Desire
by Bob Dylan

From Mother Nature's Son TOP 100 COMMENTER 08/14/2014 16:27 | #119504 | TOP COMMENT Vote up your preferred comments and the comments with the most votes will be flagged.

Call out to non-Dylan fans:

If you didn't care much for "Highway 61" or "Blonde on Blonde", be sure to check out this album before you pass up the rest of his discography completely. A totally different sound, both in terms of instrumentation (violin, accordion, mandolin and female background vocals as extra flavours) and vocal style (softer and less twangy, probably country-influenced too). Not to dismiss them at all, but you can actually listen to this album without paying any attention to the lyrics and still be enjoyed all the way through (and that's saying a lot with an 11 minutes epic, "Joey", that musically is quite repetitive) where I find his other albums sometimes get quite monotonous.

It certainly helped convincing me a lot to his music! (Edited)

One of Dylan's records that doesn't get anywhere near the amount of praise that it deserves. The songs on here are just fantastic and have a brilliant range in terms of song writing and instrumentation. We have a song as phenomenal as Hurricane opening the album and then one of Dylan's most personal songs, which is one of my favourites, in Sara. The album is then packed full of quality and depth in between the bookends of the record which are also diverse, creative and really engaging. Dylan's lyrics are just as phenomenal as they always are and I think his vocal performance on here is on that level as well. He also gives us some enthralling and entertaining performances on guitar and harmonica. Where this album really stands out for me is the ensemble Dylan has backing him with all of them being incredible but one stands out for me and its Scarlet Rivera. Her violin playing is beautiful on this album and she absolutely commands every song she is on and adds such a special twist to this already great record. Overall, this is more than just a back catalogue album in my opinion and is arguably just as good as his better known releases as its quality is consistently fantastic. (Edited)

Dylan's excellent follow up to, blood on the tracks. Desire, is another one of those Dylan albums that sound like nothing else in his back catalogue. The key to this, apart from Bob's songs, (with Jaques Levy, apart from two), is the use, all the way through the record of Scarlet Rivera's wonderful violin, and Emmylou Harris' superb backing vocals. It opens with, hurricane, a return to protest music, it's a great track. Other standouts are, Isis, oh, sister, Mozambique, and my favourite on the album, the gypsy like, one more cup of coffee. The only dud on the album is Joey, a dubious glorification of a murderous gangster, which is not just overlong, but incredibly boring too. The rest is great though. Dylan wouldn't make an album as good as this again until 1997, with, time out of mind.

From Mercury TOP 100 COMMENTER 01/05/2014 16:00 | #99887 | TOP COMMENT Vote up your preferred comments and the comments with the most votes will be flagged.

4 January 2014

"Desire" was a grower for me. For years and years I thought it was just alright. I guess some part of me thought it was weird and pretentious (whatever that means) and just something that didn't seem to fit into Dylan's discography or my idea of it.

Then one day I gave this album another listen and something clicked. This album IS INDEED very unique in Dylan's body of work. There is something so beautiful and magical and mysterious and mesmerizing about this record.

All the aspects - from his vocals to the songwriting style (due in no small part to his collaboration with Jacques Levy for this album only) the atmospheric violin work, the harmonies, etc are all unique to this record.

Another great aspect to this album is the world music vibes on tracks like "Romance In Durango" and "Mozambique" and others.

The opener is by far the most famous song on here. And while "Hurricane" is an epic and impressive and engaging song, it is probably my least favorite song here. That says a lot about how excellent this album is.

As for my favorite song, "Sara" is probably the one. This song is so tender and sad. It really makes me feel so much for Bob's and Sara's relationship. It's almost uncomfortable how close you are allowed to get to his marriage and into this man's life.

Anyway, in closing, following up "Blood On The Tracks" is a huge task, but Dylan did as well as anyone could expect here. This album is truly a marvel from start to finish.

Grade: 94/100

This is Dylan, kicking ass. A couple of things different here: female vocals for harmony (don't know who the woman is, but her voice is fantastic), some electric violin, mandolin, accordion. This album is backed with a full band. Dylan tells a few stories here, as only he can: "Hurricane" tells the story of the fighter Ruben Carter (whose story was later made into a film); "Isis", "Joey".
I also like "Romance in Durango", "One More Cup of Coffee" (covered by the White Stripes) and "Sara" (written for about his wife Sara Lownds and the end of that relationship).