i'll think and come back because its hard to narrow it down to just 5

1. Blood on The Tracks
2. Love and Theft
3. Bringing it All Back Home
4. Blonde on Blonde
5. Highway 61 Revisited

[www.non-filters.com]

This could change at any moment, but for now:

1. Highway 61 Revisited
2. Blonde on Blonde
3. Bringing It All Back Home
4. The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan
5. Blood on the Tracks
6. John Wesley Harding
7. Live 1966 (Bootleg Series Volume 4)
8. Live 1975 (The Rolling Thunder Review)
9. Another Side of Bob Dylan
10. The Times, They Are A-Changin'
11. Love and Theft
12. The Basement Tapes
13. Time Out of Mind
14. Infidels
15. Oh Mercy!

"The sun's not yellow it's chicken"

not counting any live or bootleg releases i'd say:
1 freewheelin bob dylan
2 highway 61 revisited
3 blonde on blonde
4 bringing it all back home
5 time out of mind

I must admit i love the "christian period": slow train, shot of love, saved, infidels, empire burlesque.........................
But DESIRE + STREET LEGAL + OH MERCY + TIME OUT OF MIND are my favourites..........

Blood on the Tracks
Freewheeling
Blonde on Blonde
Highway 61
Bringing it All Back Home

Blood On The Tracks
John Wesley Harding
Desire
Good As I Been To You
Under The Red Sky

i'm also using people's responses to see what dylan album i should buy next. i have these albums:
freewheeling
blonde on blonde
time out of mind
highway 61 revisited
bringing it all back home
modern times (i sold it though, didn't like the feel)
desire
blood on the tracks
the basement tapes

although i am pretty familiar with a good portion of his 60's material on albums i don't have



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2011-08-05 10:01 by keefriffhard4life.

Street Legal is fantastic, his most underrated album. You have most of the essential ones but all except a couple in the 80`s are at least interesting, avoid Knocked out loaded and Under a red sky, they are stinkers

Blonde On Blonde
Time Out Of Mind
John Wesley Harding
Blood On The Tracks
Tell Tale Signs (Bootleg Series vol. 8)

honorable mention:
HIghway 61 Revisited
Bringing It All Back Home
World Gone Wrong

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humanriff77
Street Legal is fantastic, his most underrated album. You have most of the essential ones but all except a couple in the 80`s are at least interesting, avoid Knocked out loaded and Under a red sky, they are stinkers

What's wrong with Under A Red Sky? Love it!

Born In Time is one of my top 5 faves of Dylan.

time out of mind
oh mercy
desire
blonde on blonde
slow train coming

ps
bob - see ya in october in berlin

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humanriff77
Street Legal is fantastic, his most underrated album. You have most of the essential ones but all except a couple in the 80`s are at least interesting, avoid Knocked out loaded and Under a red sky, they are stinkers

what about these?
love and theft
oh mercy
slow train coming
nashville skyline
john wesley harding
together through life

i was also thinking of getting TELL TALE SIGNS (bootleg 8) due to the high volume of TIME OUT OF MIND leftovers. forgot to mention i have the 2 cd essential dylan set

Anybody looking to add to their Dylan collection should check out the New York sessions for Blood on the Tracks - it has some wonderful variations on the songs and the quality for a boot is amazing. My favourite Dylan unoffical recording.

I'd add Basement Tapes, Desire, Slow Train, Time Out of MInd

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DandelionPowderman

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humanriff77
Street Legal is fantastic, his most underrated album. You have most of the essential ones but all except a couple in the 80`s are at least interesting, avoid Knocked out loaded and Under a red sky, they are stinkers

What's wrong with Under A Red Sky?.

Under The Red Sky is basically a mixture of children's songs and leftovers from Oh Mercy. The album is ill produced (to many musicians in too many sessions etc). Listen to the alternate mixes/versions and you'll see that point.

Street Legal is nothing but a bluff - great sound when you listen to it for the first time(s), but if you listen closer and read the lyrics everything falls apart. I guess Bob Dylan realized this and thus hasn't performed any of the Street Legal songs (except for Señor and a one off performance of We Better Talk This Over) during his never ending tour (1988-2011).

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slewan

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DandelionPowderman

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humanriff77
Street Legal is fantastic, his most underrated album. You have most of the essential ones but all except a couple in the 80`s are at least interesting, avoid Knocked out loaded and Under a red sky, they are stinkers

What's wrong with Under A Red Sky?.

Under The Red Sky is basically a mixture of children's songs and leftovers from Oh Mercy. The album is ill produced (to many musicians in too many sessions etc). Listen to the alternate mixes/versions and you'll see that point.

Street Legal is nothing but a bluff - great sound when you listen to it for the first time(s), but if you listen closer and read the lyrics everything falls apart. I guess Bob Dylan realized this and thus hasn't performed any of the Street Legal songs (except for Señor and a one off performance of We Better Talk This Over) during his never ending tour (1988-2011).

Well, I have the album and I don't agree, as there are several good songs in there. I agree about the production, though. But that goes especially for the bluesier numbers with the Vaughn-brothers etc.

Born In Time (one of the two OM-outtakes) with Crosby is stellar. So is Wiggle Wiggle with Slash. Waddy is doing a fine job (sounding like Keith) on Handy Dandy. The title track is awesome. Which ones were the children's songs?

A songwriter like Dylan always has leftover-songs. Some of them may well be classics as well. But, of course, Oh Mercy is a great album, too.

Bringing It All Back Home, Highway 61 Revisited, Blonde On Blonde and Blood On the Tracks easily. that makes obvious four. they're all perfect, but very similar to each other. 1966 live disc is another perfect in Bob's discography, but most of the songs are from the albums above ("Judas!"). Desire is a nice album ("Mozambique" being the cutest song ever x)); the last three ones are also very good. beware of the 80s!

Mick Taylor played on Real Live if I remember correctly (not the best, not the worst; not much artistic worth but enjoyable) and there's also unreleased version of Oh Mercy with Ronnie.

hey, I remember now... I downloaded some years ago off HungerCity many GBs of almost complete Bob's 65/66 tour... was just going to listen to it all through... but then I suddenly deleted it forever. damn hell. maybe I'll download again?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 2011-08-05 12:56 by Amused.

PS - not many of my friends like Dylan, but there's a pretty girl who walks in the middle of every party and puts on "Wedding Song" - it's not a bad introduction to Dylan.

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DandelionPowderman
The title track is awesome. Which ones were the children's songs?

Wiggle, Wiggle, Under The red Sky, 2x2, Cat's In The Well, Handy Dandy - just take a look at the lyrics! It's all children's rhymes and/or nursery rhymes. All these lyrics are so simple and easy to remember and mostly without any deeper sense that they can be easily sung in kindergarten ('There was a little girl and theres was a little boy and they lives in an alley under the red sky…', 'one by one they followed the sun, two by two to their lovers they flew…', 'Handy Dandy, just like sugar and candy…', etc etc)

some people suppose that Bob wrote these songs for this then little daughter

so i see someone said dylans last 3 albums are great which includes MODERN TIMES. i got rid of it after having it for 2 years. is there something there i missed? i just didn't like it. almost every tune i already knew as another more well known melody. yes i know folk artists borrow a lot and i have no problem with that considering a few of his earlier albums had some melodies i already knew but modern times seemed almost funny is how mainstream the melodies were. at one point i thought i was listening to an allman brothers tune with dylan singing

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slewan

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DandelionPowderman
The title track is awesome. Which ones were the children's songs?

Wiggle, Wiggle, Under The red Sky, 2x2, Cat's In The Well, Handy Dandy - just take a look at the lyrics! It's all children's rhymes and/or nursery rhymes. All these lyrics are so simple and easy to remember and mostly without any deeper sense that they can be easily sung in kindergarten ('There was a little girl and theres was a little boy and they lives in an alley under the red sky…', 'one by one they followed the sun, two by two to their lovers they flew…', 'Handy Dandy, just like sugar and candy…', etc etc)

some people suppose that Bob wrote these songs for this then little daughter

LOL! I should have known that

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keefriffhard4life
so i see someone said dylans last 3 albums are great which includes MODERN TIMES. i got rid of it after having it for 2 years. is there something there i missed? i just didn't like it. almost every tune i already knew as another more well known melody. yes i know folk artists borrow a lot and i have no problem with that considering a few of his earlier albums had some melodies i already knew but modern times seemed almost funny is how mainstream the melodies were. at one point i thought i was listening to an allman brothers tune with dylan singing

I said they were very good, many consider them really great, though, and they have a point. it seems keef that melodies are what you're looking for in folk albums, kinda strange yep, not only melodies are "borrowed" from old blues and folk numbers, but also some lyrics are not original, and this album was criticised for that much.
on the other hand, "Thunder On the Water" is a cool boogie; "Rollin' and Tumblin'", "Someday Baby" and "The Levee's Gonna Break" great blues numbers; "Workingman's Blues #2" is amazing! (I haven't read the lyrics carefully yet, well, hope that's not too socialistic )

Top four is easy enough to pick

Blood on The Tracks
Blonde on Blonde
Highway 61 Revisited
Bringing It All Back Home

After that, it gets harder. At a push I'd say The Basement Tapes, even though Robbie Robertson's selection methods were seriously flawed.

Bubbling under - John Wesley Harding, The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, Desire, Street Legal, Love & Theft, The Times They Are A-Changin'

Thats just the studio albums of course. The live records and the Bootleg Series releases are another matter.

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Amused

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keefriffhard4life
so i see someone said dylans last 3 albums are great which includes MODERN TIMES. i got rid of it after having it for 2 years. is there something there i missed? i just didn't like it. almost every tune i already knew as another more well known melody. yes i know folk artists borrow a lot and i have no problem with that considering a few of his earlier albums had some melodies i already knew but modern times seemed almost funny is how mainstream the melodies were. at one point i thought i was listening to an allman brothers tune with dylan singing

I said they were very good, many consider them really great, though, and they have a point. it seems keef that melodies are what you're looking for in folk albums, kinda strange yep, not only melodies are "borrowed" from old blues and folk numbers, but also some lyrics are not original, and this album was criticised for that much.
on the other hand, "Thunder On the Water" is a cool boogie; "Rollin' and Tumblin'", "Someday Baby" and "The Levee's Gonna Break" great blues numbers; "Workingman's Blues #2" is amazing! (I haven't read the lyrics carefully yet, well, hope that's not too socialistic )

Rollin' And Tumblin' was credited as a Dylan-song? As far as I could hear it was a cover of the Muddy-tune...

it was recorded years before Muddy Waters, it's almost impossible to track down autorship of "Rollin' and Tumblin'". yeah, it was credited to Dylan, as well as "Someday Baby" (Keith played it many times under the title "Worried Life Blues", Big Maceo Merriweather @#$%& yeah).

but Bob's version have lyrics way different, see [www.bobdylan.com]

Highway 61 Revisited
Blonde On Blonde
New Morning
Planet Waves
Oh Mercy

Then there's John Wesley Harding,Blood On The Tracks,and pretty much all the rest.

been reconnecting with these after some time:

Slow Train Coming

Blood On The Tracks

Oh Mercy

Highway 61 Revisited

Modern Times

with Dylan we have so much so high quality.

Amazing.

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Amused
it was recorded years before Muddy Waters, it's almost impossible to track down autorship of "Rollin' and Tumblin'". yeah, it was credited to Dylan, as well as "Someday Baby" (Keith played it many times under the title "Worried Life Blues", Big Maceo Merriweather @#$%& yeah).

but Bob's version have lyrics way different, see [www.bobdylan.com]

Arranging credits I can understand, but songwriting credits? That's a bit too much.

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Amused

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keefriffhard4life
so i see someone said dylans last 3 albums are great which includes MODERN TIMES. i got rid of it after having it for 2 years. is there something there i missed? i just didn't like it. almost every tune i already knew as another more well known melody. yes i know folk artists borrow a lot and i have no problem with that considering a few of his earlier albums had some melodies i already knew but modern times seemed almost funny is how mainstream the melodies were. at one point i thought i was listening to an allman brothers tune with dylan singing

I said they were very good, many consider them really great, though, and they have a point. it seems keef that melodies are what you're looking for in folk albums, kinda strange yep, not only melodies are "borrowed" from old blues and folk numbers, but also some lyrics are not original, and this album was criticised for that much.
on the other hand, "Thunder On the Water" is a cool boogie; "Rollin' and Tumblin'", "Someday Baby" and "The Levee's Gonna Break" great blues numbers; "Workingman's Blues #2" is amazing! (I haven't read the lyrics carefully yet, well, hope that's not too socialistic )

those are the main songs i was talking about. i knew every song before dylan sang a word. old melodies to a lot of songs by other artists. is TOGETHER THROUGH LIFE better and/or not as obvious in the melody borrowing?