On February 27th 1980 Bob Dylan receives his first Grammy for 'Best Vocal Performance 1979'
at the 22nd Grammy Award at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles!
22nd Grammy Awards
Best Vocal Performance 1979
Shrine Auditorium
Los Angeles, CA 02/27/80
The Song
Gotta Serve Somebody
In his acceptance speech he thanks "The Lord, Jerry Wexler and Barry Beckett who believed".
Tracks:
1. Gotta Serve Somebody
2. Precious Angel
3. I Believe In You
4. Slow Train
5. Gonna Change My Way Of Thinking
6. Do Right To Me Baby (Do Unto Others)
7. When You Gonna Wake Up
8. Man Gave Names To All The Animals
9. When He Returns
Liner Notes
"Biograph" (1985)
"Dylan & The Dead" (1988)
"Bob Dylan's Greatest Hits, Volume 3" (1994)
"The Essential Bob Dylan" (2000)
"Twenty years had to go by for people to become aware of the fact that Bob Dylan is
one of our great gospel writers? - I hope this is the beginning of a lot of people
really paying attention to that period of his writing."
Jim Keltner
Dylan on Slow Train Coming (New York, 1984):
"The songs that I wrote for the "Slow Train" album [frightened me] ... I didn't plan to write them, but I wrote them anyway.
I didn't like writing them, I didn't want to write them... But I found myself writing these songs and after I had
a certain amount of them I thought I didn't want to sing them, so I had a girl sing them for me...
A girl I was singing with at the time, Carolyn Dennis... I [would give] them all to her
and [have] her record them, and not even put my name on them. I wanted the songs out
but I didn't want to do it [myself] because I knew that it wouldn't be perceived in that way.
It would just mean more pressure. I just did not want to write at that time."
"For music, I would say that Bob Dylan's "Slow Train Coming" is the best Christian album ever recorded.
I've certainly never written anything that says as much and I'd be most impressed if he ever surpasses it himself.
I wish every Christian who likes modern Gospel music would buy a copy of "Slow Train".
Then they'd have an idea of what Christian music is capable to communicating."
(from Bill Parr's site)
Perhaps Dylan's Best Album,
January 24, 2000
Reviewer: Skylar H. Burris / Amazon
This is one of Dylan's most mature albums, both lyrically and musically. I am not sure why one customer reviewer wonder
"where are his clear critcial views?" They are HERE, and with force. Social/Religous commentary springs forth
in prophetic tone on "When You Gonna Wake Up" (which is critical of religious hypocricy, disregard for the elderly,
doctors-pushing drugs, and on and on), "Slow Train," and "Gotta Serve Somebody."
My favorite song is "When He Returns," a moving and profound ballad, with beautfiul imagery:
"Surrender your crown on this bloodstained ground, take off your mask. He sees your deeds, he knows your needs, even before you ask."
From the slow to the grinding, this album is a powerful, moving, expression of Christian music.
So-called Dylan fans who can not get past the 1970's and can not accept that Dylan has grown and matured
and improved are really missing out on something here.
"I don’t think that a song that is written about God ... will ever die, no matter who wrote them.
But because Bob Dylan wrote them and we’re going in and we’re doing them over now,
I think that all it does is just remind people that this man is God-gifted." (Regina Havis)
Gospel Stars to Serve Bob Dylan on Tribute Album
Bob Dylan contributes to Gospel Album
Revisiting Bob Dylan's Gospel Music
Gotta Serve Somebody - The Gospel Songs Of Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan Duet With Mavis Staples Highlights Gospel Tribute to Dylan Due in March
Artists Salute Dylan's Inspirational Albums
Pool thread
Other related articles
An exclusive interview with Spooner Oldham
Karen Hughes Interview - 5/21/1980
An interview with Regina Havis
Not Buying into the Subculture ~ Christianity Today on "Slow Train Coming"
Watered-Down Love ~ Bob Dylan encountered Jesus in 1978, and that light has not entirely faded ...
Bob Dylan Finds His Source ~ By Noel Paul Stookey
"Slow Train" was a big album. "Saved" didn't have those kinda numbers but to me it was just as big an album.
I'm fortunate that I'm in a position to release an album like "Saved" with a major record company so that it will be available
to the people who would like to buy it." (London, 1981)
"Christ is no religion . . . [He] is the way, the truth and the life. . . religion is another form of bondage that man invents
to get himself to God. . . . . Well, a religion that says you have to do certain things to get to God -- they're
probably talking about that type of religion, which is a religion which is by works:
you can enter into the kingdom by what you do, what you wear, what you say, how many times a day you may pray,
how many good deeds you may do. If that's what they mean by religion, that type of religion will not
get you into the Kingdom, that's true. However, there is a Master Creator, a Supreme Being in the Universe.
People say, "Bob don't do that stuff." It may be costing me a lot of fans.
Maybe I'll have to start singing on street corners. Still I'll give all praise and glory to Got."
(Tuscon Interview, 1979)
"I don't know what you think you're hanging on to. We're hanging on to a solid rock made before the foundation of the world."
Solid Rock
for more on Solid Rock 2002!
"All right, this one of my lesser known songs, but it's still one of my favorites so ..." (before In The Garden in Glasgow 91/2/2).
"I'm gonna do a song about my hero. Everybody's got a hero. I don't know who your hero is. Maybe Mel Gibson.
All right, let's hear it for Mel Gibson. Some of you it may be Michael Jackson......Bruce Springsteen.
Anyway, I don't care nothing about none of those people. I got my own hero and I'm gonna sing about my hero now..."
INTRO -- In The Garden, 02/1986
In The Garden
After almost 23 years, on FEBRUARY 6th, 2003, Bob Dylan pulled out SAVING GRACE!
What a happy day!
for more on SAVING GRACE
comments on performances:
"Saving Grace the real surprise packet of the show.
This version sounding true to the version from the much underrated Saved album."
"Then as we have come to expect from Bob, the unpredictable....Saving Grace, sung beautifully,..."
"Saving Grace is an unknown song to me, yet I felt I knew it by the end
- he took that one very seriously and sang with, well, grace."
"Saving Grace sung with true feeling."
"Saving Grace moved down to 13 from its 7th position in Canberra and 11th in Melbourne.
Enjoying this more and more."
"Saving Grace also contained some of the finest vocal work of the evening with each line delivered
in hymn-like fashion with the clarity and grace unparalleled. During the song Bob appeared to take a slight break,
resting against the piano. By this time he'd invested such energy into his performance,
the level of which is seldom seen in artists half his age."
"Saving Grace was beautiful Bob put a lot into the vocals and sang it like he really meant it.
Larry took the solo on this one and really shined."
In the summer of 1980 Dylan contributes harmonica on the recording of Keith Green's song 'Pledge My Head To Heaven',
later released on the album 'So You Wanna Go Back To Egypt ..." on Pretty Good Records.
Keith Green's Discographie
"I read the Bible a lot; it just happens I do."
"You can tell by the lyrics that he is a man who reads the Bible"
(Dr. Allen, pastor of New Bethel Church of God in Christ on Vance St)
"As Bob Dylan once wrote, ‘you gotta serve somebody...It may be the devil, it may be the Lord,
but you gotta serve somebody’. The choice is ours one day at a time. We may choose to surrender to fear,
to pride, to money, to resentment, to popularity, or we can choose to surrender to God who really cares for us."
(Rev. Ed Hird, St. Simon’s Anglican Church, North Vancouver, B.C.)
