AVIGNON
Moonlight 9517/18 [T-475]
Palace Des Sports (Avignon, France); July 25, 1981
Tracklist: Saved, I Believe In You, Like A Rolling Stone, 'Till I
Get It Right [Regina Havis], Man Gave Names To All The Animals, Maggie's Farm,
Girl From The North Country, Ballad Of A Thin Man, In The
Summertime, Shot Of Love, Walk Around Heaven All Day [Carolyn Dennis], The Times
They Are A-Changin', Let's Begin, Lenny Bruce, Slow Train, Solid
Rock, Just Like A Woman, Saved By The Grace Of Your Love [Willie Smith], Watered
Down Love, Jesus Is The One, Heart Of Mine, When You Gonna Wake Up,
Forever Young, In The Garden, Blowin' In The Wind, It Ain't Me
Babe, Knockin' On Heaven's Door
DEEP: The complete circulating soundboard tape (not quite
the whole show) presented in excellent quality. Sound here is clear
and well balanced, with the vocals right up front, and Dylan's
performance is very energetic and forceful. His voice takes on
added nuances and expression, which only adds to the quality of the
show. Preferable to me are the acoustic and sparser sounding
numbers; the subtleties are sometimes lost in the "wall of
sound" arrangement employed on a lot of the "louder"
songs, although Dylan's charismatic vocals never fail to cut
through the busy mix. Fred Tackett does some fine work on guitar
and the back-up singers, while annoying in some places, are well
suited to some of the arrangements on this tour. Overall, an
excellent set. The packaging is timely and decent but won't win any
awards.
