Pain.

I'm a new fan to Bob Dylan's music. Oh Mercy, Another Side of Bob Dylan and Desire is where I started. After listening to Empire Burlesque I have to think that Bob somehow was blindsided by the 80's. Every cheesey production trick to come out of the 80's is on this album (reverb, background singers, glossed up production). So it's kind of a hard listen. You get through all that crap to get to the songs which aren't Bob's best (in my humble opinion). My suggestion is to stop wasting you time and move on to Bob's 90's music which is far superior to his 80's music. His 90's music is good but not as good as his 70's music. However, his 60's music is probably close to scripture at this point in a lot of peoples minds. Enter this record at your own risk. At the end of it you might be searching for spandex pants.



Maybe Bob could re-record this album and free the songs of the bad production? That's a thought...

Well . . .

Bob Dylan has said on multiple occasions that he has never liked the great acclaim he's been given nor the title "Voice of a Generation", and so produced crappy albums to silence the fanatics.



Yeah, this would be one of them.



Dylan meets '80's synth? The result is . . . it's terrifying.

Yields some rewards for the dedicated Dylan fan...

Unless you have a soft spot for the "80's sound" (and I know people who do), most people who love and know Dylan only through his early-folk years, "Blonde on Blonde," or "Blood On The Tracks" will not warm to this immediately. It was a tough listen when I first heard it, and it took awhile to grow on me. Some have accused Dylan of trying to achieve a then-contemporary sound on EMPIRE BURLESQUE (and Dylan jokingly replied that he didn't know anything about new music, "I still listen to Charley Patton"). Though Arthur Baker did add an extra layer of gloss, much of the production choices were actually Dylan's. He brought in studio professionals like Anton Fig (best-known from David Letterman's house band), Benmont Tench, and Mike Campbell (the last two from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers), all of whom played on records by Cyndi Lauper, Don Henley, etc. It all sounds dated now, but once you get past that, I think there's plenty to enjoy. Having said that, there are also plenty of weaknesses.



The first track, "Tight Connection," sounds like a quintessential 80's pop song. Originally recorded for INFIDELS, it was re-written and re-recorded several times; the finished result is presented here. It's too slick, but it's still not enough to hide the engaging melody and reggae-groove.



"Seeing The Real You At Last" doesn't get talked about much, but it's not bad, a pretty good, slick rocker driven by some confident vocals.



"I'll Remember You" is still played quite a bit in concert. Lyrically, it's not one of Dylan's best love songs, but he still gives it a good performance here. It wouldn't sound out of place on lite-rock radio, though.



"Clean-Cut Kid" feels like a novelty song wrapped around sharp political commentary; the clean-cut kid is an average American kid who's radically altered by his experience in the Vietnam War. The words aren't too subtle nor up to Dylan's usual standards in wordplay, but it's still an interesting song with some real backbone.



"Never Gonna Be The Same Again" is the one song I never get into. Everything - performance, song, arrangement, production - doesn't work well. It's one of the two worst examples of how problematic the production/mixing is on this record.



"Trust Yourself" is actually a pretty lean, tough cut that swaggers. Dylan brings another strong vocal performance here.



"Emotionally Yours" is really pushing it. It's another love ballad, spare and awash in echo. On paper, it seems really syrupy, really saccharine, but if you don't dwell on the words too much, you can enjoy Dylan's tender vocal and some nice guitar work by Mike Campbell, particularly at the end.



"When The Night Comes Falling From The Sky" is perhaps the worst example of what bad production and mixing can do, because this once was a great song. Arthur Baker did fine work with New Order, but whatever he did here doesn't work with the material. When people label EMPIRE BURLESQUE as 'Disco Dylan,' this track is the reason. A very evocative song with some striking imagery, it's been recast as a thudding disco track. It's not a good dance song, not even close to, say, New Order or 80's-era Chic. A better, earlier version with better words was recorded and later released on THE BOOTLEG SERIES VOL. 1-3; check it out - an upbeat, piledriving rocker, that version is a lost classic.



"Something's Burning, Baby" is another excellent song, but it holds up better under its aural surroundings. A slow-building march accented with synthesizers, Dylan gives an excellent performance, and the apocalyptic imagery in the words is classic Dylan.



"Dark Eyes" is just Dylan on guitar and harmonica, no polish, no echo, and it's possibly the best thing here. It's structured like a children's song, very rudimentary guitar work, very simple notes, but it really sinks in over time. Dylan gives a great, understated performance, particularly when he sings the last line of each section (which always ends with "...all I see are dark eyes.") No wonder Patti Smith covered it in concert, and no wonder she sung it with Dylan when they briefly toured together.



If Dylan had used the original version of "When The Night Comes Falling..." and included the epic, lost classic "New Danville Girl" (never released, but re-recorded as "Brownsville Girl" for the next album), replacing one or two of the weaker tracks, this could've been a strong album despite the production. As is, once you get past the gloss, you can learn to enjoy a good deal of it. Not for the beginner, but at $10 retail and $5-7 used, it's a worthy purchase for dedicated fans or for those who are exploring other parts of Dylan's catalog most don't talk about.