Bob Dylan – Tempe, AZ (11/26/79)

Bob Dylan
11/26/79
Gammage Center
Tempe, AZ

1. Gotta Serve Somebody
2. I Believe In You
3. When You Gonna Wake Up
4. When He Returns
5. Man Gave Names To All The Animals
6. Precious Angel
7. Slow Train
8. Covenant Woman
9. Regina McCreary Havis:
Put Your Hand In The Hand Of The Man From Galilee (Gene MacLellan)
10. Gonna Change My Way Of Thinking
11. Do Right To Me Baby (Do Unto Others)
12. Solid Rock
12. Saving Grace
13. Saved (Bob Dylan/Tim Drummond)
14. What Can I Do For You?
15. In The Garden

Concert # 20 of the First Gospel Tour.
Concert # 20 with the First Gospel Band: Bob Dylan (vocal & guitar), Fred Tackett (guitar), Spooner Oldham (keyboards), Tim Drummond (bass), Terry Young (keyboards), Jim Keltner (drums), Regina Havis , Helena Springs , Mona Lisa Young (background vocals).

4 Bob Dylan solo (vocal & guitar) with Spooner Oldham (piano).
13 Bob Dylan (harmonica).
17 Bob Dylan (piano).

Note. There was no encores this evening, probably due to the exceptionally hostile audience response.

Source 1:

LB-7210

Lineage: CDR – XLD – FLAC 8
Number of Discs: 2

Source 2:
LB-9313

Notes from Source 1:

This concert likely constitutes the low-point of the entire tour, if not of all Dylan tours. The circulating recordings of this concert all lack the monologue and introductory gospel songs by the backing singers. However, from the crowd noise leading into “Serve Somebody” and Dylan’s clear anger following “I Believe In You,” the crowds’ treatment of the backing singers must have been quite nasty. The crowd comments decipherable through Dylan’s harangue suggest that this concert was marred by a few individual hecklers rather than a broad negative response of the audience. As may be heard, the hecklers yell their comments and are quickly shouted down by a number of other members of the audience.

Dylan’s response is interesting. He begins by simply telling the crowd they’re being rude. He then launches into a story meant to illustrate the pervasiveness of what he calls the “anti-Christ,” particularly as represented by a famous guru Dylan says claims to be god, but also, by implication, the band “Kiss” and their like. Dylan persists in this story despite very aggressive heckling which finally prompts him to raise the lights in the hall, calling out, “Turn the lights on! Give them some light! Let them in the light!”

Dylan leaves the lights on for the remainder of the concert, another fourteen songs. In response to numerous shouts to turn the lights down, following “When He Returns,” Dylan says, “Why? Too bright for you?” This poisoned atmosphere doesn’t improve. Dylan performes the next few songs at a quicker pace, with flatter phrasing, in marked contrast to the confessional tone he takes at nearly every other concert of this tour. The combination of Dylan’s tone and pacing, the lights, and the clear unease of the audience with both Dylan’s anger and the lights, appear to rattle the band as well. They struggle through “Change My Way Of Thinking,” “Saved” and a thoroughly dispirited “In The Garden,” sounding downright relieved to be done by the final notes of the latter.

On the other hand, both “Covenant Woman” and “Solid Rock” stand out this evening. Both capture Dylan’s apaprent mood of the evening, Dylan delivers the former, a difficult song on the best of nights, with a lovely wearied rephrasing. Dylan and the band crank out an angry, defiant, “Solid Rock” with a wonderful guitar solo by Fred Tackett and great vocal licks from the backing singers.

Dylan’s first address to the audience, concerning the gurus and “Kiss,” focuses on false deceivers and the bright line between those who are saved and those who are lost, essentially a cautionary tale that you either have faith or you do not. Dylan’s second address takes a more plaintive tone, directly acknowledging his own role as a spokesperson for the faith. When fans call out old songs, Dylan acknowledges these calls, but treats them as accusations rather than requests. Dylan defends his earlier songs as not having intentionally misled anyone. In response to someone shouting “Everybody Must Get Stoned!” Dylan recounts the story of Jesus confronting a group about to stone an adulterer. Dylan then relates his view that current events mirror biblical prophecy and portend Armageddon within the next few years. Dylan then reminds the audience that they need to prepare for this final battle and, referring to Jesus’ use of parables, suggesting that the truth is before them, but some simply cannot grasp it.

I find Dylan’s defensiveness about his earlier songs and his persistence in trying to preach the gospel to his audience remarkable. While many may bristle at being told they are “lost” because they do not believe in Dylan’s god, Dylan’s intentions, and the urgent care he shows for his audience, are moving. Not unlike Pascal’s “Wager”, Dylan seems animated by his own fame to utilize it for the service of what he is clearly convinced is the good of his audience. This is not a man condemning the world and holding himself above it. This is someone who has clearly condemned himself for his own past, now laboring to help his followers avoid a similar fall. Dylan’s reference to parables towards the end strikes me as evidence that Dylan is beginning to grasp the obstacles which lie before him in spreading his message.