Bob Dylan Sunrise Musical Theater Sunrise, FL November 19, 1981 CB Master via JEMS Recording Gear: Shure microphone (mono) > Sony 152SD Cassette Recorder JEMS 2015 Transfer: CB Master Cassettes > Nakamichi CR-7A azimuth-adjusted playback > Sound Devices USBPre2 > Audacity 2.0 (24/96 capture to .wav) > iZotope RX6 and Ozone 6 mastering > iZotope MBIT+ resample and dither to 16/44.1 > Audacity > TLH > FLAC 01 //Gotta Serve Somebody 02 I Believe In You 03 Like A Rolling Stone 04 The Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll 05 Man Gave Names To All The Animals 06 Maggie’s Farm 07 Girl From The North Country 08 Ballad Of A Thin Man 09 Simple Twist Of Fate// 10 //Heart Of Mine 11 All Along The Watchtower 12 I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight 13 Forever Young 14 Gamblin’ Man (trad.) 15 The Times They Are A-Changin’ 16 A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall 17 Watered-Down Love 18 Shot Of Love// 19 //Just Like A Woman 20 Solid Rock 21 Masters Of War 22 When You Gonna Wake Up 23 In The Garden// 24 //Blowin’ In The Wind 25 It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding) 26 It Ain’t Me, Babe 27 Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door// The JEMS team has always been proud of its contributions to Dylan collectors. In fact, several recordings now considered classics by almost every Dylan fan (such as the unearthed Mike Millard recordings thought to be lost only to be found years later) were proudly released by JEMS. So, with that, it's no surprise for anyone when JEMS decides to look up at their archives just to find recordings like the one we plan to share now. Longtime JEMS ally CB is known for his essential early work recording Bruce Springsteen, but he did record other artists. One of those artists, as you obviously guessed, is Bob Dylan. While this is not up to the legendary Millard's standard mentioned before, it's indeed a fine recording. And to just make the things better, this may prove to be a previously uncirculated source albeit incomplete. If you listen to the recording, it seems that the taper had few problems with his gear that night. Also, due to the limitations of the cassettes at the time, he had to do four tape flips that were faded in and out (which are noted in the setlist) to make the recording more listenable. Samples provided. frogster This is the first-ever true digital transfer of CB’s master tapes of Dylan’s Sunrise, Florida show, one of the last (only two more would follow) of the 1981 tour. Given the recent release of the excellent official Bootleg Series box set of the Gospel Years, we thought it was finally time to get this one out there after we borrowed and transferred the masters a few years ago. CB recorded the show on one microphone, in mono and did a very fine job. Lossless Bob lists a single source recording for the first night at Sunrise, and in a quick spot comparison, the circulating source does appear to be a different recording than CB’s. The extant copy is listed as stereo, has full bass, but is otherwise a bit noisy and sounds like it is down a generation or two. CB’s new source doesn’t have as much low-end, but to my ears it is clearer and more natural sounding. I consider it an upgrade to the existing recording, but you can judge for yourself. Samples provided. Thanks to CB for his pioneering work in the ‘70s and beyond and for his continued generosity in letting his master tapes be newly digitized. We also continue to tip our hat to frogster for helping with the post-production and distribution of JEMS releases. Happy New Year to all. BK for JEMS