High Fidelity

The times they are a changin'

People are talking about Bob Dylan this week after commercials featuring him debuted over the weekend. He appears with a supermodel in a commercial for Victoria's Secret.

This is not the reason people should be talking about Bob. I've finally made my way through all 15 of the remastered albums, released last year on Super Audio CD. Say what you will about SACD versus DVD-Audio; the improvement in clarity and the added richness in sound present on these albums are undeniable. And because the entire collection was released in hybrid form, even folks who don't want to buy a new stereo just for Bob Dylan can enjoy the improved audio on the CD layer. You'll miss a few highs and lows, but you'll still benefit from a desperately-needed remastering that, to re-use the explanation I've given over and over regarding these albums, makes you feel like you've been listening to Dylan through a door all these years and have finally been let into the room with him.

My only complaint is that the remastering effort doesn't include Time Out Of Mind. It's hard to justify including Planet Waves, Street Legal, and Infidels while ignoring a work that won Album of the Year in 1997. But it seems likely that there will be a second round to this undertaking, in which case all will be forgiven.