard Rain (Bob Dylan album)

Hard Rain
Live album by Bob Dylan
Released	September 13, 1976 (1976-09-13)
Recorded	May 16 and 23, 1976
Genre	Rock
Length	51:06
Label	Columbia
Producer	Don DeVito Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan chronology
Desire (1976) Hard Rain (1976) Masterpieces (1978)

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[1]
Christgau's Record Guide	B− [2]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[3]
Rolling Stone	[4]

Hard Rain is a live album by American singer-songwriter Bob Dylan, released on September 13, 1976, by Columbia Records. The album was recorded during two concerts in May 1976 during the second leg of the Rolling Thunder Revue. The second of these concerts was recorded by NBC and released as a television special to coincide with the album's release. Hard Rain received mixed reviews.

Recordings and TV special

The album was partly recorded on May 23, 1976, during a concert at Hughes Stadium in Fort Collins, Colorado; the penultimate show of the tour, the concert was also filmed and broadcast by NBC as a one-hour television special in September. (Hard Rain's release coincided with this broadcast). Despite heavy promotion that placed it on the cover of TV Guide , NBC's television broadcast of the May 23rd concert drew disappointing ratings.

Four tracks from the album ("I Threw It All Away", "Stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again", "Oh, Sister", and "Lay, Lady, Lay") were recorded on May 16, 1976, in Fort Worth, Texas. ^[5]

Hard Rain remains the only official release of the 1976 Rolling Thunder tour. A representation of the earlier 1975 portion of the Rolling Thunder Revue was released in 2002 on The Bootleg Series Vol. 5: Bob Dylan Live 1975, The Rolling Thunder Revue . A more comprehensive 14-disc collection titled Bob Dylan – The Rolling Thunder Revue: The 1975 Live Recordings was released in 2019 to coincide with the Netflix documentary-film Rolling Thunder Revue: A Bob Dylan Story by Martin Scorsese .

Reception

Hard Rain received mixed reviews. The album peaked at No. 17 in the U.S. and No. 3 in the UK. Hard Rain eventually earned gold certification.

"Although the band has been playing together longer, the charm has gone out of their exchanges," writes music critic Tim Riley. "Hard Rain...seemed to come at a time when the Rolling Thunder Revue, so joyful and electrifying in its first performances, had just plain run out of steam," wrote Janet Maslin, then a music critic for Rolling Stone . In his mixed review for Hard Rain, Robert Christgau criticized the Rolling Thunder Revue as "folkies whose idea of rock and roll is rock and roll clichés."

Three of the recordings on Hard Rain ("Lay, Lady, Lay", "Idiot Wind", and "Maggie's Farm") were included on the Masterpieces compilation (1978), and "Shelter from the Storm" was included on the Live 1961–2000 compilation (2000).

Track listing

All tracks are written by Bob Dylan, except where noted.

Side one

No.	Title	Writer(s)	Recorded	Length
1.	"Maggie's Farm"		May 23, 1976	5:23
2.	"One Too Many Mornings"		May 23, 1976	3:47
3.	"Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again"		May 16, 1976	6:01
4.	"Oh, Sister"	Dylan, Jacques Levy	May 16, 1976	5:08
5.	"Lay Lady Lay"		May 16, 1976	4:47
Total length:				25:06

Side two

No.	Title	Recorded	Length
1.	"Shelter from the Storm"	May 23, 1976	5:29
2.	"You're a Big Girl Now"	May 23, 1976	7:01
3.	"I Threw It All Away"	May 16, 1976	3:18
4.	"Idiot Wind"	May 23, 1976	10:21
Total length:			26:09

Personnel

• Bob Dylan – vocals, guitar, production

Additional musicians

• Gary Burke – drums
• T-Bone Burnett – guitar, piano
• David Mansfield – guitar, pedal steel guitar on "Idiot Wind"
• Scarlet Rivera – strings
• Mick Ronson – guitar on "Maggie's Farm"
• Steven Soles – guitar, background vocals
• Rob Stoner – bass guitar, background vocals
• Joan Baez – guitar, background vocals ^[6]
• Howard Wyeth – drums, piano

Technical

• Don DeVito – production
• Don Meehan – recording and mixing engineering
• Ken Regan – cover photo
• Paula Scher – cover design
• Lou Waxman – chief of tape research

Charts

Chart performance for Hard Rain

Chart (1976)	Peak position
Dutch Albums (Album Top 100) [7]	10
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100) [8]	38
New Zealand Albums (RMNZ) [9]	24
Norwegian Albums (VG-lista) [10]	15
Swedish Albums (Sverigetopplistan) [11]	41
UK Albums (OCC) [12]	3
US Billboard 200 [13]	17

Certifications

Certifications for Hard Rain

Region	Certification	Certified units/sales
Canada (Music Canada) [14]	Gold	50,000^
United Kingdom (BPI) [15]	Gold	100,000^
United States (RIAA) [16]	Gold	500,000^
^ Shipments figures based on certification alone.

References

1. Thomas, Stephen (September 10, 1976). "Allmusic review". Allmusic.com. Retrieved February 7, 2012.
2. Christgau, Robert (1981). "Consumer Guide '70s: D". Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies . Ticknor & Fields. ISBN   089919026X . Retrieved February 24, 2019– via robertchristgau.com.
3. Larkin, Colin (2007). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music (4th ed.). Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0195313734.
4. Rolling Stone review Archived October 1, 2007, at the Wayback Machine
5. Bjorner, Olof. "Soon To Be Divorced, Bob Dylan 1976, page 19" (PDF). Bjorner.com. Retrieved May 16, 2019.
6. "Bob Dylan's 1976 TV concert special Hard Rain surfaces online". October 22, 2013.
7. "Dutchcharts.nl – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain" (in Dutch). Hung Medien. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
8. "Offiziellecharts.de – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain" (in German). GfK Entertainment Charts. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
9. "Charts.nz – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain". Hung Medien. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
10. "Norwegiancharts.com – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain". Hung Medien. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
11. "Swedishcharts.com – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain". Hung Medien. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
12. "Official Albums Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
13. "Bob Dylan Chart History (Billboard 200)". Billboard. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
14. "Canadian album certifications – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain". Music Canada . Retrieved September 19, 2022.
15. "British album certifications – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain". British Phonographic Industry . Retrieved September 19, 2022.
16. "American album certifications – Bob Dylan – Hard Rain". Recording Industry Association of America . Retrieved September 19, 2022.