Down Along The Cove (BlackDog 006/007)
Erb Memorial Union Ballroom, University Of Oregon, Eugene, OR – June 14th, 1999
Disc 1: Cocaine Blues, My Back Pages, Boots Of Spanish Leather, A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall, Love Minus Zero/No Limit, Don’t Think Twice It’s Alright, Down Along The Cove, Blind Willie McTell, Most Likely You Go Your Way, Simple Twist Of Fate
Disc 2: Can’t Wait, Highway 61 Revisited, Not Dark Yet, Like A Rolling Stone, Blowin’ In The Wind, Not Fade Away. Bonus tracks, Madison Square Garden, New York, NY – June 30th, 1999: Don’t Think Twice It’s Alright, Crossroads
Down Along The Cove is the latest release on the BlackDog label, the imprint of TMR records that handles the soundboard recordings. The source for this show is an excellent and well-balanced soundboard recording. A bulk of this show was released on the first disc of the five disc set Ace Of Clubs on Wild Wolf (99-001/2/3/4/5) and the complete set was released as Down Along The Cove on the European label Filou (FLU-022) in December 2002. This new release on BlackDog is of comparable and excellent quality and contains as a bonus two tracks from Eric Clapton’s Crossroads Benefit Concert from June 30th in New York.
The Eugene show is most famous for being the live debut, after only twenty-two years, of the John Wesley Harding song “Down Along The Cove”. It seems almost inconceivable that there are songs in Dylan’s oeuvre that have yet to be played live despite a career of over forty years and the current never-ending tour now creeping in on the twenty year mark. “I want to say hello to all the ex-hippies. I’ve never been a hippy myself, but I’m an honorary hippy” he says afterwards. There is also a sublime version of “Not Dark Yet” and Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away”.BlackDog include as a bonus two of the seven tracks Dylan participated in during Clapton’s benefit two weeks after the Oregon show. “Crossroads” includes Clapton’s backing singers Katie Kissoon and Tessa Niles and is a nice touch by the label although I would like to see a release with his complete set. This too is in excellent soundboard quality. A photo from the event is included on the inner sleeve. For the Eugene show this title is definitely worth having especially if you missed picking up previous releases of this show. (GS)
