3xLP GREEN VINYL SET CHRONICLES DYLAN’S LEGENDARY 1974 TOUR WITH THE BAND AND INCLUDES A 1970s-STYLED SOUVENIR TOUR BOOK WITH PHOTOS AND ARCHIVAL MATERIAL, PLUS A 7” OF “BLOWIN' IN THE WIND” B/W “MOST LIKELY YOU GO YOUR WAY (AND I’LL GO MINE)” (LIVE 1974)

SUBSCRIBE BY JULY 31, 2024 AT MIDNIGHT CST TO RECEIVE THIS PACKAGE

 

In honor of the 15-year anniversary of the Vault, the longest continuously running vinyl subscription club in the world, Third Man Records in conjunction with Columbia Records / Legacy Recordings is proud to announce its 61st Vault package, Bob Dylan’s The 1974 Live Recordings: The Missing Songs From Before The Flood. The box set chronicles Dylan’s legendary 1974 tour with The Band, a pivotal moment that saw them performing for their largest crowds to date.

With a variety of full show performances available to cull from in the compiling of Before The Flood it was natural that some songs, no matter how compelling and powerful, would not fit on the original 2xLP release in 1974. Pressed at Third Man Pressing in Detroit on three charming green LPs, this configuration is the only vinyl release of any of the archived 1974 live recordings. 

As an added bonus, Third Man has designed a classic 1970’s-styled souvenir tour book. Comprising photos taken during this momentous tour and of-the-era graphics and archival material, this 8.5 x 11 inch, 20 page book is the perfect visual accompaniment to the moving, powerful audio it is paired with. To top it all off, included here is a 7-inch single featuring the inimitable “Blowin' In The Wind” as originally included on Before The Flood backed with an incendiary take of “Most Likely You Go Your Way (And I’ll Go Mine)” recorded at Madison Square Garden on January 30th, 1974.

Visit www.thirdmanrecords.com/vault and purchase your package before midnight central time July 31st.

 

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Bob Dylan’s 1974 Tour marked his first time touring live in eight years and reunited him with The Band - who had become widely renowned in their own right since backing the artist nearly a decade earlier. Booked into arenas for the first time ever, Bob Dylan and The Band performed 30 dates in 42 days (often playing two sets per day) before an average audience of 18,500 - helping set a new standard for what rock concerts could look and sound like. And in front of those crowds, they brought an energy that Rolling Stone’s Ben Fong-Torres described as “searing and soaring, unified and precise…excellent in itself.” Music critic Robert Christgau compared the sound to Bob Dylan “running over his old songs like a truck.” 

Tour ‘74 kicked off January 3, 1974, at Chicago Stadium - the largest indoor arena in the world at the time it was built - with a tense and combative rip through ultimate deep-cut “Hero Blues,” an acoustic-gone-electric outtake from The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan sessions, that he had scarcely performed before - or since. Additional rarities - like a wildly-reinvented “Ballad Of Hollis Brown,” “Song to Woody” (not performed since 1962) and Planet Waves outtake “Nobody ‘Cept You” - would be well received in the tour’s first nights. “We were booed off of every stage in Europe,” The Band’s Robbie Robertson recalled to Newsweek of their previous run together. “What happened tonight in Chicago is so reassuring for us.”

The reception wasn’t the only thing that had changed since Bob Dylan and The Band last toured together in 1966. Since then, The Band had released six LPs, played Woodstock and other famous stages, and recorded a series of historic sessions with Bob Dylan - from The Basement Tapes to Planet Waves. For his part, Bob Dylan had effectively retired from the road altogether following a 1966 motorcycle accident, yet was still “widely regarded as the most influential and significant star in the last 10 years of American popular music,” according to The New York Times.

Though they might not have known it at the time, Bob Dylan and The Band were at the vanguard of a new era. Tour ‘74 would help create the template for the major rock tour, and codify many of its shared experiences - from the sight of audiences holding up lighters en masse (as captured in the iconic cover image for Before The Flood), to the bright flash of the house lights during a show’s signal moment, in this case their performance of “Like A Rolling Stone.” Likewise many songs performed live for the first time on Tour ‘74 - “All Along The Watchtower,” “Forever Young” and the show’s eventual opener-and-closer “Most Likely You Go Your Way (and I’ll Go Mine)” - would take on a life of their own.

 

 

TRACK LIST:

 

LP 1, Side A

1. Something There Is About You – 1/30/74, New York City
2. Leopard-Skin Pill-Box Hat – 1/3/74, Chicago
3. I Don’t Believe You (She Acts Like We Never Have Met) – 1/15/74, Largo, MD
4. Hero Blues – 1/4/74, Chicago

 

LP 1, Side B

1. Tough Mama – 1/3/74, Chicago
2. Maggie’s Farm – 2/14/74, Evening Show, Inglewood, CA
3. Just Like Tom Thumb’s Blues – 2/13/74, Inglewood, CA

 

LP 2, Side C

1. Song to Woody – 1/6/74, Evening Show, Philadelphia*
2. Nobody ‘Cept You – 1/3/74, Chicago*
3. The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll – 1/3/74, Chicago*
4. Love Minus Zero/No Limit – 1/4/74, Chicago*
5. To Ramona – 1/6/74, Afternoon Show, Philadelphia*

 

LP 2, Side D

1. Girl from the North Country – 1/9/74, Toronto*
2. Mr. Tambourine Man – 1/6/74, Evening Show, Philadelphia*
3. Mama, You’ve Been on My Mind – 1/6/74, Afternoon Show, Philadelphia*
4. Wedding Song – 1/15/74, Largo, MD*

 

LP 3, Side E

1. Gates of Eden – 1/31/74, Evening Show, New York City*
2. She Belongs to Me – 2/11/74, Afternoon Show, Oakland*
3. It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue – 2/14/74, Afternoon Show, Inglewood, CA*
4. The Times They Are A-Changin’ – 2/14/74, Evening Show, Inglewood, CA*

 

LP 3, Side F

1. Ballad of Hollis Brown – 1/26/74, Afternoon Show, Houston
2. One Too Many Mornings – 1/16/74, Largo, MD
3. It Takes a Lot to Laugh, It Takes a Train to Cry – 1/9/74, Toronto
4. Forever Young – 2/13/74, Inglewood, CA

 

7-inch single

Side A - Blowin’ In The Wind – 2/13-14/74, Inglewood, CA

Side B - Most Likely You Go Your Way (And I’ll Go Mine) – 1/30/74 New York City

 

All tracks previously unreleased except for “Blowin’ In The Wind”

 

Bob Dylan: vocals, guitar, harmonica, piano

with

The Band

Robbie Robertson: guitar

Garth Hudson: organ, piano, clavinet, accordion

Richard Manuel: piano, electric piano, organ, drums

Rick Danko: bass guitar

Levon Helm: drums

* Bob Dylan only