Maps of Music

Bringing It All Back Home (1965)

Where the lyrics of Bringing It All Back Home take you, and where it was really made.

Dylan's first album with electric instruments was never meant to be fully electric: about half of it is solo acoustic performance.

Key places

First solo session at Columbia Studio A (1965)

Recording site Record Plant Studios — Dylan recorded the first session for the album here on 13 January 1965, playing piano or acoustic guitar alone. Ten complete songs and several sketches came out of it, and nearly all were discarded. Google Maps · Apple Maps

How to get there: See the map for directions.

Album story

Overview

• Bringing It All Back Home: fifth studio album by Bob Dylan
• Released by Columbia Records in April 1965
• First Dylan album to use electric instrumentation
• Side one backed by an electric rock and roll band; side two mainly acoustic
• Abandons the protest music of Dylan's earlier records for more surreal, complex lyrics
• Caused controversy and divided the folk scene at the time

Background

• Summer 1964: Dylan spent much of it in Woodstock, upstate New York, where manager Albert Grossman had a place
• Joan Baez stayed at Grossman's house with him that August
• Dylan's lyrics grew more surreal and his prose more stylistic, close to stream of consciousness
• Dylan met the Beatles for the first time on 28 August 1964 in their New York hotel
• That meeting influenced Dylan; his next three albums would invoke a rock sound
• Release coincided with the final show of a joint tour with Joan Baez
• By then Dylan was far more popular and acclaimed than Baez

Recording

• Producer Tom Wilson worked with Dylan on early fusion experiments in December 1964 at Columbia's 30th Street Studio
• Early electric experiments were set aside; the album sessions began with a solo acoustic session
• First session, 13 January 1965, Columbia Studio A in New York, recorded solo with Dylan on piano or acoustic guitar
• Ten complete songs and several sketches were made; nearly all were discarded
• Second session, the next day, used a full electric band with guitarists, pianists, bassists and drummer Bobby Gregg
• Band recorded eight songs without rehearsal; musicians played first takes with few retakes
• Session ran from 2:30 pm to 6:00 pm; five master takes were selected for the album
• Later that day, a different group including John P. Hammond and John Sebastian recorded six songs that were rejected
• A final session the next day needed no more work; pianist Frank Owens replaced Paul Griffin
• Dylan never meant the album to be completely electric, so roughly half of it stayed acoustic

Cover

• Photographed by Daniel Kramer with an edge-softened lens
• Sally Grossman, wife of manager Albert Grossman, lounges in the background
• Room props include LPs by Robert Johnson, Ravi Shankar and Lotte Lenya, and a Time magazine with President Lyndon B. Johnson as Man of the Year
• Dylan holds his cat, named Rolling Stone
• Back cover photo shows filmmaker and performance artist Barbara Rubin massaging Dylan's scalp

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Tracklist

Sources: musicbrainz.org

Artist

Formation

• Born Robert Allen Zimmerman on May 24, 1941, in Duluth, Minnesota; raised in Hibbing, Minnesota.
• Moved to New York City in January 1961 to pursue a music career.
• Signed to Columbia Records after playing harmonica on Carolyn Hester's album; debut album Bob Dylan released in 1962.

Members

• Solo artist; backed over the years by bands including the Hawks/the Band, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, and his touring band led by bassist Tony Garnier.

Career

• Breakthrough with The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan (1963); protest songs such as "Blowin' in the Wind" became anthems for the civil rights and antiwar movements.
• Went electric with Bringing It All Back Home and Highway 61 Revisited (1965) and Blonde on Blonde (1966), provoking controversy among folk fans.
• Motorcycle accident in 1966 led to nearly eight years without touring; Basement Tapes recorded with the Band.
• Converted to Christianity in the late 1970s and released gospel albums; won Album of the Year Grammy for Time Out of Mind (1997).
• Has toured since 1988 on the Never Ending Tour; won an Academy Award and ten Grammy Awards; awarded the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Reception

At release

• Billboard Pop Albums chart: No. 6, the first Dylan LP to enter the US Top 10
• UK: topped the album charts later that spring
• Dylan's first single from the album, 'Subterranean Homesick Blues', charted in the US at No. 39
• Dave Marsh, Rolling Stone Record Guide (1979): said fusing the Chuck Berry beat of the Rolling Stones and the Beatles with the folk revival tradition created a new kind of rock and roll
• Clinton Heylin: called it possibly the most influential album of its era
• Folk-scene reaction: the electric backing alienated Dylan from some of his former folk peers

Reappraisal

• Described by multiple publications as one of the greatest albums of all time
• Rolling Stone 500 Greatest Albums of All Time: No. 31 in 2003, kept in the 2012 revised list
• Rolling Stone 2020 edition: fell to No. 181
• Grammy Hall of Fame induction in 2006
• Included in Robert Christgau's Basic Record Library and in Robert Dimery's 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die (2010)
• Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums (third edition, 2000): ranked No. 189

Records

• Billboard Pop Albums: peak No. 6
• UK album chart: No. 1 in spring 1965
• Inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2006
• Ranked No. 31 in Rolling Stone 2003 list, No. 181 in the 2020 list
• Mono version re-released in 2010 on The Original Mono Recordings
• High-definition 5.1 surround SACD edition issued by Columbia in 2003

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

Trivia

• The album was released on the same day as the final show of a joint tour with Joan Baez, and it was the last time the two performed extensively together until 1975.
• Daniel Kramer received a Grammy nomination for best album cover for the photograph.
• Dylan's cufflinks in the cover photo were a gift from Joan Baez, who later referenced them in her 1975 song 'Diamonds & Rust'.
• The back-cover massage scene features filmmaker and performance artist Barbara Rubin.
• Dylan's cover pose, tipping his hat, was a nod to Eric Von Schmidt's album cover and was repeated for Nashville Skyline four years later.
• Only 'Gates of Eden' is mono on the stereo release and all later reissues.

Sources: en.wikipedia.org

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