Bob Dylan Glasgow Barrowland 24th June 2004 Great show and atmosphere in the 1,900 capacity Barrowland Ballroom in Glasgow. Disc One 1.Drifter's Escape 2.I'll Be Your Baby Tonight 3.Tweedle Dee 4.Just Like A Woman 5.It's Alright Ma 6.Girl From The NOrth Country 7.Most Likely You Go Your Way 8.Ballad Of A Thin Man 9.Floater Disc Two 1.Highway 61 2.It Ain't Me Babe 3.Honest With Me 4.I Believe In You 5.Summer Days 6.Don't Think Twice 7.Like A Rolling Stone 8.All Along The Watchtower Review from Glasgow Sunday Herald. Sunday Herald -27 June 2004 Bob Almighty The Big Event: Bob Dylan -SECC, Glasgow **** Bob Dylan - Barrowland,Glasgow***** Reviewed by Damien Love WHATEVER happened to the Hampden Roar? I think I know. It took some time off. It travelled a bit, gave up cigarettes and drank tea and honey to soothe its ragged throat. Then, last Thursday, it came back home and managed to sneak into the greatest concert I've ever seen. This happens four songs into Bob Dylan's Glasgow Barrowland gig (his second night in town after playing the SECC the night before). By now, he's already zigzagged across the great dark continent of his songbook, from a vicious, stopstart prowl and howl Drifter's Escape, and a cat's-paw playful I'll Be YourBabyTonight -which turns out to be his statement of intent -right into the new century with the absurdist newsflash Tweedle Dee AndTweedle Dum.Then, just when he's made sure you don't knowwhere he might go next, his band start this pattering, descending-rising figure, and he's playing Just Like A Woman. And when he gets to the chorus -"Aw, she takes ..." - it happens. The Roar jumps alive; the building sings. Not new, of course; people always sing at Dylan shows. Tonight, though, the place is so much smaller, the sound so much bigger, so much more together, it's like a new presence has entered, hovering over the 1,900 souls cramming this small, sweating room. It astonishes everyone. You see the effect it has on the band breaking across the stage like dawn. Tony Gamier, the zoot-suited bassist who's been Dylan's bandleader since the late 1980s, suddenly has this huge, helpless grin, is turning to the other players -Larry Campbell on guitar, dttern, slide, fiddle; George Recile on drums; Stu Kimball on guitar - as if to say, "Can you believe this?" These smiles are genuine. Dylan is standing chording away at his keyboard, leaning into the song now, listening, and a surprised grin flashes across his face, too. Anyonewho knows anything about Dylan will not believe this, but, by the end of the song, just for a moment, the man famous for wilfully restructuring the DNA of his songs , seems to be singing along with the crowd, not vice versa. Flash back to the night before. Dylan appeared at the tin cattle shed that is the SECC,his regular Glasgow haunt for the past decade-and-a-half. In 1991, I saw Dylan charge like Custer at a suicidal set, leaving his band scattered behind. This new band, though, are ready for anything. On Wednesday, Dylan put on his best ever SECC show. Those present, and who didn't get to Barrowland, may console themselves with the knowledge that, of the 17 songs he played both nights, 10 were different, and that on that first night he unveiled a fragile version of Boots Of Spanish Leather. At the Barrowland, though, the audience is so surrealistically close to Dylan it's like having Picasso paint your living room. It's Alright Ma is a storm approaching a dty. Girl Of The North Country, with Garnier gently bowing his double bass, is chamber music to make the silverware shiver. Summer Days,a roadhouse rumble, driven by Kimbal's splenetic work. Dylan is definitely back into one of his "periods". You can tell by the way he looks. He always looks great when he's at his best: the 1960's punk alien; the beat-gypsy of the 1970's renaissance. Now,with Clark Gable moustache and Civil War duds, he just looks incredible, a cosmic cowboy vampire bluesman. He walks like a bopping boxer, hands held before him. With one hand, he's rediscovered the harmonica, producing forceful, sinister and plaintive runs. With the other, he paws out these big, warm, gospel-inflected chords on his keyboard. People have wondered why he's given up guitar this time. Some have speculated arthritis (though, last month, he was playing guitar with Willie Nelson). But Dylan has always played piano and, notably during late-1970s tours, has abandoned guitar before, to concentrate on singing. And he is singing tonight. That exotic pet of a voice is something up from a mysterious swamp, a husk covered in scales, but filled with skeletons and jewels. Sometimes, it's a spook show; he puts these high inflections at the end of phrases, so words linger and drift. Sometimes (Ballad Of A Thin Man), it's that old put-down sneer. Sometimes (I Believe in You), a lover's prayer. We eventually get to the hymn that is Like a Rolling Stone. The Roar rises on that chorus, redoubled. After it, the grin can't be hid. Dylan comes stage centre, shaking his head and -that rarest thing -talks to us. "We musta played that song a thousand times, an' no-one's ever kept up like that." Bob Dylan pays us a compliment. ALL Along The Watchtower sounds a warning. Then, it's over.