I have extremely ambivalent feelings about the Sinatra albums. For some time, I refused to do them (and since for a long time that was all Dylan was playing, there weren’t that many updates to the site, unfortunately – not my fault!), but at the same time many of the songs on those albums are among my all time favourites, and when I finally sat down to do Shadows in the Night, it was actually something of an epiphany.

In other words: don’t count on me to do all of Triplicate at once, but don’t be surprised if a Sinatra song or two shows up. Like Stardust, one of the greatest songs of all time, and most recently Melancholy Mood, a great request from Ray Padgett of Flaggin’ Down fame.

I’ve realised that the base theme doesn’t work on iPhones, and that it works badly on mobiles in general. I’ve therefore added a couple of themes, that are not by any means finished. There is also a theme switcher. “Augustine” is the new default theme, “Jesse” is a very sparse theme with no features at all, and “dc2” is the old main theme.

If I Was a King is another gem from the hotel room session in Glasgow that produced What Kind of Friend Is This? and On A Rainy Afternoon/Does She Need Me?/I Can’t Leave Her Behind. The lyrics are not coherent, and the transcription is an attempt to balance somewhere between what sounds he might actually have made and what words he might actually have intended to sing. Meaning: they don’t make sense, but it’s not all gibberish.

I intended to write a brief survey of the various live renditions of “Tangled up in Blue” as an appendix to my discussion of the song itself. It grew to become a post of its own, and it even had to be split in two. This part covers everything up to the “Larry arrangement”, which was used from 1997 to 2004.

Many of the Dylanology posts are for paying subscribers only, but this one is open for all.

If you like the work I’m doing, either on Dylanchords or on Dylanology, please consider a subscription.

A new issue of Dylanology is out, this time with yet another look at Tangled up in Blue, Dylan’s greatest song. In this issue, I investigate the two studio versions from 1974 and the differences between them. In the course of the work on these articles, I am also regularly adding new versions and tabs to the main chord page here on dylanochords.com as well. 

I added the revised version of Key West that has been played since this spring. Where the album version is a model of restraint, harmonically speaking, using only the related chords C, Am, and F, the new live version sounds quite a lot like the dreaded Pachelbel’s Canon, with bowed bass and dim chords, and in the bridge the same odd semi-tone figure that has also showed up in live versions of “I Contain Multitudes”.

In the two latest issues of Dylanology, my monthly newsletter/webmagazine, I discuss Dylan’s 1974 album Planet Waves based on the question: “Why is Planet Waves not one of his most beloved albums, a classic on a par with Blonde on Blonde or Time out of Mind?”

Dylan’s recent birthday greeting to Brian Wilson may not be his finest moment as a musician, but of course it belongs here. Not only is it the first solo acoustic performance in I don’t know how many years – it is also charming and cute, and that little smile in the end, where he plays the wrong chord and gives up on the attempt to come up with something to save it, is priceless.

Dylanchords #10 is out, with an answer to the question: “Why is Brownsville Girl” the best Dylan song?

I also notice that I have forgotten to announce the two previous issues. #8 has the follow-up to the text about “Let’s Keep It Between Us” in issue #7, about the soft-rock songs that Dylan recorded in the 80s, in addition to the Christmas celebration of CITH.

In #9, I discuss The Times They Are A-Changin’ under the heading: “What’s Wrong With The Times?” There is not a single bad song on the album, but I never really liked it.