I think one of my favorite parts of this whole multichannel audio hobby is that I will sometimes listen to things I never thought I'd enjoy, or give some things an extra chance just because they have a multichannel release. While our selection for multichannel and quad goodies is actually pretty good all things considered, it's still admittedly a bit of a niche thing. But it's a good niche and one that has brought me a ton of joy in my life. I don't think I'd ever have listened too much to Björk if it wasn't for her having a bunch of surround releases, and now she's easily my favorite artist and I'm a massive Björk fan.
Anyways the reason why I said all of that is that this is a release I probably would never have listened to if it wasn't for the quad version. I always love myself some dylan, and really enjoy my Blood on The Tracks and Blonde on Blonde SACD's, they're also my two favorite Dylan records. But I don't think I'd ever listen to Nashville Skyline. It seems to be considered a bit of "lesser Dylan" if you will, at least to my knowledge. If you look at
his page on rateyourmusic.com Nashville Skyline is relatively lowly rated compared to his other releases from the time period, and is also one of the few non bolded ones too (bolded releases means they're in the top 10,000 highest rated).
I had actually not really heard any tracks off this one before, not even Lay Lady Lay, but with the first track I was turned off immediately by his new crooning voice. Sooooo I put this one off for a while. Yesterday though, I thought I'd give it a bit better of a chance, and it absolutely grew on me. Sure this album isn't classic after classic like Blonde on Blonde, and this isn't nearly as heavy as some of his other releases, but it sure is some great fun Country Rock tunes that somehow pans out really nicely. It doesn't overstay it's welcome, clocking in at about only 27 minutes, but I don't think it needed to be any longer than that. The clear standout here is the absolutely stunning Lay Lady Lay which honestly might be my favorite track by Bob Dylan now. It's at least up there. The other highlight to me is the wonderful Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You, which is a great way to end off the record.
This album isn't about tackling hard social issues, it isn't about complex and introspective lyrics, it's just about having a great time and enjoying yourself, which can honestly be a nice change. I'm not going to pretend that this is Bob Dylan's best work because it obviously isn't, but is it fun and enjoyable? Absolutely. I'm really glad I discovered this release especially for tracks like Lay Lady Lay.
Oh and I almost forgot to mention, the quad mix. I'm usually not a fan of having the drums in somewhat weird places, like having one in the rear left and front right or the other way around, or just having them all in the rears, but I feel like putting the drums
mostly into the rear right works well and somehow doesn't really feel unbalanced. I like how they used the rears for ambience with his voice, and for some reason i feel like that specifically adds quite a bit to the music here. Everything blends together nicely, and doesn't feel too discrete which is a more common problem i occasionally hear with quad.
I think I'll give this a 8/10 all around, mix, music and overall. Great release and I'm glad I got the chance to hear it.