Got You By The Heel (Thinman-125/126)
Scandinavian, Gothenburg, Sweden – September 25th, 1987
Disc 1 (33:24): Like A Rolling Stone, Maggie’s Farm, Forever Young, Trust Yourself, John Brown, I’ll Remember You, Tangled Up in Blue
Disc 2 (37:23): Clean Cut Kid, Tomorrow Is A Long Time, Shot Of Love, Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door, Dead Man Dead Man, Rainy Day Women #12 & 35, In The Garden
Temples In Flames was Dylan’s second tour in 1987 following the short summer trek with the Grateful Dead. Beginning with a show in Tel Aviv, it wound its way around Europe before ending with four shows in Wembley in London. Thinman use the same excellent sounding audience recording that was utilized for the 3LP compilation Live Scandinavia (Colucia Records KC 87926) and on the on CD title Göteborg 870925. There are non-destructive cuts between some of the songs (most notably after “Clean Cut Kid” and “Dead Man, Dead Man”).
Thinman use the same thick glossy paper they’ve used with their recently releases and even include original liner notes in the insert. It is a high class production all the way for a worthy tape. The only small criticism one could level is the shortness of each of the discs. At just under seventy-one minutes it could easily have fit onto one disc. Perhaps the label could have included the non-Dylan portion (if such exists for this show), or perhaps an second show from Scandinavia.
There is also a minor tracking error on disc two where “Dead Man, Dead Man” is included on the same track as “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door.” Track five on disc two is thirty seconds of crowd cheering, and the cheering continues into “Rainy Day Woman #12 & 35” for about three minutes.
The structure of these shows was, according to Olof’s files, “done in collaboration with Roger McGuinn who opened each concert with a solo set consisting of 5 or 6 songs. He was then joined by Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers for the final 3-4 songs. After Roger McGuinn’s set, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers performed their set of 7-8 songs. After an intermission, the lights went down, the sound got worse and Bob Dylan came on for his set which consisted of about 14 songs.”
Dylan’s sets on this tour are charactized by a wide variety of selections and sequences but the opening three of “Like A Rolling Stone,” “Maggie’s Farm” and “Forever Young” is most frequent. There are very good versions of some songs that are rarel played anymore from his mid-eighties output, “Trust Yourself” and “Clean Cut Kid.”
“John Brown” made its first live appearance on July 4th on the tour with the Grateful Dead in about twenty five years and Dylan continued to include this track on this tour as well. Played at a medium tempo, there is trememdous drama in the narrative undersocred by the country guitar picking. Beginning with this show, Dylan also included at first one and then two solo numbers. He plays “Tomorrow Is A Long Time” with joined by Mike Campbell on guitar and Benmont Tench and piano.
The set ends with a scorching version of “Dead Man, Dead Man.” On the first encore “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35″ Roger McGuinn joins on guitar, Howie Epstein joins on in slide guitar and Tom Petty on bass (bass) and McGuinn remains on stage for the final encore of the night “In The Garden.” Despite the criticms of this release listed above Got You By The Heel is a very solid release by Thinman and hopefully they will continue with more Temples In Flames tour tapes.
